IDEAS ON TUESDAY 624

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them? Regarding Fantasy, this insight was startling: “I see the fantasy genre as an ever-shifting metaphor for life in this world, an innocuous medium that allows the author to examine difficult, even controversial, subjects with impunity. Honor, religion, politics, nobility, integrity, greed—we’ve an endless list of ideals to be dissected and explored. And maybe learned from.” – Melissa McPhail.

F Trope: dark lord
Current Event: “In November 2012, satellite photos revealed a half kilometer long propaganda message carved into a hillside in Ryanggang Province, reading, ‘Long Live General Kim Jong-un, the Shining Sun!’. The message, located next to an artificial lake built in 2007 to serve a hydroelectric station, is made of Korean letters measuring 15 by 20 meters, and is located approximately 9 kilometers south of Hyesan near the border with the People's Republic of China.” (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/23/north-korea-hillside-homage-kim-jong-un)

Ardian Goodpaster tapped on his tablet-computer – t-comp – and said, “Look, you have to read this!” He held it out to her.

Noemi Zweifelhofer grunted, hunched over her own t-comp. She said, “Doar stai un minut!”

Ardian’s eyes grew wide and he whispered in German, “Ich denke nicht, dass Sie Rumänisch in diesem Augenblick sprechen sollten! Wir sind in genug Schwierigkeiten, wie es ist!”

Noemi finally looked up, her dark eyes flashing and said, “Do you think speaking in English would be all right?”

Ardian snorted, “Better than speaking Romanian. We can get in trouble for that…”

“You don’t think believing that Kim Jong-un is an incarnation of The Dark Lord will keep us out of trouble?”

“I didn’t say I believed it – just that it seems…logical given what Mom and Dad say about how he acted when he went to school here.”

“Your mom and dad were his friends! He hated my dad!”

Ardian shook his head, “I’d probably dislike your dad, too if he stuck my head in a toilet and flushed it…”

“That was a kid’s prank!”

“…fourteen, fifteen and sixteen times on ten different occasions in honor of the illustrious North Korean leader’s birthdays?”

Noemi glared at her best friend, then burst out laughing. Finally she said, “All right, it wasn’t a kid’s prank. But all of our parents agree he was creepy and mean.”

Ardian tapped the t-comp and said, “You really believe that the inscription means what they say it means?”

“‘Long Live General Kim Jong-un, the Shining Sun!’?” He stared at it then slowly shook his head. Noemi continued, “I know my Korean is adequate…” Ardian snorted, but she overrode him, “But I’ve cross-referenced this in half a dozen dictionaries.”

“So what do you think?”

She zoomed in on the image of the inscription then swung to the right, saying, “When it’s written like this, left-to-right and with the order of the characters – and given that the archaic form was used intentionally, it reads, ‘Long dominate Kim Jong-un, Darkest of the Dark Lords’.”

“And no one else in the world reads it that way?”

She held out her t-comp, “I wouldn’t say that.” Their eyes met and for a moment locked. Ardian felt the blood drain out of his face. She handed him her own t-comp. “Read it.”

He kept his eyes on hers then finally looked down. The headline was in German, from a recent edition of Die Welt. “Different Interpretation of North Korea’s Paean of Praise?” He read, looked at her.

“Scroll to the next document. Two weeks later.”

He did and read, “Interpreter Found Murdered”…

Names: ♀; ♂ Today, both are entirely Swiss names Image: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/98/71/e5/9871e52bbc09c525af21b8f6471eab15.jpg

WRITING ADVICE: What Went RIGHT With EMERALD OF EARTH – Part 1

In September of 2007, I started this blog with a bit of writing advice. A little over a year later, I discovered how little I knew about writing after hearing children’s writer, Lin Oliver speak at a convention hosted by the Minnesota Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Since then, I have shared (with their permission) and applied the writing wisdom of Lin Oliver, Jack McDevitt, Nathan Bransford, Mike Duran, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, SL Veihl, Bruce Bethke, and Julie Czerneda. Together they write in genres broad and deep, and have acted as agents, editors, publishers, columnists, and teachers. Since then, I figured I’ve got enough publications now that I can share some of the things I did “right” and I’m busy sharing that with you.

While I don’t write full-time, nor do I make enough money with my writing to live off of it...neither do all of the professional writers above...someone pays for and publishes ten percent of what I write. When I started this blog, that was NOT true, so I may have reached a point where my own advice is reasonably good. We shall see!

EMERALD OF EARTH has got to be the single greatest exercise in writing persistence in my long and varied writing career (see “Writing and Air Quotes” for a discussion of my writing career: http://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2016/02/writing-advice-31-writing-and-air-quotes.html).

As my kids and wife will attest, I started EMERALD twenty-one (!!!!) years ago in response to the wave of dystopian science fiction aimed at young adults. Of COURSE there has always been "dark" science fiction -- HG Wells' WAR OF THE WORLDS springs to mind! In fact, I was really and truly hooked on science fiction by the grim future in John Christopher’s THE WHITE MOUNTAINS books. Lois Lowry’s THE GIVER came when I was in high school, and Margaret Atwood’s THE HANDMAID’S TALE rose to the top NOT as teen lit, but as subversive science fiction – not for teens, but for adults who were looking for MORE after rereading the HARRY POTTER fantasies a dozen times.

Then came the deluge of the “book-to-movie” best sellers like THE HUNGER GAMES and MAZE RUNNER following on the heels of what I think of as “teen carnage” novels where, like the Harry Potter series after GOBLET OF FIRE – teens slaughtering each other and being slaughtered by evil adults became totally normal for YA fiction – because while they were ostensibly for teens and YA, adults were reading them in DROVES.

There’s been some serious research on this as well: “Why Do Adults Read Young Adult Novels?" Monica Hay, Portland State UniversityFollow, Portland State University. Department of English Publication Date 6-2019

Subjects: Book industries and trade, Publishers and publishing, Young adult literature (Abstract)

“Young adult books are widely read by adults. Through interviews with publishing professionals and a survey of 2,139 participants, several reasons were discovered regarding why adults read young adult literature.

