Is Anybody There?

"Remember when you used to have a blog? That was fun." - My buddy Mike last week.

Wow, it's been three months since I checked in here. If you're still around reading, you may want to get used to this. I tend to fall off the face of the internet from time to time, and in the Winter, especially. Maybe I should just put up a graphic of a hibernating bear from December through February. No! This time next year, the blog will have been flourishing non-stop throughout the colder months. Is Internet Seasonal Affective Disorder a thing (I SAD)? Because I don't get emotionally depressed like a person with regular Seasonal Affective Disorder, but my blog, Twitter and Facebook feeds tend to get neglected. Maybe I should call it Internet Sensitive-Only Sesaonal Affective Disorder so I can call it "I So Sad". Ah, it feels good to be rambling again.

So, what to do? I can catch you up on a few things with me. I made a few resolutions this New Year, so here's how that's going:

1) Get out of credit card debt
This is going exceedingly well. Melissa and I are in what I call "Budget Crackdown" mode. No going out for dinner, no buying little things we don't need, every extra penny goes to our credit card debt. Thankfully, Disneyland for us is essentially a free trip. We have one card down, the second will be done this weekend, and that only leaves one. I expect to be done by the end of March. I'll still have student loans, and we'll have a car loan by the summer, but to be out from under the thumb of the credit companies is going to feel damn good.

2) Write creatively every day
I haven't done this every single day, but most days for sure. I finished the first draft of a new screenplay with my writing partner Josh (we're waiting on some responses right now) and have been working on the first television spec I've written in years. I've done some preliminary work on a cartoon I'm working on with my friends. I've also written a few jokes for a standup routine I'll probably never perform, but you never know. So what haven't I been writing? This blog. But you knew that.

3) Run a Marathon without stopping
Training is going very well, my last long training run is this Sunday (20 miles) and the marathon is less than 3 weeks away. My time isn't going to be what I had hoped it would be, but it won't be terrible (probably between 4:30 and 4:45).

4) Start barbershopping
I haven't done this yet. January was supposed to be my "Month of Barbershop." So was February. Things aren't looking good for March. I'll look again in April. Unfortunately, the choruses I really want to sing with are over an hour away from me.

So that leaves the old Scribe and Mouse (in case you haven't been paying attention, that's the name of this blog). I don't think it's too late to do a Selzer & Smuckles recap, so look for that soon (and I mean it this time). After that, I don't know. I could go back to my "ranting about whatever" format, but people really seemed to respond to the Selzer & Smuckles/cooking blog format. I still cook plenty, I could keep blogging about it (even though there are millions of cooking blogs out there already). I'll probably do a hybrid format of some sort - talk about what I'm cooking, but with more ranting interludes than before. I could always talk about crosswords again (I know how much everyone loved that). We'll see. It's an adventure.

Anyway, that's where we stand, and I look forward to having all of you reading my words again. Sorry if this seemed a little sloppy and disorganized - I have to get my blog legs back. See you soon!

Cheers,
Eli