Monday Monday

Monday, continuing day-long rain, a giant piece of writer's block, and no end in sight. There's got to be something to pull out of the last couple of days? Politics is happily embargoed for the moment, and my mind is still being made up on the first season of 'Supergirl', so what else is going on? The GCSEs are finally in full swing, and causing their usual stress-related problems. I honestly don't know how my students are coping. My own memories of GCSEs are extremely hazy, but they didn't seem to be so numerous or so stress-inducing. Of course, I was never in danger of failing (such modesty!), so maybe it's just a case of different perspectives.

Ah, at the end of a not particularly long or busy day, it's good to think about going to sleep. People really need to sleep more. As a member of the nine to ten hour club, it's really one of the best things to do to stay healthy. If anyone other than llamas or mythical unicorns were reading this, I would tell them to stop drinking coffee and go to sleep instead. That's the top tip for the insane people of the modern day, and one only barely ahead of ditching sugar. Ah, health tips from the bizarrely tired might not be the best things to accept.

It's very difficult to write today. Nothing seems to be gelling. Even the last OU assignment was a wearisome and extended task, and it should have been a doddle given the constraints. On the flip side, 'Wordspace' has been a genuine pleasure to return to. Is it psychological? Is it hair cut time? It must be that! It's the old 'Inverse Sansom' syndrome, an old curse that persists from ancient times. It's always seemed miraculous to me that people with longer hair ever get anything done at all...

That's Monday for you, a mixed up bunch of words. Some posts on 'Supergirl' and the continuing 'Wordspace' will follow in the next few days. Now it's time to do the healthy thing and go to sleep. At last.

O.

Story: 'Wordspace' Phase II, Part VII

( Part I , VI , VIII )

Club's grasp of history wasn't comprehensive, but he had heard of the Ordinals. Near the beginning of their time, a group of words had formed, as part of the fundamental order of things. According to Truth, they had reflected the order of things somehow, but Club was more interested in practicalities than philosophies or history. He really needed his old friend Mystery for things of this nature.

"We will go and see?" Repeated First. "What is wrong, good fellow?"

"I am not used to interesting times." Club admitted. "This is all... very new to me."

"New to you, sir?" A second word interjected. "We haven't seen a non-Ordinal in numberless days!"

"And I have only heard stories about you."

"But they were good stories, I trust?" The second word persisted.

"Yes. Yes, they were good stories. You're right. We should go." Club turned with alacrity. (But not with Alacrity, who had been out running when this latest disaster had descended upon them.)

He led them back toward the Zone.

*    *    *

Dream and Surprise headed down the unexpected tunnel to parts unknown to her. Every so often, they would reach another side corridor or trapdoor in the floor, and descend further into the depths.

"This can't be possible. There's no way through the foundation of the Wordspace." Dream muttered disbelievingly.

"That's what we thought, but a chance experiment by that idiot Alchemy revealed the existence of these tunnels. He suspected a connection to the Well, but privately I thought that we were still above the foundation, that perhaps the super-fundamental layer was extra thick in these regions." Surprise couldn't help showing off his vocabulary. It was a little vanity of his.

"But..."

"Neither of us was exactly right." Surprise uncharacteristically stopped Dream before turning the next corner, and asked this question: "Are you sure you're okay, Dream? To be away - vanished - for so long. I think I'm trying to ask whether you can stand, and I know I'm spoiling something here, a surprise?" He looked very uncomfortable.

"Is there a choice? I'm still shaky, so stay close." Dream did her best to look brave.

"Very well." Surprise led his still recovering friend around the corner and stayed close as they came up against the guard rail forming the boundary of a small platform. The platform projected out from the side of mass of foundation, and before them... Well, Surprise summed it up best. "Voila, the great question. The world underneath our world!"

To be continued.

Little Droplets From The Stars

I've always loved to watch it rain. (Sometimes, it's also wonderful to sing and dance while walking in the rain, but we won't talk about that too much just in case the padded room beckons.) There's something magical about those moments of living in tune with the environment as you watch the drops of water fall from the stars, and creating that lush symphony of sound. Never has a sunny day been all that agreeable, but rain... rain is the bringer of a kind of holiness. Maybe 'purity' is a better word for it than 'holiness', on second thought. You might, for some moments of your life, buy into a Gaia orchestrating it all. For a few moments.