“In the research, the most common reasons were the influence of Harry Potter and Twilight, the relatability for millennials, the social media presence of YA online, and the success of women writers in the category. Survey participants had more to add. The survey themes were nostalgia, ‘less pretentious,’ ‘faster reads,’ diversity, escapism, ‘less graphic,’ and perhaps most importantly, hopeful.” (https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/eng_bookpubpaper/35/)

So I started to look at a DIFFERENT future than the doom-and-gloom presented by some of the books even adults were reading. What if Humanity launched into a serious exploration of the Solar System? I was compelled to give my novel a title that would draw in YA readers expecting carnage in their reading. I changed it to HEIRS OF THE SHATTERED SPHERES, with the intent of writing a series. And I still WILL if sales of the first book go well. If it comes out in March 2024 like I’m HOPING IT WILL, it will be EMERALD OF EARTH.

It takes place in a future where Humans have launched into an exploration of the Solar System thoroughly and methodically. Using a hollowed out asteroid called the SOLAR EXPLORER (SOLAREX for short!) as a base, they will spend a year at each planet, probing, landing on, collecting samples, data, and answering questions without having to worry about shipping tiny amounts of material “home” to be analyzed by experts. The experts were right there.

But at one point, I thought EMERALD OF EARTH was boring and would have had a hard time finding advocacy among the more exciting titles (except THE GIVER; that was hardly self-explanatory, nor was THE HANDMAID’S TALE or even Butler’s 1979 masterpiece, KINDRED). Flashy titles had replaced subtle, so I had to do the same. I came up with EARTH ATTACKED!

Ugh. Then I tried LEGACY OF THE WOUNDED WORLDS…Worser and worser!

Finally, I resorted to something I’d never done: I sat down with a thesaurus and the “Legacy” title and found synonyms for all of the words and wrote them on slips of paper. Then I went to a table and began to rearrange them, speaking them out loud countless times until I found one title that held up under the stress of repetition.

HEIRS OF THE SHATTERED SPHERES. Instead of a single book, though, I suddenly had an idea for a SERIES.

Emerald’s story would be its own story, separate from eleven others but intertwined with them because they all live aboard the ship, , but hers would be the first of a much, much larger story. I wouldn’t have her defeating Inamma in one fell swoop. She needed to fight for her existence, so I made Inamma smarter than it had been before and more subtle.

Even more though, I needed Emerald to have “kid problems”. She needed to deal with issues every kid on Earth needed to deal with. So I gave her friend problems. She wanted them but couldn’t seem to keep them. But what began as a nebulous “I can’t get friends”, needed a firmer foundation.

As a guidance counselor, I’d started working closely with several autistic students and had come to understand them just a tiny bit. The ones I dealt with were brilliant – but challenged by the world they lived in. I realized that my growing understanding of these young people might be an aspect of Emerald that I hadn’t really developed.

Once I started to understand Emerald, other things fell into place – things like answering the question, “What do teenagers DO on a spacecraft called SOLAREX, committed to a twelve year mission?” Next time, I’ll look at the development of “school for teens in space”…

Image: From Author's File, Bruce Bethke, Rampant Loon Press

IDEAS ON TUESDAYS 623

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Octavia Butler said, “SF doesn’t really mean anything at all, except that if you use science, you should use it correctly, and if you use your imagination to extend it beyond what we already know, you should do that intelligently.”

SF Trope: Humans are Something Special in the universe
Current Event: http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2010/08/15/interactive-infographic-of-the-worlds-best-countries.html

While this doesn’t rank HUMANS, it does rank COUNTRIES on Earth. What if there were a list like this of planets with intelligent civilizations – and Earth was last? It would explain The Fermi Paradox, wouldn’t it? Fermi Paradox: “In an informal discussion in 1950, the physicist Enrico Fermi questioned why, if a multitude of advanced extraterrestrial civilizations exists in the Milky Way galaxy, evidence such as spacecraft or probes is not seen.” A clearer definition would be: “The apparent size and age of the universe suggest that many technologically advanced extraterrestrial civilizations ought to exist. However, this hypothesis seems inconsistent with the lack of observational evidence to support it.”

“What are you doing here?” Bintou Kogda asked in French.

Ouedraogo Ye replied in the same language, leaning closer to her than he’d ever done to woman – excepting his mother and sisters – and said, “The same thing you’re doing here. I’m bored and this sounded exciting.”

Bintou leaned away. She’d managed to maintain her sense of modesty despite the crazy American obsession with sex. She shook her head. She should have known that Ouedraogo would want to embrace that insanity.

Even so, she bumped his shoulder as a young man stood at the front of the room and clapped his hands, saying, “Let’s get this gig hummin’!”

Bintou puzzled for a few moments. Though she spoke English as well as anyone who completed high school in Burkina Faso, American idioms still left her totally confused. Especially when they piled them on top of each other. She could only deduce that it meant “This meeting will now come to order!” because others started taking seats. No one sat in ordered rows, it was more like a circle without any definition.

After the chairs were done scraping across the floor, the young man said, “Hey! My name’s Edgar Bailey and I’ll be the moderator tonight for this first meeting of the ET Discussion Society. If you’d tell us your name before you speak, it’ll help us get to know each other. To start things off, I’d like to toss this out to the group.” The lights dimmed abruptly and a projector hanging from the ceiling flicked on, projecting a web article.

Ouedraogo groaned. Bintou had managed to sit across the group from him. She also kept her dismay to herself. Edgar stood on his tiptoes to locate the source of the groan. He snapped, “What’s wrong with this article?”

Ouedraogo stood up and replied in English. Bintou shook her head. It was unlikely that his heavily accented English would impress the people in this room as he said, “First of all, the article is almost twenty years out of date – the information is patently wrong...”

Edgar cut him off by saying, “The information is unimportant...”

Ouedraogo fired back, “It’s important to some of us! You’re perpetuating a stereotype!”

