Easter Bunnies Taste Better With Terror

When I eat my chocolate bunny, I always start at the feet, move up to the neck, then go from the ears down, saving the head for last.  I want him to know what's happening because fear tastes just delicious.  True story. Read more!

A Thought: On the Eradication of Fear

While reason is the tool with which fear is eradicated, hope must be the force which drives it. Read more!

A Thought: On Unreasonable Inequality

In all of the fervor over marriage equality lately, I have yet to find a single non-theological argument against it that holds up to even a cursory reasoned examination. 

The founders of the country never put word one in The Constitution about marriage in any sense.  And don't try to get into the whole literal vs. spirit debate.  You don't want that when it comes time to talk about other things that actually ARE in there.  Trust me.

Expanding a right to all never diminishes it.  That's like saying giving everyone all the free apples they want makes it so you don't get as many apples.  You're a lot less likely to get to enjoy your apples if the people who you said don't get any are staring, empty-handed, at you while you try and eat them every day.

Okay, so all cherrypicking aside, you've got a verse in The Bible that says, under one interpretation and context aside, that gay sex is wrong.  Here's a solution...You've been stressing that teenagers can and will go without sex until marriage, which is why we shouldn't be educating them about it.  So let's just have gay people promise they won't have sex, just be married.  How does that sound?  Feel better?  Good.

What else?  Ah, yes, the old snowball effect.  If we allow this, next we'll be letting adults marry kids, men marry their snakes, all that sort of thing.  What you're forgetting is that a legal marriage is a binding contract.  We've already got a TON of safeguards in place to prevent anyone deemed incapable of reasoned consent from signing them.  That includes kids and animals.  So that one goes down the drain.

Finally, when it comes right down to it, you just don't want it because the thought of it makes you feel icky.  Fine.  You're entitled to think that, to feel that, even to say it.  The thing is, you can't make legislation against something just because it makes you uncomfortable.  Believe me, I wish you could, because bigotry and close-mindedness  make me feel pretty icky. Read more!

A Thought: On Equal Irony

I find it ironic that so many people today have elected to speak out against those who choose, for whatever reason, not to change their profile picture to a symbol meant to support equal rights.  Read more!

A Thought: On the Tragedy of a Catalyst

The difficult and sometimes tragic nature of a catalyst is that it is so often used up in the reaction it inspires. Read more!

A Thought: On Hopeful Inspiration

If you give people hope for a better future, remind them that just because things have been does not mean they must always be, they are more willing to fight for the tools to make it so.  Inspiration.  Education.  Innovation. Read more!

A Thought: On the Seed of Possibility

Possibility is amazing, intoxicating, the very essence of inspiration and that which drives the grandest of endeavors.  However, the seed of possibility, no matter how great, must first find fertile root in reality to truly thrive. Read more!

A Thought: On Equine Misandry

While I can totally get behind My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, as it manages to be entertaining for adults as well as children and puts forth genuine, valuable lessons in each episode, I do take issue with the subtle misandry of it. 

The show provides very few positive male figures, with nearly all who do appear in speaking roles being in subservient positions or as bumbling comic relief.  And, on the rare occasion one does attempt to contribute to the plot, he inevitably fails in his attempts, only to be rescued by one of the female characters.

Are there a ton of misogynistic shows out there for kids?  Yep.  And I take the same issue with them.  I just feel as though this show, with its near-cultish male following, should rise above that.  With so much emphasis placed on friendship, how about showing that boys and girls CAN be friends, and that both can bring things to the table? Read more!

A Thought: On Comfort Versus Possibility

Too many choose comfortable misery over frightful possibility.  In truth, we shape both.  The latter simply provides more options. Read more!

Flash Fiction: Year 2!

Last year, I asked you guys to give me some titles so that I could write some flash fiction. It was a whole lot of fun and I'd like to do it again. So, if you could, come up with some more?

