The Eyes Have It

I’ve off-line for a while, at least as far as my blog is concerned. This is because of a number of reasons, the most memorable of which, for me, was the eye surgery I had back in April.

I have suffered from glaucoma for years now. I even have congenitally deformed eyeballs, which hasn’t helped. They aren’t quite spherical, which causes focus problems. I’ve worn glasses since I was 17. In March this year my ophthalmologist suggested I have cataract surgery and at the same time get drainage stents inserted to deal with the glaucoma.

Yes, that is my right eye in the picture above. And yes, it is scary. That’s how my eyes look, and have looked for years now. The bloodshot effect is caused by the glaucoma medication. I’m on three different eye drops for that. I use them three times a day and will do so for at least another month until it can be determined if my stents are working properly. I will then, hopefully, be able to go of the medication and my eyes should return to normal.

As for the cataracts, they are gone and artificial lenses have been inserted. That was fun an experience.

The surgery consisted of two operations (one for each eye) two weeks apart. The old lenses, the ones I was born with, were destroyed using a sonic lance rather similar, I guess, to Dr Who’s sonic screwdriver, except that it had to be actually inserted into my eye to break up the lens. The bits were then sucked out by a vacuum pump (I’m not kidding here) that was also inserted into my eye. The new lens was then put in place and the stents inserted in the bottom of each eye in a part called the trebecular mesh.

Naturally, I was under anaesthetic during these operations, which only took about twenty minutes each. The first one was fine. Although the anaesthetics were the “twilight” kind (which means I remained conscious during the operation, not that I fell in love with a sparkly non-vampire) I have no memory of the first operation. The anaesthetist introduced himself and said he would knock me out completely for about five minutes during which he would insert a needle under my eye to deliver the rest of the knock-out drops that would numb my head. That was fine by me, since I had no desire to witness (at the closest possible quarters) that part of the proceedings. He inserted a catheter into my arm and the next thing I remember was waking up in recovery. I have to this day no memory of the operation itself, or even being wheeled into or out of the theatre. My doctor said later that I was fully conscious, said hello the surgical team and followed instructions well. But the actual operation itself (mercifully) is a complete blank. Such is the nature of twilight anaesthetic.

Not so for the second time around, the operation on my left eye. I woke up during that one.

Strictly speaking, I was “awake” the whole time. But I have a memory of the last few minutes. The last thing I remembered the anaesthetist delivered the initial drug, while we talked about Canada for some reason. Then I became aware of being on the operating table. I couldn’t see anything: my right eye was closed and my left, the one being operated on, “saw” some weird things. It was like looking at a white sheet of paper over which someone had smeared orange marmalade. I know that sound bizarre, but that’s what I saw. I became aware of things “moving” behind the whiteness. I suppose those were the instruments inserted in my eye at the time. I could hear the surgeon talking. He asked me to move my head slightly to the left, which I did.

I wanted to let them know I was awake, so I emitted a groan. While I felt no pain  at all, there was a definite feeling of discomfort which made me afraid that I would start to feel pain. I wanted them to know I could sense something going on, in case they didn’t know that and it wasn’t supposed to happen. I groaned a second time.

There came more voices, I felt myself being moved and then a voice asked me to step down. I climbed off the gurney as my vision came back and sat in the recovery room where a kind nurse gave me a cup of tea and sandwiches.

I’m glad the “awake” episode occurred on the second operation. Had it happened the first time, going back for the second operation would have been much harder psychologically.

So here I am now, awaiting laser surgery next month. This is remove some “thickening” around the lenses and tweak the final touches to my eyes.

I now need glasses for reading, which I didn’t before. I used to wear glasses to correct my short-sightedness and now don’t have to, although I do wear some very weak corrective lenses when I drive because my long vision still isn’t quite perfect, and never will be.

So that’s been my health issues in the last few months. Recovering from such surgery doesn’t take long, but there is an extended period while the vision settles down and, as I said, I still need laser surgery in July.

Certainly not something I wish to do again.

