I want to be a Glass Half Full person. I’d like to be a Glass Half Full person, but ultimately, annoyingly, I’m a Glass Half Empty person. And occasionally, it’s a bit exhausting.

Last night was my belated birthday party, and while only a small number of people turned up, I did have tremendous fun- but the resulting foggy head this morning has left me wobbly and unsure, and after a week of sub-editing and boring, routine normality, I’m suddenly back in the reality of ‘Writing World’ and I think I’d forgotten that it’s a slightly intimidating and scary place to be.

Essentially- and this may sound either ridiculous or like an insane amount of dithering, but I’m not sure what to do next after finishing off The Hypernova Gambit. I feel like I need to at least work out in my head what’s going to happen, mainly because I know I could very easily drift along like an idiot not being certain of what to do, when the answer is- to be perfectly honest- getting on and doing it. I’m just finding the whole path of making the decision really difficult. Again, I’m envious of those who can write short stories, as- besides the freeform burbling on Division X- I can’t really think them up very well. Big, bold and brassy stories are where I’m most happy, it’s just the point before I dive into them that’s particularly scary.

I don’t think it helped that I finished re-reading WATCHMEN today, in my funky, re-coloured, massive slipcased edition, and I’m currently in total awe of what Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons acheived in that. The level of focus and depth and reality in it… is just breathtaking, and it leaves me thinking “Waah!” I just want to get close. I want to push myself, and get closer to where I want to be as a writer, and the only way I’m going to be able to do that is buy writing like hell, and motivating myself into that position is always so bloody difficult.

Sorry. Currently tired and irritable, and not up to blogging as extensively as I should be. I’m also finding that my Mac keyboard is actually rather tough on my fingers. I’m going to try and relax for a little while tonight, and then throw myself into the fray tomorrow. Plenty of things are going to be done tomorrow, whether I like it or not!

Talking of WATCHMEN- here’s a brief little amusement. As a set-up for any non comic-geeks reading, a few years back, Marvel superhero mastermind Stan Lee did a series for Marvel’s arch-enemy publisher DC called ‘Just Imagine’, where, in a sequence of one-shots, he’d take the basic premise of DC’s major superheroes, and give his own distinctive spin on them. So, imagine if Stan Lee’s hyper-active, hilariously melodramatic style was applied to a more adult title, dealing with politics, violence and superhero sex?

Just Imagine: Stan Lee’s WATCHMEN!

(Not all the gags work, but the ones that do are ones to treasure).