Two Words I Would Like To Change, Please

Hello!

I have been absent for a long time.

I have no explanation for the above, but it's often weird when a person who has been absent for a long time suddenly returns without a single mention of his absence.

That being said,

I have been absent for a long time.


I've got that off my chest now. What was I going to talk about?

Oh, yeah.

There are two words in this beautiful and convoluted language of ours which I believe are both overused and misused. These two (seen below) are:

Nerd

and

Obsessed.

I shall begin with a scrupulous, over-analytical discussion of the word "nerd."

If you watch popular television/movies/etc., it may be easy to discern that the word "nerd" is used often as a derogatory synonym for the word "virgin," and vice versa, where there is nothing (emphasis on "nothing") wrong (emphasis on "wrong") with either.

Here's an example: in the show "Supernatural," Sam Winchester spends an episode snooping through a boy's closet trying to ascertain the character of said boy for his own mysterious reasons. In the aforementioned closet, he is seen observing a Star Wars T-Shirt whereupon he says "Tchah!" and then he says, "Virgin!" in an ill-favored tone.

I don't feel like explaining further, and I am not writing an essay for an English class, so my commentary on the example I have just mentioned consists of the following directions: after you read the example, re-read the preceding thesis and connect the two.

But there is another usage of the word "nerd" which I also find irritating and slightly demeaning. If you spend any time at all on the internet (which you do, otherwise you would not be reading this blog post which is posted, strangely enough, on the internet) you will notice that the word "nerd" is used to separate people who know These 18 Facts About Star Wars from those who don't now These 18 Facts About Star Wars. Even if you know 17 of These 18 Facts About Star Wars, you don't qualify as a nerd, or a "true fan," and therefore your fanship of Star Wars is inadequate, no matter how much you love the story, characters, setting, or theme.

I may be wrong or over-sensitive, but that is the way I feel it is.

If the problem I've perceived does indeed exist, I think I might have a bit of a solution. If we replace the word "nerd" with the word "devotee" we can eliminate the negative/superior connotations attached to it and start with a fresh word which nobody uses, and which therefore doesn't have any negative connotations that I know of. I know what the word "devotee" means, but I forget the precise definition, so I'll provide one for my own amusement below:

dev·o·tee

noun

1. a person who is very interested in and enthusiastic about someone or something.

That about covers the word "nerd" as people mean to use it, without any of the derogatory or superior baggage attached. And that's all I have to say about that. 

The second word I think is misused and overused is the word "obsessed." If you're like me, you will have learned from your therapist that an "obsession" is an intrusive or unwanted thought that replays in your head until you die. Being "obsessed" is not endearing, pleasant, or fulfilling. It is not fun. It is exhausting. The phrase "I am obsessed with" is not, in my book, synonymous with the phrase "I love," but this is how it is used. 

I'd like to suggest, therefore, that people instead use the word "enamored" instead of "obsessed" to describe whatever it is that gives them immense pleasure or passion. For example, instead of saying "I am obsessed with The Lord of the Rings," I like to say, "I am enamored with The Lord of the Rings." Because that is a true statement. Again, I know what the word "enamored" means, but again, I forget the precise definition, so I'll post one below, again, for my own amusement: 

en·am·ored

verb

1. be filled with a feeling of love for.

I think that's the meaning people are aiming at when the use the word "obsessed."


That's all I have to say about that. Beth out.

Goodbye!

Yours etc.

Point Of View

Hello!

I have a situation.

Actually, I have many situations compiled into a single situation which is My Life, but among these is one situation on which I would like some advice from fellow connoisseurs of Fiction.

Here it is, and this is it.

My Protagonist is having a problem with me, i.e. the omniscient, all-knowing Narrator, getting inside her head. I need to get inside her head, because that is where part of the story takes place. One of my characters lives inside her head. Without her head, the rest of the story becomes less interesting. I need to get inside her head. And, as the omniscient, all-knowing Narrator, I ought to be able to get inside her head.

I was thinking about this the other day, and I said to myself, "Self, maybe you don't have to be the omniscient, all-knowing Narrator. Maybe the story would be better told from Gillian's point of view." [My Protagonist's name is Gillian]. Then I thought, "Hey, that's a pretty good idea, Self. Have a banana." So, I tried writing a little in the first person. Just as the view of a wake is best when seen from inside the coffin, I found that for the most part, this bit of story I'm trying to upchuck is about fifty-seven times more palatable when told from my Protagonist's point of view. Her voice is clearer, more idiotic, and more passionate, and she feels like more of a person than a plot-device. I made a mental note of this, and I thought to myself, "Self, write the story in the first person. This is a first person story, and first is the person in which the story shall be written. Write the story in first person, Self. Write the story in first person."

