Scott Adams on the Dilbert Blog talked about his work habits , his need to keep both his butt cheeks on equal proportions on the chair and about his mischievous cat whose life's mission is to thwart his work when he finally rises from the inertia of laziness.

His recent blog post made me wonder about my own peculiar working habits. While the likes of Stephen King would listen to hard rock and pump their system with booze; I, on the other hand, pen words down with Hip Hop or occasionally while listening to Moby. Hip Hop is for stuff like Book Reviews, Movie Reviews and Moby is for stories especially for the gruesome ones like Kali.

I tend to write at night and many a times write through the night and feel kind of deprived when I see dawn filtering through the flimsy curtains. To me a good night rest is important, I love to sleep as most of the times I am quite sleep deprived. When its not my family taking up my time, its the worldly distractions like movies or serials that keep me from penning down my thoughts.

However, that being said, I have been learning a few tricks of the trade from Serials such as West Wing and from Japanese Directors like Takashi Mika who specialize in horror flicks so gruesome and weird that they make movies like Ringo and Grudge look like PG-13. Which reminds me that I have to do their reviews and of soft porn flicks done by Tinto Brass (he is a real toad and I have yet to watch Caligulla).

There is always some thing to learn from one's environment. Scott Adams might believe that his cat distracts him from his work but wasn't she instrumental rather the inspiration behind his current post? The world is always buzzing with dynamic ongoings even a little weed while seemingly negligent can be a writer's inspiration.

After all, no matter how many times one pulls the damn thing out with the roots, another soon takes it place and if one is not careful the whole garden can and does become the weed jungle. Obviously, a die hard attitude can make even a below average writer write atleast one master piece in his/her life time be it a novel or an article.

But it all comes back to ambience. Do we really need the right mood, music or environment to spill our guts, thoughts and fantasies? People like Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Charles Dickens etc wrote master pieces in the worst environments and under intense pressures.

Could most of us be able to emulate them , be the weed and no matter what, even in the barest cell be able to write our best?