I am not allowed to ever come up with a single original thought.
And because I'm so hooked on concept, my latest concept is to see what I can write without a concept. I guess that is kind of low-concept.
My biggest problem when writing for the paper, as I have been, is that I'm not allowed to use any profanity. OK, the argument is old. They're just words, and all that. But what I'm talking about isn't so much in the realm of explicitly talking about sex. No, I need these as adjectives.
When writing in the paper, I'm already denied things like italics and bold. I know that I could theoretically use them, but it would take some doing, and maybe a little less sloth on the part of an editor or two.
The problem is that everything that I do is very deliberate. And the difference between being automatically deliberate and naturally gifted is that the automatically deliberate thinks about everything relatively quickly. That's what I do. I think about everything I write, how it sounds, the rhythm of it. It's a verbal style that enhances the comedy, and I thing swearing is kind of inherent to that.
Maybe it is crass, but my intent is not to be overly obscene or crass. My intent is to emulate the verbal stylings of the crass, to a degree. The intent is a deliberate rhythm. You get something different from "This is so fucking stupid" than you do from "This is so stupid." You get something different from "I fuck*ng HATE myspace" than "I HATE myspace". The cussless ones sound significantly without teeth, without bite. That's not to say one needs to swear to convey effective emotion, but that it's an arbitrary handicap. It's like telling someone they can't use the word "the" to describe something, they can only use indefinite articles.
Do I survive? Sure, but I have off-weeks. Weeks where my articles lack substance or vigor, and it would be so easy to at least feign enthusiasm about my topic of default by tossing in a few cusses here and there. It's not an easy out, it's an artistic decision.
I've been picking up a lot of media lately. Books, video games, the internet. Most recently the film "Network," and it does some really amazing things satiring the establishment. The sad part, though, is that I'm so worn on analysis. I'm much more keen on observation. Sure, I love to absorb all - my dad tend sto reference that I've seen everything. But it feels like if I don't catch it all, I'm missing out. My Netflix queue, as it stands, could cover my viewing needs for a good year and a half, because I feel obligated to accept so many ideas. And I'm just, at the moment, burnt on consumption.
Creation, now, there's a different beast altogether. But it's always high on concept and weak on execution. Sure, I thrive in the applied medium, but... well.
Let me put out the example. As a CS major, I almost expect myself to have the next great idea. The problem is, no one these days does it themselves. It's always duos - even if it's one single person who gets the fame, it at least started as a duo. Sergey Brin and Larry Page. Chad Hurley and Steve Chen. Bill Gates and Paul Allen.
I'm not around anyone who has a similar ambitious or creative streak right now. Maybe it's that we're all tired and in school. Maybe that's it.