"The growth of understanding follows an ascending spiral rather than a straight line." ~Joanna Field

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Bookmarks - False Memory

Another Dean Koontz book, False Memory is copyright 1999, and published by Bantam (Random House).

False Memory follows Martine (Martie) Rhodes and her husband Dustin (Dusty) as well as some people they know as Martie quickly deteriorates into an extreme case of autophobia. They become suspicious of a person who lends them help as everything wrong in their their memories starts leading back to singular-gender-neutral "them".
"Autophobia is a real personality disorder. The term is used to describe three different conditions: (1) fear of being alone; (2) fear of being egotistical; (3)fear of oneself. The third is the rarest of these conditions."
Mr. Koontz did a fair amount of research for this book into phobic disorders, and the book shows it well. All the panic attacks and other psychological things seem very real and entirely plausible.
Everything that is put forward in the novel seems entirely possible, if not even likely, while reading the book, and the characters seem real (though making some bad decisions).

Definitely recommend this book to everyone. Though be warned, you may well be questioning your own brain and memories after you read it.

Saturday, January 21, 2012

Bookmarks - The Taking

The Taking: written by Dean Koontz, copyright 2004, Random House published.

A couple wakes up to torrential rain outside their California mountains home and realises something is wrong when the TV starts giving strange news and eventually cuts out.
Leaving their house the couple encounter many strange creatures and organisms as they try to gather and save children with the help of a pack of dogs and some other people.
People are dying and going missing all over the place.

Definitely an apocalypse novel. And a darn good one.

Suspenseful with some truly creepy parts, this is a horror story with some possible religious overtones.

I would recommend this book to everyone, except if you are prone to nightmares about the world ending.

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Thoughts on Suicide

Wow, okay, that title is a bit dramatic, I know, but it sums up the following bit perfectly.
I have gone through things that I prefer not to go in depth about, but suffice to say I have thought about suicide many times, and attempted it a couple.
I have hurt myself (mainly through cutting) before.

And I think it is important for me to address the following here, if only briefly (and I have mentioned it in a single line once before), mainly so I can link to this in the future, but also because I don't know who you are, and tough as it sounds, I don't care who or what you are.
But I do care that you are hurting. Because no one deserves to feel that bad.
Who you are doesn't matter to me, because every one matters.

So. If you are EVER feeling suicidal, I want you to right now know that, cliché as the statements are, you are NOT alone, and it DOES get better.

I'm living proof.

You will hear all around you that suicide is not an option. I want you to know that suicide is definitely an option, it will be as long as you are alive, but it should be reserved until every other one has been exhausted.

Suicide is the largest choice you can possibly make but, if you feel the need to make a decision in that area, you need to know that it is a normal thing to think about. It is not something to be ashamed of thinking of, it is not wrong, or sick. It is how you are feeling. And while I fervently wish that you did not feel this way (because it is a crumby-ass way to feel), many people (myself included) understand feeling suicidal, and can accept it.

So please look into counselling in your area and online, look at online communities and IRL help groups, call a crisis line or an understanding person (friend, family member, random acquaintance), go see a doctor-- anything.

Because no one worth the time of day wants you to commit suicide, even if it feels like they do at times.
(Please realise that if you want you to commit suicide, I am not lumping you into that category. You can feel about yourself in that way (though I wish you didn't feel the need to) without being wrong, or evil, or worthless. But coming from other people that is not an acceptable thing to want or encourage or suggest.)

It is a very similar thing if you are thinking of hurting yourself.
It sucks BIG TIME to feel that the best thing to do is to drag a knife across your skin, or stick your hand in fire, bash your arm until it breaks, eat until you puke, to exercise until you can't breathe, etc.-- any way of hurting yourself.
But it happens.
And it happens to a lot of people.
And it is normal. It is NOT wrong. It does NOT make you a bad person.
And you should not be ashamed.
Because the shame will only make it worse.
It would be very nice if you could find a new way of coping with situations, and/or someone to talk to. And I whole-heartedly suggest you look, and keep looking until you find something.

Yeah.

