Worksheets

I went over to Script Frenzy, the sister site of nanowrimo. I don't think my Star Runner adventure is going to work as a script, but I found some worksheets for high school students. I thought I would work through them. Curiously, they ask questions about my characters I do not know the answers to. Thinking about them, working through the work sheets--I thought it might be a way to flesh out the plot which was written on the fly and on an as needed basis for word counts. Then I can go back and actually make something of the story. In doing a lot of thinking on why write, I have concluded I write for enjoyment and I would like readers to do the same. The internet provides a suitable venue for this. I will post how the crafting project is going and maybe even some of its results.

Tired

Well, having finished my novel for nanowrimo, I'm feeling both drained and bewildered. What should I do? I've been writing this novel all month and it has taken over my life. Now I'm not feeling at all grounded. Is it too early to start editing it or should I give it a rest?

Nanowrimo Winner

After pasting in my novel, here's what the screen said:
Through storm and sun, you traversed the noveling seas. Pitted against a merciless deadline and fighting hordes of distractions, you persevered. You launched yourself bravely into Week One, sailed through the churning waters of Week Two, skirted the mutinous shoals of Weeks Three and Four, and now have landed, victorious, in a place that few adventurers ever see.

We congratulate you on your hard work, salute your discipline and follow-through, and celebrate your imagination.

You did something amazing this month, novelist. We couldn't be prouder.

We wish you well on your future adventures, and hope to see you for Script Frenzy in April, and have you back again with us for NaNoWriMo next November.

Nanowrimo for Today

I wrote 1757 words today to make a total of 3517. This is almost identical to the number of words I wrote yesterday. It's all drivel. I can't seem to get my character moving. It just likes to run its mouth, but then, Star Runner is like that, very narcissistic.

Nanowrimo Begins

National Novel Writing Month has begun. Here are the stats for Day 1:
Number of words: 1760
Average per day to reach the goal of 50,000: 1667
Percentage Completed: 3.25
Number of words to go: 48240
Number of words to catch up: -93
which means I wrote 93 extra words today which can always come in handy.

Preparations

I've been thinking for some time I'd like to get a podcast going. I have had numerous podcasts in the past. Some were of a professional nature; some were short-term projects; some were just for the fun of it. I like blogging, but the truth is, I'm much more likely to listen to a podcast than read a blog. Some people prefer reading to listening. So, with the listening audience in mind, I'll post something here within the next week.

I'm writing this post for two reasons:

1. I want to make sure it posts from my mobile phone. I discovered I can change the blog which updates from my dashboard.

2. I want to be certain this blog has at least one post on it.

I'll be hosting the files at the internet archive. It's free. Like all things which are free, there can be some gliches. If the files are not available, check back later. They will be available then most likely. For some reason, internet archive has times where it is impossible to download and when those times pass, things are back to normal. You get what you pay for.

I've started to record some segments. I discovered that my headset creaks. This bumping sound comes through on a recording. I am disappointed in this. I particularly liked this headset. Back to digging through the box and finding something that sounds okay. Mics are such a pain. I'm also using an onboard voice synthesizer and it is distracting. I'm wonderingif I should just turn it off while I am recording. The other alternative is to go with a digital recorder and copy the file. In the end, this may be a more elegant solution though it does mean the step of converting the file from its recording format to a wav file. It would take care of the bumping though and the voice synthesizer interruptions. That may make it worthwhile.

I like very much the evolution of the podcast name and mission. More about that in the podcast itself. I've recorded that segment several times and it is shaping up. Another go at it with a digital recorder and maybe I will have it. I'm still working on the description of the fair itself, its highs and lows, good points and bad. It came out great once, but then I discarded the recording without noting that down. Something to bear in mind for future recording.

I'm still uncertain about the book section. I don't know whether discussing a particular book is the best way to go here or a general discussion. Something to ponder.

I'd like to be more conversational in my speaking than didactic. I always feel like I'm talking to a class than another person. Perhaps it is because I'm addressing the void and there is not another person here in the apartment. Something else to consider.

Muscles

I spend a lot of time thinking about success. Am I a successful human being? How do I explain my lack of success? How do I spin my life experience to demonstrate my successfulness. Do I make decisions about my life to skirt the question of successfulness? Why I am I obsessed about this question?

One of the areas in which I struggle is writing. Early in my life I won a creative writing contest. My mother pushed me to submit a story to American Girl magazine. I hated the whole process of submitting a story. It didn't win. She argued that I ended the story before the outcome of the horse race is known and perhaps that is why it did not win. In reading the winners, I wrote a very straight forward action adventure featuring a boy while the winners featured girls and were more subjective. It put me off contest writing.

In high school I had pieces published in the creative writing rags. One story was too long and could not be published though the English teacher advisor thought it was a good story. No suggestion to cut or editing advice.

AFter that my story writing tailed off and from time to time I have gone back to it, but progressively I have been dissatisfied with my own writing.

Two years ago I signed up for a Nanowrimo account but the month of November was too chaotic to attempt a writing schedule, or so I thought. Last year I dived in. I "won". The story may or may not ever see the light of day. I learned some interestingthings about my character. I will work on another story using the same character this year. Some of the work you've seen here about Star Runer is more background info for the novel.

I was just listening to an old Adventures in Sci Fi Publishing podcast and an author talked about practicing writing. If you don't use your writing muscles, they weaken. No one questions that a musician practices.

Huh. I had never thought about this. I could practice my writing. It wouldn't have to be good. I know enough about practicing music that it means wrong notes, going over a passage, taking this part and then that part and going over it. It means not producing a beautiful piece at any time during the session. I remember explaining this this to my daughter, digging out a recorder and letting her listen to her playing to hear what part of the piece needed more work and suggesting she work on the part of the piece which was giving her the most difficulty. It makes sense to apply this to writing, to write for the sheer practice of writing.

I have thought I would get back into podcasting. Again, practice the recording. If the first take isn't what I want, do it again until it feels natural. Why not? This is a craft, too.

Lifeverse

I'm blogging this more or less freehand. This morning, my regular WPR station seemed to be off the air. In searching to see if my tuner had wandered away from the station, I came across a local update. When it was over, I started to flick the tuner button again. Just before I left what turned out to be a Christian station, I heard an announcement for today's "LIfe Verse". I believe it was going to be from Jeremiah. What came into my mind is how the phrase Life Verse can also be a name for a universe in which life exists. The lifeverse then is a unique place rather than a snippet of Scripture. I don't know how this relates to anything, but I want to hang onto the word for future use.

On Writers' Blogs and Other Doings

I've been away, partially because I moved and partially because I was using facebook and discovered a number of posts are missing and gone forever. I was pissed and went away to sulk. I\

I've been thinking about doing more writing and have even started a small description of the Hypatian system, including a secret base on Hypatian's larger moon, Cleopatra. It's called Over the Moon because it's on the far side.

But this is not what this post is about though I did want to say a little about my virtual disappearance.

