2019-05-03 14:56:21

Hmmm, a little odd  nobody beat me to the punch today, but hay so it goes.
Happy belated beltane to any pagans who were celebrating earlier this week and happy starwars day to everyone tommorrow big_smile.

Okay not a lot to report from this angle. we did some amazingly fun improvisation on Wednesday night at my acting class, they asked to do a skit about a traffic warden giving  someone a tickit. One option the instructor mentioned was  trying to make the traffic warden something that a traffic warden would never be, so I decided what would happen if he was completely stoned!

It was hilarious, I was looking at the car and  admiring how "shiiiiiiny!" it was, then trying to use the ticket to make a bong. 

Today we're goint to a do at my mum's work and we've been roped into doing some disney stuff, which should be good as far as it goes. Sadly I probably  won't have time to prepare poor  unfortunate souls from Little mermaid, since apparently I do a very good ursula, still  only doing a couple of things.

On the plus side more of my reviews have got put up on www.fantasybookreview.co.uk including ones for magic's price by mercedes lackey and for the darkborn trilogy by Alison sinclair. the next review project is a book I just finished, the very good, but intensively  library on mount char by Scott Hawkins, about some semi immortal, likely magical librarians outside reality and some of the down right disturbing things they do!

I'll probably make it a book of the month, it was incredibly good, if rather ambiguous and down right nasty in places.

Hope everyone else is having a good may!

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-05-03 15:14:31

That sounds like a really good book. I love reading especially sci-fi and fantasy, but I also like mystery/thriller/horror as well. Not many people know me very well in here I don’t think, I’m new but I am on a lot of other social networks. But the main highlight of my life is martial arts. I am still looking for work or I guess I should say again, so I have been keeping pretty busy as well.

2019-05-03 15:33:43

I've been having a... shitty... case of dyaria, sorry don't know how to spell it, liquid shit, and I've missed a few days of school. I feel absolutely horrible.
I'm writing this in class and I need to shit but I don't want to because it's not fun and I'm in school. Speaking of witch, the school has the worst toilet paper. It's thin and rips at a touch and is kind of corse like sandpaper, yeah it's not fun.

I do enjoy me some scifi books, fantasy's at the top though.
I've been spending most of my time coding, shitting, and reading Hary Potter fanfiction, thanks to Brad's HP Fanfic collection thingy.

----------
“Yes, sir. I am attempting to fill a silent moment with non-relevant conversation.”
“You don’t tell me how to behave; you’re not my mother!”
“Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.” – Data (Star Trek: The Next Generation)

2019-05-03 15:53:00

Double post, sorry if yall didn't wanta know the first bit, felt like talking.

----------
“Yes, sir. I am attempting to fill a silent moment with non-relevant conversation.”
“You don’t tell me how to behave; you’re not my mother!”
“Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.” – Data (Star Trek: The Next Generation)

2019-05-04 04:22:27

Hi.
Well not doing anything earth shattering this month, not yet at least. I am going through some family trouble with my niece and nephew, but that's a story for another time. I've been reading a lot of thrillers lately, ben coes and marc Cameron to be specific, I get a kick out of the explosions, fights, and things like that. I think I'm enjoying these so much because they remind me of the TV series 24.
Also I've been practicing guitar and piano, which is always fun!
@Dark, that's interesting you can do Ursula from little mermaid. I can do a pretty good Ursula voice, although not enough to do it professionally. Sometimes I sing Disney songs like poor unfortunate souls to my nephew when he's here visiting. He seems to enjoy them, but listening to myself I think I sound like a fork in a blender lol!

Guitarman.
What has been created in the laws of nature holds true in the laws of magic as well. Where there is light, there is darkness,  and where there is life, there is also death.
Aerodyne: first of the wizard order

2019-05-06 05:40:49

hello
agreed with 5: I had been having family probs lately: o and at this time of wrighting; I am klass: I dont cair whether the teeture call me or not
one thing that I like in this munth is the foot ball game that's happening today: in about 2 hours I have to go; and wish me good luck

my new youtube channel. click subscribe if you like my stuff
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzL-l8 … YCkjOm3FIg

2019-05-06 09:14:15

@Redfox sorry about the stomach problems, hope they cleared up.

