It is Saturday. A day of rest.
So I stay at home and I read comics, and I read books. I watch stuff on youtube.
I make some phone calls. I find out about stuff. I arrange stuff for next week.
I listen to Japanese jazz. Yoko Kanno, yo!
I re-read old books and old comics. I internalize the lines. I see how the scenes were arranged.
I watch Chris Rock and Howard Stern.
Some people called, invited me to go out with them. I will not.
I do not go out on the Sabbath.
I empty my mind and I hear the construction noise from next door. I become aware of my breathing.
I realize that the human body itches. Like how it was pointed out in The Terminal Experiment by Robert J Sawyer.
I have my food delivered from the cafe downstairs.
I listen to some Cajun bullshit.
I watch shows I like, and I figure out how they do it. The style AND the content.
Alam has always reminded me that I have a fixation with style, with form. That I am a stylish writer, and I may add that I can copy almost anyone. And come up with a few of my own.
Which throws the flipside on the question of content. Neil Gaiman postulates that ideas come from a confluence of ideas.
Like how glass is actually made from glass. Silicon from sand, yes, but they add broken glass to the mix nonetheless. And how artisan potters and bakers and artisan breadmakers alike always keep a portion of their clay or dough to mix with new batches. Some potters have kept a batch of clay for 20-30 years. It's because of the microbes in both clay and dough that makes for the desired optimum bubbles in the final creation.
And all my career, I have been dealing with storms of ideas. Small ideas, big ideas. Suicide ideas. For if you follow their trail, you might get lost and never come back.
Ideas are my clay. My dough.
And today, a Saturday, I keep stock and check up on my batches of clay.
