Rambling On About Anchovies and Art

'Write about what you know' is good advice. So is 'paint what you see.' In my case, though, my mind's eye occasionally sees folks like the ones at that little get-together you see on your right.

They look interesting, but what they're doing - it's the sort of thing that happens occasionally. Someone organizes a little get-together, everything's going fine: and then someone orders a pizza.

The scenario is fine, as far as it goes, but there's not much of a 'story' there. At least, not one that occurred to me.

On the other hand, I've learned that I can usually crank out a weekly snapshot taken from my imagination. That's been showing up on another blog, Apathetic Lemming of the North, hosted by my flannel-wearing alter ego.

My non-fiction writing is chugging along just fine: mostly two posts a week, each Friday and Sunday, on A Catholic Citizen in America.

Okay, I've done the shameless self-promotion — except mention that my art is available as photo and canvas prints, up to poster size; and occasionally on gift cards.

That's at Brian H. Gill's Shop on the DeviantArt.com website. The site's name may be off-putting, but I've found some quite talented commercial and amateur artists there. Not in my shop, though: that's just my stuff.

I had something in mind when I started this post. What was it? Writing, paint, pizza: right!

I'm dusting off an old 'slice of life' idea I had, years back, that might turn into something readable. Then again, maybe not. I won't find out until I give it a try.

NO! Don't Shoo... - - - GLIPNARF!!!!

Writing a post for another blog, A Catholic Citizen in America, my mind took me off on an tangent. Nothing unusual there.

It's almost on-topic for that post, but not quite: and the excerpt is a better fit with this blog.

Airman AB Glipnarf's Big Mistake

One of the very few 'UFO' reports that I think could plausibly involve extraterrestrial intelligence happened in northwestern Minnesota in 1979.

No, I do not think this is proof that We Are Not Alone: but the report is intriguing.

As a writer, I can imagine a story from the point of view of the space aliens: deputy sheriff Johnson could have startled the jittery crew of a vessel, maybe one that wasn't supposed to land in the first place. The alien equivalent of an Air Force AB shot at the patrol car before the commander could stop him/her/it: making a bad situation much worse.

What happens to Airman AB Glipnarf may depend on how many forms the commander needs to fill out; and whether the landing was the result of equipment failure, botched navigation, or something else.

Now I really should get back to work.

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Seriously Searching for Life in the Universe"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (February 8, 2013)
• "Genesis, Optimus Prime, and Victorian America"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (April 10, 2012)
• "The Aliens are Coming! The Aliens are Coming!"
  (April 26, 2010)
• "Interstellar Empires, Imagination, and an Occasionally-Sozzled Detective"
  (March 12, 2010)
• "Gods, Demons, and Used Spaceship Dealers"
  (February 13, 2010)

Writing: Main Course, Desert, Snacks

While gathering my thoughts, or procrastinating, before working of Friday's post in another blog, I checked in at Google Plus. A post there took me to this:

"Meat and potatoes writing and other stuff"
Paul Sofranko, In the Land of My Exile I Praise Him… (July 2, 2013)

"Some other rambling thoughts I've developed since starting Listening to the Lost Voices is the interrelationships between the various forms of writing I care about, namely fiction, blogging and posting...."

Food as a metaphor for written material isn't new. Neither, I suspect, is his main course/desert/snacks breakdown.

That's okay, since I also think that there aren't new stories: and haven't been for thousands of generations. What matters is how a storyteller presents the old tales, and that's another topic. Sort of.

Here's Paul Sofranko's breakdown. That didn't come out right, and I don't have time to rewrite. More topics.

Original writing, Sofranko's view:

• Fiction
  • Meat and potatoes
• Blogging
  • Desert
• Posting on social networks
  • Snacks

I appreciated reading that Paul Sofranko thinks blogging can be (self-) indulgence or service to others.

Even self-indulgent 'my opinion is better than yours' blogs are a service to screenwriters and columnists, sort of. I suspect that the ditzy blogger is a good substitute for the crackpot neighbor in sitcoms. Serious columnists facing a deadline can whip out the required word count with a 'death of reason' piece by writing a '60s column: with "blogging" substituted for "television."

Most of my blogs are of the 'indulgence' variety. I'm still astounded that folks keep reading Apathetic Lemming of the North posts. The 'service' blogs, like A Catholic Citizen in America, take more effort: partly because I realize that nobody's going to read those posts unless I make them mildly entertaining or informative. Yet more topics.

I'm in the happy position of being a semi-retired old coot, so I can indulge my enthusiasm for sharing odd bits of information and spend time sharing not-so-odd ideas.

A deadline looms. I can't put this off any longer, I've got to get back to work.

Vaguely-related posts:

• " 'Sleep on It:' Separating Inspiration From Indigestion"
  (January 24, 2012)
• "The Threat of Dangerous New Technologies: It's Not All That New"
  (August 23, 2009)
  Particularly
  • Writing as (Dangerous) Information Storage and Retrieval Technology
• " 'Willing Suspension of Disbelief' - What's That Mean?"
  (August 17, 2009)
• "A Thought for the Day: Education and Writing"
  (August 10, 2009)
• "Four Millennia of Human Nature: I Think Qoheleth is Right"
  (August 3, 2009)

'Sleep on It:' Separating Inspiration From Indigestion

Looks like the question isn't so much getting good ideas. It's telling the difference between a good idea, and one that's not. And some research says that "sleep on it" is pretty good advice.

