On Wanting to Be a Writer, and Why it Might Not Work

I want to be a writer, because all writers are miserable. It would be better if my misery came as part of a territory.

But really, that's why. I want an excuse to be miserable. That's not morbid of me, because everyone is miserable in their own way. Writers can own it though, trademark misery as their own. Who wouldn't want that?

I think writers can own misery because they attempt something inherently impossible for a career. They attempt to convey the human experience in text. This can't be done, precisely because it is experience, and experience is only gathered by our senses. Reading, of course, is not a sense. A good writer may be able to trigger a reader's senses, but it remains secondhand. The goal of writing is an impossible thing, and writers bear the burden of trying it anyway, because they are desperate to be the owners misery.

Why the writer feels the need to convey their human experience (impossible) is a question whose answer far exceeds the faculties of my attempted logic. I only know that it is enjoyable, and impossible. Hence the misery.

Even right now, I am sitting here at 2:13 in the morning (reason enough for misery), and I am thinking how poorly I am currently conveying my "experience" as a "writer." And it holds no matter that I just said doing such a thing is impossible. It's a bit of paradoxical warfare, where my desire to be a writer is deeply embattled against my own writing. Hence the misery.

If all this is true, if the goal of writing is an intrinsic impossibility, it is quite obvious why, almost mathematically, the best writers are also the most miserable people. A really good writer gets very close to the impossibility of relaying human experience. Getting so close with so much effort, all the while realizing the futility of said effort, has got to be invariably miserable. Edgar Allen Poe, Virginia Woolfe, Ernest Hemingway, Sylvia Plath, Jack London: all incredible writers. All incredibly miserable people. I want that.

Most of the writers above also had miserable upbringings. I will have to overcome this in order to become a great, miserable writer. I have had virtually no hardship, and I blame my parents for this. Thanks a lot mom and dad, for making my childhood so cozy and nice that I have no misery-fuel to use in my writing.

Of course, all this poses quite a challenge for the aspiring writer. I, for one, could not even figure out which words to capitalize in the title of this, not to mention account for the existential unfeasibility that underlines writing philosophy.

Also, there really are not any great writers named Jeremy. Don't immediately assign insignificance to this. It is a real trepidation. I fear that if my writing ever does approach prominence, it will rebound against a barrier that blocks all those with common, uninteresting names. Just consider the list of authors above. All such writers names. Is this why some writers use pen names? Was Edgar Allen Poe's real name Joe Smith? And would not his writing have been degrees more insignificant if it was? No one cares about a guy named Joe. Edgar, though, now that's a name.

This is what I feel about writers, and why I might not be able to be one.

Ducks Nationwide Furious at Teenage Girls

Ducks in lakes, streams, and public fountains far and wide are expressing disgust at the way they are being portrayed by teenage girls across the country. 

According to members of the duck community, most human females between the ages of 12 and 21 have at some point blatantly disrespected the entire waterfowl family by mushing their lips together and flattening their mouths in a way that hideously resembles the perpetual state of a duck bill.

"It's flat out rude," said a duck floating in a pond outside Omaha. "We can't help the way our bills are shaped. Would they make fun of a penguin's waddle? A baboon's butt?"

Ducks are unsure of the origin of "duck face," but have seen enough evidence to deduce that it runs rampant in groups of teenage girls, who apparently find the need to disfigure themselves in duck-like fashion in the company of other females, in "selfie" photographs, or while flaunting an askew peace sign.

"It's embarrassing," added one duck while covering its bill with its wing. "Is that what we look like?"

Some ducks are in fact becoming so self-conscious and ashamed that they are refusing to leave the water where they can hide their mockery of a mouth part under the surface. "Blurghle glughle glugh, blugh glurghle," stated one insecure drake.

Ducks are baffled that they are being ridiculed by earth's dominant species. "They already control our water sources, chase us off their lawns, and eat us," said a duck while munching on some grass, "and now they are making fun of the way we look? What did we ever do to them?"

"They draw us in with food then they mock us with revolting facial expressions," said a mother duck, watching in disgust as a group of adolescent humans fed her ducklings bread while continuously tormenting them with duck face.

