one \u2013 It\u2019s 426pm. I have a thing at 7pm. And I might be interrupted sooner than that. I want to try and do something here in the meantime. I want to get a glimpse of something that feels like magic. What do I have to do for that? One of the things I believe to be true is that you can start somewhere arbitrary, then try to go in a marginally interesting direction, and then repeat until you end up somewhere cool. I can feel some of the thoughts and ideas in my mind\u2019s drawer rustling about a little bit, a little over-eager to contribute. I don\u2019t want to make too much of an effort to suppress them, but I don\u2019t want to introduce them either. I want to channel a spirit of irreverence that has felt like it\u2019s eluded me for some time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
two \u2013 I\u2019ve heard that the line \u201cWhere do we go now?\u201d in Sweet Child O\u2019 Mine emerged naturally in a jamming session\u2013 Axl Rose literally sang the question out loud when trying to figure out what lyrics to put in the bridge, and it seemed good enough, and so that\u2019s what it is. Is it really the best possible line for that song? It\u2019s hard to imagine it being anything else. But it\u2019s the kind of move you can only really use once\u2013 if you repeat it in multiple songs you reveal that you don\u2019t really have any ideas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
three \u2013 sometimes I like to use bullets or numbers as a kind of navigational aid when writing. It\u2019s a way of creating some sense of structure, even if it\u2019s completely arbitrary. You can always take them out later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
four \u2013 one of the weird things about writing is that you might write the first draft in a linear fashion, but then you travel \u2018back in time\u2019 by going back to the start of the piece and changing something about it. Sometimes this is visible to the reader, but usually it isn\u2019t, and most readers probably don\u2019t care. Yet it\u2019s something I get somewhat self-conscious about, maybe because of my long habit of doing twitter threads, where each tweet cannot be edited. You can subsequently recontextualize it by quoting it in a new thread, or by adding more tweets at the end, but you can\u2019t edit what you\u2019ve already written. I wonder if it would be a good idea for me to continue with this arbitrary constraint when trying to write longform pieces, so that I don\u2019t confuse myself with too many options.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
five \u2013 I have always been someone who tries to do many different things simultaneously. Sometimes it\u2019s lead to really interesting outcomes, but for the most part I don\u2019t particularly recommend it. It feels more like an affliction than a blessing. Maybe it\u2019s both. My first book Friendly Ambitious Nerd<\/em>, for example, simply insisted on being about three different things at once. As a result each section is a little weaker than it could otherwise be, but I feel that the combination is important. I sometimes fantasize about writing an airport book titled \u2018Reply Game\u2019, but the idea of it kinda tires me out after a moment. The sensible thing to do would probably be to write an essay for starters, but I don\u2019t even really feel like doing that, even though I imagine it would probably be worthwhile to do. Why not do it? I feel like I\u2019m waiting for something, but I don\u2019t know what exactly, until I encounter it. I already have the \u2018primary frame\u2019, but I think that\u2019s not quite enough. There\u2019s something like a \u2018secondary frame\u2019, or the stories you want to tell through the primary frame, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n six \u2013 maybe this is where we\u2019re going: the big puzzle of my creative life is, how come I haven\u2019t just already done all the things that I seem to want to do? How come, for example, my essay on wretchedness isn\u2019t done yet? Okay, let\u2019s say it\u2019s a kind of perfectionism. How come I haven\u2019t written a janky draft? Wait, I do have a janky draft. It\u2019s just\u2026 disassembled. And here I went on a bit of a journey\u2013 I had searched \u201cvisakanv wretchedness\u201d, found a podcast that I did with Jim O\u2019Shaughnessy, and realized that I ought to tidy up the transcript (which I\u2019m currently doing in another window via Claude.ai), and publish that, probably on my blog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2731 <\/p>\n\n\n\n (2025may27) one \u2013 It\u2019s 426pm. I have a thing at 7pm. And I might be interrupted sooner than that. I want to try and do something here in the meantime. I want to get a glimpse of something that feels like magic. What do I have to do for that? One… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5gxNz-3Qv","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14787"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14790,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14787\/revisions\/14790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Interestingness unfolds when you just describe things. My son is in a Kobe Bryant jersey. I\u2019m listening to Twisted Love by ATB \/ Christina Soto. I found this track in a compilation I found in 2013 searching for \u201ctrance\u201d on youtube. I used to play it on the office speakers while we played poker after hours once a month or so. I had my first taste of Laphroiag whiskey at those sessions.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"