Some links may be affiliate links. I may earn money if you buy something or take an action after clicking one of these links on this site.

Rob Knowlan is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Plenty To Do

Sure, it’s the weekend, but I’ve got tons to do. How’s a guy supposed to get any rest with all of this work to do?

Systems

Indecision may or may not be my problem. ~Jimmy Buffett

When I’m faced with a surplus of stuff to do, the first thing I do is panic.

Okay, only for a moment. One needs a bit of catharsis after all.

The first productive thing that I do is to try to develop a system for sorting and managing the chaos.

There are a variety of approaches:

• FIFO 🥇 First In, First Out
• Squeaky Wheel 😭 Deal with whoever is yelling loudest or most persistently
• Timeboxing ⏱️ Allocate a specific period of time to each task so that everything demonstrates a little progress until things get completed and fall off of the to-do list
• Dartboard 🎯 Pick something at random and work on it unti it’s done
• Order of Complexity 🔹🔷❄️ Knocking out the little stuff to make time for the harder items helps me to feel like I’m making some kind of progress
• And many more 💐 …

My normal process is a mix of all the above. As with hats, one size does not fit all.

Systems, or semblances of systems, help me to have a sense of control so that I can focus and get through things.

Once I’ve picked an item, I set an interim goal. If it’s small and I can just get it done, great. Unfortunately, most of the stuff on my plate isn’t quick, knock-it-out kind of stuff.

I have to pick a done enough to move on to the next thing target. Since most of the things are weighty enough to require exclusive use of my time, I need to pick partial targets so that I can report progress to all parties.

That’s great but whether it’s continuous, long-slog concentration or time-sliced multitasking, I find myself mentally exhausted before long.

Sucks getting old…

Why Didn’t You Guys Help Fight Thanos?

Marvel Studios’ Eternals | Final Trailer

So, I haven’t watched this one yet. It came available on Disney+ a short while ago.

Not sure I really want to.

What it does present is a case of unintended consequences.

Apparently, these superpowered folks have been hanging around waiting for something to happen.

From the trailer, it seems that they have a mandate to protect humanity from the monstrous Deviants.

Okay, rules of engagement.

Whatever.

Their job is associated with one of those whole world is at stake storylines that I generally don’t care about.

Some people like that.

I’m not one of them.

I prefer small-scale heroics.

The only reason I enjoyed the Infinity Wars arc is because each of the characters had an opportunity to present themselves in a personal scope before we got drawn into Thanos’ plan to eliminate half the life in the universe.

Even with that in play, it was still generally a small-scale conflict. Stopping Thanos and saving half the lives in the universe is obviously a large-scale threat but the action is still pretty tactical.

It’s also pleasing to see all of your favorite heroes on one battlefield in Wakanda dishing out some serious whupp-ass to Thanos and his army of monster dudes.

These guys?

I guess I’ll find out when I watch it. There’s only a handful of them and they’re fairly niche, but the proposed conflict is already global from the get-go. Maybe they’ll make it a more personal scale in the actual movie, but that doesn’t seem to be the script.

I’ll let you know how it went after I’ve watched it…

Eternals Final Battle All Fight Scenes Ikaris And Kro Vs Eternals Thena Vs Kro Best Scenes Ending HD

Oy, more property damage…

What Will Come Next

The pleasure of reading a story and wondering what will come next for the hero is a pleasure that has lasted for centuries and, I think, will always be with us. ~Stan Lee

That’s the crux of storytelling.

You want people to wonder what’s going to happen next.

If that curiosity is intensified, you wind up with a page-turner that you can’t put down until you’ve ripped through the whole thing.

If that curiousity is stirred, you wind up with something that lets people enjoy a bit and put it down, wanting to pick it back up again later to find out.

If that curiosity is completely lacking, you wind up with something that people will put down and rue the time they wasted reading as much as they did.

If they want to know, they’ll keep reading. If they don’t care, they won’t.

The trick is, maintaining that level of curiosity while still telling a story that makes sense.

Anybody can strum along a bit of drama. It’s actually a party game.

Somebody tells a bit of a story and leaves it hanging for another person pick up and run with.

It’s fun and the story can go any which way, but it doesn’t make it a great piece of literature.

It’s an amusing trifle.

If you want people to read your stuff, you’ve got to put a little meaning into it.

Unfortunately, I’m not there with The Sentinels yet.

I don’t have much of a message for those guys.

Who knows? Maybe the question “What If?” is sufficient reason to write a superhero, fantasy or sci-fi story.

Technically, it is. I’m just not feeling the vibe.

Probably because I’ve got so much freaking work to catch up on.

It’s not writer’s block in the usual sense. I already know what the series is supposed to consist of.

I’ve got the broad strokes. I just don’t have all the connective matter worked out.

Without a sound idea of how I’m getting from one event to another, my mind returns to the rest of everything I have to do.

Oh well, if I can get caught up, that should clear up some mental capacity for writing.

For now, I just want to go back to bed…

---

Keeping it quick so I can respond to everyone’s to-do lists. I hope your weekend is more relaxing than mine… 😒