SLICE OF PIE: Our Unlikely Love for ENOLA HOLMES and the Genre of the MYSTERY...and others...

On October 7, 2007, I started this blog. Eighteen years later, I am revising and doing some different things. My wife and I are now retired senior citizens, our kids are both married, we have a bonus daughter and her wife and we have three grandchildren, (with a fourth on-the-way!) the oldest of which will soon finish his first year in high school, one smack in the center of Middle School; the third almost done with kindergarten. I have forty-five professional publications, plus countless other publications as a slushpile reader, and sometime essay contributor to Stupefying Stories https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/.
These days, I write whenever I want to – or when I’m not busy exploring the world with my wife or kids or grandkids. I write and read constantly. Then I discovered that I was writing longer and longer pieces. My new focus is to write shorter; and to write HUMOR. On purpose. Maybe I can still irritate people while being funny. It works pretty well for John Scalzi! We’ll see what happens.

Seeing the advertising for the first ENOLA HOLMES (2020 movie Netflix) brought out a feeling of, “Of all the IDIOTIC STUFF on NORMALLY idiotic television (my father called the television the “idiot box” (this was when the thing actually WAS a box holding a cathode ray tube…). My wife had the same reaction.

A couple nights ago, we were searching for something new along the lines of “The Thursday Murder Club” movie – nothing too difficult to watch, nothing to strain the brain, but clever, snarky, and with a touch of humor.

The search turned up the usual suspects, almost all of which we’ve seen. Now, I KNOW I am well-known as a SF fan and writer and that it perfectly just! However, several years ago, I developed a taste for the detective Walt Longmire (Did I ever mention that I also LOATHE Westerns? I do.), and in a strange turn of events, Brent Spiner (STAR TREK’s Mr. Data) played Sherlock Holmes in the movie, FIRST CONTACT…which was actually a Star Trek full-length movie!

One of the movies ranked with That included ENOLA HOLMES. With a heavy sigh, we decided to give it a try, but had a few other movies in the queue which we could reasonably spend a few hours mindlessly watching.

The “blurb” for the BOOKS was…questionable…at best (though the first and a later one were both awarded Edgars (YA lit’s equivalent of SF’s HUGO, and movie’s Academy Award): “The Enola Holmes Mysteries…[star] Enola Holmes…14-year-old sister of…Sherlock Holmes, twenty years her senior. The…series borrows characters and settings from the established canon of Sherlock Holmes, but the Enola character is Springer's creation and specific to this series.” The 14-year-old Enola is the same age as our granddaughter…who is also into mystery, murder, and mayhem…she ALSO has a wicked sense of humor. Figure Holmes himself is usually represented with something of a sharp (or wicked) wit, we hoped that Enola might have some of that.

With further study, we found that the two were NOT quite the same: “A 2020 mystery film starring Millie Bobby Brown as the title character, the teenage sister of the already famous Victorian-era detective Sherlock Holmes. The film is directed by Harry Bradbeer from a screenplay by Jack Thorne that adapts the first novel in The Enola Holmes Mysteries series by Nancy Springer. In the film, Enola travels to London to find her missing mother but ends up on a thrilling adventure, pairing up with a runaway lord as they attempt to solve a mystery that threatens the entire country. In addition to Brown, the film also stars Sam Claflin, Henry Cavill, and Helena Bonham Carter (who, BTW was ALSO Bellatrix Lestrange, evil witch in four Harry Potter movies).

To arms, then: it turns out that you can’t see a movie by it’s title or blurb…Enola Holmes was truly fantastic! As such, it compelled us to NOT immediately blitz through the other two without a care in the world! We waited a few days before watching EH 2 last night; and we MIGHT last through the night tonight without watching EH 3! (Maybe…) The question was WHY was was it SO FREAKILY GOOD?

First of course, was that “Sherlock Holmes”! Really, how much more compulsion do you need? The character “…holds the Guinness World Record for the most-portrayed literary human character in film and television. Estimates indicate that over 75 to 130 actors have played the detective on screen, with comprehensive lists (including stage and audio productions) featuring nearly 350 actors…” https://www.imdb.com/list/ls098162253/

Secondly, I just realized that both SF and Mystery are what are called “genre literature” which is, by definition…”any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time…” The genres most of us are familiar with besides SF and Mystery are (off the top of my head) spy, fantasy, horror, Western – though it appears not even the EXPERTS know how many genres there are. Seems to be some number between three https://www.thoughtco.com/genre-in-literature-1690896; to seven; to 28; to 35; to 113…to (I’m sorry, I didn’t have time to count them) several HUNDRED (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_writing_genres)...

Sherlock Holmes is possibly even his OWN genre! I write “hard science fiction” – which is what MARTIAN HOLIDAY is…but it has a religious flavor to it as well (Christian, witchcraft (there’s a coven), and Buddhism (the Dalai Llama of Mars puts in an appearance), as well as the United Faith in Humanity.

All of this to say that my wife and I watched Enola Holmes 2 (2022): “In September 2020, co-producer and star Millie Bobby Brown (16 in the movie rather than the books’ 14)…an original story based on the real 1888 matchgirls' strike and the life of labor activist Sarah Chapman…to advance her career as a detective (or a “finder of things” [she] has to work with others and not just be reliant on herself. It's a story that goes from 'I' to 'we', and that is a story of sisterhood.” We will soon be watching Enola Holmes 3…

I think I’d like to try my hand at a Sherlock Holmes on Mars story…or even better, invent my OWN sleuth…maybe a retired science teacher who’s looking for something to do in his retirement.

Hmmm…

Inspiration and references: ENOLA HOLMES 1, 2, 3; Bellatrix Lestrange (four HARRY POTTER movies; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millie_Bobby_Brown; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genre

A SLICE OF PIE: Why Does THE ADAM PROJECT STILL Make Me Cry At The End?

NOT using the panel discussions from ANY recent World Science Fiction Convention, I'm jumping off, jumping on, railing against, and shamelessly agree with the BRIEF DESCRIPTION of something that sparked my interest in the world of Science Fiction. But not today. 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…

I’m a sucker for a movie or book that’s all about reconciliation – The Jane Austen movies are about reconciliation of broken relationships (They’re romances, too, but that’s beside the point). STAR TREK: Wrath of Khan is about reconciliation between Kirk and his son David. Dad introduced me to STAR TREK in the late 60s, and watching the shows with him, and eventually my wife and kids, was a foundational event that led me to me pursuing my writing.

Even the goofy Lego Movie has a father-son reconciliation at the end (Oddly, there are NO images of them hugging at the end...sad, that.)

The first movie mom and dad brought us to see was the original MARY POPPINS. We saw it at the Terrace Theater in Robbinsdale, the city Mom grew up in. At the very end, Mr. Banks reconciles with his kids, dumping the “bank life” for flying a kite with Jane and Michael. The author of the Mary Poppins books, PL Travers, in the movie, SAVING MR. BANKS, argues that her book was NOT about Mary Poppins or the children -- but saving Mr. Banks, who was based on her own FATHER. 

I’ve been reflecting lately about WHY reconciliation movies and books are so important to me. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a sort of odd duck in the family. Dad played football and basketball (in the day when players who were 6’1” were tall, he was STILL short!). My brothers and sister played sports all through high school and beyond. Even mom was a member of the Robbinsdale Girl’s Athletic Club – tennis, badminton, and even fencing.