It all started at school, where I would spend wonderful lunch hours in the arched recesses facing out to the sports field, sometimes reading and sometimes just watching and listening. It was a tiny piece of magic, and a great exercise in embracing both solitude as well as communion with all of nature. Now, it continues from underneath the workshop stoop, or the trees at the top of the garden, or somewhere out on a country walk. Have you ever actually listened to raindrops on leaves? It's an amazing thing. Such moments are not to be missed.

Rain makes an environment interactive. No longer are you surrounded by a mass of emptiness; no longer is the world a boring nothing to walk through. There is something new; a medium through which everything becomes fresh and exciting. This probably sounds bizarre and eccentric, and of course it is, but not everyone has to be the same. Sometimes I wish we could emblazon upon banners that axiom: 'Not everyone has to be the same.' It's perfectly acceptable to prefer a rainy afternoon to a sunny day, although maybe not a rainy afternoon in mid-January, when you're afraid to step out in case you freeze into an icicle, while rain from the last walk clings to all your clothes and wonder how far away pneumonia might be. No, we're talking about slightly nicer days than those.

It's still lovely to stop and watch the rain fall. There's a gorgeous smell to it in some times of the year, and a sound that crosses over from audible to living in your unconscious. It was hard to live in Beeston and not have it rain so often, and in Hungary we went for months on end with not a drop of moisture from the sky. Months on end! It seems so bizarre a memory now. Endless days of cloudless blue skies. How unnatural for a coastal dweller from a stormy island it was.

Yes, the rain has fallen, and the world is a little cleaner. Today's planned post is pushed to another day, and now it's time to close.

O.

Deadlines

The final OU deadlines of the academic year are upon us part-time students, heat rash is pouring down upon the Welsh Mediterranean, the election battle busses have been launched, the Quirky Muffin is counting down to its nine hundredth post, and GCSE season has started! It's all go, and doesn't even include the horror of impending birthdays. If anyone would like to take over this hectic schedule, please send your details plus a hefty bribe in magnet loaded plastic penguins to the Quirky Muffin, with your answer to this tie-breaker question: 'I am lunatic enough to write your blog and make wooden busts of William Shatner because...'. Nothing less than twenty thousand words will be acceptable. Good luck.

There's something just a little bit romantic about an election battle bus, isn't there? A long road trip full of ideas and passionate debates? No? We're probably far too cynical to believe that now. People are not exactly prone to being persuaded of things any more, and that's about as far as I'll go. It would be nice to think that ideas could propagate and intermingle to make interesting and exciting new things to talk about.

Nine hundred posts would be quite a milestone. How difficult would it be to get there, I wonder? Could it be done nicely? Oh, we all know it will be done, but what exactly will be the content for these next twenty something posts... The ongoing serial stories have been on hold for so long that I'm not even sure what has been happening, but maybe it's time to dig in and actually read through what has occurred so far in 'Diary Of A Laundry Robot' and 'Wordspace: Phase 2'. It could take days of deciphering all the dead ends and mis-starts. Fortunately, the job is made easier by the aborting of 'The Glove', which had fallen completely apart. Somehow, it never quite worked. There should have been more penguins.

Maybe we need to use battle busses more literally. Would it be better, since actual debates are things from ancient history at this point, to use them instead for ludicrous tugs of war with old bits of anchor chain? It might be more interesting. Or they could be used to for chicken races? These are all just ideas; You can make up your own. Each one needs an appropriate mascot for their party on the dashboard though, or hanging from the rear view mirror.

O.

Television: 'Star Trek: Arena' (1967) (Episode 1x18)

It's the quintessential Kirk episode, it's the episode with the Gorn, it's the episode with the home-made cannon, and it's one of the first episodes where Spock calls his captain 'Jim'. It defines 'Star Trek' in many ways for those who discovered it early, and is one of the most anomalous episodes of a series which also features an episode with Alice in Wonderland and Don Juan.

