Pterygopalatine Fossanation

Timed Writing: 2/17/2012

2012-02-17T12:03:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Source: Barcelona by Alexandr Kulikov

The dock stretched long and straight before me. At the far end was a bicycle -- and a man.

The stacked leather heels of my boots beat a low marcato rhythm from the tympanic boards of the walk as I approached him. A hot wind sang through the taut cables of a minimalist barricades on either side. The bicycle leaned against a railing, facing the man. The man faced the ocean. He sat on the edge of the dock, silhouetted against the horizon, where the almost white of the blue sky met the almost black of the blue water. He made no movement nor gave any indication that he perceived my approach. He was expecting me though. He'd been expecting me for a very long time -- he and his bicycle.

I first met Guy at a party in Lausanne -- a party in my honor. I had been working all summer in an immunology laboratory at the Institut de Biochimie, and before I departed, Hans, the PI, hosted a farewell party for me. Most of the people in attendance were postdocs and techs in Hans's, but there were people I'd met from other labs as well. Guy was a new graduate student, who would start his rotation with Hans the following week, and since he'd just arrived in town, Hans invited him to join the party. His name was Guillermo and he was from Barcelona, but he preferred to be called Guy. Like Guy Ritchie, he'd say, standing up tall and trying to look tough, not like Guy de Maupassant.

Guy arrived at Hans's home, a few kilometers southwest of the city, by bicycle. It was an off-road bike -- the kind with a straight handlebar and rough, knobbly tires. It was appropriate only for the final hundred meters of the trip -- Hans's steep, gravel drive -- but he didn't ride it up the driveway. I know because I was on the veranda when Guy arrived, and I watched him stop at the open gate, dismount, and walk the bicycle all the way to the house.

Regarding the Timed Writing Exercises

2012-02-16T13:21:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow, I will have been posting my daily free-writing exercises for two months, and to mark the occasion, I will try using a different type of prompt. So come see how that works out.

Also, I've turned a couple of these exercises into longer pieces, which has been great fun. If there is one of them, in particular, that you'd like to see expanded, let me know. If it's one that I've already used, I'll send you a link to the longer work -- if it's not, I'll prioritize it for expansion.

Thanks for reading!

Timed Writing: 2/16/2012

2012-02-16T13:14:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: The exotics have already been placed in the green-house
Source: Jules Michelet, Autumnal Aspirations

The exotics have already been placed in the green-house, as have the last of the provisions and the heating fuel. Icy claws of wind rake my nose and lips. The earth is free of frost, but come morning, it will crunch and sparkle. Scrubby tufts of grass sprouting from the exhausted beige soil tremble in the breeze. Tomorrow they will stand rigid and crack at a touch. All that remains now is for me to check the levels in the fire-point magazines at the perimeter, and then join the exotics and the other children for count-off and seal-out.

At the first fire-point I find the magazine full, the warming coils clean, and the seals intact. The second has one of the old butyl rubber seals and it has cracked. Most of the liq in the magazine has evaporated away. I pull off a glove and fumble in my belt pouch for a new seal. I scrape away the crumbly black rubber with a stubby screwdriver and fit a bright silicon replacement into the flange of the magazine. I refill the chamber from one of the bladders on my back. The hose is narrow, so it takes nearly two minutes. In the cold it seems much longer.

The veiled glow of the sun retreats behind a wall of red stone topped with pine skeletons. I relive last night's dream -- the one that caused me to move seal-out up a week and to carry extra seals and liq on my rounds this evening.

In the dream I was locked out of the green-house and I was naked. It was night and the only light came from the flood above the gate. I pounded on the steel panel, but there was no response. I would either freeze to death or become food for the scavs -- or both. I walked toward a fire-point, considering whether I might warm my hands over the heating element or maybe even splash some liq to the ground start a fire for warmth and protection. I had no flint, nor matches though. Then I saw the eyes of a scav out in the darkness. It was a large one, judging by the height at which the glowing points floated above the ground, and it was well within the range of the fire-point's trigger eye. Why wasn't the fire-point spewing? And then I heard the hum of its pump, spinning dry. The magazine was empty. The eyes drew closer and I saw the grass and rubble behind the scav distorted by its transparent body. Then I woke.

I replace seals on two more fire-points and I top off the magazines of all of fifteen. Then I return to the gate.

(about my timed writing exercises)

Timed Writing: 2/15/2012

2012-02-15T10:48:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: In the beginning, the skulls were treasures
Source Tom Brown Jr. and William Watkins, The Tracker

In the beginning, the skulls were treasures. Lust for them fueled crimes -- burglaries, street robberies, a few murders. Later, once we had discovered what else the skulls did, all that changed. Rather than being coveted, they were shunned and a person who carried one was no longer celebrity, but pariah. Doors were shut to him and he was treated like the lepers of old -- an outcast, forced to live beyond the confines of the city, scavenging what he could glean from the fields and gardens of the unwary, while seeking someone to accept his skull.

I possessed a skull for a short time. My girl, Annie, had been talking of them and I wanted to impress her, so I snuck into the diggers' camp and stole one. I was no great thief. I just got lucky when a careless foreman left a haul unguarded. I did not keep my skull for even a full day.

I woke the following morning in a bed not my own. My head was dull and groggy and the ceiling that stared down at me gave no clue of my whereabouts. There was a hollow beside me, where someone had lain, but it was cold. I lay atop the covers, fully clothed, with even my hat and boots in place.

The skull! I jumped up and looked around. It was nowhere to be seen. My satchel lay in a corner, with the purse of coppers untouched inside, but the skull was gone. I looked out the window and the farmers' stalls looked back at me from across the market square. I must be at the inn.

Vague memories of drinking by the fireplace returned to me. Annie had brought me a tankard. Was that before or after the stranger came in and I got angry at him for talking with Annie? Everything was tangled and my head rang anvil-like with every pulse of my blood. I stumbled out of the room and down the stairs to the public room. The host met me.

"I was coming to roust you, Johnnie," he said. Can't have you two fouling my flop all day 'less you're payin' for it."

"What happened?" I said. "Where's my skull? Where's Annie?"

Before he could answer, the door behind him opened and the constable entered.

"John Harris," he said, looking past the host, to me. "John Harris, I'm arresting you for the murder of Anne Carson."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/14/2012

2012-02-15T10:28:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: I am almost afraid to stand alone, here in the churchyard
Source: William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

I am almost afraid to stand alone, here in the churchyard, while all my friends and acquaintances stroll about in pairs and trios, under the canopy of sycamores. I cannot find it in me to celebrate. I fear that if I am absent, however, the truth of the matter -- of my role in the failed plot -- might be suspected. I move toward a buffet table. If my mouth is full, I cannot be expected to smile.

"Martin! Come join us!" It is Jill, the girl with purple braids who lives two doors down. She is sitting with young women that I've seen around town but have never met. There is a large plate of sandwiches and fruit on their table, and they are sharing a jug of beer. I wave to Jill and abandon my previous course, ambling instead to their table.

"Fran," Jill says to the heavily tattooed young woman on her right, "grab a chair for Martin, won't you?"

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/13/2012

2012-02-15T10:20:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Tell him I'm going to punch his head
Source: Robert Louis Stevenson, The Wrecker

"Tell him I'm going to punch his head." Charlie was drunk. So was Riccardo, the possessor of said head.

Expression and comprehension of a foreign language tend to improve -- to a certain point -- with intoxication. Fortunately, Riccardo seemed to have moved beyond that linguistically optimal state and sat on his stool, one elbow on the bar, with a sleepy grin across his pock-scarred face. When I told him that Charlie wished him good health and a good night, he burst into laughter and waved and nodded and scrawled something illegible on his slate.

"Charlie," I said, turning back to my charge, "drink this cup of water and put on your coat. I can't have you starting a row. Not here, not now."

"He's laughing at me! Did you tell him? You didn't tell him. Tell him, Tippo. I won't strike a drunken alien without fair warning -- especially a mute."

"Have you forgotten, Charlie, my friend, that you are the drunken alien here? And pray look around the room, my boy. Do you observe all of these rough gentlemen at the tables? Do you see how their countenances bears greater resemblance to Riccardo's than to your own? Do you mark the lengths of their knives and the girths of their arms? Perhaps they would stand by, amused, while you assault their townsman, but I won't let you take that chance."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/12/2012

2012-02-15T10:06:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: I put that enlightened object before him
Source: Charles Dickens, The Mystery of Edwin Drood

I put that enlightened object before him and he tried to act as though he'd never seen it. He tried, even to appear surprised and impressed at the way that it glowed and sparkled in the darkness. He picked it up, turning it in his hands, holding it close to his face.

"Don't act dumb." I snatched the facetted sphere from him and set it back on the table. "We both know what it is and what it can do. All I want from you is your price."

"Surely you aren't auctioning it off to the highest bidder. That doesn't strike you as... sacrilegious?" Grovener was, in truth, the only person I knew who would be interested in the piece, but if he was interested, there must be others out there. I only hoped that he thought it possible for me to have encountered them. I knew I'd never get the sphere's worth from him or from anyone -- even if its value could be quantified. I just wanted enough to buy my way off this prison and get back to my preferlife.

"Didn't mark you as a reverent man, Grov. You taken up with the 'lievers since last we talked?"

"Corey," he said, using his older, wiser, more-experienced-in-the-ways-of-this-and-any-other-world tone, "my recognition of this object for what it is, does not signify that I would be able to make any use of it. I cannot pretend to have more than a passing acquaintance with the methods of the enlights, so without some time to... test the merchandise, I would be loathe to offer you any but the most paltry of sums."

"Be loathe, then, Grov, 'cause the question you oughta be asking yourself right now, is what it's worth to you to keep it out of the hands of some other interested parties."

"Who else has seen it?" he asked.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/11/2012

2012-02-12T11:37:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: I found Bruce at the bar, but there was no sign of the ape
Source: Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

I found Bruce at the bar, but there was no sign of the ape about him. Bruce's suit was wrinkled and the collar of his shirt stained yellow.

"What are you drinking, this morning?" said Bruce.

"I'll have whatever keeps you calm," I said. Bruce did a little twirling wave at the waiter and twenty seconds later I held a glass of amber that emitted dirty sock and burnt seaweed fumes.

"You don't think it's a little early for an Islay?" I said. I tried not to inhale as I sipped.

"'Calm,' you said. Would you rather we order espressos and I rip your head off again?"

"You don't remember that, do you?" I asked. I was actually a little bit worried.

"I remember watching what I found on your video cam this morning," said Bruce.

Shit. I'd left it running and had forgotten to mention it to Helen. When she'd come by to clean up the mess and dump me in the tub, she probably hadn't even noticed it in the corner, on its tripod. But I didn't understand how Bruce had gotten a hold of it.

"You know I'm not upset, don't you?" I said "I don't blame you at all, and really, it happened so fast that I didn't even feel it." That was a lie. It had been quick, but I'd certainly felt it.

"How long have you known?" Bruce asked. "Have you been watching me all year?"

"No," I said. "Only for about three months, now. Since the... the episode with Karen -- when the primate people came through the building questioning everyone."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/10/2012

2012-02-12T11:22:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: There were unicorns and forests of marijuana
Source: Luis Sepulveda, Full Circle: A South American Journey

There were unicorns and forests of marijuana in the dreamworld of Calvin Bords. There were 1968 ragtop Camaros and rib-eye steaks as well. Mostly, there were willing women -- willing and possessed of cruel wit.

Humor was important to Calvin Bords. He understood his own shortcoming -- an apt term -- better than anyone, and to have it either ignored or pitied drove him insane with rage. He would have his physical anomaly both acknowledged and ridiculed with the full force of a woman's scorn and then he would have that woman consume him in spite of it.

Calvin Bords would cruise along through verdant jungle, behind the wheel of his chromed and waxed red beast, a smoldering role between his stubbled lips and an Uzi on his lap. A unicorn would emerge from the undergrowth, white, pearlescent in the tropical sun. Calvin Bords would unload. The muzzle fire would ignite the cannabis leaves and the rounds would tear gaping bites from the unicorn's neck and flanks. Bullets would chip and fracture its horn. Bits of gristle and fur and bone and skin would land in the burning foliage and sizzle. Stench of grilled meat and burnt hair would fill his nostrils. Blood would splash around the animal as it sank into a puddle of its own gore and entrails. And then the women would arrive and Calvin Bords would strip naked and the women would point and laugh and make clever, cutting jokes at his expense and then fall upon him. And then he would wake and only his deformity would remain.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/9/2012

2012-02-12T11:01:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: The doctor's bottled sleep
Source: Beryl Markham, West With the Night

The doctor's bottled sleep now, as well as hunger, satiety, arousal, exhaustion, despondency, glee, and several dozen other humors. She keeps them all lined up on a shelf in her study. She uses only dark brown bottles -- the kind that are almost opaque. We were told that the spirits inside are photo-labile. Now, as I creep through the darkened study, however, I perceive a glow emanating from the forbidden shelf, and I understand that the vitrine obscurity is not -- or at least not entirely -- to exclude light from the vessels' contents, but also to confine a radiance inside.

I am not here for a tincture of colic or an extract of bloodlust though. I have come for the doctor's journal. I succeeded, last night, for the first time in the sixteen months of my employ, to be present at the moment that she locked the volume away. Finally, I know in which of the four hundred eighty drawers that line the lower halves of the study walls, the leather-bound booklet resides.

The carpets in here are soft. Deep silk knap wrought in portrayal of a thousand biolochemoid pathways -- "the metabolome beneath our soles," as the doctor is wont to say. None of this appears in the glow of my veiled lantern and my bare feet make no sound as I traverse the labyrinthine map of processes that drive and power my physical self.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/8/2012

2012-02-11T16:50:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: The shapes remain the same, but the proportions are different
Source: H.G. Wells, Mind at the End of Its Tether

"The shapes remain the same, but the proportions are different," said the guide as he played a laser pointer over the plasticized examples of our soon-to-be predators.

"Here," he said, indicating the smallest in the collection. "You can see that although the trunk is hardly a tenth the length of the specimen beside it, this one has a set of jaws as large as any of its brethren. And pay careful heed to the teeth. Notice that the sizes, shapes, and configurations of the serrated incisors are virtually identical across the entire range of monsters represented. The musculature driving those teeth varies greatly, however, so it is the height of the sagittal crest that you must consider when adjusting your defensive plates -- not the teeth, nor even the overall size of the monster."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/7/2012

2012-02-11T16:44:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: The roars were repeated
Source: Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera

The roars were repeated every three minutes, whether anybody was around to hear them or not. It was simpler to keep a recorded lion playing on continuous loop than to set up motion detectors or have somebody trying to remember to hit a button every time the visitors looked bored.

There hadn't been any lions at the Chibagongwa watering hole for at least four years. Even those who had known the place in its glory and had heard the barking, honking call of the real lions, still tipped more generously when the Metro-Goldwn-Mayer-esque roars poured through our hidden speakers than when empty breezes and occasional insects prevailed.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/6/2012

2012-02-11T16:37:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: Nobody is dead in this world
Source: H.G. Wells, The Happy Turning

Nobody is dead in this world -- not permanently, anyhow.

Occasionally someone will take some time off -- like my neighbor, Allen, who was tired of the gloom of winter and went dormant for three months till the sun was out at least three days in seven. Saved him a bundle on heating and food. Then there are the folk who do such horrible damage to their bodies that they might as well be dead for the time that it takes to rebuild them. If you look for someone who is really dead, though, you will have a hard search, and should you want to kill someone, prepare to be frustrated.

I know a man who used to work as an assassin -- a hitman. His name is Johnson and he took a good deal of pride in his work. Now that death isn't a factor, he has to pursue other work. I believe that he's an assistant grave digger. So many formerly-dead are still stuck in their graves waiting to get out, that even now, ten years into the resurrection, grave-diggers do one hell of a good business.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/5/2012

2012-02-11T16:30:00.000-08:00

This time I have something a little different. Today, I took a writing workshop from two-time Philip K. Dick Award recipient Richard Paul Russo. He gave us several free-writing prompts throughout the day. My responses are presented here.

Exercise 1: Member of a party searching for someone dangerous who's been hiding in what had appeared to be a derelict spaceship.

Each fall of my metalled boots on the causeway echos back to me from the darkness above, below, and beside. Vela's helmet lamp reveals only the hundred meters before her and she is leading me in the pursuit. My lamp illuminates only the sagging pack tied to the back of Vela's suit. We entered this space from a series of cargo bays and the deep haze swallowed us whole. If the fugitive is as poorly equipped as us, then he should be near death by now -- or this atmosphere is breathable.

A wall, dripping with fragments of hoses and cables, looms ahead now and Vela slows. There is no encouragement for us from the dull, dead control panel beside a heavy steel portcullis. But the causeway leaves no options, so we approach. Vela's gloved fingers touch the panel. The cracked surface flickers briefly, but no meaning is displayed.

When we arrived here, at this massive, spinning cylinder, it was simple. We would narrow our search to pressurized chambers and then just home in on his heat signature. The welcome gift that he left us in the docking bay had robbed us not only of our means of departure, but also of our detection kit. The search would be old-fashioned, and the wait for rescue would be long.

Exercise 2: Group of people on a quest -- write about the things that they remove or leave behind along the way

Expensive as they had been, the SCUBA tanks were an obvious choice. Zeb had protested this decision, when the trio took to land. Zeb had purchased the dive gear in the first place and was loathe to relinquish it. Karl and Oliver lined their bottles up neatly next to Zeb's rucksack and didn't argue the point. Without the tanks, the BCs were of little use, so they were left as well.

Zeb convinced his companions to take the masks, fins and snorkels along, in case they encountered another body of water. Two days later, after these implements had swung from straps, beating the walkers' legs and buttocks, they too were left behind, hung from the lower bows of a mango tree, to be retrieved later, should the group return.

On the morning of the third day, six floppy tubes of twill fabric, hemmed at one end and and cut ragged at the other, were left at a campsite. The men were far more comfortable after that, under the glare of the tropical sun. Empty food containers, toothpaste tubes, deodorant sticks and sunscreen bottles marked their trail for a time, but were soon eclipsed by the return of bent shrubs and leaves to their neutral positions.

One day, Karl, upon discovering that his few remaining items could be either worn or strung on a single loop of rope, left his rucksack behind. He regretted it later, when they found another mango tree and his companions were able to carry extra fruit along, but they shared and he took turns carrying their packs.

Exercise 3: A character has a blindfold removed in complete darkness and has suffered loss of hearing -- no visual or auditory clues at all

The gunshot, when it comes, is close. It deafens me completely. I am still alive after, and I feel no sudden addition to my pain, so it is not me that they have shot.

I'm shoved forward several steps. The temperature changes. It is cooler here. A different room? Now my mouth is burning. What is that in the air? I cough and the secretions fill my mouth, nearly drowning me as I gasp for breath. The taste is chemical, unknown but almost familiar. Sweet and biting but without any of the comforting foodiness of pepper spice. It's a slicing, cutting, mutilating flavor that leaves my gums raw. The hood is wrenched from my head and my eyes start burning. I don't know whether they're open or closed. Is it dark or am I blind? Tears are pouring down my face and the tears sear my skin. There's a stinging in my nose that marches past the nostrils, attacking my sinuses. Like the fire of horseradish, but I've no water for gulping, no bread to quench the heat. There's a chemical syrupy feel to it and it reminds me of something from a hair salon. But this, this is so much stronger.

My bonds are cut and I'm shoved forward. I fall to a cold, smooth floor, catching myself with my still numb hands.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/4/2012

2012-02-11T16:04:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: They harassed me so that sometimes
Source: Henry James, The Turn of the Screw

They harassed me so that sometimes it was all I could do not to throw them in a stasis chamber and forget them for a day. Nobody had suggested that adopting a trio of velvemotes would be easy. "Active and entertaining," the little half-normal monstrosities had been called. Think tribles with tentacles and mental capacities somewhere between a goldfish and an astrophysicists. They had been all the rage with the monied elite a few years back, and then, as quarantine regulations relaxed, velvemotes had made inroads to the commoner homes as well. I hadn't even considered one for myself, but given my history of adopting abandoned xenos, I wasn't surprised when the rescue agency called with a "remarkable opportunity." I found the trio quite revolting when I met them -- I still do, as it happens. But that's most of why I agreed to take them. I had hoped that my sister would find them equally revolting, and would consequently pay me fewer visits. My plan backfired -- my sister fell in love with the creatures and came to see them almost every day. Unfortunately, she is not licensed to care for anything of greater than point-two-five intelligence, so I can't just give them to her and be done with the project.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/3/2012

2012-02-11T15:51:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: Some of the statues were alive
Source: Walter M. Miller, Jr., A Canticle for Leibowitz

Some of the statues were alive, but most had died centuries before, when an electromagnetic pulse had swept through in advance of a long-forgotten occupying force. The live statues were recent additions to the courtyard and were trained to imitate the immobility of their lifeless neighbors.