I didn’t do sports. I read. I wrote. I played guitar. I went to a very religious college and then went touring in Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and eventually West Africa with two different church bands. I went to Moorhead State University and worked most of my summers at Bible camps.

I wasn’t home a lot because, frankly, I didn’t feel like I belonged.

Then I got older and wiser, got married, then Josh and Mary were born, and then Alzheimer’s touched our lives. After Mom passed, it just seemed to get worse, but I started to spend more time with Dad. Oddly, I started to feel closer to him as we did more and more things together – like watching NASCAR racing, going to restaurants after doctor or dentist visits, or going to The Lookout just because. Our lives began to twine together like they never had when I was younger. We would talk, sometimes just sit together, or go to an event at SilverCreek and enjoy ourselves. In the end, I felt reconciled – I felt like Dad was part of my life again and that I was part of his. Maybe that’s why the movies like Sing, Back To The Future, FINDING NEMO, GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (Part 2); MEN IN BLACK 4; and yesterday, THE ADAM PROJECT -- all mean so much to me. All of them are about reconciliation; about joining BACK together after a time of separation.

I cried at those movies when I first saw them. In fact, if it's been a while, they STILL make me weep...

Last night, me and my wife were rewatching THE ADAM PROJECT for the hundredth time. Basic idea was Dad (Mark Ruffalo) wrote an algorithm for controlled time travel -- alienating his 12-year-old son, Adam. He's angry at losing him BEFORE he died, and grows up into an angry, reckless adult who IS capable of loving a woman. In the end, both "boys" reconcile with their father, playing catch in their back yard as they all return to their anchor present...the young Adam makes changes that change his older self. I suppose it's a sort of "substitutionary" healing. The thing is that, as I've continued to be touched by these movies, I've never tried to write a story like them about ME. What am I afraid of -- releasing my anger? Am I holding on to my pain. Maybe it's finally time to release my pain; maybe start to heal my own heart...

Now all that's left is for me to create a character who mirrors my OWN life and write his story...

Image: https://thecollision.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/the-adam-project-wide.png

DIVING INTO THE PAST: Saturday, April 9, 2011 Observations of a Breast Cancer Husband

About fifteen years ago, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. I thought my reflections were interesting, so here's my FIRST ever essay published on the second blog I started, GUY'S GOTTA TALK ABOUT BREAST CANCER: https://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2011/04/observations-of-breast-cancer-husband.html

I wanted to use a blog title that was simple and would pop up on a normal GOOGLE search, but “Breast Cancer Husband” was already taken (http://www.breastcancerhusband.com/). So was “Stand By Her” (http://standbyher.org/). I went to those sites, but one has been corrupted by endless spam and the other has been inactive for nearly a year. Another I tried seems full of advertising and another still was a long advertisement for an exercise program developed by a breast cancer husbands’ wife.

So here I am, because I need someone to talk to RIGHT NOW and I want to talk to other husbands, fiancés, and lovers of women with breast cancer.

Our journey is only two weeks old. While my wife Liz knew something was seriously wrong inside of her body, I was clueless. Until two weeks ago, a biopsy at the Breast Health Center at Regions Hospital in Minnesota (http://www.regionshospital.com/rh/doctors-specialties/breast-health-center/index.html) confirmed that she had infiltrative ductal carcinoma. It's the most common form of breast cancer. Treatments had been worked out. Research had been done. It is survivable…

A week later, Liz had a bilateral mastectomy.

I’m writing this six days after the surgery.

I’ve searched the internet and I haven’t been able to find an active husband-whose-wife-has-breast-cancer blog that I could chat on. Maybe it’s because their wives have been survivors for years and they can relax, or they can take a step back, or they’re exhausted, or the danger is no longer clear and present.

Not so for me. Based on everything I’ve read so far, this job is only just beginning.

Ah, the name of the blog: I couldn’t call it Breast Cancer Husband, so I went to the thesaurus to look for synonyms and the etymological dictionary for word roots. It all comes down to a “husband” having something to do with farming. Words like cultivate, garden, graze, grow, harvest, landscape, seed, sow, tend and till the soil are all related to “husband”. The word “reap” was in there, too.

At first that didn’t do anything for me, but when I came across “reap”, of course the first thing I thought of was the Grim Reaper. Then my mind went to work, the Reaper’s robe turned pink and I had the image in my head of the Breast Cancer Reaper: cutting down breast cancer, growing hope, harvesting love, creating a new landscape (in more ways that one!), cultivating peace, sowing joy, tending the field, the Garden of Eden, good and healthy eating…

At any rate, this will be a personal blog with medical LINKS and occasional medical comments (or curses?) – I’m no doctor, though I have been a science teacher for three decades. This blog may wax and wane humorous as well. Humor is how I deal with grief and tragedy (actually, humor is how I deal with just about everything and every one…)

We’ll see. All I know right now is that my wife has breast cancer, she, my daughter (whose blog links are below), my son & daughter-in-law & grandson and the rest of both of our families and friends, are dealing with this in different ways.

I should be here once a week, probably Saturdays, and my goal will be to provide something that’s short, personal and helpful.

That is all…

AND 15 YEARS LATER, I'M STILL HERE; MY WIFE IS ALIVE, MY DAD PASSED DUE TO COMPLICATIONS OF ALZHEIMER'S AND NOW I HAVE BEEN LIVING WITH TYPE 2 DIABETES (ALONG WITH MY WIFE) LO, THESE PAST FOUR YEARS...SO, THERE YOU GO.

Image: https://img.picturequotes.com/2/87/86226/observation-is-the-most-enduring-of-the-pleasures-of-life-quote-1.jpg

SLICE OF PIE: Who Am I – and Where Am I GOING?

WARNING: THE FOLLOWING HIGHLIGHTS ASPECTS OF MY CHRISTIANITY. SKIP IT IF SUCH MEANDERINGS MIGHT BE OFFENSIVE TO YOU…

On October 7, 2007, I started this blog. Eighteen years later, I am revising and doing some different things. My wife and I are now retired senior citizens, our kids are both married, we have a bonus daughter and her wife and we have four grandchildren, the oldest will soon finish his sophomore year in high school, one moves into High School; the third almost done with first grade, and the youngest celebrated the first birthday. I have forty-five professional publications, plus countless other publications as a slushpile reader, and sometime essay contributor to Stupefying Stories https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/.

These days, I write whenever I want to – or when I’m not busy exploring the world with my wife or kids or grandkids. I write and read constantly. Then I discovered that I was writing longer and longer pieces. My new focus is to write shorter; and to write HUMOR. On purpose. Maybe I can still irritate people while being funny. It works pretty well for John Scalzi! We’ll see what happens.



I just got back from a retreat. In case you don’t know the term, it’s Christian-speak for “vacation with a purpose”. It made me wonder if Christians are the only ones who reflect on who they are, visit someplace that might give them clarity, and discover what they’re doing “in life”.

So, I dove into a GOOGLE search. Initially, virtually ALL of the responses on GOOGLE for “retreat” had to do with Christianity.