Oh, 'Arena' truly is a special piece of daftness, but it does say something very special that cuts through the polystyrene rocks and fights to the death. It dares to say that humans are a developing and evolving species with a good future, which is practically unheard of in science fiction after the advent of HG Wells! It defines the essential difference between 'Star Trek' and everything else of its time. 'Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea' never did that! 'Star Trek' even contradicts it itself occasionally, but the spirit persists.

Overall, though, this is the episode remembered for the fight with the Gorn, where Kirk refuses to finish off his foe and wins the admiration of the Metrons. Surprisingly, however, there is about twenty minutes before that fight even begins, where the noble crew reluctantly set off to chase a ship that committed a massacre on a Federation colony and perform like interstellar policemen. It's pretty unusual in that respect, with a whole varied story playing out on many stages, especially with a location shoot to unwittingly visit the massacred outpost.

Are there better episodes of 'Trek'? Yes, there are. Are there better showings for any of the cast? Yes. However, this one does something special, where the whole exceeds the sum of its parts, and Kirk runs around making a makeshift cannon while fighting a bloke in a far too hot lizard suit. That's special, and ultimately you do believe we might have a better future after all, and it's one with rubber lizard suits. Be warned on that front.

O.

Snoozey Ramblings

Returning from a trip, there is always the joy of your own bed, the place where you spend more time than anywhere else. A bed is more important than a chair or a desk, even if you're not actually awake for most of the time that it's in use. Yes, your bed is the best part of coming home... Sleep away, merry voyagers.

Now, having slept off travelling weariness, it's time to get back to normality. What does that mean? Teaching and studying, studying and teaching. There's no escape! Oh, and some baking. There should always be baking. What is life without highly experimental biscuits, after all? Just a hollow mockery. There needs to be a good sugar-free carrot cake, though. How to do it? How?

The quest for a sugar-free carrot cake has been long but erratic. Months can pass with little thought on the subject, and then suddenly it pushes itself back into the mind. There has to be a nice one, that doesn't require fake sugar substitute. There has to be! Maybe it could be merged into the experimental cookie path? That almost makes sense. Actually, it makes a lot of sense. It... could... work...! ('Young Frankenstein' has a lot to answer for.) We might be putting on the Ritz.

Oh, that bed is really calling now, after three students and the pressures of helping with exam preparation. It's a tough balancing act, as the exams move closer and closer, between past paper practice and explaining just why things happen and how the questions work. Every fibre of being demands teaching and illumination of the mysteries while the hours tick by and you are cornered more and more into drilling with past papers. It's tough.

Now to sleep, and perchance to dream. Hopefully, the nightmares of the last few nights will not recur. The Charmed Hockey Stick of Security should see to that. Worry not, it will be explained one day.

O.

Story: 'Train Story', Concept

With the 'x' now bluntly pencilled into an electoral box of doom, and an enjoyable trip over, it's time to get back down to business. However, what should it be?

---

Story: 'Train Story', Concept
The train chugged along the tracks quite happily, steam and smoke trailing from the locomotive. I was at peace with the world as I watched the slow bend go by from the restaurant carriage's platform.

In the distance, there was a lake, glistening in the evening light, with a few small boats sailing in leisurely fashion. It all looked very relaxing.

"Excuse me, sir." It was a voice behind me, on the platform. Probably a conductor or porter.

"Yes?" My peace broken, I turned resignedly. It was neither a porter nor a conductor, but instead a woman in very plain clothes. In a crowd of passengers, she wouldn't have stood even a small jot.

"Train detective Jones, sir. I've been observing, and have some observations, if you would be interested."

Inwardly, I sighed. Sooner or later, someone always tried to change the rules. Maybe it was a mistake, though. "Observations about what? The beautiful scene out there perhaps?"

"No. Actually, it relates to the activities in the Poker Car, and the methodologies of your opponents." The detective was being as discreet as possible, as was her duty.

"Cheating? Deception? Creepy goings on amidst the usual shenanigans?"

"Perhaps."

"Oh well. It was getting cold anyway. Lead on, Lady Macbeth."

The detective led me back into the carriage. A herd of mammoth came into view as the bend finally came to an end, but I missed them. I always seemed to miss the mammoth.

This will eventually be expanded into a story.