@ambs1985, I'm an sf and fantasy fan myself, though Mrs. Dark does read the odd thriller etc. While my bubble of interest reading wise is pretty wide, going everywhere from horror and high fantasy to space opera and steampunk, I do generally like books with some sort of fantastical element even minimally. I also write reviews as I said for www.fantasybookreview.co.uk.

Having polished off my library at mount char review yesterday I've started This alien shore by Celea Friedman. I enjoyed her coldfire trilogy which mixed sf and fantasy, albeit they got a little too overblown romance fiction in places. The fascinating thing about This alien shore is while its an sf novel written in 1998, it anticipates a  lot of the modern day concerns about hacking as well as a few bits of modern tech like the google glasses, plus it has some really interesting ideas, like everyone using "brainware" which not only can flag up a display in everyone's vision, but also can use icons, physical objects to activate bits of the program. So one character is a security expert who investigates computer viruses, and he can't even look at the virus code in normal light in case his brainware activates the program by mistake. So, while the main female character is being a bit damselly at the moment, it looks pretty good.

I've also got more of my own writing to work on today, since I really want to get my sf novella finished. I've been consistantly doing 500 words a day, at least most days, and since writing is what I'd like to do these days its a good diciplin to get into, actually its nice to not have to write about the ethics of disability anymore big_smile.

@Guitarman the disney thing was fun, and I wouldn't do ursula accept for a bit of a joke, though it was quite amusing when Mrs. Dark said I sounded rather like her. While I do need to get back into the habbit of learning serious music regularly, I currently have some handel and a piece from  opera don etzetti to learn, its always fun to just slack off and do something silly, especially if you actually get a chance to perform it, which is unfortunately rare at the moment annoyingly.

Oh, and as an end to this post, RIP Peter Mayhew, thanks for giving us the most lovable walking carpet in the galaxy.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-05-07 13:50:53

So everyone is having different sort of May.

Mine has been a busy one so far. first, I am officially out of my teens now, I got twenty years old at the first of May.

Then since at the fourth May, my mother had a birthday of her own, my uncle's family arrived. their older son, whom I consider my few of the brothers who get along with me, also came.

We played various video games, watched videos on Youtube, and recommended some anime series to each others, because we both are the big fan of them. there were however, downsides. like, he won't leave me alone.

Anyway, at least I can sleep like a log since I don't have anything hanging over my head, like the exams. though several people are asking me, "Aren't you worried about the result?" my response is simple. "At this point, I really don't care about the result."

After twelve years of school, I think I really have become uncaring towards my score.

My programming teacher told me that the classes will begin in the June, but since I haven't studied anything related with programming, I decided to read books. hopefully, I wouldn't have lost my edge too much.

Also, another chapter of my fanfic is done through it's editing process, I am about to publish it now. it has been several months since I did something like that.

Hope everyone is having a good time.

2019-05-07 21:20:37

Although I've not been feeling good physically of late, I've had a wonderful birthday.
First, dinner with a friend, and loving on her orange cat because he adores me for some reason.
Then I spent time with my hilarious nieces and nephew, my brother and sister-in-law, and my parents. God chose the perfect family for me, because where I'm introverted and can be cerebral and serious, these people make me laugh all the time! The ice cream cupcakes didn't hurt my feelings either. *smiles*
I have been playing a lot of Popmundo and Landlord Tycoons.
And I've gotten out of my reading slump.
First I finished "The Land that Time Forgot" and liked it.
Now I'm reading "Under a Dark Summer Sky" which is intense because it deals with racism, but its imagery of Florida in summer is so vivid and beautiful!
So although epilepsy or non 24 or who knows what is causing me not to feel my best, I've had a fantastic week and am grateful for the friends and family God has given me.

2019-05-13 15:26:01

@Dark eagle, good luck with the exams, but yeah I agree with you, if you've done all you can then you might as well relax. Actually between your annoying cousins and Mirage's crazy cat it sounds like everyone is having a hectic time.

