General Update

It’s cold, wet, windy and generally bloody miserable out there today.

And I have a headache, just above the right eye. They seem to be happening there more often, yet I was given an all clear on the head MRI.
My solution is to have a chocolate biscuit, drink some flavoured water and chill the BLEEP out.
And if that doesn’t work, the bed is only 5 feet away.

***

Cool! This water is purple! (Strawberry & Kiwi flavoured. Nummy num!)
Please note, water only appears purple when viewed from above due to refraction of light.
This note has been bought to you by Physics! Physics, keeping you bored since always!

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Ray Bradbury Challenge, Week 5.

Finished not long after midnight having written 1183 words.

It was an idea from the 26th that I’d scribbled down to avoid forgetting it. I think it worked fairly well and conveyed everything I wanted it too.

Zero desire to write today but I’m going to try to knock out a few paragraphs on “Survival” to get it a bit closer to completion. It was good to see the prepper tag attracted some attention to the blog, I’d also like to thank the people who responded to yesterdays post on depression as well.

I think the only way to cope is to try to keep living, focus on something you love.

I’ve got my writing and my goal to complete The Bradbury Challenge at least once.

I think we forget the benefits of such simple things, like a good hot meal when hungry, a nice cold drink when thirsty, a refreshing hot shower.
Even some soothing or ambient music to distract the mind from the jumble of daily life. All things that can lift you both physically AND mentally. Douglas Adams used to swear by the hot bath to relieve his writing-related anxiety.

The one thing I’ve noticed amongst people who have depression is we all appear to be high functioning creative types.
Any way, I’ve achieved my goal for today (and this week). Hopefully I can get a bit more writing done later.
I think lunch beckons first. Then a hot shower, once there’s some more hot water. ;-P

Still busy writing, kinda

As usual with the old depression issues and mood cycles, I’ve been up and down a bit this last week.

Wrote a short early this morning whilst in bed which I typed up (after several hours procrastinating) this afternoon.

A finished story of 213 words. Add that to the pile of completeds in the Bradbury Challenge folder.

If any readers of the blog have any ideas on how to cope with the lows, I’d love to hear from them.
I don’t get manically depressed, just incredibly low. No desire to write, or go out, or see anyone, or speak, or do anything.

Writing silly things about God

In the beginning, God created science fiction writers.

Then subcontracted them all for ideas at 5 cents a pop.
This TOTALLY explains why the Universe is in such a damn weird state.
_____________________________________________________________________________

In the beginning God said “Let There Be Light“.
Moments later someone complained & said
“What colour do you call that? I can’t even READ with it!”
Readers. We’re never happy.
Unless we’re reading.

Today I…

Typed up 5 finished stories. 3 went into the Bradbury folder.

Still have Survival to complete. Maybe tomorrow. Right now I’m hungry.

Settling the account for today.

Back From The War – 678 words.
The New Law – 432 words.
Marriage Vows – 372 words.
Week Five – 647 words.
Rewriting History – 840 words.

Five stories typed up, 2969 words in total.
Not a lot as none of them are very long but decent days output.

Ray Bradbury Challenge, Week 4.

Done in an hour or there abouts, written literally just after midnight.

I didn’t need a prompt or an image, I already had an idea and it wrote out pretty easily.

I’ve also decided, any other new stories that I don’t publish online are going in the Bradbury folder. It might be week 4 but I already wrote 6 stories with one underway and incomplete and a few more on the tv to be typed up.

It’s going to be a productive year!

A thought on sleep and dreaming

The memory of a subconcious brain is a weird thing.

It can remember EXACTLY what a junior school friend looked like in 1978 as you are sleeping in 2014.
(That’s thirty six years for the hard of maths! 36!)
But then sometimes you’ll present it with data it can’t remember.

I know roughly what a digital sampler SHOULD look like.
It certainly doesn’t look like a portable record player.

But it was quite funny when the music teacher gave me that when I asked for a digital sampler.
Admittedly they actually hadn’t been invented in the year I was asking for one.
(Having since checked, Wiki says yes they had.)
So it was quite funny to be given a portable record player with a completely serious look saying “Yes, this IS what you asked for.”
My brain is odd. And I have to live in it.

“This is the city. I work here. I carry a badge. I carry a badge.”

What’s occurring?

Time to give you an update on what I’ve been up to.

Obviously you already know I’ve finished this weeks Bradbury Challenge story.
Then said I was having the rest of the week off.
Best laid plans of mice & men, eh?

I’ve been writing.
I appear to be possessed by the demon of a writer.
And I’m quite enjoying it but it’s rather taking it’s toll on me.

Things I’ve discovered:-
Completed stories to be typed from last year! 23rd Dec, 24th Dec, 7th Jan, 17th Jan and 18th Jan.
And the story I posted a few days back.
And the story I started today, did 3 hours work on and wrote just over 3000 words of.
Oh, and five partial ideas/outlines/concepts that I jotted down to write at a later date.

This Bradbury thing is starting to have an effect.

