Today, when this blog post goes up, is the two-year anniversary of my return to updating this blog on a regular basis. The day I wrote this is the two-year anniversary of my return to writing regular blog posts. I started this period of blogging with a one-week buffer and, with a couple small exceptions, have maintained this lead-time ever since. I am incredibly proud of the work I’ve done over these past two years, the growth I’ve made as a writer (since this project and the one-week buffer was intended to give me a means to practice editing my own work and to improve my drafting abilities), and the discipline I’ve shown by sticking to it as much as possible without damaging my health or well-being. Turns out it is more difficult for me to do something on a limited scale than it is for me to do something more extreme. Updating this blog every day for over a year, like I did when I first started out, was mentally easy. I just had to do a thing every day. It became a daily habit, just like brushing your teeth or showering. Doing this five days a week with a single weekend update if I can manage it is much more difficult, since I actually need to plan my time out. After all, it’s easy to take a day off if you’ve got a buffer before you run out of blog posts. It takes way more work to keep the buffer in place.
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Skipping Another Week
There’s no Infrared Isolation post today. While my rest is having a positive effect, it is not an instantaneous one, nor is it swift. It is a slow process that will hopefully bear fruit in coming weeks. The chapter for next week is already written and sent off to my editor, so it will be good to go for next week. Since I finished that early, I’ve even already started work on the next chapter (by which I mean I renamed the document, moved some things around, and reviewed the old chapter that is being rewritten into Chapter 25). If I manage to actually get more work done on it this weekend, between my various other activities, that will be even better. I don’t know if I’m quite that recovered, though. Just because writing during the week has gotten easier doesn’t mean that I’m quite ready to start spending time on the weekends working on writing projects. Especially this weekend, with my last two days of preparation for my new tabletop campaign and my on-going attempts to not mess up my sleep schedule all over again. I’m a bit more hopeful than I used to be, though. Now, recovery and a return to my old, non-exhausted way of living actually seems possible. Only time will tell, though.
No New Infrared Isolation Chapter This Week
I’ve been struggling to write, lately. For some reason, I’ve been feeling emotionally drained and all the work I’m doing takes more effort than usual. Almost like I’m consumed with other matters and unable to properly focus on resting, let alone my work. There’s no new Infrared Isolation chapter this week, but there will be one next week. Who knows what will happen the week after that. I’ve got a lot on my mind these days and it’s difficult to push through it all long enough to make any progress on creative writing, so each new sentence feels like pulling teeth. Just maintaining this blog is enough to finish exhausting me after a day of work, lately… I hope this stress will end someday. I hope things will get better. I’m prepared for them to get worse, though, since I’d rather be surprised by improvement than degredation.
Anyway, happy Saturday and I hope you’re doing alright. I’ll be fine. I just need to spend more time resting and processing stuff for now. See you next week for Chapter 23.
No New Infrared Isolation Chapter This Week, Sorry
I spent a couple hours trying to find something to post today, or come up with a project I could complete in a reasonable amount of time. I found nothing and eventually had to admit that doing an entire extra writing project for this update would be too taxing. I’m still recovering from the last seven months of stress, exhaustion, and worsening burnout, so I’m trying to opt for rest more often than I opt for stress, which is why there’s no chapter of Infrared Isolation today. Sure, I finished the chapter on Wednesday, but that’s barely any time for me to review and edit it and too little time for me to ask this to be finished by my usual editor, especially when she’s still recovering from being sick. Plus, I’m trying to avoid being in this position again next week and that’s not going to happen if I grind out another short story or don’t let Chapter 22 spend time in my buffer before it goes live.
I wish I’d been able to write more during the last three months. I feel like I really fell off the writing wagon starting in March and it’s been a struggle to get back on it since then I returned from Spain in April. I’ve had so much going on. Still, I finished a chapter and I’ve got the energy to at least do a bit of work on the next one, so hopefully this will wind up being a good step toward getting the old Weekly Update train rolling. Time will tell and I have learned not to make promises in these updates, but I sincerely hope there will not only be a chapter next week, but a chapter the week after as well. I hope you’re having a restful weekend and thanks for stopping by.
No New Chapter of Infrared Isolation This Week
Between my total exhaustion and my editor being sick, there will be no new chapter of Infrared Isolation this week. Despite my exhaustion, I’ve kept writing, so there WILL be a new chapter next week. I just need to give my editor time to rest up before she reviews it and myself more time to rest up before I try to crunch out another one. Rest is important.
A Small Disruption To Our Regularly Scheduled Programming
I’m spending the next three days moving into my new apartment and out of my old one, so I’m taking a couple days off from posting (today and tomorrow) so that I don’t have a bunch of writing to do during my spare time or extra writing during what is supposed to be a post-move recovery week. There will be no new chapter of Infrared Isolation tomorrow and the book review that was originally scheduled for today will go up on Monday. I’m only human, after all (as much as I like to pretend otherwise), so I’m going to do the sensible thing once again and take a couple days off. After this, though, I shouldn’t have any more disruptions to my schedule. I will FINALLY have some quiet, restful times (assuming nothing goes disastrously wrong, which feels like a dangerous thing to assume after the first five months of this year). I’m very much looking forward to it and hopefully I’ll be able to get back to more positive or thoughtful posts once all my mental and physical energy isn’t being directed toward trips, obligations, and large responsibilities. Catch y’all next week.