"How Do We Identify Good Ideas?"
Jonah Lehrer, Frontal Cortex, Wired Science Blogs (January 23, 2012)

"I've always been fascinated by the failures of genius. Consider Bob Dylan. How did [Dylan] ... conclude that Down in the Groove was worthy of release? Or what about Steve Jobs: what did he possibly see in the hockey puck mouse? How could Bono not realize that Spiderman was a disaster? And why have so many of my favorite novelists produced so many middling works?

The inconsistency of genius is a consistent theme of creativity: Even those blessed with ridiculous talent still produce works of startling mediocrity. (The Beatles are the exception that proves the rule, although their subsequent solo careers prove that even Lennon and McCartney were fallible artists.) The larger point is that mere imagination is not enough, for even those with prodigious gifts must still be able to sort their best from their worst, sifting through the clutter to find what's actually worthwhile...."

Don't worry: the writer does get around to telling how we tell the difference between a good idea and a bad one.

"My Fair Lady" - "Oklahoma!" - "Spiderman?!"

By the way, I'd forgotten that someone tried to make Spiderman into a musical. And spent $70,000,000 doing it:

"Bono's 'Spider-Man' musical still weak, critics say"
Reuters (June 15, 2011)

"Broadway's most expensive and ridiculed musical, 'Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark,' suffered another round of crushing reviews on Wednesday, a day after its long-delayed official opening drew celebrities such as former president Bill Clinton and actor Robert De Niro.

"The $70 million comic-book adaptation, featuring music by U2's Bono and the Edge, was lambasted earlier this year while playing in a record-breaking 180 previews as its producers struggled to overhaul the production...."

Still, it could be worse. What if someone talked an investor into backing a rewrite of "Hamlet:" as a musical comedy. With songs like Ophelia's "My Dad, So Sad;" and Hamlet's "I Get the Point." Say, maybe that's not such a bad idea after all.

Nietzsche, Experts, and University Students

Lehrer quotes Nietzsche, the gist of which is that artists don't get flashes of inspiration: they're just good at sorting out nifty stuff from the ideas that everybody gets. I'll buy the idea that creativity involves a whole lot of selection and connection of notions. Back to Lehrer's post:

"...A new study led by Simone Ritter of the Radboud University in the Netherlands sheds some light on this mystery. In the first experiment, 112 university students were given two minutes to come up with creative ideas that might alleviate a mundane problem: improving the experience of waiting in line at a cash register.... half of them went straight to work, while the others were first instructed to perform an unrelated task for two minutes. ... this delay was to give the unconscious a chance to percolate, to let that subterranean supercomputer invent new concepts for the supermarket queue.

"There was no difference between the groups in terms of creative output - both the conscious and unconscious/distracted subjects came up with the same number of new ideas. Although previous studies have found an impressive link between unconscious incubation and the imagination – it really is better to sleep on it - that result was not replicated here, perhaps because two minutes of distraction wasn't long enough. (True creativity takes time.)

"Here's where things get interesting. After writing down as many ideas as they could think of, both groups were asked to choose which of their ideas were the most creative. Although there was no difference in idea generation, giving the unconscious a few minutes now proved to be a big advantage, as those who had been distracted were much better at identifying their best ideas. (An independent panel of experts scored all of the ideas.) While those in the conscious condition only picked their most innovative concepts about 20 percent of the time ... those who had been distracted located their best ideas about 55 percent of the time. In other words, they were twice as good at figuring out which concepts deserved more attention...."
(Jonah Lehrer)

Writing For the 19th, 20th, or 21st Centuries

I haven't read Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories for quite a while. In terms of style, they're popular detective stories. I doubt that Doyle thought he was writing 'great literature,' or was trying to snooker his readers into seeing the tales that way.

On the other hand, Doyle wrote those stories in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and it shows. In "The Hound of the Baskervilles," it takes 342 words to get Watson from a train station to Baskerville Hall. The two paragraphs have some beautifully descriptive prose: but they're long-winded by today's standards.¹

Then there was Charles Dickens, a solidly 19th-century writer. A humorist said that an analysis of the style of Charles Dickens suggested that he was paid by the word. That's a fairly common practice in publishing, and another topic.

English prose got a tad more terse in the 20th century: although I've wondered if 'best sellers' ran longer than the usual novel because publishers figured that readers expected big, heavy books. More topics.

That was then, this is now, and 'how to write online' advice that I've seen often advises brevity. Short sentences. Not too many sentences in a paragraph. Almost the exact opposite to the manner in which I'm prone to compose, given my background not only as a recovering English teacher but also as someone who loves language.

It's an effort, writing tersely.

Jonah Lehrer's style in this post is readable: but I think it's more appropriate for printed matter. Still, he gets the point across.

And I've gotten off-topic again.

