No no

Following on from my annoying new breathing habits, I've identified another of my quirks that makes me want to be someone else, just so I can get more momentum for kicking myself in the abdomen.

Again, I'm not sure if this is new or if I've only just noticed it.

When I'm agreeing with someone, I say "yeah" twice in quick succession.

Yeah, yeah.

But that's not quick enough.

Yeah-yeah.

Even that isn't quite right. It's more like this.

"Oh hey, do you remember Pauly Shore? He was really good."
"Yeahyeah! He was great!"

Yeahyeah.

Not the solitary yeah. That clearly doesn't indicate my agreement in strong enough terms. I'm so excited that my yeahs have piled on top of each other, like two oafish schoolboys bundling their way into a sex shop.

Yeahyeah! I agree with you so much. SO much. I'm almost insulted that you even raised it as a question. I'm eager and I'm eager to please. I span the entire spectrum of eager. Understand?

Oh, yeahyeah.

One yeah is annoying enough. Two is appalling. I'll try to wean myself off using it, just as I will wean myself off exhaling pointlessly, and just as I stopped myself from prefacing every joke with "In many ways...".

Self-improvement is an important part of being human. Without it, we're just moss.

***

It's been a little while since my last blog post, so here's a list of things that have happened to me since then:

• I drank some apple juice

***

Life is like a box of chocolates: it's full of outdated clichés. Forrest Gump came out nearly eighteen years ago. His little boy is probably dead by now. And those chocolates are well past their best before date.

***

Orange is the only word in the English language in the dystopian novel I'm working on.

I just tweeted that. Except I changed the third "the" to a "this". I thought you'd enjoy an insight into my creative process. No detail is too small. This tweet could make or break my career.

Except I haven't got a career. If it was to break my career, it would have to make it first. It could make and then subsequently break my career. In which case, I break even. But I'm richer for the experience.

I might get offered a job in an orange grove or as a novelist (in an orange grove). And then immediately lose my job due to "a series of appalling citric infractions".

I hope that does happen. I can write a book about it.

***

Thinking about it, people would probably just learn French or something. Damn. 700 wasted pages.

I just tweeted that.

Don't worry, I'm not going to use my annoying "keep repeating a section of the blog with a twist" technique. You know the one. I just write the same thing again and again, changing it slightly, in an attempt to make this all seem well thought-out, when in reality it's just a way of increasing the girth of the entry. I won't do that.

I won't even do it now, in a hilarious meta-joke. I'm trying out new techniques today. It will make people glad that they've read this.

***

I'm too distant, that's the problem. Readers don't want distant, they want intimate. You want to get to know the real me. I shouldn't be hiding behind lists and references to lists. I should tell you what makes me feel weak at the knees.


The thing is, I'm not intentionally keeping it from you. It's just that there's nothing to keep. There's not a wealth of hidden yearnings and hopings and dancings that illuminate the real me. What you see is what you get. I don't feel weak at the knees. I feel strong. At the knees.

I suppose I'm not distant. I just create the illusion of distance by being blurry and small. But I'm like that up close.

It would be strange if this blog became a quivering confessional, where I pour out my quivering heart (or a GIF of a quivering heart) onto electronic blotting paper. It would be quite interesting, I suppose.

When they collect my raw, visceral diary-style posts into several hardback volumes, they'll wonder whether they should include the early ones too.

"His work from 2012 onwards has been considered some of the most personal, heartbreaking and revealing writing of the 21st century. Before that, he did a lot of stuff about apples and waffles and drawings of ducks."

I wonder what will be considered my best period. Probably the ducks.

***

I'm going to go now. I usually find that I write my way into something interesting in even the most fragmented blog post. This hasn't happened today. But, as with all creative enterprises, no-one cares.

Here is an appropriate song that a colleague/friend/confidant/bon vivant has just sent me. Let's call her 'S'. I'd like to thank her for providing me with a way out of this mess.

I'll try again soon. I'll make preparatory notes. I'll win you back yet. You see if I don't.