Prompt Cheater & Useless Luck

For those of you who write, do you think it is cheating to use writing prompts to think up things to write about?

With the exception of Writer's Workshop with Mama Kat on the occasional Thursday when one of her prompts inspires me (and I have time to respond to one), I don't use prompts much. Although, I suppose that little contest I wrote for (in my last post) was technically a prompt.  My life is full of things to write about.  I generally have plenty I want to remember and lots of things that just make me laugh or I think someone else might find interesting/inspiring/informative.  Well, maybe not that informative--that just sounds boring.

When I get stuck I tend to go back through pictures I have taken recently--inevitably something strikes me as fun or interesting and I write about it.  I need to upload my pictures from my camera.  I think I may have hit a record.  It has been at least a week since I uploaded a picture. Maybe two.

But I am already sitting in bed, too lazy to go upload them and seek inspiration.

And I need inspiration, because I made a promise to myself that I would post at least once a week.

So I cheated, if you think prompts are cheating.  Only it didn't really work, or maybe it did. . .

After I swung by Kat's blog and drew a blank (Tomorrow is Thursday after all), I googled a writer's prompt website and clicked on prompt 346:


Use the following words in a story: college student, crumpled paper, train and laptop

Okay. . . this prompt is why I can't write, not inspiration for writing.  I can sum them up in one sentence; I don't need to write a story (though if I did it would be the story of my life):

I am a book buried college student, surrounded by rejected pieces of crumpled paper, who can't maintain a steady train of thought while staring at the blinking cursor on my laptop.

. . .which explains why I have had trouble maintaining my goal of regular blog posts.  Not that this post is particularly inspiring OR entertaining, but I found the irony amusing at least.  That's just my kind of luck.  The non-useful kind.  Ironic maybe, but useless.

And since today was the unveiling of the new iPad, perhaps I will soon be trying to maintain a train of thought while staring at my iPad. . . just maybe. (though that might require a little useful luck. . . or a paying job).

What has inspired you lately?