...Looming Like a Great Looming Thing

By Kathleen Bradean

"...Looming Like a Great Looming Thing"

Any fan of Blackadder will recognize that quote. Anyone who doesn’t know Balckadder has missed one of the best comedic television series of all time. I'm most partial to the Elizabethan ones, which feature such great actors as Miranda Richardson and Stephen Fry. If you're a Huge Laurie (of House fame) fan see the Regency ones. The entire cast comes together perfectly in the World War I episodes.

I'm off on a tangent, which is bad news considering that I have a deadline quickly approaching. Sundays are my deadline days. Every week I have an Oh Get a Grip article to write, and every month I review a book for Erotica Revealed. I used to review for the Erotica Readers and Writers Association too, but when reviews were cut down to a max of 700 words, it felt more like rewriting the back blurb than writing a real review. Besides, ERWA only accepts positive reviews, so I often read an entire book only to find that I couldn't "review" for them, so I felt my time was wasted.

Like every other adult on this earth, my time is in short supply, so I have to be on the constant look-out for claim jumpers. You know what I'm talking about. Those people who guilt you into coaching soccer teams (as if I'd ever fall for that again, after falling for it twice) or working a fund raiser for the high school band or pitching in with set building for the high school musical. And why is it that with the hundreds of kids involved in these activities, I see the same twenty parents at all of these events? How are the rest of those parents weaseling out of any commitment? What would happen if the twenty of us went on strike? And it isn't just school stuff. Jean could tell you all about her struggles to keep Pride Day going in her town. Everyone wants to enjoy an event, but no one wants to do all the dull, time-sucking crap that makes it happen. Oops. Another tangent.

I wish I had a vault full of spare time like Scrooge McDuck's vault of gold, and that I could sneak down to swim in my horded minutes and hours whenever I wanted to or better yet, toss great wads of time on my bed and roll around in it with sybaritic abandon. So much lovely time. I'd grab handfuls of it and let it trickle through my fingers while laughing gleefully and perhaps a bit maniacally but only for the cartoon effect. Deadlines? I'd sneer at them, because my infinite supply of spare time would act as an impenetrable force field. Maybe I'd call myself Time Girl or maybe The Hourglass. *looks at figure* Well, obviously String Theory is out of the question.

I once met a girl whose name was spelled Infinite but pronounced Infinity. Maybe there was supposed to be a little accent over her final E. Anyway, imagine the possibilities. She was the embodiment of TimeItSelf. Sort of. That was her brother's name. No fooling.

Tangent.

Anyway, there are three ways to handle deadlines. 1) See them coming from far away and plan accordingly. 2) Panic. 3) Denial.

You get to guess which method I chose this week.