Reflections of time

If you're wondering what I'm going to write after such a grand title for an entry, then I fear I may be joining you in that.  However...

What I was thinking of is how we use our time and how much of it we waste. 

The reason for today's musing is this - another fine question has arrived in my inbox, and it asks in essence; "How do I come up with some of the strange tweets I post?" 

In truth I've edited the inquiry a little, there was a suggestion some were more than a tad strange, accompanied by the thought that my mind must be either jolly creative, or simply mad.

On that matter I won't - daren't?! - comment, but i will do my best to answer the question, and it comes back to the title of the blog.

I've always been fixated by time.  From early memories of watching Dr Who (very quick aside - it was the Cybermen who freaked me the most, not Daleks), i think I fairly rapidly came to the conclusion that time itself is the one enemy we can never defeat.

And from there, I've noticed time had featured strongly in many of my tastes in life.  One of my favourite paintings is Dali's The Persistence of Memory, with its mesmeric melting clocks.  A favourite poem is Eliot's Four Quartets, with its reflections on time.

For all the great innovations of mankind, it's time that always hunts us down in the end.  We can make new friends, make money, make so many things, but we can't make more time for ourselves.  And for that reason, I hate wasting time. 

What has this to do with the question I was posed, you may well be asking by now? Well, the answer is this.

It's unavoidable in life, I suppose, that we have moments where we have to wait, or be doing something we're not particularly interested in.  But I try to make even these passably worthwhile, and that's where the ideas for some of my tweets come from.

I'll think of them when I'm doing mundane chores, like brushing my teeth, or shaving.  And I'll often - at risk of traumatising you with the image - think of them when I'm laying in bed at night.  In fact, it's one of my ways of getting myself off to sleep.  I find it far more enjoyable than imagining sheep, as it were...

On which subject, it's time to be getting my kit together ready for my Saturday morning self-flagellation class at the gym.  So, as I assemble the offending articles, I shall think up something, this time probably on a theme of autumn, as she's currently busy swirling leaves and greying the sky outside my window.

Don't forget, if you've got a question you'd like to ask about the tvdetective books, any area of my writing or education work, or indeed any of my often strange musings, you can get in touch via the Contact page of the site - www.thetvdetective.com/contact.html