Crabs, Sauces, Apples, and Moods

One more of Johan Lehrer's paragraphs, and I'm (almost) done:

"...But waiting isn't the only approach. A few years ago, a team of German researchers gave several dozen subjects a variety of word puzzles known as remote associate problems. The puzzles feature three words (such as 'pine,' 'crab' and 'sauce') that share a common compound word. (In this case, the answer is 'apple.') Here's the clever part: only some of these remote associate problems had an actual answer. The rest were impossible. Interestingly, the scientists found that subjects in a positive mood were far better at figuring out which remote associate problems could be solved and which were a waste of effort. In fact, even when they didn't end up finding the solution, those who were happy were much at figuring out which problems had solutions. As a result, they wasted much less time searching for epiphanies that didn't exist, or chasing down possibilities that didn't pan out...."
(Jonah Lehrer)

Now that's interesting. And contrary to the 'anguished artist' stereotype.

Sometimes a writer can't 'sleep on it.' Deadlines loom, and staff writers don't always get time for a second look at their work. But if circumstances permit? It looks like there's evidence that taking time to pick out morsels of inspiration from a plate of mostly-indigestible notions is worth it.

Lehrer lists some good ways to step away from your work. Literally, in some cases:

• Take a few days off
• Play a stupid video game
• Go for a long walk
• Sleep on it

When the alternative may be explaining to an investor what happened to $70 million? That sounds like really good advice.

Bottom line? Write in haste, edit with deliberation.

Related (?) posts:

• "A Not-Entirely-Misspent Afternoon"
  (August 20, 2010)
• "Advice, Opinions, Resources, and How-2 for Writers: Over a Hundred Micro-Reviews"
  (August 25, 2009)

---

¹ Excerpt from

"...The train pulled up at a small wayside station and we all descended. Outside, beyond the low, white fence, a wagonette with a pair of cobs was waiting. Our coming was evidently a great event, for station-master and porters clustered round us to carry out our luggage. It was a sweet, simple country spot, but I was surprised to observe that by the gate there stood two soldierly men in dark uniforms, who leaned upon their short rifles and glanced keenly at us as we passed. The coachman, a hard-faced, gnarled little fellow, saluted Sir Henry Baskerville, and in a few minutes we were flying swiftly down the broad, white road. Rolling pasture lands curved upward on either side of us, and old gabled houses peeped out from amid the thick green foliage, but behind the peaceful and sunlit country-side there rose ever, dark against the evening sky, the long, gloomy curve of the moor, broken by the jagged and sinister hills.

"The wagonette swung round into a side road, and we curved upward through deep lanes worn by centuries of wheels, high banks on either side, heavy with dripping moss and fleshy hart's-tongue ferns. Bronzing bracken and mottled bramble gleamed in the light of the sinking sun. Still steadily rising, we passed over a narrow granite bridge, and skirted a noisy stream which gushed swiftly down, foaming and roaring amid the gray boulders. Both road and stream wound up through a valley dense with scrub oak and fir. At every turn Baskerville gave an exclamation of delight, looking eagerly about him and asking countless questions. To his eyes all seemed beautiful, but to me a tinge of melancholy lay upon the country-side, which bore so clearly the mark of the waning year. Yellow leaves carpeted the lanes and fluttered down upon us as we passed. The rattle of our wheels died away as we drove through drifts of rotting vegetation - sad gifts, as it seemed to me, for Nature to throw before the carriage of the returning heir of the Baskervilles...."
("The Hound of the Baskervilles," Arthur Conan Doyle (1902), via Project Gutenberg)

A Not-Entirely-Misspent Afternoon

I've been spending a moderately productive afternoon in the attic: reading, relaxing, reviewing notes on a story that's starting to almost make sense; and letting my mind off the leash.

That last is an exercise that can have interesting, sometimes entertaining, and occasionally useful results.

On the other hand, occasionally not-so-useful results.

As I was getting toward the bottom of the thermos of coffee I'd taken up with me, I remembered that I had a Loonfoot Falls Chronicle-Gazette column to write. That's 250 words for a fictional newspaper in an equally fictional small town. Sort of like Garrson Keillor's Lake Wobegon: except that I actually life in a place like that.

Where was I? Remembering that I had a deadline coming up. Right.

While mulling over my weekly challenge of finding something to write about for that nonexistent small town's imaginary newspaper, this phrase dropped onto the front desk of my mind:

"Loonfoot Falls and eight tiny reindeer."

In the context of what I'd been reading a couple hours earlier, that almost made sense - in a convoluted, quasi-metaphoric way.

I think.

On the other hand, aside from that aphasic glow of self-satisfaction I experience when cool phrases fall out of whatever bit of cognitive ductwork they've been lurking in, there didn't seem to be much I could do with that conjunction of ideas.

Besides, I was starting to feel hot and in need of dealing with all that coffee. Which, eventually, led me back here to my place by a north window.

And I still don't know what I'll do about Loonfoot Falls today.

