Bargains and Backsliding

Well, it's been a couple weeks, so I might as well try to post an update. Maybe I can delude myself into thinking it's writing practice...

In thirtyish years of living with myself, I've come to understand that I'm a lazy beast, but I can be bribed. The one doing the bribing is usually myself. For instance, a while ago I found a game, The I of the Dragon. The premise looked pretty cool: you actually get to play as one of three dragons. I'm a sucker for dragons, and the thing looked like it would actually run on my aging machine, so I picked it up... conditionally. See, I know how I am with games. I lose whole weeks to good ones. During the height of my Arcanum and Sims phases, it was all I could do to remember to eat lunch. (It didn't help that I was unemployed at the time, nor did it help that my sister also owned said games - she's the one who got me hooked on them - and what time I did manage to spend away from my own copy was often spent watching her play hers and/or discussing strategies, mishaps, and downloads.) At the time I found this particular game, I was still jobless, but I really, really, really wanted it. So, I made a deal with myself.
"Self," I said (not verbally - there are limits to my insanity, after all,) "we can get this game, but we can't play it. Not yet."
"Why not?" I whined.
"Well," I answered patiently,"We have a little problem. We're lazy, we're broke, we're unemployed, and we really shouldn't be throwing more time away."
"That's four problems," I point out.
"Shut up!" I snap. "The point is, we need this game like we need a hole in the head."
"Technically, don't we have holes in our head? I mean, we have ears, and eye sockets, and-"
"Yeesh, I gotta cut back on the cocoa... are we always this difficult?"
"Must I answer?"
"Anyway... until one of these things changes, the game cannot be played."
"Then why get it to begin with?"
"Um... er... collection purposes. Dragons, you know..."
"Flimsy excuse, isn't it?"
"Are we really going to argue? That might lead to logic, and we know where that'll take us..."
"Say no more. Which way to the checkout?"

That was some months back. Anyway, fast-forward to this weekend. I was taking a breather from site work, contemplating booting up Word for another round of almost-daily writing practice (as mentioned in the previous entry), when my eye falls upon the icon for the dragon game. (Yes, I installed it, but I didn't actually play it. Just wanted to be sure it would install to begin with whilst I had time to get my money back. After all, I have no delusions about how long it takes me to change anything about myself...) I went back over my mental list of reasons why I couldn't play the game. Was I still lazy? Umm... yes. Was I still broke? Not as bad as I was at the time; I had just deposited my first paycheck from my job. A job? Yes, a job. That meant I was employed! No need to linger too long on that last condition... I had accomplished one thing, I'd bargained for one, and, dang it, I needed something to do that didn't involve reorganizing web sites or cleaning templates!

So, I guess you can figure out where my weekend has gone. My sketchbook's gathering dust, my pile of books to read has been growing faster than it's been diminishing (though I have actually read a few of the quick ones), Skyhaven's stuck in disorganized limbo, and my story files in Word grow lonelier and lonelier. But I've been learning to fly and how to incinerate various beasties, and I'm leveling up at a fair clip. If I wanted to rationalize it, I could call the game story research; my "big" story deals with dragons, and this game lets you actually be a dragon, in fire-breathing, wing-flapping, spell-casting 3D. I can even toggle to dragon's-eye views for the full experience. But, as I said earlier, there are limits to my insanity. I've backslid, and I know it. But I kept my bargain with myself. I couldn't boot it up until I had a job, and danged if I didn't actually hold off until then.

Now, there are other bargains I've made with myself over the years. I actually have another game tucked away, which I not only will not but actually cannot load until I've earned myself a new computer. (Don't ask, but it looked very, very cool and I knew I'd kick myself forever if I didn't grab it... that, and it was reasonably priced. I still have bad luck with games I pay more than 20-30 bucks for, but that's a whole 'nother topic... as are the conditions for "earning" a new computer, but that's mostly a budget matter, save certain peripheral upgrades I'd rather like to indulge in.) I only let myself buy somewhat sugary cereal after three or so boxes of healthy stuff. On a larger scale, I have told myself that if/when I ever actually get in shape (budget pending), I'll take a swipe at parasailing off the mountain, like I've watched so many people do in my years of living beneath one of the state's major jump points. And then there's the big prize, the granddaddy of all personal bribes, the one I still torture myself with annually: when I finally sell a story, I will attend a DragonCon*. (This presumes that DragonCon's still running at the time - and that Atlanta's still standing, given our changing storm patterns and somewhat disturbing tendency of making enemies out of the rest of the world.)

Well, now I've spent about half an hour typing this blog entry up. That's more time than I've spent writing much of anything in about half a week. At this rate, DragonCon's looking more and more misty, unless I can figure out how to bribe my way to get back into story mode... preferably a bribe that won't suck up all the free time I should be using to do even more writing. Wonder what I'll come up with...

* http://www.dragoncon.org/ . Need I elaborate?