I reread the page for the third time, trying intently to focus, but knowing that my mind was already beginning to drift by the third sentence. The door to the frat house flung open. I ripped my eyes away from my dreadfully boring homework as Mike strutted into the room. A mischievous kind of smile was plastered on his face. The kind I had seen many a time before. "Do you want to do something stupid?" he asked. I shook my head and tossed my book onto the couch. "Screw it. My brain is fried for the night. What do you have in mind?" Mike walked over to the big bay window and flung the curtains aside. Pristine white snow coated the ground. "You always talk about how we need to go sledding at the park since you missed it the last time." "Give me one second." Without another word, I ran up the stairs of the house. At the top, I rapped on one of the white doors. It opened a second later. A bearded face greeted me, a neutral expression peering up at me. "What's up?" "Can I borrow your Santa costume?" His brow furrowed. "My Santa costume?" "Yeah. And a sled or something. Any ideas on that?" His eyes widened in realization. "You're not..." I smiled and nodded. He sighed. The next thing I knew, I had a $200 Santa jacket in my left hand, a Santa hat on my head, and a gray storage box lid in my right. I ran back downstairs. Mike hadn't moved. "Let's go!" I said with a grin. I threw the jacket on, shoved something in my pockets, and carried the gray lid close to me as we emerged into the cold. Mike dropped his Hummer's tow cable and I grabbed onto it. I took out my phone and sent a quick message in the dorm group chat, urging all of the freshmen to come outside immediately. Mike drove slowly, relatively speaking. It was a smooth ride. I only flipped over like twice. As we crept closer to our dorm down the college's main street, I saw the confused guys beginning to congregate. "Ho ho ho!" I bellowed. They began to walk towards the road, and the familiar Hummer they all knew far too well. "Merry Christmas!" I gripped the tow cable with one hand, then reached into my pocket and removed a handful of mints. I threw them as far as I could, which admittedly wasn't very far since I was sitting and only had one arm I could use. The freshmen doubled over in laughter.

Hello everyone, Attached is a short story I wrote. I would love to hear some constructive feedback on it, and any suggestions on how I might be able to improve it.

I pride myself on being productive and using my time well. I think that I do a good job managing my free time and getting things done. Unfortunately, that can also create a feedback loop of feeling like I need to use all my down time to get something done. Do you feel this way too? Do you ever make yourself artificially busy or fixate on the things you could do when that's not actually what you need to do? Share your thoughts and experiences. I want to hear about it. I talk about this a little more in the newest chapter of Writing the Piano, but it's a pretty short chapter this time around. I think I'll expand on this idea of productivity, and I would love to hear about how everyone here navigates it so I can respond to and incorporate some of those thoughts into the next resource.

I have an interesting relationship with comic books. Growing up, I never really read or collected them in any meaningful capacity. Don't get me wrong, I loved superheroes. I was a kid when the Marvel Cinematic Universe was just getting started, and I have fond memories of watching different superhero cartoons. I picked up a few small collections of one-offs or comic arcs as a kid, but I never really got too into them. Recently, I've been seeing a lot of discussion online about one of the new Batman comics: Absolute Batman. The most appealing part to me was how each issue was like 50 pages and only cost $5. I don't mind that kind of deal, so I decided to go check out my local comic book store. While they had some Absolute Batman, they were missing the first four or five issues. But what they did have was the first collected edition of issues, so I decided to pick that up. I got home, read the first issue, then set it down because I knew I had to limit myself to one issue a day or else I would run out of content to read in an afternoon. As I've read more of Absolute Batman, I'm nearing the end of the Abomination Arc, which is the second collected edition. Unfortunately, the third collection doesn't drop until September, so I'll have to tide myself over on other reading material until then (good thing Absolute Green Arrow just started and I decided to pick up the first issue of that). I'm really glad that Absolute Batman is starting to get me back into reading for fun again because as a writer, I know that if I'm not reading, I'm not writing and passively improving my craft. One of the best ways to grow as a writer is to just read more works by other people. I need to do that more (and I think I'll talk more about that in this week's "Writing the Piano" chapter). Batman has always been one of my favorite heroes. He was always so cool with his utility belt and special gadgets. I have fond memories playing the LEGO Batman video game as a kid with my brother back on my dad's PlayStation 2. Batman: The Brave and the Bold was one of my favorite cartoons as a kid. I could go on. So when I heard there was a dark, and fairly deep, new Batman comic that changed up his origin and rogues gallery, I figured it might be worth checking out (also the fact that reading the story is incredibly easy because there aren't a bajillion side arcs and cross-overs you need to worry about). The art style is great. It's gritty yet stylized. Yes, it's violent and intense, but it works. The aesthetics of the art match the tone of the narrative. As for the story, it's still developing. On the one hand, it's your classic Batman vs. the bad guys who are tearing up Gotham. On the other hand, he's the underdog. His victory isn't guaranteed, and he will suffer if he's going to get it. I really don't want to spoil too much, but I just reached a point in the story where Bane does some pretty awful things (mentioning Bane isn't a spoiler because he's literally on the cover of the Abomination book). And as a writer, I think I gained a super valuable lesson from reading this book: it's ok to blow your world up and make your characters suffer because the consequences will be interesting and drive the story forward. In my current novel, I've reached a tough spot where I find myself holding back. I know that I can do some crazy things, and I've let myself do some of them, but I also find myself holding back to maintain an equilibrium. The end result feels... unsatisfying. My single biggest takeaway from Absolute Batman is that I should say screw the equilibrium and just let things burn. I can sift through the ashes later, and it'll make the characters and world more compelling as a result.

The easiest way to grow as a writer is honestly pretty simple: read. If you want to hone your skills as a writer, make sure that you are reading. If you're just writing, or doing other things and writing, your writing will suffer as a result. I talk about this in a bit more detail in the premium resource, "Writing the Piano," but I wanted to share the main sentiment here as well: if you're not reading, you're not writing. So the next time you feel dissatisfied with your writing, asking yourself when was the last time you read a book for fun?