[Side-note: By now, you may understand what an obnoxious being my soul is and I hope you can appreciate the fact that I have to live with it every damn day]

However,

I wrote more of the story in the first person, and I encountered another situation, a little more difficult to solve. I need at least part of the story to be told from my Protagonist's point of view. However, there are parts of the story some of which my Protagonist knows very little and others of which my Protagonist knows nothing. This is deliberate. I want my Protagonist to go through life doing this and that and not realize that the consequences of her actions are being twisted by Something [God] so that even those consequences which result in death and destruction have an overall positive effect on the story as a whole. This is something I want the reader to recognize, but not the Protagonist. The Protagonist has to remain mystified, because like all human beings, she's an utterly confused, lost, restless, and dissatisfied soul [i.e. as in St. Augustine's quote "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee"] but that does not mean nobody's looking out for her.

And I don't want to be preachy about it. The original point of the story was to try to amuse people with the contents of my absurd brain, but I need to put some Seriousness in it as well because it's there and I can't help it.

I forget what I was talking about.

Oh, there it is.

The point is, I need my Protagonist to narrate her part of the story, but there are parts I need her not to know about. This eliminates the possibilities of

(a) having her narrate the story from Purgatory where she can now see her life as a complete picture

and

(b) having her narrate the story after compiling information from all the participants in it.

I suppose I could still do (a). But I don't really want to. Should I? I don't know. That's partly what I wanted to ask.

My current solution is to tell parts of it in first person and parts of it in third person. I think I can do this. I know what parts need to be in first person and which parts need to be in third person, and I think I can separate the two so that the reader does not get confused or throw up his hands as if to call upon God to explain to him what gives writers so great a desire to mystify the readers of this little vast world, so cold in its abandonment, yet so sweet in its endeavor to find joy in pain.

I forget what I was talking about.

There it is.

I think I can have the story told alternately in first and third person without the reader getting confused. My question is, to what extent does the concept make you want to weep and tear out your hair before throwing yourself to the lions to escape the cruel whims of amateur authors? Does it sound like it could be palatable, if executed correctly? In the words of Aragorn and Thorin, what say you?

Please comment, if you have an opinion. If you don't have an opinion, comment anyway so I can say Hi. If you don't want to comment, don't comment [unless you have an opinion].

Thank you!

Beth out.  

How To Stop Feeling Fat

1. Stop adjusting your pants.

2. Stop adjusting your shirt.

3. Stop tightening your muscles.

4. Stop sucking in your gut.

IT WORKS.

Also,


5. Look at Renaissance paintings of women.

Like this one:

And this one: 

And this one: 

Stupidity and Scrupulosity

Hello!

We interrupt this program (this being whatever it was you were doing hitherto) for a brief harangue on what Lemony Snicket might call "The Anxious Clown." 

 The Anxious Clown, as you may know, is the name of a restaurant in A Series of Unfortunate Events: Book the Third: The Wide Window, but it's also a good way to describe the juxtaposing characteristics that I'm trying to portray in the absurd bits of writing I call My Book. I outline these characteristics now in an effort to align the synapses in my alleged brain and to try to discover more about the people I'm trying to bring to life. 

My three protagonists whom I'm going to refer to as G, M, and C are different, but they share two underlying characteristics: each possesses his own brands of (1) stupidity and (2) scrupulosity, traits that humans generally do not want to have, but I'm a writer, and my object is to make the little people in my brain as miserable as possible until the story comes to a satisfying conclusion. 

Since G is the primary protagonist whose point of view overlooks the majority of the story in my head, I'll start with her. G is not stupid in the classical sense as an airhead or a bumbling idiot, but in the sense that she tends to over-analyze the circumstances in front of her, which clouds her vision. This kind of stupidity goes hand-in-hand with her particular form of scrupulosity, which I'm going to call Social Scrupulosity. This kind of anxiety causes the sufferer (G) to worry constantly that everything she says or does has a negative effect on the rest of mankind. I say it goes hand-in-hand with Over-Analysis because I believe Over-Analysis is caused (at least partly) by Social Scrupulosity. G's brains imagine every possible outcome (all bad) of The Way She Acts because she's afraid that one of these outcomes could have struck her compatriots on the face, and now it is her moral duty to make up for it. 

M has a more obvious kind of stupidity in the sense that he's Legitimately Stupid. The Gilligan kind of stupid. His brand of scrupulosity is meant to save him from his stupidity. I don't know what you would call it (whoever you are), but for the purposes of this post I'm going to call it Religious Scrupulosity. M knows very very deep down that he's an idiot, and so he compensates for his stupidity by basing his morals on The Rules. If he follows The Rules, there's no need for him to do any subjective analysis or to use his personal (bad) judgment on What To Do In A Situation. If the authorities forbid or endorse certain actions or behaviors, then so does M. Unlike G, M doesn't suffer from his brand of scrupulosity until the outline in my head I call Book 3. 

