The Idea Oubliette

I’m feeling a little agitated and jittery today. My internet access is down due to some nasty snow and wind. Are the two related? They might be. I know I’m certainly missing my twitter friends and feeling less in touch with the world. How long is this weather going to hold? I can’t look that up. Sure, I could pull out a radio and listen in, if I had one. I might somewhere, but I’m at the mercy of the broadcaster to decide when to report the weather and how much of it to report. Some argue that internet access should be a basic human right. Does this point of view hold water? I suppose it could be argued that since the internet allows us to draw together into a larger community that it is an essential part of improving the human condition. Its use in political organizing and to connect dissidents in repressive regimes can certainly help make the case for it as a basic human right. Is the jitteriness really from not having the internet? My doctor did just increase my dose of modafi...

Empathy is the ability to look at another person, see their emotions and experience a sympathetic emotional response. It’s an ability present in humans and chimps, and perhaps some of the other equally intelligent animals out there. It’s what helps us care for and about those in need around us and rejoice in their success. It’s generally considered to be a female trait, but I think it helps to define us as human beings. An uncaring perspective, relegated to simply reacting to the emotions of others without understanding them, can lead to a worldview unable to take that dimension of the human condition into consideration. It’s easy to see how empathy could have helped our distant ancestors. With the ability to care about the suffering of others they were able to see a need for compassion. This mutual support would have allowed for closer knit communities and more caring for those most in need. Some studies have found that people with conservative viewpoints are less likely to have...

I have never had the pleasure of traveling to Europe before. In fact, I’ve never left the borders of North America, having only visited parts of Canada and the US. In June 2010, it seems that this is going to change; my father will be taking me to Belgium both to visit relatives and see the sights. Realizing how easy it would be to simply take some of that time to visit the United Kingdom gave me the idea to have a few tweetups with my UK tweeples, and of course, see the sights. My basic idea is to take a week of my European trip to travel through the UK. I’m planning to have stays in London, Liverpool and Edinburgh. There’ll be a plane trip from Halifax to London, then a train trip to Liverpool, followed by another train trip to Edinburgh, and finally a plane to Brussels to join my father in Belgium. I’m planning to get to London between the 10th and 12th of June, with a departure from Edinburgh between the 18th and 20th of the same month. How much time I spend in each city will d...

140 characters is just not enough to do justice to the people I follow that make my Twitter experience so great. Either that, or I’d have to flood people’s timelines with many, many tweets. That’s just wrong... But if I forgot you, and you feel wronged by it, feel free to chew me out publicly in tweets. If I mess up the links to your twitter pages, I'm sorry. Beatings are encouraged. First and foremost: @ JardinDeSophie because she is my wife and the bestest. I don’t know where I’d be without her. @betagoddess One very special tweep who will be silent forever. I miss my mother. Good people: People who have engaged me in conversation, some of them have helped me through the hardest time of my life. @ ladyloki @ botticellirejct @ mergyeugnau @ bird42 @ ram327 @ WongoWoman @ CS999 @ doodledawne @ KingBobulousIII @ sundaeg1rl @ M20Mermaid @ damarisens @ mr_craig @ JulesHardy @ Noadi @ Angry_Atheist @ happy_atheist @ TheMadderHat @ kpibca @ Smithengarde @ Scr...

I’ve figured out what I want to be if I grow up: a writer. In fact, by writing this I’m living the dream, aren’t I? I guess things have been building up to this my whole life; I’ve been reading since I could, and writing even when I didn’t have to. Whatever my mood has been, as long as it wasn’t too severe, I’ve always written. When I was down, I wrote depressing poetry or prose. When I was up, I wrote whatever popped into my head. Now that I’m stable, I can take the time to write coherent, sensible articles. What are you going to write? It’s a good question, and I like it quite a bit. I’m going to write articles here, like the ones I’ve written so far. I’m going to write for HandmadeNews.org , with my first article there out just recently. I’ll always be writing emails. Sometimes I’ll write things down in my notebooks. If I feel like my writing is worthy of it, I might write a screenplay Josh Olson would enjoy reading. I wont bring it to him to read, though. If it’s good enough ...

I started programming when I was young, with the hopes of writing video games. I think a lot of kids start that way. When you like something, or someone, you try to emulate what you’re seeing. But how has that early dream turned out? They tell writers to write what they know. It’s good advice. How can you write about life in the Serengeti without have someone to give you a first hand account or having been there yourself? You can always use your imagination, and that’s all you can really do when writing fantasy or science fiction. It works for writing video games. How can you expect to write a genre you don’t immerse yourself in? These days I spend most of my gaming time playing casual games. I’m busy doing other things, and don’t want to spend long stretches just sitting at the console or computer. Recently I read an article about the kind of video games the most people tend to flock to. Typically they’re games that are relatively simple and involve sorting things in some way. It...

Here's a quicky I wrote trying to mix science fiction and horror a little. It was always a bit cold in space stations, Terry thought. Sometimes it made it hard to sleep on the metal deck plating, but then again, beggars can't be choosers. He'd been waiting for a transport for weeks, so he could hitch a ride out of Titan Station, but strangely, none had come. In his experience, even remote research stations like this one tended to get weekly supply shipments. There was no trouble keeping out of sight from the scientists on board, they were too consumed with whatever research they were conducting. Just as well, he thought, it gave him an easier time when dipping into the food stores. Not fantastic fare, certainly not 'an epicure's delight,' as the last transport's in-flight magazine had described his previous home's cooking. But then again, there was no beating Mars colony's Advanced Flavour Enhancer 3000; it made even stale bread taste delicious. He h...