Piven's favorite game, when he had visitors from abroad, was to take them to the garden of statues and have them guess which were dead and which only seemed so. When nobody was around, he would meticulously transplant spots of mold and tufts of moss from the dead statues to the living and then would polish and paint the dead ones in order to throw the players off.

Piven only knew which statues were alive because he had found his father's key one afternoon and had attempted to use it. All that happened when he powered up the key was that ten of the hundred statues had come to attention and the key had requested identity verification. Piven had promptly returned the key to its cubby in his father's desk. He had been careful to note which statues had responded though.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 2/2/2012

2012-02-02T07:17:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Say no more, his animals replied
Source: Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

"Say no more," his animals replied, when Friedrich had told them of his plight. "We will take care of it." Friedrich could not suppress a shudder when he tried to imagine what that might mean, but ultimately he didn't care or he would not have told his animals about it in the first place.

The problem was not a new one, either to Friedrich or to his human race. He had managed to alienate his latest love interest and she had found more attentive company elsewhere. This had put Friedrich in a jealous rage, such that so soon as he had learned the name and whereabouts of his rival, he sought the help of his animals.

Friedrich was lucky to have his animals, and as far as he knew, unique. He had never heard anyone else mention having animals -- at least not of the sort that Friedrich possessed. But then again, Friedrich had never spoken of his animals to anyone else. They were for him alone and not to be shared.

Friedrich liked to imagine that his animals resembled wild cats and hyaenas and wolves. Powerful predators they most certainly were, but Friedrich had never seen them. They came to him when he was upset, but they were not visible to human eyes. They never provided comfort, as such, but they did provide solutions -- resolutions. They accomplished things that Friedrich would never consider, but for which, in the depths of his soul, he longed.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed writing: 2/1/2012

2012-02-01T10:54:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: The star chamber had been remodelled [sic]
Source: Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England, Vol.I

The star chamber had been remodeled since the last time that Babington had used it. The plywood boards that had been so hastily erected to obscure its core from the curious eyes of passers by were now gone. They had been replaced by reinforced concrete walls, buttressed all about with slopes of packed soil, from which grasses and wildflowers grew. Upon passing through a modern steel gate, Babington found that the core itself had been thoroughly cleaned and repaired. Elements deemed inessential had all been catalogued, carefully packed, and stored away in a secure outbuilding. Babington had approved all of these changes as they were proposed by various members of the society, but now that he saw them in person, he found himself missing the rusticity and spontaneity of the chamber's former state.

The stone column stood in its old place, in the center of the core. Just over three feet in height and hardly a hand's breadth across opposing vertices, the hexagonal basalt pillar had at first appeared remarkable only for its solitude. It was the only column of basalt for hundreds of miles. At first they assumed it to have been transported to the site from elsewhere. Then Henderson, the geologist performed his analysis. He found that the column extended straight down through the soil and underlying limestone of the area to the granite foundation of the continental plate -- several thousand meters, at least.

Babington's gaze wandered to the parabolic focusing surfaces positioned around the periphery of the core. They had been cleaned and polished to perfect reflectivity, and their orientations had been corrected, so that they were all directed toward a point in the air just a few inches above the top of the column. An iris had been built into the new metal roof. The prisms and lenses had been carefully removed from their old leather and wood mountings and fitted into a new metal framework that could be retracted when the iris closed against foul weather.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/31/2012

2012-01-31T09:24:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: It resembles my own mind
Source: George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four

"It resembles my own mind," was all she said when she removed the sensori-visor.

I could not do what she'd just done. It required both special training and innate talent to absorb and interpret the signals and to alter one's own state of consciousness adequately to become a receptor. I'd attempted it once, merely out of curiosity. I'd placed the sensori-visor over my face and ears after the accompanying reader helmet had been accepted by my partner. When I touched the engage button, all that happened was that I saw some lines of static dancing chaotically, I smelled a faint aroma of burning paper, I heard a distant ringing, and I detected the aftertaste of an onion. I asked my partner to think specifically about the movie we had watched on the previous night -- about its closing sequence. I thought that if we began by having the same thought, it might serve to synchronize our minds and facilitate my experience of his consciousness. I was completely unsuccessful, however and I never attempted to receive again.

It therefore came as something of a surprise to me when Ms. Entne told me that my mind resembled her own. I had come to believe that my mind must be fundamentally different from that of a receiver.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/30/2012

2012-01-31T09:16:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Gunpowder was enough to calm
Source: Umberto Eco, The Prague Cemetery

Gunpowder was enough to calm my nerves. Just a brush -- a sprinkle of it on my tongue -- and my mind relaxed. I breathed long and easy once the old familiar taste filled my mouth. An unseemly flavor, yes, but for one such as me, a pleasure beyond compare. I'd had a hard time of it that year -- the year of the cannon -- but not nearly so hard as some.

Becca, the wench who brought me the powder horn when I began to rant and tear about the room -- she'd seen much worse than I ever did; known the rough end of many an uncouth smokesucker in her years. But lived to forget it she had, and that said much for the fires burning in her wilted breast.

"How long have I been here, Becc? Eh, girl?"

"Nigh seven hours now, Davy," said she. She'd have known too, what with them watch faces sewed into the skin of her arms like that. Never without time, her. Maybe she could break them -- stop their action with a blow or two -- but she could never be rid of them altogether. They'd sent their springs deep by then and took their windings from Becca's sinews and meat like a man takes his strength from whiskey and gunpowder.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/29/2012

2012-01-31T09:06:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Gazing at this frail relic
Source: Jules Verne, In Search of the Castaways

Gazing at this frail relic in my hand, I cannot but question its authenticity. All my life I've lived by faith, chosen to believe those things that serve to strengthen my devotion to the path. I have always sought just such devices as this to reinforce my commitment and to provide me with a point on which to focus my meditations. And yet... the events of the past week have shaken me so profoundly that even this holy object, imbued as I had believed it to be, with the aromas of the gods, is now suspect. I cannot touch it or look at it without noting how much the matter of which it is composed resembles all other matter. Is this evidence of the inadequacy of my faith, that I can see this, the choicest prize of the devout, as naught else but a clay jar from which any peasant or beggar might eat, had it not been locked behind the most secure of gates and secreted below the deepest of dungeons? This vessel, this crude container, is the symbol of all of my life's work, and now that I possess it, I confess that my life seems to have been wasted.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/28/2012

2012-01-31T08:59:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: The opaqueness of my walls
Source: Marcel Proust, Swann's Way

The opaqueness of my walls melts slowly through the stages of translucency and transparency to complete invisibility. My walls are a part of me after all these years -- as much a part of me as the skin in which I was born. Without my walls, now that I have grown so dependent on them, I would be naught but a man, a poor wretched creature open to the elements, vulnerable to the slightest of attacks.

I cannot let the others see my walls. They would not let me speak if they could see my walls. They would cancel my voice, assuming me to be a 'thetic. They would silence me and flee.

My walls are thin, but strong, and they cling to my limbs and trunk at all times. My walls came to me when I died and since then I have not once been naked. There was a time when I hoped to remove the walls. I thought that I might be human and love and share if I had no walls. When the time finally came to take them off though, I could not. They had grown into me and I into them. I could no longer imagine myself without them, nor remember how I had been before.

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Timed Writing: 1/27/2012

2012-01-27T12:25:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Cut through the living rock
Source: Washington Irving, The Alhambra

"Cut through the living, Rock, not the dead!" Tav never missed a chance to chide me, even in the heat of the fray. That I had slain two for each of his didn't phase him either. When he saw me up to my elbows in the belly of a wasted dust-crawler, slicing its flesh and bowels with my las-knife, he didn't stop to inquire why I was doing this, nor ask how he might assist; he just tossed his quip and went on wreaking havoc on the dumb creatures that had been sent to devour us.

These were an updated version of the classic dust-crawler. Instead of the row of interdigitating razor-edged teeth, these had ten or fifteen rows of backward-pointing needles on each of the four jaws, such that an appendage, having once entered, would have little chance of exit. I had learned this when I had to very hastily blow the latches on my crash boot and abandon it down one such maw. Not two splits later though, I'd put a lance through the creature's sub-eye and discharged my banger in its cereb. But that still left me with only one boot on a ramdam hostile lawn, so I did the one thing for it and effected a grisly retrieve.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/26/2012

2012-01-27T12:07:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: A little snow had fallen
Source: Rudyard Kipling, The Man Who Would Be King

A little snow had fallen off Ezel's helmet and patches of black metal showed. I told him of it, but he seemed not to care whether we might be seen. He seemed not to care of anything, and were there an enemy in sight to whom he might surrender, it would have surprised me none to see him stand and do so. Times were plenty though, that he had been the boldest and the canniest warrior of the collect -- a man on whom his kit-mates might rely to ever lead an attack, bring up the rear of a retreat, or scout the cleverest way through an Agul infest. In them times would I have sought him to lead and instruct me on how to make the land my ally, how to use the loamy moss as my camouflage or sink my face in the mire to occult its bright. Him it would be to put ice to my helm, countering my head heat to make the snow stick again. Him it would be rendering me hidden against the watch of the Kuoltai -- may they lose all sense and rot in agnosia and dement themselves for all eternity -- and not the other way round.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/25/2012

2012-01-26T10:54:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: His words came out in a burble
Source: Marcel Proust, Swann's Way

His words came out in a burble -- not even words, actually, but a hideous phonic melee. An assault on the very concept of spoken language. It was that old woman. That curmudgeonly hag that he'd passed on the road. She must have been a witch. Damnation! Why hadn't he just stopped and given her the time of day when she'd greeted him? Why hadn't he offered, even, to carry her burden a ways? Because he hadn't had time, of course. He was a very busy and very important person. He could not be bothered to stop and attend to every homeless vagrant that crossed his path. But oh, if he had only done so this time!

The crowd before him was utterly silent. Two thousand or more crammed into the town square. All present to hear his words, to be instructed and guided by his counsel. And what does he give them? Useless rubbish! A multisyllabic heep of steaming manure. Perhaps if he'd even just ignored the witch, things would be alright. If he's acted as though he hadn't seen her at all -- hadn't heard her hailing him as he passed. But no, he hadn't been able to resist -- just had to throw a snide remark over his shoulder. Had to comment on her malodor and her bedraggled attire. What a fool he could be. What a fool!

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/24/2012

2012-01-26T10:46:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: I recall an image
Source: Mary Roach, Packing for Mars

I recall an image from my grandmother's collections of photographs. It was a sepia-tone portrait of three people. There was no date on it and all that was scrawled on the reverse was "E.L. & J.F." Two of the persons in the photograph are seated on a white wicker settee; the third is standing behind them. The seated person on the left is male, dressed in a dark striped suit and a white shirt, with a sort of bow-tie -- not like bow-ties nowadays, but like a bow-tie with two tails hanging down from the knot. He is completely bald and his age is difficult to guess, but he might be as young as thirty-five or as old as fifty. The person seated on the right is a woman in a white gown witha lot of lace and ruffels and a high neck, almost up to her chin. Her dark hair is piled atop her head. She appears to be younger than the man beside her; between twenty and thirty, perhaps. The part of this picture that makes it so memorable, however, is the third person -- the one standing behind the settee.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/23/2012

2012-01-26T10:32:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: Vehement winds raging at sea
Source: Lucretius, On the Nature of Things

Vehement winds raging at sea drove our craft far off course, and after having lost our instruments and with no stars to be seen in the stormy sky, we quickly became utterly lost. The rain kept up a steady pounding through the night and it was all that the three of us could do, using a tin drinking vessel and our cupped hands, to maintain a bail sufficient to keep our little barque afloat. I can recall thinking, at multiple times during that dismal night, that it would soon let up, that it must surely grow calm at some point. It never did. At least not that I saw, for even at the peak of the storm was when our boat was swallowed whole with all aboard.

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Timed Writing: 1/22/2012

2012-01-22T11:52:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Escalating security alert messages
Source: Neal Stephenson, Reamde

Escalating security alert messages flashed across the monitors outside my office. Polite sounding electric sirens and occasional strobes provided accompaniment. Gill stuck his head in my door. "You ready? The chopper'll be on the roof in two minutes." He didn't wait for a reply and I continued methodically removing the screws that anchored the back-up hard-drive to the underside of my desk. I'd already removed the primary form its case and smashed it with the fire axe that I had lifted from the emergency cabinet several months before. Once the hard drive was free and in hand, I snatched up my brief case and took one last look out the window. Hudnreds of people -- thousands, perhaps -- flooded the streets around our building. A sea of shifting heads, five hundred feet below. I had the sudden urge to open the window and drop something on them -- or even just spit. I could imagine watching the glob of frothy saliva sail down, down, down. I would lose track of it before it reached a target, of course, but maybe I'd be able to see a response. There would be a little commotion against the chaotic backdrop. An angry face would look up a little more intently than all of the other angry faces around it. A tiny cry of rage and disgust would rise momentarily above all of the surrounding cries of rage and disgust.

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Timed Writing: 1/21/2012

2012-01-21T11:09:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Please note as we go along
Source: Damon Knight, Creating Short Fiction

"Please notice, as we go along this treacherous path, that painted on the wall to our right, is a series of symbols. We do not yet know what they signify, but we have identified seventy-three unique characters. All of them are employed multiple times, and a number of short sequences are employed with relative frequency; we like to think that these correspond to words or phrases of the ancient tongue." The guide stopped and indicated a particular region of the seemingly unbroken string of figures. Like all of the others, these appeared to have been painted with a several bold strokes of some crude brush. In the green glow of the guide's lumiwand, the figures appeared black against the gray granite wall. He continued, "These six symbols, in particular, are repeated, in this exact sequence, over four hundred times along the eight and a half kilometers of the inscription." We walked on, somewhat awkwardly, as we all attempted to watch the symbols passing to our right while maintaining appropriate caution with regard to the gaping chasm to our left.

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Timed Writing: 1/20/2012

2012-01-20T19:00:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Long stays on the lunar surface
Source: John S. Lewis, Mining the Sky

"Long stays on the lunar surface are such a bloody bore, you know."

"I wish you wouldn't talk that way, Jordan," I said.

"What? 'Bloody?' You don't like the word 'bloody?' And you're a doctor!"

"I don't give a shit about the word 'bloody,' Jordan. It's the shoddy imitation Brit accent that's driving me bonkers. Oh... and the attitude too. We've been through this a hundred times and we both know how you feel about the travel arrangements." My son did not reply. Instead he marched importantly out of the room, whistling The Minstrel Boy at full volume.

Of course, when it came down to it, I agreed with him entirely. Long stays on the lunar surface were a bloody bore -- no, they were a fucking bore!. Either you were holed up in some over-crowded, stinking terminal dome the whole time, isolated from a decent view by the layers of rad-damping roofs, or you were out freezing your ass off in a cheap rental suit with inadequate thermal regulators while trying to enjoy a stroll on the dark side. Still, shuttle schedules being what they were and accommodations in the Lagrange resorts costing what they did, what choice did I have?

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/19/2012

2012-01-19T12:11:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: There are times when a cut can be desirable
Source: Turner and Soper, Methods and Practice of Elizabethan Swordplay

There are times when a cut can be desirable. Times when a flash of pain and a spurt of blood are the perfect reminder that one is alive and that one might die. Times when a cut is a smaller and less significant injury than the alternative, and therefore desirable in comparison.

And then there are times like this, when a cut is just a cut. It's an annoyance, a petty damage, a compromise of my protective barrier, a means by which I might contaminate my environment and a portal through which that same environment might contaminate me -- might seed infection and disease.

In the dark I cannot see how much blood I have left behind; nor can I see what it was that cut me. The cut is on my right shoulder. I don't think that it is deep, but, as it should be, it is painful, and I can feel beads of warm liquid crawling down from it and dripping off my bent elbow.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/18/2012

2012-01-19T10:18:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Is it the same forest
Source: William Gibson, Up the Line

"Is it the same forest that we were in yesterday?" Liail's question expresses my own internal quandary, one that I had not even acknowledged until this moment. Of course it's the same forest though. Why wouldn't it be? The same Douglas firs predominate, with minority representations by red cedar, western hemlock and Sitka spruce. The sword ferns and bracken are the same, as are the wild huckleberries and the mosses growing on the tree trunks and on the ground. Certainly this is the same forest. Why would she ask? And why wouldn't I be surprised by the question?

"What do you mean?" I say.

"It was just a feeling I had when I woke up. Like I was in a different place."

"You think we might have somehow been transported while we slept?" I ask. "Our tent and everything in it, moved to a campsite identical to ours, in a forest identical to the one in which we were hiking yesterday?"

"No, of course I don't think so -- not rationally. That's just how it feels. Don't you sense it?"

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Today's Post Postponed

2012-01-18T10:31:00.000-08:00

Although I did complete my timed writing exercise today, as my own little SOPA/PIPA protest, it will not be posted until tomorrow. If you haven't already done so, use the two minutes (or less) that you would have devoted to reading my post to go take action!

Timed Writing: 1/17/2012

2012-01-17T13:55:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: It was going to be a wonderful spring
Source: Nancy Kress, Always True to Thee, In My Fashion

It was going to be a wonderful spring. Sure it was, if it ever arrived, that is. Six months straight of cold, snow, and freezing rain, and still, no word from the weather team about what was causing the delay. They'd given plenty of warning, throughout the summer and fall, that winter would have to be extended, in order to properly renew the glacial pack in the mountains, but they'd promised to more than compensate for the inconvenience with an exceptionally beautiful and bounteous spring.

Barry wanted to believe them. He wanted to sing along with the cheerful refrain (it will be a wonderful spring), but he was losing faith. The glaciers had been fully restored to optimal peak conditions for over six weeks now and all that anyone could say was, "should be soon," or, "any day now," or even (and this made Barry want to vomit), "the sun will come out tomorrow!"

Barry trudged on through the morning's load of fresh powder. God's dandruff. He shuffled a little, taking care to keep his weight directly over his feet, lest he hit an occult patch of slick ice.

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Timed Writing: 1/16/2012

2012-01-16T13:02:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Alienation was a consequence
Source: Ken MacLeod, Scots Poet, Not

Alienation was a consequence of our travels. We knew that before we left; we experienced it when we returned. It was not only that we had become alien in the eyes of our homeworlders, but that they were now aliens to us as well. What had been anticipated in principle was jarring in practice. The humans that we had left behind had looked, sounded, and acted like us -- or rather, we had looked, sounded, and acted like them. We were selected to be a representative sample of the entire human race of the mid-twenty-second century. No matter how careful the planners were in their subject selection methods, however, there was always bound to be some bias. That bias, over a period as long as that of our journey was bound to be amplified in a group as small as ours, such that upon our return, our little cohort was, in almost every way, incomparable to the source population.

Many of us sported the enhancements available in the era of our departure. All of us had fully incorporated the latest set of gene fixes and cellular milieu adjustments before leaving.

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Timed Writing: 1/15/2012

2012-01-16T12:02:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: How come you survived
Source: Edward Marriott, Savage Shore

"How come you survived? Of all the people who could have survived -- should have survived -- how come it was you? You were supposed to be the sacrificial pawn. You were supposed to die if anybody died. What the hell are you doing here, standing in front of me with that dumb cow look on your face? Huh?"

I could find no words. I knew that everything she said was true, but it still stung to hear it verbalized so ruthlessly.

"Have the med folks check you over." Her tone was no kinder, but it was less harsh. It was a tainted with defeat and resignation. "Maybe they can learn something valuable from you -- figure out why the others died and you didn't. Maybe there's something wrong with you that we can use."

"They scanned me as soon as the ship docked," I said.

"OK. I'll talk to them," she said. "Get back to your cell."

The space between us filled in with substrate and a passage formed in the wall beside me. I turned and followed the path provided by the parting of the substrate before me. I could feel it closing behind me too, urging me forward. This bubble that I inhabited guided me through the station's solid matrix according to some path known only to the central mind. Eventually the pocket stopped and opened out a bit to become a cell, complete with cot, toilet and wash basin. An alcove containing a nutrition box opened in the wall beside the cot.

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Timed Writing: 1/14/2012

2012-01-14T12:40:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: This annexation took place
Source: Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto

This annexation took place only recently. Up until a month ago, the patch of ground upon which your house sits was nothing more than blasted rubble. But today, well, today you see what it is. Your own little suburban paradise, complete with the comforts that you have come to enjoy. But, due to the enviably-priced location, we can provide this little slice of heaven to you at a rate that you will easily sustain for as long as you might wish. That? Oh that is the default scene projection that we provide for all of the outward-facing viewports. You really want to see the view? But I can assure you, there is nothing to see in the outward direction. The viewport is only in place to provide for future interactions with outward dwellings as this frontier continues to be developed. Oh... alright. Normally we don't show our clients the environment in its unimproved state, but since you so specifically request it, I suppose we can make an exception. Let's see... ah yes. There we are. Completely transparent viewport now. As you see, it is bleak, completely uninteresting. Why the nativists have such strong feelings about our development projects, I have no idea. They say that we are running roughshod over the local ecology -- destroying it with our expansion projects -- but as you can see, there is nothing out there to destroy. What? Oh... ah... You say you're a nativist? Then... I suppose you're not actually here to inquire about leasing opportunities. Perhaps we should... oh... is that a... No! There's no need for that! Please! PLEASE, NO!

