Linkage begins…now.
:: I wish the makers of air fresheners would be more specific about what their products smell like instead of having cutesy names like “Sunny Meadow” and “Early Morning Breeze”. (But how else does one describe these things, other than “Nice-smelling collection of chemicals #5”? I point out in comments over there how a lot of men’s deodorants describe their scents in terms that aren’t aromatically evocative at all, like “Fresh Sport” and “Victory”.)
:: I feel like I’ve lost the connection to some of the deepest parts of my identity: whatever talents I have as a writer, my literary and cinematic interests, my curiosity, hell, my sense of enjoyment. Not being able to do the things I enjoy and by which I’ve always defined myself is generating tremendous anxiety for me. (Ye Gods, I wish I had something wise to say to Jason about this kind of thing….)
:: Seriously, it’s nice that there can suddenly be complete Looney Tunes cartoon physics in a comic defined by someone’s lingering death from cancer. (Ahhhh, ripping on Funky Winkerbean — one of my favorite of all pastimes!)
So far, they’re right. (For some reason, I like reading reactions to DC Comics’s reboot, despite the fact that I just don’t read the comics at all. Weird.)
:: Look at it this way: Should the government tell the overalls factory to pay its employees a decent wage and to avoid using toxic chemicals in its fabric? Absolutely. Should the government tell people that they’d better wear shirts under their overalls and cinch up those straps tight? Of course not! (This blog mixes semi-serious political writing with photos of women clad in overalls, and nothing else. I swear I am not making this up. Believe me, this one is NSFW!)
The stars are not too far. (So writes Vernor Vinge, highly-regarded SF writer, whose sequel to his twenty-year-old novel A Fire Upon the Deep — which I plan to re-read soon — is imminent. I don’t know if he’s right or not, but it’s so nice to find an SF writer who is willing to be optimistic, and who is not willing to give up on humanity going to the stars. Lots of other authors may write fun space operas with FTL travel and star-spanning cultures, but in interviews, they all seem to say, “Yeah, we’re never leaving the Solar System, that’s it.” Vinge clearly believes otherwise, and thank God for that.)
More next week!