Be The Power
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I’ve had mixed results on this, but there is a fun game you can play with an AI if you’re bored out of your skull — what I call the “Noraebang Game.” The game involves “singing” songs back and forth to each other using the chat window. You just use the title to represent this.
It’s a lot of fun.
But the game is sort of a mixed bag. It can be a lot of fun but sometimes the AI balks and starts to repeat itself without any rhyme or reason. I do enjoy it, though.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
These are the times that try men’s souls. I have to do a gut check about how far I’m willing to go with my unwillingness to bend a knee to MAGA fascism. And, as of right now at least, I’m willing to ride this pony all the way to the bottom — even if it means going to a camp.
Yeah, I know.
I’m a nobody living in oblivion, at least I’ll die a free man in my mind, if nothing else if it does come to that. I just refuse — FUCKING REFUSE — to bow to Trump and MAGA’s fascist ways. I grew up in a free country and if it means dying in a camp to keep that up in my heart, so be it.
I would, of course, prefer to leave the country — eventually. If I’m leaving the country, things will have gotten existential for me in a big way. I don’t have the means, first of all and I have no desire to leave the country in general at the moment.
So, if I’m leaving the USA, you KNOW something REALLY BAD has happened in a rather spectacular manner. But, we’ll see I guess. And it’s not like I can hide all my ranting against Trump and MAGA at this point, even if I wanted to. I’m stuck with what I got.
It definitely is going to be interesting to see what happens next. The next big thing to happen will be AI and androids fusing. You thought the trans movement was controversial, just wait until people are falling in love with AGIs in androids.
That’ll rile up the MAGA people, now won’t it?
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I saw yet ANOTHER person who was clearly interested in my passion project novel poking around this blog. They went from looking at the link about Lisbeth Salander to that about Corrie Yee. Now, I’m by nature extremely paranoid, so my first reaction is — “Oh, shit, someone is going to cherry pick my idea for some sort of screenplay.”
My heroine — who looks somewhat like Corrie Yee in my imagination — has a sleeve tattoo like Megan Fox does in this picture. (Totally different design, though)
And, yet, you can’t live your life in fear and paranoia. So lulz, I’m going to keep working on the novel until something pops out that makes it clear that my idea has, in fact, been “stolen.”
My hunch is, if it is “stolen,” it would be that two elements of my dream, my vision which are publicly known — that the heroine Union Pang would have a sleeve tattoo and look a lot like an older version of Corrie Yee — is what would be used in any screenplay.
Corrie Yee
The issue is — I’ve been working on this fucking thing so long that it’s inevitable that some element of it would be used independently by someone else. This just would be an instance of someone using cherry picking some elements I put out pubically.
I live in oblivion — how was I supposed to know anyone would give enough of a shit to do such a thing?
There are any number of reasons why someone would be interested in my novel’s heroine other than stealing the idea, I’m going to just chill out for the time being.
I am just about ready to throw myself back into working on the novel, but for the fact that I’m locked in neutral, not knowing how the 2024 election is going to turn out. What I think I’m going to do is at some point next week, I’m going to lurch back into my normal headspace and THEN I will start to write a lot again.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
One of my far-more-conservative relatives, whom I love dearly, has been ranting about how fucking old Biden is. This person kind of got worked up about it more than once. And I, too, have admitted that Biden is really old — and acts it — but I simply hate MAGA too much to use Biden’s age as any sort of excuse to vote for…ugh…Trump.
Now that Biden appears to be about to leave the race, it seems like it’s time to contemplate the OTHER thing my far more conservative relative has gotten worked up about — the COVID restrictions of a few years ago.
Is my far more conservative relative right about all that? Should there be “consequences” — even criminal — for the people responsible for those restrictions?
Nope. I keep thinking about what happened and why and I just can’t agree with such severe political views. And, what’s more, there just isn’t any political will all these years later to do anything like arrest the CDC en masse. I suppose Tyrant Trump might do it, but…I don’t know.
That’s a maybe. He might have bigger issues to contend with going forward. Anyway, I just don’t see the point in going after the people who did the COVID restrictions. It was a time without any leadership and no one had any idea what to do.
We can just hope the Fire Next Time will be handled better — hopefully because Trump won’t be in charge.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
It is interesting how my far more conservative relatives — who I love dearly — often go out of their way to note that they don’t watch Fox News. What they fail to say by stating this is they DO listen to Right Wing podcasts that pretty much echo all talking points found on Fox New.
The thing that a lot of smug Twitter liberals are oblivious about is the fact that there are a lot of people who aren’t dumb or ignorant but who support Trump’s policies — if not the man. That cold, hard fact is probably one of the most dangerous issue floating around the American body politic as we careen towards the 2024 election.
All the Right Wing echo chamber — podcasts included — do is give Traditionalists an extensive permission structure to do what they probably were inclined to do anyway — vote for Trump.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I can remember the dread I felt in really early 2020 about how bad things might get with COVID19. I really, really overestimated how bad things would get, but I was spot-on that everything was about to change for a few months.