So, there are manymanymanymany, many resources out there for you. All you need to do is look.
If you would like me to post some of the many resources I have come across, I can.
But I, at this point, would prefer if people would look for themselves.
And this is only because I don't know what precise mix of issues you feel ready to look at, and I don't want to be sending you to resource after resource only to find none of them fit (because I don't know you or what you are facing) and get disheartened by that.
(Because I have seen lists of resources like this and found none in a list of twelve or more that seemed to relate to me at all, and I started to feel like a freak "Nobody is feeling this way, they don't even have help for people like me!" and it is totally untrue.)

Also, I understand if you don't agree with me on some points (especially where I say suicide is an option, I know that is a big thing for a lot of people) and I am okay with and accept that.
Please know I am not trying to inflame or start an argument. I just want people in pain to know that I have been there, I care about them, and (in limited and proper ways) am available to them. If you can't deal with that, I would appreciate you show me the same courtesy as I show you, and not attack me, my beliefs or experiences, because they differ from yours.

Good luck,
Have fun,
Be safe.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

Bookmarks - Blindness

Blindness, written by José Saramago is copyright 1995, though I read the English translation copyright 1997 (Prof. Juan Sager). First published in English by the Harvill Press, and originally written in Portuguese.

A man suddenly goes blind in the middle of an intersection and sets off a chain of events in which everyone (or very nearly) in the world is going blind for no apparent reason.
Camps are set up to quarantine the White Blindness and we are in the first of these following the story of the man's wife, the only (known) person who has not gone blind.
An apocalyptic novel as we watch the degradation of human dignity and decency, as well as society.

I don't know whether it is because this book is translated, or that Portuguese writing is inhereantly difficult (though I will go with the former), but this book was a chore to read.
The idioms and phrases (as would be expected) were unfamiliar to me, the spacing was just wrong.
I don't care what you are trying to prove, an exchange of dialogue should not be done all in one sentence.

Imagine two people talking:
"Hello, it is nice to see you."
"And you too, a lovely day we are having."
"Quite! And did you catch the game on the telly last night?"
"No, I'm afraid I missed it. Who won?"

Logical. It switches back and forth between the two speakers with clear distinctions, even without explicit he-said she-saids (though that would be nice, as it can get confusing it someone were to pause and not say anything, throwing off the balance.)

But in the story it is written such:
Hello, it is nice to see you, And you too, a lovely day we are having, Quite, and did you catch the game on the telly last night, No, I'm afraid I missed it, who won

And this will go on for (quite literally) a page or more.
Nothing to break the speakers except capitals(sometimes) and commas. No periods, no quotation marks, no spacing.
I think the most annoying times are when (as shown above) someone has a comma in their speech. Did the person change, or just part of the sentence?

Regardless of these technical issues, the story was engaging (enough for me to keep fighting the book) and was well written (as far as pacing and plot points go).

~*~ Also has been made into a major motion picture, if you did not know.

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Bookmarks - This World We Live In

Hey guys, back with another segment of Bookmarks! I've tried to build up a cushion of posts, so maybe this weekly thing will work out. Who knows.

Next on the docket is a teen novel, it is This World We Live In by Susan Beth Pfeffer, and is apparently the third companion in a series (Last Surviors). Oops.
(Interestingly a quote on the rear cover by the School Library Journal says this: "It is a testament to the author's skill that This World We Live In can be read as a stand alone novel. In fact, new readers might not even realise that the earlier titles exist.")

Regardless, copyright 2010, published by Graphia, apparently an "imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing company". Yep.

Anyway. This was a reasonably good novel.
Set a year after the moon was hit by a massive meteor that altered it's orbit and started wreaking havoc on the earth's various systems.
Yes, it is a post-apocalyptic(PA) novel.

Set in diary format, we are listening to a 16-18 year old girl's life as things change for her and her family once more (as if the world coming to an end wasn't enough change!).
First winter starts to break, and the rains come. Then family arrives and bring new challenges and people into the mix.

The novel reeks of mother-daughter conflict, and left me wanting to yell at both of them to just f'ing talk to each other. A fair bit happens in the novel, and as stated in that quote, it is a perfectly good stand-alone novel.

All in all it was... mediocre. I liked it well enough, and read it through with no difficulty or slogging. But it is not raising any large emotions by any means.

A good read if you need a diary or alt-format book, an acceptable choice for a PA novel, especially for those just beginning to dip into the genre.

