h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So this is my first journal entry for h2g2's NaJoPoMo 2011. I can't believe I actually signed up for this since I actually hate writing. I hope I don't spend the whole month complaining about how much I hate writing.

It is unclear to me what my hang-up is. I was a little writer as a very small child. I wrote a short story about a postal stamp which everyone thought was so cute it got published in the elementary school paper.

Later in school, I couldn't tolerage criticism about my writing very well and developed a phobia about it. I spent college avoiding any class that required much writing at all. I'm sure I missed out on a lot because of that. When I did have to write in college, I would procrastinate until very shortly before the assignment was due, then I'd write some half assed tripe in the middle of the night.

This was the 80's so there was no computer. I had a manual typewriter that I inherited from my parents. I used to play with the typewriter when I was in preschool. I loved to pound on keys until I got the strikers all stuck in the middle and it became unusable. I managed to pull the strikers apart in high school and it became usable again. So in college, this is what I had to work with.

Actually at the college I went to, some instructors allowed you turn in papers hand written, so I did that a few times too. My handwriting is and was atrocious, though I think it's gotten much worse since I so rarely have to hand write anything. I can't imagine those papers even got read. (What a drag for the instructors to have to read all those papers!)

Due to my phobia, I often had to take "incompletes" in my classes. Meaning I had until the middle of the next semester to finish writing the final papers. It was embarrassing and still is. Of course I'd still put off writing the paper until very shortly before it was due and at least once had ask for more time to complete the paper.

It's been 25 years since college. My writing phobia has slightly abated, but mostly in informal writing like here. So here's to NaJoPoMo!

Classic opening paragraph hellbound

It's painful to remember the days before computers. One of my jobs in my early 20s required using a typewriter that was a fancy one that you could get to erase the word you'd just typed. Which was just as well, because I'm fairly perfectionist in this regard. The idea of using an ordinary typewriter makes me cringe - all that pulling the paper out and starting again because I got one letter wrong I'm sure it wasn't quite that bad (especially with whiteout), but the memory is still there.

I thought needing an extension on handing in papers was normal

I'm glad you can and are writing despite your history.

NaJoPoMo!

Thanks Kea! I didn't really learn to type until computers came along. I took typing in high school, but never got very good at it. I learned to type when instant messengers came along. Before that I couldn't get a job that required much typing. And even short papers took all night to type and were full of typos, I'm sure! Now I type fast.

Essays written between midnight and 3.00am, I remember that so well. And never time for a read through before handing them in. Now writing's something I really enjoy but it still takes some sort of deadline to get started.

I dropped in from the NaJoPoMo page, good luck with the 30, I hope you enjoy writing some of them at the very least!

Waz

Thanks LL. I still need a deadline too. And now I have a deadline everyday!

I always had the reverse problem - I loved writing so much I'd rather do that than any of my other home-work...

But I understand the anxious slightly phobic refusal to let people LOOK at the writing, and JUDGE it. Ick ick ick EEEEP.

Good start, though! Nice and deep.

Ah manual typewriters, gotta love 'em. I've still got a portable, must be getting on for 25 plus years old. Got a box of spare ribbons for it too.

The deadline every day, who's idea was that?

I've only learnt to type since having a computer and being on h2g2 (all those debate threads). I think that's why typing in a typewriter was so horrible, it was tedious enough on two fingers, but then I still made mistakes

I've not learned to type with my little fingers yet though.

One of my favourite books, Still Life With Woodpecker, was written on and partially about the love for the manual typewriter.

I'm seeing I should take the time to read my posts a little more carefully before hitting "post message". I see typos that could have been avoided. I'm inclined, however, to make the post without reading it over 'cause if I don't I'm afraid I'll get bogged down in editing and never get to posting. It could happen.

Kea, I don't always use my little fingers either. Sometimes it's just easier not to.

Two fingers and a thumb is sufficient, I find. They usually hit the right keys, and it saves me having to remember which finger is supposed to hit which key.