Generating worlds, exploring them, losing the thread.
So has my Muse fled the scene forever, or is she merely suffering pandemic burnout?
Psychologists are reporting a rise in “pandemic burnout” as many people find the current phase of lockdowns harder, with an increasing number feeling worn out and unable to cope.
The Guardian
So here I’ve parked, this past year, largely confined to home with computers and ideas for books on all sides, shielded from such distractions as a social life. Liberally supplied with food, water, tea … Read more
Last week Mu did what she could to bulletproof Jack, given his tendency to annoy the wrong people. This week Jack hears from yet someone else he’s just a babe in the woods.
Selections from Arno Petty’s Intelligencer and Weekly Gleaner
As predicted, the worlds described in MOM and Genesis 2.0 lie just down the road. I wrote this “science fiction” in full knowledge it might soon be better described as history. And I was right. Consider the exponential advances of artificial intelligence, quantum computing and nanotech; see what transformations they have already wrought.
Read the MAGIC CIRCLES novels for a preview of how the human condition might soon be further shaped, for example, by a global pandemic — one far … Read more
This week Jack tries to undo some of the damage he has done to himself. Meanwhile, Mu does what she can to bulletproof him against any and all of life’s slings and arrows.
Selections from Arno Petty’s Intelligencer and Weekly Gleaner
Aphorism du jour (hot off the press)
One good thing about blogging: you can present nearly any proposition you like, and nowhere is it written you must provide hard evidence to support it.
So I’ll let the following rip just because I’m in the mood and because I don’t have to please academic supervisors or my mother or anybody.
A few weeks ago we saw how our preferred books, movies, music and choices of underwear, rather than being determined by … Read more
Last week, Hippolyte Lafleur advised Jack to stop doing the Funky Chicken in the middle of everyone else’s nice waltz. This week Jack gets another warning.
Selections from Arno Petty’s Intelligencer and Weekly Gleaner
THE BETTER PART OF VALOR. Too often tourists take exception to the admittedly obnoxious touts on Patpong Road, and find themselves involved in fisticuffs. Be advised that anybody in these parts you asked would probably guess the Marquis de Queensbury was a new … Read more
This week’s post follows on from last Thursday’s look at the selfie culture found within coffee shops of a certain standard.
Trying to account for what I witnessed, I was stuck by the notion that many of my fellow citizens seek refuge in new and improved realities. And these realities are socially and digitally engineered according to criteria that remain opaque to mere humans – including, arguably, the IT whiz kids responsible for the tech underlying these new cognitive dimensions. … Read more
Last week Jack got some much-needed exercise while negotiating Bangkok traffic en route to a rendezvous with Hippolyte Lafleur, a.k.a. Izzy Scoop.
Selections from Arno Petty’s Intelligencer and Weekly Gleaner