~*~ If you are interested in reading the previous two they are Life as We Knew It and The Dead & The Gone, both by Susan Pfeffer.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Gooey Browser, Take 2.

Okay. I hope this post will be a bit more structured than the last (which wasn't really intended to be what it ended up being.).
As stated before, I have some lofty dreams for the future of my internet usage. But, like so many things, I have no intent of follow through, it is just a dream.

Anyway. Let's start with a list of things I want from my browser, and maybe a bit of why:

  1. The obvious, web browsing capabilities. I want to be able to navigate to/from websites quickly and easily. Best done, as proven, with a URL box.
  2. In-built search function. All the major browsers (which I classify as Chrome, IE and Firefox, though Safari and Opera can get put in if you prefer.) allow some kind of in-built search now. Type into you URL box and it will search if it is not set as a URL. I want this to be a customizable search engine, like Chrome. (Because I like Google. But some crazy people use Yahoo or Bing or whatevs. Not my issue.)
  3. I want interconnectivity between everything I do. That means one account to get into my browser, and I have access to my data/files/browsing history etc. wherever I am, whatever I am doing. This means using my browser as, basically, a computer account. It should be like logging into my PC. (Yup, this will become very like the Google Chromium OS)
  4. I want modifiable priorities. Person One may be a die-hard news junkie and wants twenty news feeds up all the time. Person Two might be a clean-cut music fan who wants just their browsing and music available. Etc.
  5. I want transparency and ease of use. If the browser is going to do something, it should be from my command, or from a set of instructions I have okayed. No downloading without consent, no preferences changed without consent, etc. (Again, rather basic and obvious.)
That's it. A small list, but rather lofty in places.
And the reason it is lofty, and only a dream at this point, is that it requires the internet (or at least every part that gets used) to play nice with one another.

Moving on.

So you open up your laptop, turn on your PC, whatevs. I'm not asking for insta-internet access like the Chromium OS. Don't really care if there is another OS. But it would be nice if it were unnecessary, or at least minimal. Turn that sucker on, open this. You got everything there as you want it. All visible, in fully customizable gel-pockets.

And what I mean by join hands is my #3 point. I want to log into my browser and I want to be logged in to everything I do.
Facebook? Opened in the social media ticker feed. Same with Twitter and Google Plus. (Plurk if you're into that.) In fact, everything that can give me a notification (other than email and RSS feeds) I want to open into the social ticker. That way I can drag that to my main browsing space and look through my everything all at once.
PMs from my forums, Facebook updates, tweets, missed IMs... All there. And constant updating, so when I have it minimised to the little carrel it will scroll along with it's new stuff.

I want my eamil (all of them. Personal, work, other) to be put into another carrel. Same idea here. I want constant updates. When something new comes in I want to drag it to my main browsing space (MBS for ease) and look at it, respond, make new ones, etc. Then throw it back into the carrel.

RSS/Reader/Tumblr and the like to their own bubble. New things in the same way, same functionality.

When in their carrels, these widgets will only show what they are told to (default to New Feed, but can be set to show a stable page/image/etc.).

I want my calendar in a tiny carrel. Look to your lower right screen (Windows). Where the date/time is? I want that to have full access to an interactive calendar (Possibly Google Calendar). Or in a larger one like you see on websites with the whole month available.

I want my music program of choice to sit in a carrel showing what I am listening to with controls all available on my screen.

I want all the standard necessities, word processor, spread sheets, slide-show, image editor, calculator, I want to be able to make databases too, or better sort functions in the spread sheet (either way) and I want them all available as widgets. That way I can throw one down into a carrel and make notes while reading an article. Do quick math while chatting with a friend. Collaborate with someone over video chat on the slide-show for work. Share a spreadsheet and reference it while writing without minimizing and maximizing windows all over the place.

I want share functions. If I am connected to a friend I want to be able to connect one of my carrels to a "sharing" carrel in their browser and have them see what I am doing in that carrel.

I want an in-built video chat that can be put in a carrel as well.