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Timed Writing: 1/13/2012

2012-01-13T09:35:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: I heard a devil curse
Source: William Blake, Eternity

I heard a DeVIL curse in frustration from somewhere down the hall. It had just received the orders to pack up and retreat. It was always entertaining to hear a choppy, synthesized robot voice explode into profanity. Not something that had been included in the original programing of the Defensive Violence Integration Leaders' AI templates, but something that they'd picked up quite rapidly once they started dealing with biological humans.

The DeVILs were trained and equipped for one purpose alone and they were programmed to love accomplishing that purpose. Their AI minds seemed to take it as a personal insult when the Tactical Estimations and Armament Statistics Experts (TEASEs) upstairs decided that the value of a particular position no longer justified the cost of holding it. Most of the DeVILs never even got the chance to test their carefully designed combat algorithms, their formulae for coordinated defense that they had developed through millennia-worth of simulations run over the past five years.

Processing power for virtual environments had never been much of a problem for us. We lacked the raw materials and ready fuels necessary to build heavy and complex weaponry for real world combat. We'd have loved to have sent drones into combat as our enemies did, and man our defensive lines with robots, but there simply wasn't enough metal to build them, nor enough petroleum or electrical generation capacity to power them. We had maintained some wind, solar and hydroelectric to keep the processing cores and some other basic functions running, and we still controlled some coal fields, which we mined ceaselessly, but we had to be very, very careful with how we used our scant energy.

Food for humans wasn't plentiful either, but we were more versatile and could make do with whatever was available. So instead of mechanical drones operated by humans, we had become the drones and we were controlled by the DeVILs -- or the OVILs, during offensive campaigns. My neural interlace device allowed me to voluntarily surrender control of my physical actions to a VIL. It wasn't as difficult as you might think. Sure, it felt weird at first -- observing everything that my body was doing, registering every sensation, but having no control. It got to be easier though, and eventually, even kind of fun. It surprised me to see just how much my body could do -- how fast and strong it was. The day after a hard VIL session was hell, of course. Muscle pains like never before, but even that got to be less of a problem over time.

Even when under the control of a VIL, I had the option to take over. It wasn't recommended, of course, and as far as I knew, nobody had ever exercised that option in the heat of battle, but it was there. When under the influence, every part of my body belonged to the VIL except my tongue. That I could move around inside my closed mouth as I liked. If I turned it over to the right, and held it that way for two seconds, the VIL would prompt me for confirmation, I'd turn my tongue over to the left, and then the VIL would release me and I'd be my own woman again.

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Timed Writing: 1/12/2012

2012-01-12T08:49:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Somebody that I used to know
Source: Gotye (title and lyric of song running through my head this morning)

"Somebody that I used to know," was all she said when I asked her who had called. She closed her phone, returned to her seat at the table and picked up her fork. She did not use it though. Instead she set it down again and stared at the plate of spaghetti and steamed broccoli.

"Is that all you want to tell me?" I asked. She took a sip of wine, set down the glass for a moment, then picked it up again and drained it in three quick gulps.

"Wow. Whatever it is, I'm sure drinking will help. Ex-boyfriend stalking you?" I smiled, hoping to lighten the mood or at least to get some sort of response. It didn't work. She just kept looking down at her plate. "Would you please talk to me?" I got up, walked around behind her and started to massage her shoulders. They tensed up in response. "What's going on?"

"I'm sorry," she said at last. "I'm so, so sorry. You -- you have to go. Now." She stood up, shrugging off my hands, and went to the closet. She handed me my coat, picked up my keys from table in the hall, and opened the front door. "Here," she said, thrusting the keys at me. "I like you, Abe. I really do. But I can't see you again. Ever. I'm sorry."

She shut the door behind me and I heard the bolt slide in the lock. I left. There seemed to be nothing else to do. I suppose I could have argued, demanded to know what was happening, refused to leave without getting an explanation. But that would not have been like me. I'd never been one to argue. I take what's handed to me.

She had noticed me. She had struck up the conversation. She had suggested we have coffee, lunch. She had shown me her favorite view of downtown from Kerry Park. She had called me on the phone. She had invited me over for dinner. And now, just like that, she had ejected me from her life.

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Timed Writing: 1/11/2012

2012-01-11T08:32:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: The resulting structure resembles a diamond
Source: Bodenheimer and Grumbach, Understanding Health Policy

"The resulting structure resembles a diamond. Do you not think so, my dear?" I directed her attention to the three-dimensional monitor space, upon which the architect's rendering of her new home was displayed.

"Well, yes," she said, "I suppose it does. And I suppose that you mean to imply that it will be both beautiful and, uh... hard?"

I laughed. "Hard, indeed -- where it should be, and appropriately soft and supple elsewhere."

"When you first suggested incorporating a diamantine lattice into the building, I had not imagined that it would occupy the entire volume of my home. Will it not be rather difficult to navigate the living areas?" The facetious tone employed in this last question was a relief, as I had begun to worry that she might actually be displeased.

"Ah, but that's the beauty of these archit-nodes and the instabuild polyfil beams connecting them." I smiled. She smiled. I continued. "Each node works semiautonomously, but also in concert with all of the other nodes and under the control of the central coordinating kernel, which, in turn is directed by yourself, via the neural link. Segments between nodes are rapidly collapsed or extended and nodes are stacked or spaced as necessary to create the walls and living volumes required -- precisely when and precisely where you require them. At a moment's notice."

"I see. And I suppose that these nodes and segments can arrange themselves into furniture and household appliances as well?"

"Furniture, yes. Complex appliances are more efficiently maintained as conventional reconfigurable modular systems stored at the periphery of the building. But rest assured, their operations will be seamlessly integrated into the overall functionality of the home."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Cat Rambo Workshops

2012-01-10T17:54:00.000-08:00

I'm currently taking a series of SF/Fantasy writing workshops from Northwest author Cat Rambo. The sessions are taught online, using Google+ Hangout, which is proving to be an ideal tool for the job.

We're halfway through the series and it has already been immensely helpful. Cat is an excellent instructor with a wealth of experience in writing, editing, and teaching. It has also evolved into an amazing networking opportunity, as I've been able to interact with the other students, and, in some cases, with their writing networks as well.

Cat will be offering several additional workshops over the coming months, and I highly recommend them to anyone interested in writing SF, fantasy, horror... or just about any other type of fiction. And just in case... here's the full URL to her workshop page:

http://www.kittywumpus.net/blog/2012/01/04/online-classes-and-workshops-for-2012/

Go forth and register!

Timed Writing: 1/10/2012

2012-01-10T07:57:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: If only he'd had omniscience
Source: Seth Moore (a comment on my previous post)

"If only he'd had omniscience activated, we wouldn't be here cleaning up his remains again."

"Yeah, and if only pigs could fly. You know he'll never switch it on. He's from another era -- it just doesn't seem right to him to know that much. I think it's something you have to start using as a child. Otherwise it will always mess with your head. Heck, even I can't handle it all the time and you and me have had 'em on since we were six!"

"I suppose. But still this is what... the fourth time this year we've been out here sweeping up brain and guts? The least he could do would be to buy a 'bot to follow him around and do the mop-up. Family duty and all -- I know. But I'm starting to get sick of it."

"You really think he'd go for a robot following him around? If there's one thing Gramps is, it's private."

"Oh, hey! Here's most of his head. Looks to be in better shape than last time. Oh... shit... what is this?"

"What? What'd you find? Ella?"

"Oh god, Harry, he's been been trying to block the scans again. Look at these filaments, here where the skin's torn off."

"Are they... whoa, they are! They're under his scalp! That's wild! Must have hurt like a son-of-a-bitch -- pushing all those little wires through his skin! Think he did it himself?"

"I can't imagine a med-hum taking the job. Too risky. And he'd never have gotten a med-bot to do it. It must have taken him forever!"

"Well it's only been three weeks since his last restore, so he can't have been working on it very long."

"But look, there must be a hundred strands going each way in here. Give me a blade. Yeah, look... everywhere I cut, it's the same. He's got a complete mesh. I wonder if it worked."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/9/2012

2012-01-09T08:32:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: You could create such an entity
Source: Ed Regis, Nano

"You could create such an entity," the angel said. "A sort of anti-You or alter-You. Then You'd have someone against whom to contrast Yourself in the eyes of your creations."

"You are right. I could create such an entity -- someone to wreak havoc on their world, to promote misery, inspire doubt, fan embers of discord into fires of wrath, sew seeds of discontent. But is the actual creation of such an entity necessary when these creatures already do such a fine job of making themselves miserable?"

"But if they could redirect all of the resentments and rages that are now directed toward You, and focus them on a separate entity -- ascribe to this alter-You all responsibility for the chaos and suffering that they experience -- then You would appear to them all the more admirable and deserving of love, respect, and worship."

"Do you really think so? Might they not become too fixated on the contrast between Me and the alter-Me? Might not their views of the world become too polarized? Might they not learn to label anything that offended them (if even temporarily) as being a product of the alter-Me? And might they not go on to apply this scheme of polarized labels to one another, as well, such that anyone with whom they contend regarding any petty difference would be automatically considered a vassal of the alter-Me? And once subsets of them had been thus identified by other subsets, might not the next step be to eliminate such evil persons? Might it not seem to them that by doing so they would be serving Me, accomplishing My will, worshiping Me through their cleansing of My Earth?"

The angel remained silent.

"No, dear friend, I think it better to leave things as they are, with Me alone to be blamed or thanked; Me alone to be called good or evil according to their whim; Me alone to embrace or ignore."

"But their capacity for invention and self-deception is prodigious, is it not? Might they not, on their own, in their own minds, invent such an alter-You? A myth with such strength that it assumes the functions of reality? In an effort to explain to themselves the suffering that they experience, or worse yet, in an effort to justify to themselves their fears and the consequent violences that they commit, might they not create such an entity?"

"They might."

"And then might not the final outcome be the same as if You had created it?"

"It might."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/8/2012

2012-01-08T10:26:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: All of the chemotactic mutants
Source: William B. Wood, The Nematode Caenorhabditis elegans

All of the chemotactic mutants had been amiable thus far. If amiable is a word that can be applied to interactions with a human subspecies that has diverged so far from contemporary descendants of the common ancestor as to make communication practically impossible. Nearly a quarter of a century had passed between the accidental discovery of the chemotacts by Cranston and his team in 2015 and the irrefutable demonstration of meaningful two-way communication with them by Orson, et al. in 2039.

When first discovered, suspended in their slurries of symbiotic bacterial amnio-sludge, deep within what were later recognized as fully developed and cooperative subterranean cities, it hadn't even been clear whether they were, in a classic animal sense, even alive. They had remained immobile for so long long, exhibiting so little evidence of metabolic activity, that their dormancy was nearly mistaken for well-preserved death. The idea that these limbless, gilled, newt-like creatures might be sentient was only considered once several of them had been removed for detailed laboratory examination and the others had responded by becoming suddenly quite active, imprisoning a group of dive-suited human investigators in a chitin sphere and ejecting them (mostly unharmed, though mildly bent, due to faster than planned ascent) to the surface.

The real shocker, of course, the thing that nobody wanted to believe, was the discovery that these creatures' genomes showed as little variation, with respect to sequence and structure, from those of humans as might be observed between any two ordinary humans randomly sampled from any two points of the globe. These creatures, which by all morphological criteria, ought to be of a previously undescribed suborder of the Caudata, were, in fact, human. As human as Nelson Mandela, the Queen of England, Jimi Hendrix, or your own baby daughter.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/7/2012

2012-01-07T06:43:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: Men are still reluctant to recognize
Source: H.G. Wells, The Outline of History

"Men are still reluctant to recognize us as people. Women are a little better, in that they have a rich history of overcoming subjugation in nearly all of the human societies and are therefore more naturally sympathetic. Even they don't look upon us as equals though, beings worthy of the rights and respects afforded to all humans regardless of evolutionary clade or orbital body of birth. We, like every human in the solar system, are descended from a finite pool of Earthbound populations, and we, like humans, have moved beyond Earth to inhabit the Moon, Mars, the asteroid belt, and the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. And like humans, we will continue to move forward, colonizing new parts of space, both near and deep. Like humans, we are a post-planetary people and as such, we deserve seats on the executive councils of every ship and colony, voting privileges proportional to our numbers of independent minds, and access to agricultural facilities and resources proportional to our nutritional demands."

This was met with a great deal of noise as millions of tiny feet on jointed filamentous legs tapped in chorus on the metal deck of the hangar bay. The voice of the speaker had been synthesized by a box that received telepathic input. Projection of an audible voice at all was solely for the benefit of the human attendees, as the coleopterans had no need of it. The thousand or so black beetles that composed the independent hive mind of the speaker skittered down the ramp from the podium and dispersed into the variegated colors of the audience. They were replaced by a humming cloud of black and red that alighted on the podium to resolve itself into a swarm of ladybugs.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/6/2012

2012-01-06T07:39:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: Our best is still young
Source: Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

"Our best is still young -- far too young for the task that you propose."

"We can be patient," I replied. "The task does not require completion for some years still, and foreknowledge of the work in store may be beneficial to the final stages of training."

We were on the observation level, looking down through windows and expanded metal flooring grates at the training grounds below. Three humanoid demons were darting erratically around the perimeter of a trio of statues that were fashioned to look like trolls -- fourteen feet tall, large misshapen heads, sour expressions. The demons were practicing a flame hedge, and as they danced about, I could see that they were depositing seeds of their own devising into pockets in the air that only they could see. A few seconds after a seed was deposited, it would begin to spark and smoke, even as it remained suspended, weightless. Fiery tendrils emerged from the seeds and spread radially, like the spokes of a wheel. As the tendrils increased in length, they also assumed greater diameter, becoming wiry vines. Where a vine from one seed encountered that of another, new tendrils would sprout from each and intermingle to form glowing red knots. Within mere minutes there were so many of these mutually enmeshed lines of fire that a contiguous net enclosed the statures. The demons stood back to watch the remainder of their project unfold. Leaves began to sprout from the vines and tendrils, each leaf a white-hot flame, until all gaps in the network were filled and a solid wall of fire surrounded the mock enemy. This flaming cylinder now began to contract. The fire was so dense that the troll statues could not be seen, but as the cylinder grew narrower and narrower, encroaching on the statues' space, dark smoke suddenly billowed from its top and then settled to the ground almost immediately as a ring of gray sand. The flames contracted to a single narrow column and then extinguished themselves from the ground up, leaving nothing but a circle of charred earth behind.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/5/2012

2012-01-05T09:39:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: They too will stop caring
Sources: Seth Moore

They too will stop caring when they discover that they cannot die. Of course they won't stop caring all at once. First they will be thrilled. They will be ecstatic. They will celebrate for many days. Their festivities will be joyous and full of love and full of thoughts of their long, bright future. They will make plans and lay the intellectual groundwork for a vast and prosperous society, one that will succeed where others have failed because everyone in it will live to see the eventual outcomes. Rather than creating a better world for their children, they will be creating a better world for themselves. They will continue thus for a time, but subtle changes to the tenor of their interactions will already be seen within the first weeks following the discovery. Whereas they had begun by buying drinks and meals for one another and relishing the love of their mates, they will start to hoard their money and possessions, sharing less, protecting themselves more. They will look more frequently, with lust, at the mates of their neighbors, beginning to imagine how long they have to live and beginning to wonder whether they might soon tire of their own mates. When funds begin to dwindle and food and drink grow scarce, they will grudgingly return to their work. But they will think not of the infinite time and opportunities before them, but rather of the infinite tedium of their occupations, of how discontent they had always been and of how miserable they will always be. Their immortality will stretch on before them as ours does before use, but they, like us, will soon stop caring. Absence of death will just become another part of life.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/4/2012

2012-01-04T13:33:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Our knowledge is of a different kind
Source: Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass

Our knowledge is of a different kind of people -- a newer kind, or rather, of a kind that is yet to be. We have no knowledge -- nor understanding -- of your kind. We know of a people who share a common level of education, common experiences and beliefs, who know the same things about the universe and how it works, who are able to engage in conversation based on the assumption of a common background. Here, in your world, it is different. Here everyone holds her own version of reality within her mind, and that reality may differ so entirely from that of her neighbor, that communication may be impossible without exerting a crippling amount of time and energy on first establishing the ground rules for the interaction.

The mystery, to me, is not why you have failed to escape the confines of your gravity well, but rather, how you have managed to accomplish all that you have. I can only assume that my survey of your minds has been too small to capture the whole truth. I can only assume that at certain times, and under certain circumstances, enough of you manage to align your beliefs to an extent sufficient to allow the limited cooperation and collaboration required to accomplish a discrete task.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/3/2012

2012-01-04T13:12:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: In its raw state, it flows
Source: (I don't remember)

In it's raw state, it flowed out of the massive gash in the silvery bark. It ran down the side of the tree, coloring it golden yellow. Some of it was thus lost, but the woman worked quickly to position the trough that caught and diverted the sap into a copper pail. The flow continued for almost an hour, though its rate steadily decreased. Finally, when only a few drops issued from the defect, the woman removed the pail and the trough. She picked up the piece of bark and tree flesh that she'd hacked out with two strokes of her machete, and she carefully fitted it back into place. With one finger she spread some of the sap on the edges of the wound, sealing them together. She then placed both hands over the damaged area and drew a deep breath. She closed her eyes and spoke a series of words in a hushed tone. When she left the tree, with the pail in hand, all that was left to show what she'd done was a faint outline of the gash and the stain of the spilt sap on the bark. The tree had accepted the fragment back to itself and was again whole.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/2/2012

2012-01-04T13:05:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: The rain pounded on the window
Source: Kate Gentry (I asked my wife for a random phrase or sentence. We live in Seattle.)

The rain pounded on the window. The window waited several seconds, as though deciding how to respond. When the window did respond, a slight change in its color and texture would have been observable, had there been an observer present. The tympanic effect of the beating rain went silent and the water ceased to cascade down the surface of the glass. Instead it was absorbed through microscopic pores that opened on the glass's surface. Roughly three-quarters of the window's total area had, instantaneously, opened. The pores did not pass through to the inner aspect of the glass, however. They opened into channels that converged throughout the vitrine matrix into larger channels. These channels were of an optimal diameter to induce capillary wicking of the liquid through them and outward to the periphery of the window. The outward motion of the liquid through the channels was encouraged by the rotation of the window. It was a round window, set in a track of roller bearings, several of which were motorized. The rain, upon reaching the periphery of the window, was collected in a trough and from there channeled into a larger collection system that fed the potable water purification facilities in the bowels of the floating city. Hundreds of similar windows dotted the acres of roofs and upper walls of the city and within seconds of the onset of the deluge, they had all acted in exactly the same manner as this one. It was common enough to get rain, but this rain was different from most. It was cleaner. The purification facilities could render nearly any water potable -- even seawater, if necessary -- but the greater the disparity between the water recovered and the water desired, the greater the price to be exacted in the form of energy expended.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 1/1/2012

2012-01-04T12:53:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: I stood there, staring at the back of his head
Source Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

I stood there, staring at the back of his head through the scope of my X-ray laser gun. Staring at the tiny red dot that I had painted there. Watching the dot jitter and dance around. The gun was mounted firmly to a pair of heavy tripods, but even so, at a distance of three miles, even the slight vibration caused by my face resting against the scope was enough to make the fiery spot bounce about in the closely cropped stubble of his head and neck. I detached the scope from the gun and locked it onto a third tripod instead. I detached the gun's control pad as well. I looked through scope and repositioned it so that I could see my target clearly. There was no wind, so in the absence of my physical contact with the gun, the red spot now hung stationary, at the base of his neck, about three centimeters right of center. Using sticks on the the control pad, I engaged servos on the gun's mount, finely adjusting the position until the dot was perfectly centered. I depressed and twisted the red safety knob, rendering the weapon active. I took a long deep breath.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/31/2011

2012-01-04T12:01:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: If you have an accident
Source: State Farm Automobile Insurance Card

"If you have had an accident, please notify your keeper at your earliest convenience, so as to optimize the restoration of damaged parts."

"I have not had an accident," I say. "I meant to run into the wall. I want to fucking destroy that wall."

"If you wish to circumnavigate an obstacle in our path, please enable autopilot. The most efficient route around the obstacle will be calculated."

"I don't want to go around it. I want to go through it. I want my usual route back! I'm sick of hese walls that keep popping up every day!"

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/30/2011

2012-01-04T11:57:00.000-08:00

Time: 12/30/2011
Prompt: I think I'm missing something
Source: (sorry, can't remember)

"I think I'm missing something," he said as he rummaged through the outer zipper compartments of his duffel bag.

"Missing something?" the woman beside him says. "What's missing?"

"Um... just... something," he says without ceasing his increasingly frantic search through the various compartments of his duffel, his backpack, and the sling style camera bag.

"Frank! What did you lose?"

