Various Happenstances of Seth

November 22, 2005

   I am a procrastinator*. And I think I should revel in it, because procrastination is a wonderful creative tool. If you aren't familiar with the idea of structured procrastination, it can basically be explained as follows: You have a big project to do that you are avoiding, so you do other useful things instead. Now, I'll admit that I don't intentionally plan it as much as the author of that article, but we've all had those moments when we suddenly feel the need to clean our house, do the laundry, pay the bills, iron the cat, and basically do anything at all except sit down to do whatever the heck it is that you're "supposed" to do.

   Well, as I've mentioned, I'm currently participating in National Novel Writing Month**. And as it turns out, I don't really want to write this novel. I've gone to various parties, baked exciting foods, caught up on almost all of my email backlog, and then I sat down to work on the novel... and realized that I should clean up some files on my computer, and had some humor to write instead of working on the novel. This week has been a particularly good example. On Sunday, I wrote a Thanksgiving column, because I didn't want to work on the novel. Monday, I worked on the novel, and almost caught up. And then Tuesday, I sat down to work on the novel, and suddenly had a great idea. And now I'm updating my blog.

   So I'm starting to think, okay, maybe I work better on humor with a big project hanging over my head***. It's a bizarre idea, but perhaps the best way for me to keep myself motivated to write random humor is by taking on large, not-terribly-funny projects that cause me to flee to humor for safety. Life is strange.

   Also, apropos of nothing, I feel I should point out that the title of this post is NOT stolen from the song "Celebrate Good Times, Come On!", but rather from the lesser-known better song "Defenestrate Good Times, Come On!".

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*And I like cheese. If you know me, this really shouldn't be news to you.

**Where by "participating in" I mean "signed up for and would rather be doing many other things".

***But you know what I don't work better with hanging over my head? A large potted plant. Which is why a few weeks ago, when my boss decided to move my desk directly under a large hanging plant, I lobbied to have it removed. I'm still irked I even had to argue so hard to get it removed, honestly, we're not running e-Damocles here.

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