Made me start to wonder if the only people who wondered about their purpose in life were Christians. I instinctively KNOW that’s NOT true, my personal experience as a public high school counselor lends lots of evidence to my claim that it’s a lot more common than just in the Christian community. Lest you assume that I taught science and counseled at some kind of privileged private “religious school, this is where I spent most of my 41 years as a teacher: Robbinsdale Cooper HS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbinsdale_Cooper_High_School
Enrollment Characteristics (2024-2025 school year) (I retired 2019-2020) https://nces.ed.gov/ccd/schoolsearch/school_detail.asp?Search=1&DistrictID=2731780&SchoolPageNum=2&ID=273178001319
Enrollment by Grade: 9=323 10=339 11=382 12 352
Enrollment by Race/Ethnicity:
Am Indian/Alaska Native=7 Asian=122 Black=533
Hispanic=349 White = 247 Hawaiian/Pacific Islander=1 Two+Races=139
Total Enrollment = 1396
Free and reduced-price lunch eligible total: 983

After digging around some more and reflecting on the above, I discovered that lots and lots of people wonder about their “purpose” in life. With 9th-12th graders, virtually all of my conversations hit that mark, ranging from the obvious “college search and application” to an all-to-common conversation that usually started with some version of, “You do want to graduate from high school, right?”

I was a pretty decent counselor. “My Graduates” (men and women with whom I spent more than just casual time) include a bilingual Kindergarten teacher; a physics teacher who now has a 3D printing business in a large mall where he also teaches people HOW to work a 3D printer; a band member; an insurance analyst; a railroad engineer; two retired US Marines; a couple of welders, a consultant for a games-development company; a couple of physicians; a retired Housing Project Coordinator; a desktop systems analyst; an Academic Dean of Students; a Physics Instructor and research scientist; a Quality Assurance Analyst; theater director; a couple of reverends (both male and female)…anyway. I think that establishes some of my cred that allows me to continue with confidence…

I wanted to dig a little deeper, so I just typed in “retreat”. This produced a wild mix of results from Christian events (which is what I went on) to “…a US retreat built around 'magic' mushrooms. Psilocybin therapy…” Our retreat was based on “Our Identity…” That pretty much gave me dozens of Christian retreats centered around that subject…

That was weird, but then I thought of what a non-religious event might be called. I guessed, “vacation with a purpose”, typed it in and WHOA! Jackpot!

Here’s just a bit of what I found on Wikipedia: apparently, it’s also called “voluntourism combining traditional leisure travel with service projects, allowing travelers to give back to communities, support conservation efforts, or engage in immersive learning. Some broad examples: Environmental Conservation; Community Aid; Cultural and Creative Retreats; Immersive Experiences; Family/Group Mission Trips leading to Authentic Cultural Immersion to build meaningful connections with locals by ensuring travel dollars benefit the local community; personal growth; Focusing on projects that fill a genuine need…”

OK…finally back to my main point: the retreat I went on focused on the source of our identity (during which time, I ran a “36.5 Hour Prayer Room” where people could come at any time, get out of the main track of the “fun” of the retreat, and reflect and seek out God. I spent most of the retreat in that prayer room…as in I slept six of those hours; ate for a couple more, and WARNING: WAY TO MUCH SHARING IN THE NEXT SIX WORDS!!!) visited the restroom occasionally…). As it happened, I felt God move in me in an unexpected way and it led me to realize that I have NOT been focused on God’s plan for my life, but on MY plan for my…WRITING life. I spent many hours praying for others, but also a serious amount of time praying for myself and I’m about to get serious with my writing again. There’s been something of a drought lately – though a short story of mine is scheduled to appear on the AMAZING STORIES website (which is ONE of the “drought” issues right now…) as well as disappointing responses to my 780-page-novel. As my personal life had drifted a long way from pleasing God to pleasing myself…which is dangerous even if I WEREN’T a writer) my identity had shifted from child of God to Writer Extraordinaire. I’m the first to say now that that was NOT a good shift. And in case you were wondering, I’m STILL not going to write “religious/Christian science fiction. MARTIAN HOLIDAY was NOT written to be “Christian Science fiction”. I have a note to myself: “I didn't write MARTIAN HOLIDAY to be read by Christians for ‘entertainment’, but to be shared with friends and let the conversation lead to the implications a Christian faith might have in the far future and in the near future of next year...” A bit of Bible supports my new intent: John 21:25 “But there are also many other things which Jesus did, which, if they were written in detail, I expect that even the world itself would not contain the books that would be written.” New American Standard Bible

As well, from the following website: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMkXvVAzmys&t=377s I found this: “Effective science fiction for witnessing explores themes of redemption, sacrifice, and the search for meaning, prompting deep spiritual conversations. Here are the top science fiction works for spiritual discussions with non-Christian friends.”

So…there you go. Reflections from the Men’s Spring Retreat…as well as some reflections on other things that occurred to me. This is more me than I’ve been in a long time. Apologies if I’ve given offense. That was NOT my intent…though there are several things about “intent” and “results”. This quote from David Grinspoon gives me hope, “There is a real danger of unintended consequences, of encouraging people to give up. Pessimism, if it becomes a habit, can reinforce a narrative of unstoppable decline. If there is nothing we can do, that releases us from our obligations.” So, I’m posting this with high hopes! (I read Grinspoon’s book awhile ago! It’s great! I blogged it here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2023/12/possibly-irritating-essays-lonely.html

Image: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61IlBkXnVyL.jpg

SLICE OF PIE: Hard Science Fiction For Teens: Where Are We Today?

Hard science fiction isn’t just for adults. Kids today are more tech savvy than ever and fiction featuring real (or at least possible) science for teens is gaining steam. However, how hard should a hard SF novel get for young adults? What hard SF is getting it right? Who should we be reading? How can teens effectively pick through those old SF classics that they would find compelling today?

Steven Gould (m), Jennifer Brozek, Fonda Lee, Marissa Meyer, William Campbell Powell

I only recognized Steven Gould, and Fonda Lee (maybe Marissa Meyer)...I didn’t recognize the others. When I attended this talk about ten years ago, I only recognized the  moderator's name. At THAT time, I was a former science teacher (10 years middle school/high school substitute; 11 years 8th grade science; 10 years freshman science; and ten years counselor -- so my first question was “What are these people doing here?”

Your first question should be, “So what if you don’t recognize any of the names? You’re almost seventy! What would you know about hard SF for teens?”

I’ll look into the answer to the first in a second. The second I’ll answer right now: I’ve been a middle school and high school teacher for 34 years. I know what kids are reading because I SEE what they’re reading. I talk to them about what they’re reading. I teach summer school classes to the gifted and talented – THEY are the true future of hard SF – and I see and talk to them about what they’re reading. I’d be willing to bet that I have a pretty dang good idea of what they are and are not reading. I worked at Barnes & Noble a couple of years ago, tried to order a set of the Heinlein classics and put them in the Teen section…and they were repeatedly moved back to the “regular” science fiction section because the brick and mortar giant DIDN’T RECOGNIZE THEM AS BEING FOR TEENS, a cursory skim through the twenty-six pages of “hard science fiction for teens” on Amazon didn’t net a single Heinlein book.

So who are these people and what are they doing here?

Steven Gould is described by Booklist as writing “novel[s] straddle the line between YA and adult fiction; its lead character is a teen, but the story has many adult-themed elements”. He also has a couple of the YA “beasts” of his own. Perfect!

Jennifer Brozek seems to be well-experienced short stories and anthologies – but I’ll say right up front, that is not where and how most teens read. As an author of several RPGs as well as a BattleMech YA novel, she absolutely has the experience. But…not so much with the “beast” itself. And short stories isn’t the usual direction teens take in their reading. The ones I know want to be immersed in story; they want to escape the harsh reality of the here-and-now.

