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Independence Day 2024 · 4 July 2024

People celebrate Independence Day in interesting ways. They eat too much and blow too much stuff up. Or maybe that is just me.

I am sure I have written much about Independence Day. Not a blog post every year, but enough to be able to search and find many references to and blogs about Independence Day. I suppose that is because I think it is an important holiday. Not quite a holy day, but close. And so I have written about it quite a bit.

(Now, if my blog was a TV show, I would put together a montage of different blog post and point to them. I would reminisce about words I have already written. But this is no TV show. It is a blog post. And there will be no reminiscing. Or even links. Since I fixed my website search, you can search them out yourself and reminisce.)

I must admit that I like eating too much and blowing stuff up. At least I used to. In both cases. Just last week, I used to love to pile my plate high with everything in sight. After all, whenever you go to a picnic or other large gathering, you ought to show your appreciation of the food by eating a bit of everything. Right? Well, I might continue to do that, but I realized that I am too much of a pig and I need to do less of that porking out. I do not want to eat until just before I explode.

At any rate.

I also love to blow stuff up. Okay. Maybe I do not love it as much as I used to. I used to love to take firecrackers and stick them in just about anything to make them explode or at least jump in the air. Nothing living mind you. Except anthills. I used to love to stick firecrackers into anthills to flatten them out. Or at least see what those little soldiers would do once they gathered their wits. None of them seemed to blow up. The ones who were running around on the firecracker trying to figure out what it was and how to get rid of it might have been vaporized, but I think they just brushed off their armor after being flung to the far reaches of the area and hustled back to fix the anthill that I so rudely had blown to bits. Or at least had flattened a little bit.

Nowadays, I do not really like to blow stuff up. Or rather, I am too cheap to want to buy the firecrackers that blow stuff up. And I do not want to mess up the yard by blowing stuff up. After all, the only anthills seem to be near the house and I do not need the house to come tumbling down.

Overeating and blowing stuff up is all well and good. It is a fun way to celebrate Independence Day. But when it comes right down to it, I like to see the American flags flying all over town. Private residences, businesses, public facilities. They all seem to fly the flag on Independence Day. Even if people are not there. They fly the flag to remind themselves that freedom is not free. Or at least I hope they do. I hope that they remember that freedom requires vigilance. And sacrifice.

It is funny. I know that we seem to celebrate Independence Day with too much eating and blowing stuff up, but I think most of us remember that our freedom is what allows us to do so. And in a moment of reflection, I hope we remember that only vigilance and sacrifice can keep it that way.

Happy Independence Day 2024! (Don’t eat too much or blow too much stuff up.)

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An Interesting Phenomenon Explained · 29 June 2024

It is funny. I wrote about my interesting phenomenon a bunch of years ago and just posted it a week ago. So I thought I would explain. At least a little bit.

If you did not read about it yet, my interesting phenomenon has been that when I have an inventory of writing for my blog, I do not have anything to write about. But as soon as I have little to no inventory, I come up with something. I have always found that to be interesting. After all, the glass cannot always be half full. It must get empty sometime. But it never did. Nor really. So I decided that I just needed to finally post the piece. I had been seeing it in my blog document for years, but it kept getting pushed farther and farther down the file because I kept having something else to write. Sometimes something more timely. Other times, I just had a new topic. But I always seemed to come up with more writing so that I was able to keep the interesting phenomenon piece in reserve. Just in case.

The thing is that even when I finally posted it, I had other pieces in my inventory. I just needed to sit on one piece for a bit. And another piece was ready but needed another set of eyes to look at it before I put it out there. So while I had more inventory, the pieces needed to sit for a bit before they were released. So I finally posted my piece about my interesting phenomenon.

The other interesting phenomenon about the interesting phenomenon piece is that it did not need much editing. I added a couple things before I posted it, but that is it. Maybe I had edited it a bunch over the years, but I do not think so. I think it got pretty much the same treatment that all my blog posts get. An initial writing. And then a final read before uploading and posting. Simple. Yes, I know. Some of my pieces could use lots of work even after I post them, but that is the nature of a weekly blog. You just need to get stuff out there. Even if nobody reads said stuff.

Which is another interesting thing about explaining the interesting phenomenon. I am sure that there are not that many people who care that I wrote the piece several years ago. (I nearly wrote “many” years ago. Then I thought that it might lead to an urban legend. You know. The interesting phenomenon about MediocreMan’s An Interesting Phenomenon piece is that it was his first blog piece even before he had any inventory at all.) Still, even if there are not that many people who care about my interesting phenomenon, it is still a topic that I wanted to explain.

Well, there is not that much more to explain or that is interesting about An Interesting Phenomenon. I just thought it might be interesting to note that it was a piece I wrote many years ago. In fact, it might have been the very first piece I wrote even before I had an inventory. Or maybe that is just an urban legend. Even so, I am glad that I finally had a chance to post An Interesting Phenomenon and this follow up piece about it. Even if it is not really that funny. Or interesting.

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An Interesting Phenomenon · 22 June 2024

It is an interesting phenomenon. When I have an inventory of writing pieces ready for my blog, I end up not being able to write new stuff.

I write six days a week fifty two weeks out of the year. And I have done so for many years. Not as long as I have been blogging, but still, quite a while. Some people think it is crazy. After all, to what end do you just keep doing something in obscurity? But fame and fortune are not the end result that this writer is seeking. It was, but I have figured out that for me, writing is like breathing. It is something I need to do to survive. God made writing part of my DNA, so I write. Whether anybody reads it or not.

Now, I have written about all that stuff before. Or at least I think I have. I have even written about writing when I do not have inspiration. Which is really just a thought about discipline. You know you are a writer when you write all the time. Even when you do not want to write. Even when you do not have anything to write.

The strange phenomenon though is that when I have an inventory of writing, I end up not having anything to write. I suppose that ought to be a clue that I need to get started writing another book or something. Those projects are much bigger endeavors that take much time and energy. And thought. And when I am involved writing one of those bigger projects, I end up getting frantic about my blog. I think to myself, “Oops. I have been involved in one project so much that I have neglected my blog. I have no inventory. Time to come up with something. Pronto!”

And I do. I come up with something. Something good or bad or in between. But I come up with something to post. Which is fine and dandy. And it is even an okay way to work. After all, I just blog about anything. I do not have a specific topic. Except life.

Which brings me back to the main topic.

I am not sure why I draw a blank when I have an inventory of writing for my blog. It is not the whole inspiration thing. After all, inspiration is really the product of hard work. Or of just living life. It is surely not something that a writer can depend on for everything. After all, while it seems that some writers are truly inspired, every writer writes junk too. There are pieces of trash littering writers’ computers and wastepaper baskets all over the world. I am sure that there are no writers out there whose writing is always the product of inspiration. Or if there is one, nobody has ever heard of that writer because he or she has never published. Or maybe even written much. Or maybe that is just me.

If I had kept on the path of just writing when I was inspired, I am certain I would have nothing to show for it. No books. No blog. Certainly no consistent output. I would have a couple notebooks full (or maybe just half full) of stuff that I thought was good at the time.

So while I cannot wait for inspiration to strike, I do wonder about the strange phenomenon of not being able to write much for my blog when I have an inventory of blog posts. I might never know the answer. But that is okay. I just continue to write anyway. And some day, I might even write something that somebody thinks is inspired.

Maybe one day I will figure out my strange phenomenon of not having anything to write when I have an inventory full of blog posts. But I doubt it.