State-of-the-Art Neuroscience, About Two Dozen Centuries Back

When it comes to how the universe works, what we know, what we don't know, and what we think we know that just ain't so, has changed quite a lot since information technology made it possible to 'freeze' our thoughts in somewhat permanent form. That's a span of around 5,000 years now. (August 3, 2009, January 4, 2010)

Not that everybody wrote down what they thought. Take Aristotle, son of Nichomachus, for example. He lived almost two dozen centuries ago: from about 384 to 322 BC. These days someone in his position probably specialize by studying some narrow topic. Aristotle's interests included aesthetics, biology, ethics, government, logic, morality, physics, and poetry. ("Aristotole," The Literature Network) Think Leonardo DaVinci in a chlamys.

At least some of Aristotle's books are thought to have been written by his students, from lecture notes. He wouldn't be the first professor who, although brilliant, wasn't quite up to speed on the latest information technology.

On the other hand, I've run into enough sources with phrases like "Aristotle's writings" to think that the ancient genius wrote at least some of his thoughts down, himself.

What We Know, What We Think We Know

It's a little late to have Aristotle take a standardized intelligent test, but there doesn't seem to be much doubt that he was a very smart man. He's credited with getting quite a bit of Western civilization's intellectual life started.

And he seems to have had the good sense to find out what things looked and felt like, before deciding how they worked.

Maybe you've heard that Aristotle thought the brain was a sort of radiator. That's so - sort of - although his analysis of that 'marrow' we keep in our heads was a little more complicated than that.

Considering what he had to work with, I think Aristotle did a pretty good job of analyzing the brain's function. He was wrong, but at least his model was internally consistent.

One of the facts he got right was that the brain has no sense of touch - something that makes in possible for neurosurgeons to operate on the brain of a conscious patient. On the other hand, Aristotle used that fact as a proof of what turned out to be a really wrong idea. Here's part of what Aristotle had to say about the brain:

"...That it has no continuity with the organs of sense is plain from simple inspection, and is still more clearly shown by the fact, that, when it is touched, no sensation is produced; in which respect it resembles the blood of animals and their excrement...."

Don't laugh. Aristotle wasn't stupid - but he was working near the start of Western civilization's efforts to sort out how the universe works.

Two dozen centuries from now, some of what's in your high school science textbook, and what's coming out of CERN, may look a trifle daft, too.

Science and the Speculative Fiction Writer

There's a broad range of approaches to incorporating 'real' science into speculative fiction - from 'science? what science?' to old-school 'hard' science fiction, where the authors seemed more interested in practical applications of what was in the latest science quarterly, than delving into empires of the mind.

I'd just as soon write stories with more-or-less 'real' science: but I like full-bore fantasy, too. As far as I'm concerned, it's 'author's choice,' an aesthetic preference.

That said, the example of Aristotle may give me a lot more wiggle room for my 'real' science, than you might think.

There's an excerpt from one of Aristotle's books at the end of this post, a sort of introduction to his discussion of the brain. His analysis was wrong - but quite a few of his supporting facts were spot-on.

The lesson here, I think, is that someone who's making up 'future science' has a lot of room for the imagination to roam. Me? I'm going to make an effort to see to it that the 'future science' doesn't depend on what we can observe being different. In other words, if rocks fall up in the 36th century: there better be a really good explanation for why they don't now.

Back to Aristotle. His analysis was wrong - but not as much as it may seem. The brain looks like marrow, it feels cold, and it really doesn't have a sense of touch - it so it won't respond when prodded. At least, not in a way that Aristotle - or whoever supplied him with his data - could have observed.

Here's that excerpt:

"Parts of Animals Book II – (Brain)"
Aristotle (English translation), via Alexandra Cuffel (Medieval History), Macalester College

"From the marrow we pass on in natural sequence to the brain. For there are many who think that the brain itself consists of marrow, and that it forms the commencement of that substance, because they see that the spinal marrow is continuous with it. In reality the two may be said to be utterly opposite to each other in character. For of all the parts of the parts of the body there is none so cold as the brain;whereas the marrow is of a hot nature, as is plainly shown by its fat and greasy character. Indeed this is the very reason why the brain and spinal marrow are continuous with each other. For, wherever the action of any part is in excess nature so contrives as to set by it another part with an excess of contrary action, so that the excesses of the two may counterbalance each other. Now that the marrow is hot is clearly shown by many indications The coldness of the brain is also manifest enough even to the touch; and, secondly, of all the fluid parts of the body it is the driest and the one that has the least blood; for in fact it gas no blood at all in its proper substance. Thus brain is not residual matter, nor yet is it one of the parts which are continuous with each but it has a character peculiar to itself, as might indeed be expected. That it has no continuity with the organs of sense is plain from simple inspection, and is still more clearly shown by the fact, that, when it is touched, no sensation is produced; in which respect it resembles the blood of animals and their excrement. The purpose of its presence in animals is no less than the preservation of the whole body. For some writers assert that the soul is fire or some such force. This, however, is but a crude assertion; and it would perhaps be better to say that the soul is incorporate in some substance of a fiery character. The reason for this being so is that of all substances there is none so suitable for ministering to the operations of the soul as that which is possessed of heat. For nutrition and the imparting of motion are offices of the soul, and it is by heat that these are most readily a acted. To say then that the soul is fire is much the same thing as to confound the auger or the saw with the carpenter or his craft, simply because the work is done when the two are near one another...."

