It's stormy in the North but karma in the South.

  Seems to be thawing out here in Enon Holler. We had a cold snap last night, but it got up into the high 40s during the day. I sort of hate to see the snow go as that stark white is a nice change from constant green and brown. Still, to everything turn, turn, turn.

 Otis is getting stir crazy. We haven't taken a walk all week apart from a quick trot down to the mailbox. He didn't like the snow, though. He's just heavy enough to fall through the ice/snow crust every few steps but not all the time. Confused the hell out of him and he didn't care for the cold. Plus, I don't have any footwear that'd be good for such weather. Hopefully, it'll all dry out soon.

 Anyhow. Naturally, Winter Storm Uri dominated the news this week so it was the main topic of conversation in The News. There were some other things. Monday looked at the suggestion for a 9/11-style commission on the January 6 riots at the Capitol, and how screwed up that "9/11" is an adjective. Still can't get used to that. Wednesday was a quick look at just why Texas, in particular, suffered so spectacularly and Friday offered some good news on the COVID-19 front.

 In all honesty, this wasn't a good writing week. Something about the weather made me a bigger slug than usual. Perhaps I am part bear. I dread trying to put together tomorrow's News weekend wrap-up. I also haven't done much fiction writing, either, though I did start putting the pieces together for another idea/world/waste of time. Long story short, it'll be a low-fantasy detective novel. Sort of like The Witcher where monsters and magic and elves and all that exist, but they're not as ubiquitous as you'd find in Dungeons & Dragons.

 I'm also considering giving the magic a sinister bent, like good magic exists but bad magic is much, much easier to do. I think we'll have multiple deity-like characters but more along the lines of The Elder Scrolls in that they exist, can be prayed to, and occasionally intervene, but for the most part, they're interested in their own higher-plane shenanigans and don't care about the mortal world.

 This one has closer to a plot than the Weird Western or the Space Opera, but that's because a whodunnit is a plot almost in and of itself. I've gotten some good advice from friends and fellow writers on figuring out a story or narrative or what have you, but I really haven't had the drive to make 'em work. Again, worldbuilding is way too much fun.

 And that's about it, really. The news this week just didn't move me, I'm still looking for a new book to read (I have plenty, don't suggest anything), and I did get pretty deep into Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. It's an older game but fun if you're into real-time strategies and harder-than-usual science fiction. There's a Battlestar Galactica that it's supposed to be like. I have that but so far haven't been able to crack that nut.

 I managed to completely erase every song in the Rock genre I had on iTunes, so that's getting all my attention. I really need to get this computer looked at, these slowdowns are getting up my nose. I've decided to just take advantage of Apple Music I pay ten bucks for every month rather than download and reinstall everything. Some stuff I have isn't on Apple Music, so there's that, and my own peculiar kinks mean that losing all the organization I did being gone is the worst part.

 Hey, kids, I know it's not all that interesting but I have no desire to berate anyone or anything right now. That's how it is sometimes. Catch me next week.

Don't you know her when you see her? She grew up in your backyard.

 I am sick to the teeth of writing on COVID-19. I am exhausted about writing how the president is a callous moron. I am tired, tired, tired of writing about how he might actually be the president this country deserves because this country's full of complete bastards who get off on watching people get ground under the hell of corporate boots. So, hopefully, that's got that out of my system.

 Granted, I've been staring at the rest of this screen for the past half hour and nothing else comes to mind but the blind, seething rage at the world's stupidity and awfulness and mean dumbness, followed by resignation to our fate of never traveling the stars because we need science to focus on making pills that get flaccid cocks hard. And while that may make for interesting prose, it's tough to keep going for too long. Besides, half the point of this whole affair is working on making my overall mood as something other than Plath-esque gloom and righteous indignation.

 Well, this isn't going well. On top of the first paragraph up there, I'm pretty tired as in "exhausted and weary". I'm still not getting enough rest, CPAP machine or no. I don't understand why I'm so sleepy all the time, but there you go. This is all very interesting, isn't it? Okay, moving along.

 I finally dug into Nexus: The Jupiter Incident which I'd picked up on sale at Good Old Games yonks ago. It's pretty neat, a real-time strategy space conflict-type game. Something like Homeworld if that's at all familiar. If not, you play a captain of a big ol' space freighter-type thing, more like a Star Destroyer than an X-Wing fighter. Instead of concentrating on blowing up the opponent, your problem is managing power, issuing orders, transfering repairs to different parts of the ship, that sort of thing.

 The backstory is fairly interesting, too. Rather than being part of a military like in most of these types of games, the various factions are powerful corporations. I'm not sure if it's my leanings towards anarchism or just basic cynicism, if we ever make it to space travel, I see us getting by less on centralized governments or even federations, and geared more towards corporations and business interests. Ever seen the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode that took on the '60s Hammer space film Moon Zero Two, which actually wasn't that bad? Something like that. I'm not saying it's a primo outcome, that's just how I see things.

 Anyhow, while not rock hard, the science is a little better than the usual fantastic stuff. Humanity's only colonized the solar system to, far as I can tell, Jupiter. A trip from Phobos to Europa takes eight months, that sort of thing. I do like hard science fiction, but far too often creators, especially authors, think that means "really boring". This is more along the lines of Cowboy Bebop than Star Trek, though I do think some sort of faster-than-light drive comes into play. No aliens, either, but I've already recovered some fantastically advanced technology, so I reckon it's only a matter of time.

 I don't know if I've made a full shift from sword-&-sorcery fantasy to science fiction, though it's looking that way. I do that when it comes to video games, my interest shifts not between types of games so much as types of background stories. Science fiction, fantasy, and true crime, with the odd Western thrown in. There are very few good Western games. I'm told the Red Dead Redemption games are killer bee, but the only one available for PC is $60 and 140-plus gigs. I'm in no hurry. Maybe when I get a little more money coming in, I'll buy a console.

 Okay, what else, since I have nothing interesting going on in my brain. Days like this really makes me wish I had a bit of the good smoke, if for no other reason than I find it stimulates creative thinking. Still working on From Eternity To Here by Sean Carroll and still enjoying it. It's still in the "let's go over this very complicated if mundane physics knowledge that makes up the background for the really wild shit later in the book" stage of things, but it's doing that very well. Maybe it's because I haven't read any of this type of book in ages but I am thoroughly enjoying it.

 I guess that's plenty for now. Maybe more later, maybe not.