Are you ready for the most autistic shit you’ve ever heard?

Ladies and gentlemen, we the team here at Diary of Sisyphus are excited to announce a brand new dimension to this podcast… Seasons!

What are seasons?

A season will consist of 10 articles, followed by an in-depth season recap. These season recaps are a real party. We’ll drink champagne, there’s gonna be streamers, maybe even costumes involved. We’ll take the opportunity to reflect, self-evaluate, refocus and select a theme for the next season.

I’ll be evaluating myself based on the following questions. To me, these are the five things I worry about the most when it comes to writing:

• Was the article funny or boring? (40% of the grade): First and foremost, the articles need to be funny, or at the very least interesting. I have a background in comedy writing and not much else, so if the shit’s not funny, what the fuck are we doing here? That’s my only redeemable quality.

• Was the article heartfelt or just whiny? (20%): When you’re writing memoirs, as I so often do, there’s a very fine line between writing something heartfelt and just whining about your life. I’m a classic over-sharer. I have no problem being vulnerable. I just want to make sure I’m doing it in a way that’s self-aware and effective, where I’m not just throwing a 2,000-word pity party for myself.

• Did the article make good points or do I already disagree with what I wrote? (10%): This one is not high on the priority list. In fact, one of this blog’s golden rules is to never try to make good points. However, I want to make sure I’m controlling for times when I pull the trigger on an idea too early before I fully think it out. There’s no problem with realizing that you’re wrong, I’d just prefer to do it in the privacy of my own brain instead of posting my half-baked ideas on a public forum.

• Could I show this article to my dead grandma or is it too edgy? (10%): I also have no problem with being edgy. I have a dark sense of humor. Sue me. HOWEVER, I do realize that if I want my writing to appeal to a larger audience, I should probably cool it with the cum jokes.

• Is the article hopeful or depressing? (20%): I firmly believe that nihilism is a stepping stone, not a stone you build your house with. Yeah, yeah, yeah, everything sucks and nothing matters, we get it. But if all I’m gonna do is sit around and talk about how terrible everything is without doing anything to change it, then I’m just an asshole.

Each category will be scored on a scale of 1-10 and then weighted by the importance multiplier, for a maximum narcissism score of 100. I get a minimum narcissism score of 10 just for having a blog.

Example Article

Funny/boring: 7 (x 4) = 28
Heartfelt/whiny: 5 (x 2) = 10
Made good points/sounded dumb: 5 (x 1) = 5
Could show this to my dead grandma/edgy: 6 (x 1) = 6
Hopeful/depressing: 8 (x 2) = 16

Total score: 65/100

There will also be awards given out to:

• The best article

• The worst article

• The article most likely to get me fired from my job

• The article that I had the most fun writing

I will conclude with a brief synopsis of the season, talking about what I thought went well, what I struggled with and what my goals are for next season.

Why are you doing this?

I think it’s important to hold myself accountable. I want to grow as a writer. I don’t want to get in the habit of shitting out nonsense. Your time is valuable. I needn’t waste it with surface-level hot-takery or low-effort clickbait.

I want to write stuff that I can look back on months from now and be proud of. A good way to achieve that is to look back on the articles I wrote over the last couple months and see if they still make me proud. Seems like a pretty good idea to me.

Will the award show be filmed?

Yes. What an oddly specific question.

I plan to pop a bottle of champagne, listen back to all ten articles, provide DVD commentary and then give my grades. The show will be posted on the Diary of Sisyphus YouTube channel, which at the moment has no content other than two videos of Butter running around in circles at the dog park.

OK, cool, can I get back to my life now? Are we done here?

Yes. Here’s a picture of Butter as a parting gift.