Russell Proctor

 

 

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Child of the Night Guild – Andy Peloquin

Today, another review, this time of the fantasy novel Child of the Night Guild by Andy Peloquin.

Andy Peloquin isn’t afraid of a challenge. He likes his fantasy to explore the darker side of human nature, and with his book Child of the Night Guild (Book One in the Queen of Thieves series), he has certainly done that. His story about an innocent girl transformed through brutal training into a thief and killer is a gripping read all the way. This is partly because it’s a damn good story. The other reason is that, like his heroine, Peloquin successfully tackles a number of challenges many authors would quail at. In the hands of a lesser writer, much of this story could have gone tragically wrong.

The first of these challenges is the fact that his protagonist is a thief. She steals without remorse or compunction in order to survive. We like to think of our heroes as the good guys, but this girl is no noble-hearted Robin Hood, robbing people for a higher cause; she’s a crook. Making a criminal into someone we admire is a hard ask for a writer.

Secondly, he writes from the point of view of a pre-teen, and later teenage, girl. From Peloquin’s promotional photograph, I assume he isn’t one (the beard is a bit of a giveaway). As a writer of female protagonists myself, I understand how hard it is for an adult man to think like an 8 to 18 year old girl.

The final challenge he sets himself is that the premise of the book is based on child abuse. There’s no polite way of saying this. The dark side of humanity that he chose to write about in this book is the brutal, unforgiving—and unforgiveable—abuse of innocent children. There are publishers out there who refuse to deal with such stories, and so basing an entire series of novels on the idea takes guts. At times reading the book was a little disturbing, even for a seasoned horror and fantasy writer like myself.

Fortunately, Peloquin comes out on top with all three challenges.

The book is a bildungsroman, the story of an individual’s growth physically, mentally, morally and emotionally. We follow the heroine as she learns about the world in which she lives. There is no long introductory world-building in this book. Our view is as limited as the lead character’s for most of the first half. It is only later that the view opens out and we find out more about the world of the book. We adapt with her, suffer, eat, train, win and lose with her. I found within a few pages of the book that I desperately wanted to know more about her, empathised with her, cried for her. The reader learns along with her to hate the Night Guild as much as she depends on it to survive.

Peloquin has done his homework. The detailed descriptions of how to pick pockets, how to fight, how to climb walls, how to acquire other people’s property without their knowing add verisimilitude to this already character-rich book. I’d love to have dinner with the man sometime to find out more about him.

I look forward to the second book in the series, Thief of the Night Guild, out in mid-2017. I also will avail myself of Peloquin’s other books.

So I conclude with a heartfelt thank you to Andy Peloquin for writing probably the best story I have read in the last year.

Check out the excerpt below for a taste of Child of the Night Guild. And go to the links and buy a copy. If you don’t, the Night Guild might pay you a little visit when you least expect it, and you wouldn’t want that to happen.

Want to buy his book? Go Here for Amazon Kindle or here for Amazon Canada.

Writer Andy Peloquin. The beard is a giveaway: he ain’t no girl.

Andy Peloquin’s website here.

EXCERPT from Child of the Night Guild:

“Are you sure you’re doing it right, Seven?”

Seven scrunched her face, concentrating hard. “I’m doing it just like he showed us, Three. See?” She attempted to snatch the purse.

Three patted the oversized waistcoat Master Velvet had given him.

“I could still feel it. So you’re doing something wrong.”

Frustration mounting, Seven tried again, doing exactly as Master Velvet had taught them. Walk toward the mark. Bump into him. Dip two fingers into his pocket to hook the purse. Apologize to the mark and touch him with my free hand. Hide the purse in my palm and hurry away.

He shook his head. “That time, too. I can feel you pulling the purse out when you move away. Maybe you need to do it faster.”

“I can’t do it faster, Three. Not yet, at least.” Seven clenched her fists in frustration.

He held up a hand. “It’s okay, Seven. Give it time. You’ll get it.”

“Here.” She threw him the bulging, cloth-stuffed purse. “Let me try again.” Even as she tugged the purse free, the look on Three’s face told her she’d failed.

Her friend shrugged. “Still felt it.”

