Graduation month

October is nearly over. Mine started with some non-existent work experience. They didn’t get back to me until over a week later, saying they forgot I was meant to be in that week. I left it at that.

I played a gig at Pivo Pivo on the 18th and it went well. I did a 4-song set – two instrumentals and two with vocals. I used my friend’s digital piano and although it sounded good, I think I’ll use a real piano for my next gig. The sound from a real piano can’t be replicated, which is a wee shame coz there’s not many places that have an in house piano.

I graduated on the 21st. Ten seconds to collect the degree, two hours of clapping. I liked the graduation though. It was a good end to my university education.

I reviewed a book called ‘The Secret Crown’ by Chris Kuzneski. It is easily one of the worst books I have ever read. Kuzneski ticks every box in what not to do. Pages of pointless research everywhere and anywhere – tick, unoriginal, stereotypical main characters – tick, an annoying female character whose only role is to be needy and fall in love with the main man, a story that makes no fucking sense – tick. Added to this was a complete lack of tension and suspense. If I wasn’t reviewing it I wouldn’t have went past page ten.

On the other hand, the novel I read after it called ‘White’ by Marie Darrieussecq was excellent. It’s an unusual story set in the Antarctica and was everything ‘The Secret Crown’ wasn’t.

I finished the first draft on my own novel on Tuesday afternoon. It’s taken me around a year. I’m going to leave it a few weeks now, then I’ll start re-drafting and get as many people as possible to read it before a final draft.

I read an interesting fact today that the average human only lives for around 650,000 hours. When life span is expressed in hours it makes me realise how short it is and that I’ve wasted too many of mine doing shitty jobs. It also makes me more determined to finish my book and do something worthwhile with the hours I’ve got left.