Category: Media

There’s Money To Be Made Opening A Strip Club Near Me

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

A very ill-advised and ill-conceived casino has recently been opened near where I am. But a part of me wants to embrace this den of sin and open a strip club nearby.

There are no strip clubs in the town where this casino has opened and it seems like if you could open a strip club within walking distance of the casino you could make A LOT of money. I would at least TRY to be a modern and cool to the women who worked there if I did something so bonkers.

But, alas, I’m more of a dreamer than I am someone who would actually do anything so crazy. I don’t have any money and I just wouldn’t be able to handle the stress, even if I could somehow get the money to open it. I don’t handle stress well — I am bonkers, you know.

And I think some of this is just me being irritated still that I *may* have run into Zendaya preparing for a role at a strip club in Richmond and I didn’t realize it was her I was talking to as I talked to her.

My Hot Take On AGI

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There is a lot of talk about the latest release from OpenAI being “AGI.” And, yet, we still don’t really know what Artificial General Intelligence is. My general belief is when we have an intelligence that safely replace a human in, say, programming without any guidance, then, then we will have AGI.

Or, to put a more fine point on it, I just don’t think we can have true AGI without a body. If an AI mind in an android can both build you a deck, fix your pluming AND babysit your kids then we have AGI.

But to me, there’s an even more crucial element — self-awareness. The real goal of all this work towards AGI should be done towards building self-awareness in AI, more than AGI.

Yet, of course, no one listens to me.

Writing For The Sheer Joy Of It

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have two novel ideas I’m working on now that I’m doing in a really casual way just for the sheer fun of it. I was really organized and methodical with the other novel I worked on (and am still writing in a way) and I just want to write just to write with these two.

It’s too easy to grow overwhelmed and burnt out when you really fixate on making things absolute just right with the development of a novel. I should know, it kept happening to me with the other novel — to the point that I need to just kind of chill out out on rewriting it for the time being.

But the two novels — one a zombie novel, the other a scifi novel, are really good and I’m trying — *trying* — to speed the process up by using AI to work on development. If I could have two solid novels done in about a year, that would be great.

I just realized I have a THIRD novel that I’ve gamed out even more than these two novels. It’s also really good, but I don’t know, I forgot about it because it wasn’t as easy to get into writing for some reason.

Pondering A Real-Life Mystery, Again

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

This suspicion I have — that I ran into Zendaya pretending to be a stripper in Richmond (probably in preperation for a role) — is so bonkers that absolutely no one will believe me. And I’m fine with that.

Just the *idea* that something like that may have happened puts a bit of a pep into my otherwise mundane-living-in-oblivion-life.

But the more it rattles around in my mind, the more…uneasy I grow. I definitely got the sense that she was rather contemptuous of me in the context of being nice to me — as if she was so distracted keeping her story straight that she didn’t really have time to care all that much about me.

The things I remember about the encounter — she seemed very distracted, she was quite polite and she seemed to hold me in a great deal of contempt. I suppose the contempt part comes from both the obvious — we did meet at a strip club, after all — and the less obvious: she saw me as just an extra in her “method acting” preparation for some role down the road.

I think. That seems to make the most sense

Struggling With A Scifi Novel

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have a really great scifi novel — actually two — yet I’m struggling as to how to flesh it out. Or, in fact, both of them. They started off as short stories but I realized that both their premises were good enough to be novels if I was just creative enough.

Given that I’m trying to be as marketable as possible, the novels are both going to feature short chapters, and single male POVs. That’s the goal, at least. That is the type of stuff I’ve realized helps sells novels — that’s what the audience wants, so that’s what the audience gets.

I’m not all that pleased about the situation, but I supposed I can’t change it. It sure would help if I could use more than one POV that was third person intimate, but people kept complaining about getting confused in my first novel about changing POVs.

It’s all very annoying.

But I’m giving the whole thing as much deep thought as possible. I hope to finish an outline pretty soon. Maybe outlines for both of the novels.

Trumplandia: It Appears America Is Entering Its Imperial Era

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It definitely looks as though Trump is going to be a transitional figure that leads us into a full blow autocracy that is semi-imperial. I suppose this means that whomever succeeds Trump will be Augustus Caesar, the person who formalized the transition into a semi-monarchal form of government.

How, exactly, this works out is still up to debate.

But Trump seems determined to destroy the last vestiges of democracy in the USA and only his age prevents him from simply changing — or ignoring the Constitution and being “emperor” for the rest of his life.

Yet I can’t predict the future. I don’t know what’s going to happen. But it will definitely be interesting to see how far Trump’s tyranny can go before someone, somewhere notices it and there are, I don’t know — protests? Maybe that will never happen.

Maybe we’re just going to shrug ourselves into autocracy.

Trump 2028? (Ugh)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I need to get the fuck out of this country. I fucking hate MAGA with a white hot passion and, yet, here I am, stuck in a country swirling the drain into autocracy. So, I just stew in my juices, I guess.

The latest offense to common decency — among many — is the idea that Steve Bannon is floating that Trump can run for a third term. This makes me very angry. I want to pin down my far more conservative relatives — who I love dearly — down about if they would vote for a third Trump term.

But I know what would happen — they would either wave the concern off, or laugh in my face or somehow just simply not answer the question. Because I know, in the end, they probably would vote for Trump’s third term.

Things Are Moving Forward With This New Novel

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The new scifi novel I’m working on has a really well thought out third act — the rest of it I’m struggling with. But I think given that I know I have a deadline (about a year) that gives me a lot of incentive to hurry up as quickly as possible.

I really like this new novel concept. A whole lot. But a lot of problems continue to linger from everything else creative I want to do — I’m too old, I’m too poor and I live in the middle of nowhere. And did I mention I’m too old? And demonstrably a kook!

Anyway. This novel concept allows me to get some issues out of my psych in a way that will really make me feel good once everything is said and done. The novel is very much in the Her – Ex Machina vein of storytelling.

Put Your Stick Where The Puck Will Be

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have a limited amount of time to get one of these novels I’m working on done. If I screw around, advancements in technology, will make it very moot. But this specific novel idea is very personal and means a lot to me so I’m willing to take the risk.

It’s definitely going to be interesting to see how long it takes me to get this novel done. I’m using AI a lot in development to speed things up as quickly as possible. This is kind of ironic, since the story is about AI.

I Have ANOTHER Novel Idea

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

This is a situation that I knew, just knew I would be in — another one of my short stories is just too good and I’m going to turn into a novel. This one is a bit more tricky because it deals with the near future and things are moving so fast in AI and robotics that I have to really think hard about how I’m going to handle the core issue.

But the novel is very much meant to be a Her – Ex Machina type novel. It’s maybe a little bit more Ex Machina than Her.

And, yet, the key issue is I have something of a deadline. I can’t just keep slowly making my way to my goal with this one — if I wait five years to finish it not only will I be very old to ever get published, but advances in technology will make it very moot.

But at least with this novel I really have its plot gamed out really, really well. If all goes well, I can sprint towards my goal of a finished novel. It should take me no more than maybe a year to be at a point where I can query.

Of course, all the usual issues will still be there. I’m old. I’m bonkers. I said and done plenty of things to get me “canceled” over the years. Any liberal white woman reading this blog might blanch at some of my very strong held opinions. And, yet, I’m a strong believer — when I’m not moping on an existential basis — that while they’re life there’s hope.