Seven ground her teeth. Master Velvet said this is supposed to be easy. So why can’t I get it right?

Three tugged the vest over his head. “Let’s give the bump a break for a moment.” He pulled a dun-colored cloak around his shoulders. “What say we give the snatch a try?”

Seven nodded. The snatch required timing and dexterity, but she’d grown adept at it. She walked toward Three, brushed against his cloak, and lifted the purse from the hidden pocket, all without breaking stride.

Three’s eyes widened. “Damn, Seven. I didn’t feel a thing!”

She beamed. “Well, at least there’s one thing I’m good at.”

Master Velvet strode up behind her and took her small, muddy hands. “You’ve got good finger-work, tyro.” He ran his calloused hands over her fingers. “They’re quick and nimble. With the right training, you could become quite the purse collector.”

“Thank you, Master Velvet.” She flushed at his praise. It was the first full compliment she’d ever heard pass his lips.

“Keep it up, Seven. Three.” With a nod, he moved to the next pair of tyros.

Three slapped her on the shoulder. “Look at that! You’re getting there.”

“Yeah. Now if only I could get the bump down properly.” She held out her arms. “Here, give me the vest and cloak. You’ve got to practice, too.”

As Three passed her the clothing, Twelve’s shout echoed through the Menagerie. “Damn it! You’re doing it wrong, you stupid sack of shite.”

Two met Twelve’s glare without a trace of fear. “How in the Keeper’s name can I be doing it wrong, Twelve?” Two was taller than Twelve, though not as broad. “I’m standing here in this vest. You’re supposed to be pulling the damned purse.”

“Well…” Twelve faltered, his face reddening. With a snarl, he threw the purse in Two’s face and stormed off.

Three snorted. “Looks like he’s not doing much better than you are, Seven.”

Seven glared at her friend. “That’s not saying much for me, you know. With those fat sausage fingers, he can barely fit his hands in the pocket.”

“There you go.” He gave her a broad grin. “You’ve got the advantage, at least over him. Just give it time and you’ll get better at it.”

She rolled her eyes. “Well, let’s see how good you are.”

“I’ll bet you a peach I can do the bump better than you.”

“You’re on!”

_________________________________________________________________________________

More about Andy Peloquin:

I am, first and foremost, a storyteller and an artist–words are my palette. Fantasy is my genre of choice, and I love to explore the darker side of human nature through the filter of fantasy heroes, villains, and everything in between. I’m also a freelance writer, a book lover, and a guy who just loves to meet new people and spend hours talking about my fascination for the worlds I encounter in the pages of fantasy novels. Fantasy provides us with an escape, a way to forget about our mundane problems and step into worlds where anything is possible. It transcends age, gender, religion, race, or lifestyle–it is our way of believing what cannot be, delving into the unknowable, and discovering hidden truths about ourselves and our world in a brand new way. Fiction at its very best!

Unlikely Hero – Richard G. Lowe Jnr.

Today another review, this time of Richard G. Lowe’s short story, “Unlikely Hero.”

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Traffic cops often have a bad day. Think about for a minute: while they are out there protecting us from bad drivers, whoever they pull over isn’t likely to be someone pleased to see them.

So take pity on Don, a motorcycle officer who is just doing his job when he pulls over someone he sees as driving very badly. Except there’s a reason for the bad driving. An urgent one. Like end-of-the-world urgent.

Richard  G. Lowe Jnr has crafted an exciting and quick-moving tale about what has to be the worst day in a patrolman’s life—or anyone else’s for that matter.

I admire Lowe’s simply-crafted words. He doesn’t bother us with long descriptions or great detail about motivations. He just gets on with telling the story, a style which matches the urgency of his narrative perfectly.

I found myself caught up the story and desperately hoping things weren’t as bad as the author paints—not because I necessarily wanted a happy ending for the characters but because the implications were just too ghastly. This is a scenario that might actually happen, which removes it from the usual thriller style of story.

I asked for something different and Richard G. Lowe delivered. I remain a happy and wiser reader. And a terrified one.

