Category Archives: Uncategorised

Here is this week’s list of blog posts and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Spurious Correlations. This was too funny. My favourite chart was the one that connected the divorce rate in Maine to the per capita consumption of margarine.

From My Granddad, the Mass Murderer via Johnny_Spacey:

My Granddad smoked a pipe, a habit which I now share and, some nights, when I’m sat in a pungent cloud of Condor original I close my eyes and remember him. I was nine years old when he died, too young to have enough nice memories, but then however long he’d lived, for his Grandson, it wouldn’t have been long enough.

Why Being Polite Isn’t Always the Best Path via ShelbyBerzley. At first I was prepared to completely disagree with this blogger. It drives me up the wall when people are rude and nasty to strangers…but this wasn’t what she was arguing for at all. Go check out her post to see what she was really saying. I ended up loving it!

You Don’t Like Me and That’s Okay via KW_Writes. I absolutely loved this post. I also suspect that I’d like the author of it quite a bit if we ever met. Ha!

This is Your Brain on Nature. What a fascinating article. I love city life, but I have to admit that there’s something nice about being surrounded by nature sometimes.

From Born In Between:

While many of the other kids on the site had visible health problems, Pam was unclear what this baby’s special needs could be. “Here was just this perfect little girl,” Pam said recently.

When she called the South Carolina Department of Social Services to find out more, she learned that M.C. was born with a rare condition that produced a patchwork of male and female anatomy.

What have you been reading?

We only have three days left until it airs. I’ve purposefully avoided spoilers for this show, so this post is safe to read if you’re also looking forward to being surprised by it. Everything I’m about to say is pure speculation.

Part of me is really excited for this spinoff. One of the things that is missing on The Walking Dead is an understanding of how the zombiepocalypse started as well as how things became chaotic so quickly.

You’d think that more people would have figured out how the disease is spread and how to contain the walkers early on, though. Yes, a herd of them is incredibly dangerous, but you can easily outrun or restrain a handful of them. They’re not intelligent like vampires or unusually strong like werewolves.

It’s one thing for a malnourished, exhausted character on The Walking Dead to be surprised by yet another herd. It’s quite another for someone who isn’t traumatized, still has a safe place to sleep at night and has food in their cupboards to deal with just one of these creatures.

I’m very curious to see how it all plays out. I know so little about the new cast of characters that it’s hard to imagine what the writers will do to put a world that is still (mostly?) ruled by humans in genuine jeopardy.

Will the characters be written as people who don’t have any street smarts whatsoever? This happens so often in the horror genre that I’m both expecting it and dreading it. Just once I’d love to meet a cast that has realistic reactions to unexpected events.

I certainly don’t rush to investigate spooky sounds at night or jump into the middle of a situation that I haven’t figured out yet. There’s a difference between helping someone else and putting yourself in danger before you even know what’s going on.

So I’m also hesitant. Will this be a great show? A good one? Will the characters make rash decisions that make me wonder how in the world they ever managed to survive childhood?

We will find out soon!

The best quote from this video: “You can’t fight crime in a crinoline.”

Juicy rumours by Erik Pevernagie.

Lately I’ve been getting quite a few hits from people using search engines to find Bruce Gerencser criticism.

Bruce is a friend of mine. I’ve known him for about six or seven years now, and apparently have mentioned him here just often enough for search engines to send people to my blog when they’re looking for dirt on him.

Sorry, that won’t be happening here. I don’t do that to anyone, much less an old friend.

What I find most amusing about this, though, is how much more they could learn about him if they simply read his blog themselves. He’s not the kind of person who is at all shy about telling the truth about himself.

Even if this wasn’t the case and I knew something about him that he was desperately trying to hide, gossip is socially acidic. It doesn’t only hurt the people who are having rumours spread about them. It also damages the reputation of the person spreading and it makes it really difficult for me to trust them with any news about my life in the future.

If they’ll share it with you, they’ll share it about you.

So, no. This isn’t the right place to come if you’re looking for juicy gossip. Although it does make for a good topic for a blog post!

Here is this week’s list of blog posts, short stories, poems, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Where Dreams Await via AustinDetails. There’s definitely something to be said for seeking out the small pleasures in life.