I stopped by two writers' blogs. You can google them if you want. I am not going to fuss with links. What I learned reading them over for the last few days is that they go places, name drop and suck up. And, oh yes, talk about their published work endlessly.

I did stop by kriswrites.com to find out if there was another Retrieval Artist book. I've read all 6 plus the novella which started it all via audible.com and enjoy them very much. A new one is coming out next year. If comments were turned on, I would have asked that it be recorded as part of the print release. I will watch audible for it.

I've been reading a great deal, especially making use of my new overdrive account from my regional library for the blind The borrowing period is only a week so I need to focus, but on the other hand, books become available quickly even if several people have requested it.

Mirrors

I read this article in the International Herald Tribune on mirrors The parts that caught my attention were these:

1. People generally think they are better-looking than they are and think their image, when enhanced, looks more like themselves than an unenhanced picture.


2. The image of one's own face in a mirror is half the size of one's face and consistenly stays that size no matter how far away the individual is from the mirror. This has to do with optics.

I mention this because Star Runner works in its head and I thought it might be curious to ponder this data in relation to Star's own image of itself. Star's VR is therefore part computer memory and part mirror which distorts Star's own image of itself in the same way humans and other self-aware animals respond to mirrors.

Poverty

Hypatia has to have poverty. Granted it is an alien world transformed for the rich rourist trade, but even with robots, there has to be people doing low-end jobs. There has to be people that get stuck on Hypatia and can't afford to leave. There has to be people who get blacklisted and can't find jobs. There has to be people who run out of money, luck or even become injured and can't work. Where do they live? What do they do every day? How do they survive?

The Suit

This happened in real life, but it would make a great short story. Here are the facts as C. Related them to me. Here's what I suggested and where this could go.

C.'s daughter is getting married next month. C.'s mother needed a dress to wear, but C.'s mother put very restrictive requirements on the dress:

* high collar to hide her chicken neck

* long sleeves to hide her spotted skin

* cost no more than $40

A dress was found for $39.99 in a not-soo-good color for Mom.

While walking through another store, Mom noticed a lovely suit. Her eyes lit up. It was torquoise. C. Got her mother to try on the suit. It was perfect, but it cost $80. Mom refused to buy the suit despite C. Offering to spring for the $80.

Later, upon hearing the story, C.'s husband insisrted they buy the suit.

I suggested C. Tell her mother it was a final sale and she could not return the suit. C. Suggested she say it was marked down even more. I said L., the daughter, could insist grandmother wear the suit at the wedding.

This sounds like a great start to a story. Of course, I will hear what really did happen.

To make this magical, the suit could have properties. The off-color dress could have properties, too. The clothes could end up on the wrong people. Or something even beter could come along to spice this story up. It's literally the stuff of real life which we all deal with creatively every day.

Sea Caves

Sea caves appear in Careless in Red. When the tide is out, you can walk around in the cave. When the tide comes in, the caves are flooded. In this case, the water gets so deep a person trapped in the cave will drown. Sea caves have been used forever as places to hide things. They are favored by pirates.

There are sea caves along the shore of the North Sea on Hypatia. Who would look for anything valuable in a galaxy where there is ftl space travel, artificial intelligence and teleportation devices? The Hypatia pirates do it.

Oops

I lost it. I had a plan for yesterday's blog entry, and then it went right out of my mind. I'm moving in less than 3 weeks, so lots of things are flying right out of my head. I guess writers are just as subject to stress as anyone else. I'll do my best to keep this blog up-to-date.

Rosetta

I'm not even sure if this is the correct spelling for the Rosetta Stone, but I have this idea that Rosetta, Rosetta Stone, or some other form can be used to describe the protection for Hypatia. It is spacebound, secret and stays hidden most of the time. Star will be approached to join. I think it will be a good fit for it, at least in the short-term.

Rant

Every blog needs a rant now and then so here's one for you today.

I was a fairly early adopter of podiobook listening at http://www.podiobooks.com/ There's a lot of sci fi on the site which I enjoy. (No surprise this.) I've listened to Lafferty, Lowell and Hutchins. I caught Sigler on his own feed. The Rookie made me laugh and was a good read. I'm not into horror so I pass by a lot. Only recently have I come to appreciate fantasy. I'm enjoying podcastle at http://www.podcastle.org/ and I've had Escapepod in my feed for a long time http://www.escapepod.org/

One of the things I've noticed is the incestuous character of science fiction podcasting. I think they like to think of it as networking. I interview you. You interview me. It's two podcasts. We get interviewed by a third person. That's three. Then we each interview the third person and that's two more podcasts. The bottom line though is there are only three people.

So Hutchins decides to have a big deal about short stories in his Seventh Son Universe and everybody's all excited. Don't get me wrong. I'll listen. I enjoyed the story. But come on. It's not that big a deal. It's a group of folks, mostly unpublished or published by very small presses, recording their stuff.

Writing for yourself, reading to small groups of people, it's been done forever and ever amen. This isn't news. There's just the Internet to spread the reading around. I think it's great, but it's not earthshaking. The campfire is just a little bigger and we don't have to worry about forest fires.

Am I sore because I'm not included, I'm not as good a writer yet?

I thought hard about this. At times, I am, but then at other times, most of the time, I am quite content to push on my own limitations and see where I go. I'm not so serious about all this.

You want to be a writer. Be a writer. Just don't keep going on and on about it. Write. Read. Publish. I'll listen if it's audio.

End of rant.

Azotus

The activities of Philip, a deacon in the early church, came up. He finds himself on a desert road in the middle of the day, running to talk to an Ethiopian eunoch. After the man is baptized in a pool beside the road, Philip is snatched away to Azotus and must walk home many miles. He preaches along the way. Philip's adventures are not recorded, but it is such a wonderful story because it challenges me so.

Can I run to catch up with the chariot?
Can I expound on a passage of Scripture such that my listener will ask to be baptized when water appears miraculously?
CAn I be so focused on my message that I can even share it when plunked down far from home with no physical means of support?

Philip certainly has networking skills to find food, shelter, protection and people to preach to.

Imagining myself into this kind of evangelism and commitment is my creative work for today.

Going Forward

The more I read and the more I think about it, I think I want to imagine a world very different from my own. I finished reading Mike Resnick's starship trilogy. I was amused to read that 3000 years from now people will be using paper and pens. Oh, there were some advances with computers, but basically everything stayed the same. Things will not stay the same. So writing about a time in a future requires my imagination and requires choices. I can't imagine it all. I have to choose what I imagine. My biggest challenge so far is imagining my main character. I need to go forward and imagine other characters, too.

If, for example, Old Kelly can communicate telepathically, it makes sense that she may not be able to speak or hear. Then again, she is old. Perhaps that is why she cannot hear. I need to think about this some more. What are Kellens really like and why was she in prison for so long anyway and does it matter to this story?

