I have begun the process of culling volunteers.  What’s a literary blog without feedback, right?  Whether through cajoling, begging, or bribing, I will assemble a modest but motley band of eyes and ears for this effort.  As I write I can hear the winds whipping bullets of water against the walls of my single wide splendor.  The hurricane is far to the south, but the storms will come nonetheless.  So off into it I go to work, to cut metal and bend metal and make people happy.  Ciao for now.

There is never enough time to do everything you want to do.  That’s a given.  I remember in the movie Gladiator when the general asks his servant whether it is difficult being a servant.  The servant answers, “Sometimes…I do what I want to do.  The rest of the time I do what I have to do.”  This has become a kind of mantra for me.  I want to write creatively, but I know there are things I must do first.  And the older I get, the greater the pull of responsibility is.  How richly indulging it must be to live under the illusion that writing is one’s solemn duty to one’s society, its people, or to rabid fans.  That would be the only way to justify letting the gravitous things of life go by the wayside while I spin this fancy wheel for hours on end.  So I’ll spin for minutes instead; but in the end, I will spin.