People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the physical pl…
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Scripturient: The Secret to Good Writing
Spoiler alert: the secret to writing well is…. (insert drum roll)… writing. Writing a lot. Every day. Every possible minute you can spare. Writing and writing more and then writing even more. But doing so within a pre-specified limit. Oops̷…
Continue readingScripturient: Grammatical Hell in a Handbasket
The Washington Post has started the apocalypse. Yes, they have. And the whole world is about to go to hell in the proverbial handbasket because of it. The maw of Hell has opened… The Post has decided after decades – centuries? – of e…
Continue readingScripturient: A Sense of Pinker’s Style
I share one of Steven Pinker’s passions: I like to read style books, grammar books, language books. To me, they’re like literary chemistry sets. When I was young, getting a chemistry set for Christmas or a birthday opened a whole world to …
Continue readingScripturient: The Gauche in the Machine
Rudibus ex machina: criticizing Collingwood’s latest newsletter feels a bit like punching a puppy. Or commenting on the sloppy grammar of local bloggers. Both are far too easy, like catching fish in a barrel, and I feel guilty when I even think of doing it. But since your tax dollars
Continue readingThe Political Road Map: Wriber: Canadian Intellectual Advancement
While Stephen Harper has done his fair share to direct our economy into the ground, he failed in all of his attempts from keeping Canadians from doing what they do best, which is making new things that benefit everyone as a whole! Introducing Wriber… https://www.wriber.com/ Improve your writing and idea
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: The Tone Analyzer – Fascinating Pages on the Internet
Ever wondered about your writing style and the message your ‘word medium’ conveys? The Tone Analyzer will tell you. 🙂 I put one of my previous endeavours through the mill. This is what was returned. I’m still looking into if any of the analysis is congruent with reality. If
Continue readingmark a rayner: The tyranny of freedom
From Kurt Vonnegut’s Bluebeard, 1987.
Continue readingcentre of the universe: Money for Nothing
Copyright is, at its simplest form, the method by which creators are paid for their work. It is a registration of an intellectual property (IP). It says “the creator has the right to charge, or not to charge, money for you to use this”. It’s not a form of censorship
Continue readingmark a rayner: The nature of novelists
A short addendum, filed under who knows: Time-travelling pirates Über-chimp astrologers Ham-fisted hosers Over-emotional AIs Plus this subset of writers: Whisky-swilling scribblers Wine-soaked hacks Beery autobiographers Alltop is a algorithm posting as a humor site.
Continue readingmark a rayner: A post in which I quote Marx
See, there was nothing to worry about, comrades. Alltop is not half-hearted about humor.
Continue readingmark a rayner: You tell ’em Kurt
I post this quote for no particular reason. It’s from his collection, Wampeters, Foma, and Granfalloons. Alltop has some insanely fun links.
Continue readingmark a rayner: Keyboard Shortcuts for Novelists
Or you could just mash the keys together in a fit of anxious rage and see what happens? Alltop gets funny whenever you hit alt + f. H/T to Corey Redekop. Genius cartoon by Tom Gauld.
Continue readingcentre of the universe: A tisket, a tasket…
What the crap is a tisket, anyway? Or, for that matter, a tasket? You know what, it doesn’t really matter. I’m’a just make it up. And I’m’a write about it. And the thing I write is going to be called “The Great Tisket; or, An Adventure in Tasket”. AND IT
Continue readingcentre of the universe: This may be the best thing I have ever written
I found this little gem on my Twitter feed via timehop. Part of me wishes it were fiction. It’s always an adventure when you’re me.
Continue readingcentre of the universe: A letter
I wanted to write to you, to tell you that I’m trying really hard to be positive right now. That I’m trying really hard to think about the things that can go right instead of the things that have gone wrong. I wanted to write and tell you about my
Continue readingmark a rayner: Interview in Western News
My authorial compadre at the Faculty of Information and Media Studies, Kane Faucher, did a great job of interviewing me a while back, and it appeared in print today. Seriously. on PAPER, so you know it’s legit! You can read: “Finding humour in a changing landscape” here. Western News is
Continue readingScripturient: The Story of Chicken Little
Chicken Little was out one morning walking around town. It was a fine morning, and he decided he wanted a cup of coffee. He wanted one so much could even smell the coffee in the air. So he walked into a local restaurant. But then he stopped and his mouth fell
Continue readingScripturient: Two New Posts on the Municipal Machiavelli
I added two posts today to my blog about Niccolo Machiavelli, the 16th century political philosopher. These are: Machiavelli: The Graphic Novel – a short piece about the recent publication of Don MacDonald’s exciting new graphic book. and Atheist Machiavelli? A longer piece on the debate about whether Machiavelli was
Continue readingScripturient: Propaganda?
Last term, when council sent out community newsletters to keep residents informed, the illiterati screamed these were ‘propaganda’ and a waste of tax dollars.* Now this council has done the same thing and these nattering nabobs of negativity have raised their voices and screamed… nothing. Their silence is deafening. Well, they wouldn’t
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