Pods

This has to be quick today. I started listening to On The Media. The first story focused on a style of internet cafe where each person has a separate space, comfortable chair and a variety of gaming and network options. Many choose to simply read a book. This configuration reminded me of Star's acceleration web. I want to revisit the story at http://www.onthemedia.org/ and review some of the reflections on solitude and relationships. I always think of solitude as retreat, as going out into nature, being physically removed. There was focus here about being immersed in plain sight. I think this has application to runners.

More On Pirates

I found this book just posted on librivox.org -- Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts by Frank R. Stockton. And when I finish reading STarship Mercinary and Rumpole and the Reign of Terror, I'll give it a listen.

The Inn in Her HEad

Today S. Told me about the inn in her head. She went there whenever she had time. Other people moved in and did things with the inn she didn't like. She closed the inn and opened a bed and breakfast in her head. More later about this.

Charles Dickens

Except for A Christmas Carol and the musical Oliver, I can't say for certain if I have ever read a Dickens novel. Curiously, Dickens' characters show up in novels I read: The Starship series by Mike Resnick which I am currently reading and the Thursday Next novels. Charles himself makes an appearance in the Autobiography of Santa Claus.

Besides beingin the public domain, I wonder what the attraction is. David Copperfield is such a well-drawn character in Resnick's books--an alien who stays in character and calls the protagonist Steerforth.

I don't know if I know any public domain character so well that I could pull such a thing off. Sherlock Holmes, of course, is the go to guy. I wonder who else could be pressed into service.

Status Updates

I've started to update my Facebook status regularly. I don't know how long the fascination will last. I mention this activity here because what I write needs to be said in a few words,, to the point and clever. It needs to be worth someone else's attention. Who cares if I need to empty the dishwasher or take the dog out?

The surprise for me is that I pause and consider. What is my status? How do I feel? What do I want people to know about? What do I need to say? It is an exercise in honesty and reflection--a creative moment.

More About Runners

I've been reading Starship Mutiny. There isn't much characterization and lots of plot. I like character development. One of the beings on the ship is a pilot, permanently wired into the ship's navigation. I wonder what thiese people, read inverted commas here as the British say, do when they are not wired into a spaceship. It did get me thinking about runners though.

Runners perform more tasks than just piloting. They are leaizons between other members of the crew and the ship's AI. Although other crew members can talk to the AI, runners interact more intimately and more immediately. They share consciousness.

Runners also have to perform a lot of other ship duties if they are the only crew on a smaller ship: they interface with maintenance, inspectors, space station personel, shippers, buyers, sellers. They may need to negotiate or make decisions for the shipping company or individual owner.

Star, being at the top of its class, was selected for government duty, especially military duty. This was a poor decision. The discipline and narrowness of the position frustrated STar and STar did not flourish. The Institute chose to make Star surplus rather than to try to retrain STar for a currier position. They couldn't imagine STar working for a shipping company after having been exposed to the technological wonders of a starship. Their lack of imagination almost cost STar its life, but STar had enough gumption to get the training it needed. It paid for the training by working for a company until the debt was paid. Then STar went out on its own, finding a backer and then going solo.

Dulce et Decorum Est

I don't know Latin so I had to track down what it meant. The second part of the quotation is part of Wilfred Own's poem by this name.. I could figure out Dulce means sweet and mori had to do with death. Decorum surprised me. I think of decorum as behaving properly, but it means honor. The whole quotation is Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. I was thinking father with patria, but it means country. Ah! Patriotic. And the Spanish word for country is pais. So the translation is: It is sweet and honorable to die for one's country.

Wilfred Own's poem is from World War I and recounts a gas atttack. I read it as part of librivox.org's http://www.librivox.org/ weekly poetry project. I haven't been reading of late but it is a small way I can contribute to reading. I am such a big consumer of the spoken word. The weekly poems are short enough to Braille and I feel competent to read. I'm hoping in my new environment to have better recording quality. This is a very noisy environment. Part of it is the clocks, fountain, refrigerator but the large windows which I enjoy so much don't help. Nor does the computer fan. Anyway, when I read the poem to myself I had to work through it as a reader. I had some problems recording, so I read it over and over again aloud. The Old Lie: Dulce et decorum est/Pro patria mori. How do you read an old lie? I spat out the words. Poetry has that affect on me--collapsing words to sharp points of emotion. I read some Scripture this way. I read Plath this way. I am writing this post all run together because of how the poem is written and what it says. If you had been there, you would not speak of glory.

World War I produced poetry like this. It was the first modern war. The gas, the mechanization, the devastation of whole regiments getting wiped out and the introduction of airplanes changed war from being very individualized to something very impersonal and depersonalizing.

Not that any war was ever sweet.

Some have said we don't write poems about war any more. We send emails, snap cell phone pictures and videos, and blog. How will that change things?

Confession Saturday

I don't know that every Saturday will be about what I have done and what I have left undone as far as my writing is concerned, but it occurs to me it may not be a bad idea. One of the things that is happening right now is that I am writing about writing rather than writing. As I am moving in a little more than a month, I don't feel really focused on my writing. I'm writing these background pieces as ideas come to me in the hope that I will be able to put them together at a future date. I did, however, want to own the lack of fiction here.

In addition, I want to say I have several works started but not finished:

I * Earlier Star Runner pieces
* Operatorion Solp, a fantasy novel
* The story here about Toby, the healer
* Third Cataract, of course

This is the list as I know it although there are probably other things, too, but they can be for another Saturday.

Sound

I continue to be surprised by the fruits of this blog. While I was updating facebook, search for me under Merrill Louise), I heard the sound of a tour bus idling on the street. I live above the Lucy museum. The buses aren't suppose to idle in the street but they often do.

This may sound strange, but I am a visual person. I would have been a photographer or videographer. Thinking in sound is an adaptation for me. I don't tend to write about sound, but the bus reminded me I can. Further, Star is a Pantheran and although Star maintains it is not a cat, Star does indeed exhibit many cat features. I've included hearing in them, the swiveling of ears, for example. If Star's vision is average to poor, especially where color is concerned and hearing is improved, sound landscapes would be of higher importance to Star. That works well for both of us.

Street Festival

There are several festivals along the streets where I currently live every year. From my perspective, they are inconvenient--strangers congregating on the sidewalks, loud music until late, traffic disrupted, stands and crowds hindering navigation. Yet street fairs provide color and options in a narrative. How can I use a street fair on Hypatia in the story? What could Star and Old Kelly see, do, imagine? How could it move the story along? I'll have to think about this because I know a little about these and the only saying is: write what you know. Perhaps it is simply a background for conversation. Has Star ever been to a street fair? Would something like this ever take place on a space station? I would think the answer is yes, but space is so limited. Where would such an event take place?

African Railway

I'm not sure what the difference between a railroad and a railway is. I've been reading Ann Perry's new Charlotte and Thomas Pitt mystery set in late Victorian England. The mystery revolves around folks who want to build a transAfrican railway from Cape Town to Cairo. I wondered if this south-north railroad was ever built. It turns out most of it was, backed by Cecil Rhodes. The wikipedia article did not say who raised the money, engineered and supervised it. Much of it still operates though are gaps, most notably in the Sudan. The Sudan has been lawless country for a good while.