I want a note/comment function. Not only to make documents like above, but also to be able to write a note on a webpage and have that connection saved to my account. That way if/when I ever open that page again there is my note. "Read to this paragraph", "Use this quote", "Look this up"

I want my "Find it New" and "I Saw This".
Find it New, that is my StumbleUpon widget. It comes up with new things it thinks I would enjoy, and gives me things that might challenge me.
I Saw This lets me keep track of what I have seen or not, and whether I liked it. It also lets me tag those things with personal tags, as well as keep my likes organized. It is a bookmarking widget.

I want all my carrels and their configuration to be set up to suit how I use my screen.

I want multiple browsing spaces but I also want tabs.
Difference being if I change to a different browsing space, everything changes except the MBS. All my carrels are set up in another configuration (say, a 'clean' set, where there is only the time and the MBS), whereas a tab would be a subset of the MBS, and would only change within it.

And above all I want all these things to be directly linked to one account.
If someone sees my "profile", they will have access to everything (that I have allowed, of course.) No running from site to site trying to get an idea of who I am.

If I leave my profile public (or if you were a friend) you could pull it up and you would be able to see all of my activity. Browse the favourites I made available. See my updates. Go where I am and participate. Everything I liked or made or commented would be available in one place. (As I so choose, of course.)

Point being that every site would be part of this. There would be no need to log into Vi.sualize.us and look at my pictures. Any picture I liked there would be here, and vice-versa. No need to go to Facebook, you see all my social content here.

So I am not asking much. Just a total re-haul of the entire interconnectivity system that has been around since before I was born.
Unification.

I guess what I want is Google Chromium with a face-lift and the internet to all join hands.
That isn't too much, right?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not so crazy to think it would ever be possible. But I just wanted to tell you my dreams.

I know I said there would be pictures, too. That is not this post. There is one more on this topic, then I think we will be done.
Next post will be pictures and a quick overview of features and functionality of this imagined system.
Thanks for entertaining me. :)

Sunday, January 1, 2012

New Years

There are many things I don't understand about human tradition, (or at least humans in my culture as, if I were to incorporate the entirety of human existence, the list would be never ending), but one that comes up every year (how's about that) is the idea of 'New Years' and the resolutions thereof.

It isn't that I don't understand the idea of wanting a fresh start, I certainly get that.
But if you want to make a change in your life, why limit yourself to one time of year to start trying?
Every day can be considered the start of a new year. If a year is defined as a space of 365 (or 366) days, or as the amount of time before the earth has done a complete rotation around the sun, either way it will be a full year before January 1st comes around again. Same for the 2nd. Or August 15th. Or any day of any year.
So why is JANUARY ONE considered the best day to decide the curvature of your life for the next year and the years to come?

Honestly, since so many people are drunk on New Years it actually seems like the worst time to decide... anything.

The only time one should commit to a life changing course of action should be when they are ready for a change.
My dad told be something that he had heard once, last week:
"Never change anything in your life until you are completely bored with where you are."

I understand the desire, I just don't understand the significance of a New Year's resolution.
Especially since they are notorious for failure.

If you want to change something in your life, do it.
Don't wait for the new year, don't pin it on the change of time.
Just do it (thanks Nike, now I can never say that with a straight face.).

Of course, if New Years is the only time you think about rearranging your life then that is understandable.
But that pressure for people to have a resolution is silly.
If I don't have a resolution, it doesn't mean I have no desire to change anything.

I made my most recent resolution on the 7th of December. Because that was the day I decided I could not stand one more day of living the way I was.
So I resolved to change.

So I guess the point of this post is to ask:
Do you make New Years resolutions?
Have you ever succeeded with one?
Do you feel you have to make one?
If so, what makes you feel that way?
Why do you make resolutions?

Me?
I do, once every couple of years.
I'm not sure if I have ever succeeded, I don't remember what any of them were.
Yes, I do feel pressured.
People announcing theirs, or asking about mine. When you say you don't have one, that look they get that says that you are lazy, or unambitious, or unmotivated. That look makes me feel like I am wrong for not having one.
I make resolutions (as stated above) when I feel I can no longer put up with what is going on. They can be small ones ( I WILL clean my room today, and keep it clean for a week!) or they can be big ones (I will no longer participate in the vicious cycle of self harm.). But whatever they are, they are sparked by the horrible feeling of worthlessness, and the much better feeling of being better than that. Deserving more than what I am giving myself.
I dont know if that is the "right" way to do it, but it has worked so far.