Organization

 

Finally got my complete set of Aubrey-Maturin novels in order. Unfortunately they don't all match and couple have kitty teeth marks on them so I'm not showing the whole thing.

I enjoy reading the weekly newsletter Orbital Operations from the multi-disciplinary writer Warren Ellis. I first encountered the work of Ellis through his excellent, fast paced novel Gun Machine. He is a geyser of creativity, mostly known for screenwriting, comics, and graphic novels. Some of the properties are huge: Iron Man, Red, and the Netflix animated series Castlevania. But his newsletters and blog posts are just as engaging. He opens his mind so you can see what is going on, how he works and thinks, and even to a certain extent how he lives.

Ellis's work is systematic and thorough, yet still artistic. He consumes prodigious quantities of print fiction, old movies, comics, old and contemporary television, and the newsletters and blog posts of other writers. He listens to obscure but beautiful ambient music and is a keen observer of industrial design. He works in his garden and prepares food and craft drinks. Granted, he does not work a regular day job, so he can spend his day from dawn until past sunset studying, writing, and working. And it all seems relevant to his career.

I want this for my own life. Ellis's creative industriousness is a source of inspiration. He is usually either writing, seeking sources of inspiration, meeting or communicating for business, or organizing his home and garden. It motived me to try to organize my chaos of books at home and my vast library of electronic files in iCloud. I'm something of a packrat, in both analog and digital worlds. As always, I made some progress then bogged down. When I bog down, I sometimes don't resume for weeks, or months, or in some cases years. This is why I'm not as successful as Warren Ellis (among other reasons).

Unfortunately it looks like the link to subscribe to Orbital Operations is currently broken, but you can still check out Warren's official online presence at Warren Ellis, Ltd. It has much of the same feel as the newsletter. And you can listen to ambient music on some of the embedded players.

Maybe they will fix the link by the time you get to it.