This got me thinking--how writers can delve into a historical setting and pull out some most interesting items. I had never thought about a railroad and African though I know about the AMerican coast-to-coast railroad and how they met in the middle, well, how they almost didn't meet in the middle and the golden spike. No golden spike here.

One of the thing Perry talks about about is British sensibility--about one's rightful place of ruling the seas and by implication having control over a great deal of the planet. I'm guessing this is fairly accurate. It's something Americans deal with today. I once heard it said: The sun never sets on the British Empire; God doesn't trust them. I wonder what will be said of us.

Flowers in the Sky

Today I bought a jacket. It has a scene of a town all around the hem. There are flowers in the sky. I'm wondering what sort of a place would have flowers in the sky. Are they clouds? Does this place also have clouds? Perhaps when there is rain, there are clouds and when it is sunny there are flowers. Or do the flowers produce rain? Do their pedals drop? And If so, are they just detritis on the ground or does something happen, like a new plant grows or is that just when the seeds drop? What about polen? There is so much to think about here, so much on which to build. Then again, maybe just one says, "There are flowers of all colors in the sky," and then leave it at that and go on in this fanciful world.

North Sea

Although I am moving to the Midwest, I find the sound of the ocean compelling. I don't think there is another sound like it. If I were rich enough, I would live where I could hear the sea all the time. Instead, I continue to move farther away from it for practical reasons.

Star has never been near the sea. As I have conceived this story, Star will go up the Nile to the third cataract, just like all the travelers to Egypt in the 19th century did. But I am hoping the story will bring Star downstream to the sea. Although I will mix up Earth geography, I want this river to flow to the North Sea. I will make it as gray and inigmatic as writers have described the sea off of the ENglish coast. I want Star to confront water with no discernable end. I remember when my dog confront the Atlantic Ocean. It shocked her. She could not see a way around it.

No One, Anyone, Someone

I enjoy listening to Start of the Week, a podcast from BBC Radio 4 at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4. This week there was a woman who has written about identity and how computers affect our identity. We can be no one, just responding to the screen; we can anyone, one of us interchangeable with another; we can be someone, an individual. She also spoke about silicon in the brain and how the brain is able to interface with nano technology. I can't do it now, but it seems a direction to go in when thinking about Star. At some level, Star is not a no one, just a response. Star is more intended to be an anyone, one runner easily substituted for another. As I imagine Star's education, it is clear that this is not entirely true. Its teachers recognized the individuality of all the androgynes, yet there was the programand each runner must complete it. Star was, forgive the pun, a star pupil. What Star experiences now, after having been declared surplus and going out on its own, is becoming someone. Star did that in its own context of both runner and member of The Race. Now Star needs to develop an identity which is all its own without its lifelong touchstones. Being human, in name only, will not be enough.

Old Kelly can help here. She is a Kellen, a race I know nothing about. She has been imprisoned for a very, very long time, so long no one remembers why. Yet Old Kelly has retained her sanity and her identity. She has much to teach Star. What I have to figure out is what Star does for her.

On Runners

I've been really focused on other things today so I haven't given Third Cataract or any other creative project much thought. ONe of the good things about blogging daily here is making myself think about it. And when I do, something comes to me. It isn't exactly writing, but I'm still working on the story line.

Star is an evolving character. I've written about it, and when I do, I learn more about it.

Today I realized I've always thought of Star as an individual. That's because I'm human. Star is a mammal just like me. Star has feelings, thoughts, aspirations and the like just like me. However, Star is a designed being who had, until it was virtually terminated, simply an identification number. Star was okay with this. Captain STar Runner became its name because humans needed something to call Star, to address STar, to talk about Star. A number wouldn't do it. Star thought the idea a little silly, but over time, Star became attached to its identity. Perhaps even having such an identity prompted STar to act in the ways Star did.

In reality, though, is Star an organic computer? Its function is to interface with a shipboard AI, another computer. Star's body needs to be regulated, its mind taken care of the way a computer is taken care of. I suppose that means STar is vulnerable to viruses and spyware. That's another story line. However, is one of the changes in STar becoming human means is becoming more of an individual rather than a robot?

I got here because I asked myself what sort of media is consumed on Hypatia: entertainment and news. What sort of news is there? What kind of entertainment is there? How are the people visiting Hypatia and living and working on Hypatia connected to their part of the galaxy? Do they have iPods and watch the nightly news? Are there newspapers, politics, sports?

When I"ve placed Star in its ship out in deep space, I didn't have to think about these things, but now it seems a good idea to at least think about such things even if they don't make it into the story.

Pirates

I've been turning it over in my mind... Are the pirates still on Hypatia? Although Star fancies itself to be a pirate, Star is not a thief. Star does not threaten or hurt anybody. Star is nervvy and takes risks, often putting itself in personal danger to succeed at its goals. Therefore, piracy as a way of life would be antithetical to Star's character and past performance. Despite what has happened to Star, it would not turn and prey upon its former race. So the pirates of Hypatia, if they still exist, need to be something other than out and out pirates. They could either be in some kind of speculation or they transport risky cargos. Given STar's current vessel, a very fancy yacht, Star could not be useful carrying large loads. But Star could easily carry messages, data or gems.

Suppose there is a find on Hypatia of gems of some kind or naturally occurring material that is scientifically/industrially significant, like a substance harder than diamonds or something useful in computer technology. I am out of my depth here as to what sort a something that might be in a far-in-the-future technology, but something like that. Perhaps even something that could revolutionize ship navigation which would change how runners operate their ships. There could be a Fungusian connection here. The Fungusians have no love for the Pantheran Empire. Sending STar to Hypatia doesn't have to be altruistic on their part. It doesn't have to be cynaster toward Star either. Pirate in this sense may mean less about theft and force and more about taking away the Pantheran hierarchy of androgyne design. After all, Pantheran society has been shaped and reshaped by a fuchsia-colored Pantheran.

Back Story of the Planet

I haven't pondered much today about Third Cataract except to think "What am I going to blog about today?:

I'm stilll mulling over Crime Wave and all the shops on the pirate ship. I guess we would call it a mall of sorts.

One of the questions I asked myself is why would there be a pirate ship on Hypatia in the first place, real or imagined? I mean, why not Cleopatra's barge? The book store could have been called the Asp.

That got me thinking about pirates. Star is, or was, a pirate of sorts. At least, Star enjoyed thinking of itself as a pirate. Tamara lived aboard Pirate's Cove, the space station for Treasure Island which encircles the star Long John Silver. Humankind loves to romanticize pirates. Just think of the Pirates of the Carribbean movies and the ride at Dizney World.

Suppose Hypatia was the supposed haunt of pirates in the past. Nothing conclusive, mind you. Just rumors. And, to unabashedly pick up a common theme, suppose there are rumors about buried treasure. Why not? Putting your loot, whatever it might be, on a planet with a toxic atmosphere sounds like a plan, right?