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Richard G. Lowe, Jnr:

After spending over 33 years in the computer and information technology industry, Richard decided to take an early retirement to pursue his dreams of becoming a professional writer and published author. Richard is a leader in the computer industry, serving as Vice President of Consulting at Software Techniques and Beck Computer Systems before settling down as Director of Computer Operations at Trader Joe’s. During his twenty-year tenure at that esteemed company, he focused on computer security and preparing for the possibility of disaster.

In addition to creating hundreds of articles for the web and blogs, Richard actively works as a professional ghostwriter. In that role, he has completed books on a wide variety of subjects including memoirs, business volumes, and novels. Because of his in-depth background in software management and computer security, Richard has ghostwritten a number of major books in those areas.

Additionally, Richard has published books of his own. His first two volumes, Safe Computing is Like Safe Sex and Real World Survival Tips and Survival Guide, respectively touch on the subjects of computer security and how to survive emergencies and disasters. Richard has also written and published a series of short eBooks on the aspects of freelance writing, including blogging and ghostwriting. Other published books include How to Plan a Party and How to Surround Yourself with Beautiful Women without Being a Sleazeball.

An avid adventurer, Richard has been a photographer for much of his life, with a focus on nature, scenic, performance and event photography. He has done everything from hiking in dozens of national parks throughout the country, to photographing various unique festivals and events, such as the Labyrinth of Jareth Masquerade Ball and the World Mermaid Awards Convention. He is well known in the Renaissance Festival and Belly Dance communities, having photographed over 1,200 dance events and 400 festivals. For several years, he photographed the Tournament of Roses parade in Pasadena, California.

Richard is currently working on a large number of short Kindle eBooks on a wide variety of subjects. Beginning in 2016, the first of a ten volume series of Science Fiction novels will be published.

One of Richard’s passions is to use the power of words to educate people on human rights. He believes the world will be a better place when human beings are treated with the full respect and dignity they are due.

Russell Proctor – http://www.russellproctor.com

Story Review: “When the Fleet Comes”

A review of a short story today: When the Fleet Comes by G. Scott Huggins.

I wanted something different, a story that didn’t follow traditional paths in sf. Here we have a fresh take on the “Stranger in a Strange Land” scenario, a man on an alien world surrounded by its native inhabitants (only this time he isn’t the only one).  This one has aliens, creepy but not too creepy, just enough to be different. I liked the way the aliens, the Hrredin, are different in subtle ways: Huggins drops in enough hints to show this is a very alien planet with very alien inhabitants, but not so much to crowd out the story with unnecessary detail. He paints a vivid picture with a few fine brushstrokes, letting us know only what we need to know, and inviting us to fill in extra detail as we see fit. I like this talent in a writer, letting the reader take a part in the creative process.

 As Sean, our protagonist, works his way through an unusual (and long) day he encounters people and events that raise questions about some all too human problems and traditions. Racial prejudice, the plight of immigrants, the nature and value of faith and the relentless need to preserve one’s species at all cost, including at the sacrifice of personal dignity and ambition, all receive treatment here, and Huggins is careful enough not to provoke us with one-sided answers.

 One of my reactions to a story is “would I read this again”? Is it captivating, thought-provoking, and just plain important enough for me to want to go through it at least one more time?

 The answer with “When the Fleet Comes” is an emphatic yes.

Russell Proctor http://www.russellproctor.com

 You can purchase a copy of the story here: When the Fleet Comes.

 

The Horror of Children’s Stories

This is repost from an earlier one. It’s still relevant though.

Picture this: a little girl has just thrown a bucket water over a Witch. What happens next is quite disturbing.

“With these words the Witch fell down in a brown, melted shapeless mass and began to spread over the clean boards of the kitchen floor. Seeing that she had really melted away to nothing, Dorothy drew another bucket of water and threw it over the mess. She then swept it all out the door. After picking out the silver shoe, which was all that was left of the old woman, she cleaned and dried it with a cloth, and put it on her foot again.”

Now let’s get this straight… a little girl calmly melts an old woman, sweeps the gooey slime she has become out of the door like so much swill, and then calmly cleans her shoe like this sort of thing happened every day.

