What a crazy week!
I mean, I thought I was swamped last week. Turns out that was a cakewalk compared to this week. This week I was scheduled to be out of town for half the week, which meant I would barely have time to even think about this week's theme, which was "Two Down, One To Go".
So, planning ahead, I decided to play it safe and write+record a short fiction piece. I mean, I love writing fiction. So, I figured this would be a good exercise. And recording it as a monologue would still make it an audio story.
But my brain just wouldn’t let up. It kept throwing these shards of ideas at me. reminding me that the whol eidea of this podcast was to get better at doing non-fiction pieces! So, I started considering a few of these idea-shards…
Yeah, yeah, I know, big mistake and all that… ☹
But, once my brain gets going, it is basically like a runaway train…
The first thought that had popped into my head when I saw the theme was my own attempts at getting myself into shape. I've managed to shed a couple of kilos over the past couple of weeks but there's still lots more to go, and not just 'one'. I could have swung it since the story was still channeling the same spirit but, nah...
Then, while booking my travel for going out of town, I noticed that the travel operators still had disclaimers about COVID-19 vaccinations on their booking rules and regulations That got me thinking. How many people in India did actually take the third shot of the vaccine? (Here, we called them 'precautionary' doses, by the way.) I put out a call on twitter and found someone who had a unique story but I just couldn’t fit them into my schedule.
Then I found this tweet:
In case that tweet has been deleted or removed, it is from a user named ‘Jon_Wyner’, and it says, “Bad things happen in threes. Two down, one to go. Jay needs to be careful.”
I didn’t really check who the Jay being referred to was, but the idea was quite interesting. In India, we have a similar saying that goes something like, “Eeja, beeja, teeja…” which basically translates to “First, second, third…” and is often used when two (unrelated) deaths happen in quick succession. It is usually meant to signify that a third death is looming… Very ominous.
Except, I don’t consider myself qualified to talk about death and grieving and it is a difficult subject that needs a lot of care. So, that went out too.
Then, on Friday evening, after I had finished my last calendar commitment, I met a really interesting young dude named Harsh Savergaonkar. The rest of that story you’ve already heard in the episode. If you haven’t, here’s the episode:
However, I know for a fact that I did not do justice to Harsh or the story I was hoping to tell. I didn’t really have a concrete line of thought going in and my interview questions were a bit all over the place. The only excuse I have is that I recorded the interview on Saturday afternoon and spent the rest of the day (and the entire night) cutting tape and putting together the story. I did get some great bytes but I was so exhausted by the time I brought the whole thing together that I was practically nodding off at the edit table… :(
If it were any other podcast, I would go back and re-do the edits. Probably, re-do the entire interview, even. Replace the audio with a much better edit, a much better story.
But, seeing as how this podcast is all about making mistakes and learning from them, I will leave that episode up as-is and maybe do an “after-hours” edit and post it on this newsletter here…
But, lesson-f*cking-learned: I WILL NOT RUSH A STORY THAT I HAVEN’T PROPERLY PLANNED.
(Image generated using: https://www.ranzey.com/generators/bart/index.html)
🤷
Anyway, the theme for next week is “Shut Up.”
It was generated as a writing prompt on randomnamesgenerator.com. In fact, the entire prompt went something like this:
Write a 1000 word story in the crime genre. It's about a philosopher and should include a lightbulb. Also use the sentence 'Shut up.'
Bonus prompt: Your character is dying.
It is Valentine’s week and I get this prompt - I don’t know whether to laugh or cry!
I have a few ideas bounciing in my head and I’m not sure which one to go with. One of them is actually a bit tangential/orthogonal to the theme but, if I can pull it off, it might make for a fun audio-piece to listen to. I’m gonna spend tomorrow trying to see if I can gather enough material for it.
If I do, you’ll hear about it in the next episode of the podcast. If I don’t you’ll hear about it in the next edition of this newsletter!! 🤣
Of course, if you have any interesting ideas for the theme:
Until next time,
- S