With a Brain Like Mine, Who Needs LSD?

This post is a bit off-topic, but I'm releasing it anyway. Most of Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space is a sort of working journal of my efforts to write stories. Or tell stories - not quite the same thing.

Today, while meditating (that's another topic), I realized that I was dredging up memories, and making associations, that might be worth sharing.

Or, not. I've been wrong before.

The Sixties Weren't All That Now and Wow

The stoned artist isn't a product of the sixties. Long before Jimi Hendrix started a trend for celebrity overdoses, the literary world was paved with the booze-drenched droppings of inebriate poets and authors. The fellow who put the town I live in on the map, Sinclair "Main Street" Lewis, was a case in point.

I doubt, however, that he could attribute his Nobel Prize (1930) to being sozzled. The man actually could write.

Coleridge and Opium

Then there was Samuel Taylor Coleridge. I grew up in the sixties, and had the connection between Coleridge's use of opium to "Kubla Khan" drummed into me. Make that addiction to opium.

What sets Coleridge apart from the stoned poets of Haight-Ashbury is that artistic wannabes of the sixties, some of them consciously following Dr. Timothy "turn on" Leary's advice, thought that scrambling their circuits would make them more creative. (Depending on your muscle-fat ratio, body mass and metabolism, anywhere from a beer to a six-pack will do the same thing. You'll feel like the biggest thing since [insert your favorite singer/whatever].)

Coleridge got hooked on opium, thanks to state-of-the-art medical practices, ca. 1800. Opium was a wonder drug then: and widely (over-) used as a pain killer.

Coleridge's run-in with doctors wasn't a total loss. We got "Kubla Kahn" out of it, and his was one of many cases that finally convinced doctors that they might want to take a look at the long-term effects of psychoactive drugs.

The Sixties and Me

I'm no Coleridge. Or, by the grace of God, Sinclair Lewis.

Somehow, I got through the sixties without turning to drugs: booze or the groovier sorts. No virtue there. Wanting to get high wasn't on my priority list.

I did develop a serious drinking problem, but that was later: and another story. Wondering if getting sozzled didn't really make me more creative? It didn't. I occasionally felt like a hotshot: but I read what I wrote, later. Ouch.

Want some 'inside' advice? If you have to drink something while you write, make it coffee. But don't be surprised if you can't sleep afterward.

I've learned, recently, that for most people the teen years aren't Purgatory on steroids. I believe it. I also believe that some people don't look back on their adolescence as 'the best days of their lives.'

I'm one of the latter sort.

No complaints: There were many bright spots, but I wouldn't wish the experience, as a whole, on anybody. For a variety of reasons I was under a lot of stress, from about the time I was thirteen on.

Psychedelic Music, Disco, Techno, and Me

Lately, I've been listening to music from the sixties and following lately - some of it using those strange sound distortions. You may have heard it: voices that sound like they're at the bottom of a well, Dopplered tones, that sort of thing.

For me, that sort of thing evokes something that's about as close to nostalgia as I'll feel.

I've read - and believe - that those sounds, and the weird light shows, were an effort by people to replicate the sensations they experienced while high.

I've experienced pretty much the same thing. But, apart from post-operative anesthetics, I've never 'done drugs.'

Fatigue and Stress as Psychoactive Agents

I didn't need to, sort of. I can remember, in my teens, watching the walls and ceiling of a room wobble like Jello. They'd stop as soon as I concentrated on them: but my memory faithfully records the movement. Then there was the time I looked at a lighting fixture and 'saw' it as a sort of spiky starburst. Again, concentration quickly sorted it out into a normal appearance.

That wasn't, quite, a hallucination: I think. The light was one of those with a radial set of grooves in a semi-transparent hemisphere. I'm pretty sure what I was "seeing" was a template in my visual cortex: one that's used to handle bright objects with strong radial elements.

Drugs? No. Booze? Oddly enough, again no.

Stress and fatigue? I think so. Extended over a couple decades.

Again, no complaints: I learned a lot about managing my brain during those years; although it wasn't until recently that I've been able to get back to my pre-teen efficiency. Wonderful things, those serotonin-uptake inhibitors.

Trick Wiring

I don't know if it's 'polite' to say this, but I don't think that everybody's exactly alike. Which is just how I like it. A world full of people just like me would be - scary.

Some of us are taller than average, some shorter: and I'm convinced that not all of us have exactly the same wiring in our heads. I'm fairly bright, in an academic way, but can't figure out the sort of associations that people use to solve those 'where's the key' puzzles that some American communities have as fundraisers.

My brain is great at integrating data, solving problems, associating ideas and perceiving patterns: sometimes patterns that are as real as the Canals of Mars. No bragging: it's the equipment I was issued. All I'm doing is making use of it.

On the other hand, when I relax and 'take my hands off the controls' - - - well, that's where my Narcissus-X posts come from. The trick for that blog is to decide on a place to start, and then enjoy the ride. They're not 'stream of consciousness' writing - each time something interesting shoots by, I grab it, go into 'normal' mode and write a phrase or two about it.