Bintou sighed. So much for keeping a low profile. She stood up and said, “What Ouedraogo is trying to say is that he and I are from Burkina Faso and this list places our former country at the very bottom as the worst country in the world from 2008 to 2009. Unflattering, to say the least. But what you’re implying by using this is that Earth has somehow gotten on the bottom of some interstellar ‘worst place to live’ list and that that’s the explanation of what puzzled Fermi and Hart?”

Edgar blinked slowly, massively as Bintou sat down. A moment later, there was a crash as Ouedraogo knocked over his chair and stormed out of the room. Beside her, a young woman with wildly uncontrolled, curly red hair nudged her and said, “Nice going! I’m glad someone shut down the pompous windbag before he went on his superior rant about Fermi.” She snorted, “You even mentioned Hart.” She raised an eyebrow and added, “You probably made his most-hated person list today!”

“I didn’t mean...” Bintou began.

“Don’t worry, you just made it on to about sixty people’s ‘OMG, I have absolutely GOT to get to know this woman!’ list. You’re certainly on mine. I’m Ginny Phleger. What are you doing after the meeting?”

Names: ♀,♂ Burkino Faso, America
Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e1/Falcon_9_Demo-2_Launching_6_%283%29.jpg/220px-Falcon_9_Demo-2_Launching_6_%283%29.jpg

RECONCILIATION BLOGS, MOVIES, AND TV SHOWS -- all the links you could ever want!

I never realized -- until now -- how important the subject of reconciliation is to me. Below you'll find the several POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAYS I've written over the years that deal with reconciliation.

Enjoy...though I'm not sure that's QUITE what this is about...

SPIDERMAN 3 AND RECONCILIATION

https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2024/01/possibly-irritating-essay-spiderman-3.html

STAR TREK, ALZHEIMERS, AND RECONCILIATION

https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2019/02/slice-of-piemaybe-alzheimers-star-trek.html

INTERSTELLAR AND RECONCILIATION

https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2014/11/possibly-irritating-essays-interstellar.html

"ONE MILLION NINE-HUNDRED THOUSAND" - a short story of mine that was not published...

https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2016/08/writing-advice-can-this-story-be-saved_28.html

"A QUANTUM ECHO AT TACONITE HARBOR" - another short story of mine that was not published...

https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2023/04/writing-advice-can-this-story-be-saved.html

Site and Image: https://nationaltoday.com/national-reconciliation-day/

PIE: Sentimental Flicks? Spider-Man, Men In Black, Guardians of the Galaxy, Adam Project, Free Guy

I WILL NOT use a Program Guide from a World Con to jump off, jump on, rail against, or shamelessly agree with the BRIEF DESCRIPTIONS. This explanation is reserved for when I dash “off topic”, sometimes reviewing movies, sometimes reviewing books, and other times taking up the spirit of a blog an old friend of mine used to keep called THE RANTING ROOM…

Do you find yourself tearing up or weeping uncontrollable whenever you watch Spider-Man: No Way Home, the Back To The Future Trilogy, AVENGERS: Infinity War, Men In Black 3, the Adam Project, or Free Guy?

No? It’s only me?

Maybe if I just explain a bit, you’ll recall the time you found yourself crying during these emotionally charged movies and you’ll agree with me!

OK, I’m starting with Spider-Man: No Way Home (herewith: NWH). First of all, we all know that Peter Parker is a young man with no real male role-model left in his life. His mom and dad were killed (mostly in a plane crash, though sometimes murdered) and he was raised by his Aunt May and Uncle Ben. In NWH, we find three versions of Peter who show up in HIS universe via Ned creating multidimensional portals and them hopping through. Their meeting is convenient at first, until they start “sharing” and they all find out they’ve lost someone important to them. (PS: Apparently ALL the Spider-Mans in this movie are weepy, too). But the scene that gets to me is the very end when they all say “Goodbye” to each other and Peter NWH knows what’s coming. He tells Doctor Strange that he wants EVERYONE to forget that Spider-Man is Peter Parker, and the look Strange gives him – and the understanding on Peter NWH’s face make me weep harder, until I’m using my hanky to wipe my eyes.

In Men in Black 3 (MIB3), J (Will Smith) has been bitter his entire life because he grew up without a father. Sadly, the reason I never questioned this is because I fell prey to the “Black Father” meme – that “all black men are bad fathers and leave their families”. While my personal experience KNOWS it's not true, if you ask honest White people, they’ll usually admit that they’ve subconsciously bought into the lie. It's so insidious that even J in the movie has bought into it.

MIB3 wouldn’t work if anyone watching it assumes that J’s dad is gone for a noble reason. If we're honest, few of us THINK that J’s dad, Colonel James Darrell Edwards Jr. died a hero, protecting his country. When J witnesses that, realizes that HE was the little boy that K neuralizes…I weep.

In the Back-To-the-Future Trilogy (BTTFT), Marty McFly’s dad is a spineless, fawning twerp whom NOBODY, not even Marty can respect. Instead, Marty has latched onto Doc Brown as a father figure and willingly follows him through alternate timelines and helps him fix the past, present, and future that MARTY screwed up by creating a terrified but BRAVE George (his dad) and altering the timeline. He and Doc spend the rest of the first and the next two fixing the timeline…

The place where I find myself weeping every time is when Marty tries to keep Doc Brown from being murdered by the “Libyan terrorists”…but fails, even AFTER stealing the DeLorean and working so hard to fix everything. He sees Doc gunned down and runs up to the (bloodlessly) dead Doc Brown and break down, weeping. As I do…then Doc wakes up, show Marty his Kevlar vest, and shrugs off the slight tweak to the timelines…of course, saving Doc Brown from being murdered by Mad Dog Tannen merely changes the PERSON who dies. Horrified, Doc Brown sets out to save Marty…

In Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (GG2), Quill thinks he’s found his father, and has! The problem is that Dad is a psychopathic god who only wanted a child so he could create another creature that was half himself. The purpose of that, is to get his DNA and then recreate himself forever…or something stupid like that. Yondu, the alien with the head fin, who both told him the only reason he kept Quinn around was because he “was a runt and could get into small places” and constantly kept Peter in terror by threatening to eat him”. What we eventually find out is that Yondu saved Quill from certain death when he found out about Ego siring children on every sapient life form in the known universe, then murdering the resulting, “disappointing” child when they proved they didn’t carry his “god genes”. When he realizes the truth, he honors Yondu as his true father.