So suppose teleport man thinks it would be cool to get up an expedition to find the buried treasure while seeing all the fake pirate stuff on the pirate ship mall. Any sane person would make fun of the shameless commercialism of the place.

Star is interested in the treasure hunt, curious about the human love of mysteries, mystery stories and pirate lore. Old Kelly is interested in teleport man. There will be some kind of writer, a media person, too. I've been thinking a lot about what sort of media is around. There will be some adventurers, some bored people, some scientists and an artist or two. I can't think who else should be along. Maybe a real pirate?

Crime Wave

I have read some of Carolyn G. Hart's "Death on Demand" mysteries. Their relevance here in this blog is a mystery book store. These exist in real life. I have learned that Madison, where I am moving, has a mystery book store called "Booked for Murder". I am looking forward to checking this one out. Perhaps some mystery writers will turn up there for readings.

What sort of a mystery book store would there be on Hypatia? It culd be retro, of course, really having paper books. That's one thought. Another could be some sort of virtual experience for the hip people who come there. But I'm reaching for something else.

Here's what I know so far: The place has a name. I'm very excited about this. Names have always been hard for me. I don't have that clever streak, or at least, I never let it out. But I did think of a name: Crime Wave. It's a pirate ship anchored in the Nile-like river on Hypatia. In fact, it's called the Nile. I'm wondering if it should be called the Red Nile since everything on Hypatia seems to be red like all the old stories about Mars.

When I think of a Pirate ship I think of the one in Dizney Land comlete with parrot and restaurant as it was when I went there in 1957. It's changed since then.

Such a structure would allow for a parrot and a restaurant. Star likes restaurants and that would entice it inside. I'm not at all certain a nystery bookshop would unless, of course, Old Kelly has a hankering to check it out and drags Star along. I'll have to think about that because they both need to be there.

It is aboard the Crime Wave, having something to do with fictional mysteries, that STar and Old Kelly come to go to the Third Cataract. I'll have to ponder some more to see how this all comes together.

Of course! Star thinks of itself as a pirate and so would want to tour a "real" pirate ship. That is when some folks tell STar there are real pirates on the Red Nile. STar wants to meet them and a plan to go up the Red Nile is hatched.

There's a lot of work to be done here since the group that goes up the Red Nile will be the characters I have to work with for most of the novel unless they encounter another group or aliens who can survive the hostile, read deadly, conditions on Hypatia.

Well, this post is hardly a gem of writing but the exercise has been worthwhile.

A Technical Note From Star

As I understand human concepts, I don't see the same way humans do. This is not so much a mechanical thing as it is a way of doing things. My eyes serve me well enough. I can navigate independently. I can see colors--unusual I know because many of the animals on the human home world cannot see colors. However, I do not consciously recognize a great deal of what I see. I leave that for the AI. My eyes are most importantly cameras. I take footage of the scenes around me and leave it up to Ship to analize this information and bring to my conscious mind necessary images and data. I still only have rudimentary subroutines for appreciating beauty, for example. It is a very hard concept to understand. I see the red cliffs from the hotel terrace. I can measure them. I can begin to analize their composition and the difficulty of climbing them. I can see nothing grows on them. However, I have heard humans exclaim about their alienness, their ruggedness, their awesomeness and even their stark beauty, but I don't know how to see this in the rock formations. Humans might characterize this as lacking imagination. I have an imagination. I just can't see what they see.

My brain is very different from a human mind. It's not about the physical construction of my mind per se. It's about how I use my mind. I was designed to be a runner. I still think of myself as a runner though, admittedly, I am striving to conceive of myself differently. As a runner, I am designed to interface with a shipboard artificial intelligence. With a good AI, it is hard to know where the runner ends and the Ship begins. It is a partnership. Ship is my friend, my confident and my caretaker. I would die without Ship. A subset of Ship's functions is in a band I wear on my forearm when I am farther away from the ship than a space station. I am wearing it now. Ship is currently within signal range so the band acts as a booster. I have full access to my AI so the visual footage I am recording is being analized in real time.

This relationship I have with my ship's AI feels very comfortable to me. It is, of course, a vulnerability. As part of the virtual termination agreement, I had to agree to a data whipe. This was not virtual but quite real. The whipe was performed on me personally. The Northern STar's AI was destroyed. I could move. I could talk, but I had no long-term memory. My short term memory was unreliable.

I left Tamara, Penny and Captain Gillian Romeres Lujo with very specific instructions. I I did have time for that thankfully. They carried them out. Tamara brought me back to Pirate's Cove aboard the space yacht DAncing on Water.

By the way, I think this is a very peculiar name for a space yacht, but both Tamara and Penny think it is a beautiful name. I do not understand why. They cannot, or will not, explain it to me. I don't see what space has to do with water.

Anyway, when Tamara and I arrived, FunjiMan met us there. FunjiMan is a convenient moniker for any male of the Fungusian Collective. Captain Gillian Romeres Lujo had contacted the Collective. Penny had arranged financial renumeration. It was costly, but FunjiMan installed a new AI in Dancing on Water, restored my latest backup and supervised my first interface. It took nearly a week for all the pathway and connections to be made. While this was underway, Ship cared for me in my acceleration web. TAmara fretted. Penny and Captain Gillian Romeres Lujo waited for word. FunjiMan stayed telepathically connected.

I'm still getting to know my new AI. I have all the old memories of working with Ship, but this feels very different. I have finally decided the difference is the Fungusian craftsmanship. I think the appropriate word here is flavor. I think in a slightly different way. Is the word wholistically. It's the way a Fungusian colony would exist together, linked but also separate. That is the way Ship and I are now. It is frankly superior. It is an enhancement I like. It's just feels different and I have surprises from time to time. Ship will give me an idea which an AI ought not to have.

Anyway, it was the Fungusians who suggested I get far from Coalition space, even farther out than the Northern Frontier, and visit Hypatia.

"There is much opportunity there," FunjiMan had told me. "Just be careful. There is also much danger there. You have lived a dangerous life. You have dealt with unscrupulous people with unclear motives. Be aware you will meet many like that on Hypatia. You will also meet people who can open doors for you if they want to. You need to build a new life and not be so closely aligned with the Coalition's political and military enemies. We can continue to provide you with database support. We cannot do more for you."

What they had done was already more than any runner had a right to receive. I had a new lease on life. Runners didn't get chances like this. I just hoped I didn't blow it.

Writing Descriptive Passages

I'm writing these blog entries because I want to write better. I no longer dream of being a "professional" writer, that is, a person who gets paid a great deal of money to write books, a person who is on TV and gets to hang out with all sorts of rich and famous people because she herself is rich and famous. After all, Jessica Fletcher already has that covered and she's fictional. Add to my description having cool friends and living in a cool place and doing whatever it is I want to do when I want to do it.

