After my first true blog entry (Houston Part 1: Badgers in Tigerland) I received a lot of useful critiques which I have henceforth put into practice such as: 1.) More pictures and 2.) Cale your posts are too damn long. I have thus tried to buzzfeed the crap out of my posts to make them as short and visibly appealing as I can, but sometimes my verbose nature and short attention span for picture taking and in blog placing takes hold and I fall short, but I try dammit.
The first true hurdle that I ran into, and not over, was finding an adequate work environment for constructing these posts. I began by utilizing the locales where I slept (such as friend's couches or hotel rooms), but I quickly found that the overwhelming amount of distractions did not jive well with my short attention span (peregrine=traveling, discipline=discipline . . . get it, it's a non-sexual double entendre!). Begrudgingly I dragged myself into coffee shops and bars to see where creativity best flowed.
This was daunting to say the least. Writing in public is nerve racking. I think there is a fundamental urge to shelter our artistic creations from unsolicited critiques. For me, these fears are clearly a mix of paranoia and megalomania, so I remained steadfast and wrote surrounded by strangers in various locations. Terrifying.
After a great deal of practice my anxiety slowly dissipated and allowed me to analyze the pros and cons of my two primary creativity hubs: bars and coffee shops.
Allow me to begin by analyzing my favorite of the two places while not writing: bars. Bars are fun locales that attract interesting people, especially during the day. Fun fact: Pub is short for public house, so they are designed to be inviting, social, and a tad bit raucous. However, alcohol, the incredible elixir of fun that it is, creates an ever increasing amount of merriment and noise as people become shnockered. This means that there is a creativity bell curve that occurs in bars that limits the prose production. Not an ideal place to write at midnight, but it can be acceptable at 3 in the afternoon. As much as I would like to do all my writings in a seedy bar a la Hemingway, it just isn't feasible for those of us with moderate hearing.
In the previous chart I have mapped the creativity and production level while writing at a bar. This chart only takes into consideration three facts 1.)You are in a bar, 2.)You are drinking, and 3.)Your purpose in the bar is to write . While I will speak in passing of ambiance and noise, this will primarily focus on the level of intoxication and its correlation to creativity. I will be utilizing the second person present tense to tell the story of creativity in relationship to drinks consumed as if it were happening in real time and to elicit feelings of nostalgia for choose your own adventure books.
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| Selecting a Writing Bar: Pictured here is an Irish bar in Berlin named after a celebrated dandy and literary giant. When in doubt, try to find a bar named after a masterful writer and a celebrated drunk, with any luck you can draw upon the energy of their name to increase both your writing and drinking prowess. Channel those good vibes like a warlock. You see a bar in the distance . . . |
0 Drinks Down, 60% Creativity- You walk into the bar and look around. Given the odd time of day there are only three other patrons in the bar, a thirty something having a disjointed conversation with the barkeep and a couple at a table who appear to be in town on vacation and are using their time to get a little day drunk. You sally up to the bar, 2 stools down from the lone man, enough room to hear what he's talking about and engage him in conversation if he's interesting, yet far enough to be protected from his awkwardness if he's a weirdo. The barkeep greets you amiably and asks if you will need a food menu. You reply with a pithy remark that informs the bartender that you are only drinking, but aren't a raging alcoholic. You order a beer, so as to seem a little more respectable (it's the middle of the day after all) and start a tab. Grabbing your drink and head to a table in the bar area near the wall and are fortunate enough to find an outlet. The table is close to the bar and provides a good view of the entire establishment in order to allow for ample people watching and eavesdropping. You begin to unpack your backpack. You place your beer on the side of your non dominant hand so that it will not be in the way of your writing process, but keep it in clear line of sight so that you don't clumsily knock it off the table. You plug in the computer and meticulously set up the table to write. Your computer is directly in front of you, your mouse is just to its side, your primary notebook is next to the mouse precariously close to the edge, and your secondary notebook is behind it. As you boot up your laptop you take a sip of your beer and take in your surrounding. There are anticipatory bees buzzing in your stomach, a happy sort of anxiety due to the new surroundings and mild excitement to start your writing for the day. You open your notebook to the appropriate page with short hand notes for today's writings and begin to clack away at your keyboard.
