deadlines and deadends

I allowed myself leisure on Monday. Ideas are the source of my power, but when I forget them, I am powerless. So I have to rediscover the things I believed weeks or months ago.

I slept in late, did a fair amount of thinking, still keeping up with mini yoga routines, and ended up watching the Watchmen movie in the evening. There was a little work on music somewhere in there.

The Watchmen movie was surprisingly good - about as close to the novel as you can get. They changed a few details - like how the good/evil mastermind ushered in a new world order - but they gave a great overview. Especially to people who've read the book.

I've decided that to work on music necessitates a clear mind. And yet I've been spending a lot of time filling my mind up, leading to distractions or just unclear thinking. Everything you learn must be assimilated, organized in the structures of your mind. These periods seem to come and go in waves. A period of intake followed by a period of purging. A period consuming, a period digesting, a period excreting the excess as waste. So I'm back to saying no to say yes. Limiting my intake so I can process what I think I know. Synthesize. It's just that it's hard to create in a period of intake. Creating is synthesizing, purging.

So that's what's on the plate for this week. Info fasting and synthesizing. [read: less internet.] Adhering to a more rigid structure, treating it more like work.

And then to Chicago this weekend for operas upon operas.