Purple prose asphyxia
Blockaded on May 26, 2024.
Writer’s block descended onto my head like those blocks of cheese of yore. Like that crate of eggs, it descended. And there it sat, a scowling vulture eyeing me balefully, smugly satisfied at my inability to scriven out even the first sentence of a shiny new blog entry.
I put pen to paper, but nothing emerged. I put pen to my monitor, yet still nothing emerged. I paused. Realizing this was a computer, I picked up my keyboard instead. But when I put that up against my monitor, again—nothing emerged but crumbs from snacks and lunches long dead. I had nothing to write about. There was, and is, nothing to write about anymore.
My pen was constipated. My keyboard was fully stopped up. I had nothing to write about. There was, and is, nothing to write about anymore.
Every story has been told, every song sung, every poem poesied, and every epic epicked. There was nothing new under the Sun when Solomon lamented, “Nihil novi sub Sole!” but when the astute reader asked him why he was speaking Latin, he had nihil else to say. He had nothing else to write about. There was, and is, and never again will be, anything to write about anymore.
I wracked my brain hard. Ideas came to me but none were fruitful. The Fluppy Dogs visit Candle Cove? Baron Munchausen joins G.I. Joe? David the Gnome battles it out with Inspector Gadget? But none of these ideas panned out beyond the first sentence. Not even an idea for a musical about an anthropomorphic banana’s strange, erotic journey from Milan to Minsk panned out—and that one was full of fruit. I had nothing to write about. I thought about giving up.
I tried gluing random words together into clauses and sentences, but none of them would stick—not even with superglue. I tried gluing phonemes together into random hoots and catcalls, but those stuck together even more poorly. (It did make me sound a reborn squirrel-fox-dingo, however—and a drunken one, at that.) I had nothing to write about. I thought about giving up.
I went wildly free-writing down Bouillabaisse Boulevard, but my neighbor chased me off before I could finish filling up all the space on his garage door with the asemic banter gushing from my spray can. I then went merrily freebirding back up the boulevard, but this was met with equal disapproval, opprobrium, and a threat from one neighbor to use a pair of hedge trimmers in ways not intended by God. I slunk back into my palatial abode, turned off all the lights, and squatted sullenly in front of my word processor. I had nothing to write about. I thought about giving up.
All the purple prose I had wrenched out of this blog over the past 25 years had finally died of strangulation. I had nothing to write about. I thought about giving up.
Maybe if you had stayed spooned for more, this would not have happened!