DO YOU DOODLE? I used to. A lot! Some of my doodles were extravagant and others were simple. But there never seems to be a pad and pencil around anymore. Does there? The computer has changed all that. 

Few people are sufficiently adept to doodle using MS Paint, and yet, for some, that's all they can do with it. Google has elevated doodling to a fine art. However, that really isn't doodling, is it?  

By the way, Yankee Doodle Dandy originally was an insult. British soldiers sang it derisively as they attempted to crush the rebellion in the colonies. The word “doodle” meant fool, and a “dandy” was a fop or a bully.

I suppose that playing solitaire on the computer is what passes for doodling these days. It's a mindless activity that prevents us from daydreaming.

I used to daydream a lot. It got me into a lot of trouble in school. However, it gave the teacher something to do. She seemed happier sneaking up behind me in class and whacking me up alongside the head with a ruler than in simply boring everyone to death with useless facts and information, like algebra.

I learned early on that some doodles were socially acceptable and others weren't. No, not like that! (Where is your mind?) No, I mean that I could get away with simple doodles in class (as long as I wasn't doodling in my textbook or on the desktop) and in business meetings. But, as the doodles became more complex, people seemed to think that I wasn't paying attention to them.

Actually, studies suggest that doodling does help us pay better attention. Like I said earlier, it keeps us from daydreaming, which takes all of our attention.

Truth is that this blog posting is a sort of a doodle. I finished two chapters on my new novel yesterday (that's a pretty productive day) and I have eighty blog posts in reserve. Imagine that. Eighty blog posts all written and illustrated. All I have to do is click “Publish.” So, I'm just taking a break while I think about things.

What sort of things am I thinking about? Doodling for one. There was a television show in the late 1950s about doodling. Contestants vied to explain arcane drawings. I think that it was hosted by Hans Canried, but I can't find a citation for it in his biography in Wikipedia. (Of course, that proves nothing.) However, I did learn that he was the voice of Snidely Whiplash in the Adventures of Dudley Dooright (Rocky & Bullwinkle Show), and that he was born in Baltimore (my birthplace). See. Wikipedia is good for something.

Like I said, I'm doodling. I think that I'll make doodling a new category. It'll be a kind of miscellaneous bin for blog posts that don't really fit anywhere else.

Now, there must be a pad of paper around here somewhere....

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ANSWERS
Doodle #1: A soldier marching outside a window with a rifle and bayonet.
Doodle #2: A bear climbing the far side of a tree.