Category: Uncategorized

On commercial/friendly relations and two joke/poems

I’m new to this area and had been through tough times in my last city. So, one of the people I speak with most is a reliable and friendly taxi driver.

It makes me think of the difference between the commercial and the persornal.

I said once to recent a bar attendant in the city I last lived in that you must get tired of people coming and drinking and blabbing.She said,” it’s my job”. But she and another staffer at the bar said they liked me. It was kind.

Two joke/poems

“Run” by yours truly

“Oh, no Uncle Crampion: don’t rerun for U.S. president again in 2024!”

“Got edema: so running is anyway poor.”

“What, you don’t want more?”

“That’s for sure.”

This a slightly sexually risque joke/poem. I’m sorry, if I offend anyone.

“inflation” by yours truly

I am also concerned about inflation,

Namely, having trouble blowing up my plastic sex dolls.

It doesn’t matter the color of their hair or skin.

Just need to begin again.

On climate

Locally there can be very strong wind maybe because of the high elevation, over 7,000 feet. We also had a strong lighting storm last night. The visuals were just brief flickers of light really, but the later thunder sounds were a bit more disturbing.

I don’t know what it is about climate. I think it can become more important as you get older. It can change your mood and skin health, if you are “white.”

I posted a while back about the literary theory of pathetic fallacy, and a 10,000 Maniacs song called “Changes in the Weather” that deals with it seemingly

On creative writing and “middle narratives”

Have begun a new novella about federal politics. The exposition seemed easy to write because it was really my own views on politics.

I have stalled a bit now, while turning to the middle. It will likely be about the main character/Senator having married a high school sweat-heart who also became a senior Capitol Hill staffer.

i find the tension between personal and political intriguing.

On the word “no”

A high school history teacher I liked had a quote or statement: “No! No! A thousand times no!”

The statement came to mind to mind because I have been in so much trouble with authorities the past few years.

A Japanese author wrote a book titled The Japan that Can Say “No.” I didn’t read it but suspect he was talking about his country taking back its sovereignty after WWII.

Or maybe it’s about Japanese women refusing to sleep with me. Haha.

 

On fiction work

I have a few fictional works out already or should be out soon. The first novellas are called “Shaking and Steady, but Not Stirred.” and “After-life” which are thrillers at their core but also a bit post-modern.  I consider my best novella to be “Redux, A Novel of Second Chances”; you can find on Amazon or Barnes and Noble, maybe adding the author name E.C. Walsh.

I also have one in the pipeline called “Senex Amans” about May-December love. And another called “Invasions” about simultaneous invasions of the U.S. by non-state terrorists.

There is also one called “Swizzel Stuck” that is mainly semi-autobiographical.  I tend to semi-autobiography but try to keep it brief and don’t name real names.

Trying to do on-line video publicity for these books but having some issues with a new computer.

 

 

 

 

 

On mainstream media

Does anyone else find it irritating when an anchor newscaster smiles while reporting a very bitter celebrity divorce trial?

The late-20th century newscasters may have made some mistakes, but they mainly seemed to be serious. This guy’s producers may have told him to smile throughout the show, but it still seemed discordant and inappropriate.

I didn’t care much for the pop singer Don Henley, but he had a cynical song about the almost violent potential of media taking pleasure in others’ pain: “Kick ’em when they’re up/ Kick ’em when they’re down” goes one line, and he sings about a newscaster looking inappropriately happy while reporting disaster.

Two poems and a memory

“Blue Notebook” by yours truly

Blue notebook, where are you, blue notebook?

You contain all my usernames, passwords, and six-digit pins.

And a few of my sins.

Blue notebook.

“Inside Out” by yours truly

“Inside/outside. Leave me alone.

Inside, outside.// Nowhere is home.” —The Who

The inside of this home can be nice,.

But the outside is often not.

Too many loud birds, dogs, and cars.

Maybe we are all from Mars.

On a memory

When I started teaching in grad school my first year one of my students came up to me after class. which was called Rhetoric and Composition and basically meant to teach how to write essays. But this student got passionate about how she did not like fictional literature.  I only used one or two brief poems; the rest were all non-fictions. The student dropped out of the class and college and went back to her home in another state for service-sector work.

On memories

Thinking of an uncle who was kind to me.

We dd not agree on political ideology because he was very liberal and a bit atheist. But he gave me lunch a few times, and we were both in journalism at the same time.

Sadly, he seemed to have died very painfully with back problems, maybe because he lifted a lot of weights when younger. I have some physical health issues now because I may have   overdone exercise when young. But I was also tortured repeatedly throughout my life.

In a weird way, human cruelty can reinforce belief in God.

 

 

Another few comments on creative writing

Some of our undergraduates when I was a teaching assistant in grad school said a bit cynically that you need to have substance-abuse addiction to be a famous creative writer.

There’s a novel called Confessions of an Opium Eater that I have not read. But the title is provocative. I have not taken illegal drugs (or hugs. Haha.} much, but a lot of people are addicted to something in a way.

That is all I have for now to say.

Some odd thoughts

I have recently been through psychological and/or religious remission in which you come to   terms with bad things possibly done in your youth that you may have blocked from memory.

I have accepted I did them, but one of the odd things is my voice has changed somewhat. I used to be almost totally monotone and a bit deep-voiced but am now a bit high-pitched.

I am not homosexual, but when I sing to myself at home to pass the time, I sound a bit like the gay singer from the British pop group Erasure..