Going on Another Trip
I am once again departing on vacation. I’ll even be seeing the same group of people. This time, though, I’m just driving to New Jersey and then staying there for a week before driving back. The trip to Spain was with a wedding party and now it’s time for the wedding! Sure, I could bring my laptop and try to write while I’m on the East Coast, but I think I’ve got enough going on as it is. I’m going to do my best to rest between visiting friends, finishing my preparations for the wedding, and then being in the wedding. I’m also going to play as much Tears of the Kingdom as I can, so I won’t have a lot of time for writing. Any writing I wind up doing will likely be just for fun and to keep my writing muscles loose during this period of rest, just like while I was in Spain, so little of it is ever likely to see the light of day.
Continue readingGoing On Vacation
Today’s post is the last one you’ll see from me until April 5th at the earliest. As this goes up, I’m currently on the road to New Jersey (and here is my routine reminder that I write and schedule these a week ahead of time), so I won’t be taking the time to write a post today. After today, I’ll either be flying to, in, or flying back from Spain. Then, on the 3rd, I’ll be driving back to good old Wisconsin from New Jersey (and attempting to do it all in one day, unlike the drive down that will be split into two days). I will probably wind up splitting that into two days of driving as well since I am enthusiastic and willing to push myself but not suicidal or foolhardy (well, I supposed that depends on which of my friends you ask, though). I’m not going to risk myself. I imagine that I’ll probably be tired and maybe still a bit jetlagged at that point, since I’m getting back to New Jersey late Sunday night and plan to leave fairly early Monday morning.
Time will tell, though, since I have the ability to take more time off if I need it and I won’t know how I’m feeling until I get there. Who knows, maybe I’ll actually feel super rested and ready for a long haul. I doubt I’ll feel anything but tired at that point, but I’m open to other possibilities. I wouldn’t mind being pleasantly surprised. I actually enjoy driving, after all, and the only reason I’d need to spread the drive out over multiple days (beyond my own potential exhaustion, of course) is if the weather turns bad. I’d done enough driving in awful weather to know that I’d be better off waiting it out than trying to drive through most of it, and late March/early April is prime “late snowstorm” weather. There’s always the chance of thunderstorms, too, so all I can do at this point is speculate.
When I’m back, I’m sure I’ll have plenty to write about and maybe even some pictures to share. Though I’ll likely only share pictures that I’d use to replace the header image on my blog. I don’t really do much with pictures here, even if I have a bunch that I’ve taken and still like years later. I just don’t really want to get into all the formatting and stuff, you know? Plus, I’m really bad about just leaving stuff on my phone for years, eventually dumping it into folders on my PC, and then ultimately forgetting it’s there until I stumble on the folder again while looking for something else (which I then immeditealy forget about as I embark on a long trip down memory lane). Many of my friends have stopped asking me to take photos of them as a result. I always offer to send them the photos they want but they decline, usually thinking they’ll pull them off Facebook eventually, but I don’t put shit on Facebook and haven’t for several years at this point.
Anyway, I don’t really have much more to say other than you will get your next post on April 5th and I’ll have plenty of stories about traveling abroad when I come back (which will only show up after a week’s delay, of course). We’ve got some cool stuff planned (not to mention I get to see a friend in person that I haven’t seen since May of 2013), so I’m hoping to have a great time and to wind up with plenty I’d like to talk about. Have a good week and a half, everyone.
Infrared Isolation Will Return On April 8th
As a result of how busy I’ve been and how busy I expect to stay, I’m not even going to try to get a chapter of Infrared Isolation ready for any Saturday this month. I’ve got a two-week skip planned for the end of the month anyway, since I’ll be traveling and am planning to not update my blog at all while I’m on the road (though I expect I’ll have plenty to write about after my trip). So I’m just starting this now. Gonna save myself a whole lot of mental effort and strife, and do my best to get rested before I have to go on my first trip to Europe.
To be clear, there will be no new chapter posted on the 11th (today), the 18th, the 25th, or the 1st of April. Aside from today, there won’t even be a disclaimer post. I will post a reminder on the 27th not to expect anything new until the 3rd of April. I’ll actually focus on my vacation and what my friends and I are doing for once, instead of trying to keep this place going constantly.
On the 8th, though, I’ll have the next chapter queued up and ready to go. Until then, enjoy your weekends.
You’re Probably Going To See A Lot of “No New Infrared Isolation Chapter This Week” Posts This Month
Life is, once again, kicking my ass. I’d like to say that I listened to my friends for once and decided to take it easy rather than continue to work through the stress, exhaustion, and series of incredibly demoralizing events involved in the past five days, but I genuinely just have not had time or energy to do anything, no matter how much I’d like to. Work has been busy, life has had a series of unfortunate events for me (nothing emotionally destructive like most 2023 prior to last week, thankfully, but it has still been a lot to process and work through every. single. day.), and I’ve been struggling with depression again because of all that on top of returning sleep struggles. It has been a pretty miserable and unredeemable week only made manageable because I’ve been getting a sense of accomplishment (and utter mental/physical/emotional exhaustion) from my day job, so it’s been a bit easier to go without all the writing I normally do to get that.
Anyway, if I keep going too long here, it’ll turn into a full post and the whole “do less so I don’t hate myself, my life, and the entirety of creation” thing I’m trying to do will have failed, so I’m gonna go. Have a great weekend and get some rest. I’ll be doing my best to do that while also attending to the million other things I’ve got to do this month… No real rest for me until April, unfortunately. Who knew international travel took so much preparation?