A Melange of Musings

This is an environment for me to say something about nothing, and say nothing about something. I will keep adding nothing to it until I have something, which will accumulate until I have nothing. I will update on a regular basis as long as nothing comes to me. As soon as something comes to me, I'll update on an irregular basis.

If that made perfect sense to you, then you think like I do. You talk to yourself because you're the only one who listens, and your favorite color is a transparent shade of opaque. You're probably capable of swallowing your neck.

~ I would rather know nothing than know everything.
I would rather be dead than know nothing.
I would rather enjoy life than be dead.
I would rather know everything than enjoy life.

~ Correct spelling means everything. Consider the impact of missing a single letter. Example: On a resume you meant to type "Public Relations Expert". By missing a single letter, you typed, "Pubic Relations Expert."

~ It's not cheating if the game lets you do it.

~ Many misuse the word "potential", as in, "S/he has potential." I told a friend (Novalyyn ) in an e-mail recently: "... when someone views a person's work and admires it, that means the person's potential is already being used, and is thus already in the transformative process of becoming kinetic. To say that one has potential is to say that they are not using a talent. So, with this in mind, I now would rather say that someone is 'rising' or 'growing'. These are kinetic words that reflect the ongoing process of progress. 'Potential', by definition, is stagnant - it implies that a spark is needed to make you shine. I prefer to say that another log on the fire will make you shine more brightly."

~ There can be no light without a darkness in which to place it, and without light there can be no shadows. (An original phrase, but not an original thought.)

~ If the unexpected will happen, then how can anything happen? In this frame, the unexpected becomes expected, and the expected won't happen.

~ A wise man once said, "Oh, ****, that hurts!" See, the wisest among us is still only human.

~ I don't have too much empty time. I am always engaged in some worthwhile occupation, even if it's purposeful sleeping.

~ If fate controls our lives, it is as much an injustice as a trial by executioner.

~ This I believe to be the core of pessimistic thought. It requires a bit of a twist of logic, but is that not how optimism and pessimism work? They are merely a difference of perception.

         All human conflict is either Human vs. Self, Human vs. Human, or Human vs. Nature. In the conflict of Human vs. Self, no matter which side wins, our hero is vanquished. In Human vs. Human, Human, of course, loses no matter the outcome. And in Human vs. Nature, Nature has the clear advantage of longevity and home territory, and will long outlive Human even if conquered. In other words, in any conflict - and conflict is unavoidable - Human is doomed to fail.

~ Whenever the mood strikes you, engage in a sudden burst of random behavior. Say or do something unexpected, or at least unexpected for the situation. Why? I figured that random behavior provokes random thought, and random thoughts are seeds of inspiration and innovation.

~ Respect works like a bank. You can only withdraw so much without paying anything back, before the bank stops giving you money, turns its back, and demands repayment.

~ There is no such thing as insanity. There are just different brands of sanity, and many people seem to prefer the taste of only a certain few.

~ A semicolon can be called a "half-assed mark".

~ It seems to me that God must be watching the works with one hand over "Manual Override" and the other over "Abort", just itching to push a button.

~ The saying "Thank God it's Friday" doesn't quite work. Humans set up the weekly schedule. Friday is named after a Norse god. It seems God doesn't have much to do with it. How about "Thank Thursday it's Friday"? Thank Thursday for ending so Friday can come.

~ A quote from my story, "Master Function": "Funny how uncertain you can feel even when you know it's a sure thing." (It was a comment from a reviewer that made me decide it was quotable.)

~ War is like a bunch of bees on one side of a hive, sacrificing their lives to leave their stingers in the walls on the other side.

~ "It can be interesting, the unintended metaphors and symbology that can be found in something as it's picked apart... Of course, if something is picked at too much, it tends to fall apart." Quoted from an e-mail from Novalyyn , a talented story-weaver I have the pleasure of knowing well, and have come to love.

~ Everyone who has ever made a leap of faith has flown for a while, even if a safe landing wasn't guaranteed.

~ The Groundhog Day irony: People look to a creature that's been living underground for weeks, to find out about what's going on in the sky.

~ More wisdom courtesy of Novalyyn : "look at the probability of things, and very few things should happen, except those that should happen all the time, but don't"

~ If "ass" backwards is "ssa", then does that mean that the Social Security Administration is ass-backwards? I bet few would argue with that....

~ Another bit of sideways thinking from Novalyyn : "Each day that [passes] takes one from in front, and puts it behind. Note that right, and it'll seem days are going double...."

~ You're not an internet addict until you start using "lol" in spoken conversations.

~ You're not crazy until you start referring to yourself in the third person plural.

~ The glass-is-half-empty/full contrast of optimism and pessimism is actually rather mild. An extreme optimist will see the glass as completely full: half full of water and half full of air. The extreme pessimist will brood because he ordered a soda.

~ Fiction is larger than life. Truth is stranger than fiction. Does this mean that truth is far removed from life?

~ Language may be the cause of certain forms of insanity. Words are insufficient to convey most of the ideas that are of greatest importance to us. And how often does silence feel more comfortable than words? The compulsion to express ourselves in words may be an affront to what is natural in us, binding the thought processes that once were free -- chaining our true selves to grammar, definition, and censure. Perhaps some "insanities" are the mind's rebellion.

~ Everything's kooler when spelled with a k, and even Kooler when spelled with a kapital K.