I have a head cold. It's not so terrible but it is affecting my ability to write or do anything other than blow my nose and feel a bit miserable. Yesterday was worse than today. Washing dishes was too difficult and reading an entire newspaper article caused me to fall asleep at my desk.
My novel is floundering and still embarrassingly short. I had intended to write an entire chapter for my sci-fi heroine to explore the underbelly of her neighborhood. She would find out what evils lurk in the shadows. She might even discover that she has more in common with the so-called villains than the good guys. Or something.
Maybe I should give her a cold as well. She will find out that she is the last living human to contract a cold in the year 2068. Or maybe she is a carrier of the cold epidemic that brought down a dictatorship 20 years ago. It can serve as a warning to all of my fictional war-hungry Presidents. Maybe the back story is better than the actual story that I am trying to write. All that I could manage to write yesterday was "This cold sucks." This is going to be the best book ever!
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
How to do nothing at work and still get paid
This is a great teaching tool for those young kids who are just starting their first office job.
Spam From Another Dimension
Is there a random word generator that spammers use in order to get past our email filters? Or are these actually the messages of sentient beings from another dimension? I actually love the combinations of subject titles that I've been getting and broke them down by category:
Strange facts
A Fedora is Non-submersible
Art surveys
Which Renoir to Shampoo?
Riddles
Is Pythagoras a cadet
A fiddle, myself
Dangerous sports:
Go mine slogging!
Shakespearean:
Her not unto thee, let go wickedly and departedly
A nosebag to Hannibal
Strange facts
A Fedora is Non-submersible
Art surveys
Which Renoir to Shampoo?
Riddles
Is Pythagoras a cadet
A fiddle, myself
Dangerous sports:
Go mine slogging!
Shakespearean:
Her not unto thee, let go wickedly and departedly
A nosebag to Hannibal
Monday, April 16, 2007
Today in Virginia
It is difficult to think of anything very witty to write about today's tragedy in Virginia. So far, the reports state that one shooter left 33 people dead on a college campus. My heart goes out to the families and friends of the victims.
Tales of epidemics, war, natural disasters, and murder are reported everyday. Humans have suffered from these tragedies longer than written memory. Some religious folks believe that the first murder occurred in the very first family when Cain killed Abel ("2001" fans will remember that the alternative version of the first murder took place when our primate ancestors figured out that tools and weapons were interchangeable). I bring up these well-known points because it strikes me that unlike these other tragedies, this massacre feels strangely modern. It is undeniable that modern weapons have enabled a single person to inflict damage on a large population. With so little information available, perhaps I am filling in the details of this story with others that recently have become familiar like the Columbine shootings, the DC snipers, and suicide bombers.
Was it a schizophrenic fantasy or depersonalization disorder? Did he imagine himself as a lone soldier who believed that each and every human had become an enemy? Did he stop believing in the institutions created by society because he no longer felt that he belonged? We won't ever know. Madness or clear-thinking, whatever the reason, it should be apparent to everyone that guns are ending up in the wrong hands time and time again. What bothers me most of all is the nihilist philosophy that has trickled into the public subconscious that accompanies unchecked hate that we see endlessly reproduced on our 24 hour news cycle. Give that man a gun or access to C4 and we're giving him the ability to kill anyone or anything in sight. You can bet that gun control will be a major issue in the 2008 Presidential election.
Tales of epidemics, war, natural disasters, and murder are reported everyday. Humans have suffered from these tragedies longer than written memory. Some religious folks believe that the first murder occurred in the very first family when Cain killed Abel ("2001" fans will remember that the alternative version of the first murder took place when our primate ancestors figured out that tools and weapons were interchangeable). I bring up these well-known points because it strikes me that unlike these other tragedies, this massacre feels strangely modern. It is undeniable that modern weapons have enabled a single person to inflict damage on a large population. With so little information available, perhaps I am filling in the details of this story with others that recently have become familiar like the Columbine shootings, the DC snipers, and suicide bombers.
Was it a schizophrenic fantasy or depersonalization disorder? Did he imagine himself as a lone soldier who believed that each and every human had become an enemy? Did he stop believing in the institutions created by society because he no longer felt that he belonged? We won't ever know. Madness or clear-thinking, whatever the reason, it should be apparent to everyone that guns are ending up in the wrong hands time and time again. What bothers me most of all is the nihilist philosophy that has trickled into the public subconscious that accompanies unchecked hate that we see endlessly reproduced on our 24 hour news cycle. Give that man a gun or access to C4 and we're giving him the ability to kill anyone or anything in sight. You can bet that gun control will be a major issue in the 2008 Presidential election.
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