Then there’s the relationship between Tony Stark and Spider-Man NWH: and this is one where BOTH of them became a true father and son team. Stark’s father, while he DID have strong feelings about Tony, was totally incapable of sharing them with his SON. He had no trouble sharing those feelings with the adult Tony when they shared a “two-men-whose-wives-were-expecting” moment in the past. Nor did he have any trouble sharing those feelings on a movie made about his “vision” of the future of humanity – but ending with “I built [Stark Expo] for you…it represents a whole lot more than people's inventions…one day you'll figure this out. And when you do, you will change the world. What is, and will always be, my greatest creation…is you.” Tony’s need to repair his relationship with his father was IMPOSSIBLE TO DO as his father was long dead by the time he found the film.

Spider-Man NWH/Peter Parker NWH was in desperate need of a strong father figure. Him and Tony were a match made in Heaven – or the Multiverse (feel free to choose according to your belief system!) And it worked. Tony Stark turned Stark Industries over to a much more caring and responsible Peter Parker NWH; and he saved the world by using the Infinity Stones he snatched from Thanos to put it back to a time BEFORE Thanos had eliminated half of all life in the UNIVERSE…

That cost him his life, but he was almost happy to pay the price. He certainly “won over the Woman”, and he certainly received a son’s adoration from Peter Parker NWH. When he dies at the end of Infinity War…I cry every time.

Two more recent movies have also come to exemplify the idea of "reconciliation" between fathers and sons, and "best PALS where one has ALWAYS been in love with the other".

The first of course, is "The Adam Project" -- and this is complicated! "Fighter pilot Adam Reed crash lands in 2022 after getting injured while stealing a time jet, and meets his 12-year-old self in the process, who had been dealing with the loss of his father Louis the year before. All-the-while, Maya Sorian, defacto "owner" of the dystopian world and head of her company Sorian, plans to monopolize time travel. After crashing his ship, he not only meets his younger self, he meets his wife and a fellow time pilot left stranded in 2018 after a failed attempt on her life." So, we have Adam's lost wife discovered; we have a Boy Adam (B-Adam) who's lost his father -- and holding on to his anger, becomes the extremely irresponsible and dysfunctional Adult Adam (A-Adam); a scientist lost in his research -- A+B Adam's father; and the Adam's terrifying possibility of losing everything. After working through several issues, the last, most important issue is resolved: BOTH Adam's learn that their father loved them more than anything else and he apologizes for losing that focus...I weep every time A-Adam, B-Adam, and Dad embrace. Reconciliation!

"Free Guy" also deals with reconciliation -- and AI, and geekdom, and scoring off a jerk who stole a pair's idea and made bazillions of dollars. Free City is a shooter game that's immensely popular -- which is to say, exactly WHAT I PERSONALLY BELIEVE is the least-common-denominator of the entirety of video gaming. While I also believe that SOME of our current world's politics and interpersonal relationships can be laid at the feet of the industry. There is absolutely NO REASON that such an experienced industry can't work positive world views into their games. Why NOT a character who...OH! how about a character who does GOOD? Sound like the plot of a MOVIE? So, the fact is that the INDUSTRY knows what the meme is -- though I suppose to admit that they could create a Blue Shirt Guy in a video game and with their advertising clout, they would also have to admit that most of the industry is made up of wimps like Mouser whose only concern is bringing home a paycheck as well as mega-bazillionaires like Antwan. Millie, the strong woman struggles against the status quo wishing Keys would join her and bring down Antwan and Soonami Studios. It takes a chat with the AI who appears as Blue Shirt Guy to see into her soul and points her to the fact that Blue Shirt Guy is a love note to Millie from Keys...reconciliation between them leads to a date for a cup of coffee -- impressing Mouser to say, "FINALLY!"

So, there you go! Everything you need to know!

“Excuse me?” I listen, then reflect the question back to the Asker, “You still don’t know why I’m the one who weeps at all of these scenes?” (and I’m sure I’ve missed many others). I nod, then reply, “I was hoping that you hadn’t noticed me dodge that bullet.” Listen, then nod sagely, “I suppose I DO owe you that.” I purse my lips, breathe in deeply through my nose, release the breath slowly, conjure up a stool, sit and say: My relationship with my own father AS SEEN BY ME was fraught. I was born when Mom and Dad didn’t have much money, and after mom quit (it WAS after all, 1957) to stay home and “raise the children”, Dad go another job. He was a general laborer, who’s someone in the construction job site hierarchy whose rank is virtually 0, with 10 being the Site Supervisor (aka The Suit In The Hard Hat). He needed another job to feed his growing family, so he worked oil changing and “whatever” at a local, NON-Chain garage (Tony’s, if you must know). He bowled in the winter, played softball in the summer, and all-in-all, put food on the table in the Best Of Times, and did scab work (non-Union carpentry) when we had to use food stamps in the Worst Of Times.

He didn’t seem to have much time for me; and as I loathed organized sports (after a DISASTROUS attempt at Little League Baseball when I was seven: I was always the right fielder (as it was the position that saw the least action). Remember the scenes in MEET THE ROBINSON’S when Goob (Michael Yagoobian) plays baseball, drops the catch in the Championship Game? That was me at 7…only our team wasn’t that great – and I was the worst of them. Even the coach was disparaging. (Which I realize as I write this on January 18, 2024 is ALSO a reconciliation movie!)

