I’m Kinda Boring at the Moment

Posted on August 8, 2003    Posted by John Scalzi

In the comments thread of the last entry, Ed Thibideau asks:

A fascinating post. But why don’t you ever write about political and social issues any more? That’s what brought me here. But Whatever is rapidly falling to the bottom of my daily surf list.

Are recall elections anti-democratic? Hiram Johnson was a hero in the history books of my childhood but what has he wrought?

Excellent question.

Well, Ed I’ll tell you. I sit down every day to write about these things, but the moment I do, a crushing wave of ennui slams into me and I can’t imagine anything worse than reading myself drivel on about this stuff, and if I don’t want to subject myself to myself, I can’t see why I would want to subject any of you to me writing boringly about it.

Then, there’s the tangential but related fact that for the moment at least I’ve pretty much lost all sense of humor about politics, so when I do write something, it comes out all screedy and whiny and like I’m standing here stamping my feet because people just won’t listen. Again, why would I want to subject any of you to that? I’ve just got this funny thing about quality control; also I don’t want to look like a humorless ass.

Also also, there’s the fact that thinks to the books and other things, I’m not wallowing in, say, the California recall or Dean or what Gore’s been saying. I’m cognizant of it all, sure; I like keeping up. But I’m not really thinking about any of it. I realize that thinking about a subject is not a perquisite of writing about it, otherwise the blog world would simply implode. But on the other hand I like to have an actual, gut-driven opinion about something before I bloviate. After I’m done with my books and setting up my AOL Blog space, I’m pretty sure I’ll emerge out of the mental cocoon, but for the moment, I’m focused on ramming through the last hundred pages I owe on The Book of The Dumb. This leaves correspondingly less mental space for the stupidity of politicians, I’m afraid.

Right now, I kinda feel like writing about pointless, inconsequential things, like my new computer and my friends’ books and my cute, gender-switching cat. I have absolutely no doubt that at some point in the reasonably near future I’ll take more interest in consequential things (or more accurately, in things of greater consequence than my own personal deadlines), but right now, I just don’t, and I’m not going to force myself to do so. I’ve got enough going on. Until I get all riled up again, if you feel like not dropping by so often, I’ll totally understand.

Just remember that the title of this little area is literal; it’s about whatever’s on my mind at the moment. And at this moment, this is the stuff that’s on my mind. Not very dramatic, but at least it’s truth in advertising.