Last week we finally finished off Mrs. Dark's visa application, though we need to go for a biometric appointment in June. this was very stressful, particularly as the stupid company the government are paying for the biometric data, yes, biometric data you must! have so have absolutely no choice but to pay stupid company, has an even stupidder website which has about the most inaccessible capcha system I've ever seen, this combined with my dad's general dislike of all computers made the hole thing super stressful.
So, we've spent the weekend generally recovering, we finished the next October Daye novel by Seanon McGuire, once broken faith, the series we're reading together about a half Fae detective in San Francisco, This was a trifle disapointing mostly due to the main character behaving like an arrogant arse.
To cheer ourselves up though we're now reading the third Wayfarer's novel by Becky Chambers, Reccord of a space born few, which is proving really good!
Actually, anyone who loves the idea of books set in a very weird future universe where you get to see just normal people live, work and get around aliens I'd highly recommend, particularly since they're the first thing I have read for a very long time that portrays future humanity in a positive light without going all utopian and startrek, or without making everything to saccharine. you can find my reviews for the first two books over on fantasybookreview.co.ukk, and I'll definitely be saying something positive about the third.

Reading aside, my writing continues though I'm feeling a bit shattered this afternoon so will probably wait until tomorrow to get things done. Unfortunately, our local Marks and spensors supermarket has closed, and finding an alternative is being a pain so I was shopping all morning which I do not enjoy, though at least  went with a friend of Mrs. Dark's so didn't have to rely on less than helpful shop assistants and a long wait.

On the plus side, Mrs. Dark is doing some audiogame voice acting which is pretty cool. I can't say what or for whom, but she appreciates the chance to get some vaguely useful acting work done. I'll probably be contributing bits too.

In terms of games I've just started the grail lords which is proving interesting, indeed I've been looking for a game that requires daily logins but is not a pvp fest, I'm also still playing trimps, because Trimps is bloody awesome! big_smile.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-05-16 15:07:32

Hi,
Dark, the visa forms sound even more of a nightmare than they seem at first sight!
As for me, it's been an amazing month so far, kind of out of the blue.
First I'm being contracted to work 4 days a week up from 3 in september, five if the second school keep me on as well, which I know they want to.
Secondly, a reunion with one of my closest friends turned into a date half way through when things were said, which we later realised had been brewing for a while.   I'm seeing her this weekend so we'll see how things go.  I must say that because we know each other so well, it feels incredibly natural; though this week seems like the longest one ever.

2019-05-17 02:09:25

For some inexplicable reason, I've been really into Harry Potter fanfic again for the last 2 weeks or so. Mostly my interest in fanfic happens in phases where I'll be interested in it very very much for 5 to 8 months, and then stop reading it almost entirely for the same length of time or longer.
In other news, it's busy in school right now since I'm leaving in early June to go to an independence camp in Minnesota for 8 weeks. For that reason, I've been starting to do the culminating projects for my classes in my spare time, because I'll need to be done pretty much everything that the other students will do in those final 2 weeks and during exam time by June 7. I anticipate already that math will be hellish to do on my own since I'll have to do some trigonometry, which is terrible.

2019-05-17 03:02:20

Hi.
@DanC, that's great, your very lucky. I wish you the best.
@Dark, how do you right stories as a blind person? I ask because I've been blind since birth, and I love to read. I have so many story ideas I've never been able to put down. It's like a never ending show in my head that I can never share properly. When I have tried to write stories before I read them and they make me sick, I feel like a child wrote them. Maybe I'm being too hard on myself, or maybe I just can't find my voice. I've had many different ideas, my favorite is an urban fantasy story or stories that feature a blind wizard. I wonder if it's just me, or if a lot of people dislike their work when they read it themselves.

Guitarman.
What has been created in the laws of nature holds true in the laws of magic as well. Where there is light, there is darkness,  and where there is life, there is also death.
Aerodyne: first of the wizard order

2019-05-17 06:59:48

@Dan C, yep, however bad you think the Visa forms are, they're actually worse, especially all the different bits of random evidence they require. Good luck with your friend, hope things go in a direction you both want, my best friend is definitely the person I'm married to! big_smile.  I will admit I have no advice since the hole business of a formal "date", I.E going somewhere just for possible romantic intent without knowing where you stand is a bit nuts to me,  the first time my lady and I actually went out together was after she was staying with me when we were definitely a couple and just a month before we got engaged big_smile.

