Every Writer Needs a Roomba, or Another Way to Entertain Your Muse by Terena

As I write this, my floors are being expertly cleaned by our new family member, the Roomba. She's a lovely thing, small, cute, hard working, round, and she does a better job on my floors than I ever did. Plus, she gives me more time to write, therefore, I love my Roomba.

My Muse is fascinated by it; she can't stop watching it move across the floor picking up bits of debris and dog hair, bashing into walls and furniture, figuring out how to navigate those obstacles, and then proceeding on its quest for cleanliness. She likes to throw more bits of detritus on the floor to see if the Roomba can pick it up. She cheered when it managed to vacuum a crushed Fish Cracker.

"Did you see that? It actually got every bit! What a marvelous invention."

When she came back from her summer hiatus, she dumped several ideas into my lap. "Here. I've been working on these for weeks." I flipped through each one, growing excited by the possibilities. Three plays, a novel revision that saves the plot and therefor might get my novel out of its hiding place, the entire philosophy of The Guru, and two ideas for essays.

"These are great! But I don't think we're going to have enough time to do all of this! School starts on Monday."

"So. You'll manage. How's the play coming along?"

"With these ideas for The Guru, it's practically done."

"Great. So what's next?"

"I'm waiting for the notes on the Business Book."

"And then..."

"I guess I'll start in on one of these ideas."

"Excellent." And then she saw the Roomba sitting on its charger. "What's that?"

The Roomba came from Tama, my newest author. She adopted my cat, so I adopted her old Roomba. It needed a bit of tweaking, but luckily my boy is a tinkering wizard. After reading a few websites and ordering another Roomba for parts, he got the thing chugging along beautifully. In fact, he's ordered a costume for the Scooba (the mopping Roomba) and is trying to decide whether to dress up the Roomba as a French Maid, or a Tiger.

See, Roomba's are a beacon for creativity. Buy one today and your own personal robot will give you new opportunities for writing. Or would you rather vacuum?