You might think the extract is taken from the latest gore-filled treat from Permuted Press, but it’s actually from L. Frank Baum’s children’s classic The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, published in 1900. A children’s book. Of course, if you are only familiar with the 1939 Judy Garland film, you may remember the witch-melting scene was a little more wholesome. Certainly in the movie Dorothy didn’t have to clean up the disgusting sewage of what used to be a human being like she was doing a simple household chore. And in the movie version Dorothy felt pretty upset about the whole thing as well, even though the witch was evil and had tried to kill her.

Take another story: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. Now there are no violent scenes in that timeless classic, surely? Admittedly the Queen of Hearts threatens everyone with having their heads chopped off, but no one is unfortunate to actually have it done. But most of the violence of the Alice books is more subtle. According to Hugh Haughton in his introduction to the Penguin Classics edition of Carroll’s books (1998), there is an underlying theme of eating and being eaten in the book. The characters are in more danger of being consumed by other characters than anything the Queen of Hearts might threaten. Alice eats and drinks various substances and changes size; the baby oysters are consumed by the Walrus and the Carpenter; the Hatter is obsessed by tea and bread and butter. There is also, of course, more overt violence: the Duchess physically abuses her baby son, the March Hare and the Hatter try to drown the Dormouse in tea, and the terrifying Giant Crow threatens Alice in the forest.

It doesn’t end with those books. In Peter Pan by J.M Barrie, the fairy Tinker Bell is a right bitch. Her first act on seeing Wendy is to get Tootles to shoot her with an arrow in an attempt to kill her. He almost succeeds. Tootles is so distraught he asks Peter to kill him.

Now, the point is that these are probably not events most people recall when remembering these tales. But they are there in the original books.

There have, of course, been many criticisms of traditional fairy tales as being too violent. Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel and so forth contain considerable murder and mayhem. The difference between them and the more modern stories I’ve referred to is that these stories are folk tales, handed down over many years and added to, extended and changed over generations before being recorded by people like the Brothers Grimm. They were not written specifically for children. The adventures of Alice, Dorothy and Peter Pan were.

So what do we make if this? Are these stories in their original forms just too violent? I say “in their original forms” because each of those I mentioned has been “toned down” when made into films. Disney and Warner Brothers made a point of changing things so the stories were more wholesome for tender readers (or, in their case, viewers). Dorothy melts the Wicked Witch, but feels bad about it at least. Admittedly, modern versions of Alice (I refer specifically to the recent Tim Burton CGI extravaganza) may take liberties with the plot in which they do present a more dangerous version of Wonderland than the Disney version. But this is a modern trend, I submit, and I’ll mention it again later.

My point is (and I’ve taken a while making it) is that there is a wealth of trauma available to writers in children’s tales. Quite often where you wouldn’t expect it. In The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame, Toad not only steals a motor vehicle, he is actually in involved in numerous car accidents and is thrown in prison as a result. And I’m sure most of us remember the Narnia series by C. S Lewis, which tells of children not only fighting in wars but killing their adversaries with barely a nod at any feelings of guilt afterwards.

Writers might well find ideas in these tales. And that’s a good thing. While I’m not condoning the exposure of children to violence, death and horror, it certainly can entertain the adult reader and inspire the adult writer.

Back when these stories were written, I submit the world was a more violent place. There was no such thing as being an adolescent. One went from the caterpillar stage of childhood to the butterfly stage of adulthood without any inconvenient chrysalis stage of adolescence in between. People grew up earlier. Children’s books were violent because life was violent. It still is these days, but we don’t like to admit it and try to protect our children from its excesses. An example of this is the scene in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland where the Duchess throws her baby boy to Alice (who only just manages to catch him) after singing a song about how beating a child was a justifiable punishment for it sneezing. This would hardly have raised an eyebrow back in 1865. Children were beaten. The world was perhaps no better or worse than it is today, but violence was condoned more and seen as an acceptable solution to social and domestic problems. Carroll was using violence as nonsense, and perhaps as a comment on the philosophy of child-rearing at the time: the air in the Duchess’s house was full of pepper, the baby sneezed as a result, and so the Duchess beat him. Problem solved.

