Stop and Stare

Sitting in my room for most of the day yielded little. One book review, polished and sent - that was it. The rest was spent idling, reading blogs and waiting for the virus scanner to finish.

Not a productive day.

Yet I've been up and about so much during my sabbatical it no longer feels like one. I start my new job next week and this... torpor sets in. Plus, the status of my back-pay is in doubt. There'll be little by way of infusions for at least a month or two.

Screw it. I need a burger.

I left Webzilla running and trooped downstairs. There was a small crowd around the 7-Eleven Burger Stand. It'll take a while before I get mine.

"Two beef burgers, no chilli sauce," I told the vendor. "I'll come back for them later," I added.

"OK."

I went to the petrol station for some POKKA® Lemon 1000®. While I was aware that these will be a luxury in the coming months, I get a couple, which I intend to sip like long-buried vintages - and not drain like moonshine.

An unsettling sight stops me short - a scavenger raiding the 7-Eleven trash bin. He finds a discarded chicken sausage (courtesy of the burger vendor) and breaks it into three. I turned away to avoid the possible sight of him eating the damn thing. A compare-and-contrast mental routine kicked in.

Freaking writer's block, hmm? Soon, writing is going to be the only way I get salt out of the mines. "Writer's block" is another luxury I cannot afford - that is, unless I switch to a lifestyle that involves throw-away sausages out of a trash can.

I can't afford that, either.

I may have experienced and forgotten it many times, so it's always confounding how so much could come from so little. Such is the unparalleled marvel of the wake-up call.