Sensible

listen to the wind
until the end

look to the sky
it knows why

taste the river
the senses quiver

feel the ground
from the upside down

smell the forest
and let yourself rest

Trek in 2024

This year we’ll be given two more seasons of Trek with SNW getting a third and Discovery’s fifth and final.

I do think SNW has the legs to make it to seven seasons like the traditionally successful Trek series, but I am completely happy that the disaster of Discovery is ending. The format of a multi-season storyline has only ever really worked on DS9, and it was a slow build-up, with massive rewards to the viewer, save for the horrible way they killed-off Jadzia.

The strengths of SNW aren’t just its episodic format, but the fact that it seems to have struck a comfortable balance between the ideals of the older Trek and the Discovery premise. SNW has the tortured protagonist, timey-wimey stuff, strong supporting characters, and the ever-present Treknobabble that helps twist the plot in ways that have worked since the ‘60s. What it could do more of is pull away from the TOS characters a bit more.

I know there are legions of Kirk and Spock fanatics that want nothing more than to see them in every episode and witness them in wildly outlandish scenarios…I get it, really. What I have always wondered about is the vast Federation. Hundreds (maybe thousands) of cultures and civilizations that we only ever hear mentioned. Why not flesh a few of them out, let them move toward the main storyline. The whole idea of Star Trek is to tell stories via allegory, so why always do it so blatantly through the eyes of humans? And no, I’m not advocating for a whole show built around the Klingons or Vulcans…I’m not that kind of fan.

In any case, I’m looking forward to SNW, and ecstatic about the end of Discovery.

Early morning

A quiet roams the street,
the sun and the mountains meet.
Frost rests softly in the air,
the winds blow without care.

Flaky

We had our first snow on Saturday. I really do not enjoy the snow, but I think it’s worrying that we used to get 4 or 5 noteworthy snows starting in late November running through to February or March, and now, we might get one, maybe two. Last year we didn’t get any accumulation, just some flurries. Again, I’m not a fan of snow, but this anecdotal evidence from my place is still enough to raise an eyebrow.

Just so we’re clear…I guess it’s not really snow itself that bothers me as much as the cold winds and icy conditions that often accompany the snow. Having driven in these conditions, and having been forced to stand outside in them, I get anxious when it begins to snow. Just weird, but still, something I don’t like to have to deal with.

Wind. Wind is worse than snow, by a mile, but I’d rather dig a ten ft deep hole than shovel snow.

Social Media

I joined the ZBB in 2004, a few years before sites like twitter and facebook really took off. I didn’t join twitter until 2014, and sites like reddit and discord weren’t of interest to me until much later. I’ve used them to reconnect with old friends, colleagues, and folks that have similar interests, as well as advertise my conlang work. However, not long after I joined twitter, social media began to show signs of malevolence and vitriol. I’m sure there’s no correlation…at least I hope not. ;)

Since about 2020 I’ve been less active, save for a spat of memes on twitter and the occasional conlang sample scattered around. I find the whole thing to simply be tiring and counterproductive. Are there good things on sites like twitter? Maybe. Do I find any sort of satisfaction from arguing with random strangers about politics or various aspects of linguistics, philosophy, or culture? Nope, not really.

I often think of myself as a moderate, or leaning progressive, but I’m far from a purist. I loathe the notion of holding everyone to some idealistic standard that is not only unrealistic, but some imaginary utopic dream. It’s serves no one. It helps only those that cling to such childish notions. There has never been a global phenomenon that didn’t involve some form of violence or hate, and whether that speaks to the form those phenomena take, or us as a species is very much up for debate…one that I do not care to participate in, at all.

I have no intention of deleting any of my social media accounts, but I think this election year, and the wider state of conflict across the globe is a good opportunity for me to test my own resolve and not engage. I will endeavor to refrain from all social media unless I have something of substance to offer, something unique to say or contribute. It just seems like a healthy choice. One that will most assuredly give me more time and space to focus on my creative pursuits rather than the sophomoric notions of worrying about who may or may not have blocked me on some made-up social network because they didn’t like something I said, or that I didn’t post an all-inclusive joke.

There are things I find great about social media, but the number of aspects that I find harmful currently outweigh those good things.