Workaholism is sneaky.

Linda has always said that I only slow down and relax when I'm sick. That is, I only really let myself do nothing when I have a bug. That same feeling of luxurious relaxation has come over me during the current crisis. It's the fact that my somewhat Puritan aspect is tamped down. Doing nothing is what I should be doing!

The funny thing is, I've always thought of myself as lazy--but I now believe that is just a sneaky element of being a workaholic. The constant spur to do more.

For example, I realized at some point that I was actually putting a huge amount of time and thought and effort into my business. But that thought and effort wasn't visible on the outside. What eventually happened is that I talked to enough other businesses to realize that it was possible that most owners hadn't really put a lot of analysis into what they were doing; nor were they as persistently relentless in their pursuit of it.

I think where this really shows up is that when I took a different route and started writing, leaving the store in Sabrina's capable hands, that the same thought and effort exploded into the equivalent of about 35 books. I mean, the whole time I was writing them, I still thought I was lazy.

In hindsight I can see how diligent I was. I mean, it's obvious now.

I compare it to what I saw my mother do. She was a great gardener, but it didn't come to her magically. She put huge time and effort into the process--and about 90% of it the public didn't see. I lived at home while this was happening, saw that she was absorbed by gardening from 6:00 in the morning to 9:00 at night, with a few breaks here and there. Her friends and customers only saw the magnificent garden and her encyclopedic knowledge of plants. She was inspiring, but I don't think most customers who talked to her understood the amount of work she put into her inspiration.

I'm not sure this is the best way to live. No one goes to their deathbed thinking, "Gosh, I wish I'd worked harder." Certainly, having a heart attack at the age of 66 is not an ideal result--though if stress was a contributing factor, I'd attribute that more to the stress of keeping a business afloat than the workaholism.

On the other hand I'm proud of what I've accomplished. 

Random thoughts, Sunday, March 29.

***Hopefully some of you find these random thoughts interesting. I used to check blogs everyday where there wasn't anything extraordinary about them, but they became a habit. Just a connection with another regular human being. (I probably should mention, many of these random thoughts occurred the day before and I'm just collecting them.)


***Nobody really seems to know what's going on with the stimulus bill. In fact, I seemed to know as much or more as the experts I talked to. I do tend to research things. Anyway, I'm in a phone queue at a local bank. What's for sure is that this isn't going to be a fast process. I predict some clogging.


***I am confused by the closing of trailheads. I mean, it's really, really easy to keep your distance outdoors. And it's a mentally, physically healthy thing to do. Even the beaches should be accessible, since it's usually pretty easy to keep your distance--at least, that's the way I've always done it. Just me and the surf and the sand.


***Not to be holier than thou, but I really think some of my retail brethren are kidding themselves if they think curbside pickup and all is going to make a difference to their bottom line--at least to justify the increased risk of an open vector. Just saying.


***Being a couch potato is your patriotic duty! Embrace the heroism!


***Young man who is our next door neighbor asked to come over to use computer to reboot his elderly father's phone. I wasn't happy about it, but what can you do? This is how the world ends.


***I have an itchy trigger finger on my book orders. So hard to hold back. I have great fun looking through the lists of books.


***It's noon and I'm starting my new regime. Sitting here at my desk for the next six hours, minus my hour walk, and trying to finish my stories. Part of this is establishing the habit of using my office for writing, instead of my bedroom.


***Every time I think I've found "my people," the differences arise and seem vast. I have to face the fact that I'm truly a loner. In the writing world, there seems to be a consensus that writing a first draft is hard and rewriting is a pleasure. For me, it's the opposite. What I'm noticing about the current isolation is that most of my retail brethren are making huge efforts to outreach socially, whereas I'm just shutting down until it's over.


***I've never been able to listen to music when I'm writing my stories. But my current rewriting seems to allow for that. In fact, it's kind of nice distraction so I don't get bogged down making corrections.


***The signals from Marvel and DC aren't good. It appears that they want to go around the comic shops. Which could undercut us to a deadly degree. Digital and through open stores. Horrible idea.

Random thoughts, Saturday, March 28.