1 Drink Down, 50% Creativity - You finish the last sip of your beer and sit back to reread what you've already written. Sure it's riddled with grammatical and spelling errors, but it's a good start, future you can deal with cleanup later. You quickly save your work and head back to the bar for seconds. You make small talk with the bartender and tell him that you are only visiting for a few days. The man who was at the bar when you walked in chimes in and informs you that this bar is great, and you should definitely come back on a Friday or Saturday night, then continues to say some moderately inappropriate things about the moral fabric of the young (insert the object of your sexual preference here) in the town. You make a not exactly empty, but definitely offhanded vow to return to establishment during the weekend. The bartender returns with your drink, you put it on your tab and return to your table. You, now being future you, reread what you've written and apply those grammatical and spelling corrections that you noticed earlier. You spend a good portion of the beer working on these corrections. When you do begin to write again you do so at a slower pace. That little break and onset drowsiness has put a damper on your creative flow. You spend the remainder of the beer writing a paragraph, looking around the bar, and eavesdropping on the couple and bartender/bartended.
2 Drinks Down, 80% Creativity - Another beer down and another trip to the bar. The man at the bar is still sitting alone, but is decidedly more subdued and less chatty. You have the briefest of interactions with the bartender with only an order, confirmation, and beer passing between you. When you sit down at the table this time you feel refreshed. The drowsiness of the first beer has worn off and you are ready to attack this post. You start writing at much quicker pace and begin to include pop-culture/obscure references that you fact check on the worldwide web. You have 9 browser tabs open and are constantly navigating between them and your blog to ensure that you are using words in the proper context and your obscure references are factually accurate. You even begin to utilize the shif-tab combo to switch between screens to allow for efficiency to the extreme. You are shift-tabbing, writing with inspiration and alacrity, and taking perfunctory sips without so much as noticing the bar filling around you. You have reached the elevated plane of function colloquially known as "the zone." You reach down for your beer with your eyes rereading what you've wrote, lift it to your mouth and discover that it is empty. It was an exciting run, you were able to write without pause through an entire beer.
3 Drinks Down, 100% Creativity - You are beaming with good vibes as you approach the bar for round 4. Your witty remarks translate as well spoken as they had written, and you and the bartender banter like old friends. You're feeling great and a little mischievous. "Let's see if this place makes a good Old Fashioned" you say to yourself, fully aware of how much time goes into constructing the cocktail, and then order the drink like the smug punk that you are. You have an extended conversation with the barkeep about the merits of whisky vs. brandy old fashioneds (you are a proponent of the brandy variety and tell him why) and the two of you speak about the venerated cocktail for a good five minutes before he begins to make the drink. You watch intently and are relieved to see him grab a pestle for the muddling process. A good sign, you think to yourself, and then stare intently at the process as you scrutinize the process in your head. "Seems acceptable," you think to yourself as the bartender presents you with the cocktail 5 minutes later. You take a sip and nod your approval to the man and then strut back to your table. You look at the screen and reread some of your previous work. "What drivel" you think, and rewrite it in an acceptable manner. You have now achieved a full symbiosis with the bar around you: you are smiling at the witty remarks of the new patron at the bar and researching an obscure Wild West reference simultaneously. You achieved a zen of expression, the input of sensory perceptions is occurring simultaneously with your output of written creative expression. The more fervently you write, the more fervently you drink. This blogging nirvana is short lived as you notice you have downed your entire old fashioned. You look down reverently at your glass as you lament its untimely passing.
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| 100% Creativity As you look around the room everything is fueling your creative juices. You are seeing symbols of literary achievement everywhere. The chairs have become more comfortable. The art on the wall is speaking to you in profound ways . . . And is that a God damn American Flag on the wall!? Who cares if it might be a hallucination, it's a creativity fueling hallucination of freedom. U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! |
4 Drinks Down, 80% Creativity - You leap off of your stool and then pause for a minute, because you are feeling a little light headed. Only for second though, as you regain your bearings and swagger up to the bar like the alcohol fueled cock-strong son of a bitch that you are. You are on top of the world, you are a juggernaut of creative expression, and you deserve to drink hard alcohol. You remind yourself that the bartender was able to adequately and correctly construct an old fashioned, so you allow the now venerated craft cocktail crafter to suggest a drink. He asks if you like mezcal, and by George you do. He suggests a mezcal drink and you say "Yep, I'll have that." As you wait you are smiling a wry smile. Could it be the alcohol increasing your feelings of grandeur or is it a justified sense of self-satisfaction that comes from creating something of quality? You don't know, and you certainly don't care, because you feel great. The bartender returns, unveils the drink, and explains the ingredients and how they meld together to create a complimentary flavor collaboration. You take a sip, give kudos where kudos are due, and return to the table to tap out some more phrases. You begin to type more slowing and almost as easily as you were before . . . almost. You find yourself making more and more grammatical mistakes and mistyping wrong letters more frequently than you had before. You are tapping the backspace more and more frequently, but you are not deterred, because the thoughts flowing through your dome piece are still of the highest quality. You give up on attempting to correct every grammatical mistake and resign yourself to deal with that shit later. After what seems like a mere couple of minutes you realize that your drink is no more. It is time to recharge.