I’m pretty sure Dad was embarrassed. I have a picture of me at about two years. Mom and Dad had dressed me up in a baby-sized football helmet, shoulder pads, and put a football in my hands. Scrawled on the back in my mom’s feminine script are the words, “No interest at all!” Yep. Those words might as well have been tattooed on my forehead. My dad had played basketball and football; brother #1: football, hockey (school, traveling, college with scholarship), baseball; brother #2: (choir) football, hockey, track and field (State Record shot-putter); sister: ?, volleyball, softball, Mom: college fencing (!!!).

Me? Reading; just call me a square peg in a round hole.

Near the end, Dad was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and because I was closest physically, much of the day-to-day contact with Mom and Dad fell to me. No problem, but by then, my feelings of animosity toward my dad was pretty much a hard shell. I find myself wishing the picture above was Dad and me reconciling...but by the end, he hardly knew me, and I was exhausted.

And then, to add insult to injury, I NEVER had a substitute Dad…no male figure ever tucked me under his wing and made certain I was being nurtured and he was genuinely interested in whatever it was I was doing. I became very bitter – and I’m quite certain some psychologist would find a goldmine of various and sundry psychological neuroses, etc. to dig up and confront me with and prescribe treatment. But, the fact is that, I’m not interested because I’ve found my own comfort.

Besides those I note above, IMDb lists some 1300 “sci-fi, father-son relationship” movies. If you drop the sci-fi, the number LEAPS to over 21,000. I’m clearly NOT the only person who has experienced and tried to reconcile this relationship. When I type in, “sci-fi, father-son reconciliation”, I get 70 hits…of which, three are sci-fi (two are actually horror), and one episode of an old TV show…and then the list repeats the 35 selections again to give a nice 70…FWIW, none of the entries are the movies above…

So, why did I write all of this? It’s all fantasy, right? I all of a sudden realized that
I’ve been looking for a reconciliation with my father most of my life. He died of complications of Alzheimer’s three-and-a-half years ago, so there’s no chance that I’ll EVER reconcile in reality, but now I understand why, when I see that happening in movies – and I react with grief.

Now that I know that, perhaps what I’ll start doing is WRITING my way into reconciliation by focusing my narrative on creating those kinds of stories. The kinds of stories I'd LIKE to see…

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_and_Mary_Parker#:~:text=Richard%20and%20Mary%20Parker%20appear,Uncle%20Ben%20and%20Aunt%20May's.,
Image: https://media.istockphoto.com/photos/two-old-men-exchange-a-brotherly-hug-picture-id156894368?s=612x612

IDEA ON TUESDAY 622

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them. Regarding horror, I found this insight in line with WIRED FOR STORY: “We seek out…stories which give us a place to put our fears…Stories that frighten us or unsettle us - not just horror stories, but ones that make us uncomfortable or that strike a chord somewhere deep inside - give us the means to explore the things that scare us…” – Lou Morgan (The Guardian)

H Trope: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AndIMustScream
Current Event: http://nypost.com/2013/10/15/brother-of-missing-autistic-teen-searches-on-his-own/

Yarelis Smits held up her tablet computer and shouted to the mass of people, “My foster brother has been missing since yesterday! He’s autistic and he can’t speak! A friend of his from school saw him in this neighborhood late yesterday,” she stopped shouting as the crowd had quieted. “Please remember that even though he can’t speak, Ray Cantú can hear us.”

A girl from school, a year older than Ray, who was in ninth grade, said, “This is a really bad neighborhood. What if we can’t find him?”

Yarelis’ heart felt as if it had stopped in her chest. She looked around the crowd, hoping to see Dorian. The high school police liaison officer had showed up after most of the volunteers had arrived, hanging back, supposedly separated from them all, but still part of them. No one else had noticed him yet.

She was also pretty sure no one had noticed that he was an android. The only reason Yarelis knew was because her Mom was a detective with the local peakers – peace keepers and Yarelis had stumbled across a stray text message that hinted at it. When she’d asked Mom, who never lied outside of work, she’d admitted it.

So to find her missing brother, she had a bunch of people she went to school with, and a robot cop. All she was really missing was her best friend, the mysterious, supposed reincarnation of the late Turkish singer, Selda Bağcan.

Warm breath brushed her ear as a voice mimicking a Turkish accent said, “What, you think I was going to leave you all alone with these insane muggles?”

Yarelis rolled her eyes, the whole HP phenom was so four decades ago. Jane Eyre – which was her real, actual name – was the only one Yarelis knew who still read the things. Except for her, but Yarelis only read them because Jane was her best friend. That’s what she told everyone, anyway.

The girl shouted again, “Isn’t it dangerous here?”

“Dangerous for who?” called a low, bass voice. Yarelis didn’t recognize it and stood on her tiptoes, scanning the crowd. On the edge opposite Darius, there was movement as people who had actually heard the voice turned, then parted between the speaker and Yarelis.

“You’re not from school,” she said, scowling.

“No, I’m from the neighborhood.”

“What are you doing here?”

“You might call me a vigilante.”

“What? My brother’s harmless – he’s autistic, mute. He’d never say anything to anyone!”

The man, who wore a faded, black cowboy hat, pushed up the rim then looked at her intently from under it. He said, “They say it’s the silent one’s is the most dangerous.”

“He’d never hurt anyone!”

“Then how do you explain this?” the man said and pulled his hat off. The blood mixed with his gray hair had been concealed by the back rim of the hat. “I was on my way here and he attacked me with a broken board. He...”

“You must have done something to frighten him, then!” Yarelis cried.

“He ain’t the one scared here, missy. I am.”

Names: ♀Puerto Rican, Dutch, ; ♂ Mexican
Image: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51niGRrH6DL.jpg

MINING THE ASTEROIDS Part 19: The TRUE Reason We're Shying AWAY From Mining the Asteroids…

Initially, I started this series because of the 2021 World Science Fiction Convention, DisCON which I WOULD have been attending in person if I felt safe enough to do so in person AND it hadn’t been changed to the week before the Christmas Holidays…HOWEVER, as time passed, I knew that this was a subject I was going to explore because it interests me…

I've done lots of reading on the Human mining of the asteroids, and the single most frequent objection I run across is that it will be far too dangerous. The TECHNOLOGY is here; now. NOT refined to the point that Earth's mining industry has it today - but as it BEGAN on Earth a long time ago.