"Maybe I put it in your bag by mistake when I was packing up this morning." Frank half shoves, half nudges the woman around so that he can access the outer pockets of the retro-style ruck-sack she's wearing.

"Would you cut it out for a minute and talk to me?" she says. "What did you lose?"

Frank retightens a draw-string and turns the woman back to face him again.

"I'm sorry, Karen. It was supposed to be a surprise. A birthday present. I was going to give it to you tonight, but now I can't find it. I think on e of the ground crew baggage guys must have swiped it."

"Oh god. I'm sorry. Well what was it? I can help you do a more thorough search if I know what to look for."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/29/2011

2012-01-04T11:50:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Just open your mouth wide
Source: (I can't, for the life of me, remember!)

"Just open your mouth wide and let it all out," he said. He was holding a cut crystal bowl in front of me with one hand while he held my hair back with the other. I was on hands and knees on the cold gray flagstones of the back garden, sorely regretting my decision to combine warm gin, cold scotch and durian with a mostly empty stomach and a nano-enabled Cuban cigar. Of course, it wasn't like I'd sat down, carefully weighted my options, and deliberately selected this menu. It's never like that.

The pain in my upper abdomen spread out like gasoline spilled on a cracked sidewalk, slowly covering every inch of free space and filling in every crevice and defect, all the while evaporating, forming an explosive cloud. Just waiting for a spark.

"Suck on dog shit," he said. I hurled violently, emptying the predominantly liquid contents of my stomach into the Waterford.

"What the fuck? What do you mean, 'suck on dog shit?' That's sick!"

"Well, so were you," he said, "but now you're feeling better, aren't you? Oh, perhaps not quite yet." Another wave sweeps my body and I expel a few more teaspoons of yellow-tinged liquid.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/28/2011

2012-01-04T11:41:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: The heavy scent of wineshops
Source: G.K. Chesterton, The Mariner

The heavy scent of wineshops fills my nostrils as I turn down the cobblestone alley to seek shelter from the summer downpour. I've walked this alley many times, but perhaps never on a hot, humid, rainy day, such as this. In any case, the scents are stronger today than every before: wine, licorice, sex. Mostly wine and sex. The licorice scent came with me. It is not a product of this alley.

The awning under which I huddle is currently occupied by one of the less fastidious women of the afternoon and when I join her there she raises a hopeful eyebrow and shifts her posture to allow the open neck of her dress to slip off one shoulder. Turning my back on this advertisement I find myself face to face with my partner, Hames, who, it seems, has just exited the door beside which I stand (the door of a wineshop, not that of a brothel).

"Torry! What are you doing here?" Hames glances over at the whore, hesitates a moment, and then appears to reach the correct conclusion. "Forgot your umbrella in the office again, eh? Well here, walk with me." We depart the stoop under the shelter of his large black umbrella and he shows me the bottle he's just acquired.

"A spirit of transport!" I say. "What need do you have of such a thing?"

"I've given it a lot of thought and I think it's at least worth a try. I know, I know. It does smack of charlotry, but I have to find out for myself. I wasn't even planning to tell you about it, as I knew what you'd say, but then when I saw you here, well..."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed writing: 12/27/2011

2012-01-04T11:33:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Let us now see how iron cools
Source: T.B. Jefferson and Gorham Woods, Metals and How to Weld Them

"Let us now see how iron cools your innards, shall we?" The object that George pulled from the liquid nitrogen dewar did, in fact, surprise me, and as one often does in response to the unexpected, I felt an urge almost to laugh. The specific circumstances inhibited such levity, however.

Though fully conscious, the epidural administered at a dangerously high thoracic spinal level had rendered me paralyzed and insensate below the ribcage, and my arms were firmly embraced by nylon webbing at multiple points, such that the only regions of my body over which I retained control were my head and neck. The operating theater, being entirely deserted (besides the two of us), George had elected to leave me un-gagged, free to voice my terror (or discomfort, should the anesthesia begin to fail) throughout the entire proceeding.

"How much direct contact with such a cold surface do you think that a human liver can take before the freezing results in death?" George gave the cast-iron skillet that he held in his gloved hand a final dip in the steaming liquid, then lifted it high above my abdomen, which was held open by four stainless-steel retractors mounted to a fifty-two-centimeter ring.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/26/2011

2012-01-04T11:23:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: They wait for resurrection
Source: Gwen Harwood, Cups

They wait for resurrection, but they've long since forgotten that for which they wait. Like the charge on the circuits of a memory card that dissipate in the moments following interruption of current, these minds have slowly lost their memories, beginning first with those that were formed most recently. The rushed conversations that some of them were able to have with their physicians or with the field medics, in which they were told about the hibernation protocol and the possibility of future restoration -- that is all gone. They will wake -- if ever they wake -- to memories that end far earlier. Depending on the duration fo their dormancy and the robustness of their cognitive function (or perhaps the orderliness of their mental catalogues), they may remember events from as recently as a month before immersion. Or they may be lucky to remember enough language to ask for a glass of water when they return, utterly disoriented, but physically intact, to consciousness -- to humanity.

"What happened?" is the most common inquiry from the newly awakened, followed by "I've got to take a piss."

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/25/2011

2012-01-04T11:13:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: Part of a moon was falling
Source: Robert Frost, The Death of a Hired Man

Part of a moon was falling toward the planet. That was a sure thing now. The rest of the moon -- well, it would probably fly off in a rough tangent of its orbital path and, odds were, never have any impact on anything or anyone. The part that was falling though, that was of great concern to the inhabitants of the gas giant's geosynchronous orbital cities. Nobody seemed to agree on what (fi any( consequences this hemisphere that was pursuing a rapidly decaying orbit would have when it eventually succumbed to the planet's gravity and plunged through the increasing densities of gaseous sea that comprised the planet's substance. Would there be a "splash" effect?

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/24/2011

2012-01-04T11:07:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Darkness that encroaches
Source: Lucretius, On the Nature of Things

Darkness that encroaches like the invader's bugbots spreads through the camp at sundown. There is little dusk in these southern lands and we are forced to rely on infrared spectral scanners for nearly half of each day's hours. The bugbots do emit a heat signature, but it is minimal -- far lower than that of the endemic fauna of the soil. Thus, with nightfall, the bots can move about nearly undetected. We only know of their presence because we occasionally tread upon one, disabling it. We know not what mischief they are about, whether they merely surveille us or whether they work some greater harm that we have yet to discover. You may well ask why we do not simply keep the grounds illuminated trhoguht the night, as these bots can be seen with the unaided eye, given adequate light. Recall though, the nature of our enemies themselves, and the narrow range of light intensities in which they seem fit to do battle. In utter darkness we have never been attacked, nor in the bright of day; but when fighting raged in the northern climes, these creatures were all too willing to engage us at dusk, and we learned quite early in this campaign that artificial illumination is similarly conducive to their most aggressive behaviors.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/23/2011

2012-01-04T10:57:00.000-08:00

Time: 15 minutes
Prompt: Dreadful snake-headed creatures with turreted backs
Source: Lucretius, On the Nature of Things

Dreadful snake-headed creatures with turreted backs lay writhing in the muddy battlefield, impotent and forgotten. The rising moon reflected off the diamond lenses of their eyes and a chill wind hastened the freezing of the blood and mud that permeated their mechanical joints.

Garton picked his way carefully, keeping at least two lance-lengths between himself and any of these dying monstrosities. Though he had no reason to distrust the reports shouted gleefully from camp to camp, when it came to the battle-drones, one could never be too careful. Tales, there were, of drones whose recording analysis and functional optimization systems had gone rogue; the drones had become independent of their operators and pursued their own ends. So even if the war had been won and all of the drone operators were held captive, Garton didn't want to give some newly-hatched synth-mind a chance to wreak any revenge on his aching body.

One of the battle drones lashed out with a probe tentacle, but it was not aiming for Garton. The movement appeared purposeless -- just the thrashing of a dying motor core. The conflict within the machine's semi-autonomous subsystems, between exertion of adequate energy to stand and conservation of all remaining energy in case an operator cam online and gave a command.

Gorton paid less and less heed to the drones the further he went. His path, which had comprised a series of sweeps back and forth across the field, each taking thirty minutes, became more erratic as the moon crawled across the sky.

(about my timed writing exercises)

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Timed Writing: 12/22/2011

2012-01-04T10:48:00.000-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: Solo terrified near window
Source: Random Phrase Generator

Ms. Solo stood terrified near the shattered window. Her face was splattered with blood. My ears were ringing from the blast, so I wasn't sure whether M. Solo was screaming at us or just moving her mouth wildly in silent maledictions on our attacker.

This was not the first time a school had been targeted by the terrorists, but it was the first time a school with boys as well as girls had been hit. Three weeks before, seven girls and three teachers had died when a roof collapsed on top of them in an all-girl school in Longview. The building had been rigged with hundreds of micro charges, stuck lik gum-wads in the crown moulding. Though they still haven't caught her, it seems that the job was done by a woman they'd hired a year or so before to clean the classrooms and help with hot lunches. They'd suspected that she might have been religious, but that, in and of itself, wouldn't have been grounds for denying her the position. It's not like religion is technically illegal or anything.

(about my timed writing exercises)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.

Timed Writing: 12/21/2011

2012-01-04T10:43:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: The shelter inconveniences your sea
Source: Random Phrase Generator

The shelter inconveniences your sea. It forces the tides to turn aside and wash on other shores. The strong tall shelter that we all crave renders strenuous the tasks of your salty sea.

It would wash the beaches and pull the sands. It would stir rocks and expose roots. It would leave gifts of driftwood and dead leviathans at your feet. If left unimpeded by these sheltering walls. Still the sea works on, tries ever to accomplish its purposes with respect to your lands. The shelter keeps it from affecting one isolated stretch, but it works all the harder elsewhere.

In our shelter now we wait, we watch, we grow and plan. One day we will step out and embrace, once again, your sea and all she offers. Till then we will inconvenience her as we shelter in this refuge.

(about my timed writing exercises)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.

Timed Writing: 12/20/2011

2012-01-04T10:29:00.001-08:00

Time: 10 minutes
Prompt: A committee washes beside a crack
Source: Random Phrase Generator

Several committees were actually known to wash beside the crack, just as many individuals had taken to washing there. The heat that poured from the crack was intense enough to warm the pails of water that the committees would bring, and within half an hour of arriving at the crack, the committees could proceed with their dual purposes: discussing the issues with which they'd been tasked and communal bathing.

"But what about the demands for higher grain prices in the markets?" a gray-haired woman of sixty said as she dipped a cloth in a pail of hot water and proceeded to scrub her bathing partner's back.

"It's ridiculous," he replied. "We've raised and lowered the prices for all of the commodities over the past several years, proportional to demands and availabilities. Neither the demand for, nor the availability of grain has changed meaningfully since last year. They're just jealous of the prices that the potato farmers are getting due to the potato blight. Would the grain farmers like to suffer abject poverty at a rate of two in five, as has occurred with the potato farmers? Perhaps some locusts could be arranged to come destroy their crops and drive up prices."

(about my timed writing exercises)

Timed Writing: 12/19/2011

2012-01-04T10:24:00.001-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: An objective crawls past a hero
Source: Random Phrase Generator

An objective crawls past a hero, thinking, just for a moment, that it has escaped the hero's observation. Crack! The electrical arc connects the objective's spiky metal carapace momentarily to the hero's electrode. For a split second, rivers of electrons pour through the air, into the objective, washing its armor in sparks of light, denaturing proteins, boiling blood, burning hair and skin. The smoking shell now lays still beside a dozen others that have attempted the bridge. The hero breathes a sigh of relief and starts pedaling the generator to recharge the system.

(about my timed writing exercises)

Timed Writing: 12/18/2011

2012-01-04T10:23:00.000-08:00

Time: 5 minutes
Prompt: Local dreaming research failing
Source: Random Phrase Generator

"Local dreaming research failing" was the first thing I read that morning and it put me in a sour mood for the entire day. The header was one of twenty or so scrolling across my viewspace when my light field glow reached sufficient intensity to summon me from sleep. I lay in bed, thinking about all the time, all the effort, all the bloodshed invested in the project. For the infonews folks to dismiss it so casually with just four words (one of them in the wrong tense!) -- this would have been too much for even a strong neut, and I'm an emotionally labile pseudo-male.

(about my timed writing exercises)

A New Project

2012-01-04T10:18:00.000-08:00

Greetings, readers.

I have, as you are well aware, failed to maintain any sort of regularity in posting to this blog. With the advent of a new year, I will endeavor to rectify the situation. I know myself too well to imagine that by simply declaring a resolution on (or shortly following) the first day of the calendar year anything will change. I must therefore employ some strategy, some plan, some discipline.

I am currently taking a series of online writing workshops from Cat Rambo, a local SF writer. During the first session, she had the participants perform a timed writing exercise, based on the prompt, "The puppets of chaos were dancing." The rules (as I recorded them) were 1) give yourself permission to write crap; 2) keep the pen moving or the fingers typing (don't stop to edit; just put the words on the page); and 3) go for the jugular (if there's something that frightens you, that may be what you should write about). I'm not sure how much time she provided, but this is what I managed to produce:

The puppets of chaos were dancing, but they weren’t dancing very well. At least that was the opinion of Harold, the official critic who’d been hired to monitor the event from afar. He’d seen so many dance troupes by this point in his career that it didn’t take him long to recognize talent, skill, or the lack thereof. The puppets of chaos were but one of nearly a thousand troupes beaming him videos of their performances from the furthest reaches of the galaxy. One of nearly a thousand rag-tag bands of wannabes hoping for a free teleport to the central system.

I found this exercise surprisingly challenging and surprisingly enjoyable and stimulating, so I did it again the following day, based on a prompt from a random phrase generator I found online. Then I did it again the next day, and the day after that. I haven't managed to do anything on a daily basis (besides, eating, sleeping, excreting, etc) for at least ten years, but now I've just finished my 18th daily timed writing exercise.

Hooray for me, right? But how does this help with the resurrection of my stagnant blog?

I will post all of these timed writing exercises here. I may not post everyday, but I'll write every day and so on average, there'll be at least one new post per day on my blog.

These will be very rough pieces and they will probably never be complete. Sometimes they may even end in the middle of a sentence. No apologies. They're just exercises.

Feel free to read them or not.

Feel free to comment.

If there's one that you particularly like and think I should pursue further, let me know.

If you want to suggest prompts for future timed writing exercise, I'd be very grateful, as coming up with prompts is the toughest part of the exercise (please keep the prompts short -- one sentence or less).

I anticipate that ultimately I'll incorporate some of these into longer pieces, and when I do, I'll post about it, with a link to the original post.

Enjoy!

a long time coming

2010-09-27T21:04:00.000-07:00

As faithful followers of this blog will note, an indecently long interval has passed since last I posted. That's life. I neither offer excuse nor beg forgiveness.

Tonight, however, I'm inspired to write (at least a short little blurb), if for no other reason, to draw your attention to the change in the above description of this blot. Where the subheading used to refer to yours truly as an "intermittently disillusioned pathology resident," or some such bunk, I've now assumed a new identity. Yes, I am a hopelessly chronic case of academic addiction.

Of course I have a fairly good idea of where to lay the blame for this intellectual dependency. Don't quote me on the (pseudo)science here, but my impression is that people who are denied a certain substance or experience throughout enough of their formative years, are more likely to develop unhealthy attachments to such vices later in life.

I was home-schooled for the first eleven years of my education, so whereas most people develop a healthy balance of respect, disdain, appreciation and general apathy for formal education by the time they get through college, once I started taking classes at the local community college at age 18, I was hooked. A hopeless junkie for life. And like any addict, I rode the crest of an initial wave of academic ecstasy (top of all of my classes, prize pupil of all of my instructors) and thought that it would last forever. Neurotransmitters become exhausted, receptors become saturated, and all junkies must ultimately crash. I managed to graduate from college with a decent GPA, but that was in no way due to my last two quarters. And by the time I'd finished my last class, I was more than ready to (as PGW would so eloquently put it) part brass rags with the whole academic mess and just settle down to work for a while.

That "while" lasted just over a year, after which I found myself studying for an MPH in International Health and Development at Tulane's School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. The thrill of that first big hit after a respectable piece of abstinence put me over the edge and I took the big step down the path into darkness: I applied to medical schools.

Eight years later, I've finished my medical training (four years for the MD and another four of pathology residency), and what do I do? Do I call it quits for good, get a job, and contribute to this blessed capitalist abomination in which I live? Nope... the "dark passenger" was too strong (as the eponymous hero of another of my guilty vices, the Showtime series Dexter might say).

I have fallen into the epitome of academic intellectually masturbatory depravity: the PhD! This time I'll focus on Environmental and Occupational Health (after four years of diagnosing death and disease, I'd really like to get involved in the preventative end of things).

So... am I full of guilt and self-loathing? Am I writhing in an agony of ecstatic despair for my hopeless condition?

Well... classes start the day after tomorrow, and actually, I'm pretty damned happy about whole thing. (AAaaahhhh... the sweet rush of that first taste... a stronger cut... a new, exotic flavor... my next fix).

a word about a word... and about apples

2010-03-25T19:38:00.000-07:00

By the way... the title of the previous post refers to an example of one of the many things that I loved about the book Anathem. Stephenson has the most elegant gift for politely drawing the reader's attention to the etymologies of words that we use without a second thought. Data is one of these. Frequently throughout the story, as characters engage in philosophical or scientific discussions, they refer to the "the givens" -- that is the pieces of raw information on which further arguments may be based. At one point in the story a character refers to the discipline of Datonomy and the person with whom he is conversing recognizes this as the naming of "the givens." When I read that my mind went wild, started racing, knowing that I knew the connection but couldn't quite access it. "Data, datum, dat, date, dato, da..." and there it was: dar! The Spanish verb meaning to give.

In all of my years of education, studying sciences, statistics, even a bit of the philosophy of science, I'd been using the word data every day without even considering its root. And that insignificant little passage in Anathem was what finally brought it all home. Data (singular, datum) must be derived from the same root word as dar, hence a datum is a gift.

It puts a whole new spin on the language of basic scientific investigation. Data, which so often is seen as the raw output of an experiment -- the stuff that needs to be analyzed and refined before it assumes the far more noble and desirable status of information is, in its essence, the gift given to the investigator... and like all gifts (if they are truly given freely), it is up to the investigator to decide how best to use (or abuse) them. The gift itself is neither good nor bad. It is raw material that is waiting to be utilized. Like all gifts, data is sometimes deserved and sometimes not, and it is up to the recipient of the gift to recognize the value of the data... or not. There are many examples of seemingly serendipitous scientific discoveries. Careful examination of these tales will usually reveal that the hero had spent years (even decades) working hard, slogging away at a problem, and without that preparation, would not likely have been in the necessary frame of mind to recognize the value of the discovery. All the same... Fleming's agar plates did grow mold (an accident -- a gift), leading to the discovery of penicillin; Röntgen's cardboard barrier turned out not to be as opaque as he'd assumed (an accident -- a gift), leading to the discovery of X-rays; Jenner happened to pay attention to the wive's tale (another gift) about milk maids not getting smallpox, leading to the development of all subsequent vaccines; and maybe... just maybe... an apple fell on Newton's head.

OK... so most don't believe that a falling apple had much (if anything) to do with Newton's descriptions of this revolutionary force called gravity. All the same, it's become the symbol of serendipitous scientific discovery. Interesting that it's also the symbol of something else: sin. Or is it? Not really... the "apple" that Eve takes from the tree isn't the sin. The sin is the fact that she's taking it when told not to, and that is entirely beside the point (for now). The apple is the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. That's right... knowledge!!! The tree is the source of the knowledge. Just like data -- the raw pieces of stuff that are turned into information -- are the source of human knowledge -- the gift. Yeah... I'm stretching a bit now and I hope you'll all pounce with criticism, but still, the symbolism is just begging to be seen. And I'm certainly not the first to see it. Check out Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials! That tree of knowledge is the ultimate gift, the datum from which comes information -- information that accumulates to become knowledge and knowledge that is necessary to build a meaningful understanding of one the world in which we live. And remind me... who was it that told Eve not to eat of the fruit of that tree? Oh yeah... him again.

A datum from Neal Stephenson

2010-03-25T18:52:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I finished reading Neal Stephenson's Anathem. It was one of the most enjoyable and satisfying books that I've ever read. As I told a friend when I was only a quarter of the way through it, reading Anathem felt like drinking a very rich, full-bodied wine (thinkAmorone or Barolo). It's an incredibly complex book that is still delightfully accessible. It's got layers upon layers of physic, philosophy, cosmology, culture and humor all tied up in a damn fine story. The book to which I'd be most likely to compare it is Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose. The above mentioned friend, George, who is something of an expert on many of the topics covered by the book -- a professional, in fact (he's a professor of philosophy) -- wrote a review of Anathem that I encourage you all to read (don't worry -- it won't ruin the story if you read the review first!). George's review does more justice to the book than I ever could, so I'll conclude by saying that if you don't read Anathem you're denying yourself one of the finest literary treats to be had, and although the 1000-ish-pagedness of the tome turned me off for almost a year, by the time I'd read 100 pages, I was wishing the book was at least 3000!

