Refracted Neurons

There are many unknowns in the world.  Aliens may be out there.  Parallel dimensions might exist.  Star Wars might actually be non-fiction, or at least that's where the online library put it: Kids, I have something to tell you.  C-3PO is real and he's hiding in your closet. Somehow this didn't bother my daughter at all.  No, what bothered her was Benjamin Franklin. "He's scary," she said, "He isn't real, right?" "No, he's real.  But he died a long time ago." "Did he go to Heaven?" "I mean, probably." "Is there more than one Heaven?" By now, I know where she's going with this question and I'm struggling not to laugh.  "No, there's only one Heaven." "I don't want to go then.  Not if Benjamin Franklin is there." The next day she comes up to me, "I want to see a picture of Gingerman Franklin." Yup, you've heard of Slenderman, but have you heard of Gingerman?...

“I can see the technical skill, but it doesn’t make me feel anything.” Grimmett felt it.  He felt the judges’ words like a hot mandrel pressing against the back of his neck.  He looked at the case next to his, the desire to tip it over bubbling inside him.  “How do you feel now?” he would roar as the headpiece hit the ground.  He imagined the display case shattering, phallic-shaped beads scattering, rolling across the polished cement floor. “Hi Grimmett,” a hand touched his elbow and he jerked.  “Oh, sorry,” the woman pulled her gloved hand away.  “Jade,” he faked a smile, “How nice of you to come.”   She peered in the display case, her neck taking on the elegant bend of blown glass, “It’s rather tacky, isn’t it?” “How do you know that’s not mine?” “As someone who has only taken one lampwork course ever . . . I don’t know.  Your work just feels different,” she scooted over to his case, “This looks like yours.” “How does it feel?” “Uh,” Jade...

Some of you might remember how obsessed I am with Paintschainer , the coloring AI.  Well, recently I stumbled on an AI called Artbreeder that lets you mix images together and fine-tune them by editing their "genes."  I did a little reading on Artbreeder and I'm still not entirely sure where some of the creeptastic images it spits-out come from.  Like this camel for instance: If I'm understanding things correctly, this is what a robot thinks a camel looks like.  The image doesn't originate from some weirdo uploading an image and modifying it through one of the various and sundry gene editing modes (flag pole gene, anyone?).  I really hope I'm wrong and for God's sake, don't look up the gene Sorrel.  I still can't figure out what animal that's supposed to be, but it haunts my dreams. Of course, I decided to contribute to this AI's misunderstanding of the world by uploading close-ups of flowers in the "Portraits" section.  It said t...

Save Desdemona is on sale!  And by "On Sale," I mean free.  Smashwords is doing a quarantine promotion through the end of this month and there are tons of great discounted and free ebooks available. If a low-fantasy survival game is not up your alley, I also finished Do Not Reuse.  It's a futuristic mystery with an unsettling undercurrent.  Of course, this means that I'm working on a new project.  The first is the sequel to Save Desdemona.  It's largely a rewrite of an older novella (just like Save was).  The structure of the book is already there, I just have to rewrite almost all of it (hahaha).  Since it's a rewrite, I want to work on something else co-currently, I just have to decide what.  A while ago, someone suggested I expand a short story about lampworkers into a book, but I'm still not sure about plot.  I'm trying another short story about lampwork this month, and I guess I'll just see how it goes from there. ...