Fonda Lee has a novel, though nothing else published (Internet Speculative Fiction Database).

Marissa Meyers is the author of the best-selling LUNAR CHRONICLES (which consistently remained in the top three spots when my book came out last summer.)

William Campbell Powell is the author of a YA novel.

So all of them are more-or-less qualified to comment on YA hard science fiction.

However, I didn’t see that any of them are intimately involved with their target audience. I didn’t note that they TALK to young adults – though Mr. Campbell Powell and Mr. Gould each have two teens, and Ms. Meyers and Ms. Lee are still very much young adults themselves. However, this is not an absolute qualifier. I have two beasts of my own and they are notoriously opinionated – in my favor.

I would have loved to be there for the discussion and I’ve added books by all of them to my list of “to-reads”. However, the fact remains that I have not SEEN their books on the check-out lists of the high school I work in, and that, in the long run, is where we have to win middle and high school students over to the science fiction camp.

As for the Heinlein books – I love them and collect them, but the loving is more in the memory than in the re-reading. I find their prose clumsy and (also) very privileged “white folk”. Sorry, there’s no other way to write that; which in my own personal book disqualifies them as having any relevance for teenagers today. They live in a diverse world in which HALF of all Americans will speak Spanish as a main language by the year 2050, and it’s nearly impossible to advise kids what to take in school and college to prepare for their future career – because that career may not exist yet.

Maybe that’s what we need to do as SF writers for YA – imagine careers (and games, which is what Fonda Lee did in her novel) that might be there when they arrive.

That’s my mission. I wonder what the mission is for these others. Tell me if I did OK; read my hard SF novel for YA – a link to it is posted on your right.

(DANG! I need to get to one of these World Cons…someday!)

Links: https://reactormag.com/young-adult-spotlight-january-and-february-2026/#:~:text=If%20All%20the%20Stars%20Go,lots%20of%20adventure%2Dy%20fun. ; https://booksbonesbuffy.com/2025/11/11/26-science-fiction-books-to-read-in-2026-scifimonth2025/

Image: https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Publication211/v4/ac/05/0c/ac050c86-029b-31dc-dcc3-4817bf984454/9781250382061.jpg/536x0w.webp

Slice of PIE: “Free Guy” Is Just “Stranger Than Fiction”…But With VR Headsets…

 

I WILL NOT use the World Science Fiction Convention 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…

My wife and I love both “Stranger Than Fiction” (2006) and “Free Guy” (2021) movies. In case you’re too young to watch old movies, here’s the plot of “Stranger than Fiction”: “IRS auditor Harold Crick suddenly finds his mundane Chicago life to be the subject of narration only he can hear: narration that begins to affect his entire existence, from his work to his love life to his death.” This film stars some real names: Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman (none of the “Free Guy” targets know who he is), and Maggie Gyllenhaal. (For the 2022 generation: Ferrell is best known as the Elf in “Elf”…; Emma Thompson is best known for lots of things, but for the target audience of “Free Guy”: Professor Trelawny at Hogwarts)

“Free Guy” (2021): “In the extremely popular video game, Free City, a NPC named Guy learns the true nature of his existence when he meets the girl of his dreams, a human player. This player's interactions with Guy has massive effects on him, the game, and real world as they play it.” This film has some big names as well, Ryan Reynolds (for the target audience, he’s Deadpool); Jodie Comer (Rey’s Mom in STAR WARS: “The Rise of Skywalker”); and Taika Waititi as the Calm Blue Rock Guy in 2 of the AVENGERS movies…

SO…how are “Stranger Than Fiction” and “Free Guy” basically the same movie – one made for people who read books, then other for people who play video games?

A fairly short list of events in both movies might serve my argument:

FIRST:
Harold Crick in “Stranger Than Fiction” is a fictional character – both in the movie; and in the book in the movie.

Guy in “Free Guy” is a fictional character – both in the game; and in the real world.

SECOND:
Harold figures out he’s a fictional character. Guy does as well.

THIRD:
Guy finds out he’s going to die when the game shuts down (or before if Antawan catches him). So does Harold – but his person isn’t a real villain. She’s an accidental villain. Actually, Dustin Hoffman serves as a sort of “low-key” villain, insisting Harold HAS to die if the book is going to be a fabulous piece of literature.

FOURTH:
Both Guy and Harold object to dying.

FIFTH:
Someone CRAZY is in charge of Harold’s story – she just thinks she’s writing her newest novel. Guy’s not even supposed to BE a character – until he puts on the glasses and goes from being a Non-Playable-Character to a FORCE in the video game…albeit, he’s not technically controlled by ANYONE at first. Then Antwan sends his controllers in.

SIXTH:
They both meet the story creator eventually – Harold at the very end, Guy when he falls for one of the creators after he has the glasses.

SEVENTH:
Neither Millie nor Keys; and not Karen Eiffel have ANY CLUE that their fictional characters are in fact an artificial intelligence and a real person…until the very end and they are ALL totally freaked out.

EIGHTH:
Both Harold and Guy have a happy ending: Harold gets Ana; Guy gets Millie…and then it turns out he’s actually KEYS…who gets Millie and Guy gets his best friend back.

There are only two differences:

Karen Eiffel and Millie/Keys are HORRIFIED to find out that Harold and Guy are REAL. While Karen lets Harold survive getting hit by a bus instead of dying; Millie and Keys set Guy free (actually all of the Free Life characters).

Karen Eiffel isn’t actually evil, Antwan is.

So, if it’s been done twice, in two very popular and award-winning movies, what are they trying to say to us?

“Free Guy” was almost universally considered a fluff movie – pure fun, no thought, just a good-old time. Esmerelda Gomez at SocioMix however, disagrees: “…the NPCs are more than coded programs for gamers to play with…this theme is centered on civil rights being messed with…by the government…[and] how citizens will fight for them…interactions and movement for change create more room for others to have the ability and rights to…live better lives.”

“Stranger Than Truth” is instead considered a piece of existential thought: “…there’s something very poetic about the understanding of one’s place in the universe, but it’s far more dramatic when such understanding occurs only days before that life ends…Each of these characters ends up doing little things to save one another. There's an underlying theme that the things we take most for granted are often the ones that make life worth living and actually keep us alive.”

The two quotes above might be swapped – STT is certainly about free will and civil rights, and how interactions and movement create room for others to have better lives. FG is certainly about understanding one’s place in the universe, and it absolutely IS more dramatic when Guy understands just before his life ends.

For both, I’d say that there is indeed an underlying theme that the things we take for granted are things that make our lives worth living.

And so, I rest my case…

References: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stranger_than_Fiction_(2006_film), https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0420223/, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Guy, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6264654/, https://www.sociomix.com/diaries/entertainment/the-philosophy-of-the-movie-free-guy-on-reality-purpose-and-change/1633291983#:~:text=Free%20Guy%20Displays%20The%20Change%20An%20Individual%20Can%20Make.&text=Yet%20Guy's%20interactions%20with%20other,the%20NPCs%20he%20interacted%20with.
Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/1/1c/Free_Guy_2021_Poster.jpg/220px-Free_Guy_2021_Poster.jpg, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/ff/Stranger_Than_Fiction_%282006_movie_poster%29.jpg/220px-Stranger_Than_Fiction_%282006_movie_poster%29.jpg

Out of Town for the weekend -- back next week!

