My thumbs have gone weird....

Isn't it funny how when you sit down in front of a computer with the absolute intention of writing something, anything, that you dry up, much like an actor on stage? And while there might not be 500 people waiting for me to produce words of wonder, it certainly feels as though I am letting people down, pretty badly... My writer's block exists on several levels. It's been about five years since I wrote anything, creatively speaking and I simply can't seem to advance myself. Last year, I arranged to have Wednesdays off from my unutterably dull day job so that I could write. And have I written? Have I hell. The last bit of writing I did was in the stalls of a theatre, scribbled on the back of a piece of paper, when I really should have been paying attention. Every Wednesday, I sit in front of this PC and try to write, but nothing comes. This blog has been through seven drafts already and I'm still not happy with it.

High expectations are the problem, I think. When you immerse yourself in good quality film and TV, your standards for your own writing are raised, even though you don't realise it. I watched Withnail and I the other day. The dialogue is still as perfectly funny as it was 10 years ago, when I first saw it. With Marwood's mini-logue about speed, ringing in my ears, I just sit here, trying to locate the bit of me that could come up with something as poetic and moving. I think that part of me is hibernating at the moment...

Perhaps I am to come to the conclusion that I am indeed, as this blog states, shallow and inconsequential. The grind of working life has taken its toll on my creative instincts and I shall never write anything of note again. I don't mean this to sound so dreafully maudlin, but writers will understand how ghastly it is to be blocked. I shall leave it to my honourable co-blogger to give you all something upbeat and interesting to read later today... Apologies to Bruce Robinson and Paul McGann.

Speed is like a dozen transatlantic flights without ever getting off the plane. Time change. You lose, you gain. Makes no difference so long as you keep taking the pills. But sooner or later you've got to get out because it's crashing, and then all at once the frozen hours melt out through the nervous system and seep out the pores.