Stepchildren of the Circus Master

A very long time ago–maybe 2003, which is a long time these days–I had an argument with someone with whom I used to work.  I don’t remember what brought about his comment–I do know it was something I said that he didn’t care to hear–but it is a statement I’ve heard from a number of other people over the years.

It’s simple:  ”You can’t believe anything you read on the internet.”

My response was to ask him if, since NASCAR results–he was a huge race fan–were posted on the internet, if I should consider them fake as well.  This only pissed him off more, as, of course, they were correct since they reflected an action that had been seen by many.

Any medium can be fraught with errors.  Back when I was growing up, I know some of the things found in my parent’s encyclopedic weren’t really, truly, totally correct.  Or so we know now.  It’s all a matter of information gathering; don’t get your data from one source, but rather from many.  Then factor the information, and come to a decision.

It’s called thinking, y’all.

The Internet is going to have is fair share of crap floating about.  You have websites on just about everything, so it’s inevitable that pure, unadulterated BS is gonna come floating your way eventually.  It happens all the time to me, probably more so to you.

There is one current going around this weekend:  the tale of the planetary alignment of Mercury, Venus, and Saturn, with the Pyramids at Giza, on 3 December, 2012.  Only happens once every 2,737 years, you know.  Hey, there’s even a picture taken at night showing you want it would look like–

Only it’s stated that this happens an hour before sunrise.  So that’s easy enough to check out, because there are all sorts of programs that will let one see the sky in Cairo just before sunrise.  Oh, and hey, there are those same three planets in the sky on the 3^rd.  Only they’re in the south-southeast sky, which means the picture is wrong, as a quick check of Google Maps shows the picture was taken from the south-southwest.  So, to see this alignment, you have to be standing off to the north-northwest.  And you have to be standing in the right spot at the right time, neither of which is given.

You can also see this same alignment on the 2^nd and the 4^th, so you can blow off that “once every 2,737 years” meme, too.  Because when you can stand somewhere and make your own alignment, those years roll away very fast.

Yet, people buy this shit readily.  The number of, “That’s incredible!” or “I never knew that!” comments are numerous.  It’s not only on the Internet, but there’s a picture!  So it has to be true, right?

It seems there is an inherent need for people to buy into bullshit of this nature, if for no other reason than to say, “Hey, see!  This makes sense to me.”  So many false memes float about, and yet I’ve seen comments to the effect that people don’t care if it’s fake, they like what it says.

Bullshit or not, it’s getting a like.  Just deal with it.

Maybe I make too much out of this.  Maybe it’s the writer in me saying, “Hey, just because you try to think things out, it means everyone else should as well!”  Or maybe it’s just me wondering if people think this fake alignment is cool because it proves that aliens built the pyramids–

Hey, I already knew that last.  I mean, haven’t you ever watched Stargate SG-1?

The End of the Uncertainty

Yes, the end is in sight.  The end of this story, I mean.

Started Part Eighteen of Diners at the Memory’s End last night, and the writing was good.  I’ve known this ending for a very long time, and it’s been there in my mind, resting, waiting for the moment to come out and make itself known.

The words did flow.  If it hadn’t been for a lot of special formatting I needed to do, I would have likely finished everything in about an hour.  With formatting, it was two.

A good time had by me, yes.

Why was there a lot of special formatting, you ask?  I’ll tell you why.  The conversation was happening “in mind,” psychically, and I used different fonts to be able to tell who is speaking.  So it was write a few lines of conversation, then go back and set up the right fonts.

It’s a bit of work, but it’s fun.  It helps keep the story straight.  And it keep the writer’s sanity straight as well.  Until they start formatting.  Then it get nuts.

Where I’m at in the chapter, I easily know what’s coming after.  The rest of the scene should be easy, simple, short.  So much so, in fact, that I can likely finish up tonight.

One thousand more word, maybe fifteen hundred, and Diners is a wrap.  As The Who once wrote, the song is over, and so is the story.  Albert’s foray back into college, and how it affects him, will come to an end.

I should at least have a very strong drink to celebrate.