 NORTHERN MINNESOTA this weekend with wife, daughter, son-in-law, and grandson

Lake Mille Lacs, near Isle!

Wonderful time, mostly!

See you next week!

POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAYS: PunchFace or, Why Do We Like Our Heroes Better When They’re Beat Up?

My wife and I rewatch movies all the time. From rom-coms, to historical, to sci-fi series, to period pieces, to book-to-movies (sometimes in multiple iterations with different actors!) Some don't seem to have been remade -- like Back to the Future. But the one I come back to avidly and my wife willingly, is the STAR TREK movies. All of them; all directors; all series...in particular, I typed this observation in 2009...

In JJ Abrahamson's STAR TREK, skidrow bum/cadet/PunchFace/captain Kirk is slugged by his enemies sixteen times (as opposed to only being slugged by people who would become his friends later four times); shot at with hand weapons, ship weapons and missiles innumerable times; strangled or thrown by his enemies nine times (as opposed to being injected, pushed, slapped, thrown or strangled an additional nine times by his friends); he hurts himself twice, is chased (by security officers, a furry thing and a lizardy thing) three times and mind-melded against his will once. Total number of countable physical and mental injuries in one movie: 40 (allergic reactions are being counted here as one and the same as involuntary injections…)

Kirk in the original series was pummeled as well because of his attitude or by chance or being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was always wiping a trickle of blood from his chin and was frequently the punching bag of friend and foe alike.

Lest you think I’m a STARWARS-o-phobe, I've never been compelled to do an actual PunchFace count, I recall Luke Skywalker taking an unnatural number of hits though. Perhaps even more than Han Solo did; though certainly more than those meted out to Princess Leia.

Nevertheless, and in keeping with my theme of exploring the intersection of faith and science fiction, I’m going to throw Jesus into the mix as well. The Bible even prophesied that he was going to be a PunchFace. Isaiah 53:5 says, “ But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed.” It’s well-known that He was crucified on a cross after being scourged and humiliated.

While according to the internet, both Muhammed and the Buddha died of poisoning it’s clear that they suffered at the end. While Hindus never die and are either reincarnated or achieve Nirvana, many Hindus have suffered and died in their service as well. It is the ones who suffer that we remember best.

Is it any surprise that our heroes and heroines are the ones who suffer most either before they die or at death? Is it a subconscious Human condition that in order to achieve greatness, someone must suffer and die for their cause? Is it something we’re hard-wired to respect and revere? We even have a saying that can be applied to anything from weight-lifting programs to monastic ascetism: “No pain, no gain”.

So, it is any surprise that our SF heroes and heroines also suffer and die in spectacular ways?

Not to me, it isn’t! How about you?

PunchFace to Eternity anyone?

Slice of PIE: Why Do We Need Christian Spec Fic Publishers? (First posted in March 2009)

In 2014, I received the monthly announcement of Marcher Lord Press (Rebranded as ENCLAVE PUBLISHING ) (http://www.marcherlordpress.com/MLP_Publishing_Model.htm. Around their slogan, " “Enclave publishes out-of-this-world stories that are informed by a coherent theology.” Enclave Publishing is built around the power of great stories which explore the boundaries of the imagination, while championing powerful expressions of Redemption, Truth, and Hope." 
As a division of Oasis Family Media, "Enclave publishes genres called speculative fiction, science fiction, fantasy, military, space opera, steam punk, and myths. Whether it’s Christian science fiction you love, or fantasy, time travel, retellings, steampunk—if it’s speculative and it comes from the Christian worldview, Enclave is the place to go. We strive to get Christian speculative fiction into the hands of the fans who love and devour great stories."

An enclave is a group of like-minded people in a place where they are surrounded by those who are not like-minded. It is not a place to hide, instead, Enclave is supposed to be a place where authors and fans of Christian Fantasy and Science Fiction can come together and then go out and make a difference through worlds of words. Our stories can seem strange but underneath they contain powerful expressions of Redemption, Truth, and Hope.

My question: with hundreds of publishers already producing spec fic in the secular world, why do we need a Christian spec fic publisher? While I can't dispute their call to minister to God’s people in this way, I have serious questions to which I’d like to hear answers.

I've yet to find a well-known hard science fiction writer on Enclaves's author list. Some authors have won secular awards, but by no means all of them. By extension then, these authors are not the "best" in the field yet they are being published as representative of the BEST the Christian spec fic market can produce. These authors represent Christ – at least in the speculative fiction field – to the entire world. Scripture is clear in its commission to us: “Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.” (Colossians 3:17) The fact is that when people buy these books and give them to their spec fic reading unsaved friends, they’ll be compared unfavorably to what is being published in the secular press.

CS Lewis, who not only wrote spec fic for a secular publisher, and published short fiction in the secular market (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction published three of his stories) spoke eloquently to the issue: “What we want is not more little books about Christianity, but more little books by Christians on other subjects with their Christianity latent.” GOD IN THE DOCK, p. 93

Beth Moore as well points out in her scripture workbook: “We cannot seclude ourselves indefinitely in Christian hideouts. Our lives must be poured out like healing ointment on this injured land.” DANIEL: LIVES OF INTEGRITY, WORDS OF PROPHECY, p. 128

Finally, Reggie McNeal: “The truth is that the North American church culture extracts salt from the world and diminishes the amount of light available to those who need to find their way.” THE PRESENT FUTURE, p. 72

It’s clear to me that these Christian publishers have, with the greatest of good will inadvertently created a ghetto in which they might safely believe that they are reaching the world but may be creating a spectacle of themselves at which the secular world peeks, points their fingers, laughs and then moves on its way to the REALLY important work.

And that leaves the secular world effectively unreached. The Church has always been responsible for their loss from the Kingdom of God and leaves us open to the reprimand of our Lord. Matthew 25: 34-46 are verses we often quote to ourselves, patting ourselves on the back. In particular, verses 41-46: "Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’ Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?’ Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me. These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’”

We still have time to become the BEST in the secular world and reach the lost for Jesus Christ. I went to Minnesota Minicon (link here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2025/04/caring-over-science-fiction-and-fantasy.html

That’s where my mission is. Here's a letter from another Christian who is reaching the unreached: https://pierpoints.wordpress.com/2024/08/01/christians-increasingly-consider-their-voice-in-secular-culture/

I have no doubt my concern will have zero effect on Enclave -- that's business and the company was founded to make a profit for its investors -- be that a single founder or other stock investors. But that market draws Christians from writing for the secular market to reach the lost. That's where I want to be...How about you?

Image: https://www.equip.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/CAB-WEB-Is-There-a-Gospel-in-the-Stars-1080-x-630-px.png

SLICE OF PIE: Will Robots, AIs, and Artificial Humans Believe?

On October 7, 2007, I started this blog. Eighteen years later, I am revising and doing some different things. My wife and I are now retired senior citizens, our kids are both married, we have a bonus daughter and her wife and we have four grandchildren! The oldest is in high school, the second in Middle School; and the third will be a first grader this fall. I have forty-five professional publications, plus countless other publications as a slushpile reader, and sometime essay contributor to Stupefying Stories https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/.