Teenage girls are responding to allegations of what's being called "duckscrimination," maintaining that they only make a face that "kinda looks like a duck's face" because it "makes us look cute," and that they "don't really care what ducks think" because "YOLO."

"How do you respond to that?" inquired an incredulous mallard before flying off into the sunset.

Unconfirmed reports indicate a group of rogue ducks are attempting to retaliate against duck face by employing something called "bitchy resting face," an imitation of the expression of the average teenage human female. However, retaliation of the sort seems inevitable to fail, as ducks are allegedly way too cute to pull off such a look.

Area Grandma Thinks Googling is Sex Act

BELLMONT, MS---A local grandmother has become convinced that "the Google" is an amorous maneuver performed during the sexual act of "Googling." 

After watching a local news segment that profiled young couples who Googled each other after the first date, 74-year-old Gail Howerchuk became confident that to be "Googled" is to have had "the Google" performed on you by a "Googler," and that the term she keeps hearing "thrown around by the youngins" refers to something having to do with "knick-knack patty-whack." 

"Boy," said the appalled matriarch, "I'm afraid I just don't know what kids these days are up to in the bedroom."

Howerchuk was visibly disturbed as she recalled various contexts in which she had heard the term used in the past, including being told to "Google funny cats," because the results are "very satisfying."

"Oh my heavens," she said.

She also learned that Justin Bieber is Googled more than 1 million times per day, and that the Google itself is used more than 1 billion times per day.

"Good gracious!" was her response. 

"When I was that age, well boys were gentlemen," recalled Howerchuk. "There wasn't no googlin' or ganglin' or what not goin on. If a young man was interested in a young lady, he treated her like it, and only took her to bed after the 5th or 6th date. And there was no funny business."

After gaining her newfound knowledge, Howerchuk reportedly became curious about "the Yahoo" and "the Twitter," stating "I'll tell you what, if those are sex moves too, I just have lost all track of what's hip." 

At press time, Howerchuk was reported to have been Googling her husband, as she was "curious what all the fuss is about."

SkyMall Magazine Receives First Ever Purchase Order

For the first time in over two decades of existence, the commonly browsed airline catalog, SkyMall Magazine, has sold something.

"We are very excited to announce our first ever purchase order," said SkyMall founder Bob Worsley at a press conference last week. "Our first issue hit commercial airline seat pockets in 1990, and now, only 23 short years later, we are reaping the rewards."

The widely recognized in-flight boredom-queller is seen by approximately 88% of all domestic air passengers in the United States, but, up until now, has sold 0% of cataloged items. 

"It's a wonder," said product manager Matt Genandt of the catalog's sheer failure, "that we haven't done a bit better, with products like the 'Solar Moler' Solar-Powered Mole Repeller and the Electronic Feng Shui Compass. These are quality items that pretty much everyone could use."         

Ed Braun, the man who recently made SkyMall history by ordering a pair of Hidden Camera Sunglasses, admitted his decision was due in part to delirium caused by a long transatlantic flight. "I didn't have anything to do, so I just kept flipping through SkyMall," said Braun. "The next thing I know I'm trying to decide between a 'RealRock' Fake Rock Cover and an Architectural Tea Light Lantern. But then I saw the sunglasses, and it must have been the mixture of claustrophobia, airline food, and a lack of oxygen that made me think I have to have these. They were 350 dollars for Christ's sake."

Other items such as the Toilet Roll iPod Docking Station, the Bigfoot Garden Yeti Statue, and the Mademoiselle Haute Couture Floor Lamp have sat collecting dust in the SkyMall warehouse for years. However, Worsley believes this purchase will "open the floodgates" for SkyMall. "And when it does," he added, "we have the 'H2ooh' Aqua Vacuum to clean it up."   

    

Tour de France Crash Leads to Massive Bicycle Mix-Up

A large crash during the 17th stage of the Tour de France yesterday left more than a dozen riders bruised, battered, and utterly confused where the hell their bicycles went.

"It was pure chaos," recounted American rider Cadel Evans, who agreed to interview despite having a substantial portion of his face mangled into a fleshy pulp.