@Lucas1853 good lukc with the trig and the camp thing.
@Guitarman, stories fundamentally involve language, and language is a thing you can learn to use, though of course like any skill it takes a good deal of work and practice, and above all writing each and every day. I've tried to hold myself to a strict 500 words a day limit, and hopefully I'll have something to show for it relatively soon.

If you mean by "writing as a blind person" writing about colour, and facial expression, well for me, I can see colour anyway, though other things like facial expressions I generally go off emotional empathy and what I know from others. However, interestingly enough,  Mrs. Dark who has been blind since birth (or at least from the age of 2), loves descriptive passages about colour for their poetic content and usually can get a sense of tone music, emotion and style, EG one of the first things she sent me was a beautiful description of a sunset and moon rise from Pat Conroy's prince of tides.

This is it however, since unless your just going to write blind characters all the time, your probably going to be very limited in your writing, indeed being able to think about how someone unlike you experiences the world and convey that in language is the mark of a good author. Heck I was quite amazed at how well  Anna Smaille wrote a blind character in her book The Chimes, particularly with its absolutely amazing descriptions of music.

Speaking of which my review of Library at mount char is now up, the surreal book I mentioned at the start of this month's topic Read it here, it was interesting since it really was a very good book, albeit I do wish Hawkins had put the plot together a wee bit tighter.

Actually, the webmaster over at fantasybookreview.co.uk has posted a good few of my reviews of late, including those of Alison  Darkborn Trilogy, which involve a hole blind society (although she falls adly into the trap of writing a blind society and then for all practical intents and purposes making them not blind at all).

Find my full list of Reviews here

As for me, unfortunately my parents have decided its going to be a busy weekend. my lady has her first training as a voluntary councillor for sexual abuse victims tomorrow, which will be worthwhile,  but obviously hard, and unfortunately my parents have decided this is the perfect opportunity to  organise a hole bunch of things this  weekend which probably is going to be  quite tiring, indeed I sort of wish  they'd asked us before deciding to buy tickets to some sort of musical comedy Saturday night since I doubt my lady will be in much of a comic mood after dealing with training all day.

So this morning I've been roped in to helping some people from a choir of learning disabled people out with learning some songs from Les Miserables. I'll do my best, though I confess working with learning disabled people is not particularly my forte, and I hope we're not going to have nuclear war over the fact that I don't particularly want to do this permanently, since its  something my mum is very heavily into.

Actually we're sort of getting to a crisis point with my parents, since they seem to refuse to acknowledge the fact that I'm actually not twelve anymore and so would prefer to be consulted before they randomly organise things or decide to turn up and ""help" with something like housework or shopping whether we need, want  desire such help or not.
Heck, I'm now unfortunately thinking even though we're about 45 minutes drive away from my parents, moving even this close is a bad idea.

Anyway, it will hopefully work itself out, and hopefully without too much by way of explosions.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-05-17 21:09:42

Hi Dark.
I've tried writing about characters who are sighted, but to me it seems like I just write what I have read in a book, it feels very similar at least that's how it feels when I reread passages later. I've been thinking I should take a writer's workshop, maybe that would help me understand what I'm trying to write a little bit better.

As for having problems with parents, I still get that somewhat. I'm nearly thirty, but sometimes I feel like a child when they want to help me whether I need it or not. I appreciate what they are trying to do, but at the same time it gets frustrating. It's odd, I figured I was the only one who had this problem, I guess I'm not alone in this after all.

Guitarman.
What has been created in the laws of nature holds true in the laws of magic as well. Where there is light, there is darkness,  and where there is life, there is also death.
Aerodyne: first of the wizard order

2019-05-18 11:43:43

@Dark:
He is not as much as annoying, he just wouldn't leave me alone. also, I suspect that I would have same parent problems from my mother once I am at your age.