These days, I write whenever I want to – or when I’m not busy exploring the world with my wife or kids or grandkids. I write and read constantly. Then I discovered that I was writing longer and longer pieces. My new focus is to write shorter; and to write HUMOR. On purpose. Maybe I can still irritate people while being funny. It works pretty well for John Scalzi! We’ll see what happens.

I just finished reading THE THREE POUND ENIGMA: The Human Brain and the Quest to Unlock Its Mysteries by Shannon Moffett (©2006).

Granted, it’s technically nineteen, but most likely 20 years out of date. Most of the book is a fascinating examination of what science and scientists had discovered about the brain up to that point. The front jacket copy reads, “Where do our big ideas come from? How do dreams affect our waking life? Why do some of us always remember faces but never remember names? Meet the people charting the world inside our head...”

It was great to read, I’d have loved a look at it while I was working on my masters degree in School Counseling!

But, as a retired science teacher and counselor, my mind and efforts have now turned to writing as much as I can. That writing also includes searching for fodder for my next story. Rest assured I found plenty of ideas.

I also found some things that are concerning to me as a Christian. You can ask anyone in the school district I worked in from 1990 to 2020 how often I forced my beliefs down the throats of the public school kids and staff I worked with and you’ll find I never did that. I’d talk about my faith only when specifically asked. I retired with as little fanfare as did the Class of 2020: which is to say, “none”.) I did a couple years stint in private Christian schools before starting in a middle school in a public school district adjacent to the gigantic Minneapolis Public Schools, all the while assisting my wife as she home schooled both of our kids until sending them on their way to middle school in the district I worked in.

Maybe the thing I found most...irritating...was the assumption that somehow, study of the mind must fall into the purview of Eastern religion, in particular Zen Buddhism. That’s the endpoint. Christianity appears to be a way station to the reality and truth of Zen Buddhism and not useful in dealing with our world or mind. Even so, Dr. Roberta Glick (Chapter 1, Jewish by birth and choice), said, “I think that believing in God means that you think what you do has meaning beyond just yourself, that your actions have greater meaning than just you.” (p.35)

This is in contrast to the final chapter where Moffett interviews Norman Fischer, who has a BA in religion, philosophy, and literature, an MFA in poetry, and an MA in history and phenomenology of religion. He is now known as Zoketsu Norman Fischer, a Soto Zen priest. Most of his quotes have a mystic leaning, such as “[Zen] is not the usual kind of activity in that you can’t really try to do it. If you try to move toward I, it always seems to be somewhere else. The harder you try the worse it gets. But you can’t not make any effort, either; in fact you have to make a mighty effort, but in another direction...” Writing like this may be why it is “difficult...for Western minds [to grasp] Zen precepts. Bred on rationalism, scientific method, and that it’s obvious that the shortest path between any two points is a straight line.” His POV is that “meditation may both answer them and provide a solution to the problems raised by” our dissatisfaction, and being “unhappy to the point of being nasty to our loved ones, and to the point of child abuse, war, and genocide...meditation may both answer them and provide a solution to the problems raising them.” (p.273)

So...no action but meditating will take care of everything. We don’t have to DO anything. Just meditate. Based on what has come before, the solution won’t involve us doing anything. To be fair, many “comfortable Christians” seem to have the same POV of God. We pray, God will take care of it with no effort from us...

So...I’ve been working on a series of short stories that will look at this – Christianity, Zen, and a Unified Faith in Humanity collide in a robot who has Human intelligence (how could they NOT? An AI’s brain; a robotic brain; an Artificial Human’s brain are ALL based on our own brain. The question, on Mars is WHY are AIs, robots, and Artificial Humans NOT Human?

Given that all of these are BASED on Humans, why AREN’T they considered Human?

BIG QUESTION: Why do we consider Jesus Human? Technically, He was only half-Human. Mary was entirely Human, but Jesus was incarnate by the Holy Spirit. Is that why people felt no problem executing Him – or does it go deeper? If a people who refuse to accept AIs, humaniform robots, and artificial Humans as Human, how can they accept Jesus as the Son of God and Son of Man?

The four or five stories will be based on a robot’s quest for salvation. Arnine (Robot 9374) is exposed to Christianity on a Mars violently opposed to all religion and bent on eradicating everything except a United Faith in Humanity.

“…tomorrow’s robots may face dilemmas of their own, where their survival comes into question.” How should they respond when they come to believe that their eternal existence is under threat? How do they ‘work out your salvation with fear and trembling’? (Philippians 2:12)

SERIES: Stainless Steel Conversion

CORROSION WROUGHT ON STAINLESS STEEL
REPENTANCE WRACKED BY STAINLESS STEEL
BAPTISM WRUNG FROM STAINLESS STEEL
SALVATION WRIT IN STAINLESS STEEL

So far, the stories will involve recognizing one's sin, believing in Jesus as the savior, repenting of sin, confessing faith, and being baptized/salvation. I may even try and work in some humor as an old-magazine-I-read-in-my-youth-become-website does. You can find it here: https://www.wittenburgdoor.com/

Inspiration: Worldwide persecution of the Christian Church (as well as SOMEWHERE, every kind of belief or faith in something non-corporeal.)Links: https://www.opendoors.org/en-US/persecution/countries/, https://www.premierchristianity.com/features/the-robot-revolution-is-comingbut-are-christians-ready/14500.article, https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ReligiousRobot

Image: https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/humanoid-robot-praying-near-cross-religion-science-concept-creation-new-intelligent-life-concept-humanoid-robot-273669473.jpg?w=992

SLICE OF PIE: LIBRARY PASSPORT Leads To Surviving the Information Apocalypse!!!

On October 7, 2007, I started this blog. Eighteen years later, I am revising and doing some different things. My wife and I are now retired senior citizens, our kids are both married, we have a bonus daughter and her wife and we have three grandchildren, (with a fourth on-the-way!) the oldest of which will soon finish his first year in high school, one smack in the center of Middle School; the third almost done with kindergarten. I have forty-five professional publications, plus countless other publications as a slushpile reader, and sometime essay contributor to Stupefying Stories https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/.

These days, I write whenever I want to – or when I’m not busy exploring the world with my wife or kids or grandkids. I write and read constantly. Then I discovered that I was writing longer and longer pieces. My new focus is to write shorter; and to write HUMOR. On purpose.

To that end, I thought I’d share the startling flow of ideas I gleaned from the results of my birthday present.

A few days ago, my son and his family presented me with a novel artifact: a HENNEPIN COUNTY LIBRARY PASSPORT. Everyone has a library card, right?

Or is that just a naïve assumption made by an old man (68 a few days ago) and foisted off on the world of the first quarter of the 21st Century.

Here are some numbers: “Some 61% of Americans ages 16 and older say they have a library card for a public library. These card holders are more likely to be female, white, under the age of 65, and suburban and urban residents, and are also more likely to have higher levels of education or live in higher income households. About 21% of library card holders did not visit the library in the past 12 months, and 17% of those who have used a public library in the past year say they do not have a library card.”

“According to the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, there are around 2.8 million libraries worldwide. Most of those (2.2 million) are school libraries, over 410,000 are public libraries, and a whopping 85,623 are academic libraries, like those found here at High Point University.”

OK – NOT everyone has one. BUT, it’s possible for everyone (pretty much) to GET one. So what happened on our first trip to eight different libraries listed on the passport?

First, something funny.

