Writing Tips at GarySpeer.com

I think it’s probably a truism that good writers make good trivia players.

If nothing else, the reading and research most writers do of necessity gives them a wide knowledge of a wide range of subjects.

Of course, generally speaking, generalizations are never a good idea. (That’s sort of a joke.) But in my case, and as with every writer I know, years of writing and reading has made me pretty good at “Jeopardy” and the few trivia games I play. (In fact, I rarely play trivia games. I rarely play any games. Just not a game person.)

As a recent example, I was working on something that led me to the term terry romper, which I immediately suspected had something to do with infants’ toys or infants’ sleepers. I discovered when I researched the term, I discovered it goes beyond infant clothing and is a perfectly acceptable term for adult clothing. Other odd, or even downright “weird” words I ran onto in the same research are:

assumpsit — Sounds almost “dirty” or “naughty,” doesn’t it? It’s actually a legal term related to breach of contract matters.

wenis — Term for the rough patch of skin often found on the outside of the human elbow.

Those are just two of some weird words that might be useful when you do your next trivia game. Let me give credit where it is due: Those two weird words and some others you can have great fun with came from a website I stumbled onto and have bookmarked on my computer. Take a look for yourself at “Naughty-Sounding Word for Odd Occasions” and enjoy.

I’m not exactly sure why my mind turned to this subject, but here we are. As a writer, do you rely on any “artificial stimulants” when you do your work? That is, do you feel the need for anything from a soda to mind-altering drugs when you are writing?

Just coffee works for me, thanks. Okay, an occasional diet soda or some nicely chilled green tea works, too.

It has always amazed me to read of very famous authors, and very successful best-selling authors, who I discover used everything from cocaine to pot to just plain tobacco products to “stimulate” their creative juices, or perhaps just keep them mentally active, to get their writing done.

Inevitably, most of those writers either kill or hurt themselves — or simply burn out and drop by the wayside in their writing careers.

It would seem to me, especially in a day when most folks are aware of the evils of this stuff (the marketplace is flooded with every thing from e-cigarettes to special chewing gum just to help people break their nicotine habits), that serious writers now realize the “folly of the fix,” I guess you could say.

To put this plainly: Alcohol, cigarettes, pot, cocaine, and any other of these drugs and various chemical nasties don’t help your creativity. Some people still THINK they do, but the truth is, such stuff destroys your brain cells, destroys your creativity.

How do you support your writing habit? Are you fortunate enough to be able to make a living writing full-time? Or do you rely on some sort of “day job” to pay the bills and write when you are able to fit it into a busy life?

I’ve done both of the above. Right now I’m fortunate enough to have the time to write full-time — and squeeze out a living while I’m waiting for the writing to pay off better.

At times, as have most writers, I’ve done a variety of full-time and part-time jobs. Once I applied (three times all together, actually) for a job working for a health insurance data company. Although I went through the application process, and even got an interview two of the three times, I wasn’t told until the third time I applied that they really were looking for people ALREADY trained or experienced in medical coding.

That was a decent job with good pay and benefits. I wish I’d had some sort of medical coding training courses to get the job. I also wish they’d made it clear that I needed that sort of training the two times I did get interviewed.

Ah, well. Life goes on.

So what are you doing for a “day job”? Or are you able to write full-time and make it work? Leave a comment and tell us about your adventures in supporting your writing habit.