We would not condone such a practice today, even as nonsense, which is why this incident has not, my knowledge, been incorporated into any film adaptations of Alice so far ( I don’t include the Burton film there, as it is so far removed from the original story as to be a separate entity).

Burton’s film does, however, seek to make an adult vision of Wonderland (with a bit of Looking-Glass Land added into it). And that is how the horror of children’s stories can be used to good effect. Tales like Frank Beddor’s The Looking-Glass Wars is a classic use of a classic to create something new and insightful.

So horror is there in children’s stories. If you sit and read the originals and wonder why they all seem so different to what you thought they were about, or what you remembered when you read them as a kid, then I hope you can take a whole new delight in these children’s stories for grown-ups. And, as a writer, that they inspire you in your own tales of horror and fantasy.

Road Beasts

I stand on the corner and watch the

Cars rush by.

 The drivers, in cocoons of metal and glass,

Windows up, the world shut out,

Air conditioning on, radio LOUD,

Listening to the drive-time DJ

Serve his daily dose of stereo bubble-gum.

 Where are they going, these car junkies?

What is so important

They risk their lives to bet there?

 See the drivers:

A man, his face set in anger,

Huddles over his steering-wheel

Like he has to hold it on,

Fumes the traffic is too slow,

Mouths his frustration:

“For God’s sake hurry up!”

To the other drivers, who cannot hear.

 A woman, her back-seat driving child

Swaddled in safety harness, safety seat,

Safety-nappy, dummy,

Thumbs a text message on her phone

As the car inches forward at the lights

Like her child’s life was merely incidental.

 A young man, out to impress,

His penis-exhaust throbbing,

One arm propped out the window,

The other reluctantly, insolently,

Resting lightly on the steering-wheel,

A cigarette set in the corner of his mouth

At just the right angle to make the girls notice.

 Road beasts, the cars, pass by,

Spewing, roaring, rushing, purring like cats,

Chugging, crawling,

Deep-chested booms and stutters,

Carrying cargoes of the helpless.

 What would we do without them?

No way to get from here to our next bit

Of mindless triviality.

 I stand on the corner and watch the cars rush by,

And I wonder to myself

Oh, why? Why? Why?

 

Russell Proctor  http://www.russellproctor.com

 

Is 2016 over yet?

It’s been quite a year for me.

In January my mother died. Diagnosed with kidney cancer in December last year, she was given four to six months to live. She refused any treatment — at 88 years old, she figured enough was enough. Besides, her brain had given way to Alzheimer’s disease and she knew she didn’t have long to go before she wasn’t herself anymore. So she was happy enough to go. It only took a month from the diagnosis before she passed away in hospital.

After that life became different. I grieved for my mother, obviously, but the truth also struck me that I was now an orphan. And since I’d spent the previous five years as Mum’s carer and working part-time, the loss of her struck rather hard. Despite all my care and attention, looking after her as her brain died from the Alzheimer’s, she still didn’t make it. I continued to live in her apartment, and still do, since it came to me under her will.

But life wasn’t the same. Not just the loss of my mother, but just about everything else as well. Although I am now “my own man”, as some people have commented, I am still surrounded by Mum’s furniture, possessions and memories. Being my own man, no longer responsible for her basically 24 hours a day, has taken some getting used to.

Then there were other things. My workload (I’m a tutor and help schoolkids with their studies after hours) dropped off. One of my major employers halved my working hours–their right to do so, but it still made inroads into my income. And I didn’t feel much like working anyway. I kept saying to myself, and others, “I just need to get my head together”. I’ve been getting my head together for ten months now. Next year, I have promised myself, I will get back to serious work.

It’s been a weird year writing, too. After having three novels and six short stories published in 2015, this year’s haul is one self-published novel and one short story. That may sound a lot by some people’s standards, but my publisher dumped me this year as well, which is why the one novel was self-published. This didn’t make me feel good at the time. It still doesn’t.

