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I\u2019m finally writing a paper. It\u2019s one that\u2019s been percolating for about a year. A year, that\u2019s actually not a long time in the making. That\u2019s just the way it is sometimes. As much as you might want it to be otherwise, some ideas just take their own good time to coalesce.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve assumed until recently that somewhere some kind of processing happens. Even when you\u2019re not consciously thinking about the overdue writing, something goes on behind the scenes. So when you come back to the writing, it\u2019s there. Well enough of it is there. You know what to do and how to start.<\/p>\n
But I think I\u2019ve changed my mind. Maybe. Perhaps the other option is that you leave the writing and you really don\u2019t process it at all and when you come back to it afresh you just have a new take on it. Because you are somewhere else. And.\/or you have more energy for the writing task.<\/p>\n
So is it percolate or nothing happens? Which option makes more sense to me? Well, my thinking is that this is currently a choice between a car and a sourdough starter.<\/p>\n
The car.<\/strong>\u00a0We have a relatively new hybrid which we left in Australia at the beginning of this year. Now hybrids have two batteries. There\u2019s the stonking big and expensive battery which does all of the alternate power work with the fossil fuel. And there\u2019s the teeny little battery that gets the whole system going.<\/p>\n So we were away for a while. And we knew from experience that there was a pretty strong chance that the little battery wouldn\u2019t work when we got back. In other words, the car wouldn\u2019t start. We\u2019d have to get someone out to jump start the little battery (and the car). That\u2019s what we were expecting.<\/p>\n This was not to be. As it happened, the little battery wasn\u2019t just out of juice. It had actually died while we were away. So we had to get a new one. I won\u2019t bore you with how inconvenient this all was, but it was.<\/p>\n But what we learnt was that, while we were away, the teeny little battery wasn\u2019t inactive. It kept busy doing little things. Beavering away. Working with auto data. Whatever. Even though the car wasn\u2019t used, the little battery was working away in the background till it just ran out of energy.<\/p>\n The sourdough starter.<\/strong>\u00a0We not only left the car in the garage when we were away, but also abandoned the sourdough starter. Normally we would put the starter into the freezer. Into a cryogenic state of complete shut-down. Which it really doesn\u2019t like and takes ages to recover from.<\/p>\n But this time we didn\u2019t do this. We left the starter in a jar in the fridge. I can\u2019t even remember why we did this. Anyway, we weren\u2019t there and the starter wasn\u2019t being fed regularly. We expected that we would come back to a science experiment and would have to start the starter all over again.<\/p>\n Well I have to say that it didn\u2019t look too promising when we opened the fridge door. Sat in its little cold coffin for months, the starter had gone more than a little off colour and crusty around the edges. We thought the worst had happened. It wouldn\u2019t revive. We\u2019d murdered our starter. It was an ex starter. It had ceased to be.<\/p>\n But you know what? After a good feed, and a bit of TLC and a good talking to, the starter was back to normal. It assumed its usual healthy colour and consistency. It is now powering the bread just as it used to.<\/p>\n