@Guitarman:
While I do not write any original stories of my own yet, (but I have plans,) I do write fanfics. at the start, even I have trouble with writing expressions and such, but another reader recommended to me that I should focus on the effects of the events rather than expressions. fight scenes are still quite hard to write though. I do not know whether other people would agree with me or not, (my story does not seems to atract many reviews,) but I have noticed a marked improvement in my writing after I wrote ten chapters.

So my mother decided that I have to go on a trip with her at her big sister's house, because their grandson was having his second birthday. of course I was dragged kicking and screaming. (not really, but almost the same.)

Sometimes, I have a hard time believeing that I have become an uncle.

2019-05-18 15:04:25

@Dark eagle,  oddly enough,  when I was your age my parents were actually far better about me going off and doing my own thing, indeed I remember a conversation I had with my mum when I was nineteen, since I'd delayed going to uni for a year because the school I was at had failed to offer a subject I needed to take the first time  around where I told her I needed to move out, go to university and do my own thing and she completely agreed, that's why this recent tendency to "help" to the point that it becomes almost age regression  really not a good thing.

Oh, and  if you think its weird being an uncle, try having a nephew who is older than you,  a  thirteen year old grand niece!  My lady is nine years older than me, and her  sister is nine years older than her, and said sister had her son when she was 17, and said son also had a child when he was twenty two.

In effect its not as weird as it sounds, though I have taken to referring to my sister in law rather jokingly as "auntie" big_smile.

Fanfics are a good practice. I tried to do a novelisation come expantion of the playstation rpg Xenogears back when I was in my late teens and early twenties, and that worked well. I haven't really written seriously since being at university, as when your spending hours writing long essays about ethics and metaphysics, not to mention a stupidly long phd, it doesn't really put you in the mood to write much else, but obviously that's now changed.

In terms of combat, one of my favourite authors when I was growing up was a man called Douglas Hill, who wrote what we'd probably now consider YA science fiction stories, although most were published in the early eighties.
they feature some of the best descriptions of combat I've ever read, complete with martial arts, blasters and real connections to character. While I certainly don't parrot douglas Hill myself, I do know what good combat writing looks like and am confident enough to do it justice. There isn't any combat in the sf novella I'm writing at the moment, but I have no worries when I do need to write combat.

the thing I'm teaching myself about at the moment is dialogue and pacing, especially conveying information to the reader about the world and how it works, without one of the dreaded infodump sections, but like a lot of things, the best way is to learn by doing, and speak words to myself, indeed just being able to hear a character's voice helps quite a bit.

@Guitarman, mostly when I do with facial expressions is go off emotional empathy and understanding of a person's feelings, though of course sticking the odd smile in there works too.
For me its more a matter of working out what sort of tone I want and what sort of emotional dynamics then finding language that conveys that accurately, which I suppose is what all writers do.

I really do hope to have the novella finished soon, then I'll start looking into publication, which will be something of a mine field I suspect.

Writers workshops can help, but again it depends upon whose doing it and what skills  want to gain. For example I went to one on micro fiction which  talked about removing words from passages, and yet while it pays to be concise and to know how to be concise, some of the things people were coming out with were so short they just  worth the time to read them.

I also have seen a lot of writer's workshops which sort of default to generic self esteem stuff all about how to "write about your feelings", or "make words that reflect the way you really feel about the world", which just  the sort of thing that would help much with actually writing fiction.

Again there are a few kicking around, I'd love to go to one of the famous seminars on writing fantasy and sf, but I haven't run across any as yet.

Well the choir thing wasn't too bad, and while I did say I'd go back to help next week, I also made it clear that was pretty much that.

The important news is that last night I did something I have been meanign to do for a long while and sat down with series eleven of doctor who. People will know my low opinion of /Show Runner Stephen Moffat, but since he departed, I was interested in picking the tv series back up again, as I dropped out around series nine (or at least I misssed it and never bothered catching up since I really didn't care).

And yee gods its good! i've seen the first two episodes, and frankly I'm less bothered about the fact that the Doctor is female, than the fact that ze uses Zir brain to solve problems again! oh, and we actually have  stories with real plot and characters for oce, not just run arounds with some over flirty woman telling the doctor what to do!