And then last month I almost caused a serious motor vehicle accident. My fault entirely.

The thing that really sent me downhill just a short time ago was Trump winning the US election. I’m Australian, but who the US President is matters to the rest of the world, and Trump’s denial of climate change is a serious issue.

So I took a couple of weeks away from everything. No news. No social media. No conversations with people about anything remotely controversial. I dug out some storage cartons which held some of my old books. I hadn’t seen these in six years since I’d moved in with Mum. I found a lot of old friends among the books and decided to take a couple of weeks off reading, writing, working and ignoring the rest of the world.

That’s where I am now. I put myself down for the National Novel Writing Month again this year (NaNoWriMo) and haven’t kept up with it. I don’t see the need to turn my latest book into some sort of internalised competition. It will arrive in due course when it’s supposed to.

So here I am, just me and the cat and my laptop, and hoping that the year will finish up as soon as possible and I can maybe see something better next year.

To all who have wished me the best, thank you. To all you I have perhaps let down a little, maybe broken a promise or something, I apologise. I’ve been a very angry person for a long while now. My mother’s deteriorating health was one cause of that. My own stubborn character is another. I’m trying to be a nicer person.

Russell Proctor    http://www.russellproctor.com

 

Apparently, In Australia, We Eat Fairy Toast, Not Fairy Bread [Recipe]

For all you Aussies reading this, you can stop laughing now. I shit you not, some fancy food blog decided to reinvent Australian fairy bread. Along with a recipe bearing no resemblance to Australia…

Source: Apparently, In Australia, We Eat Fairy Toast, Not Fairy Bread [Recipe]

An Apology and a Warning

I almost caused a traffic accident yesterday.

My fault entirely. I did a lane change without checking or signalling and a man in a 4WD behind me had to slam on his brakes so much they squealed. I have no idea how close we came to colliding. He pulled up beside me at the next set of lights and quite rightly abused me for the total idiot I was.

To him, and to any other drivers in the vicinity who may have been alarmed or also had to take evasive action, I deeply apologise. It must have been very scary for the guy in the 4WD. Had we collided the total blame would have been mine. He saved both of us.

Why I did it was simply because I didn’t think. Through a single moment of impatience I put someone else’s life at risk.

I find lately that driving is becoming more and more stressful for me. Perhaps I should give it away, although that will have repercussions for work having to use public transport. It’s not just a “go to work and come home at the end of the day” thing for what I do.

But I get impatient when driving. I need to curb that, to consider others more. I must do that or cause a major accident sometime.

That was the apology. But there are some things, not related to driving, that I will not curb my impatience about, and certainly won’t apologise for.

There are things that make me mad about the way some people act. And if this sounds hypocritical, given my episode in the car yesterday, then that’s what it is. I don’t care. Being hypocritical does not make me wrong.

One of the major things about people that gets me mad is ignorance. Let’s face it, we have the capacity these days to find out more stuff about stuff than ever before. And some people choose not to. They blindly go on wallowing in ignorance for some reason, choosing to believe something simply because they want to, in the face of all facts to the contrary.

Another thing is pretension. I hate it. Some people spend all the time thinking the universe revolves around them, that they must be the centre of attention at all times, that they are one of “the beautiful people” and we must worship them. My cat does that. But then he’s a cat, he doesn’t know any better (and he’s cute as a button, which makes up for it). People should know better.

Other things: The selfish rich. “Trickle-down economics”. Conspiracy theorists. Braggarts. People who are cruel to animals or children. People who insist their way is the only way. People who know you are behind them on the escalator wanting to get through and refuse to move aside.

All of these and more.

My sociophobia doesn’t help. I hate being in a crowd. I’ve been known to choose not to do the shopping because there would be too many people in the supermarket. I hate waiting in a queue. I walk quickly, and have done so ever since I was a hurried (and harried) articled clerk for a law firm and had to move around the city in very quick time. I walk faster than most people. That makes walking along a crowded street a frustrating experience.