After walking through the library to our areas of differing interests, my granddaughter asked the librarian, “What’s with all the chickens on the columns?” Posted on every column was a picture of some breed of chicken – even the most outlandish: watch this YouTube for the silliest ones (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daQ7-hi54_E)

The librarian replied, “Well, it’s CHICKEN month!”
My son asked, “What was last month?”
With a totally straight face, she replied, “Financial Literacy Month.”

I couldn’t help it. I busted out laughing, TOTALLY not expecting something so totally opposite from Chicken Month…”

Another fact: one of the Hennepin County Libraries was built out of a couple of buildings that they converted out of the Grain Belt Brewery building. THAT place has a rich history. The librarian and I got into a long discussion because she remembered how UNdeveloped the portion of the Twin Cities that she moved to was. I entered the discourse by telling her that not only was it undeveloped when SHE moved there, I remember when the city she now lives in was INCORPORATED and that there was nothing but potato fields and cows out that way! She tried to one-up-me by acting like she knew more about the northwestern suburbs of Minneapolis than I did…and being who I am, I one-upped-HER…

Which does NOT lead to this following tidbit. She noted that there were, in fact catacombs underneath the old Grain Belt Brewery… (actually, “The Grain Belt name first appeared in 1893 as the "Golden Grain Belt Old Lager," then brewed by the Minneapolis Brewing Company. The Minneapolis Brewing Company was a conglomerate of four other Minneapolis-based breweries, formed in 1890 by the consolidation of the F.D. Noerenberg Brewery, John Orth Brewing Company, Heinrich Brewing Association, and Germania Brewing Association. It was one of the largest breweries in the United States at that time.”)

“CATACOMBS?” I exclaimed.

She leaned forward and said softly, “And they’re still there.”

THAT statement led to this idea: I have a very science fictional mind, and I thought, “Wouldn’t that be a fascinating place for a group to survive the Information Apocalypse?” (“The rise of generative artificial intelligence (AI) has ignited a debate about its effects on the mis- and disinformation landscape. Some scholars foresee doomsday scenarios of epistemic and information apocalypse (Fallis, 2021; Schick, 2020), AI being used as a “weapon of mass disruption” (Bremmer & Kupchan, 2023), or a complete blurring of boundaries between true and false (Metz, 2023).”

And there, you go. Have fun with your imagination!

Inspiration: https://www.highpoint.edu/library/2023/06/12/16252/#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20International%20Federation,here%20at%20High%20Point%20University.
Links: https://libguides.ala.org/librarystatistics/largest-public-libs, https://www.highpoint.edu/library/2023/06/12/16252/#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20International%20Federation,here%20at%20High%20Point%20University. ,
https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2013/12/11/section-1-an-overview-of-americans-public-library-use/#:~:text=their%20family%20does.-,Library%20card%20holders,not%20have%20a%20library%20card. , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grain_Belt_(beer) , https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/polp.12617#:~:text=While%20an%20%E2%80%9Cinformation%20apocalypse%E2%80%9D%20has,Vaccari%20&%20Chadwick%2C%202020). 

Image: https://i.ytimg.com/vi/eXjZE9XyfnM/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLD9BOGeXBu6-9FfdYmRzmKgq0iwJg

SLICE OF PIE: Why Do the Avenger Movies Make Me So ANGRY; Part 1?

On October 7, 2007, I started this blog. Sixteen years later, I am revising and doing some different things. My wife and I are now retired senior citizens, our kids are both married, we have a bonus daughter and her wife and we have three grandchildren, (with a fourth on-the-way!) the oldest of which will soon finish his first year in high school, one smack in the center of Middle School; the third almost done with kindergarten. I have forty-five professional publications, plus countless other publications as a slushpile reader, and sometime essay contributor to Stupefying Stories https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/.
These days, I write whenever I want to – or when I’m not busy exploring the world with my wife or kids or grandkids. I write and read constantly. Then I discovered that I was writing longer and longer pieces. My new focus is to write shorter; and to write HUMOR. On purpose. Maybe I can still irritate people while being funny. It works pretty well for John Scalzi! We’ll see what happens.

This essay isn’t going to be funny. Actually, it’s sort of grim…

I grew up on the short, “average end” of the DNA strand. When I tell people I grew up in a family where my father had played football and basketball as a kid growing up in a poorer neighborhood of Minneapolis. I know anyone living in New York City, Chicago, Calcutta, or Port-au-Prince had it far tougher, probably deadly. Two younger brothers were football, hockey, then baseball and track-and-field; sister was softball and volleyball, and mom had been on the Fencing team at the University of Minnesota.

To say we ate, drank, and lived SPORTS was an adequate conclusion. I was pudgy after I had my tonsils out, and it seemed that what I WAS interested in (music was OK, Dad and one brother did it, Mom sang, too). Acting, swimming, and camping were WEIRD. Being a committed follower of Christ was even weirder. I was smart enough, but never EXCELLED at anything…

Bullies – from my brothers down to Tom, a neighborhood bully who physically slugged me; added to that all the guys who intimidated me at the slightest drop of a hat. The cherry on top was my name: Guy. The decade had arrived where calling me gay-Guy carried a truckload of sexual innuendo (and not ONLY innuendo – some was outright claim-that-it-was-a-fact.) and stigma.

I survived due to a complex protective mix of…well, I’ll stop there to say that after re-watching for the dozenth time, I discovered that the AVENGER movies – specifically, the SPIDERMAN movies, the IRONMAN movies, and finally, the THANOS movies were making me seethe with anger.

I discovered that the Avengers Universe (aka the MCU or Marvel Comics Universe) overflows with BULLIES. Every single one of the movies – these UNIVERSAL GOOD women and men – not only faced unfairness and persecution by bullies over and over – they also BULLIED characters (including each other – I think specifically of Antman, who appears to be a doormat more than a LOT of times…) in the movies. Even the highest and mightiest, the ones I MOST respected: Captain America, Spiderman, Black Panther, Captain Marvel, and Vision…are repeatedly bullied – and they respond with bullying others weaker than them.

Of course, the biggest and most powerful bully was Ironman. And yet, the writers and watchers worked hard to make us both feel sorry for him, and endear him to us, so that, despite how much bullying Spiderman and Ironman perpetrated, not only were they OUTBULLIED by Thanos, I wept at that last scene where Spiderman (aka Peter Parker) wept over the loss of his (abusive) father-figure, Tony Stark (aka Ironman)…

By definition I will use this one from THE ANTIBULLYING ALLIANCE: “The repetitive, intentional hurting (physically, emotionally, or spiritually) of one person or group by another person or group, where the relationship involves an imbalance of power. Bullying can be physical, verbal, or psychological. It can happen face-to-face or online (or in the Spirit realm or in another dimension, or teleportation (whether actual or spiritual).” (https://anti-bullyingalliance.org.uk/tools-information/all-about-bullying/understanding-bullying/definition)

I’m not going to go through all of the Avenger movies; I will note some obvious instances – of course is in the first scene of the first movie: Steve Rogers is getting beat up by a kid in Queens in 1942.

After that, all you need to do is think a bit and you’ll find scenes from all of them of bullying. The ones that leap out to me are Wanda bullying just about everyone she comes into contact with for her entire tenure in the Avengers. She even bullies Vision.

Steve Rogers (himself a victim of brutal bullying) resorts to bullying what’s left of the Avengers when he repeatedly says that nothing anyone else says or thinks is important – his opinion is the only valid one.

