And some of them are writing.
Not just the flip-between-works technique that makes my progress on any given work so -- erratic. Though that can happen, too, whenever I don't want to face the next scene whether writing or revising, I can also scurry off and research the names I can give the moons of the planets. (That was indeed tricky, since I want to fit the pattern I had already assigned with the planet names -- but it was still vacuuming the cat.) Or running the hero through a Mary Sue test, which is fun but not writing.
Once upon a time, I discovered the wonderful technique of sitting down and re-reading everything I had dropped writing. I learned that I was losing interest in a story whenever it required a technique I had yet to master.
But the writing life never gets any easier. Having mastered techniques enough that I can finish stories -- at least to get to "The End" and ready to mail out, occasionally even to sell -- when I am stymied, it is likely to something that this story uniquely, or at least unusually, needs.
And what is worse, taking a deep breath before plunging into something difficult can indeed help. There's been many a time when I looked at the next scene, knew it needed some hack-and-slash revision, quailed, closed the word processor, and the next day opened it up to hack and slash with abandon.
Such are the conundrums of the writing life.
