Posts filed under ‘OBSERVATIONS & OPINIONS’
LOIS LANE (NOEL NEILL) HAS DIED
Being a lover of science fiction from an early age, I, of course, watched Superman on TV during the fifties.
I just read that Noel Neill, who played Lois Lane, had died at the age of 95. I had to have watched every episode where Noel Neill playing Lois Lane appeared beside George Reeves playing Superman.
Here are some musings about how that past Superman would have a problem dealing in the current day and age. It struck me, in this day and age, with cellphones the predominate means of communication and phone booths a thing of the past, where in our current society could Superman change?
Also, a pair of glasses was his disguise. I must admit, when I remove my glasses people around me expect me to fly. I continually disappoint them, so far. And also, what would happen if Superman developed a super zit on the tip of his nose? Would taking off his glasses still conceal his identity?
Questions keeping me up some nights. I’m sure they have the same effect on you.
POEMS & FLEETING THOUGHTS: ORLANDO
Once again guns take lives,
Once again talk of gun control
Will fill the media,
And politicians will profess
How they will solve
The problem,
And once again,
Nothing will be done.
THE READING WORLD WAR II WEEKEND
The World War II weekend at the Reading Airport is now history. A short time ago I posted a piece describing the event and providing the date. Along with the information I included my first published short story centered on that weekend event.
After working the mornings of all three days of the event this year, I would like to share some observations.
We had quite a few veterans of that war, along with more recent wars, in attendance. I watched the World War II veterans, mostly in wheelchairs or supported by walkers, make their way through the gate to relive their youth. Although there was one spry 94 year old, who could have passed for 70, come to enjoy the show and I’m sure relive a time long gone. I tried to imagine what life was like when they were young men, in a foreign country, facing death any day. And what life must have been like for the civilians. In this day and age, could we muster the dedication on the scale to defeat the evil foe of that era?
These gallant men, participants belonging to the great greatest generation, rapidly dwindling, need to reveal their experiences. If you know a participant of that war, gently try to persuade them to talk of their experiences. Some are just waiting for someone to ask.
Also, if you know someone who lived during that era on the home front, ask them to share their experiences during that stressful time.
Their history needs to be preserved while we can still touch it.
THE STATE OF OUR NATION
I cannot express my feelings as eloquently as some of the fantastic poets I follow online. I must come to the brutal point; this country is in deep shit.
Not only of Donald Trump and what he has accomplished in this election year. Rather, it is because he was able to do what he has done. The sorry state of our government is the birth of his success.
The future of our country is in jeopardy of failure.
I thank God I am old.
STRUGGLING TO GET WRITING APPRECLIATED
Why do you write?
If you’re young, it’s to begin and establish a career, and along the way, perhaps make a living. If you are young this article may not interest you for it’s coming from a different place in life. The place is old age, but the need, perhaps not the reason remains the same. But then again, you will not be young forever.
My first and only novel published thus far appeared while I entered my sixties. Now, at the ass-end of that decade, when maturity infiltrates my brain, I still have a need to write as demonstrated in these mumblings. Do I enjoy it? Hell no!
I should not be working now. I should be enjoying ‘the golden years’. But my personality has always had a strange quirk, the need to accomplish something meaningful. This disease began while I was a teen and has pursued me ever since. Someday soon I may write of how this change to my personality began.
But for now, to the point of this article.
At the end of last year I receive an email from Books To Go Now, a publisher of e-stories telling me I had made 16 cents for the year. This notification brought me joy in a year of a publishing drought. I don’t know and will never meet the person who put down money to read my work.
In my mind, my friends, that is what it is all about. Not fame or fortune which is rightfully sought by the young, but appreciation of our efforts in writing. The bottom line is that appreciation and recognition, no matter how minimal of your work is important. It means someone finds your work worthy of buying. The buying is not the important part, the desire to read your work is.
That is why I write, and perhaps your reason too.
THE WRONGS OF THE PAST CONTINUE: A REVIEW OF YESTERDAY’S FICTION AND TODAYS REALITY
This could be considered one of my RANTS & RAVES pieces, but since it’s also a book review, it stands alone as a unique species.
The wide gap between the top 1%, the people of wealth, and the working class is beyond comprehension.
The products sold to the American public, behind the falsehood of corporate manipulation of the truth, is beyond belief. Unsafe and contaminated products are sold, money is exchanged, and the trend will continue as long as there is a profit to be made.
The wealthy manipulate society to their benefit, robbing the working class of a better life as they fill their coffers of greed. Something must be done for the common man as his world sinks into an abyss of despair.
If you think these facts were torn from the current condition of our society; you would be wrong. Although these revelations sound much like the current state of affairs in this country they are products of the past.
We now live in a world where wealth thumps conscience and the benefit of the average citizen. Where the greed continues worldwide, and the richest 85 individuals in the world have more wealth than the bottom 50% of the world’s population (Time magazine). Where, in this country, the gulf between the common man and the legendary 1%, which if you do the math is over 3 million individuals, control and manipulate our lives to their own benefit. The conditions of the past and the present mingle in a disturbing never-ending situation for the people of this country.
I have just finished reading The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. First published in 1906, the work changed our country with the introduction of laws to protect the public from buying contaminated meat products and labor reform. The novel is an historical work of fiction, and through the primary character’s eyes, we are allowed to see the conditions, beyond imagination, which provide food for our nation at that time. Where children are forced to work at unbelievably young ages to support their destitute families.