Think of it as surfing the space-time continuum. The trick is to avoid wiping out.

Another Day, Another Question

I've spent hours this week, sketching out how the interior of the Blue Buzzard is laid out. I think it's important, so that I can show readers - eventually. I wrote about this on Monday.

On the other hand, one of my daughters doesn't do this sort of planning. She's written many stories. They're not the sort of thing I would normally read on my own: but I've read some, and they're well-written. (Observed as a recovering English teacher, not a doting father.)

So I have to ask myself - again - am I taking the wrong approach to writing?

Good question. Someday maybe I'll have a good answer.

Overused Science Fiction Cliches: or, 'You Mean, Beings of Pure Energy Isn't a New Idea?'

Well, that's interesting:

• "The Grand List Of Overused Science Fiction Cliches"
  Television Tropes & idioms

This might be a useful guide for the writer. If that brilliant(?) idea shows up in this list, put it on the bench and do a full diagnostic to see if there's something - anything - original, or even interesting, in the idea.

Actually, there are four lists:

• Overused Sci Fi Storylines (Section I)
• Overused Sci Fi Settings (Section II)
• Overused Sci Fi Plot Devices (Section III)
• Overused Sci Fi Silly Science (Section IV)

Oddly enough, I'd been thinking about using something from Section I: "Brain-controlling parasites attempt to wrest control of human race." I still think I've got a relatively fresh angle on this, but: Yeah, I'm going to be studying the lists. Quite a bit.

By the way, although this one's a cliche, it may be a cliche for a reason:

"People connect their brains directly to computers and get dependent on them."

See:

• "Next-Generation Prosthetic Hand - and Intel Says Direct Neural Interface Brain Chips by 2020"
  Apathetic Lemming of the North (December 2, 2009)
• "Good News, Neural Devices Connect Brain, Computers: Bad News, Same Thing"
  Apathetic Lemming of the North (July 11, 2009)

And: Yes, neural interfaces are in the research & development stage; but aren't (quite) on the market yet.

---

A tip of the hat to irish_brigid, for the heads-up on this part of 'TV Tropes.'

Advice, Opinions, Resources, and How-2 for Writers: Over a Hundred Micro-Reviews

There's a wealth of information (accurate and otherwise), advice (helpful, sometimes), and opinions (fact-based, idiosyncratic, and just plain weird) on the Web. Quite a lot is useful, one way or another, for writers.

Some of the 3,019 posts I've published to date on Apathetic Lemming of the North are micro-reviews of articles and other resources that might come in handy for a writer. Earlier today, I stumbled on one ("Plotting a Novel - Like a Snowflake?!" (February 10, 2009)) and realized that I didn't remember each of the one hundred forty or so posts about writing.

Looks like Socrates was right. New information technologies can be dangerous. More about that in another post.

On the other hand, I think the trade-off between concentrating on wrote memorization and learning how to index, store and retrieve information is a no-brainer when it comes to benefit/cost ratios.

Problem is, in this case, I hadn't indexed those posts about writing. Until now.

I've divided the posts into four catgories, plus the usual "miscellaneous" for the occasional oddball topic:

• Advice and opinions
• For fun
• How-2
• Lists and resources
• Miscellaneous

The posts in each category are in reverse chronological order.

A few of the usual disclaimers: The links in those micro-reviews may not still work. Websites and blogs change, or disappear entirely; I have no control over what's on other websites or blogs; I've provided links to pages and posts I think are interesting, but have not verified any of the claims or assertions on other sites or blogs. In other words, before you spend money or sign up for anything: check it out on your own! "Due diligence" may seem dull, but it can save a lot of time, grief, and money.

Enough. Here are those posts:

