by RAF KATIGBAK

Sometimes I’m a complete idiot. Well, at least I feel like one. As anyone who’s ever had to write an essay, paper, dissertation, thesis, love letter, e-mail or post-it note can attest, having writer’s block sucks the sweat off a dead man’s you-know-what (balls). I don’t care if you’re a seasoned scribe or a budding Shakespeare who likes to take some creative licence when filling out the medical questionnaire at the dentist’s office—“Doubt that the sun doth move, doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt the last date of my check-up was April 2006”—if you’re not in the mood, there’s nothing scarier than a blank page.

Some experts believe that writer’s block is just a state of mind and that if you sit down long enough and really concentrate, sooner or later it’ll work itself out of your system, and eventually something will come out. Yes, in many ways, creativity is like that beef ’n’ bean burrito I had two days ago.

But what happens when you’re faced with a looming deadline, and sitting down isn’t doing you any good? Well, as Dionne and Friends so poignantly pointed out, that’s what friends are for.

It never fails. Any time I’ve been approached by strangers, they always feel the need to give me ideas for columns. Depending on their blood/alcohol level, these suggestions can range from the “hilarious” to the “out there” to the “shit that would make Stephen King get the boo-boo-jeebies.”

If their efforts are well intentioned, I break it to them easy. “You know, I’d love to write about how your friend just scored a sweet deal on a spoiler for his Honda CRX, but I’m not sure if I’m qualified to write about that.”

When things get a little uncomfortable, like the time an older, frazzled and recently divorced gentleman wanted me to feature his Web page where he does a point-by-point delineation of how his ex is cavorting with the devil and is now a minion of the dark lord placed on this Earth to crush all that is gorgeous and beautiful in the world including ownership of his new snowmobile, I usually just nod and say things like, “Oh really, your crowning piece of evidence is the fact that her name spells ‘Ah Satan!’ in reverse? That’s very compelling...” and then back away slowly.

Sometimes, though, I get a great idea that pulls me out of my empty-headed stupor. Case in point: at a recent pool party, well, a pool-party-themed bar night, a young lady in a rainbow winter ski coat and smoking bangs named Jacqueline B. approached me with an idea. “You should write about those goddamn Alouettes. What a bunch of wimps.”

But she wasn’t referring to the fact that our hometown hopefuls just choked like Mama Cass in yet another Grey Cup final on Sunday, but rather what she had apparently read earlier that day in the paper. “Winnipeg Cold is the Alouettes’ Greatest Foe!?” she said incredulously, “I’m from Winnipeg, it’s like, quit your bitching and entertain us.”

“Perfect,” I thought. “How could a team from Montreal—where it gets so cold that most men’s testicles retreat to become ovaries (which is my theory why there are so many metrosexuals)—complain about the cold? Aren’t these guys supposed to be the toughest of the tough? Giant hunks of masculinity getting teary-eyed when Jack Frost nips at their jock straps? What a scoop!” Alas, I was unable to locate the article in question. In fact, I found a couple saying how the cold was not a factor and how they were ready for anything. Well, almost anything.

Indeed, the Alouettes did kind of suck, but not because they couldn’t take the cold. Perhaps, in the end, they couldn’t take the heat. Hopefully that doesn’t mean they’ll give up. Just like me and that beef ’n’ bean burrito, they just have to get back on the porcelain saddle, concentrate, and eventually something will come out of it, but hopefully, unlike that burrito, next time it won’t be shit.

Riff-Raff@sympatico.ca

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