Time-Wasting

I am an expert on this subject.  I suspect that many writers are similarly expert.  I have a free morning so I sit down in front of the computer, all ready to pick up my novel where I left off yesterday evening.

But, before I click to open the chapter, I must check my emails and reply to them, and I’d better have a quick look at Facebook too, both my personal page and my author’s page.  Ah, some links there to someone blogging.  I’ll click on those and add a comment – since we writers have to support each other.

Which has reminded me to check what next week’s topic is on our group blog, Heroines with Hearts.

Ah, it’s ‘What genre I write and why’.  Well, that should be easy enough.  I’ll just play a game of Pyramid Solitaire while I have a think about it. 

Twenty games later, I suddenly remember I haven’t checked the latest posts on the several yahoo groups where I’m a member, so I pop into those, read the posts and maybe make a few comments.

Right, I’ve now caught up with everything else, so I’ll go and make a mug of coffee, then I’ll get to work. While I drink it, I switch on the TV because I haven’t seen the news yet this morning.  I’m about to switch off when the morning magazine programme starts but I see they’re doing a feature about the Lake District, so I have to stay and watch that.

Okay, time to go back to my study now.  I’ll just pick up this morning’s post from the doormat.  Oh good, this month’s writing magazine has arrived, but I’ll save that until later.

A couple more emails have arrived, better see what those say, and I’ll have another look to see who else has been on Facebook…

And now this ancient computer has slowed down to a crawl, so I need to reboot.

While it’s grinding into action again, I open the writing magazine.  Oh look, there’s an article here about procrastination …

Please tell me you know exactly what I’m talking about and not that you’re a super-disciplined writer!