Not more than a second

Monday 6/10/24

Watching Grantchester. Lazy, formulaic. Nothing is earned. You have to earn things in the work.

The Grateful Dead, May 1970. Goddamn.

"She Loves You" is the Beatles' best song. It also has the most life.

I've been working on four stories: "If You Can't Be Honest," "A Treat," "Bearded Dragon," "Go and Come Back."

There may be exceptions, but films shouldn't feature soundtrack music that comes after the time period in which the events are depicted.

I need one single second to know if there's no life in someone's piece of writing. It's an actual second. I can make the determination that quickly. And in that second I can also know all there is to know about that writer as a writer. That's how simple and barren all of this shit is. I can know the canned techniques--for lack of a better word--the voice--or lack thereof--how the sentences are structured, the unvarying meter of the prose, the inevitable subject, what that writer is up to, the monochromaticism.

I've thought about this and a second is the correct amount. How long would you need with this Pamela Painter story--right; a story--called "White Spaces" from Image? You don't need more than a second. Correct? I don't mean to read it. I mean to look at it and know how bad it is. That there's nothing there. I could do this with any of these things. And once you've seen the one thing from one of these people--any of these people--you've seen all that they do, because that's all they can do. Think about that: one second. Maybe you thought I was exaggerating. But as I said, that wouldn't have taken you much longer, if it did at all.

Minimal fitness today. 100 push-ups and ran 1000 stairs. Yesterday I walked three miles, did 100 push-ups, and ran 105 circuits at the Connecticut gate stairs. Yesterday marked 2891 days, or 413 weeks, without a drink.