King T’Challa, like all the other bullies in the MCU vacillates wildly between a (literarily pathetic) figure and a brutal bully, forcing his will on everyone in sight – including the woman he’s trying to woo…I could see the results of THAT one coming from a million light-years away.

The god Thor acts like Steve Rogers and pushes everyone around, even resorting to bulling his “girlfriend” to get his way…(isn’t that an actionable behavior…Oh! He’s a god, he’s exempt…)

Rocket Racoon continually bullies everyone he comes into contact with (and is excused because he was treated badly as a cyborg raccoon); also, Ego bullies the entire universe; Star Lord does some bullying, then retreats a bit…

OK – I’ve got both a point and a badly missed deadline. I’ll be back to finish this next week.

Inspiration: The Marvel Cinematic Universe, https://www.space.com/marvel-movies-in-order
Image: https://rchsprowler.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/il_794xN.2741269623_o55v-636x900.jpg

SLICE OF PIE: Contemplating The Future

On October 7, 2007, I started this blog. Sixteen years later, I am revising and doing some different things. My wife and I are now retired senior citizens, our kids are both married, we have a bonus daughter and her wife and we have three grandchildren, (with a fourth on-the-way!) the oldest of which will soon finish his first year in high school, one smack in the center of Middle School; the third almost done with kindergarten. I have forty-five professional publications, plus countless other publications as a slushpile reader, and sometime essay contributor to Stupefying Stories https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/.

These days, I write whenever I want to – or when I’m not busy exploring the world with my wife or kids or grandkids. I write and read constantly. Then I discovered that I was writing longer and longer pieces. My new focus is to write shorter; and to write HUMOR. On purpose. Maybe I can still irritate people while being funny. It works pretty well for John Scalzi! We’ll see what happens.

With the birth of our new GD, I’ve been thinking about what kinds of things might be “normal” for her when she “gains her majority” (aka Turning 18!). As she was born a few days ago, that will be in April of 2043. Truthfully? That doesn’t seem to be all that far away!

So, let me add a few years and make her legal anywhere (currently) on Earth: make her 25, to the year and it will be 2050. Nice round number; I should be able to get a few INTERESTING Futurecasts!

The WORLD IN 2050: PS – I will be staying ENTIRELY AWAY FROM POLITICS (except in a very, very broad way). Let’s start by looking backward 25 years, to 2000.

Now THERE was a year! The number one thing was the there was a firm belief – practically a a-Religious PROPHECY, that all computer programs would be crashing into an incoherent alphanumeric pile of incomprehensible gibberish. Doubt me?

https://cdn.forumcomm.com/dims4/default/12c6c2d/2147483647/strip/true/crop/927x618+119+0/resize/1680x1120!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fforum-communications-production-web.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com%2Fbrightspot%2Fce%2Ffe%2Fd43181d84cff9b15bd00ea2e97ce%2Fthe-forum-1999-12-17-23.jpg

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/picture-gallery/news/local/2019/12/17/20-years-since-y-2-k-burlington-free-press-covers-millennium/2672976001/

And of course, our great friends at the Weekly World News:

https://www.thecrudelife.com/2022/10/08/esg-tricks-in-energy-environment-and-empowerment/

Really?

No big deal, eh?

So, what do the pundits expect for the world ALL of my grandkids will likely be living in?

Well, the Worst-Casers are certain Earth will look like this:

https://www.single.earth/blog/worst-case-climate-scenario-rcp85

This outlook expects Paris to feel like North Africa (ie. Sahara); “By the end of the century, we’ll have an entirely different planet.”

It’s concerning that this particular “prophecy” expects that everything will continue on as it is, without any kind of technology advances, nothing mentioning a space program, nothing changing to replace drilled oil, nothing with Artificial Intelligence…in fact, it seems to miss a number of different possibilities to arrive at a very grim future for Humanity. Oddly, the author talks about their great hopes for NetZero and the continued march of the “consensus among scientists” and “limiting global warming” and that “emissions of greenhouse gases must be reduced quickly.” Apparently, “most politicians” know about it, but any effect in which they lead by example “is far from global”. Sadly, “…it's easy to assume [that pollution, extinction of species, depletion of resources, and climate change] are exclusive to the modern world. But a huge collaborative study in Science reveals that early humans across the entire globe were changing and impacting their environments as far back as 10,000 years ago.” https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/08/190829150702.htm

So, what are some of the GOOD changes we might see by 2050?

“…not just about AI… Clean energy technologies, such as solar energy and electric vehicles, have crossed the tipping point into mainstream commodities that are rapidly scaling and getting cheaper every year…gene-editing technology, such as CRISPR, have brought us bioengineering, the ability to engineer all living things, and are opening up the possibilities of a much more sustainable world more in sync with nature…”

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/08/190829150702.htm)

“Technology may be seamlessly integrated, and augmented/virtual reality, with artificial intelligence is everywhere. We no longer work, learn, or interact with each other. It will be as different as the Zulu Kingdom with its advances in warfare, agriculture, and pottery interacting through the Fourth and what was registered in Europe as the mid-19th Century, and Last Imperial Dynasty. They knew of each other, but didn’t interact much separated by culture, language, and history.

“TRULY renewable energy sources, actual ecofriendly, circular economies will be the norm, with cities designed for minimal environmental impact will begin to grow -- literally. Space Exploration and Colonization will become an unremarkable norm. Space tourism will become common, allowing many more civilians to experience the wonders of the cosmos. A healthcare revolution, led by advances in tele-health and medical technology may lead to personalized medicine, genetic therapies, and breakthroughs in disease prevention. Nanobots may be used to treat countless conditions from common diseases, to re-engineering DNA to prevent the passage of heritable disease, and wearable devices will monitor and enhance our mental health on a moment-by-moment basis. MIGHT leverage artificial intelligence for efficient public services, decision-making, and policy implementation. Smart cities with interconnected systems will enhance urban planning and resource management. Bioengineered organs may appear, but ethical considerations surrounding genetic modification will enter public discourse. Hyperconnectivity might facilitate instantaneous communication and collaboration on a global scale. Brain-machine interfaces may enable direct communication between the human brain and computers.

The biggest surprises of 2050 might be the ways my grandchildren interact in unexpected ways as we adapts and innovate in response to the challenges and opportunities of this wild future.

Did ANYONE really foresee (in 1975, the year I graduated from high school, thank you very much), what EXACTLY…(no, let’s not even demand exactness…) even approximately, what the 18-year-old-me’s grandchildren would be doing with a device so thin is could be slipped into their jeans pockets, whipped out, and do the equivalent of SEARCHING THE ENTIRE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS as well as the libraries of virtually whatever language they chose -- to answer a science, sociology, or technology question…or INSTANTLY know which of the Beatle’s were still alive; the original name of the current Dali Lama; or the value comparison of 1 ₽ or 1 ₼ or 1 R$ or 1 € or 1 ₪ or 1 ₱ to 1 $, in an amount of time that would (on a bad day) take sixty seconds to discover?

No.

And THAT’S what I expect to happen in 2050. I don’t freaking know; I can’t guess; but I CAN imagine, and no one can argue with me…

(https://www.forbes.com/sites/soulaimagourani/2023/12/09/2050-unveiled-a-glimpse-into-the-future/)

Image: https://www.shutterstock.com/image-generated/dubai-downtown-2050-flying-cars-virtual-2452049793