• Advice and opinions
  • "Writers Take Note: 'And It Was All A Dream' Not Necessarily Welcome"
    (July 8, 2009)
  • " 'Editor's Secrets' - Hardly Secret, but Good Advice"
    (April 8, 2009)
  • "Writers: Beware! 10 Overused Words"
    (March 24, 2009)
  • "Yet more Writing Advice: Describing People"
    (March 7, 2009)
  • "Linkbait SEO Insider Secrets!"
    (January 1, 2009)
  • "Yet Another Bit of Writing Advice, Again"
    (December 20, 2008)
  • "Once Again: Advice on Becoming a Better Writer"
    (August 18, 2008)
  • "Technical Writing's Got a Big Secret"
    (August 9, 2008)
  • "Writing Advice: Show, Don't Tell - With an Example"
    (July 31, 2008)
  • "Pity Your Readers: Learn How to Write With Style"
    (July 13, 2008)
    • Vonnegut
  • "Yet Another Bit of Writing Advice"
    (July 11, 2008)
  • "Another Writer Writing About Writers Writing"
    (July 3, 2008)
    • Dialogue, introspection and narrative, scene and summary
  • "Essay Assignments: Ingredients Needed"
    (July 2, 2008)
  • "Yet More Writing Advice: A Blogfull"
    (June 29, 2008)
  • "Don't Never Use These Words: Really!"
    (June 28, 2008)
  • "Mark Twain vs Pretentious Words"
    (June 24, 2008)
  • "Eschew Obuscation, and Other Good Writing Advice"
    (June 4, 2008)
  • "Other Writers are Crazy - That Explains a Lot"
    (May 21, 2008)
  • "Abulia, Writer's Block, and Doing Something About It"
    (May 14, 2008)
  • "Questions to Ask Before Writing for the Web (or Anything Else)"
    (May 13, 2008)
  • "Don't Over-Stuff Your Brain - Or Your Readers', Either"
    (May 8, 2008)
  • "Stop Thinking, and Do It!"
    (April 17, 2008)
  • "10 Habits of Effective Writers - One Writer's Opinion"
    (April 17, 2008)
  • "Cure for Writer's Block: WRITE!"
    (April 12, 2008)
  • "Kurt Vonnegut: 8 Bits of Advice"
    (April 9, 2008)
  • "Press Embargoes: Old Custom Defended"
    (March 28, 2008)
  • "Writing for For Profit? Too Many Unbillable Hours? Think Virtual Assistant"
    (March 15, 2008)
  • "Information Age Nostalgia: Writing With Retroware?"
    (March 15, 2008)
  • "Muse on Holiday? Write Anyway!"
    (March 14, 2008)
  • "Overused Words: Maybe"
    (March 10, 2008)
  • "Never End a Sentence With a Preposition? Not!"
    (March 10, 2008)
  • "Random Plot Points for Writers"
    (February 21, 2008)
  • "Writing Advice and How-2"
    (February 10, 2008)
  • "Tasty Writing Advice"
    (February 5, 2008)
  • "Pretty Good Advice for Writers: In Reverse"
    (February 2, 2008)
  • "Writing is Important: Who Knew?"
    (February 2, 2008)
• For fun
  • "Grammatical Hijinks: Dirk Driver and the Dark and Stormy Night"
    (July 3, 2009)
  • "Story Celebrating the Letter 'W' "
    (July 2, 2008)
  • "Get Rich by Freelancing: It's Worth Reading, Anyway"
    (April 7, 2008)
• How-2
  • "78 Ways to Start a Book: or Maybe 77 - or 101??"
    (May 22, 2009)
  • "Another How-2: This One's About Writing Fantasy Stories"
    (February 23, 2009)
  • "Plotting a Novel - Like a Snowflake?!"
    (February 10, 2009)
  • "More Writing Prompts"
    (January 31, 2009)
  • "A Plot-First Plan for Novel Writing"
    (January 17, 2009)
  • "Waiting for the Muse, Getting the Club: Two Approaches to Inspiration"
    (January 13, 2009)
  • "Spot Amateurish Writing Glitches: Before Your Readers Do"
    (December 10, 2008)
  • "Building Fictional Characters: a 10-Day Approach"
    (July 1, 2008)
  • "Yet Another Post About Developing Fictional Characters"
    (June 7, 2008)
  • "Learning to Write English: It Can be Done"
    (April 18, 2008)
  • "How to Write Strong Arguments: Rise Above Name-Calling!"
    (April 9, 2008)
  • "Blogging Ideas: A System to Keep Them Coming"
    (March 19, 2008)
  • "I.E. isn't E.G. - How to Remember Which to Use"
    (March 15, 2008)
  • "Writing One Thing Today: And Doing it Well"
    (March 10, 2008)
  • "Fiction Writing: Characters Rule the Story"
    (March 10, 2008)
  • "Writing on a Schedule: Or, Being Creative When You Don't Feel Creative "
    (February 17, 2008)
  • "Would-Be Novelists, Take Note: and Get Organized"
    (February 17, 2008)
• Lists and resources
  • "How to Write Better: 100 Posts"
    (July 16, 2009)
  • "Rhyme Writer"
    (June 4, 2009)
  • "Yet Another List of Writing Resources"
    (March 14, 2009)
  • "Ulitmate Character Profile Sheet! - Your Experience May Vary"
    (February 26, 2009)
  • "Getting Paid to Write: Not the Worst Idea in the World"
    (January 31, 2009)
  • "Overused Words: a List"
    (November 13, 2008)
  • "Attack of the Killer Rabbits: Attention, Writers!"
    (August 16, 2008)
  • "Yet Another 'Secret to Writing' Article: This One's a List"
    (July 29, 2008)
  • "And Now for Something Completely Different: Proofreading Marks"
    (July 23, 2008)
  • "Writing a Resume? This Might Help"
    (July 6, 2008)
    • Action verbs: not just for resumes
  • "Commonplacing: Not Your Usual Quotations Collection"
    (June 3, 2008)
  • "Yet Another List of Rules for Writers"
    (June 2, 2008)
  • "More 'Amazing Resources' for Writers"
    (May 12, 2008)
  • "Counting Cash: The Video"
    (May 2, 2008)
    • Cultural differences
  • "Creating a Character Sheet - An Overview"
    (May 1, 2008)
  • "Downloads & Worksheets"
    (May 1, 2008)
  • "A Writing Blog Post With a List of Writing Blogs"
    (April 26, 2008)
  • "Character Trait Chart - Getting Your Fictional Character Started"
    (April 20, 2008)
  • "101 + 101 = 202 Resources for Writers"
    (March 24, 2008)
  • "Chekhov's Gun: the Literary Technique"
    (March 22, 2008)
  • "Trying to Write for Television? Learn the Tropes"
    (March 22, 2008)
  • "Trading Money for Words"
    (March 21, 2008)
  • "Online Rhyming Dictionary: and it's Free"
    (March 18, 2008)
  • "Online Rhyming Dictionary: and it's Free"
    (March 18, 2008)
  • "50 Writing Ideas You Probably Haven't Heard of"
    (March 2, 2008)
  • "And Now, for Something Completely Different: Proofreading Symbols"
    (February 29, 2008)
    • I can't get enough of this, it seems
  • "Kids Doodling on Homework: Continuity Across the Centuries"
    (February 23, 2008)
  • "List of Writing References"
    (February 12, 2008)
• Miscellaneous
  • "Writing, Recession, Lemons, and Life Lessons"
    (July 24, 2009)
  • "Lingo Slinger: Writing by a Writer Who Writes"
    (March 24, 2009)
  • "Ploak.com Article Directory: Looks Interesting"
    (March 11, 2009)
  • "New Brunswick, Again: This Time for Writers"
    (July 3, 2008)
  • " 'WOW! Women on Writing Blog:' Women Writing About Women Writing About ... "
    (April 12, 2008)
  • "Writing House"
    (March 26, 2008)
    • A wonderful little building
  • "Seven Select Sources for the Serious Scrivner"
    (March 11, 2008)
  • "National Novel Writing Month"
    (February 3, 2008)
    • A pep talk