Six Years

2010-03-14T07:18:00.000-07:00

Six years ago today a girl came to my apartment / tango studio for breakfast and a dance lesson. Seventeen months later we were married. One might argue that I'd violated some rule of the teacher / student relationship. The lesson was free though and no grades were assigned. Besides, I think those rules might be a little fuzzy when it comes to dance lessons. In any case, although February 14, that much touted day of lovers means little to Kate and myself, March 14 will always be special. Here is a story inspired by the events of March 14, 2004. Other stories covering events leading up to the tango lesson are to be found here and here.

Brazil, East Berlin and the End of the World

2010-03-01T20:18:00.000-08:00

I recently watched two movies back to back. The first was Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others); the second was Brazil. Friend and fellow blogger Areophany of Martian Utopia Cafe was present for the first of these and wrote a short review of it, complete with links to the trailer, music and other reviews.

The second film, Brazil is not set in the country of that name. Its title refers to the song Aquarela do Brazil, known in Anglophone lands simply as Brazil. According to legend, director and co-writer Terry Gilliam was inspired to create the film when he encountered a man listening to the song on a portable radio while sitting all alone on an overcast day in the middle of a desolate coal-strewn beach somewhere in the UK. The contrast between the upbeat sunny cheer of the music and the oppressive tenor of the surroundings moved Gilliam to reflect on humanity in the face of adversity and out of these reflections was born one of the finest films of the last century.

Since watching the two films, I have found myself pondering their commonalities and the relative positions and motivations of their principle characters. There are two important characters in The Lives of Others: Gerd Wiesler, the high ranking secret police officer and Georg Dreyman, the playwright to whose life Wiesler listens with great interest (and ill intent). There is really only one central character in Brazil, the protagonist Sam Lowry. He is a nobody, a simple cog in the huge Orwellian complex of government ministries (Information Adjustment, Information Dispersal, Information Retrieval, etc.) that ostensibly protect the populace from a terrorist campaign of bombings that is well into its second decade ("beginners luck" as a high ranking official jovially pronounces).

The worlds of Brazil and The Lives of Others are both governed by oppressive authoritarian structures that thrive on media censorship, pro-state propaganda and invasive surveillance of their citizens. In both worlds the a range of responses is exhibited by the citizens to their state: complicity, cowed cooperation, sneaky little low-risk rebellions (watching old movies on work time) and premeditated covert actions that would be considered criminal by the state. There are plenty of movies and books about heroes rising from such environments -- people recognizing that the systems under which they live are intolerable and unjustifiable and then taking action (small or large) against said systems. Some of these stories are inspiring, some depressing, many both. The best ones are those that get me thinking hard about my own life, culture, government, media and the threats, real or imagined, that face me today or in the future.

My fantasies tend to spin out of control. In one possible future I see an intrusive Big Brother looking over my shoulder at every turn and me living in constant fear that any little unpatriotic turn of phrase or anomalous facial expression will provoke a bag over my head and a quick trip in an windowless panel wagon to a dank interrogation cell. Another scenario is largely inspired by a recent visit to the top floor of the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., where I gained a new appreciation for how easily a desperate, scared and adequately uneducated people can be led to tolerate and even support utter atrocity through calculated use of well designed media campaigns. I extrapolate from the currently vague and intermittent alignment of the modern media giants and the military industrial complex to a vast empire of multinational corporations that entirely supplant traditional government as such and control the flow of information to the masses so thoroughly and artfully that while everyone believes that the media is free, unfettered and honest, in fact every bit of information consumed is a carefully engineered fabrication, custom designed for each consumer, resulting in a population that can be controlled and directed to the finest degree without inspiring more than the most fleeting impressions of invasion or oppression. There are innumerable variations on the fantasy futures that play through my mind, but they all come down to the same basics: a corrupt and powerful few dictating the activities of the people by means of force, fear, deceit and manipulation.

In watching these two films back to back, rather than feeling the usual dread and nausea in the pit of my stomach, I found myself feeling impatient. Hardly a day goes by that I don't hear or read of another outrageous assault on freedom, humanity, civil rights or information and yet despite it all, my life goes on as usual. I eat the same good food, sleep in the same warm bed, receive the same monthly direct deposit paycheck and fumble, as usual, through my tax return. When is all the shit going to finally hit the fan? When is the horror going to come to my door? When do I get the chance to find out what I'm really made of? Am I a Sam Lowry, content to roll along with the tide of a depraved culture until it becomes so screwed up and insane that I'm forced to react? Am I Georg Dreyman, cognitive of the problems that surround me, fully aware of the corruption at the top and of the helplessness of those at the bottom, maybe a little bit smug in my superior understanding and occasionally trying to express myself (without risking too much) through some carefully crafted work of art? Or am I a Gerd Wiesler? Will I be a servant of the regime until some especially poignant ray of humanity illuminates my world, allows me to clearly see how vile I have become and inspires me to change, even if it means suffering the frightful consequences of spurning the powers at the top? Or maybe that ray will never shine through and I'll just keep doing as I'm told until I die, always relatively comfortable, relatively secure, relatively guilty, relatively damned.

Let's spice up the pot and add another story to the mix: V for Vendetta. The movie or the graphic novel, take your pick, they're both excellent. Here we're given a few more kinds of responses to a very 1984-esque civilization. In addition to an almost Gerd Wiesler type in policeman Dominic Stone, we've got the titular character, V, a victim of state sanctioned human experimentation who has become a masked vigilante, out to destroy the evil government. Evey Hammond is a young woman working for the government's media arm, a Sam Lowry sort of character who undergoes a thorough transformation, eventually taking up V's mantle as the righteous champion of truth and freedom. V's character raises the idea of outright and even violent rebellion that leads to massive revolution. So in any of my envisioned dystopic futures, what is the chance of such a hero emerging? What is the chance that I could be him or at least his next Evey Hammond?

But there's another future that I consider to be far more plausible than any of the above -- one that is eloquently sampled at multiple time points in David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas. This book, which reads with a sensuous fluidity of phrase that is almost poetry, is a series of nested stories, each told in a different voice and a very different style. Each story is, in one way or another, linked to the previous, and together they span a period of time beginning in the mid-19th century and ending in an undefined future -- probably around 2150, give or take. In that future civilization has crumbled in ruin. Humans still exist, but they have reverted to a primitive tribal existence in which artifacts of (our) modern technology are curiosities, day-to-day survival is a struggle and human lifespans have dwindled back to the preindustrial standards of 20-50 years. In the book this future has followed a peak in technological and industrial progress that is just a little beyond our current state and that is accompanied by a system of governments and media that seems only a little more authoritarian and propagandist, respectively, than our own. The specific sequence of events that leads humanity from their advanced state of civilization to near ruin is not described in detail, but there are plenty of hints, many of which point to the all too real effects of climate change.

And that brings us to the next segment of this sprawling ramble of a blog post. With increasingly hostile weather on the coasts and droughts inland, the habitable and arable regions of the globe will soon have shrunk to such an extent that there will be widespread famine, which will, in turn, lead to conflict. The vectors that carry infectious diseases will converge on these same geographic areas and with increased temperature and humidity, they will thrive and fueling monstrous epidemics of death and suffering. As material and energy resources fail and looting of all types of productive facilities becomes rampant antibiotics and other simple medications will become unavailable. Those with guns and the will to use them will maintain their way of life for a little longer than others, but in doing so will have already sacrificed some part of their humanity. A few isolated groups may succeed in eking out a decent existence, at least for as long as they can remain undiscovered by the ever increasing numbers of desperately looting hoards. Science, art, music, literature -- much of what we love and enjoy in life will disappear as the struggle for survival comes to dominate all motivations.

It's a bleak future. I don't like it, but I think it's quite probable. I probably won't survive to see it achieve such extremes, but unless I die young, I'm sure that I'll see the beginnings of the fall. I expect to see costs of food, land, housing, health care and transportation rise to the point that those of us now living comfortable middle class lives will be making due in small apartments on very simple diets, farming every scrap of yard we can find and celebrating once or twice a year with a bottle of wine. I expect that after a relative peak in intrusive policing and surveillance and mind-directing media campaigns, a resource strained government will discover that its population is so focused on the basics of survival that such high-tech control measures are no longer necessary and that a few token food handouts along with occasional shows of force are more than adequate to maintain a semblance of order (think Soylent Green)... until everything falls apart completely and anarchy (so long idealized in the setting of adequate resources) shows its ugly side.

Over the course of a few centuries things might recover to some extent. Once industry has ground to a halt and the planet has had a few hundred years to recover from at least a little of the damage we've done, civilization may have a chance to grow again (assuming the human race has not gone extinct). And what would that recovery look like? The best depiction that I've encountered is in the fourth (and final) book of Ken MacLeod's Fall Revolution series, The Sky Road. In MacLeod's version of the future civilization hasn't fallen quite so low as I expect it to, so the world of Sky Road may be a little brighter than reality, but it gives a good feel for the struggle to somehow regain a hint of humanity's glory days.

So now I've rambled far from my initial topics and have touched on many more works of film and literature than I'd initially intended. Humor me though, as I introduce another -- one that has aided me in my search for a meaningful response to the horrors and desperation to come. Author Stephen Baxter wrote a story called Last Contact (included in the 2008 collection of The Year's Best Science Fiction. It is an end-of-the-world story. The projected End has nothing to do with climate change, but is due, rather, to a massive cosmological event far beyond any human influence. Destruction of the planet is assured and unavoidable. Reactions vary, but one of the central characters in the story is a member of a team of scientists expending every last ounce of its energies to study the phenomenon that is soon to be its destruction. They do this knowing that it will do them no good, but hoping that just maybe, should another intelligence come afterward and attempt to make sense of what has happened, a faint impression of their work, a shadow of a signature of their research might remain and be of benefit.

The scale of the destruction portrayed in Baxter's story is far in excess of that which I foresee; the emotions evoked are similar though. I see monumental and inevitable doom and gloom ahead. I have spent much of the past year intermittently depressed, wishing that the world would come to its senses in time, change its ways and rescue itself. This wish will not be fulfilled. The end is nigh, as Watchmen's Rorschach's sign reads. There's nothing that I or anyone can do now. The damage is beyond humans' capacity for repair. So now that it's settled, now that I am convinced that the destruction of civilization as we know it is assured, what do I do?

When King David's first son by Bathsheba was sick, David fasted and prayed for a week, pleading for the child's life and making himself generally miserable in his anguish. When the child died, however, "David rose from the ground, washed and anointed himself, and changed his clothes. He went into the house of the LORD and worshiped; he then went to his own house; and when he asked, they set food before him and he ate. Then his servants said to him, 'What is this thing that you have done? You fasted and wept for the child while it was alive; but when the child died, you rose and ate food.' He said, 'While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, Who knows? The LORD may be gracious to me, and the child may live. But now he is dead; why should I fast? Can I bring him back again?'" (NRSV)

The horse has left the barn. King David's child is dead. I can stop mourning and wishing and hoping. From here on out I understand that destruction is a foregone conclusion. As horrible and regrettable as this is in the global sense, on a personal level it is a strange relief. Instead of wallowing grief and anguish I can now focus on what can be done. I cannot stop climate change and the four horsemen that will accompany it, but maybe in studying it, studying the human health effects associated with climate change I will be able to contribute some tiny grain of useful information that may survive the dark ages ahead and assist a future human race as it seeks to pull itself from the rubble and slowly rebuild. This is optimistic and ultimately just another fantasy, but it is something and it gives me a reason to go on... some meaning.

It also allows me to focus on how much I love of the life that I currently live. I don't know when the shit will hit the fan, and maybe I'll be lucky enough not to see it, but I know it's coming and this knowledge makes every moment of comfort, beauty and pleasure that I enjoy now all the more valuable. Since coming to terms with the end of the world as I know it, relationships have grown more valuable to me, natural beauty more moving, music sweeter, food tastier, sex more intensely pleasurable, wine more satisfying, books more engaging. Everything I touch and experience today may be taken from me as the world descends into chaos, but the memories that I make now will not desert me and if I am in one of the last generations to enjoy everything good that this civilization has to offer, I'm going to savor every second of it, soak up all of it and be ready to contribute to the oral traditions that may keep a glimmer of humanity alive through the long winter. I'm not likely to have the opportunity to be Sam Lowry, Evey Hammond, Gerd Wiesler, Georg Dreyman or V, as those characters are all products of civilizations, which flawed though they might be, are relatively stable. No, I am more likely to be Sol Roth, the old geezer sharing space in a tiny apartment, pouring over the occasional book and telling the next generation about real food from the good old days.

Then again, the best way to ensure that a particular version of the future never happens exactly as predicted is to foretell it as certainty -- G. K. Chesterton's game of Cheat the Prophet. So maybe even now, as I commit my ideas to this electronic page, I am doing my part to avert one of a thousand possible dismal future. Now for the other nine hundred ninety-nine.

Someone's Thoughts on Avatar

2010-02-02T17:21:00.000-08:00

I have not written a post about Avatar myself. I had considered doing so. I've seen the movie twice and I enjoyed it very much both times. I felt that to write about it, however, would require an investment of time that I did not have available. Fortunately, plenty of others have written about it, and I have read many reviews and critiques. Today I discovered what, in my opinion, is the finest review of the film out there, by Andries du Toit, author of the blog, A Subtle Knife. It hits everything that I would have tried to address, plus a whole lot more... and it even refers to two of my favorite works of literature along the way: The Lord of the Rings and His Dark Materials. Give it a read... it'll be well worth your time spent.

Soon To Be Read

2010-02-02T10:48:00.000-08:00

My previous post was about the last book that I finished reading. This is about the next one that I plan to start (not likely to be the next book that I finish, as I've got several others in progress already): Anathem by Neal Stephenson. The massive hard-bound book was given to me by one of my colleagues over a year ago and it has been sitting on a shelf taunting me ever since.

My attention was recently redirected to Anathem by a friend (and frequent blog commenter), George Berger, who has just had his highly eloquent, expertly informed and intelligently critical review of Anathem published on The Zone, a prominent magazine-style website devoted to Science Fiction. Congratulations George!

I know, based on George's review and the recommendations of other friends, that I will thoroughly enjoy the book. The two reasons that I've taken so long to start it are 1) that I'm pretty sure that I will be entirely absorbed by it and will have difficulty doing anything productive until it's finished and 2) it's so damned big that it'll be a royal pain in the ass to haul around with me. The second obstacle was recently eliminated when I received a Kindle for my birthday and promptly downloaded Anathem. As for the first problem... well, I guess I'll just have to deal with it.

Recently Read

2010-02-02T08:53:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I finished reading China Mieville's Perdido Street Station. I'm not sure how to even begin to describe it: there are so many overlapping genres and themes represented that to start by calling it science fiction or fantasy or social commentary and then adding appropriate modifiers and descriptors seems inadequate. It was certainly an enjoyable read -- one of those books that consumed my waking (and often sleeping) consciousness and that kept me happily distracted from many other activities, obligations and other stressors (as you may have noticed, my blogging has fallen off of late) -- and even as mere entertainment for its own sake, this book is well worth reading.

My own ambivalence about whether to call it fantasy or science fiction is reflected in the variety of awards and honors that the book has received (or for which it has been nominated). When talking to people about the book over the past few weeks I have most often described it as a science fiction novel set in a fantasy world. Yes, there are all manner of strange fantastical creatures coinhabiting the city of New Crobuzon in the world of Bas-Lag, and yes, there is magic (referred to as thaumaturgy) scattered fairly heavily throughout, but the protagonist, Isaac Grimnebulin, is a freelance scientist who seems to approach these magical aspects of his world (as any scientist should) as though they are merely phenomena that have yet to be adequately investigated. He is only really interested in thaumaturgy, however, to the extent that it can help him further his real work: demonstration and utilization of a theoretical virtually limitless source of energy.

Early in the novel Grimnebulin is contracted to help a formerly winged creature (whose wings were taken as punishment for an unspeakable crime) regain the power of flight. As he explores the various approaches to the problem, Grimnebulin collects a vast array of winged animals for study, some of which are far more dangerous than he initially realizes. In his frenzy for knowledge and successful completion of his project, he unwittingly unleashes a creature that threatens the existence of all sentient being in New Crobuzon. Most of the book follows Grimnebulin and his various companions and acquaintances as they seek to control this unholy terror, and the slimily disgusting and horrifically painful ordeals that they endure along the way are described so skillfully that as a reader I found myself cringing, crying and cowering along with them.

I could go on describing the story, but ultimately it wasn't the story itself that kept me reading -- it was the characters. They are drawn with incredible depth and their conflicts (both internal and external) are explored with elegant finesse. Grimnebulin, for example, is an overweight scientist who has abandoned the mainstream academic world in order to have more freedom to pursue his somewhat unorthodox ideas. He has been careful not to burn bridges however, and maintains frequent (if somewhat strained) relations with his former mentor and the University. As might be expected of a freelance scientist, he's constantly struggling for funding and New Crobuzon doesn't seem to offer much in the way of grants for independent investigators. So when a lucrative offer comes along he is forced to balance the practical demands of life against his driving intellectual passions. He also has another passion: his Khepri girlfriend, Lin. The Khepri are a species whose females have humanoid bodies with giant scarab bodies for for their heads (yes, I had a hard time with this at first too -- there's no hint of how such a race might have evolved -- but eventually Mieville's writing helped me overcome my doubts and just accept it) and interspecies relationships between humans and Khepri are taboo at best. Lin is an artist, however, and among her avant-garde circle of friends she is allowed to be a little more open about Grimnebulin than Grimnebulin can be about her with his academic crowd. This asymetry in the relationship leads, predictably, to tensions that are just a small sample of the interspecies (and inter-class) tensions that abound throughout the city.

So where are we now... we've got a science fiction story set in a fantasy world that is replete with magic, monsters and complex relationships... What else can we add to the mix? How about AI? Yes, artificial intelligence plays a big role in the story too, as some of the steampunk robots (or constructs, as they are called) develop viruses that usually result in system failure, but very rarely lead to self-awareness. The difference between artificial intelligence and the consciousness of living organisms becomes very important as the two classes of intelligent beings alternately collaborate with and antagonize one another in their efforts to control the devastation being visited upon New Crobuzon.

Tying the story together and serving as periodic interludes are the first-person, present-tense reflections of Grimnebulin's un-winged flight-hungry client who comes from a very different part of Bas-Lag and whose values and perspectives differ greatly from those of the rest of the characters. His story is both inspiring and tragic, and is only fully revealed at the conclusion of the book... a conclusion, I might add, that feels far more like that of a modern literary novel than that of an action filled SF or fantasy thriller. It's a conclusion which does not bring resolution of many many of the story strings and which will probably leave many readers feeling unsatisfied. I found it pleasantly credible, however, as in (at least my own experience of) real life, the endpoints of the various processes, projects and problems rarely coincide.

So give it a read... and let me know what you think. It's one of the stranger more unexpected books I've read in quite some time.

Power

2010-01-17T10:38:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite quotes about power is from Frank Herbert's Chapterhouse: Dune:

"It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible."

This is part of longer passage about the failings of governments:

"All governments suffer a recurring problem: power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a condition to which they are quickly addicted."

The theme is repeated elsewhere throughout the book:

"Power attracts the corruptible. Suspect all who seek it."

...and...

"We should grant power over affairs only to those who are reluctant to hold it and then only under conditions that increase the reluctance."

I recently read Iain M. Banks new book, Transition, and discovered this particularly eloquent statement of the same basic idea:

"Only people already riddled with the internalised special pleading and self-importance that too much power brings could even start to imagine that this might be in any way sustainable."

It the conclusion of this longer reflection on the problem of life extension and/or immortality for the "wise" and the powerful:

"The old and powerful never want to let go. They always think they're both profoundly indispensable and uniquely right. They are always wrong. Part of the function of ageing and dying is to let the next generation have its say, its time in the sun, to sweep away the mistakes of the previous age while, if they're lucky, retaining the advances made and the benefits accrued. It is an insane conceit. Power always drives to perpetuate itself, but this is a phenomenal extra distillation of idiocy. Only people already riddled with the internalised special pleading and self-importance that too much power brings could even start to imagine that this might be in any way sustainable."

These quotes bring to mind a number of current situations. There are myriad obvious examples of corruption among the powerful, but I'm especially struck by the applicability of these quotes to the appalling lack of term limits for elected officials AND the level of compensation enjoyed by such officials.

In my perfect world higher education would be freely available to all and would be a requirement for eligibility to vote. Those who chose to pursue higher education would also be required to repay their years of education in service work, for which they would receive a decent living wage. Those who serve well would be promoted to higher levels of authority -- some of them to governing positions, as representatives of their peers -- but not to never levels of pay (pay grade during service years would depend on number of dependents in the household). Once their terms of service were complete, they would be returned to the working population and would not be allowed to hold official positions again. If they were particularly passionate or motivated, they would be free to communicate their opinions to their representatives in government; they would have no official say (beyond their vote as an ordinary educated citizen, of course) in matters of state though.