OK – I’m going to run with this theme for a few pieces and I’m going to take a step back. One of the biggest objections to mining the asteroids is that “it’s going to be hard; maybe even impossible”.

I’d like to use a different template to this. I live in Minnesota; iron mining has been (and still is!) a large part of our state’s character and history.

Some of you reading this may roll your eyes and mutter, “Who the heck cares about iron mining? That’s a dead issue! Even in your ‘special’ state, your iron is pretty much played out. The whole idea of mining is so passe as to be pretty much irrelevant!”

I might point out to you that without Minnesota’s mining and manufacturing history – both past and CURRENT – your personal life would be quite different. First of all, “Minnesota's rich iron deposits were a vital component of America's [World War II] war effort. About 70% of the iron ore that America devoted to the war came from Minnesota, amounting to more than 333 million tons.” I believe it might be safe to say that without the iron from Minnesota, there wouldn’t have been much of an American response to the Nazis and the Emperor of Japan.

Secondly, in case you missed it, a company that formed out of Minnesota’s iron mining was Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing.

You know the company? No? Are you SURE you have no idea what stupidly obscure company I’m referring to? Maybe it’s other name would jog your recognition: 3M…you know a couple of their totally irrelevant products – PostIt Notes; Scotch Brand Tape…well, I’ll stop as they manufacture some 60,000 products.

“I think we’d live without paper products!” you snap with irritation. I’ll point out that among those products, there is at least ONE that conceivably saved countless lives of Humans on Earth: “The N95 respirator mask was developed by 3M and approved in 1972. Due to its ability to filter viral particulates, its use was recommended during the COVID-19 pandemic…the U.S. government asking 3M to stop exporting US-made N95 respirator masks to Canada and to Latin American countries…President Donald Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to require 3M to prioritize orders from the federal government.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3M)

So let’s move on. “Historically, much of the iron ore utilized by industrialized societies has been mined from predominantly hematite deposits with grades of around 70% Fe. These deposits are commonly referred to as "direct shipping ores" or "natural ores". Increasing iron ore demand, coupled with the depletion of high-grade hematite ores in the United States…” read there, 70% of the iron ore available to the world prior to WWII came from Minnesota.

The iron mined in Minnesota didn’t spring out of the earth in fully formed iron ingots.

It had to be dug out. “On the Cuyuna Iron Range…mining began in 1907. In the early 1880s, federal surveys noted magnetic anomalies near what would become the Cuyuna Range. No visible outcrops of iron ore were present at the surface…buy surveyors suspected the anomalies could be buried iron ore deposits. By 1902, Adams began seeking outside investors to develop mines…in June 1907, the Rogers–Brown Ore Company opened the first active iron mine on the Cuyuna Range. Around 1910, immigrants from northern and southern Europe settled into newly built mining communities with the hope of finding work at mines.”

“Demand for iron ore in the United States surged during World War I. Over thirty iron mines were operating at that time; most were underground operations. After the war, many of these Cuyuna Iron Mines closed. The few new mines of the 1920s were open pits that used large earth-moving equipment rather than shafts and tunnels to reach the ore. By the early 1930s, the economic woes of the Great Depression affected mining in the Cuyuna Range [which held] manganese-rich iron ores important for making very hard steel. The Cuyuna Range held the largest domestic supply of this ore. Demand for iron and steel continued throughout World War II and the Korean War. In 1953, production on the Cuyuna Range reached its highest point, at a little over three-and-a-half million tons. The early 1960s saw a rapid decline in iron ore from the Cuyuna Range as seventeen mines closed between 1961 and 1965. By 1982, the last reported shipment of iron ore from the Cuyuna Range was made, ending the period of active mine operations in the district.” (https://www.minnpost.com/mnopedia/2016/04/very-brief-history-mining-cuyuna-iron-range/?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiA44OtBhAOEiwAj4gpOSt0UhiZ2WaXl-6EI4yaEdcj89-g1Nd0qdvanbAhe1BaUYtMibg-LhoCHHYQAvD_BwE)

“There is evidence that meteorites were used as a source of iron before 3000 BC, but extraction of the metal from ores dates from about 2000 BC. Following the discovery of high-quality iron on the island of Elba, iron became an important commodity of Roman Empire.”

How many people died attempting to develop the technology for extracting metal ore from underground? Apparently that’s a virtually unknown number. Recently, all I can get are general numbers: “Although there are no accurate figures, estimates suggest such accidents kill about 12,000 people a year.” https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-11533349. That’s for 2023…

If the argument against mining the asteroids is that too many people will die…I suggest to you that since underground mining started…well, that number isn’t available, either. So, let’s just start with 1900-2023. If 12,000 people a year die in mining accidents, that means in the past 123 years, 1,470,000 humans (mostly males) have died; that is, from the beginning of the Industrial Era to the Colonization of Space Era, a million plus people have died.

Why do we think that mining in space will be ANY EASIER? Objecting to mining is space based on an imaginary “injury report” is…not entirely rational – and if that is the objection, then perhaps we should stop mining on Earth altogether.

No?

“12,000 lives – and some of those are probably just slaves! – is the price we have to pay in order to have the way of life we do.” And what about some of those other specialized metals the Western Climate Mitigation People need? How many deaths have there been while mining lithium for electric car batteries have occurred? We don’t know: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-tuesday-edition-1.5399491/tech-giants-sued-over-appalling-deaths-of-children-who-mine-their-cobalt-1.5399492 BTW – in the event that your argument is that “we don’t have mining accidents anymore. We’re technologically advanced!”, I suggest you follow this link: https://www.mining-technology.com/features/featureworld-worst-mining-disasters/?cf-view

My premise is that using “it’s dangerous” as an excuse to refrain from mining the asteroids carries little weight. The technology itself is making rapid advances, plus we’re not talking about sending asteroid miners to the farthest reaches of the Solar System. Asteroids swing by Earth all the time. We have the technology to support life in space – the ISS has been “live” for the past 24 years. We have ways to reach space that are gradually getting both easier and more accurate.

