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Anti-procrastination trick for writers #1083: Get a bluetooth mouse.

Bluetooth connections fall apart just often enough that if the dang thing is working, you’ll be inclined to stay at your desk. Leave your desk for longer than twenty minutes, come back, have to re-pair your supposedly wireless mouse with your computer.

My bluetooth mouse was about a month old before a bleating blue light started going off in its wheel. This, I learned, is a distress call, indicating the batteries are failing.

I let it bleat, waiting it out. I was curious. I wanted to see how much of a survivor it was.

A bluetooth mouse short on batteries will behave erratically. It will veer off to the sides of the screen, investigating possibilities of its own. It will disappear & reappear. It’s kinda like having a really disturbed friend who just wants to play. A friend who will dance into the corner of your vision, do a quick jig, maybe a shimmy, and then start freaking the hell out, before lying down suddenly on the floor.

Yet, still, I waited. Partly to see how long the sucker could last. But also because I liked the pretty blue light, always blinking, blinking. It kept me company while I was stuck at the desk writing. Stupid writing. Only in the absence of all consciousness will I get up and find more batteries.