The Night Shift

I work for myself, but I'll only come in late at night. I've been thinking of firing me, but I always seem to meet the important deadlines. Maybe it's just easier to write super heroes in the dark with one romantic little lamp guiding my text box.

However, working the vampire shift has started to have some psychological draw backs. For example, I'm the type of person that has to bribe myself into getting anything done. If I go on that run then I get to listen to "Mary Jane" by Rick James and pretend to be a comic book vixen while stretching. If I write a new chapter then I get a poker tournament. With my own work I am a tantric procrastinator. I will put off finishing a project until the moment feels perfect.

I need a little drama with my victories, so I tend to make it harder on myself than necessary. I like to type that last word just as the sun comes up. I like to make a plot decision just as it starts to snow. I like to wait until my brain has been lacerated by sleep-deprivation, video game addiction, and bagel bites AND THEN see if I can still solve an unwritten mystery.

Working at night lends two types of distraction: Late night friends. And late night Interwebbing. Occasionally there has to be a grocery run to fetch some delicious tidbit to satiate the starving muses. Luckily for me I've got a couple late night friends who also chase the illusive Write rabbit. They engage in nanirimo, they co-write plays, epic poems, sticky-kus, essays, blogs, songs, sketches, and plots for ways to find out if the universe could handle a Mel Brooks/Michael Bay movie.

Inspiration loves company. Late night interwebbing is the junkfood of my latest work schedule. In this moment I've got this window open, gchat, a $4 Hold 'Em tournament on Fulltilt, song lyrics, twitter, the Pumpkins on Pandora, and Gossip Girl and True Blood both loading on surfthechannel.com.

Hey, sometimes in order to clean you have to make a bigger mess. Sometimes it takes a village of distractions to raise one focused idea. Sometimes Seth Green and Gene Wilder make me reevaluate American humor.