***I wrote a blog about the coronavirus on February 28th, "A Black Swan takes Wing."  I predicted that spring break wouldn't happen, and that it would be painful. Little did I know. The final line of the post is, "...if you live your life in fear of Black Swans, you may as well stay home."


***HEY!!! Shouldn't my book sales be going up? I mean, what else do people have to do?

***If you shave your beard at home and there is no one to see it, did you really shave your beard?


***My new walking route, only six minutes from the house, requires the old battered pickup truck I inherited (via Todd, from David.) I'm determined to get back to the daily routine of a one hour walk.


***Well, my guess right now is that I'm going to be home at least through May, probably longer. So I need to get something accomplished. Either start a new book, or spend that time finishing off my other projects. If I sit myself down in my chair from noon to six every day, I could probably polish off all four "Faerylander" books; the four "Tales of the Thirteen Principalities;" "Castle LaMagie;" "The Reluctant Wizard;" "Sometimes a Dragon;" and "Spell Realm;" the last four of which could be tailored to the "Spell Realms" series. It's just a matter of doing it. This doesn't require the concentration that writing a new book would so fits in with the overall distraction. So tomorrow, I'm sitting down and finishing off "Castle LaMagie." No ifs ands or buts.


***I know in advance I'm not going to be able to figure out the new SBA loan program. My accountant seemed to know less than I did, for now. So I called the Small  Business program up at COCC to get an appointment to help me through. I figure the line is going to get long, so the sooner the better.

What's weird is everyone seems to be confusing existing SBA loans for the new program. It seems clear to me, but it's obvious it isn't clear to others. LATER: OK, there was a previous program from last week's measure. The one to do is the one that was just signed.

Random thoughts, Friday, March 27.

***Crisis reveals character.

Assholes who draped themselves in "Americanism" are exposed as merely assholes.

***The magic doohickey tool on "Picard" was a bit much. Chabon writes SF adjacent, more a "magic realism" kind of guy.


***Big liquidation sale at one of my game suppliers. I basically bought every game offered--so a total of 77 new games. Not sure where I'll put them all, but the prices were too good to pass.  LATER: Well...they only had 21 out of the 77 still in stock, dammit.


***I read once that politicians, as a breed, are extraordinarily social and gregarious--except for the oddballs, like Nixon. So...Boris Johnson and all the other politicians you heard getting the virus. It seems like nature's way of saying, "Wake the fuck up!"


***The landlord came through with rent relief. Rent is by far my biggest fixed expense. We'll be taking damage for a couple more weeks, but after that, it's mostly utilities we'll still owe on. Now I just have to figure out which relief program to join. I expect it to be a mess. My dealings with the SBA in the past has been that they threw up so much red tape it wasn't worth it. Hopefully, this time it will be different.


***So a couple of days ago, I had a sore throat. I didn't have a fever or a cough or unusual aches and pains, and my breathing was strong. It was enough to put a little frisson of fear through me. If I could have gotten a hold of my doctor, I would have, but I didn't think it was worthy of a 911 call.
The next day, the sore throat is gone. So it was probably just from my allergy sinus runoff. Phew.



***Bob Dylan's new song. "Murder Most Foul." Can't decide if it's great or terrible or both. I decided a long time ago that Dylan's genius is that he's not afraid to sound foolish, and so he does, but then he'll do a passage that is pure brilliance. Wincing and wowing at the same time.


***How handy that our doorknobs are the kind we can push down with our elbows.


***If we have to self-isolate, I'm glad we have Jasper the Chaos Cat with us.


***They say you can wear blue jeans forever without washing. I'm putting that to the test.


***I can't decide whether to shave off my goatee and not look in the mirror and let my skin heal for a week or so; or to let the beard grow in. Or...just keep on keeping on.


***How much of right wing wingnut do you have to be to have even Trump calling you out? Hope the voters send you home permanently, Rep. Massie. 

Random thoughts March 26

***I keep thinking the store is open. It's like a vestigial limb. Pegasus Books hasn't been closed in like 36 years! (At least, no for more than day at a time, like Thanksgiving and Christmas.)

Meanwhile, some of my compadres in the book, comic, and game business seem to me to be skirting the edges of the rules, looking for loopholes. They proclaim that they need to do so to survive.