5 Drinks Down, 50% Creativity - This time as you step off of your stool you noticeably stumble. You begin to admit that you may be starting, but only starting, to get a little tipsy (but only a little). You walk a little slower to the bar and decide that it may be time to slow down a little bit. "Beer" you think, "Beer is the ticket." You grab a drink list at the bar and peruse the menu, being careful to read about every beer in order to select the very best one. You decide on an amber ale. It's light, refreshing, and has some flavor. It sounds like the perfect cure to what ails you. You notice that the man standing behind the bar isn't a man at all, there's now a woman standing in front of you. Your bartender friend has forsaken you. You quickly reminisce about all the good times the two of you had together and then say the farewell in your head that you weren't able to say in person. Dejectedly, you order your beer from this new person . . . whoever she is. She fills it with a smile ("a mocking smile" you think) and puts it in front of you. She has the nerve to ask what your name is, the old bartender would've known. You give her your name, grab your drink, give a perfunctory smile, and return to your table. You place your drink on the table and take a moment to look up at the quickly filling bar around you. There are at least 15 people in the pub now, and they all seem to be having lively conversations. You sip your beer and listen in on a conversation between two couples. From the sound of it, they can't wait for the weekend, one of the guys is ridiculous according to his significant other (who would know him better than anyone, clearly), and 3 out of four of them love IPA's while the other isn't a fan. "Seems like fun" you think, and then lower your head to start writing again. Your writing pace has slowed significantly and you are still making an exorbitant amount of grammatical errors, but you begrudgingly trudge on. Your head is also feeling a little fuzzy. You are having a hard time thinking of . . . those things with letters put together into speaking things. You write a sentence and then eavesdrop on the other patrons for a good five minutes, it would appear that the night crowd is beginning to arrive and your beer has left.
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| The Night Crowd *Not Pictured: Your Beer |
6 Drinks Down, 5% Creativity - You decide to grab one more drink and finish up your writing. You have come to terms that you are drunk and you don't give a fuck. You will finish this writing bologna quick, ditch all of your crap, and go out to have as much fun as everyone around you. Screw that, you'll have MORE fun than them. You decide to sail into the storm and order a whisky and coke. The bartender, whoever she is, brings it to you, asks for you name (again), and you tell her that you would like to close out. You wait impatiently as you listen the euphony of merriment around you. You grab your drink and return to your table. You stare at your screen and are having difficulty reading the squiggles on the screen. It must be the lighting in the place. You write a paragraph of those letter balls onto the screen. You hit your breaking point and can take no more, so you decide to leave. You pack up your computer and other writing paraphernalia into your backpack as quickly as you can. You grab your wallet from the table, make sure your phone is in your pocket, and your keys are in your other pocket. You slap each pocket in succession to ensure that you've got your goods and hurriedly stagger towards the exit. As you get close to the exit that new bartender calls after you. You turn around, not pleased in the slightest to be halted with the exit beckoning you. She asks "Is that your backpack?". You look behind you to see your backpack. "Yes." you answer curtly, and then lurch back to retrieve it. You fling it over your should with a complete and utter lack of grace or regard and stumble towards the exit.
Thus ends your day of writing at a bar. You have made it out alive, but your piece is still incomplete. You have forsaken your task in order to head back to the hostel. You arrive, clamber up the steps, fumble your way past the lock, and toss your backpack on the bunk. You shuffle your way down to the hostel lounge where you meet a group of Croatians on a bus trip. Your newly founded group heads to the bar around the corner and drinks for 6 hours until you are all extremely drunk chummy good pals.
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| You spend your night at Cafe Klatatsch where you learn and then immediately forget the history of the Croatian War of Independence. |
The End