What were we fighting for during Gulf War 1? Apparently NOT freedom of any kind.

Songs banned by the BBC during the first Gulf War, listed alphabetically

1  ABBA – Waterloo, Under Attack
2  A-ha – Hunting High And Low
3  The Alarm – 68 Guns
4  The Animals – We Gotta get out of this place
5  Arrival – I will Survive
6  Joan Baez – The night they drove old dixie down
7  The Bangles – Walk like an egyptian
8  The Beatles – Back In the USSR
9  Pat Benatar – Love is a battlefield
10 Big Country – Fields Of Fire
11 Blondie – Atomic
12 The Boomtown Rats – I don’t like Mondays
13 The Brook Brothers – Warpaint
14 The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown – fire
15 Kate Bush – Army Dreamers
16 Cher – Bang Bang (My baby shot me down)
17 Eric Clapton – I shot the sheriff
18 Phil Collins – In the air tonight
19 Elvis Costello – Olivers Army
20 Cutting Crew – I just died in your arms tonight
21 Skeeter Davis – End of the world
22 Desmond Dekker – Israelites
23 Dire Straits – Brothers In Arms
24 Duran Duran – View To A Kill
25 Jose Feliciano – Light My Fire
26 First Choice – Armed & Extremely dangerous
27 Roberta Flack – Killing me softly
28 Frankie Goes To Hollywood – two tribes
29 Eddy Grant – Living in the frontline, give me hope joanna
30 Elton John – Saturday Nights alright for fighting
31 Millie Jackson – Act Of War
32 Johnny Hates Jazz – I dont want to be a hero
33 John Lennon – Imagine, Give peace a chance
34 Jona Lewie – Stop the cavalry
35 Lulu – Bomm Bang a Bang
36 Mcguinness Flint – When I’m dead and gone
37 Bob Marley – Buffalo Soldier
38 Maria Muldaur – Midnight at the oasis
39 MASH – Suicide is painless
40 Mike & The Mechanics – Silent Running
41 Rick Nelson – Fools rush in
42 Nicole – A little peace
43 Billy Ocean – When the going gets tough
44 Donny Osmond – Soldier of love
45 Paper Lace – Billy, dont be a hero
46 Queen – Killer Queen, Flash
47 Martha Reeves – Forget me not
48 B A Robertson – Bang bang
49 Tom Robinson – War Baby
50 Kenny Rogers – Ruby (Don’t take your love to town)
51 Spandau Ballet – I’ll fly for you
52 The Specials  – Ghost town
53 Bruce Springsteen – I’m on fire
54 Edwin Starr – War
55 Status Quo – In the army now, Burnin’ Bridges
56 Cat Stevens – I’m gonna get me a gun
57 Rod Stewart – Sailing
58 Donna Summer – State of independance
59 Tears For Fears – Everybody wants to rule the world
60 The Temptations – ball of confusion
61 10CC – Rubber bullets
62 Stevie Wonder – heaven help us all

List taken from Sociology in Perspective – Google Books.

Co-workers, a free flash fiction story by Ray Daley

Co-workers.
17/1/14
By Ray Daley

Despite their very different backgrounds and cultures, two coworkers find enough common ground for mutual respect and a pleasant chat. Only one of them is human.

“Hey Deke, back from prayers already?”
“Hallo Marcus, yes. Prayers are over for today. God is satisfied.” said Deke.
“Good to know man! That God is a tough one to please. Did you catch the game yesterday night?” Marcus asked.
“Sorry, no. I was at study, must to be learning the English more better.” said Deke.
“Just say ‘must learn English better’, okay Deke?” said Marcus.
“Thank you for your help Marcus. You are a good man.” said Deke.
“Not a problem, my friend. Are you still coming to the barbeque this weekend?” asked Marcus.
“Sure am, my mate is looking forward to meeting you and your offspring.” said Deke.
“You know there’s going to be meat, right? That’s not going to be a problem like the last time?” asked Marcus.
“No, am in shame still. Have special tablet now, will fix all okay. No go crazy any more.” said Deke.
“Hey, it’s okay man. We weren’t to know chicken would set you off like that. There won’t be any there this time, I promise! By the way, Mister Baker came by the line earlier. He was real pleased with your progress, says he’s never seen anyone take to the welding line quite like you.” said Marcus.
“I am pleased to make him happy Marcus. Is not easy for one like me to find work here, trying best to make new home.” said Deke.

An alarm buzzer sounded all across the factory.

“Time to go back to work, would shake hands but would take too long. Would be late! You are good man! See you at weekend!” Deke said, smiling as he left the break room.
“You ain’t so bad yourself Deke, for a twelve armed creature from Centauri Two.” Marcus said to himself as he headed back to work.

THE END.

Authors Notes:- The bit at the top in italics was a writing prompt from reddit. I didn’t actually HAVE to write anything else this week as I’d already completed the Bradbury Challenge but I couldn’t resist knocking a quick story out and figured why not pop it on the blog for folks to read.

So here it is.