The Naruto Effect

I never meant to give up blogging, but it's starting to look like I did. Well, I didn't give it up. I've just been extremely bad at it.

I've been pretty much alone for the last two weeks. M. is on the East Coast, one of my flatmates has been housesitting, and the other two are working nightly at their restaurant jobs. I'm not used to being alone anymore. Everything feels silent and strange.

At first there were all these grand plans of Getting Stuff Done. I was going to tighten up the whole ship. Develop good sleeping habits, do my math homework, plan for the rest of my life, water the plants regularly, and so forth. But after two weeks alone, I am pretty sure I have accomplished nothing.

I call it the Naruto Effect after the way it struck one of my flatmates a few years back. His wife spent a few weeks in Europe, leaving him to his own devices. During this time we witnessed his devolution. On the rare occasion of his leaving his room, he shuffled about the house in wrinkled shirts. He drank martinis made of cheap gin, ate bowls of cold rice mixed with Prego from the jar, and watched the whole Naruto series on his computer. As far as I know, besides going to work, this was all he did while his wife was away.

Fast-forward to this week. My productivity is shot. It's been deteriorating for a while now, but this week it's nonexistant. I go to work late, come back late, stick a pizza in the oven, shuffle downstairs to watch a TV show. It's Buffy the Vampire Slayer instead of Naruto, but the same principle applies. I'm experiencing the Naruto Effect. I finally finished the whole damn series, which should set me free, but will it?

I don't think it's about Buffy any more than my flatmate's catatonia was about Naruto. Now that it's over, I will just find another way to waste time. I wish I could figure out how to focus myself. There's no clarity now. There's just the whooosh sound of the days passing. (Yes, and staccato sentences.)

Maybe in the coming days I will direct my lack of focus (can I say that?) toward blogging. Hah! Well, stranger things have happened.