Hey, you know, and I don't?

It's on their heads. I don't feel like risking myself, my wife, or Sabrina and her wife, or anyone else we might come in contact with.


***I told Sabrina I would continue to pay her wages, but I'm now uncertain what the best thing to do. If she goes on unemployment, she will probably take home more money. The downside being that there will be loads of red-tape for her to wade through.

Meanwhile, if she stays on, they are offering a loan program that will give me 2.5 her wages last year that will be forgiven if I use the money for utilities and rent and such, but I suspect there will be even MORE red tape.

I think I'll leave it up to her.

Later: I talked to her and we decided to take a wait and see attitude.


***Started reading one accountants detailed explanation of the stimulus package and my eyes rolled back in my head and I groaned. I have such a hard time with "fine print." I mean, I'm going to have to figure it out, but...


***Advertisements for face masks and TP on Facebook.

Look, I don't need a face mask. Doctors and nurses do.


***In a weird sort of way, there isn't much news. Or rather, there is a lot of news but it's all the same news.


***Went for another walk. Have found a place only six minutes away--the closest public space that isn't a park.

I keep hearing that people are being irresponsible going out of their house. Pardon me, but I think the term is "social" isolation, which has a measure of physical isolation, but not completely. When I'm in my car, I'm perfectly safe. Out walking, I was never closer than a hundred yards from anyone else with zero chance of touching a surface that someone else touched. 

***

Random thoughts for Wednesday, March 25.

So I'm going to be doing this "Random Thoughts" thing for a while, since it feels pathetic to flood Facebook and Twitter with them (not that I use Twitter all that much--it's a totally inexplicable application to me.)

***Whenever I assemble liquidation book orders, there are always really good books that they have only one in stock. By the time I push the order button, they are usually gone, except for the ones that popped up that day.

Currently, these books seem to be staying available. Which means to me that no one is actually ordering anything.


***Amazon Author Central is no longer telling us our author rank. How can I live without knowing I'm the 40,000th most read author in America?


*** Let me preface this by saying I think this two trillion dollar bailout is a necessary measure. I certainly could use the help in my business. However, I also predict this is going to go down as the biggest boondoggle in history. Every scamster in the world is going to come out in full force.

I predict that after the first rush for "free money" that the so many preconditions and red tape and proof of need is going to be imposed that it will become almost unusable. Certainly, I don't intend to "borrow" money unless there is a good chance that the loan will be forgiven.

Sorry to be such a downer.


***Stress? My eyelids are twitching, I have a rash around the edges of my mustache which I've never had before (going to stop shaving there) and last night Linda and I watched the new "Invisible Man" and the anxiety level of the movie seemed to match what I was already feeling, to the point where Linda was patting my arm. (Usually, it's the other way around.) So...an unseen danger stocking me? Yeah, that.


***I've always imagined the future as a road I travel down. Last night, I closed my eyes and saw it as something rushing toward me, speeding up.



***Linda keeps showing me memes she finds on the internet. "Have you seen this?"

To which, I always answer, "There's no meme I haven't seen."

Was out for my (hopefully soon to be reinstated) daily walk when it occurred to me that we’re likely to see a giant wave of post-apocalyptic, dystopian fiction. That is, you know, if we don’t start living it ourselves (and kill off the genre entirely.)

The dystopian stories from now on are likely to be a bit more realistic—oh, not in the action; I mean, a whole culture of couch potatoes isn’t exactly exciting, but in the feelings that such invisible danger and isolation engenders.

The best post-apocalyptic literature in the past—books like Earth Abides and Alas, Babylon—were able to evoke feelings of doom and hope which felt real.  

It’s brisk, windy day, a bit of hail, and a cold sprinkle. Dark clouds blowing overhead, a herd of twenty deer running across my path, the river flowing by, high and noisy, and it occurred to me that nature doesn’t give a damn about what happens to the human race.

If nothing else, this has made me much more introspective and reflective. So far, I’ve been spewing these ‘deep’ thoughts on Facebook, but I think I’m going to turn to this blog more often. I suspect I’ll be back to daily blog posts, probably more than one.

Anyway, maybe because I’m not writing fiction, I find myself doing these little essays instead. So here they are.

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