From It Is Healing, It Is Never Whole:

When the souls of the suicides come tumbling out of the low, gray clouds, it’s given to us to collect them, catalog them, contain them, and load them onto the train. None of us know where the train goes—it’s the general consensus, to the extent that there is one, that it would serve no purpose for us to know, and anyway it’s not our job. Our job is to collect the souls of the suicides and do everything that comes after.

Vegan Banana Split Recipe. I’ve been telling everyone about this recipe lately. It’s simply that delicious.

Paper Ribbons via shawnamawna. I adore this.

Eerie Photographs Show Abandoned Chinese Amusement Parks Out of Season. There’s something creepy and a little sad about not seeing any people in a place where you’d expect to be surrounded by them. The picture with the white piano was the best example of this in my opinion.

Why Do You Love to Run? via MonicaBruno71. Weightlifting, walking, and dancing are my favourite types of exercise. It was fascinating to read about why these people love running, though, because their passion for it was so strong.

What have you been reading?

Earlier today, some writer friends and I were discussing the genres we work with and whether or not we’d ever consider writing in other genres.

My brain works well with science fiction, fantasy, and horror.

It has learned to like mysteries and historical fiction. I haven’t written any of them yet. Maybe I will one of these days!

It still sputters and then shuts down completely when I try to write any sort of romance, though.

I wish it didn’t. I occasionally enjoy reading them. Every time I try to outline one, my characters end up doing everything other than falling in love with each other. They might be gay, or asexual, or not at all interested in their would-be soulmate, or way more interested in finding out just who or what is making that rattling noise in the other room than in doing romantic things.

You like what you like. And what I like is the paranormal and that tingling sensation one gets from being scared by things that can’t actually hurt anyone.

I wonder how much this is influenced by childhood? As a preacher’s kid who grew up in churches that encouraged this sort of thing, I heard a lot of spooky stories from other Christians about spiritual warfare, demons they’d encountered, and prophetic dreams they’d had.

An extended family member gave me the Chronicles of Narnia and Lord of the Rings books when I was a kid. I read all of them over and over again. I read a lot of secular science fiction, fantasy, and horror as well growing up. The themes in them reminded me of what I heard in church about what it meant to be a good Christian. The language changed, of course, but it was all about quests, finding allies, saving people, and keeping your eye on the longterm goal of bringing the One Ring to Mordor and/or making it into Heaven.

We were discouraged from reading romance novels. I read a few for the novelty of it, of course, but I always returned to the genres that I’d settled into very early in life.

How about you? How strict are you when it comes to the genres of fiction that you do (or do NOT) like? Have your tastes changed over time?

Here is this week’s list of blog posts, poems, gifs, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

A Metronome for Breathing. Isn’t this cool?  I think it would be a great breathing rhythm for meditation.

The Case of the Missing Spoons via cunninghamb103. I lose socks, too, although so far I’ve managed to find (most) of them again.

Never Saw This Coming via bobnailor. Before you read this, think about who and what you thought you’d be when you grew up.

In the Day After the World Stopped Being. I really hope the author writes a sequel to this soon. It needs one.

I Weigh 200 Pounds, and I’ve Never Been Happier via LorenKleinman. This made me so glad that I grew up in a family that never shamed anyone for how much they weighed. As an adult, I’m horrified by this behaviour.

From Why Self-Compassion Trumps Self-Esteem:

Continually feeding our need for positive self-evaluation is a bit like stuffing ourselves with candy. We get a brief sugar high, then a crash. And right after the crash comes a pendulum swing to despair as we realize that—however much we’d like to—we can’t always blame our problems on someone else. We can’t always feel special and above average.

What have you been reading?

Earlier this summer I did a GIF interview with Kate Tilton about writing. It was published today, and I can’t wait for all of my readers to check it out.

What is a gif interview, you ask?

Imagine answering questions with gifs instead of with words. It’s a fun and creative way to have a conversation.

For example, this is how I feel about the interview you’re about to read and watch:

A geologist on Mars discovers something unexpected on it.

This is all I can tell you about the plot. Go discover the rest for yourself!

The Red Witch from Aron Bothman on Vimeo.