OK. Now, dear readers, please start shooting holes in my utopian scheme so that I can begin work on plugging and repairing them.

Ronnie

2010-01-17T09:07:00.000-08:00

Knock.knock.knock.

Today at 10:00 in the morning I am sitting at my computer putting together this week's laboratory medicine quiz for the pathology residents. Which of the following fluids may be transfused simultaneously through an infusion line with red blood cells? I don't actually know the answer off the top of my head, but that doesn't really matter. I just pick questions from a question bank, copy them to the body of an email and send them out to the residents. They have a week in which to send me the answers. At the end of the year the person with highest percentage correct answers will get a cash prize. Usually about $150, but it depends on how generous the attending pathologists feel when I make the rounds, asking for contributions. It's a bit of a pain having to go from office to office, knocking on the doors, asking for contributions for this year's laboratory medicine quiz contest, but in the end all of the pathologists are great about it. They like to see us engaged in friendly intellectual competition and they understand that this is a fun way for us to get ourselves to study some rather dry topics. We're all intelligent, motivated, successful young doctors, after all. Of course they don't mind putting $10 or $20 dollars in the pot for our collective educational motivation.

Knock.knock.knock.

I go to the front door, dreading the possibilities. A pair of young, bright-eyed Jehovah's Witness missionaries for me to deflate with my superior biblical knowledge? A real-estate agent asking permission to post signs in our yard, directing people to his open house? A 2o-year-old single mother of three selling the latest, greatest cleaning supplies that are both environmentally friendly and sure to remove grease, rust, blood, and fruit juice stains from even the stubbornest of surfaces?

Knock.knock.knock.

It's Ronnie.

Ronnie is a young man who lives in the neighborhood with his diabetic father. Ronnie works two part-time minimum wage jobs and does yard work and other odd jobs when he can find them. Ronnie's father is severely disabled, cannot perform any sort of manual labor, and has never been trained for any other type of work. Between Ronnie's meager earnings and his father's social security benefits, the two of them are usually able to pay for rent and utilities, with just a little left for groceries. Ronnie's father is on Medicaid and most of his medications are covered, but there is a $34 copay each month for the insulin to control his blood sugar.

It is winter here and it gets fairly cold at night. The bill for heating gas in the winter months can easily reach four or five times that of the summer months. When forced to choose between paying the gas bill and the copay for his insulin last week, Ronnie's father decided to keep himself and his son warm. He did not tell Ronnie that there had not been enough money for insulin. Ronnie only found out when he found his father on the floor, unconscious and barely breathing. Diabetic ketoacidosis. An ambulance trip. A day and a half of treatment and observation in the emergency room. A day of work lost for Ronnie. Ronnie and his father return home this morning to a house with heat and a little bit of food, but with no $34 for the insulin copay. They will not have $34 dollars again until Ronnie's next paycheck, five days from now.

Knock. knock. knock.

Ronnie hates doing this. He hates having to walk around the neighborhood asking for yard work. He hates knowing that all of us in our warm homes, happy and content with our own lives, will be made to feel uncomfortable by his neediness, by his very existence. He hates knowing that many of us will look through our peep-hole, see a slightly bedraggled young man, and automatically assume that he needs money for his next fix. Ronnie hates to ask for help. He also hates to see his father dying.

Knock. knock. knock.

Ronnie tells me about his last two days in the emergency room with his father. I already know why he is here at my door and I'm desperately trying to think of some odd jobs that I can have him do around the place. $34. On my resident's salary, that's about two hours worth of work. Can I find two hours worth of work for Ronnie to do? Two hours that he'll save me so that I can feel justified giving him the money to keep his father alive? Should I have him pick up the dog shit in our back yard? Should I have him pull weeds from the front yard that is going to be re-landscaped in a couple months anyway? Should I just give him the money and send him away so that I can get on with my day?

Ronnie and his father are a small but fairly representative sample of a huge and rapidly growing segment of our population: the underserved, underemployed, underpaid, and largely unheard poor. The poor. The poor without adequate access to healthcare. The poor without adequate government assistance for food and utilities. The poor who are reminded of how much it sucks to be poor in this country every time they have to ask for help. The poor who were born to the similarly poor. The poor who are marginalized when it comes to educational and employment opportunities. The poor who grow up undernourished because they're eating the shitty processed food that is less expensive per calorie than the healthy balanced diet that their developing bodies and minds really need. The poor who make the rest of us uncomfortable with their very existence. The poor who are desperate and sometimes steal to make ends meet. The poor who suffer at least as much mental illness as the rest of us, but who have virtually no access to treatment for such disease and must therefore self medicate with alcohol and illicit drugs. The poor who commit suicide far more frequently than the rest of us. The poor who are a nuisance to the rest of us, a problem about which we'd rather not have to think. The poor who turn to drugs to temporarily escape their poverty, only to find themselves enslaved to substances and dealers. The poor who cross an arbitrary line in the desert looking for employment, only to be arrested and deported... or to die of thirst under the hot sun when they've lost their way and are afraid to stay close to a road for fear of being arrested. The poor who have seen their mothers and older siblings beaten and raped and therefore figure that it's part of life and don't seek help or refuge when their turn comes. The poor who are far more likely to be murdered. The poor who join gangs and commit horrible acts of violence in an attempt to gain some sense of control and empowerment. The poor who rot in prisons for the rest of their productive lives while their families grow up, grow apart, grow old. The poor who bother us, interrupting our productive, healthy, happy lives by asking for help.

$34. A minuscule grain transferred across the fulcrum of economic disparity. A sick sad reminder of that day in the near future when the the situation will recur, when that $34 won't be available and the ambulance may or may not arrive in time. A reminder that the status quo just isn't enough when it comes to health care in this country.

Knock. knock.knock.

Frankl, Avatar, and most of all, Star Trek

2010-01-11T20:36:00.000-08:00

Sorry folks, but I'm not literate, eloquent or creative enough to have drawn all of the above listed themes together. Fortunately someone else is. Areophany of Martian Utopia Cafe has written (yet another) truly excellent post. So good that I think I'll have to go back and read it again very soon. It is, in part, a reflection on finding meaning in an all too often cruel and ridiculous world, and in part an homage to the Star Trek novels, in the form of a series of well crafted mini-reviews. I've never read any of the Star Trek novels, but now that I know where to start, I think I might just have to.

Selah

2010-01-09T15:41:00.000-08:00

Selah is the transliteration of a Hebrew word that occurs frequently in the Psalms of David. There seems to be some debate about the correct interpretation, but the one that I was told most frequently as a child was, "stop and consider what you've just heard." Another translation is, "Let those who have eyes see and those who have ears hear." It is also used in some passages as a verb meaning to weigh or to measure against.

All of these are appropriate responses to a recent post by Areophany at Martian Utopia Cafe about the atrocious Isreali policies toward Palestinians.

So read his post; read the references; weigh his words; stop and consider. Selah!

Follow-Up: Part 3

2010-01-08T12:49:00.001-08:00

I've grown weary of this self-indulgent ramble through the past year, so I'll finish up briefly before seeking worthier blog fodder.

flyfishing

I grew up trying to catch fish with a rod and reel. I lived on a little creek in Oregon that almost certainly had fish. I really knew nothing about catching them though, and would use whatever mad combination of worms, lures, insect parts or other bait to try. I was vaguely aware of flyfishing, but never tried it. Never until this past August. My wife, Kate, grew up flyfishing and her parents both flyfish -- especially her father. In August, Kate and I spent a week with her parents at a little cabin on the St. Joe river in Idaho. Kate's father taught me the basics and I spent many a pleasant hour up to my knees (or waist) whipping the green line into sinuous S-curves over the river, before dropping the fly of the day on my target water. Of course I also spent many hours retrieving said fly from rocks, tree branches and snags, or tying replacement for said fly onto my ever shrinking leader. In all honesty, I had not expected to enjoy flyfishing nearly as much as I did. I figured that it would be another generally pleasant way to enjoy the outdoors, but with no great advantage over just sitting beside the stream with a book and a bear. I was wrong. It is great fun, technically demanding, often frustrating and frequently rewarding. After having carefully planned my strategy and finally landed the fly just where I want it, the thrill of having a fish strike is somewhere between landing a point in a fierce epée bout and having an improvise recipe turn out exactly as hoped. I am already looking forward to the next fishing trip... when I'll get to use the beautiful new custom-built fly rod that Kate's father gave me for xmas/birthday.

vibram five fingers

...or V-F-Fs as they're called by those in the know, are making a runner of me. I've always kind of liked the idea of running, and have, at times, actually enjoyed a run if all the conditions were right and I was in just the perfect frame of mind. Overall I've associated running with misery, asthma exacerbations, and knee injuries, and have avoided doing much of it. Now I'm pretty sure that my bad experiences with running are because I was trying to run in the popular manner -- a very unnatural manner. In his book Born to Run author Christopher McDougall explores the running style and the life style of the Tarahumara people of northern Mexico. He also discusses modern running culture and technique at length and argues (quite effectively) that the heel-strike style of running that is currently in vogue (and has been for a few decades now) is an artificial and potentially VERY harmful invention of Nike that has survived only by duping most of the western world through aggressive marketing campaigns. Humans were meant to run and our feet have evolved perfectly to do so... if we use our feet correctly. We should run as we do when we're barefoot (any surprise that some of the greatest runners of all time have been barefoot runners?). Vibram Five Fingers shoes are essentially a thin rubber sole glued to a foot-glove. They provide a little protection from gravel, thorns and broken glass while allowing your feet to move naturally and interact with the ground almost as though they were bare. Using these shoes has forced me to change much about my running posture and stride and consequently I'm already finding that I can run longer, at colder temperatures (temperatures that would previously have triggered an asthma attack), and without ANY knee pain afterward. I'm thrilled... and have even been vaguely scheming with Kate on the possibility of training for a marathon.

elion

Elion is my nephew. He is going on three years old and is a really terrific kid. Lately he has gotten into "cooking," so for xmas this year he was given a toy kitchen of his own, complete with toy food, knives, electric mixers, and chef apparel. I am really hoping that this culinary passion will persist. We've got plenty of good cooks in the family, but no real professional chefs. We've got doctors, dentists, artists, musicians, actors, producers, and plenty of engineers... but no chefs. Elion, it's up to you!

elemental

...fed me the most amazing meal I've ever had. At the conclusion of the meal I was ready to die. A sensual experience so intense that I couldn't think straight for two days. No more details. Go eat there yourself.

joanna

...will be Elion's sister in about four months. I'm very much looking forward to meeting her... and finding out her middle name.

There are, of course, many other events and encounters from the past year about which I could write in excess, but if I do, it will be by accident, or as they relate to other topics.

What is food to one man is twitter poison to others

2010-01-08T04:56:00.000-08:00

Today the U.S. State department, as part of its increasing interest in social networking, will launch a contest to "tweet what you think democracy is in 140 characters or less." The winner is the person whose 140 (or less)-character tweet is re-tweeted the greatest number of times in the next two weeks receives an HD digital video camera.

In his recent article in Foreign Policy about the State Department's interest social networking, Indiana Senator Richard Lugar writes:

"The adroit use of social networking sites, such as Twitter, Facebook, and others, coupled with text messages and increasingly widespread mobile-phone technology, can help lend support to existing grassroots movements for freedom and civil rights, connect people to information, and help those in closed societies communicate with the outside world. It also promises to give a strong economic boost to small entrepreneurs and the rural poor. The World Bank estimates that for every 10 percent increase in the number of mobile-phone users in a developing country, there is nearly a 1 percent increase in its economic output."

This emphasizes the positive applications of social networking for international (and domestic) development. Just over a week ago, however, Will Heaven of the Telegraph painted a rather darker picture:

"In Iran, for instance, the government controls the internet with a nationalised communications company. Using a state-of-the-art method called "Deep Packet Inspection", data packages sent between protesters are now automatically broken down, checked for keywords, and reconstructed within milliseconds. Every Tweet and Facebook message, in other words, is firmly on the regime's radar."

...as did Scott Peterson in his article in the Christian Science Monitor:

"Iran already has powerful Internet eavesdropping and hacking capabilities, thanks to systems sold to by Nokia and Siemens. 'We didn’t know they could do this much,' a network engineer in Tehran told the Wall Street Journal last June. 'Now we know they have powerful things that allow them to do very complex tracking on the network.'

Iran was 'drilling into what the population is trying to say,' a California Internet security specialist was quoted as saying in the Journal. 'This looks like a step beyond what any other country is doing, including China.'"

I wonder why Senator Lugar didn't mention this... or why there isn't any sort of disclaimer on the State Department's contest announcement site.

I use Facebook frequently and Twitter occasionally. I use my cell phone pretty much non-stop, especially for texting and email. Generally I'm a big fan of social networking systems and a proponent of the exploding accessibility to and use of mobile technology worldwide. I'm especially intrigued by some of the disease surveillance and other public health efforts. But I don't fool myself for one minute into believing that just because such systems have been used for good, they aren't also being exploited for more sinister purposes, both abroad and at home.

Follow-Up: Part 2

2010-01-07T19:36:00.000-08:00

OK... now for the 2nd half:

environmental health

Having thoroughly turned my career trajectory on its head (or knocked it appropriately to its ass) by withdrawing hematopathology fellowship applications, I was left, about a year ago now, looking for a new direction. As described previously, I entertained the idea of pursuing additional training in biomedical informatics. I wasn't entirely convinced though and figured that if I was considering a major shift, I really ought to explore other possibilities too. Art, journalism, law and public policy all made the list of ideas at one time or another. I wasn't ready to write off my medical training altogether though. Way back before I even started medical school, I studied public health for a year. One of the most enjoyable courses I took was on environmental health problems in developing countries. Environmental health (EH) is that segment of public health that deals with identification, quantification and elimination (or at least mediation) of the environmental determinants of disease and death. The classic subfields of EH are toxicology, water, sanitation, disease vectors, air quality and food safety. More recently, the health impacts of climate change has become a major focus as well. So the more I considered all of the various facets of a potential career in EH, the more it seemed to fit my needs. It stands at a strategic intersection of medicine, public health and the environmental sciences. It would provide me with the skills, knowledge and credentials to join the fight against climate change by helping to demonstrate its potentially devastating effects for humanity.

red mars

An old friend of mine, who is known to this blog as Munjaros, loaned me a trilogy of books by Kim Stanley Robinson: the Mars trilogy. So far I have only read the first one, Red Mars, but it was one of the best books I've read. Like many great science fiction books, it is both inspiring and depressing. Inspiring because it presents a very plausible picture of how we humans might proceed to expand our domain beyond this earthly gravity well; depressing because it reminds me of just how much time, energy and resources we've wasted, and consequently, how far behind we are. Behind who? Our potential. I am looking forward to reading Green Mars and Blue Mars. Thanks Munjaros.

george

George is a fellow science fiction fan, and in particular a great fan of the works (and person) of Ken MacLeod. I first became acquainted with George through comment streams on Ken's posts. At some point, I think either he made reference to problems in health care or I mentioned that I was connected with medicine. He then shared with me a shocking tale from his own life of a hideous health care failure in a country that has long had a reputation for providing some of the best care in the world: the Netherlands. I was honored to be of assistance to him in getting the story posted on a population health forum in the US, and have since been delighted to see it posted elsewhere as well. George is passionate about health care, human rights, workers' rights, and exposure of injustice anywhere. He is constantly sending me links to important articles -- the kind that are usually ignored by mainstream media, but that need to be read. Several of my blog posts have been inspired by links from George. There is much more I could say about George (and if you keep reading my blog, you'll see plenty of comments from him), but for now, I'll just say thanks. Thanks for the continual flow of information and analysis and thanks for your friendship.

climate change

...is likely the greatest threat that the human race has yet encountered. The data to support this statement abounds and is readily available for "him who has ears to hear." I'm frequently overwhelmed by the enormity of the problem and constantly overwhelmed by the enormity of the stupidity of those who deny it. I have learned much about climate change and the near hopelessness of the human plight from Areophany, one of the co-writers of the blog, Martian Utopia Cafe. I hope that he's wrong in his assessments of the situation (he's frequently said that he hopes he's wrong too), but overall, I think he's right, which leaves me with two options: give up or fight (possibly) in vain.

forged steel

My love of steel goes back to long before I ever worked with it at all. It goes back to my childhood fascination with swords and knives. As a teen I used the money that I made working in my father's wood shop to purchase a welder and some other metal working tools. Along with friends Munjaros and his brother Zech I had all sorts of fun playing around, making stuff out of steel. The most technique for working steel is forging: heating it in a furnace (forge) and beating it to your will with a hammer on an anvil. I've only done a VERY little bit of this. I built a miniature forge out of firebricks, a barbecue and an electric billows when I was 16. I had plenty of hammers, but my anvil was a chunk of railroad track and I had to resort to charcoal briquettes for fuel. I never made anything useful or even remotely functional, but I can still feel the thrill of pulling a piece of red-hot steel from the forge and watching the sparks fly as I reformed it with energy transferred from my arm to the hammer. I haven't forged anything since. Zech, however has. One of his pieces stands elegantly in my living room. Many more of them, including some truly beautiful hand-forged knives can be seen on his blog site.

skull splitter

Violent as this sounds, no blood is shed in its use... at least not directly. I believe that if taken excessively, it could result in a skull splitting headache the next morning, but in moderation, it is a nearly perfect substance (even more nearly perfect than chocolate chip cookies). I discovered skull splitter at D.B.A., a bar in the Marigny, New Orleans. It's the best replacement I've found yet for my beloved (but sadly no longer imported to the USA) McEwan's.

chiefdom

...isn't all its cracked up to be. In fact, when it comes to being a chief resident in the pathology department at the University of New Mexico, it can be quite a crock. It does have its perks though. In addition to the additional pay, it means a little more control over my schedule, as I'm the one in charge of making the schedule. It also means a whole lot of meetings with a whole lot of people, where I have to discuss a whole lot potential changes to the residency program or sort out a whole lot of dumb interpersonal failure-to-communicate type issues. Looks good on a resume though, and for better or for worse, it seems that I'm pretty good at it (some sort of natural talent for diplomacy and negotations). I sure haven't gotten bored since becoming chief... and I sure am looking forward to surrendering the mantle of authority at 12:01 a.m. on April 1, 2010 (not that I'm counting down or anything).

the cloud atlas

Another book that I read in the past year. A book that haunts my dreams at night and my thoughts throughout the day. Part period novel, part science fiction, in The Cloud Atlas David Mitchell performs one of the deepest and most affecting explorations of the human experience that I've encountered. It's up there with Haruki Murakami's Wind-up Bird Chronicle and Julian Barnes' History of the World in 10 1/2 Chapters.

kindle

The most unexpected xmas/birthday present that I received this year was an Amazon Kindle. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised, given my love of books and gadgets, but given that I hadn't ever mentioned the Kindle to my wife or her parents, it was quite a treat to receive it from them on xmas morning. You can read all of the reviews of it elsewhere, as well as the head-to-head comparisons with the Sony Reader and the Barnes and Noble Nook. Suffice it to say, that they all have the pros and cons, but I'm very pleased with the Kindle and find reading from it to be quite enjoyable. It's also an incredibly dangerous device, in that it is WAY too easy to buy books for it. Oh... and here's the shocker: I've actually managed to turn it to some academic purposes as well. Amazon will convert documents in .doc or .pdf formats to their proprietary Kindle format for me and send them to the device, so now I'm reading all sorts of toxicology papers and textbook chapters on the Kindle. The vast majority of my Kindle's content is currently science fiction though.

Well... I've now addressed all of the topics on my original list. In doing so, however, I've discovered that there are some very important ones that I neglected, so there will have to be at least one more installment, in which I'll cover the following (and possibly other topics as well):

flyfishing

vibram five fingers

elion

elemental

joanna

2 new blogs to watch

2010-01-05T20:45:00.001-08:00

I am working on the follow-up post to my end-of-year/birthday ramble. But first I want to draw your attention to two new blogs on the net.

The first is Enigmatic Variant (think Elgar) and belongs to my wife, who is a runner, a reader, a writer, a violinist, an anesthesiologist, and the kindest, smartest and most beautiful person I know. I'm really looking forward to reading her posts!

The second is Zech Moore Artwork and Custom Blacksmithing. Zech is one of my best friends and when we were teenagers together in Oregon we started messing around with metal work. He kept with it and is turning out some fantastic hand-forged artwork and blades. I have one of his pieces (the wine stand on the second page of posts) and am thoroughly impressed with it.