I also like the Doctor herself, wonderfully scatty and nuts in a nice way which felt far more doctor who than Mat Smith's inept "I'm useless but I'm going to win" or Peter Capalady's miss directed scottish grumpiness, which might have worked if the plot actually allowed the Doctor to be more effective than Clara I'm so smug and the universe revolves around me oswald!

so, I'm definitely liking series eleven thus far! I've seen the first two episodes, so no spoilers please, but I'll definitely be doing the rest as time goes on, and yee gods its nice to actually care about TV doctor who again I've missed it!

anyway, Doctor who probably needs its own separate topic so I'll stop discussing that here, particularly since I need to run off quickly and have lunch owing to my mum's rather hectic schedule.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-05-19 22:41:51

Hi.
Well I've been doing pretty good. I'm reading the last book in the jane hawk series called the night window by dean koontz. It's good so far, but the series is coming to an end, I hope the ending isn't a goofy unbelievable one, koontz has done this sort of ending before and I don't like it at all.
I've been playing a hero's call, I'm farther than I've ever been, it only gets better.
I've also been fooling with programming again, I suck, but it's still a lot of fun to play around with.

Guitarman.
What has been created in the laws of nature holds true in the laws of magic as well. Where there is light, there is darkness,  and where there is life, there is also death.
Aerodyne: first of the wizard order

2019-05-25 18:09:24

As i said in the reviews of the koontz books I've done, I find Koontz a bit too fluffy and prone to very preachy, sterreotypical characters on occasions, so I'd be cautious about reading Koontz myself, although my lady is a fan.
I've just finished the Goblin Emperor by Katharine  Addison, which was really good, albeit its not a book for people who like fast action or everything clear, since its basically all about the politics and the emotional journey of a boy who winds up emperor when he didn't imagine being. This means I have two reviews to bang out both for very good books, Record of a spaceborn few and the goblin emperor, and just to be completely unhelpful I've got a virus which has given me a sore throat and left me feeling bloody awful which definitely doesn't! help.

Because I wanted something light and a bit fun, I decided to read a book of buffy the vampire based stories called tales of the slayer. This is actually really good, accept  I'm wondering if any of the slayers actually get to live at all big_smile.
The last story I finished in the collection, all about Elizabeth Bathroy was virtually game of thrones like in its level of making you think "wow she's going to get out of this!" and then ending with the slayer's very grizzly death, but hay that's not unexpected in horror fiction big_smile.

So, not a lot going on at the moment other than feeling aweful and reading about aweful vampires.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-05-27 00:26:50

Hi Dark.
Well the ending of the book was pretty predictable and very anti-climactic. I read the night window mostly because I read the first few books, I just wanted to see what the end was like. I think what really ruined it for me was the main bad guy going through a full mental breakdown, it would've been more interesting for me if he had had a sound mind.
After a slow read like that, I needed something fast, so I'm reading the lions of Lucerne by brad thor, which is about the president of the united states being kidnapped. It's been very good so far! Thor is a political commentator on TV and radio sometimes, which kind of put me off, but if I ignore the political part, the story itself is a lot of fun to read.

Guitarman.
What has been created in the laws of nature holds true in the laws of magic as well. Where there is light, there is darkness,  and where there is life, there is also death.
Aerodyne: first of the wizard order

2019-05-27 20:28:14 (edited by Dark 2019-05-27 23:57:25)

@Guitarman, books with heavily political or nationalistic a genders is partly why I don't tend to read spy fiction anymore, since I got a little tired  being told how great America/England was and how awesome the military/spy unit was for protecting good family values against the evil Russians/Chinese/Arabs/whoever else.

The things I used to enjoy in spy fiction, exotic locations, interesting different cultures and complex plots with occasional bits  of tension I found I could get just as well in fantasy or sf without the biases.

Well I'm feeling at least a little more human today, so hopefully will be able to get some  writing at least started, I really do want to get back to my 500 words a day writing rule, but I've been feeling so lousy recently that basically all I've been able to do is lie down and read about vampires big_smile.

I'd also like to get back to my trimps too since while they've been doing some grindy maps for metal I really do need to start another propper run, though perhaps an in depth discussion of trimps isn't right for monthly chat.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)