08-10-03 @ 10:06 am EDT

I'm strongly leaning toward creating a paper journal, using a composition book. I got some nice ones at Wal-Mart the other day and I can never figure out what to do with them. Still I keep hesitating.

I had thoughts of eschewing sleep to go with Ma to the Laundromat so I could walk to Wal-Mart and perhaps buy one of those nice hardcover journals, but 1. I can't be positive they HAVE any; 2. if they do, they're bound to be those ugly things covered with crappy flowers--why are most hardcover journals covered with crappy flowers?; 3. if I start writing in one of those I'll be stuck writing in that type of journal, and I'll be stuck BUYING that type of journal, and if you buy the really nice ones at the bookstore, the ones with MORE than just crappy flowers, they can cost a lot; and 4. I love sleep and I have composition books so just come on already and use the damn things. I have a rainbow of the "splotchy"-covered ones, you know, the typical comp book pattern with the weird splotches? (Who came up with that pattern, originally, and why? Very odd.) I have one of each of black and white (typical color), green, teal, blue, dark blue/indigo, violet/puce, magenta/pink, dark red, and orange. (No yellow ones! Hum.) I put them all in nice order like that, a rainbow. :) (Couldn't put red first because there's no yellow to transition between the green and the orange, and so it would...oh, never mind, you don't have OCD so you wouldn't understand...) But I'm thinking of saving those nice ones for something...else. I don't know what. I would SO love to fill them with goofy junk like I used to do with the old WTNT TV Studios tapes--Scaredy Question Kitten, the Loch Ness Monster, Bal Val Hal the newsguy, Roving Reporter (he is ALWAYS reporting from "the busy streets of NEW YORRRRRRK!" *cue cars zooming by*), Stupid McCupid and Irly Win, Chef Boo, Master Fart and Hitler, etc. etc. etc....but I always get writer's block. Ugh. New King Kuts stories would be fun too; I thought maybe a bit of everything could be put in them, and I could look back on them when I'm bored or blue and laugh. Who knows. Maybe, maybe not. Bla bla hmffgghhnn.

But I have four glittery-covered ones--navy blue, olive green, leather brown, and this ugly reddish-orange which just does not go with the other three pretty colors--and I thought maybe I'd use those for a paper journal. I'd use the ugly one first in case it goes nowhere, then I at least just used the ugly one. :/ I realize this is an incredibly boring entry and you're free to bail out on me any time you like. But anyway, such a journal would not spell the end of the online Skew. I think it would just supplement it. You see, as long as there are people reading Skew--and as much as I prefer that--I can't be 100% honest about everything. Well, I'm honest about most of what I POST in here (I can think of one time where I kind of anonymized myself by attributing some things I had posted to someone else--and no, it had nothing to do with any of my numerous conflicts with anybody here or on any other site, it was a neutral entry, so don't worry, I never made up anything about anything else), but I can't post everything that I would like to post. I hate to say this, but sometimes the people I care about and LIKE online can get me upset...please none of you get mad at me, I'm sure I get you guys upset too, don't I? (please don't answer)...and rather than subject them to hurt by posting that here, I've posted a few entries in an anonymous journal elsewhere. BUT...I can't be NEARLY as myself in THERE as I can in HERE, because in order to maintain the anonymity of the thing, I can never refer to my regular journal (this one, Skew), can never refer to myself by username, can never reveal details about my life or writing or whatever, etc. In short, I have to keep everything about me vague. (You should know by now how bad I am at vagueness.) So you see how NEITHER journal offers 100%...um...what was the word I was seeking?...disclosure?...something like that. I'm sure you understand what I mean. If you're still reading. Which I doubt, by now. Bla bla gnnnggfffhggg.

That really should have been two paragraphs. Agh. Anyway, in a paper journal I could be free to write ANYTHING. I'm sure I would not write nearly as much in it as I do here because it's much easier to type. (I could simply type up an offline journal, but it takes away some of the pleasure of actually writing words on clean paper, and maybe doodling attention-deficitly while you should be writing...I like to doodle little swirls. I have filled entire pages with swirls. Once while talking on the phone I nervously doodled my characters' names all over a page, and my school notebooks are loaded with more doodles than they are with notes...back to the entry. Sorry.) I can also turn to a paper journal when I'm not near the computer, like when a random thought hits me. Can't really do that with online Skew or a computer Skew. (Which at the moment is just the online Skew backup.)

Cons? Well, like I said, typing is easier and gets the thoughts out faster...if I were writing this I probably would have trailed off somewhere up above by now...not sure if that sentence even made sense. See what I mean? I would not even have bothered continuing in this entry. But anyway, there's the anal part of me that just likes and prefers keeping all my journalish stuff in one place. I hated starting Skew 2, and in my offsite backups you'll notice it's just combined with Skew. I hate how I had to separate the anonymous journal from the rest and until now have considered the entries just "waste material," and have not even backed them up anywhere because I sort of denied their importance, even though I should probably keep them because they served a purpose in expressing myself (albeit VERY bitchily). Or something. (Oh...I just came across a photograph of a trough in the woods and had thoughts of Kristeva, and that reminds me of my swirls again...*cough*...never mind...too much to explain.) I declined entering a journaling group here, even after initially being accepted in, because the requirement was that you start a new journal to put the exercises in rather than use your old one and I did not want to do that. (Group had a discussion forum for the entries so I don't see why I couldn't have just posted links to my entries in there, would have saved space on creating a new item for only a few posts...group's probably gone under by now anyway. *hmf*) So you see how I am with my personal journals; I like to keep it all together. (Plus it's a lot easier than starting new journals to back up additional Skews on sites that don't allow multiple journal creation so easily!)

There's also a part of me clamoring for me to type up said written entries once they're done and post them here. UGH, shut up, Part! That kind of obliterates the purpose of a paper journal! Maybe, once in a while if I had a really "good" offline entry that I felt would be good for online Skew and which didn't reveal anything too personal, I could perhaps type it up and share it with the world. (All five of you! Or the two of you who checked out my past entries five times...or whatever...I hardly dare flatter myself thinking there are really five people reading this thing. At least, five people who would admit it.) But I would rather have to make myself keep the personal stuff OFFLINE where it belongs. A paper journal could be my outlet when I'm so upset by online things that I banish myself from here...and you've seen that happen. (No, hasn't happened the past few days; just didn't feel like writing. I haven't typed up that dream entry yet. :( Yesterday I dreamed my mom had her throat slit by an Islamic terrorist and as always I had an inordinate amount of trouble dialing 911...whatever that means...)

Well...I think I just ran out of steam here, or maybe I was running on fumes for half this entry anyway. o_o I don't know what else to type. I think I covered just about everything I planned to babble about concerning a paper journal. Now regular readers here (all two of you) know that the last time I kept such a journal was in high school (not counting the mandatory sixty(?)-entry one for college, with given prompts), and that lasted for like two months. Previous attempts from junior high and possibly earlier didn't fare much better. Frankly I don't think I have it in me to create a decent paper journal without getting too bored with the idea; I'm too much of an exhibitionist. I'd've created one a long time ago if it weren't for the part of me that likes sharing EVERYTHING here in Skew...and just biting my tongue on the few things I can't share.

Rather than bite my tongue maybe it's time I just wrote it down the old-fashioned way. Don't know if it'll help (not that I need much journal help, I guess) or if it'll hold my interest, but I can just try it out, I suppose. In that icky orangish book, of course.

Well, I'm officially bored with my own entry and have to go now. Tar.