Follow-Up: Part 1

2010-01-03T20:10:00.000-08:00

OK, this is where I tackle the first half of the items on that list in my previous post.

hematopathology:

Hematopathology is the subfield of pathology that deals with diseases of the blood, bone marrow, lymph nodes, and spleen. About 27 months ago I decided to pursue a career in hematopathology. It's a fairly lucrative field, always in high demand, and offers just the right amount of variety without so much that one becomes entirely overwhelmed. It's also at the cutting edge of medicine. It employs wonderful technologies like flow cytometry, FISH analysis, and various molecular assays, as well as plenty of time behind the scope and even the option of some patient contact (should a pathologist ever actually desire such a thing). Until just over a year ago I thought I had everything settled. I knew I'd have great recommendations from the hematopathologists in my residency program and had little doubt about my ability to get a spot in one of the better fellowship training programs in the country. A little less than a year ago, after having gone through an exhausting application process and interviewed at several top-notch programs, I decided not to pursue subspecialty fellowship training in hematopathology.

the night sessions:

Yet another amazing book by one of my favorite authors, living or dead, Ken MacLeod. It's an all too timely tale of an all too possible future (several aspects of which I'd love to see realized!). It includes plenty of enticing themes (super-intelligent robots, space elevators, etc.), but what I particularly enjoyed was the setting: a world in which religion held little sway.

anesthesiology:

My wife, Kate, is an anesthesiology resident. In march of 2009 she was offered (and accepted) a subspecialty training fellowship in pediatric anesthesiology at Seattle Childrens, giving us a specific reason and date for our long anticipated return to our beloved Emerald City. Also, after not having ever observed an anesthesiologist's role in the OR from the beginning to the end of a case, I recently accompanied Kate to work for a day and watched her perform local nerve blocks and run cases. Very interesting and very technical. In a spirit of reciprocity she accompanied me to work and watched her first-ever autopsy.

bioinformatics:

After reading one of Ken MacLeod's other books, The Star Fraction I was convinced that my nearly complete state of computer illiteracy would be a tremendous handicap in any possible version of the future, so I finagled my way into an undergraduate introductory course on Unix. It was great fun, and though I don't use Unix or Linux on a daily basis, much of what I learned about computer systems/structures has served me since. I enjoyed the course so much, in fact, that for most of the past year I was thinking I'd pursue a career in biomedical informatics. I spent a month at the Mecca of pathology informatics, University of Pittsburgh, attended three national meetings on biomedical informatics (presented a poster at one of them), and dove head first into every informatics-related project that came my way. Ultimately, however, I decided that even though I do believe that innovations in informatics and the technology to support them are the future of medicine, I was more concerned about the future of a habitable planet, so I chose a different path.

ken

As mentioned above, reading one of Ken MacLeod's books inspired me to take a Unix class. That's not the only manner in which it inspired me though. I read The Star Fraction while I was still planning on a career in hematopathology. It had been several years, however, since I'd discovered that I derived no great joy or satisfaction from medicine, and even as I was making plans for the next stage in my training and career, I was hoping to find something else -- and yet afraid to really look for it. Ken's book introduced me to a vast array of social, scientific, political and (as far as I can tell) completely original ideas that served to shake me into a realization that if I wasn't pursuing a career in which I truly believed and about which I could work up a decent passion, then I might just be wasting the most important (the only truly important?) opportunity of my life. Reading Ken's book also lit a fire under my lazy ass in regard to politics and world events. I've always been vaguely aware of the goings on in the world, but have tended to depend on one (relatively decent) source of information (NPR) and then done little with said information. I still don't pursue the truth as rabidly as I'd like, but I'm far more aware and far more skeptical of any one source... and I'm rapidly shedding my fear of using my voice on behalf of people and causes that are ignored or misrepresented. Thank you, Ken.

health care

What blogger worth his salt hasn't touched on health care in the past year? As 1) an MD working in a university hospital that serves most of the uninsured of the community, 2) an observant individual who has now lived in two of the three poorest states in the USA, and 3) someone with many friends in other countries throughout the world, I have no doubt that the US health care system is a disaster. The worst and foremost failing is that it is a health care system instead of a health system. Until the emphasis is correctly placed on promotion of health through education, healthy living environments, healthy workplaces (and work practices), and real, meaningful reduction of the economic disparity that is running rampant, any health care system is going to be nothing more than an expensive band-aid that rapidly becomes entirely unaffordable. Enough ranting though... especially as I'll return to health care related topics later in this post. Suffice it to say that none of the US health care proposals of the past year have gone nearly far enough, and they've all been "shaved, sterilized, and destroyed" to the point that the end result will only be slightly better than the current state of affairs. It will be better... but there'll still be a LONG way to go before health in the USA is even close to being adequately reformed.

watchmen

Until seeing trailers for the movie of Watchmen I was entirely unaware of the story. Fortunately I have three cousins who more than made up for my childhood lack of comic books. While conversing with one of them about the film trailer, he told me, "if you only ever read one comic book or graphic novel, it should be Watchmen." So I picked up a copy and read it. It was truly great. The movie was excellent too... and I like it better and better each time I see it. If you haven't seen it, read the book first. If you have seen it, be sure to watch the Director's Cut. If you've seen the Director's Cut, watch the Ultimate Cut, which includes all of the Black Freighter sequences that were left out of the theatrical version. Oh... and Watchmen is not the only comic book or graphic novel I'll ever read. I've already read V for Vendetta and I'm looking forward to starting the Sandman series.

bruichladdich

Scotch whisky at it's finest. I do love Laphroaig, Caol Ila, and even Ardbeg, but when push comes to shove, if I had to settle on just one, it would be the Signatory 18-year-old Bruichladdich. Enough said. Slainte Mhath! Slainte Mhor!

obama

For this I'll refer to my previous post on the topic. In summary, I'll paraphrase and respond to a line from the movie Gladiator:

There was once a dream that was Obama. You could only whisper it. Anything more than a whisper and it would vanish... it was so fragile. And I fear that it will not survive the winter.

The man has survived a winter, but the dream has not.

On that rather somber note, I will close this post. I will be back to cover the other half of the topics though, so stay tuned.

Looking backward and forward

2009-12-30T17:47:00.000-08:00

Another year approaching its conclusion and another year older (it's convenient having one's birthday fall just one day before the end of the calendar year).

I won't bore you all with a run-down of the events of the year... yet. Maybe some day soon. For now, as I sit here sipping a glass of Laphroaig Quarter Cask, I'll just drop some teasers (these will also serve to remind me of the points that I plan to address later):

hematopathology

the night sessions

anesthesiology

bioinformatics

ken

health care

watchmen

bruichladdich

obama

environmental health

red mars

george

climate change

forged steel

skull splitter

chiefdom

the cloud atlas

kindle

Now it is time for me to go celebrate the day with some food, wine and family. Cheers.

In the interest of the persecuted...

2009-12-12T09:56:00.000-08:00

My attention was drawn to this story by a friend and fellow science fiction reader.

Regardless of a few fuzzy areas in the story, it seems pretty clear that at the very least, this represents use of excessive force by US border patrol at a US-Canadian border crossing. And when one considers the sources of information and the apparent possible motivations, it looks more like a case of hideously needless brutality and gross injustice. Take a look at the article, keep your ears open, and be concerned about what's happening at our borders. If really inspired, consider contributing to Dr. Watts' defense fund. A good defense and a victory in this case will be an important part of exposing the injustices meted out by fascistoids at our borders.

Though never subjected to actual physical violence, a good friend of mine who is a scientist and a German citizen has been repeatedly harassed and impeded without ANY cause or provocation when crossing from Canada into the United States (he has since solved the problem by moving to the UK). I don't know Dr. Watts, but I do know my friend and I trust his accounts of border crossing injustice entirely. I find many US border policies and procedures repugnant in general, but when they become downright irrational, arbitrary, and unjust, I get sick with anger, sorrow, and apprehension. Just another sign of the ongoing atrophy, fibrosis, and decay of my country.

The meter's running...

2009-12-10T19:40:00.000-08:00

...but who's running it?

Here's a superb bit of writing from Areophany at Martian Utopia Cafe about the atrocity that corporate villainy and corruptible politicians have committed in Chicago. Enjoy (or just cringe).

Some points to ponder regarding space travel -- from Charlie Stross

2009-11-29T08:55:00.000-08:00

Charlie Stross is one of many current science fiction authors whose works I have yet to explore.

Thanks to a link from Ken Macleod's site, however, I've been greatly enjoying Stross's blog. Here is a particularly interesting post, in which he dissects and debunks the myth of space travel as it has been traditionally envisioned.

Enjoy!

Where is the hero who shook my hand?

2009-10-10T04:14:00.000-07:00

Interestingly enough, I wrote the title of this post over a month ago. I was disheartened by something or other that our dear president had done or had failed to do, and I got as far as typing the title before I was interrupted by some work-related demand. Today, however, it seems appropriate to return to the topic.

I once heard Nobel Laureate Edmond H. Fischer speak (I'm ashamed to say that I didn't really know who he was at the time) and I met winner of the Kyoto and Albert Lasker prizes, Leroy Hood in a Seattle bakery once -- and shook his hand. As of today though, I can say that I shook the hand of a soon-to-be Nobel Laureate.

When Obama came to New Mexico the second-to-the-last time before the election, my wife and I drove up to Santa Fe to hear him speak. The line to get into the auditorium was over a quarter of a mile long and by the time we got to the gate the venue had reached maximum capacity and we were turned away. Then he came outside and talked to the crowd. I employed all of my crowd maneuvering skills (and abandoned my wife) to get to the front of the crowd, and I was rewarded with a moment of eye contact and a firm clasp of hands, and for few moments I was able to set aside my skepticism and truly believe, with all my heart, that this man would lead our nation -- our world even -- to true change.

Time has passed. He has proved himself to be human. He compromises. He panders. He protects. He gives undeserved preference. He even obscures the truth. I'm still glad that I voted for him and I am happier with him than I've been with any president that I can remember. But he's not the one. I wanted the Kwizatz Haderach and he is merely another Duke Leto I; a good man and a mighty relief from the Harkonen oppression that came before, but a politician none the less, and ultimately ineffectual.

Today he has been crowned by the world. I'm pleased for him and I'm pleased by the humility with which he announced his intention to accept the prize, but it makes me wish all the more that he'd done more to deserve it. If he had withdrawn our troops from pointless conflicts, if he had demanded absolute transparency regarding the tortures at Guantanimo Bay and the existence of secret detention centers, if he had sacrificed bipartisanism for the sake of a healthcare system that might really make a difference for the health of our nation, if he had shown himself to be the hero that I wanted him to be... then I would be cheering for him today, on his day.

Instead... well instead he is just a man who shook my hand. But men can become heroes and so my hope is not yet dead.

Facebook: Fuel for the Flames

2009-10-10T00:46:00.000-07:00

My post on Facebook sparked some fun debate today. I am privileged enough to have friends of all walks and persuasions (including some very conservative folks), and this makes for very lively and stimulating debates. Not the ideal blog post, I know, but it makes for entertaining reading, and I did put a little work into my responses. Oh... and if I end up posting a bunch of responses to Glen Beck transcripts, at least you'll know why.

Me:

[Micaiah] thinks that Obama could become the greatest president ever, but that he doesn't deserve a Nobel yet. Maybe winning it will inspire him to earn it.

Friend 1:

I completely agree that Obama hasn't really done much to earn the nobel. But it tickles me absolutely silly that he did! Can you imagine the wailing and teeth-gnashing on the part of the Limbaughs and Becks of the world? Infuriating the wingnut lunatics makes it all so completely worth it.

Friend 2:

I admire Glenn Beck tremendously. So does that make me a wingnut lunatic? I try hard not to call liberals names. It makes me sound condescending and arrogant. What do you think?

Me:

I haven't actually consumed enough of Mr. Beck's product to comment on him specifically, but whether or not the term "wingnut lunatic" is entirely fair, I do question the judgement (and possibly even the mental processes) of those who attribute any value to the unreliable propaganda that is continuously generated by the conservative talking heads of Mr. Beck's ilk.

Friend 2:

I challenge you to watch him for a week, then investigate his claims on the internet, and come back to your sight and give a "knowlegable" evaluation. And while you're at it, maybe you could actually keep your mind open to the possibility, no matter how impossible it may seem, that there could be an element of truth in what he has to say. After all, it is you liberals who claim we conservatives are the close minded ones, even though I could probably tell you what the liberal media is saying about any given political idea, better than most liberals I converse with can tell me the conservative point of view. Questioning my intelligence or "mind processes" sounds to me like if we were in Germany in the Nazi era, I would probably be put in an institution to rehabilitate my brainwashed mind. So would you say it requires genious intelligence in order to know truth when you hear it? I believe we've had some very intelligent evil men in history. I'll take integrity, honesty, diligence and many other signs of morality over extremely high intelligence any day! In fact I remember reading some years ago that geniuses lie more than those with average intelligence. Let's just work together, both sides of the aisle to discover what the truth is about the merits, or lack thereof, of the bills we are passing so quickly without our representatives even reading them and laughing about it as though that were the most absurd of ideas. I really admire your intelligence, but it is not my gift. But I do believe I have enough character to suspect when things just don't make good old common sense. And I believe you do, too. Please, let's stop spewing platitudes. Our country's future is too important for this blind loyalty to either party. If you can't see how corrupt both sides of the aisle are in our government and try to be open to joining with those who love their country, just as you do, then I guess I'm wasting my words. But I beg you to stop and listen to those you now ridicule long enough to give them a honest chance to convince you. And Glenn Beck is the one I believe you might actually find yourself surprised about the most. Please. It's important.

Friend 3:

Has anyone on the liberal left side stopped to think that possibly the more conservative people on the right consider things we hear and see and disagree with propaganda also? And that we, too, feel just as strongly for our beliefs as you do. I too, will take integrity, honesty and morality over high intelligence. However, I feel that it is 1) not our place to judge where anyone is at since God alone knows the hearts of men, 2) you can't believe every thing you see and hear in either the Republican or Democratic arena, so we need to be doing our own research and not relying just on what a news anchor has to say, and 3) most importantly, start simply respecting each other. This "war" between the sides is never going to end ... but each of us can start with being kind and respectful to other people's opinions and beliefs. Micaiah, you are someone that I both love and respect very much and I would never, ever stoop to calling you a name just because of our political differences. So ... please everyone, a little kindness and respect goes a long way.

Me:

(To Friend 3)

Thank you for reminding me of the importance of kindness and respect (coming from one such as you, who epitomizes both of these qualities, a rebuke, even a kind and respectful one, goes a long way -- I mean than with absolute sincerity). Furthermore, I agree 100% that you can't believe anything you see or hear in either the republican or democratic arena (I was absolutely appalled to hear on NPR [generally considered a fairly liberal source] that liberal politicians have received more in campaign contributions in recent years from the military industry than have conservative politicians) and that we cannot rely on what a news anchor has to say. That is why I do not rely on any one source of information, but rather scour the internet for as much information on a topic of interest as I possibly can. Yes, many of the items that start me searching originate from my early morning sessions with NPR, but as is evident from the above mentioned revelation of horribly suspect behavior on the part of liberal politicians, NPR is not entirely the slave of any liberal agenda. In any case, what I find, over and over again is that the conservative news sites (I refer to internet sites here, as I do rarely watch television and only listen to the radio in the early morning and late afternoon) only ever pursue stories that undermine liberal viewpoints, whereas the more "liberal" sources honestly explore all angles, even when it is liable to hurt the probable liberal agendas. Sure integrity, honesty, and morality outweigh intelligence in an absolute sense, but part of being truly honest and moral, and part of approaching an issue with true integrity is looking at the whole picture with an open mind. This is something that I do not see even attempted by the bulk of the conservative media pundits.

All that being said... thank you very much for weighing in, and please continue to do so. I am a very opinionated person, but I also lay great stock in dissent and am not easily offended. I learn more by being whittled down to size by my opponents than I possibly can by being shored up by my allies. So keep it coming, and the more specific examples and arguments, the better. People are pendulums, pushed to and fro by whatever wind is blowing the hardest. Equilibrium is the truth and it will only be reached when all of the angry squalls have blown themselves out and only the prevailing wind is left.

Me:

(to Friend 2)

I'll come back to your challenge in a minute.

First, however, regarding Mr. Beck (or Rush Limbaugh or any of the other right-wing pundits), I have no doubt that there's an element of truth in what he has to say. Incorporating an element of truth into propaganda is an age-old technique, going back to the "father of lies." The serpent said something to the effect of, "Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil," and of course the part about "knowing good and evil" was all too true (in the context). Similar strategies have been used throughout history. It's a heck of a lot easier to get a croud to swallow a lie if it's coated in truth. "Just a spoon full of sugar helps the..."

As for the Nazis (who were quite adept at incorporating partial truths into their propaganda), I think we should probably leave them out of this debate. A more than cursory analysis of their political agendas will reveal that they shared far more ideology and policy with conservative right-wing elements of this country (especially as led by GW) than they do with the liberal left.

Yes, there have been some very intelligent evil men. Evil men who are also intelligent tend to go far and make a big splash in history because of their ability to effectively impose their will on a large number of people. There have been a great many very intelligent good men (and women) too... and they often are not remembered quite so well, as they don't hurt as many people (one of the basic rules of classical conditioning is that pain is a far more potent [and memorable] motivator of behavior than pleasure). And it wouldn't surprise me at all to hear that very intelligent people lie more than those of average intelligence (I guess that's an argument for GW being far more intelligent than his speeches made him appear).

Unfortunately I can see just how corrupt the politicians are on BOTH sides of the aisle (see above response to Friend 3). In fact when it comes to evaluating any given proposed policy, I automatically ASSUME that any proponents of said policy are as corrupt as the day is long. It's ugly way to think, but over and over again it proves itself to be the case that there are no disinterested parties. Approaching an issue with this assumption does level the playing field though. It allows one to look past the sponsoring politician and/or party to see who is likely to actually benefit from the proposal. If the beneficiaries are the corporations and their executives then I smell something rotten and I'm opposed; if a proposal benefits the workers, the children, the poor, or the otherwise marginalized, however, then even if it means lining the pockets or polishing the egos of a few corrupt politicians (as sick as that makes me feel), count me in. The fact is, I have pretty much no loyalty to either of our (far too few in number) political parties. I side with the democrats more often than with the republicans because more often than not the democrats' proposals are based on better evidence and stand to benefit a greater number of people than those of the republicans. That's not always the case though. When it came to the fate of the automobile giants, it seems that more republicans were for leaving it to survival of the fittest while the democrats wanted to bail them out. I was with the republicans on that one.

OK... so back to your challenge. Unfortunately you have me at a bit of a disadvantage, as I have relatively little control over my work schedule and cannot commit to watching Mr. Beck's show for a week straight. I do have a counter offer for you though: Send me the transcripts (or links to the transcripts) of any of his shows that you consider to be especially worth reading (as many as you like) and I will read them with an open mind and respond to them here on Facebook, as well as on my blog. This method has the added benefit of eliminating any bias (positive or negative) produced by his style of presentation.

And please, keep up the discourse. I've already had my opinion on one major issue turned on its head in the past six months, so I know it's possible. Teach me, disprove me, convert me, sharpen me... "as iron sharpens iron..." and all that. Turn me into a frickin' razor already!

Friend 1:

Ah me oh my...my little funny sure did set off a firestorm! I'll respond more coherently over the weekend as it is late and I'm a-drinkin' some beers. For now: I can certainly adapt to debate mode rather than cheap shot mode; but, I would point out that my chortling at the discomfort of conservatives is certainly *not* inappropriate given theunbelievable invective against liberals generally, and Obama specifically, that they have injected into the public sphere. One need only consider the absolute glee of conservative pundits when Obama failed in getting the Olympics in Chicago; or the horrific name calling (Nazi!!) of the Sept. 12th protestors; or the absurd claims of the so-called birthers.

Okay, so maybe we liberals shouldn't stoop to "their level" but sometimes I think that it's just that sort of namby-pamby thinking that has resulted in the complete erosion of a truly progressive wing in this country. Clinton? End-of-wealfare-as-we-know-it-guy? Nafta-guy?? De-regulate-banks-guy??? Yeah, that's real left wing...NOT. And, so far Obama is demonstrating a warmed over Clintonism. In the last 30 years Democrats have capitulated time and again. I'm sick of it. So...I'm willing to be a bit snarky at conservatives' expense. Sometimes, it seems, fire must be fought with fire. I'm more than willing to debate without snark; but I'm going to stand up for a robust progressive agenda. Hopefully Obama will one day as well.

The Future of Literature: Emergence of Two Cultures

2009-09-21T12:41:00.000-07:00

In a recent post on his blog, author Ken MacLeod, draws attention to an article by Kim Stanley Robinson (author of the Mars trilogy) about the failure of the modern literary elite to recognize the genre of science fiction as a source of some truly great works. Also highlighted is the article in the Guardian in which Booker Prize judge John Mullan makes a sad attempt at rebuttal.

Follow the links above, then move on to my comments below (also left at Ken MacLeod's site).

I'm reminded of C.P. Snow's The Two Cultures (many thanks to posts and discussions here for introducing me to the work). The natural sciences were dismissed by traditional academic elite of the day as being less important to the essence of human existence than the great works of literature that had (for centuries in many cases) served as the pillars of culture. Regardless of their role in the maintenance of our species' humanity, the Humanities cannot claim much credit for the technological progress that allows (the luckier segments of) the world to live largely free of the plagues, famines, and myriad daily inconveniences so pervasive in times past. (And as a side note, I would suggest that Humanities are at least as responsible as the Natural Sciences for all of disastrous abuses of technology that have followed its development).