The ones I used last year were, "The Darkness That Made the Light," "The Eye," "Sheer Whimsy," "The Weekender," and "The Ritual." So run wild with it. Make them as simple or complex as you like. I'm very excited to do this again. Thanks! Read more!

A Thought: On Nightmares and the Unknown

I wouldn't mind so much waking in a state of lingering dread, could I remember what it was that had put me there.  It's so much easier to remind myself that the nightmares aren't real when I can put a name to them. Read more!

The Vicious Double-Standard of Dreams

"Last night, in my dream, you sacrificed yourself in a really terrible fashion to save me and the group of homeless orphans."

    Spoken with little emotion and absolutely no reaction.

"Last night, in my dream, you took me to dinner at a fancy restaurant, gave me a beautiful present, wrote me a song and sang it to me in front of the whole place. ::Narrows eyes:: But you kept smiling at the waitress."

    I'm forced to apologize and she's still angry for a week. Read more!

Kickstart Veronica Mars

This is a thing that should happen.  It should happen right now.  To all you fans of smart T.V., if you haven't seen the show, you should.  And if you have, I could have just stopped typing with the title line.  Go.  Give them money.

VERONICA MARS MOVIE Read more!

Old Writing: Wood Smoke

I came out of the building today

And into the overcast afternoon

In the air was the faint scent of wood smoke

Though it wasn’t cold

And still early yet

But it carried me back

To lost afternoons

And the smells of thing remembered

But long since passed-

The loam of rich soil

As I lay in bed of leaves and needles

Fallen from boughs that watched over me in the night

When no one else would

Cigarette smoke

And a certain, sharp smell

That I’ll always associate with yellow t-shirts.

As I walked to my car,

I remembered afternoons gone

And a little part of me lost

To the wood smoke

As it faded into the deep grey dusk

Read more!

A Clarification: On the Code Name Theory of James Bond

James Bond is not a code name.  It IS the same guy.  He's just a Time Lord.  You're welcome. Read more!

A Thought: On the Burdens of Being Literate

It secretly makes me smugly happy that I sometimes have to Google a word to make certain I'm not making it up because it's not in the built-in dictionary for whatever spellchecker the program in which I'm typing happens to be running.

On the other hand, not only have I had genuine, out-loud arguments with the squiggly red lines, but I've felt inappropriately superior to them when I've been right.

I may spend too much time alone. Read more!

A Thought: On the Responsibilities of Self-Government

The problem with living in a country founded on self-governance is that it relies on those who live within it to govern themselves and their own impulses in a manner which befits a rational, thinking person looking out for the greater good, rather than only their own interests. Read more!

A Thought: On Art's Great Secret

The secret of all artists is that for every wonderful piece we proudly, or humbly, show the world, there's at least a hundred half-finished pieces of crap shoved in the back of the closet or crumpled around the trash can. Read more!

A Thought: On Apothecary Employment Opportunities

I wonder if there's a market for an apothecary these days.  And I don't mean just an herbal pharmacist.  I mean a guy who runs a smoky, mysterious shop filled with strange artifacts and ancient herbal remedies.

...probably not.

......damn it. Read more!

A Thought: On Improper Passes

Okay, folks, I'm all for getting pissed at the government over not being able to come to a compromise and costing people jobs, given that you get pissed at the whole government.  But why are you giving businesses who post profits regularly and give massive bonuses to their executives for them but refuse to give their employees basic benefits or increase hiring a pass, every time? Read more!

A Thought: On Ignorance and Stupidity

Ignorance is simply the state of not knowing.  We are all of us ignorant about many, many things.  It is not until ignorance is clung to in the light of truth or reason that it becomes stupidity.  For the former, none can be held accountable.  For the latter, all perpetrators should be. Read more!

A Thought: On Being Thoughtful

Ever since I was a kid, people have called me thoughtful, for differing, but always positive, reasons.  While I appreciate it, there are times, like the middle of the night, when an unceasing ability to think becomes more of a burden than a blessing.  I don't think I'd give it up, though. Read more!