I know some of this is my fault. But here is the warning part of this post: those things that aren’t my fault I will continue to get mad about, continue to criticise, continue to harp on. They deserve my ire.

So I apologise for those things that are my fault. Even if I don’t know they are.

But the other stuff, not so.

 

Russell Proctor   www.russellproctor.com

 

 

The Past and the Present

Ok, so here’s a revelation: unlike every other language in the world, the English language has only  two tense forms. Past and present.

An example of past tense: The girl walked to the shop.

An example of present tense: The girl walks to the shop.

Simple, no? But wait, you say, what about all those other tenses that put fine shades of meaning to our deathless prose? Future? Conditional? Surely they are there, I’ve used them myself!

Yes, they are, but they use the past and present forms. English expresses the other tenses by the use of auxiliary verbs. So the future tense is formed by adding the auxiliary verb will to the present tense.  She will walk to the shop.

There are arguably (and that’s one of the things I love about the English language, that people can actually argue about the grammar of it) eighteen English tenses:

1. Present simple. She walks.
2. Present continuous. She is walking.
3. Past simple. She walked.
4. Past continuous. She was walking.
5. Present perfect simple. She has walked.
6. Present perfect continuous. She has been walking.
7. Past perfect simple. She had walked.
8. Past perfect continuous. She had been walking.
9. Future simple. She will walk.
10. Future continuous. She will be walking.
11. Future perfect simple. She will have walked.
12. Future perfect continuous. She will have been walking.
13. Conditional simple. She could/would  walk.
14. Conditional continuous. She could/would be walking.
15. Conditional perfect simple. She could/would have walked.
16. Conditional perfect continuous. She could/would have been walking.
17. Imperative. Walk!
18. Infinitive. To walk is a pleasant activity.

Notice something? All of the tenses are based on just two forms of the verb. Walk and walked. With a host of auxiliary verbs such as has, have, been, will, be, could, etc these two forms create all the other tenses.

“Ah!” I hear you say, “but there is a third tense form in that list. The  -ing form.”

Well, yes, there is. But actually, no, there isn’t. Walked is the past tense, but walking is…well, what is it?

The  – ing form is the present participle. English has two tenses and two participles. With a regular verb, like walk, the past tense is formed by adding -ed. Walked. But with an irregular verb, like sing, things get more complicated.

Walk (Regular verb)

Present tense: Walk (I walk)

Past tense: Walked (Yesterday I walked)

Present participle: Walking (I am walking)

Past participle: Walked (I had walked)

Sing (Irregular verb)

Present tense: Sing (I sing)

Past tense: Sang (Yesterday I sang)

Present participle: Singing ( I am singing)

Past participle: Sung (I had sung)

So we use the auxiliary verbs with the participles. Of course, with regular verbs the past participle is the same as the past tense. But not with the irregular verbs. And there are many  irregular verbs in English.

So, you know all this. Or at least, you do because you get the tenses right every day, you just don’t know the grammatical mechanics behind it all. So what’s my point?

For some reason, some writers want to write in the present tense.

Why? This tendency seems particularly endemic to YA and teen writing. But it has crept (creeps/is creeping/has been creeping/will have crept…another beautifully irregular verb) into other demographics as well.

It’s actually harder to write in the present tense than in the past. So why do it? To make the action more immediate, I hear some writers say. How is it more immediate? I just don’t get it.

Call me old-fashioned if you will, but present tense writing smacks of pretension in my opinion, except when used for specific effect. For instance, I’ve used present tense to describe a dream sequence. It is also used in dialogue. A lot of dialogue is in present tense except during recount.

But it’s worse than just my opinion. As a teacher I’ve noticed that many students today think that you are supposed to write in the present tense. Or, even worse, they get confused and start writing in the past tense, switch to the present and then back again. Even the other tenses get mixed up because kids these days see present and past tense writing used so randomly.

So stop it guys! Use it for special effect, like a dream sequence, but not otherwise. I know, Charlotte Bronte slips into present tense occasionally in Jane Eyre, and then back to past, but she was Charlotte Bronte.

Russell Proctor  http://www.russellproctor.com