Writing on Napkin Backs Pressed to Barstool Legs

Haha, wow- I think I've sunk to a whole new level of pretentiousness with my previous post. Frankly, I'm impressed with myself.

But! My truly ridiculous dirty partnership with pretentious prose is, surprisingly, not the topic of this post. The topic is, once again, NaNoWriMo.

Well first, it's a belated Happy Halloween. Hope you all had gloriously 2pooky times!

But otherwise. Totally about NaNoWriMo.




The problem is, NaNo-ing involves far too many bars. Like, a truly stupendous multitude of them.
Everywhere.

And no, Nano-ing is not an alcoholic's dream. Although I know for a fact that most Nanowrimo support/writing groups have scheduled write-ins at local bars. No, what I mean it that Nano-ing has an abundance of progress bars. They haunt your profile page, linger beneath your icon amongst forum comments- hell, there's an entire page devoted to them for each and every writer.

And it's maddening. 

Case in point.

It fills you with this sort of unbridled need to fill it. Right now. Which is impossible, because I can't pen a 50K word novel in under an hour. I can't even do it in a month- at least, not during my last 3 attempts. But still, these little blue bars are just flooded throughout the Nanowrimo site, and it's just another thing that makes you go bat-shit insane.

And then you start looking at other people's little blue bars. You start glancing surreptitiously beneath their icon across forum threads, getting little bursts of pride when your own bar is thicker than theirs, or deflating ever-so-slightly when their's is the thicker. Sometimes you see those with only 32 words written and you feel proud of yourself. . . but more often than not you come across people whose little bars say ridiculous things like 40,000 words and you're torn between slumping into your chair whilst shouting confusedly at your screen, or breaking into the alcohol cabinet. Because yes, there is an awful lot of alcohol involved in these kinds of things, as most sober people don't launch into a ridiculous attempt of writing 50K words in under 30 days.

Which, for most legally-aged adults, culminates in waking up December 1st with the great-grandmother of all hangovers, a Word document filled with scrawlings that might count as a plot if you squint and down about 5 shots of hard vodka, and an awful lot of inside jokes with other Nano-ers that, at the time, were hilarious during your drunken stupor. Now you're just left wondering how that line about olives and baby platypuses had been funny to you.

On second thought, you really don't want to know.

Unfortunately, since I'm (tragically) not yet 21, the hardest liquor I can get my hands on is a Shirley Temple. And, as I stopped getting drunk on cherry grenadine years ago, I'm left downing 12oz bottles of Mtn. Dew like shot glasses and growing forests of empty bottles on my bedside table.

No, seriously. There's like, four that I can immediately see. A 5th on the carpet by my leg, and probably three others strewn somewhere beneath clothes, bed frames and my bookcase. My mother tells me to "pace myself", but I'm already too far gone.

Why yes, I do keep manicure scissors, eye masks, a sonic screwdriver and a snail on my bedside table. Doesn't everyone?

Which is concerning to me, when I let it be. Very, very concerning. I do my best to keep the thoughts at bay- but sometimes, on nights like these, when my eyes are tired and my fingers are vibrating during the pauses between words. . . some nights I wonder. About genetic alcoholism. And my weak will. And my overall susceptibility to stupid-ass ideas. I've shown legitimate excitement to being able to drink- hell, "bartender" is pretty high on my possible employment list. I've actively wanted to try cocktails, and the martinis my mother so favors. Wanted to try rum & cokes and flavored vodkas and the beer that always seemed so heavenly to my father. Because I'm curious, and it has this whole forbidden-appeal to it. A sense of danger and maturity, even though I know full-well that it's anything but.

Yet, still.

I'm torn between trying it, or avoiding it like the plague. Because look at my father, the man whom I share exactly 50% of my genetics with. Look at what a "healthy" relationship he has with alcohol. And while usually, I'm all for not letting my parents actions and mistakes dictate my own life, this is different.
This is genetic. 

This could be written into the coding of my biology, and biology is inevitable.

And I'm scared.


Sorry- this wasn't meant to address my childish fear/desire concerning alcoholic beverages. It's just something I've been thinking about for years, I suppose.

Anyways. It's almost 2AM. I should go now.