The colossal accident occurred on a steep descent near the stage 17 finish line in Chorges. The most minuscule of contacts caused two riders travelling at speeds of over 40 miles per hour to lose control and initiate a chain reaction of violent collisions that sent dozens of bodies and bicycles flying through the air, reeling across the asphalt, and coming to rest at the bottom of the hill in a garbled pile of flesh and titanium.

"A lot of guys started scrambling for their bikes, but some just sat on the ground cupping their road rash while rocking back and forth and crying," said Evans of the frenzied scene. "Some guys were just kinda wandering around aimlessly because they had head injuries and were confused. A few ran off into the woods."

According to witnesses, many variously wounded and disoriented riders ended up getting back on the wrong bicycles. "Shit, this isn't my bike," uttered an incorrectly remounted rider, while another surveyed the wreckage wondering "was mine red or blue?" 

"This can't be it, it doesn't match my spandex" and "how did my seat get wet?" were other phrases heard by witnesses in the panicky moments after the crash.

One rider who eventually did locate his bike was reported to have immediately toppled over again after discovering his arms were "contorted into a pretzel." 

Spanish rider Alejandro Valverde was even seen immediately after the crash riding on a children's tricycle that had somehow become incorporated in the collisions. "I felt something was off," recalled Valverde after the race, "and when I looked down I realized I had mounted a Pink Barbie Tricycle." Race officials have urged police to keep an eye out for a missing and possibly mortally wounded young girl, just in case.

This crash came just days after Chris Frumme controversially won stage 15 by soaring over the finish line ahead of his bicycle. 

Soccer Quickly Becoming America's Like 4th or 5th Favorite Sport

A recent poll taken by randomly selected sports fans from around the nation indicated that the game of soccer, where you try and kick a ball into a goal, is drawing near to being among some of America's most popular sports.

"It's definitely up there," said one Chicago sports nut. "I mean, football is way better, and so is baseball, basketball, NASCAR, hockey, tennis, wrestling, and motocross, but after that, it's probably a pretty close tie between soccer and golf.

The nationwide poll asked participants to rate their favorite sports according to watchability, athletic aptitude, and, of course, hitting. Soccer was consistently listed in the top ten in all three of these categories, which is really only nine spots away from number one.

"Soccer is darn near my 5th or 6th favorite sport," noted a respondent from Texas. "The way those fellas get up there and head that ball without gettin' a headache is pretty dang cool."

Some of the more traditional American sports fans, however, were a bit irritated at the results of the poll, remarking how "weird" of a sport soccer is, "bein' that they count up instead of down," and "there's no hot beer lady commercials." "Anyone could run around a big field all day passin' a ball back and forth," said a football fan.

Despite such sentiments, the fact remains that a soccer game in Boston brought in 4,037 people last week, which surpasses the average attendance of the American Badminton League, the Field Hockey Association of America, and the WNBA.

At press time, the poll had just been taken in the UK, and the results were drastically in favor of football, with the word 'soccer' not being listed by any of the respondents. The pollers are investigating this unexpected result.

George Zimmerman Considers Quitting Neighborhood Watch Program

Since being acquitted of all charges in the death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman has stated that he "should probably think about quitting the whole neighborhood watchman thing."

"It's probably for the best," figures the 29-year-old murder suspect. 

On February 26, Zimmerman got into an altercation with, shot, and killed the young African American boy in a gated community in Sanford, Florida. "I just don't think it is sitting well with a lot of people in the neighborhood," he said.

In the short time since the verdict was decided, the internet has been abuzz with reactions to the case, including tweets such as "If that son-of-a-bitch Zimmerman ever shows his face again, I'll stab him in the throat," and "I dare you to come back to the neighborhood Zimmerman, I just dare you." 

Death threats aside, Zimmerman fears that it might be "awkward" if he showed up for work again. "I would feel bad if I made everyone feel all uncomfortable and stuff," he admitted.

Zimmerman's lawyer, Mark O'Mara, disagrees, believing his client should continue volunteering in neighborhood watch programs as "no one will ever mess with that mother fucker again."