Nothing posted for a while, having travelled out of town. Now I’ve written aplenty, though much comprises countless journal entries streamed at random junctions. Much half-lucid content I’ve produced in small intervals at random gates and food-courts throughout my exceptionally long layovers at the Las Vegas airport. Some writing sits snugly confined to the pages of the paper notebook. And the remainder hasn’t transcended beyond bullet points scattered across numerous, unevenly torn leaflets of paper.
I’ve accumulated a plethora of thoughts worth sharing, yet the idea of synthesizing the offline, the streamed, the raw and the spontaneous for the publishable - the presumably cohesive, the organized, and the conveniently scannable - the mere idea overwhelms me.
Part of the issue concerns the notion of incompatible writing energies, a theme I might explore separately. Another inhibiting factor stems from the (exuberant amounts of) Gopher reading I’ve somewhat abused, which brings me to question what and how I publish material in general.
Much on my mind has thinly spread among too many subjects, which hasn’t worked in my favor. As a simple demonstration, it has taken me over 30 minutes to arrive at this sentence in my experimental VIM ‘typewriter’ mode (something I’ll also later explore).
That can only indicate the sheer amounts of competing periphery. Focused attention has become a scarce resource, despite my ever-militant attempts to eliminate the distracting and avoid the periphery. But I’ll mine for more focused attention. I’ll mine for it, tap into it, refine it, and channel it, despite the labor strikes.
Coffee, the one chemical drug I’ve yet refrained from eliminating, should now be functioning at full capacity. At the very moment, a still unfinished 80-100 ml serving patiently endures over an hour and a half of near neglect. Yet despite my child-size rate of consumption, I already feel overbuzzed.
Now the colossal portion sizes served here in the US never cease to frighten me, though having spent the greater portion of my life in the country. Unless it be a boutique cafe, I haven’t come about portions beneath 12oz (or roughly 250ml?).
After a night of lethargy at LAS, I ordered the unique-size, massive concoction at some early operating diner. Here I wouldn’t even raise a point, had I the weight and the capacity to consume one of these cups in the entirety (as drug-induced of a behavior as that would appear). But paying over $3USD (the lower range of airport prices) for what would amount to about a quarter of that cup, the majority remainder then bound for abandon, seems an awful waste.
And having abundant opportunity for people watching in large masses over countless hours, I similarly never cease to affrighten over the harrowing visual: the severe majority on smartphones; food and beverage consumption nonstop at all hours; not a book (or even an E-reader) in sight; the rest asleep.
‘Affrighten’ might not be the proper term. It’s not even a word. But if there be a word to encompass some combination of skepticism with entertainment, I can’t readily produce it.
I can’t speak of the LAS airport with much affection in general. The degenerate air seems to find its way from the town into the terminals and the gates. But at this point it would yield to further squandered energy to paint the environment. Maybe I’ll leave it for some poem in blank verse - or better yet, free verse. I can’t imagine LAS as deserving of too much symmetrical structure. But who knows …
Perhaps I’ll post a batch stream of pensive writings over the next few days, if I care to organize materials with any efficacy. Alternatively, you might see nothing. Realistically, though, a bit or two should make its way. Cheers.
Questions, comments? Connect.