[Note: I'd like to clarify that I'm not opposed to religion in the slightest and that in this specific and complicated instance then it would have been better for M to rely on his guts instead of what PG Wodehouse would call Scripture Knowledge.]

C, I think, has the best kind of stupidity and the worst kind of scrupulosity. His stupidity, unlike M's, is not real stupidity, but mere Absent-Mindedness. In fact, Absent-Mindedness, as a species, can be mistaken for either stupidity or wisdom, but in C's case it's invariably mistaken for the former. Unlike G and M, C doesn't suffer from his stupidity in the least, but it is for that reason that his stupidity is used to give him relief from his scrupulosity. C's brand of scrupulosity is difficult to sum-up in just a word or two, but I think it can be done by calling it Existential Scrupulosity. Put simply, C feels unworthy of being listed under the heading "Human Being." He hasn't done anything particularly wrong, but due to some glitch in his brain, his mere existence in of itself is wrong, which makes him wrong, which makes everything he does wrong, no matter what it is. If he ends up in Hell, then the flaw in the universe is corrected, and if he ends up in Heaven, it must be by some clerical error. C therefore uses his Absent-Mindedness as an escape and is subsequently perceived by his fellows as one of Nature's idiots. 

I don't know why I'm explaining this. 

Actually, I do; I just momentarily forgot. 

To resume: I've found that my purpose in writing down the story I've accidentally thought up is to watch my imaginary friends and kindred spirits give their scrupulosities the middle finger and learn to embrace their little stupidities. My hope is that G will stop apologizing and M will begin to trust his own conscience and C will live and not feel guilty for it. I find stories of success against self-remonstration inspiring, but they're sometimes hard to come by and I needed one more. 

I say that like the story's a good thing, but in reality it's kind of a load of bull****. It's really bad. I've been re-reading bits of it trying to make it better and I've had to stop and reel about eight times per minute. 

Actually, it's not that bad. It's only sort of bad, but then it's sort of good occasionally, so I think I'll finish it. 

Quotes for Scrupulous Humans

"And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good."  ------John Steinbeck

"No man knows how bad he is until he tries very hard to be good." --------C.S. Lewis

"It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people don't want apologies, and the wrong sort take advantage of them." ---------P.G. Wodehouse

"Dear Sirs: Regarding your article, 'What's Wrong With the World?' I am. Yours truly, G.K. Chesterton." ---------G.K. Chesterton

"I am an evil man-cub, and my stomach is sad in me." ---------Rudyard Kipling

"There is no hurry. We shall get there one day." -------A.A. Milne

"There was already a deep black wordless conviction in him that the way to avoid Jesus was to avoid sin." ----------Flannery O'Connor

"My daddy used to tell me not to chew on something that was eating you." ------Cormac McCarthy

"What I say is, if a man really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow." ------P.G. Wodehouse

The Properties of Plastics

The following post is my way of memorizing the properties of different types of plastics I'm supposed to have memorized by Thursday. This post was made for the sole benefit of me, and was not meant to amuse or instruct anyone else, unless you're in FST 319 with me and need a way to memorize said plastics as well. The bolded words are the properties of the corresponding plastics in the above heading.



I. Polyethylene.

Once upon a time, there was a princess called Polyethylene who lived in a magical kingdom. She was sad because her mother was dead and stiff. But luckily, Polyethylene was strong and tough, so she was able to make her mother a coffin, and the coffin was easy to make and to process, besides which it cost less than the average coffin (used or new). It was also resistant to chemicals and gas permeable. 

The End.

II. Polypropylene.

Now, Polyethylene had a sister named Polypropylene, who was very much like Polyethylene's daughter, High-Density Polyethylene, in many respects. However, High-Density Polyethylene was not very good at using the castle's injection mold to make plastic containers, so she asked Polypropylene for help and Polypropylene was better at it because she, like Polyethylene, was strong and tough. However, High-Density Polyethylene soon became jealous of her aunt's skill at injection molding, so she threw her chemistry set at Polypropylene. Fortunately, however, Polypropylene was chemical resistant. For revenge, High-Density Polyethylene accused Polypropylene of being a witch and had her burned at the stake, but unbeknownst to her, Polypropylene was also heat resistant and would not burn. Then High-Density Polyethylene tried to drown Polypropylene, but Polypropylene was not only heat resistant, but moisture resistant as well, a feature she had purchased for a very low price. Then High-Density Polyethylene thought that she could kiss-ass her way into learning how to be good at the injection mold as well, so she went back to Polypropylene and tried to butter her up, but Polypropylene, as it happens, was also grease-resistant. In the end, High-Density Polyethylene managed to cultivate a great respect for her aunt because of how versatile she was, and they all lived happily ever after.

