I got home yesterday after a long day of substitute school teaching (middle school French, that’s all you need to know), turned on the faucet at the kitchen sink and… Nothing. Panicked, I tried the hall bathroom. Nothing there either. A broken line? There were no puddles in the yard. Forgot to pay the water
Today I received the following email — Congratulations! You are among the 32 contributors in prose and poetry represented in Bewildering Stories’ First Quarterly Review of 2015, now officially on line. We like to think of the Quarterly Reviews as offering safe harbour on the chaotic sea of the Internet. The Review Editors are very
Does anyone else have trouble with touchscreens? I’m finding they’re pretty much everywhere — my phone, my iPod, my netbook computer… I once got a notebook computer and had to take it back; either I would touch it and nothing would happen (multiple times!) or it would open windows when my finger was still a
“The Joy in Forgotten Objects” The good folks at Bewildering Stories have posted another of my stories. Usually they want multiple rewrites or reject them outright, but this one went right to the publication schedule. http://www.bewilderingstories.com/is…/forgotten_objects.html
What’s the most eye-catching opening line of anything you have ever read? I like to pick a work at random and just read the first line to see how interesting it sounds. “Once upon a time…” just doesn’t cut it anymore. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was
I see Forbes magazine has published its billionaires list again. http://www.forbes.com/billionaires/list/ What would it be like to have that much money? I have no idea myself. But twice in my life I’ve gotten a glimpse of wealthy lifestyles. It’s like some careless person has left the door ajar, and I got to peek inside. The first
I was reminded again today that there are two sides to every story. In this case it was whimsical, but the point is valid nonetheless. I had taken one of my infrequent substitute-teaching jobs in elementary and noticed a book in the classroom, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs by A. Wolf. Did
If you could travel through time, would you? Which way would you go, forward or backward? What if you went forward and the world no longer existed when you arrived? If you went backward, why? Right a wrong? Warn of an impending disaster? Fix a relationship? Change history? Make yourself wealthy? Today I was catching
Intellectual property is near and dear to my heart. The sad fact is if you have a really good idea, someone will try to steal it. I remember when I lived in Southern California, I took a one-day course on how to set up a business (more out of boredom at that time). A woman
Despite a 20-year career in the Air Force, I find at this stage of my life I loathe violence. It could be because I have been to war myself (Vietnam). It could be that there is just too much violence in our culture, from fiction (TV and movies) to fact ( the nightly news). Or