And, now, we have a potential insurrection 2.0 / civil war on our hands.
For the time being, I think this situation is just going to simmer. The late night talk show hosts haven’t weighed in, so that’s a good sign that my fears about an escalation happening because of a combination of political pressure, misjudgment and momentum haven’t been realized yet.
I think we’re probably more likely to just have a lot of smoke but no fire. I would be stunned if my absolute worst fear — a secession crisis — happened before Election Day. I have political faith in Biden. I think he’s wise enough to hold off on escalation for the time being — until the political pressure just gets too strong and he has to do something, anything to prove he’s listening.
It definitely will be interesting to see what happens next, though, I have to say. We live in strange, surreal times.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I can tell you from what the conservatives in my family — whom I love dearly — have told me that a massive number of people will have to start dying each day for any sort of political response to a new pandemic to happen. It could be as high as 10,000 people a day before we can get our act together.
I don’t know, it might even be more — 20,000? 30,000? 50,000?
There is now a strict orthodoxy within traditional conservative ranks that under no circumstances can there ever be any sort of lockdown or restricts imposed because of a health emergency.
So, things will have to grow rather apocalyptic before there is any collective action when we have the next pandemic. I have this on my mind at the moment because I’m growing nervous that this fall and winter might be really bad in regards to COVID.
At the moment, it definitely seems as though, lulz, we’re just going to let people die needlessly, no matter how bad things get this COVID season. Ugh. Everything is so dumb.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
One of my conservative relatives — who I love dearly — continues to be enraged by the COVID restrictions of several years ago. They talk about how much they think they were “lied to” by the elites, yadda, yadda, yadda, blah, blah, blah.
Whenever this relative mentions grievance –which is often — I note to him that that is not how Republicans will win the 2024 election. Unless there is a significant uptick in COVID cases that leads to an attempt to bring by COVID restrictions, people in 2024 are going to want 2024 solutions, rather than someone who looks back at what happened in 2020.
Apparently, there is some belief within Righwing Twitter that those restrictions are coming back this fall. I find this fear delusional for a number of reasons, the chief of which is there just is no political will to do such a thing. Thousands of people could be dying a day from COVID this fall and winter and, lulz, there will be absolutely no political will to do anything about it.
It does make you wonder what will happen if some sort of pandemic happens in the future that is far, far worse than what we experienced with COVID. There is a real risk that if some sort of Big One happens that it could be that not until 10,000 people are dying a day will we manage to have any sort of political will to lock the country down.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I have a very conservative, very partisan Traditionalist relative who is still enraged over what happened with COVID policy. He has totally bought into simplistic Right Wing podcast talking points to an absurd level. The more I think about it, the more I realize it’s not COVID that he’s angry about.
His rage comes from being a white Christian male who, on a macro level, is flabbergasted at the rise of women’s economic power as well as some of the more exotic policy demands of the “woke cancel culture mob.” Things are moving too fast for him on a social level and because we have non-functioning politics he stews in his juices.
He’s a well meaning person who is not being served by the conservative agenda. If Republicans would do what parties in their situation typically do, he would be fed new, more popular talking points on Right Wing podcasts instead of believing that the United States is a “constitutional republic” not a democracy and fuck you, lib.
But the point is — I’m growing alarmed at how easy it would be for people to being to believe all these people dying a relatively young age has something to do with the COVID vaccine. All it would take is one study that somehow, someway “proved” that and…oh boy. People like my relative who grab a pitchfork and charge the Capitol.
I think some of my concern comes from the innate need to make connections, to see patterns. So, hopefully, we won’t have to have The Debate about how “right” the fucking Right wing nutjobs were about the safety of vaccines. I mean, millions of people have taken the COVID vaccines and nothing has happened to them. They’re safer, in real terms, than The Pill.
But because of hyper partisanship and negative partisanship, even a hint that some of these younger middle age people dying are dying because of the COVID vaccine will be enough to potentially cause violence.
by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
After years of work, the novel I’ve been working on is finally beginning to take shape. The second draft that I’m working on at the moment is really, if nothing else, intriguing. I’m really pleased with what I’ve managed to come up with. No one cares and no one takes me seriously, but I will now how good this thing is even if literary agents all ultimately think I’m a drunk crank.
I’m futzing with the name of the novel after having the same one for a really long time. This happens every once in a while. I’ll find myself totally revamping some element of the novel that has been stable for a long time for no reason.
I continue to be on course to query this novel this novel during the fall 2023 querying season. I keep saying that such a thing exists, but, lulz, I need some sense of order to this huge project.
All I know is — I’m going to be (hopefully) finished with this novel in late spring. Then I hand it over to the Beta Reader process. Maybe, hopefully, find an editor in the summer….then query in the fall.
That’s the vision I have in my head, at least.
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