I am, I'll admit, a relative new comer to SF, but it seems to me that SF is the experimentally investigative science of literature. I mean this in the sense that in SF, the author is allowed to create controlled experiments, as though he/she were working in a laboratory. The parameters can be set and altered as necessary to optimize the conditions, and then the author can follow scenario to its natural conclusion, free of many of the constraints of the outside world. Then, as the themes emerge, more and more of the outside conditions can be re-introduced, in a systematic way, until the controlled environment resembles the outside world enough to allow reasonable extrapolations based on the investigator's (author's) observations. I would think that the writing of historical novels, or most other genres of fiction, would be more akin to field observations, in which the author can follow events in great detail as they proceed, but has far less freedom to alter or shape their courses, and can therefore only ever report associations and correlations, rather than the causative relationships sought by the experimental investigator.

Perhaps this is all a bit of a stretch, but building upon the (partially implied) argument that the Natural Sciences are the vehicle by which a civilization, as a whole, may potentially progress (or destroy itself), and upon the observation that regardless of the attitudes of the literary elite about the Natural Sciences, science and technology have continued to prosper, I propose that SF is the future of literature. It will continue to grow, and regardless of whether it is recognized by the Booker Prize judges and other such experts along the way, it will become to traditional literary genres what the Natural Sciences have to the Humanities -- not a replacement, and (I hope) not a direct antagonist, but rather a separate (and ever growing) culture whose power for understanding and shaping the world forces it to be recognized, acknowledged, and embraced... even if it is never fully respected by the elitists who are left to maintain their arts in the dusty halls and paper-strewn offices of an age that has past.

Inglourious Basterds: a valuable reminder

2009-09-05T08:48:00.000-07:00

I just saw it last night. It's everything that I'd expected and more. Here's my recent FaceBook post about it:

Loved it! At least my 3rd favorite Tarantino film -- maybe even 2nd. Some of the best performances ever and no trace of fear, shame, or hesitation. A thoroughly enjoyable movie that did what it needed to do without pandering to the delicate sensibilities of the opiated masses.

War is f#*%ing ugly -- always. And nobody remains clean or innocent. Were the Nazis perpetrating horrendous crimes against humanity? Did they need to be stopped? Of course. Do I think for one minute that the righteous allied forces always kept their hands clean and fought honorably? Hah!

Also, the film did a great job of emphasizing that no matter how important you think your life might be to the grand scheme of things (or how much time and energy the director invests in developing your character), when you die, you die. That's it. End of bloody story -- for you. The frequency with which such stories reach their untimely conclusions is just dramatically increased in Tarantino films -- and in war.

I'll warn you that if you're easily offended by gruesome and violent acts, you're going to be offended. But that's all the more reason to see it. Go be horrified by it. Go feel sick and uncomfortable. Go and then wonder if you should have gone, as you try to get that icky, dirty, tainted feeling out of your mind. Go and be reminded of just how appallingly perverse humans can be when motivated by greed, lust, or power, or when forced to it by injustice, deprivation, war, and genocide.

I have performed 40 autopsies, and have seen at least five times that many more dead bodies. A fair number of them were intact and would not be likely to shock the average viewer (except perhaps for the drainage of glistening nasal fluid that is pretty much ubiquitous among corpses). Many more, however, were grotesquely mutilated -- some torn and smashed in car crashes, some riddled with bullets, some with their heads blown off by a slug from a 12-gauge shotgun, some with their throats or abdomens slit open, and some burned to a crisp (most frequently in automobile accidents). I even did autopsies on one of three people crushed by a single boulder and on a man whose head was quite literally flattened by being run over by a garbage truck.

But my point? My point is that violence and violent deaths are disgusting. Humans have, along with the capacity to commit violence, developed a wonderful distaste for witnessing the mutilation (and the consequent grisly remains) of their own kind. That visceral response that we feel, the nausea and creeping shivers up the spine when we see someone in agony or when we're faced with a mutilated corpse -- that's a highly evolved survival mechanism. We're hard-wired to react to it. The reactions vary. We might hide or fight or run away or rush to help, but react we must. It is natural and right to be offended by violence and carnage. I applaud those who feel ill or vomit during scenes of torture, rape, or execution, and my hat is off to that medical student who faints in the autopsy suite the first time he sees a scalp incised and reflected back from a shiny white scull. This is how a human should respond.

The problem with violence in movies isn't that there's too much of it. It's that there is too much casual, palatable violence. I think that the PG-13 rating is one of the worst inventions of the 20th century. To allow a violent act to be portrayed on film without portraying it in all its grisly detail is a crime of censorship. Should a child or teenager be allowed to see explicitly gruesome movies? Maybe not. But should he or she be allowed to see movies in which tens to hundreds of people are killed and hardly a drop of blood is shown? ABSOLUTELY NOT! It is such polite portayals of violence that allow us to hear daily of scores of deaths of civilians and soldiers without batting an eyelash, much less shedding a tear or vomiting our guts out in horror. It is the scenes in which the hero is tortured only to then get up again and fight another day that allows us to forget that such crimes against humanity destroy lives and leave people both physically and psychologically crippled for the rest of their lives.

Every time we see a car chase in which an innocent bystander vehicle is launched into the air, instead of getting to follow our dashing hero as he expertly maneuvers his vehicle, relatively unscathed through narrow alleys and off unfinished overpasses, we should be forced to watch that other nameless, always ignored driver as his seatbelt snaps (it does happen) and he is ejected through the windshield, nose and ears being sheered off and clavicles snapped in the process, only to be smeared across a hundred feet of pavement, leaving a trail of internal organs, blood, and fat.

Every time Jack Bower slips the blade of his $495 Microtech HALO OTF knife between some dirty terrorist's ribs, and then runs off to save his SO of the day, we should have to sit with that dirty terrorist and watch as he gasps for breath, blood pooling around him almost as quickly as it floods his pleural space, collapsing his lung. He can't get enough of a breath to scream in agony, but his eyes are wide with terror, his face streaked with tears, and he thrashes about as suffocation and exsanguination vie for those final moments of life.

And every time that same honorable and admirable Mr. Bower punches a similar (but this time captive) dirty terrorist in the face repeatedly, in an attempt to extract vital information, rather than getting to see how that information saves the day, we should get a good close look at the face of that dirty terrorist, as it has become unrecognizably distorted by bleeding lacerations, echymoses, and soft tissue swelling. We should count the broken and dislodged teeth and feel the excruciating headache-like pain that envelopes one's whole body when one sustains blunt trauma to the head. And we should stay with him over the next few hours as the subdural hematoma (from when Jack kicked his legs out from under him and slammed him to the floor) continues to grow, compressing his brain, causing loss of neural function and ultimately death.

But no, we get all the addictive adrenaline high of the action, that rush of excitement, that other highly evolved reaction (this time to threats and danger), without having to live the whole experience -- without having to also feel the nausea and anguish that is an integral part of violence. Yes, fights, car chases, epic battles, and even righteously motivated high-stress interrogation scenes are exciting, even exhilerating. Yes, I enjoy watching them too. But they are only part of the story. They're like sex without STDs or unwanted pregnancy. They're like cheeseburgers and milkshakes without obesity. They're the shot of heroin without the injection site abscess. They're the rich without the poor.

When someone says that a movie is too violent, they usually mean that it made them feel uncomfortable because it portrayed violence too explicitly, and when I hear it, it makes angry, because they are asking for censorship. They want to deny themselves the only truly valuable depiction of violence on film: the reminder of exactly what it is that we do to each other every day, through wars, crimes, and stupid, preventable car accidents!

So go see the movie already. Be sick. Vomit, if you must. Cry. Get mad. But don't you dare hide your eyes or get up and leave. If you're uncomfortable, good. Revel in the discomfort. Be grateful for it. It's part of what makes you human.

And really, Inglourious Basterds is a tremendously fun and entertaining movie. It's not all just violence and gore, but that is what you're likely to hear about from those who disparage the film.

Into the Wild(erness -- sort of)

2009-08-21T06:01:00.000-07:00

Heading out for a week plus away from civilization. When I return, I'd like the U.S. health care system to be fully reformed (including an appropriate primary emphasis on health rather than health care), the economy to have recovered, the troops to have returned from Afganistan, the globe to have stopped warming, U.S. import of McEwan's Scotch Ale to have been restored, and my dog's tail to be wagging. I am optimistic about one of those desires. Cheers y'all.

The bed or the couch

2009-08-12T15:28:00.000-07:00

The savvy parent gives a child a limited number of options that provide the illusion of power. "You can take your nap on the bed or on the couch". The kid happily chooses the more exciting option of taking a nap on the couch, forgetting for the moment that either way, he'll still be sleeping away his afternoon instead of playing outside in the back yard.

I feel a bit like that kid when looking at the current healthcare debate. It's become this polarized monster of a debate that wants to force us to either support it or oppose it with every ounce of fury (and even violence) that we can muster. Either you're an Obama-loving socialist democrat who will support anything Obama wants (regardless of how unrecognizably mutilated it's become along the way) or you're yelling "Keep your grubby hands off my healthcare! I'm an American and I like it just the way it is." The way the debate is presented by the media you're either in one camp or the other. You're with us or you're against us.

Like hell I am.

We're being fed a pile of (to use a FarScape-ism) dren. The "Obama" healthcare plan has no punch and would do little more than extend the current failed system to more people and plunge the nation further into debt (not that I think being in debt due to paying for healthcare is nearly as objectionable as being in debt due to war). At least in its early forms it was going to put some pressure on the big for-profit health insurance companies to actually get competitive and provide a quality product for a decent price (not that such improvements would address the underlying problems), but now that the plan has been castrated, it's just another expensive band-aid with an assortment of health insurance company logos blazoned across it.

And as for the current system? If you actually thinks that it's functioning well and should be left to continue serving us as is... well... you're probably not reading this blog.

So what else is there? Everyone rolls their eyes and takes a deep breath in anticipation of my long-winded sermon on the glories of government-run universal healthcare coverage. But wait, I'm NOT going to propose (yet again) that the government take over and institute a universal plan such as has been so successful in various European countries. Although I do think that such a plan is a feasible and potentially very successful option in some countries, I've given up on the idea that the US will ever achieve the degree of socialism necessary to make it fly. And I've (only very recently) begun to think that that's not such a bad thing, thanks primarily to an article from the September issue of The Atlantic. In it, the author, who is not a health professional, examines and discusses the underlying problems of the current US healthcare system more clearly and thoroughly than anyone I've previously encountered. He also proposes a solution that seems more reasonable and potentially compatible with the ideals and values of a large chunk of the population than any other that I've heard to date. I'd love to tell you all about it, but then that would spoil it, right?

So give it a read. It's well worth your time, could teach you something, might make you question previous positions, might confirm what you've known all along, and might even make you want to stomp your feet, shake your head, refuse to go to sleep on the couch or the bed, and run outside to play in the sunshine.

Congratulations George!

2009-08-11T13:13:00.000-07:00

A fellow enthusiast of science fiction, healthcare reform, and libertarian left politics, philosopher and online friend George Berger has posted an account (in English) of his experiences with the all-too-disappointing Dutch healthcare system on a Dutch news site here. His piece is embedded in the 6th comment, so scroll down to read it. Although I probably won't be able to read a word of the debate that it sparks (likely to be in Dutch), I hope that it's a lively one. His story is also available on the University of Washington's Population Health Forum here.

Predicting the weather... storms brewing.

2009-08-08T20:17:00.000-07:00

Please go read Areophany's post on Martian Utopia Cafe. I wish I could say that I don't share his apparent sense of impending doom.

Gang of 6: dirty insurance money

2009-07-30T11:06:00.000-07:00

I did not write the following, but I agree with every word of it and add my voice in urging you to take action.

Dear Friends,

Have you heard about the six senators who are out to kill health care reform? Of course, that's not how they'd phrase it. Sens. Baucus, Bingaman, Conrad, Enzi, Grassley and Snowe say they're striving for "bi-partisan compromise." But what they're actually doing is working to make sure reform won't include a public option or mandatory employer-based insurance - two key policies needed for effective reform.

My personal view is that best patient outcomes at lowest cost is logically incompatible with for-profit service delivery and for-profit health insurance. Without a strong public option to begin eroding the advantages of private health insurance, no meaningful change will occur.(PMG)

There are 100 members of the Senate, but these six, inexplicably, seem to be holding all the cards when it comes to health care. So you probably won't be surprised to learn that all six have taken a huge amount of money from the health insurance industry and pharma - more than $3 million between them.

These six senators -- who, by the way, represent only 2.74% of Americans between them -- are writing bad policy, and they're doing it while they take money from the very companies who stand to benefit the most.

I just signed a petition to tell the "Gang of 6" to give back every dime of their dirty insurance money. I hope you will, too. Please have a look and take action.

SIGN THE PETITION

Our Nation's Feet of Iron and Clay

2009-07-28T18:41:00.000-07:00

I'm overwhelmed with a mixture of nausea, pity, and horror when I read things like this (link below). The religious right -- the people who believe and distribute this kind of excrement -- is the faulty foundational substance that is poised to result in the collapse of our nation. The obstinate perseverence with which this segment of our population refuses to use their minds appalls me, as does their willingness to consume, unquestioned, the decaying refuse that is fed to them by their so-called spiritual leaders. If someone wants to argue against the currently proposed healthcare reform bill, there are plenty of reasonable, rational angles from which to attack it. It's so much easier, however, to be told that something is an absolute evil than to have to recognize and accept shades of grey. Absolutes are simple, elegant, easy... dilusions.

LINK TO ARTICLE

Here is the response that I posted on Facebook (I reigned myself in a bit and directed it towards the likely target audience. Maybe tomorrow I'll add more... without reserve):

I have nothing but respect for [the person that posted this link], but it would be irresponsible of me as a physician to hold my tongue. This article is an example of the worst kind of destructive and misleading rhetoric. It attempts to prey on the emotions and spiritual sensitivities of its target audience while ignoring the truly important facts of the matter. It talks of putting healthcare decisions in the hands of bureaucrats while ignoring the fact that in the current system, decisions regarding your medical care are made by private insurance companies. In the current system, physicians are NOT at liberty to treat you as they see fit, primarily due to the evils of the private health insurance companies. And I assure you, that if you're concerned that the government doesn't have your best interests at heart, the for-profit insurance are even less interested in your health; they are interested in your money and in NOT paying that money out when you're sick. Please DO NOT trust articles such as this just because they are coming from a pastor. If history has taught us anything about the church and its shepherds, it is that they are human and that they are as corruptible as any other human. Examine the facts. Look at the numbers. Look at the millions (46.6 million, approximately) of uninsuredAmericans who are suffering every day. If you have never lived in a poor city, such as New Orleans or Albuquerque (I've now lived in both) and seen the horrors wrought on the health and lives of the uninsured poor, do some research before you let a pastor's article on a website make up your minds about what is or isn't best for the country as a whole. Consider the amount of time Jesus spent promoting health for the poor and the words that he had for those who preyed upon them (think of today's insurance companies as vaguely equivalent to Judea's corrupt tax collectors). I know I can't convince anyone of anything. however, I do hope to remind people to use their minds... the minds that God gave them. Think critically. Look at the evidence. Our minds are equipped to examine issues in detail and it would be a slap in the face of the creator of these minds to just accept ANYTHING that is handed to us on a plate. Use that organ of consciousness andcreativity to dig deep, think hard, and make sure that what you're reading (regardless of where you're reading it -- including right here), jives with the common sense and skills of logic that are part of your legacy as members of the human race.

On a side note, I am personally very upset at Mr. Joyner's (mis)use of Tolkien's character Gandalf. Examination of Tolkien's writings make it clear that he did not want his works to be seen as spiritual allegories, and that the evil powers in his books are, if anything, representative of the military-industrial complex and the way in which it destroys the environment and oppresses the poor.

Listening to Lolita in Pittsburgh

2009-07-11T12:15:00.000-07:00

Every morning I make my way from the little sub-leased apartment in the Oakland area of Pittsburgh to the Shadyside campus of the UPMC hospital system. There is a shuttle that stops in front of the UPMC medical school building (just a few blocks from my apartment) and after weaving a circuitous route through the streets of Oakland and Shadyside, leaves me within a few hundred feet of my temporary workplace. The shuttle is supposed to make the run (round-trip) once every thirty minutes. It is not entirely reliable. I often find myself waiting at one end of the route or the other for more than the theoretical maximum wait time of 30 minutes. This has led me, on numerous occasions, to forsake the hope of free transport and either take the city bus (at a cost of $2.00 per trip) or walk. The bus takes ten minutes and requires a seven-minute walk on the apartment end of the route. To walk from apartment to work (or vice versa) takes approximately thirty-two minutes (slightly longer when apartment-bound than when work-bound, as the route home is predominantly up-hill).

Regardless of the means by which I achieve my destination, however, I have taken to spending the transit time listening to recorded books on my mp3 player -- or rather (thus far), to one particular book: Vladimr Nabokov's Lolita. I had been listening to it at home before leaving Albuquerque, typically while cleaning the kitchen, cooking dinner, or preparing for work in the morning. When I arrived in Pittsburgh I had made it about half-way through the book.

On my first morning in Pittsburgh I rode the shuttle to Shadyside and did not have my mp3 player along. The radio in the shuttle was tuned to a conservative right-wing AM radio talk show of the Limbaugh type and the volume was set to a very high level, such that it was almost impossible to ignore the nauseating inanities that were being broadcast. I suppose that it is good for me to be reminded, once in a while, that such horrific varieties of baseless propaganda are infecting the airwaves and being eagerly swallowed by a large number of people; it inspires a little more sympathy for the misguided listeners and a greater disgust for the promoters and propogators.

Subsequent to that unpleasant exposure to one of the darker facets of American media, I was careful to carry my mp3 player and with the help of noise-isolating earbuds I am able to replace the amplitude modulated distribution of the worst of republican sentiments (forgive me Mr. Lincoln; I think that you, were you here now, would be quick to disown your grand old party) with a completely different strain of shocking spoken words: Professor Humbert Humbert's eloquent account of his own pedarastic misadventures and sincere, though ever so perverted, obsessive affections for the titular character.

I have been aware of the general story of Lolita for probably at least fifteen years, and it was about ten years ago that I first saw the Kubrick's film of the story. Two years or so ago my mother suggested that I read Reading Lolita in Tehran. I told her that I didn't think I should do so without first reading Lolita, and she replied that she had not read Lolita and really had no interest in doing so, and that Azar Nafisi's book could be read and thoroughly appreciated independent of Nabokov's infamous novel. Still, I had my doubts and decided to postpone Reading Lolita in Tehran (perhaps I will do so some time soon).

Knowing the story of Lolita in advance has eliminated any elements of surprise at the components of the story, and though I'm not surprised by the quality of the writing either, I am certainly impressed. I have seldom felt so entirely immersed in a character's psyche. To be able to feel incite so much sympathy--and even empathy--for a character whose appetites are so socially unacceptable and whose actions to fulfill those appetites are so abusive is, in my opinion, a mark of mastery in an author. The first time I can remember encountering such a well-crafted dispicable character was when I found myself contriving and manipulating along with Claude Frollo, the archdeacon in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. There have been many characters with whom I've felt bonds of similar strength, but it is rare that a character is so perfectly formed as to take possession of my mind in spite of overt idealogical or psychological traits that are in clear opposition to my own (or at least to those that I am able to recognize in myself).

I still have a few chapters left to Lolita. When I have finished it I have another recorded book queued up and ready to help me pleasantly pass the travel time between apartment and work. It's another similarly light-hearted frolic, I expect: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Next.

CHROME

2009-06-04T19:27:00.000-07:00

Google's Crome browser is a beautiful thing. How appropriate that adoption of a new web browser should be the event that inspires me to actually post to my blog after who knows how many weeks of silence. Anyway, if you haven't tried it, you really ought. And for those of you who have tried it... well, you know what I'm talkin' about. And on the topic of web browsers, IE8 sucks. I had to uninstall it and reinstall IE7 because IE8 kept crashing my machine... even after installing every upgrade, patch, and fix I could find for it. Oh well, who needs MS anyway, eh? Nice dream. Someday the golden-headed statue with the feet of iron and clay will topple leaving FOSS to take its rightful place as the universal norm in software generation and distribution. But I guess that will be about the same time that the US starts investing in preventative health care and multinational corporations are required to treat all humans as equals regardless of where they happen to live. Okay... I guess I rambled a long way from my starting point at chrome, but that's what a blog is for. Good night.

Setting up Email Blog

2009-02-28T08:23:00.001-08:00

So this nifty new BlackBerry is limited by a backward carrier, so I can't use mobile blogger. As an alternative, I've set up email blogging, so that I can post from my BB anywhere, anytime, via email. Not quite as smooth or convenient, but I guess I'll have to be satisfied for now. Not like I've added many entries for quite a while anyway.