I have trouble with descriptions. I've been living with other people's visual descriptions for so long I don't know what is valid and what is cliché or simply untrue. Do muscles ripple? Can looks convey complicated meaning that takes two or three sentences to explain? What sort of gestures convey meaning as in "I moved my hands to indicate I had no money so that my companion would pay our check whithout drawing attention to my financial embarrassment." What sort of a gesture can do all that? But that is the sort of thing I read about in books as well as long passages about scenery, furniture, clothing, tableware.

This being the case, I agonize over Star's descriptions of things. I've relied on Star not understanding a variety of human behavior and customs. This has helped. Star also lacks tact and subtlety.

Of late, I am wondering if Star can see in the same way humans can. Star can see color, but maybe not distinguish all the varying shades. Perhaps Star's vision is more like a camera. Star needs Ship to interpret what it sees and feed the information back to Star. In that way, Star can report the basic facts, receive needed information when necessary and the reader can use his or her imagination to fill in details.

I also have noticed that writers today describe more than they used to. In older writings, there isn't this propensity for long descriptive passages. This is even true in Sherlock Holmes adventures or a Mark Twain short story. There may be a line of carriages, but the kind of carriages, the number of horses, the dress of the coachmen are not detailed. It's a carriage. It will have the right number of horses and the coachman will be wearing whatever coachmen typically wear.

I've decided to focus more on what Star hears and to think carefully about what Star might smell or feel. I'm not particularly good at this either, but at least I have the resources to explore farther in this area.

Writing About Myself

Nat Hartshorne told me to write about myself. When I was fourteen, my life certainly seemed dull and boring, not anything to write about. I still think my life is fairly dull and boring, but today I wrote about myself and my Seeing Eye dog, Elwood. I spent some time on this post so I could say I took Mr. Hartshorne advice. It must have made an impression on me because I still can hear him say, "I write about myself." You can read Where the Sidewalk Ends as my nonfiction writing for today.

The Healer 1

The Healer

Since he was six years old, Toby knew he was a healer. He hadn't known that word, of course. He explained it to himself and to his family, classmates and teachers as "fixing things". Early on, he learned that certain plants, animals and people could be fixed with positive results while other "fixes" prvoked adults to fits of anger. Grown-ups wanted certain things broken. They expected them to be broken. They wanted certain things to die. If Toby said he had fixed them, they sometimes did not believe him and punished him for lying. he wasn't lying. he had fixed them.

Toby hit upon a strategy of small fixes. These might even be unnoticeable to the person he healed. A sniffle did not blossom into a cold. A sore ankle stopped hurting.

Toby wanted to do more miraculous healings, to let his gift fully develop, to be a help to people.

Third Cataract 2

Chapter 2

I paused in the doorway leading out onto the Terrace. The desk clerk who checked me into Shepheard's Hotel and the interactive information guide in my suite invited me to mingle here with the other guests before meals. My accommodations included breakfast and dinner sittings. The documentation referred to this level of orderliness as "old earth charm". These were the beings I would be spending a considerable amount of time with while I sorted things out for myself far from Coalition shipping lanes, far from the Mother's World, far from, I hoped, anyone who could endanger me.

I felt a restriction around my heart when I remembered Mother's World. Then I shook myself, dismissing the thought. Ship placed this thought in the trash. I was born in space on one of the Institute's orbiting satellites. My kind had never been welcome on Panthera. androgynes were the Coalition's work force and not entitled, except for a few carefully designed service lines, to step foot on Mother's World. As a runner, the purpose of my life and work focused on space. Until recently, I never imagined I would go planet side for any reason.

Now here I stood upright on my hind legs, looking beyond the railing, perceiving but not analyzing the vast exotic garden at ground level, seeing the red rocks at the base of the dome, taking in the ruggedness of the red cliffs in front of me. I am no expert on landscapes, however, the one I saw beyond the dome could only be described as both barren and hostile. None of the beings on the Terrace, including me, could survive out there without special equipment.

I blinked. Hadn't there been a red-shirted person in front of me? A shout went up from those closest to the railing. Had he gone over? Then he was standing there again, triumphant, laughing, very pleased with himself.
"A PTD," the woman, no higher than my elbow, said dismissively.
PDT?" If I had to ask aloud, Ship didn't have this information.
personal Teleporting Device."
Now information flooded my mind. Illegal in the Coalition. Developed on the Southern Frontier. Very, very expensive. And here this joker was using it to appear to jump off a thirty-story building.
"Of Kellen design," the woman said, as if reading my thoughts. Could she read my thoughts?
Ship put the profile together. The woman next to me was a Kellen. I had never met one before. They did not travel from their home world. Well, that was silly to think. She was here now.
pixy? A fairy? A witch? I wasn't sure of all the nuances. Tamara was up on all those things. Not young. Old then?
"I'm called Old Kelly," the woman said. "I prefer pixy though many think of me as a witch."

You can read my thoughts," I said matter-of-factly. No reason to get angry. Her thought-reading was as natural to her as sniffing was to me. Her smell was unique. I could not keep from noticing.
Yes, but it does not offend you," Old Kelly said in my mind.

This is better," I said.

You don't mind me in here, do you?"""

"I know where you are," I said. "I hope you'll open to me. I'm not telepathic, but I can travel your neuro-pathways to some extent."
The information exchange was quick.

Old Kelly was here to find out where the personal teleportation devices came from. None were missing on Kellen.

I knew and she knew I knew this wasn't the whole story, but it was enough for now.

The gong sounded at the dining room entrance. We began moving toward the door.

Credit where credit is due:
Old Kelly: Day 19
Personal Teleporting: Day 14
These are ideas from Mur Lafferty's News From Poughkeepsie

Star's Universe

I've never sat down and written a description of the Star Runner universe so I thought I might do that here while some other thoughts percolate.

The local governmental authority is the Coalition. I say "local" by which I mean in the galactic sense. Planets or worlds or groups of planets or worlds belong to the Coalition and in exchange get military protection and trade preferences. In theory each planet or world has equal rank with every other in decision-making for the good of the whole. However, the reality is quite different.

Before the Coalition the Pantheran Empire ruled a large swath of space. (I can't tell you which part because I can't read star maps and select the correct area.) Pantherans are highly evolved mammals who structure their society around gendered Pantherans while creating androgynous offspring who have been genetically altered and enhanced to perform specific functions in their society, usually the most risky or highly specialized functions. Military troops, for example, are androgynes. Androgynes do not have full rights as individuals. They are terminated when they perform below par.

Star is an androgyne. Its role in Pantheran society is to be a runner, an individual who runs spaceships. We would call its position a helmsperson or a pilot but the role is more complex. Star's brain is designed to interface with the artificial intelligence of Pantheran spacecraft. In practice this means that Star's mind and the Ship's memory are in constant dialog. Although Star is an individual, much of Star's memory is stored in the Ship's memory. What Star remembers or thinks is often an extension of data stored in the ship's memory.

