The Chuffah Gift Guide

Simple gifts for writers

Halloween has passed, which means it’s time for the next holiday, Thanksgiving, to be ignored. “Get out of here,” we shout at the middle child of holidays, “we’ve got holidays with GIFTS!”

One of the great thing about writing is that it’s cheap. You don’t need special equipment, or loads of upfront investment. If you’re able to view this post, you have everything you need to write. That also means if you’re shopping for a writer, or looking to treat yourself, there’s not a lot of obvious options for writing-specific gifts. And if you search for things like “gifts for writers” you’ll find so many stupid socks, you might think that writing is all about keeping your feet warm. So, here’s a few things I’ve found to be actually helpful.

1. Cheap, Dog Shit Notebooks

I once preferred keeping all my ideas in a digital space, floating in the cloud, freely accessible. While that has some obvious benefits, these days I prefer pen and paper for recording random thoughts, and brainstorming on larger projects. Writing by hand forces you into concise, clear thinking. And, when you’re working on the script, I find it’s much more comfortable to have your notes at hand instead of toggling between multiple windows on your computer.

Other gift guides might recommend purchasing a really nice notebook, with strong binding, and thick paper. I say, don’t do this. The notebook is a place for half-thoughts, dead ends, and abandoned jokes. A high-quality notebook feels like it’s begging for high-quality writing… and therefore sits unused, waiting for the thoughts that are worth recording in such a fancy notebook. Instead, get a bunch of cheap notebooks. Quantity, not quality. A notebook that says, “I’m a bunch of scrap paper stuck together. I’m garbage, and your garbage thoughts belong here.” Those babies will fill up real quick.

2. Expensive, Fancy Pens

If you want to splurge and spend more money than you should on something stupid, get a fancy pen instead of a fancy notebook. While a notebook becomes more intimidating the nicer it gets, a pen becomes more inviting. You’ll use any excuse to feel that baby gliding across paper, leading to a lot of beautiful, hand-written shopping lists. And hopefully also a few good ideas in those aforementioned terrible notebooks.

3. Cube Clock

Nothin helps me stop procrastinating like this stupid, little cube clock. It takes the daunting, seemingly endless task of WRITING THE SCRIPT and turns it into a short challenge: how much can I get done in one hour? It’s easy to start and stop, takes up little space, and it’s not attached to your phone, so you won’t get distracted by notifications when you look at it. A small, inexpensive thing to make a big change in your mindset.

4. Writing Software

Screenwriting software is just a glorified word processor. Considering how simple it is, it’s surprising just how many options there are (at wildly different price points). I’ve tried many of these programs, and I feel like they all do basically the same thing (even though they all insist that their particular program is the thing you’ve been missing to get your best writing done). I like Highland 2 for writing sketches and Fade In for writing longer pieces. If you’ve been using a trial version with a big ugly watermark on your pdfs, why not splurge for the real thing?

5. Books

There are a lot of books on writing, but only a few of them a truly great. Great books will give you new insight and new tools. Here are a few of them. But almost every book on writing will make you feel a little less crazy. You will hold in your hands proof that someone else thinks the hard part is hard, or confirms some suspicion you have. In short few writing books are useful, but many of them are helpful.

6. Museum Membership

When I feel stuck in my work, my favorite thing to do is go to a museum. You break up your usual routine, get some light physical activity, and see a bunch of cool shit! Shit that other humans created, or naturally occurring shit that boggles the mind. Shit that implies some kind of story or evokes some kind of emotion. A visit to the museum usually gives me a few new ideas, a lot of mental clarity, and A PACKET OF ASTRONAUT ICE CREAM!!!!111!!