When I get really serious about writing, when it’s “crunch time” for an assignment or I feel I really need to bang out some words on The Project, I head over to my corner. Like a carpenter’s workbench or a mechanic’s tool chest, my corner is a place I’ve set aside to work on writing and nothing else.
The PC runs Word, Notepad++ and little else, as the hardware is a bit on the older side and I don’t want to tax it. I even have a separate CD player for music. My work is saved on a USB drive so I don’t have to worry about any sort of hard drive mis-reads or other catastrophic failures. But one of the best things about the corner is its isolation.
I’m not just talking about its distance from the couch, the television and the gaming consoles, though that is a factor. The PC in the corner is not hooked up to the Internet. As much as it might be necessary to research something on occasion, when I want to put myself in the writing zone, it’s best to minimize my distractions.
Heck, it’s taken me a while to put this little blog post together, and I’ve been planning on hitting 10k on the Project since last Sunday…
I do something similar where I have to turn off any distractions, including the internet, in order to seriously crunch stuff.
I have the same set up. An old laptop my wife got from her work. I can’t even figure out how to get the network adapter working on it, which suits me just fine. It’s too easy to alt-tab over to something you just want to “check”. I’m a big fan of headphones with a soundtrack of instrumental music to complete the isolation.
(My) John built me an office off the back of the garage. She’s sturdy, but she’s seen better days. I really need to treat her better if I’m going to continue to take shelter from the distractions of the day inside her Carolina blue walls.
Within that office is the high-powered desktop I use for futzing around with the Unreal Developers Kit and the like. Naturally, I use it for writing, too. There’s a mini fridge with various libations inside, and a basket filled with granola bars sits atop the thing. My creative process if fueled by crunchy food. Popcorn, trail mix, cereal, granola, pretzels, English toffee. If it’s crunchy, and not a vegetable (I know, I know, bad panda. . .), you probably have it to thank for some of my more entertaining bits of writing.
Cork boards line one wall, so I can stick fluorescent-colored Post-its all over the place without damaging the paint. I have an old beer stein for a pen cup, and a stack of notebooks a foot high for when I want to scribble instead of type. There used to be a giant whiteboard in there, too, for me to physically draw out story timelines and such, but it’s gone now. We won’t go into why. . .*whistles innocently*
There’s also a bed in there, in case I stay up too late writing and I don’t want to wake the husband. Usually backfires, though, as he’ll come in to shuffle me to our bedroom where it’s warmer rather than have me wake up stiff and cold from my own stupidity.
Now that I’ve read all that, I’m kinda embarrassed to admit I have such a space available to me, given how little use she’s gotten in the last several months. . .*sheepish look*