I recently received some surprising news from Substack. Apparently, I haven’t posted anything here in four months. Four months!
Assigning a number to my absence made it a little too real. There’s no ambiguity with numbers, no gray areas. That’s why I never liked them. You can, for a little while, suppress the vague sense of guilt you feel about how you’re not writing anything. You can’t argue with the cold, hard reality of four unproductive months.
The email affected the same tone as most of Substack’s communications to its writers – friendly, concerned, just here to help – even as it scolded me for my failure. You know, it said, successful Substacks must regularly deliver for their readers. If you don’t post more often, you’re going to disappoint them, and if that happens, we are not liable for what they do to you. Trust us. We have seen some shit. Real, honest-to-God CSI shit that would make your stomach turn. Believe us when we say you don’t want to know. Just remember that whatever happens is on you.
They’re not wrong, loath as I am to admit it. I’ve been neglecting this space for far too long. Fortunately for you, I strongly believe in keeping myself accountable. That is why, in addition to promising to post more regularly, I present here a complete record of my activities over the last four months. Just what has been keeping me away from this site for so long? Well, dear readers, here is the complete record, warts and all.
For your safety, the more sensitive details have been redacted. A new post, on Cormac McCarthy, will be published tomorrow.
March 14 – Date of my last Substack post, lamenting my inability to get any writing done.
March 15 – Negotiated peace between Saudi Arabia and Iran. Allowed Xi Jinping to take credit in exchange for one “I.O.U.,” to be redeemed at a later date. (Wrote 0 words.)
April 5 – Visited Morocco. Got some R&R. Purchased a puzzle box from a street merchant. (0 words)
April 8 – Solved puzzle box. Big mistake. (0 words)
April 9 – Easter. (0 words)
April 11 – Wrote 100,000 words of fiction.
April 12 – Destroyed 99,990 words of fiction.
April 26 – Visited Jerry Springer at home. ████████████████████████████████ (11 words)
May 7-May 20 – Cruise in the Caribbean / nightly lectures to adjacent tables on the exploitative cruise industry. ███████████████████████████████████████ (14 words)
May 29 – Memorial Day. (0 words)
June 1 – Wrote my best article to date. Meant to post here but forgot my password. Article has since been lost. (3,500 words)
June 5 – Attended Henry Kissinger’s 100th birthday bash. (0 words)
June 16 – Bloomsday. (180,000 words, since lost on Sandymount Strand, Dublin)
June 17 – Slept off Bloomsday hangover. (0 words)
June 18 – Overslept, missing planned submersible voyage. (0 words)
June 19-July 3 – Visited the Royal family. ██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████ Enjoyed some “me” time. (150 words)
July 4 – Independence Day (U.S.)