Star's mental, emotional and physical health is monitored closely by the Ship's intelligence. Star has difficulty regulating its own bodily processes because it spends a lot of time wired into the Ship, being awake for extended periods of time. Its well-being is both dependent on the Ship and critical for a spaceship to operate at peak efficiency and speed. The geneticists who enhanced the runner profile sacrificed Star's autonomy of function in this area to assist with the interface. Star's own body accepts the interface willingly.

The Pantheran Empire has been in decline for some time. The Coalition is the Pantheran subterfuge to maintain a great deal of control while limiting its need for conquest and subjugation of new species.

Beyond the reach of the Coalition is the Northern and Southern Frontiers. The northern frontier is occupied mostly by humans. There are loose alliances like the Consortium and more structured ones like Queensland and the Republic of Space. There are also independents which have gathered together to form FRONT, the Free Residents of the Northern Territories.

Star supplied illegal and restricted munitions to all these groups and participated in a daring raid on the Coalition border patrol. As a result, Star was declared a traitor to the state.

Formerly, Star was placed on the Coalition's termination list. Star is too independent-minded to operate well under Pantheran supervision. Androgynes who are placed on the termination list can elect to be terminated or to find their own way in society, outside of the cradle-to-grave security net. This is often a demoralizing and marginalized existence. Star chose to go to the Northern Frontier and become a gunrunner.

later, Star became involved in a situation (I haven't worked out all the details of this) in which Star could not avoid being terminated. Star's friends convinced the Pantheran authorities not to terminate Star. In return, Star was struck from the Pantheran rolls. In effect, Star was virtually terminated without losing its life. Since Star was officially no longer a Pantheran, Star's human friends declared it to be human. hence Star is physically a Pantheran but is classified human with human documentation. Star's identity, for example, is no longer a long string of Pantheran numbers, identifying its birth litter, but its legal name is Star Runner, a convenient human moniker Star adopted on the Northern Frontier.

Star has come to Hypatia to sort things out in its own mind and to be as far as it can from the Coalition in case anyone wants to terminate Star physically. This destination was suggested to Star by the Fungusians, an unaligned old race of mushroom-like beings who communicate telepathically.

Notes to Readers of This Blog

on-the-go posts may have some spelling and typing errors. There's no spell checker and the idea is to be quick. Sometimes caps lock gets turned on and I don't notice so the capitalization and the punctuation, too, can look a little strange in some of my posts. Think more about how it sounds than how it looks and you'll be in my world.

Shepheard's Hotel

I started reading A Thousand Miles Up the Nile by Amelia B. Edwards available from librivox.org Sibella Denton does such a great job reading. Edwards' description of Shepherd's Hotel in Cairo is captivating. I thought it might be a great departure point for thinking about a group of tourists which Star encounters on Hypatia. The text of Edwards' book is available here

Here are invalids in search of health ; artists in search of subjects ; sportsmen keen upon crocodiles ; statesman out for a holiday ; special correspondents alert for gossip ; collectors on the scent of papyri and mummies ; men of science with only scientific ends in view ; and the usual surplus of idlers who travel for the mere love of travel, or the satisfaction of a purposeless curiousity.

(Isn't the public domain great?)

As it turns out, Star falls into this last group though Star considers itself neither rich nor an idler. Star falls into another category--someone who is lying low for the time being, staying away from familiar haunts, waiting for a period of time to pass so that its memory fades from the minds of others.

Hypatia is beyond Coalition influence. Being so far "out" Star initially thinks only the rich will be present. However, Star learns that Hypatia has a seamier side. Star is relieved. Star is a smuggler by trade, specializing in gunrunning. The opportunity to continue supplying arms on the Northern Frontier appeared to be closed to Star. However, on Hypatia Star has an opportunity to forge new alliances and begin its career over again.

Star expects business transactions to be straight forward. However, Star has begun to learn that humans can be devious and not everyone and everything is what it appears to be on the face of things.

Scientists would be on Hypatia. I am no good at science so even being somewhat vague about what they are doing there may be tough. nevertheless, I need a scientific party to travel the river, intent on studying something or other. perhaps geology would work here. I need the scientists because they are one reason there is so much technology available.

I need some business people. Star will be drawn into their plan.

An invalid or two will add some additional characters.

And the purposeless idlers. I like them the best. Star will try posing as one of these to hide its background and difficulties.

I'm also planning to read Churchill's River War This has already helped me with the Nile look-alike on Hypatia.

Creative Energy

Wow! I "won" last November participating in nanowrimo http://www.nanowrimo.org/ OI thinkP but having something creative on-line on a daily basis is already challenging. I started the Time Weaver story some time ago and realized it needed more editing. It was so tedious I set it aside. Needing something to post, I went back to it last night after a full day of just running around. I'm still not sure it's finished, but I decided it was as done as I could make it. I think I worked in a number of stronger verbs. Tense is a big issue in this piece. I envisioned it as a podcast. I even have the music on my laptop. I didn't have a working Braille printer to get hard copy to read and I knew the mixing would take me into the wee hours of the morning so I posted it as text. I want to explore the words with the music so it will be here soon.

Time Weaver

THE TIME WEAVER

The time weaver watched from the pasture's edge as the young poet WALK TOWARD HER.

"I'm standing here in the woods like one of the narnia children," the time weaver thought once again. "A moment ago I was at the Time Conservatory. Now I am here. What is now will be the past. It will be my past, five hundred, twenty-seven years, three months and four days before I was born."

The time weaver had passed through the permeable membrane between now and then to create a defense against time, preventing this young poet from dying later this afternoon.

The time weaver's intervention was not permanent. Protected from the accident, the young poet would live and write more poems. There were only six extant. The time weaver read them to prepare herself to design the pod. The poems evoked feelings in the time weaver she preferred to keep buried deep within herself. It was better if she worked dispassionately, not attached to her subject in any way. Time weavers both gave their subjects an opportunity to live and then took it away. The time river permitted some modifications for a little while, but always resumed its shape. If the time weaver was not precise in her work, the reasserting eddies of time would damage many. The time weaver herself could be washed away, lost forever in some whirlpool or dashed to pieces by cataract. A well-woven pod withstood the pressure for the young poet's lifetime, but no more. At some future time, future time for the now older poet, the time weaver would spread her hands and break the woven pod. Time would resume its original shape. The young poet would again die young; however, the time weaver's time and all times afterwards, would have the poems written while the young poet lived beyond her time.

The young poet was unaware of the time weaver's presence. The summer foliage of the trees that hugged the pasture's edge obscured the time weaver from view. As the young poet drew nearer the time weaver flexed her fingers, her hands measuring the shape of the young poet's body in the air, deftly exploring her time aura. She touched the young poet's hair, feeling even at this distance its thickness and length as it spilled down across her slender shoulders and down her narrow back to first waist then slim hip and finally flat buttock. The time weaver traced the shape of the young poet's profile, the bones of her jaw, the angle of her chin, the delicateness of her throat. She massaged shoulders, cupped small hard breasts in her fingers, brushed erect nipples, caressed belly, thighs, ankles and then touched toes. The time weaver smiled, surreptitiously lingering between the young poet's legs. How many had she fondled in this way over the years? No wonder the time purists called her craft wicked. Her breath caught. She herself became wet, feeling the power of the young poet's sexual energy. Reluctantly. She withdrew her hand. Still aroused, more aroused than she cared to admit, she hurriedly composed herself to weave the pod

The time weaver must know the stature of this young poet to weave the pod to encapsulate the poet, protecting her from the accident that ended her life later this afternoon. The time weaver knew nothing of this accident, what it would be, how it would occur. Her director had given her only the file indicating when and where to intercept the young poet. Now she waited for the young poet to take just one more step before she began to weave.

