Category: thinking

  • Wot up?

    Image of a writing journal and a pencil.
    Photo by Dariusz Sankowski on Unsplash

    I’m going to be posting less often over the summer. I think so, anyway.

    Why?

    I have a couple of irons in the fire, among other reasons:

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  • Half-penny thoughts | 12jun25

    a path in the middle of a dark forest
    Photo by Wes Hicks on Unsplash

    I’m doing some spiritual alchemy this morning. You know, calcination, dissolution, separation… yada yada yada. Fancy words for a messy process.

    As most of you know, I don’t have much patience with fancy language to describe simple things. I also don’t have much patience with elaborate processes when the processes themselves should be (and tend to be) simple.

    Stepping back…

    I was thinking again, about this process of rewilding my spirit, getting back to the beginning. Part of that involves taking what you perceive yourself to be and going all Zen by seeking out the face you wore before you were born. Or, as the kōan would have it, before your parents were born.

    [A kōan, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a Zen “public case” meant to help one realize satori, otherwise known as enlightenment.]

    What better place to set as a destination for rewilding your spirit? Your original face, before even your parents were born!

    Before nurture came around… Before your nature evolved…

    What face did you wear?

    And can you find it again?

    Note: For the curious, my philosophy is largely Taoist informed by Zen, my spiritual practice is largely animist, influenced by panpolytheistic understandings (with many of those trappings removed). Confused? Now you know why I think these kinds of thoughts.

  • sixteen

    Sixteen years ago (to the day), I woke up with a monster of a hangover. Well, it was a hangover if you can have a hangover when you’re still drunk… To save my life, I couldn’t tell you how much I had to drink the night before. Probably close to 24 bottles of ale, chased down with half a quart of Jameson. I might have cleaned up the rum that was in a nearly-full fifth… Was there some tequila? I’m afraid it is all a fog.

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  • Storytime

    Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

    I just got to the stage where my fiction subdomain is getting becoming functional. The keyword is “functional”, but it is far from finished/polished and the content quality there is. erm, lacking at the moment. Of course, it is purely for testing ideas and functionality, so it will eventually be wiped.

    It is not currently behind a “maintenance mode” wall, so if you want to see how the Fictioneer WordPress template demos on my site, you can check it out at fiction.ravensweald.com.

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  • Experiments in stereo

    Picture of an audio soundboard
    Photo by Anthony Roberts on Unsplash

    I am curious; there’s an idea that might be interesting to pursue. I’m not sure it is a good idea to pursue, but it is definitely interesting.

    Are any of my readers interested in scratching that Sisters of Mercy (or similar musical act) fantasy and write some lyrics for a song in that flavor that I have already written save for the lyrics? The flavor is more “First and Last and Always” than “Driven Like the Snow“, for those of you familiar with the band, although it might have a touch of “Lucretia, My Reflection” to the sound as well. Bass and drums are a bit more on the Mission UK side of the equation than Doktor Avalanche. [If all of this means nothing to you, that’s okay! Think gloomy rock.]

    No need to sing them (unless you want to).

    Tentative working title: “Living With the Ghost of You” (open to modification, but a repetition of this line over the “chorus” section currently works in my head).

    I can modify the song structure somewhat to fit the lyrics if the right ones come my way. Or the other way around. I think (at the moment, anyway) that it might be more fun if participants didn’t hear the music they were writing lyrics for…

    If you want to see if I think what you write will work, drop it in the comments below. The basic (current) structure is:

    • verse
    • verse
    • chorus
    • verse
    • chorus
    • bridge
    • verse
    • chorus to fade

    All verses would probably fit with a 4-lines/verse structure. Or 2-lines/verse if the lines are longer. Bridge may be left instrumental, but let me know if you have injections that work (no “babybabybaby” stuff, though, puhleez).

    Any takers?

    I can’t promise it will work, but it would still be fun to see what y’all come up with. And who knows? I may ask for your permission to use it!