Tuesday, September 30, 2008

A new XKCD

I haven't link to XKCD in a while. I really like this one.

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Sweeet. I'm finally able to post, after my computer stopped being all silly and lame. Well, I'm here! Tis Katie, the semi-noob to y'alls club. You know. The blonde one, short hair, awesome times ten? Huh. Well, whatever. Anyway, I'll pop in and post up that poem I wrote last time derived from the random quote, since, like, that's the entire reason for my posting. Weee!

----------
Let the ear despise nothing,
Nor yet believe anything forthwith.
Quothe lies upon their lips,
To retain such tales & myths
Seems a pleasant folly and
Quick-paced path to death,
But to cast them off and trust
Not words, upon a similar
grave you'll rest.

Though many things one
must not hear, but enough
he has to know–
Divide one's ears by two;
one for truth, another one for bluff.

Friday, September 26, 2008

Howdy

I'd like to thank everyone for coming last night. I think we had a really good meeting with some real nice poems coming out of our exercise. I really hope to see a few of those poems on this blog real soon. Like today, hopefully.

I spoke to Chris last night about Roger Zelazny's "Lord of Light" novel. I would encourage anyone that enjoys science fiction to seek this book out. It truly is one of the great science fiction works. The library owns two copies. We used to have one until I ordered another. I don't have much power but what power I do have attempt to use for good. There is a good review of the book at Sf Site.

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Meeting Tomorrow

I just want to remind everyone that we are meeting tomorrow at 6 pm at the Morrison Regional Library. Remember to bring something to read. I'll see you there.

If you have an idea for an exercise please let me know. I'm always looking for a new one.

An early reminder for next month: don't forget that we are meeting at the Carmel Library in October. We won't have access to our room here in October due to early voting. The early voting people take over the whole branch in October. It is also just about impossible to find a place to park. If you don't know where the Carmel branch is located you can find the address and a map here.

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Rejected!

Over a month ago I sent a few poems off to a local poetry magazine. On Tuesday I saw sitting on the kitchen table an envelope I had self addressed and sent along with the poems. When I picked the envelope up I could tell it contained the three poems I had mailed off. It surprised me how discouraged I felt for a little while. O! the rejection. How could by babies not be good enough for some local rag? The nerve! I reckon I'll revise them and send them off to another publication.

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

David Foster Wallace

I don't know how many of you have heard of or read anything by David Foster Wallace. He has an enormous book called Infinite Jest that I have yet to read. All that I have read by him have been his essays. If you ever get a chance you should read the long essay called A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never do Again. It's about a cruise a magazine sent him on hoping to get an article out of it. It's an amazing piece of writing. Whenever you read something by him you just could sense you were reading the writings of someone that saw the universe a little more clearly than you did. He could dig a little deeper and then do the hardest thing in the world, write about what he saw and make you understand. A lot of times he would do that and simultaneously make you laugh.

He was found dead on Friday. Supposedly he committed suicide. He truly was a great writer and it's too bad that, at 46, his output has ended. There is a good remembrance of him here. The quote used in the last paragraph is a good example of Wallace's writing.

Tuesday, September 02, 2008

Different Kinds of Fantasy Stories

I hate to keep stealing from Michael Swanwick but he has a nice post here about different types of fantasy stories.