The End.

III. Polystyrene

Now, Polyethylene and Polypropylene belonged to the family of the Polyolefins, but there was another family called the Substituted Olefins who ruled another province of the land, and in this family, as in the Polyolefin family, there were two daughters. The eldest of these was Polystyrene, who was something of a pain in everyone's bum unless she had her doll whose name was Polybutadiene with her. She was also fond of peanut brittle, which was easy to process, and she always made it clear when she wanted some by insulating the walls of the freezer so that everyone's ice cream melted ahead of schedule. She was also versatile. That's all I got to say about that.

The End

IV. Poly Vinylchloride

Polystyrene, as you know, had a younger sister, and her name was Poly Vinylchloride, but everyone called her PVC. PVC was something of a liar, but fortunately her lies were transparent and everyone could see right through her. When she made off one day with the peanut brittle, her family punished her by pouring chemicals onto her, but she was resistant to chemicals and developed a long-term stability, which made punishment very difficult. They tried burning her at the stake like Polypropylene, but she, too, was flame-resistant and would not burn, and they tried leaving her out in a storm, but she had great weatherability and refused to die from exposure. Finally, however, they put PVC in a blender and found that she was easy to blend, and after she was blended completely, they thought what wonderful potato-pancakes she would make and they shaped her into patties and tried to fry her in butter, but unfortunately, she was also grease resistant. So instead, they sold her remains at a low price and lived happily ever after.

The End

V. Poly Ethylene Terephthalate

Now, there was a third ruling family in this kingdom, and they lived under the name Polyesters. In this family were two brothers, the eldest of whom was called PET. His proper name was Poly Ethylene Terephthalate, but few remembered it, even though he pronounced it for them clearly. It hurt his feelings a little when his subjects could not remember his full name, but he was a tough prince and minded it as little as he could. Once he wasn't feeling well, and his mother tried to give him some gas-X with a glass of water, but PET turned both away, for he had an effective moisture barrier as well as a gas barrier, and could not be troubled by gas, nor could he combat his stomach ache with a glass of water. Everyone else lived happily ever after.

The End

VI. Polycarbonate

Now, PET had a younger brother named Polycarbonate whom everyone called PC, because he was always on his Personal Computer. PET once grew tired of his inattentiveness to Real Life and tried to break PC's PC, but the PC was very durable and would not break. He tried to burn it and scratch it, but the PC was heat and scratch resistant, and soon PET found himself aimlessly throwing sparks and bricks at it like the dad with the killer doll in The Twilight Zone. He then discovered that the PC was covered in a transparent force field which made it resistant to chemicals as well as virtually indestructible.

The End

A Thought On Attempting To Shock People

Because I'm very bad at talking about my writing, and because one must do that at which one is bad, this will be another post about the unfortunate document on my computer that I call 'my book.' 

As of now, I'm only halfway done with Draft 3 of Book 1, I've barely started Draft 1 of Book 2, and I've got just an outline in my head of Book 3, but I know what I want the overall effect of the ending of each one to be. In a word (or four), I want to shock people. 

Maybe 'shock' is a strong word. I don't know if I actually want to shock said people per se, but I have an idea of what I want Reader X to say when he's done reading said unfortunate documents: 

Book 1: "Gadzooks and goody gumdrops, but that actually makes sense!" 

Book 2: "Hellfire and damnation, where the $@*& did that come from?!" 

Book 3: "No, dammit, I told Character X not to do that and by George he did it!" 

Plotting-wise, I think I've done all right with each one. Execution-wise, I'm not sure. I'm attempting to get the above reactions by 

Book 1: Hinting at the conventional romantic-comedy "twist" and then swerving at the end to my own "twist," while keeping the philosophy behind the romantic-comedy "twist" hints intact. 

Book 2: Focusing on the external conflict of Character A and then jumping in at the climax with the internal conflict of Character B which explains the reason why Character B caused said external conflict with Character A. Also by complicating the mess with melodramatic guns and tomatoes. 

Book 3: Continuously enforcing how hunky-dory everything is throughout the narrative so that Reader X will try to make himself believe that it couldn't possibly be all ruined at the end, and especially not by Character C. 

These are the methods behind my attempts to twist my endings. If any of them conflict with the usual (or unusual) methods of Good Writing, please let me know so I can punch a wall and throw away my laptop before I fix whatever-it-is that would cause a reader unnecessary grief.

Thank you!

Beth out.