“But we don’t have any mining machines!!!”

Obviously, we can’t use diesel-powered machinery! How about battery powered? Maybe take a few of those lithium batteries and repurpose them?

I’m just saying: mining the asteroids isn’t impossible – and every member of the IPCC, every democrat in the US, and Green Party members everywhere, should be backing asteroid mining programs EVERYWHERE!

New Source: https://cowboystatedaily.com/2024/01/06/wyoming-could-be-a-space-pioneer-when-not-if-we-start-mining-asteroids/
Fundamental Resource: (A general Wikipedia post detailing what the authors currently know about asteroid mining

: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_mining)
Noted Resources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_asteroid_close_approaches_to_Earth, https://www.pharostribune.com/news/local_news/article_7fcd3ea5-3c14-533f-a8d5-9bf629922f34.html, https://www.fool.com/investing/2022/04/29/like-asteroid-mining-be-careful-what-you-wish-for/, https://www.nps.gov/wrbr/learn/historyculture/theroadtothefirstflight.htm, https://hackaday.com/2019/03/27/extraterrestrial-excavation-digging-holes-on-other-worlds/, https://www.planetary.org/space-missions/every-small-worlds-mission; https://www.earthsystems.com/history-mining/ 

Image: https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/A2D5/production/_114558614_hls-eva-apr2020.jpg

POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY: SPIDERMAN 3: No Way Home and My Favorite SciFi Subject: Reconciliation

NOT using the Programme Guide of the 2022 World Science Fiction Convention, ChiCON 8, which I WOULD have attended in person if I had disposable income, but I retired two years ago, my work health insurance stopped, and I’m now living on Social Security and Medicare…I WILL NOT use the Programme Guide to jump off, jump on, rail against, or shamelessly agree with the BRIEF DESCRIPTION given in the pdf copy of the Program Guide. This explanation is reserved for when I dash “off topic”, sometimes reviewing movies, sometimes reviewing books, and other times taking up the spirit of a blog an old friend of mine used to keep called THE RANTING ROOM…

This isn’t going to be a rant…enough people have ranted about this movie that there’s really nothing else I can say. Besides, I loved it, just…not in the way most people probably do.

The redoubtable Roger Ebert, with whom I grew up as half of the fabulous pair of movie reviewers “Siskel and Ebert” and their “four thumbs up” rating system – had this to say: “'No Way Home' is crowded, but it’s also surprisingly spry, inventive, and just purely entertaining, leading to a final act that not only earns its emotions but pays off some of the ones you may have about this character that you forgot.”

I’m sure it does, but for me, the movie was about one thing: reconciliation. It has several incidents that reconcile characters with each other, with themselves, and even, in the end, he universe.

I also has another of the themes that move me to tears: sacrificial love…I hesitate to mention this, but it’s the kind of love Jesus had for US. He surrendered to Jewish and Roman authorities not to save his friends, but to save the MULTIVERSE! (Not in those precise words, but if He had seen SM: No Way Home, I think He would understand my point.

Clearly the writers intended to say something more than just, “Spider-man fights the bad guys, converts them to Good, and then retires to his well-earned respite.” Consider the title: “No Way Home”. Spider-man gets home in the end, right? He returns to his proper universe, MJ and Ned are safe and going to MIT; Dr. Strange is safe and continues to be as sarcastic as ever; even Peter is safe from J Jonas Jameson. His identity is safe. NO ONE KNOWS THAT PETER PARKER AND SPIDERMAN are the same person.

Or was there a bigger change in the Multiverse? Did something happen where not only didn’t anyone know Peter was Spider-man…there were people who didn’t know him AT ALL – like MJ and Ned. They both knew Peter BEFORE they knew him as Spider-man. J Jonas Jameson knew Spider-man and not Peter (though in the comic books, he does know Peter as like a journalism intern or something…or not).

But because of what happened, it appears the NO ONE KNOWS PETER PARKER either, and the one person who loves him most is still dead.

Peter gave up EVERYTHING for everyone; for the people he loves. They don’t know him anymore.

Note that in his box as he’s moving into a cheesy New York apartment, there’s a GED book on top; which means that he never graduated from Midtown Smartypants School…in fact, he didn’t graduate from anywhere. Clearly, he has a job or he wouldn’t have been able to put down a security deposit and the first month’s rent to even get the place (which, you have to admit, for a New York apartment isn’t exactly a cold water, walk up, tenement. I don’t hear any gunfire in those tail-end shots, either.)

But to return to something I’m discovering is a theme I WANT to explore in my writing – reconciliation. I can’t help but weep when two individuals, separated by anger, or in fact ANYTHING that works to separate us from the people we care about. I find that I have some very…strong, angry feelings when I think about my dad. Because I was the sibling who lived closest to where he lived after Mom died. Much to his dismay, he lived two-and-a-half years longer than she did. He’d mutter about that sometimes; he was lonely and he knew he was dependent on us kids – particularly me for his everyday needs. I’d take him to the doctor, reset his television set (because he grew up with NO TV as a child, then a flip knob into adulthood…he NEVER understood how his 166 channel television worked. The staff in the Assisted Living facility he lived in were too busy to reset his channels over, and over, and over again – no bad on them! It just meant I had to return to his apartment five to ten times a week.

Nothing else made sense to him, either. He tried to get out of the building. He actually hit one of the CNAs. He hated what he ate. He just hated being alive without my mom. As his memory deteriorated, he became more and more confused. It was torture to watch him wildly vacillate every day (I was pretty much there every day). At the end, I was getting phone calls in the middle of the night…at any rate, because of his Alzheimer’s, he and I never really reconciled our relationship. There were times he’d be angry with me for coming to help him. Other times he’d be weepy. I grew to very much dislike this…person my father had become. He died without any reconciliation for me.