As mentioned earlier, this novel resulted in laws changing our society’s conditions for the better. Yet, to some extent, the same conditions remain in effect. Greed has a way of refusing to die. Industries, today, continue to provide inferior products, causing damage and death to the population. When these inferior product are discovered massive fines are imposed. But the profits reaped before the discovery of purposeful negligence far outweigh the fines. Today, this is good business practice. I have no proof of this conjecture beyond common sense. I assume, perhaps wrongly, but I think not, that these companies providing products recalled and deemed hazardous, have a massive army of lawyers and accountants running the dollar amounts for possible fines vs profits.
I will not name the prime industries involved. But if you have access to any form of news, and also a memory, you know the industries of which I speak. All you need to do is read or remember the massive recalls and billion dollar lawsuits resulting from the death and injury of consumers caused by unsafe products.
This piece reveals nothing new if you follow the current situation of our society. The only truth it does reveal is that our use and manipulation by the wealthy has not changed.
This could be considered one of my RANTS & RAVES pieces, but since it’s also a book review, it stands alone as a unique species.
The wide gap between the top 1%, the people of wealth, and the working class is beyond comprehension.
The products sold to the American public, behind the falsehood of corporate manipulation of the truth, is beyond belief. Unsafe and contaminated products are sold, money is exchanged, and the trend will continue as long as there is a profit to be made.
The wealthy manipulate society to their benefit, robbing the working class of a better life as they fill their coffers of greed. Something must be done for the common man as his world sinks into an abyss of despair.
If you think these facts were torn from the current condition of our society; you would be wrong. Although these revelations sound much like the current state of affairs in this country they are products of the past.
We now live in a world where wealth thumps conscience and the benefit of the average citizen. Where the greed continues worldwide, and the richest 85 individuals in the world have more wealth than the bottom 50% of the world’s population (Time magazine). Where, in this country, the gulf between the common man and the legendary 1%, which if you do the math is over 3 million individuals, control and manipulate our lives to their own benefit. The conditions of the past and the present mingle in a disturbing never-ending situation for the people of this country.
I have just finished reading The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. First published in 1906, the work changed our country with the introduction of laws to protect the public from buying contaminated meat products and labor reform. The novel is an historical work of fiction, and through the primary character’s eyes, we are allowed to see the conditions, beyond imagination, which provide food for our nation at that time. Where children are forced to work at unbelievably young ages to support their destitute families.
As mentioned earlier, this novel resulted in laws changing our society’s conditions for the better. Yet, to some extent, the same conditions remain in effect. Greed has a way of refusing to die. Industries, today, continue to provide inferior products, causing damage and death to the population. When these inferior product are discovered massive fines are imposed. But the profits reaped before the discovery of purposeful negligence far outweigh the fines. Today, this is good business practice. I have no proof of this conjecture beyond common sense. I assume, perhaps wrongly, but I think not, that these companies providing products recalled and deemed hazardous, have a massive army of lawyers and accountants running the dollar amounts for possible fines vs profits.
I will not name the prime industries involved. But if you have access to any form of news, and also a memory, you know the industries of which I speak. All you need to do is read or remember the massive recalls and billion dollar lawsuits resulting from the death and injury of consumers caused by unsafe products.
This piece reveals nothing new if you follow the current situation of our society. The only truth it does reveal is that our use and manipulation by the wealthy has not changed.
ec
COMPARISON OF TWO ERASERHEADS
Recently, I viewed a short clip of the movie, Eraserhead. Gazing at the main character, Eraserhead, my mind instantly recalled a figure of current times. The resemblance is uncanny to an existing political figure, who, with respect to his stature in the world, I will not mention (North Korea).
This observation led me to the following question, in relation to the height of the eraser. Does the political figure make more mistakes than the movie character? This observation is perhaps of no importance. I just though I’d share.
RANTS AND RAVES
With the revelation of The Panama Papers, it does not appear that the concept of ‘trickle down’ worldwide, is working very well.
SCIENCE FICTION BECOMING SCIENCE FACT
Since I write science fiction, I had to give praise to SpaceX landing their 14 story rocket on a barge, not a very large barge, in the ocean.
How many of us, advanced in age and wisdom remember rockets landing in movies or TV in an identical manner. I do not know why but watching the missile land, the fact that the top of the rocket was perfectly flat was something I had never pictured. It’s delivery, gone.
I just had to mention this historic event and contemplate the next science fiction turned science fact. I might share that War of the Worlds is one of my favorite science fiction movies along with The Thing from Another World which scared the shit out of the seven or eight year old Walt. Remember the last line of The Thing after the vegetable James Arness is fried?
“Look to the skies.” I love that line.
A SECOND LOOK AT GEORGE R.R. MARTIN
Those of you who follow this blog will remember, in the past, I have expressed negative opinions on George R.R. Martin’s series, The Game of Thrones. I felt, and still do, that the novels were overwritten. If they were shortened, the story would move along at a much interesting pace. In my opinion, the description of the character’s clothes and other details were far beyond necessary. While talking with a friend, I found that he also had a problem reading these novels, and had an interesting observation. He commented that the novels were really screenplays, providing details needed more for a visual representation of the story than what the novel required.
These are opinions of the author’s works of fantasy. Now I would I would like to express my limited exposure to the Martin’s science fiction.
Due to a local library’s overflow of books, I inherited a book of Martin’s science fiction work published by TOR in 1985, with the individual stories first published during the 1970’s. The first and best story, Nightflyers, was a read I highly recommend. All of the stories making up this anthology are worthy of a lover of science fiction’s attention.
From reading this the brief amount of Martin’s science fiction, I think his writing in this genre is superb and definitely plan to read more of his efforts, if I can find them. I found the stories in Nightflyers to progress at a rapid pace and entertaining.
My opinion of this author has suffered a turnaround. This is the fault of forming an opinion until all the facts are known.