The end isn’t quite here, yet, but I feel it.  Even if I don’t write the last word until tomorrow, or Wednesday, Diners is done.  I don’t need to see the end of the story to know it will happen.  I even know what the last line will be.  That’s how I roll–though I will admit, that last line only came to me a week ago.  Before then, I had some rambling crap in mind.  Now, it’s more to the point.  And given the nature of the story, the last line should leave the reader with the feeling that while the story is over, the metastory goes on.

Get it written, get it into the files, get it saved.  Put it away and edit it later.  Maybe look at Echoes for a good edit while I find another publisher for Demonic Majesty, and do my research for NaNo.  I may not be writing anything new right away, but I’m working.

Oh, and I was reading through Transporting last night, and there’s something I picked up there, and I need to take that information and extrapolate.  If nothing else, I can have fun modeling out one of my solar systems with a bit more detail.  I also saw something that I wrote over twenty years ago, and it pretty much matched something I confirmed with my software a few weeks ago.

Really, I must have been in some kind of grove all those years ago, to be able to calculate an orbit with an Excel spreadsheet, and some quick formulas.

Makes me proud, you know?

Filling My Mind With the Offerings of the Day

Yesterday was one of those days where I was flying up and down the emotional scale so quickly, it wasn’t even funny.  That seems to be the case with me any more.  I’m all over the place mentally and emotionally–just like Elton is saying right now, it’s like being a Madman Across the Water, seeing everything so very well.

Yet never seeing what you need to see for yourself, right when it’s in front of you.

The day was taken up with work–naturally–and thinking about making a planet.  I know, that last is pretty strange, but the reality of it was it didn’t take very long.  I needed it for my new story, because I wanted to visualize one of the characters, and I needed to know about her home, the planet she came from.  So, I made it:

Ah, there we go; the Cymru Newydd system, with satellites Cardiff and Tryweryn.  Nice place, no?

And here’s her home up close:

Isn’t she pretty, with Cardiff in the background?  You could almost imagine some dragons flying around that place, can’t you?  Ah, but that’s for a later story . . .

I was able to determine that the planet is small, but dense, so it’s mineral-rich, while having a gravity that’s .9 of Standard gravity, which is to say 9.8 meters/second squared, which is to say just like Earth’s.  So my character might be a little taller than normal, but not so much as to be Beowulf Shaeffer-like.  I mean, that’s how I was going to have her in the first place, but it’s what happens when I start thinking way too much about how things should be, and I start drilling into the detail just a little too much.

Then I started getting into conversations about posting this new story on another blog.  That actually went on for several hours, and it was–interesting.  Hearing about why the owner of the blog was happy to see me come on board–ah, you gotta love it when burgeoning writers begin slamming other writers over whether their work sucks or not.  Lookie here:  unless you’re pulling down Stephenie Meyer-sized paychecks on your work, you’re in no position to be telling another writer they suck, and that their work is shit.  When you’re in the big time, you can start your own website and publish to your heart’s content.  Until then, kick back, enjoy the ride–and don’t be a dick.

Oh, and do that to me, and I’ll eviscerate you and your story.  But in a nice way . . .

So the first eight parts of Diners at the Memory’s End will show up on another site, one that I’ll link to just as soon as it sees the light of day.  Now, I know some of your are saying, “But, Ray, a while back you said Diners would have sixteen parts–”.  Yes, I did.  I guess that means if you want to find out how the story ends, you’ll need to buy it once it’s finished.  In the business, that’s called hooking your butt.

Then the evening came, and the roller coaster continued, and . . . damn, I don’t know, if I were a woman I’d say I was feeling very emotional.  Don’t know how you ladies do it, but I felt like I was dying.  I just want this week to get over so I can get out of where I’m at now, and be somewhere else come Friday evening.

I kept editing, though.  I got through half of a chapter in Her Demonic Majesty, but said chapter is about forty-five hundred words long, so still some to do tonight.  Then when that’s done, maybe I’ll look for beta readers.  Or I’ll just query it.  I haven’t decided.  Right now I want that novel sold, I really do.  But it has to be right before I do.  Oi.  Why am I doing this again?  Because I love it?  Ha!

I need to work tonight.  I need to get myself into my writing.

Living my life can be such a pain; my characters are so much more interesting.