Study the Best: Girl Genius Won Hugo

The Girl Genius post of August 12, 2009 announced that Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones (written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, coloring by Cheyenne Wright) won the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story of 2008.

I don't mind a bit. I was something of a fan of Kaja and Phil Foglio, from the days they were doing What's New for Dragon magazine, and have been following Girl Genius.

And, studying what they're doing. It's nice to get confirmation that I've been studying a pretty good example of, ah, graphic story.

'Willing Suspension of Disbelief' - What's That Mean?

I'll be using the term "willing suspension of disbelief" quite a bit in this blog.

It's been defined as:

"Temporarily and willingly setting aside our beliefs about reality in order to enjoy the make-believe of a play, a poem, film, or a story. Perfectly intelligent readers can enjoy tall-tales about Pecos Bill roping a whirlwind, or vampires invading a small town in Maine, or frightening alternative histories in which Hitler wins World War II, without being 'gullible' or 'childish.' To do so, however, the audience members must set aside their sense of 'what's real' for the duration of the play, or the movie, or the book.

"Samuel Coleridge coined the English phrase in Chapter 14 of Biographia Literaria to describe the way a reader is implicitly 'asked' to set aside his notions of reality and accept the dramatic conventions of the theater and stage or other fictional work. Coleridge writes:

" . . . My endeavours should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic; yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith (quoted in Cuddon, page 1044).

"Coleridge may have been inspired by the French phrase, 'cette belle suspension d'esprit de law sceptique' from François de La Mothe le Vayer, or by Ben Jonson's writing where Jonson notes, 'To many things a man should owe but a temporary belief, and suspension of his own judgment.' "
("Literary Terms and Definitions: W," Carson-Newman College, Jefferson City, Tennessee)

I think one reason that some people declare, vehemently, that they don't read fiction is either the desire to not appear "gullible" or "childish;" or an inability (or unwillingness) to temporarily set aside the capacity for distinguishing between the real and the unreal.

I know that quite a few perfectly reasonable and intelligent people don't read fiction. Including some of my relatives. I've no problem with that. I'd no more insist that everyone have my tastes in reading, than assume that people in general should enjoy the same leisure pursuits that I do.

A Thought for the Day: Education and Writing

Now and again, you'll read that education is good for writers. The idea is that a good liberal arts education gives a person a sort of generalized background in the culture, and hones communications skills.

I agree with that, sort of. Over the decades I earned a degree in History and another in English - both undergraduate - and about half of a degree in computer science before bombing out. Along the way I picked up credits in art history, photography, the usual anthropology/geology/physics/whatever general studies stuff, and a minor in Speech. I think that was time well spent.

But I worked for both degrees in Fargo-Moorhead where there's three colleges, a technical school, and a trade school or two. I spent quite a bit of time in the Architecture library over at NDSU, checked out the agronomy department, and spent a lot of time in the three main libraries.

Sure getting the degrees was nice: but as someone must have said:

I never let earning a degree get in the way of getting an education.

Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space: A New Blog

When I was in my teens, I wrote a science fiction story: about 5,000 words. It surfaced, a few decades ago, during a bit of re-organization: and wasn't half as embarrassing as I might have feared.

It's time to try again.

This blog will be where I make notes, ruminate on backstory, potted biographies, and other impedimenta which may or may not help get a readable story done.

You're welcome to stop in from time to time, and see what's happened since your last visit: but I can't promise a finished narrative.

The fragments, drifting in from the deeps, may prove interesting, though.