The time weaver's art created no paradoxes. The pod allowed the occupant to interact normally, to love, to partner, to procreate, and to create without disturbing the time line. Those outside the pod were shielded from the reality inside the pod. When the time weaver tugged at the chords that bound her weaving together, the poet's life would unravel. What had occurred would only be wisps of regret, daydreams of what might have been.

It was time. The time weaver's hands moved, tracing in air the pod, its intricate lattice encircling the young poet's being. Again the time weaver felt the power of the young poet's sexuality .

And then something happened which had never happened before in all the history of time weaving. The young poet saw through the leaves the lead hand of the time weaver as she tied off the ends of the pod, securing it, protecting the young poet from real time. In that time of perception, the young poet saw her life as it really was and perceived the intent behind the time weaver's actions. And being a poet, she also perceived, though not clearly, the time weaver herself: her craft, her love of beautiful things, her deep loneliness, her desire for both solitude and companionship, her sexual desire and her attraction to the young poet. And while the pod was not yet closed completely, something passed between them.

Later the poet wrote many poems declaring her love for the almost unseen woman in the forest. These were passionate poems, filled with longing and desire, with dreams of union, of flight and pursuit, of exquisite physical consummation and a fulfilled soul. Future generations would keep her memory alive, savoring these poems of unrequited love, endlessly speculating on the identity of the not quite seen woman in the woods.

As for the time weaver, the young poet's love burned into her flesh, crippling her hands. She could no longer weave a sound pod. But only the time weaver who wove the pod could unweave it. So when it came time to unweave the poet's pod, the time weaver began, her nerve-damaged fingers struggling to untie the knots she had made. She worked slowly, partly because of her hands and partly because she was out of practice working with pods. The pod began to open. Slowly, slowly, the time weaver struggled to undo her weaving. She had been the most gifted of all the time weavers. When the pod had opened a mere hand's breadth, the poet, now old, her own hands bent with arthritis, again saw the time weaver's hand amid the leaves. The old poet reached out her own hand and grasped the time weaver's hand, not to stop her, but to pull her into the pod: first the fingers, then the hand and the wrist. Again the time weaver felt the fire. It moved up her arm. Unlike the first time, that other time, the time weaver welcomed the fire. She widened the opening into the pod, plunging her shoulder into the all-consuming fire. The poet pulled her into the fire, their heat burning the time weaver's face, her hair, her shoulder, and her breasts. As the fire spread further down her body, the time weaver became aware the poet held her in her arms, pressing her against the poet's own body as the pod collapsed around them.

When the final strand of the pod unraveled poet and time weaver were finally joined, setting the forest at the edge of the pasture aflame.

Third Cataract 1A

Chapter 1

Dressed in boots, blue jeans and a red flannel shirt, a Stetson turned upside down at her feet. Gold and silver coins glittering from its interior, The fiddler played a lively tune while standing in an open area on the space station's Grand Concourse. .

It took a noticeable measure of time for my onboard AI to correlate the sound with its memory banks and relay its correct identification to my brain. , I could hear the sounds of metal on metal as appreciative passers-by silently swiped their fingers across her debit machine.

"Quaint touch," I thought.

All of this was designed to give the visitors to Hypatia the illusion of stepping back in time to an Earth which never existed in history. I marveled that an American western frontier icon could coexist with the Egyptian-themed space station and planet side resort. Oh well. Humans did not augment themselves with AI's. They were not as apt to fret about esthetic inconsistencies.

Humans. Yes, I was one of them now despite my Pantheran DNA and appearance. I took a deep breath and started across the Grand Concourse, uneasy with my new status as rich tourist bound for an alien world. I would have been more comfortable docking at the cargo port and coming aboard through narrow unadorned corridors rather than this elaborate and ostentatious display of open and unused space.

Rationale

Why do this blog/podcast every day? And fear not, there will be podcast episodes)

I've been listening to Mur Lafferty's "News From Poukeepsie" on her blog at http://www.murverse.com/ I also heard her interview of Jared Axelrod from http://www.freeplanetx.com/ It's about being creative every day, writing every day, having ideas every day. So I decided, despite all the craziness in my life right now, to update this space every day with something, written or spoken.

It takes Jarad 3 hours every day to produce a podcast. I'm not sure I can devote that kind of time at this point but it is something to aspire to. Or is that to which to aspire. Sounds forced to me.

Blog Title

This blog's title is a real departure for me. I stick to the straight and narrow and usually my names are pedestrian, predictable and entirely boring. The 365 is obvious--there are 365 days in a year and typically these sorts of efforts run for a year. I don't know why. I was also influenced by J. R. Blackwell's 365 Tomorrows HTTP://WWW.365TOMORROWS.COM/.

Daze is my first departure. Obviously, days is what is intended, but daze with a z is more descriptive of my usual state of mind, especially when contemplating the creative process or even trying to write. I live in a fog most of the time. I talk about being distracted or being unfocused. It's just my normal daze and disconnect from the world around me. I live most days under a rock of my own creation.

2 is a nod to the text messaging world. It also balances 365. Unlike a lot of people my age, I celebrate the breakdown of spelling and expression. I'm sure people said the same thing about script letters versus HIEROGLYPHS. What is this generation coming to? I understand teachers are having a fit with text messaging symbols turning up in students' work in the classroom. Why? As a Braille reader, I've been dealing with these sorts of symbols for years. LOL is laugh out loud? Of course. GD is good in my reading and K is knowledge. What could be more simple.

Somewhere is not over the rainbow specifically, but it stands for the open-endedness of this journey, this project, its goals and outcomes. In a year's time I will be physically in a new place, livingin a new city, a new apartment, attending a new church, making new friends and spending my time in new activities. I can't imagine where I will be physically, spiritually or creatively in a year's time but I will be somewhere. You will be somewhere, too.

Spelling

I use speech on my computer and my mobile phone. Sometimes it is hard to tell what is being said. I can request that the word is spelled using the military or computer system of charlie, delta, echo, etc. I left it on for fun so when I check now, I get all those crazy words like lima, oscar and uniform. This goes with my blog name which I left as it was generated so that I could use it as a creative nudge.

What is a sox bus anyway?

Can a character be named Soxbus or Sox Bus?

In the coming days, we shall see.

A New Adventure

Welcome to my new on-line adventure. Some of these entries will be blog posts while others will be podcasts. To keep my creative juices going, this will be a daily venture. Join me for the ride.