Whiskey Vs. Wine While Writing

Trolling the blog universe, I notice many writers mentioning different beverages while they write. Seeing that it's NaNoWriMo time, coffee seems to be the quencher of choice. Presumably, these are the writers that begin their day with their craft. Afternoon writers supplement their wordy diets with an array of refreshments from the sugary, indulgent soda family spirited by Dr. Pepper and Mountain Dew, to the well-centered, always hydrating warm water with a mind-cleansing slice of lemon. 

Sure, I partake in various beverage adjustments throughout my writing process during the day. In the evenings, however, after adjunct duties free me to late night worldly vices such as 4th-quarter endings (November begins Thursday night football), TiVo, and the lure of attaining REM sleep should I turn in at a proper hour, I provide my laptop and me a mediator from the adult beverage family. That's right...a night cap while I write. Stop slapping my knuckles with that ruler, imaginary Catholic-school-English-teacher-I-never-had!

French press writing is great. If When I get myself an agent and my first novel is published, Mr. Coffeebean will be thanked. Those peaceful mornings that lead into an afternoon of reaching or surpassing my personal writing goal for the day are sublime. After the day's work is done, though, I put back on my writer's hat again. The inspirational moments cannot be ignored, and drinking caffeine at night makes my skin itch. Lately, I've been paying attention to which nightly beverages affect my writing and how.

Not Near Beer Right Now

I love beer, but I begin by eliminating it as an option for this post (hence it's absence it the title). Whereas beer is fine for watching football and appreciating a newly mowed lawn, its influence has produced little writing from me. Now that Texas' heat has finally succumbed to seasonal change, the hops have lost their appeal a bit. Nearing Thanksgiving, the warmth of wine and whiskey reintroduce their attributes.

The Case for Whiskey

Yes, this is a bold taste, especially if you drink it on the rocks as I do. Not yet a scotch enthusiast, bottled variations of Jack and Crown supply the current extent of my name-brand mentioning. 

Whiskey aligns the mind with hand to hammer away at that keyboard. Have an idea? Punch it out. Edit later. Press on and fill that page. It's the evening equivalent of caffeine: the difference being a hint of arrogance minus the jittery attention to incessant proofreading. Just remember to hold to one or two glasses at the most. Any more and you're spending the evening on PokerStars.com rather than with MSWord.

The Case for Wine

I can only speak for red here because I am not a fan of white. And as Dr. Frasier Crane said, "Why go Merlot, when you can call a Cab?" 

Wine offers a unique writing episode to me. Cooool, calm, collected, and possibly clichéd. Okay, so I used the past tense of that one French word writers most consciously try to avoid falling victim to its denotation. Big deal. If you are writing with a nice glass of red wine at your side, chances are that creativity is flushing to the brain as fast as the blood and sulfites are to the cheeks. Let it flow.

Depending on if you are master of your alcohol domain, you can choose how you want to write late at nights by the beverage you sip. If you are not master of your alcohol domain, then your beer, whiskey, or wine nights may be uncooperative. But your mood, the mood in which you want to write, should take precedence. If you're at all a fatalist, your writing intentions will always choose your drink. 

Think not of me not how you think you should; but instead, how you feel you might without those constraints."

That's a real quote. I swear. 
A guess at whether I'm a whiskey or wine blogger tonight? Here's a hint: Thursdays are my Fridays.

Lawn Mowing Musings

Once it roars to a start, focus begins. While settling into its incessant hum, the rest of the world takes a backseat to the mundane: mowing the lawn. While safely directing the mower along whichever course works best during the outing, the imagination kicks in.

The reality of humanity leaves for an hour or three. In its stead, inner musings consisting often of to-do lists and imaginary ramblings take place. I suggest an obliging wave or nod to neighbors to deter having to shut off the mower (and thus, the imagination) for potential real-world conversations. Having already attained historical context, the imaginary conversations are just as good, right? Just as real?

Anyhoo, here are some of my lawn mowing musings from this weekend:

Random Rambling: Attack of the Acorns
I don't remember that big oak dropping this many acorns last year. Of course, last summer was much hotter so perhaps they dried up before they dropped. Is that even possible?

Slippery little boogers. There must be a million acorns covering that side of the yard. Okay, that's an exaggeration. What do you think? Fifty, a hundred thousand? I'd say about two to three hundred thousand, realistically.

See you built a firepit.

Yeah, I'm hoping most of the acorns fall in there. The smoke isn't hitting your house is it? We've only used it a couple of times: when we first built it and when we had a ton of family in town. I trimmed up the oak branches overhanging it so the smoke funnels the other way.

They really sting when they hit, especially if there's a little wind behind their fall. Who knows if an acorn can cause a concussion. One has hit me in the head...I think. I do remember a couple nailing me in the chest, and boy did they sting! Probably left a welt or at least some redness. Suppose if one of the kids got hit in the head with one, they'd be wailing. They do hurt, but it's hard not to laugh when you see someone getting beaned in the head in the middle of telling a story!

To-Do List
Mow the front too, or save for tomorrow? It won't take much time even though there are papers in the office in need of grading. But do those tomorrow while watching football. Get all yardwork done today. Why do tomorrow what you can do today? Who said that? Somebody made it famous.

Did NaNoWriMo start yet? Is it the 1st? If not, then it hasn't. Duh. Sooo, what does it take to register? Ready yet, or still dinking around in sports writing? Fiction needs attention, especially with how frequently the days have been overcast. Ahhh, the Pac-NW mindset. Always welcomed.

Commit to either rewriting that first draft or moving on with that new story. The new story has hit a wall and that first draft is screaming. You know what to do. Plus, the wine-induced epiphany Friday night produced some good notes on how to rewrite the entire novel. Going from third to first-person will do it some justice. Should of thought of that before, but it makes much more sense now.

Finish reading the novels you've started. Stop starting a new one before finishing the last one. Focus. Plus, efficiency is a must to get a jump start on that New Year's resolution to read a book a week.

Writing workshops: Research online options. Throw them up on the blog.

Lowered the wheels to the second lowest setting on this outing. Doing that along with the effect of the cooling weather will keep the grass short for months. Unless I mow to "vacuum" the leaves, these musings will take place in some other yardwork-oriented fashion. There's always gathering firewood musings, barbecuing musings, putting up Christmas lights musings.

No humming motor with those though. Verbal contact with the world is to be expected.