Month: January 2024

Is Tay-Tay A Secret Rock Star?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m so desperate for regular old pop rock that I find myself listening to lesbian rock interpretations of Taylor Swift songs and loving them. G-Flip’s cover of “Cruel Summer” is great.

G-Flip

Now, if only we could get Tay-Tay herself to come out with a straight rock album. There is a rumor that she’s recorded a rock album called Karma. But, who knows.

It could be that I’m just old and pop rock will never, ever come back for economic reasons. But it is interesting that Tay-Tay songs lend themselves to be interpreted as rock songs.

Next Generation AI Generated Media Is A Compelling Use Case For The Apple Vision Pro

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Now, of course, it’s possible that the fucking Fourth Turning will happen starting in late 2024, early 2025 and we’ll have to sort that out first, but there is also a chance that a combination of AI generated media and the Apple Vision Pro might cause a vibe shift.

It could be that, ultimately, AI generated media, or AIGM, will really take off because of the advent of the Apple Vision Pro. Or, if nothing else, one of its successors. It definitely seems as though we’re on the cusp of a media sea change.

The question at this point is how, exactly, that sea change expresses itself and how long it takes for it to happen. Everything definitely seems to be rushing towards a sudden lurch into the future, some sort of future shock, but…I dunno. There remains too much that I just don’t know.

Could The Start Of WW3 In 2024 Be The ‘Black Swan’ Event That Prevents A Trump Win?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

At the moment, malignant ding-dong Trump has an air of invincibility and inevitability about around him. He’s going to win and we either turn into a MAGA-themed autocracy, or we have a revolution then civil war.

But I can’t predict the future and there is always a chance that some sort of “Black Swan” event could happen that would give us an off ramp just like the pandemic did in 2020. Of all the possible Black Swan events that might happen, something that might be marketed as WW3 is definitely among them at the moment.

If, say, Iran and Pakistan nuked each other. Or if the DPRK went at it with the ROK that would be enough for the American press to say, “Buckle up, America, WW3 has started.”

That, in turn, would cause a rally-round-the flag movement (at least at first) and that would help Biden. A lot would depend on WHEN WW3 happened. The later it happened, the more it would help Biden and potentially allow us to avoid a dystopian hellscape.

Modern Gender Politics & Pop Culture Are So Fucked Up

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There is a small — but vocal — group of the reading audience that simply can not, will not, validate the idea that I, as a smelly CIS white male, would, at times, write from a female POV in this novel.


And it’s only going to get worse the moment they learn my heroine is a part-time stripper.

And, yet, fuck it, we’ll do it live.

I am so matter-of-fact about the sex worker side of things that I think, within the context of the novel, that it won’t be seen as too terribly gratuitous. It’s just there’s a lot –a LOT — I can do with the whole stripper side of things to make the story really interesting and enjoyable so, lulz, why not.

And Barry — which dealt with an equally surreal professional life — was a success. But that was a comedy, so, I suppose it’s not a one-to-one.

And I am well aware that someone might steal a creative march on me, given how long it’s taking me to write this damn thing. As such, I really need to start to work on some backup stories.

A Downlow Fear About This Novel

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It’s a lot easier to build out nuance when it comes to something like “part-time stripper solves a murder mystery” than it is in a movie.

My fear, of course, is, that if I actually manage to sell this novel and it becomes a success enough to catch Hollywood’s interest, that any movie would focus way too much on the stripper side of things and not that fact that my heroine is the owner of both a strip club and an alternative weekly.

But I think I’m overthinking things. I think all I should worry about is writing the best novel I can. Any thoughts of this novel becoming a movie are way, way, way, way, way, way too early.

I need to just keep my head down and write.

Welp, A New Beginning For The Third Draft — AGAIN

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Within moments of looking over the beginning of the third draft of the novel, I came up with a new, better (?) beginning. The key thing is I really get right into the part-time sex worker (stripper) element of the story.

I never know how much of these changes will stick and how much is just part of the “breathing” process of the novel where everything moves around for months and months until I FINALLY reach something I kinda, sorta like.

But I think if I’m going to do this editing and rewriting right, I need to calm down some. I need to be more methodical because otherwise, I’m just going to spin my wheels for months and months and lulz, nothing will ever get done.

Part of that is to be more active with my setting and descriptions. In past drafts, I’ve kind of been lack about shit like that because the point was to get something, anything down.

Now that I’m on the third draft, I think I need to give a lot more consideration to describing things. I have a feeling I’m doing all of this wrong, but lulz, I’m doing it in a vacuum and have no one to tell me “no.”

My Hot Take On Trump’s Recent Ranting About ‘Absolute Presidential Immunity’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I don’t pretend to understand ding-dong Trump’s mind, but it definitely would appear there is a specific reason why he rants shit like this:


What he’s doing is trying to stake out the most absolute fucking extreme negotiating position on the slim chance that he might get more than he might get otherwise.

That’s it. That’s all I got.

Welp, I Guess I’m Going To Edit & Re-Write The First Act Of The Third Draft Afterall

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

After a lot of brooding on my part, I finally sat down to start work on the “Fun & Games” part of the third draft of the mystery-thriller I’m working on. Well, it instantly occurred me to that I was in no position to jump right into the second act.

So, I started to read the novel from the beginning and I, of course, instantly became sucked into editing and re-writing everything. Ugh. This is going to slow me down so much. But, the point is, if I go through the first act and straighten things out then I will be in a position to zoom through the second act.

That, at least, is the hope.

I just don’t want to get bogged down by trying to make everything “perfect” in the first act. But I can’t help myself. It’s just not been as easy as I had hoped to simply start from the beginning of the second act.

I think I may give myself the end of the month to sort everything out with the first act. At least that way I will have a deadline. I have to stop drifting towards my goal. I say that then turn around and do exactly that.

I’m Having Difficulty Getting Into ‘The Expanse’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve heard some really great things about The Expanse TV show. So, I started it, only to stop watching it within moments of seeing the first few moments. I will try again soon, but for the time being, I just could not get past the basic premise of the show.

Humans are idiots and, barring some external force, “the Other,” it is highly unlikely they would ever willing unite under the auspices of the UN. In fact, the only way I could see something like that happening is if WW3 happened and that event scared and scarred humanity so much that we finally decided to unite in some way.

That, or aliens.

In fact, one of the things that makes it so difficult to think of a way to zap a large number of humans to new, habitable planets in a new solar system — as I keep brooding about — is nationalism, specifically American nationalism. Americans simply will not abide with ending the nation-state.

So, you have to accommodate that in some way and that adds a great deal of complexity that I still — to this day — have yet to totally figure out how to overcome.

I Despise AI Generated Photography

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Jesus Christ. This photo of a woman — specifically her face — has been touched up by AI and it enrages me.

Fake.

Among the many things that bothers me about this photo is I don’t even know if that’s anywhere near being the face of the person who is actually attached to that body. It could be someone totally different for all I know.

And, yet, here we are. The future is now and we have to figure out what the fuck we’re going to do about it.