[A Pleasurable Headache] What is a veggie korma?
This newsletter, like everything else at the moment, is stuck in a kind of limbo.
Baby is imminent. The day job is a relentless maelstrom, prone to pangs of chaos and crumbling infrastructure.
The weather veers from record-breaking to mundane in the blink of an eye. Amid the madness I have managed to finish up another short story, previously mentioned here. As stated, this one deals with body horror, running and the notion of legacy in one hope-shattering bundle. I figure one or two more passes to bring out some elements that remain unclear and this will be good to go.
During this week’s writing sprint sessions via Zoom I started the ball rolling on a new story/concept. Currently, I’m not entirely sure what it is I have, or whether it may need to longer than a short story.
One thing I am quickly learning though is that process is not a stable, permanent thing. Every story and project requires its own method, be it something new or a remix of practices used before. It reminds me of an old running adage (one that I used in the recently completed short story) – run the mile you’re in.
Links
Volcano Manor, Blasphemy, and Christian Nationalism
https://www.gamerswithglasses.com/features/volcano-manor-blasphemy-and-christian-nationalism
A great piece by Nate Schmidt on a very specific setting in Elden Ring (which seems like forty lifetimes ago in games discourse).
The post, on Volcano Manor one of the later settings in the game, discusses the cast of characters at the manor and how they perfectly mirror some of the thoughts and inclinations present in the current Christian Nationalist movement in the U.S.
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I Got Hit By A Car In A Roblox Indie Rock Show So You Don’t Have To
https://kotaku.com/i-got-hit-by-a-car-in-a-roblox-indie-rock-show-so-you-d-1849180401
“I start running with my hair salon scissors because I don’t know how to put them down, and somehow find the concert stage. I did it! Soccer Mommy’s Roblox avatar is standing in front of the mic smiling while songs from her album play loudly. Someone just tried to run into me with their car, and people keep asking Soccer Mommy what veggie korma is, because she said she had some for lunch. I can see her avatar and that she has chosen “criminal” as her profession. OK, now two cars have run into me.”
Absolute nightmare fuel.
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A Bored Chinese Housewife Spent Years Falsifying Russian History on Wikipedia
https://www.vice.com/en/article/pkgbwm/chinese-woman-fake-russian-history-wikipedia
“One of her longest articles was almost the length of “The Great Gatsby.” With the formal, authoritative tone of an encyclopedia, it detailed three Tartar uprisings in the 17th century that left a lasting impact on Russia, complete with a map she made. In another entry, she shared rare images of ancient coins, which she claimed to have obtained from a Russian archaeological team.”
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Revealed: Secret plan to pack Lords with Tory loyalists
https://www.itv.com/news/2022-07-15/revealed-secret-plan-to-pack-lords-with-tory-loyalists
This story seems to have been lost in the recent ‘the clown has resigned’ and ‘everything is on fire’ round of stories currently doing the rounds here on hell island.
“It says the loyalty of individual peers could be rewarded by giving them CBEs for political service, making them special envoys or advisors to the prime minister, and giving them lunches and dinners at Chequers, the PM’s country residence.
It devises a strategy to prevent too much criticism of what many would see as an anti-democratic ploy by proposing that many of the new peers come from under-represented parts of the country, such as the north and midlands.”
Disgraceful.
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Public Transport Should Be Free
https://tribunemag.co.uk/2022/07/public-transport-free-fuel-crisis-cost-of-living
The more I read, the more I come to the conclusion that the solution to a number of problems plaguing modern cities (public health and the climate) everywhere is:
a) building out the public transport infrastructure and
b) making cities inhospitable to cars and a nirvana for cyclists.
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Greenland Threatens
https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/07/19/greenland-threatens/
Robert Hunziker at Counterpunch on the incredibly frightening and precarious state of the ice shelf in Greenland.
“Greenland is acting out. For example, it rained at the Summit Station at 10,530 feet above sea level where it has never rained throughout all recorded history. It’s not supposed to rain at the top of an ice sheet nearly two miles above sea level. But, it did.”
“In just one week in July last year, the ice and snow virtually disappeared from the surface of Greenland’s barren interior. Only a few months earlier, when Box predicted this might happen, he was dismissed by many of his fellow scientists as an alarmist.”
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Boris Johnson Has Many Enemies, but the Deep State Isn’t One of Them
https://jacobin.com/2022/07/boris-johnson-britain-conservative-party-deep-state/
Daniel Finn at Jacobin on the departing clown’s repeated references to ‘the deep state’. In this, Johnson is using similar tactics to Trump. Both used the term frequently. But, like most verbiage that comes out of their mouths, it is a gnarled, battered version of the term that bears no resemblance to the original meaning.
“In its original usage, “deep state” referred to overlapping networks that connected the state security forces, organized crime, and far-right paramilitary groups. Those networks have been a very real and tangible presence in the political cultures of southern Europe. In Spain, for example, the GAL death squad operated in the 1980s with support from high-level figures in the government of Felipe González. Some of those later convicted of GAL murders were serving members of the Guardia Civil, Spain’s national police force.”
These structures existed. They continue to exist.
“When Trump or Johnson talk about the deep state, on the other hand, what they really have in mind is the permanent government: a much wider administrative cohort, consisting of senior civil servants, judges, bank governors, and other state officials who possess a great deal of leeway in the implementation of government policy. In theory, they are meant to be neutral and nonpartisan. In practice, they have their own ideas about the way things should be done, and the ability to make life difficult for any government minister who won’t come round to their way of thinking.”
SAS unit repeatedly killed Afghan detainees, BBC finds
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62083196
This report was found via the Jacobin article above and forms part of a recent Panorama special on the subject by the BBC.
“Individuals who served with the SAS squadron on that deployment told the BBC they witnessed the SAS operatives kill unarmed people during night raids.
They also said they saw the operatives using so-called “drop weapons” - AK-47s planted at a scene to justify the killing of an unarmed person.”
Another sorry tale in a long line of grief, violence and trauma that Western powers have inflicted on the Middle East region during the so called ‘war on terror’.
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I’m off to remember what sleep is before it becomes a distant stranger to me once more. See you in two!