So, I’ve come to have strong emotional attachments to stories and movies in which ANYONE reconciles ANY relationship. I get teary-eyed at the end of “The Other Woman”; “Guardians of the Galaxy 2”; “Enchanted”; “Star Trek: Wrath of Khan”; “Free Guy”; “A Goofy Movie”; “First Wives Club”; "The Adam Project"…according to IMDb, there are 882 movies with the theme of reconciliation.

I’m not taking the time to see if it’s there, but Spider-man: No Way Home is a movie all about reconciliation. Even so, it’s on MULTIPLE levels. There’s a reconciliation of the time line that Mysterio screwed up; there’s the reconciliation between Tony Stark and Peter Parker…(or was that Spider-man: A Long Way From Home? Hmmm); there’s the chance that Peter and Ned and MJ can go to MIT – even WITHOUT SPIDER-MAN changing the time lines! He’s stunned when the MIT Administrator says she’ll reconsider all of them, I get all excited about that simple reconciliation…

But the true focus of the movie is (of course) the three Spider-mans coming together TO FIX THEIR ENEMIES! Sandman, Doc Octopus, the Green Goblin, and Electro, all were healed and reconciled with their appropriate Spider-men. Even Andrew Garfield noticed how reconciliation fit naturally into the story: “ Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker/Spider-Man “…was interested in exploring the idea of a tortured Parker [and] how lessons from those events could be passed to Holland's character…[Garfield] was grateful for the chance to ‘tie up some loose ends’ for his incarnation…and described working with Holland and Maguire as an opportunity to have ‘deeper conversations... about our experiences with the character.’”

There was even the smaller storyline of the relationship between the Current Spider-man as he’d been dealing with the death of Tony Stark, who, I imagine, he’d seen not so much as a mentor, but as a father-figure. Even Tony Stark was drawn into that relationship – and it helped that he had a daughter who was still growing into herself. He, in fact, led the way for Spider-man/AVENGERS UNIVERSE to sacrifice his life for the good of others when Tony died restoring the AU and brining back people lost in Thanos’ demented desire to “balance the universe”.

While he didn’t lose his life and his horrific ostracism from Human society was nearly unbearable, he deemed allowing his friends to return to a life without him as the much greater good. He also reconciled his relationship with Steven Strange; perhaps his “new father-figure”…except that even Strange has had his memory wiped of Peter’s existence as Spider-man…and THAT, people, is why I weep at the end of that movie: the fact that he finally knows he’s truly not alone and that the other Spider-men are his real brothers; knowing that those he loves – Ned and MJ – can grow in the way they were meant to; and even though he misses May and will be a stranger to Happy, he can move ahead and make new friends and a new life…one that might even hold MJ, Happy, Dr. Strange and a career as a scientist…

And so, I weep time and time again. Excuse me while I set about to face my unrecognized, inadmissible love (because that would be painful to tell the BEFORE story that leads up to the thing that touches my heart): reconciliation.

Resource: https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/spider-man-no-way-home-movie-review-2021; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider-Man:_No_Way_Home, https://www.imdb.com/search/keyword/?keywords=reconciliation
Image: https://www.goldderby.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Spider-Man-No-Way-Home.jpg?w=640

IDEAS ON TUESDAY 621

Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration (quote, website, podcast, etc.) and then a thought or two that came to mind. These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat, irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if anything comes of them? Regarding Fantasy, this insight was startling: “I see the fantasy genre as an ever-shifting metaphor for life in this world, an innocuous medium that allows the author to examine difficult, even controversial, subjects with impunity. Honor, religion, politics, nobility, integrity, greed—we’ve an endless list of ideals to be dissected and explored. And maybe learned from.” – Melissa McPhail.

Fantasy Trope: Heroic Fantasy (Conan The Barbarian)
Current Event: http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-in-school/fantasy-fighting-takes-modernday-gladiators-back-in-time/article6178357.ece

Sukhjeev Hegde adjusted her brass brassiere and said, “Do you know why they make us wear these things?”

Shrugging, Vrishab Brahmbatt pulled up steel supporter and said, “Same reason I gotta wear this thing.”

“And that is…” she hefted the broadsword, swung it – and nearly chopped Vrish’s head off.

“Would you watch out with that thing!” he cried, then added, “It’s verisimilitude.”

“How can dressing this way be ‘an appearance or semblance of truth’ if it’s all fake anyway? We act like it’s true...”

“Why? So it will become truth? That’s the most fantastic thing you’ve said on this entire date!”

He pursed his lips, then said sullenly, “It’s not a date.”

“Sure it is!” Sukhjee said. “You asked me to come with you on this adventure thing and I said yes, if we can have a good cup of coffee afterwards.” She glared at him and added, “You’re not thinking of reneging on the coffee, are you?”

“No, we’ll still do the coffee, it’s just that I forgot to tell you something about this simulation.” The ground trembled suddenly and the rest of their mutuality turned to the castle gate as it wound down on heavy chains. The computer-generated images – Sukhjee had called them barely adequate shimmered and seemed to take on the weight of reality.

Without looking at Vrish, she said, “You forgot to tell me that at some magical command or when the Moon is in the Seventh House and Jupiter aligns with Mars that peace won’t be guiding the planets – those gigantic monster sheep with glow-in-the-dark scarlet eyes will?”

“You took the words right out of my mouth.”

“So, do we run or fight?” she asked.

What he assumed were the ‘real’ people had dropped their weapons and were running away from the sheepsters. “It’s a first date, I’m open to whatever you’d like to do.”

Sukhjee tossed her sword from one hand to the other, almost dropped it then grinned at Vrish then said, “Let’s go fight us some sheepsters, sweetie!” Along with the once-simulated army, she charged the creature who’d been joined by four others.

“Don’t call me ‘sweetie’,” Vrish said as he charged after his date.

Names: ♀ Sikh, India ; ♂ Hindu, India Image: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/98/71/e5/9871e52bbc09c525af21b8f6471eab15.jpg