Author Archives: James Pyles

Shut up, Wesley OR Why You Should Expect twitter to Hurt You

shut up, wesley

Shut up, Wesley meme

“It is impossible to see a fault in someone else if you don’t have it in yourself.” -Anonymous

I’ve been thinking about the amazing amount of kvetching going on in social media and especially twitter. I’ve participated in a certain amount of it as well, as chronicled in blog posts such as This is the World of Science Fiction and WorldCon?, Part 2: This is the World of Science Fiction and WorldCon?, and Here We Go Again: Comicsgate. In the last comment I made in the last blog post listed, I decided to take the moral high road and not participate in such spitting contests and the measuring of each other’s male genitalia. However, I came across something interesting.

wheaton

Wil Wheaton quits social media

Apparently, actor Wil Wheaton of Shut up, Wesley fame has made a rather big deal of quitting social media because people were mean to him.

Okay, I get it. People are mean to each other all over twitter, and someone like Wheaton, who arguably played the most unpopular character in STTNG, and who was once compared with Jar Jar Binks on a closed Science Fiction group in Facebook makes a really big target. Actually, I kind of feel sorry for him as on his blog, he said:

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The New Dragon Saga: The Resistance

collar

Replica collar from the original Star Trek series episode, “The Gamesters of Triskelion.” Found at the “Star Trek Prop Authority” website.

Chapter 3: “It’s a good thing the biotrace found him.”

Landon heard a familiar voice, a man’s voice. The Master? Where was Buddy?

“Yes sir. Another few minutes and his signal would have faded forever.”

It was Carmen Ramsey, Landon’s doctor; the one who treated his wounds after one of the Games, the Roman’s sword. Yes, he remembered.

“Without the collar, he was free of our influence, and in his case, the ability to use sorcery was restored. He is too valuable a contestant to lose. Besides, if he ever freed the dragon…” The Master abruptly stopped talking.

“Wait. He’s coming to.” Carmen put her hand on his forehead.

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Quoting: The Wealth of Torah

pliskin

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin – Found at the website promoting the book “The Light From Zion.”

During a holiday, students at the Lakewood Yeshiva were elated at the words of Rabbi Aharon Kotler, the Rosh Yeshiva, who had just delivered an inspiring holiday lecture.

At the end of his talk, the students began to sing a tune to the words from King David’s Psalms, “Were it not for Thy Torah being my delight, I would have succumbed to my poverty…”

Rabbi Kotler interrupted the singing, and said with great joy:

“King David was tremendously wealthy. Yet except for the enduring possession of Torah, King David was drowning in a sea of poverty!”

-from Rabbi Shaul Kagan – Jewish Observer 5/73; cited in Rabbi Zelig Pliskin’s Gateway to Happiness, p.97

Sorry I haven’t been around much, but I was visiting my aged Mom in Southwestern Utah, an eight or nine hour drive from where I live in Southwestern Idaho. Just got back yesterday, but then we have the grandkids, so I’m still busy. Managed to finally catch up on my sleep last night, but will still be busy catching up with events at home, so my online writing will still suffer.

Quoting: Don’t Let Materialism Distract You

pliskin

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin – Found at the website promoting the book “The Light From Zion.”

A man once said to the Chafetz Chaim, “Rabbi, I have just bought a lottery ticket. Could you please give me a blessing that I will win, since the money I acquire will enable me to study Torah with peace of mind.”

The Chafetz Chaim gently blessed him, “May the Almighty help you study Torah with peace of mind.”

The man was disappointed that the Chafetz Chaim did not give him a blessing to win the lottery. It occurred to him that perhaps the Chafetz Chaim did not hear him exactly, so he repeated – this time in a louder voice – that he would like a blessing to win the lottery.

Very calmly the Chafetz Chaim reiterated the same blessing, word for word as before.

Today, ask yourself: Are my material possessions in any way distracting me from the real goals of life?

-Sources: see HaChafetz Chaim, vol.3, p.1141; Rabbi Zelig Pliskin’s Gateway to Happiness, pp.76-7

Quoting: Powering Up with Enthusiasm

pliskin

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin – Found at the website promoting the book “The Light From Zion.”

Rabbi Simcha Zissel of Kelm (19th century Europe) wrote: “There is no comparison between doing something with enthusiasm and joy and doing it without enthusiasm and joy. If we would do everything with enthusiasm, there is no limit to the elevated levels we would reach. Enthusiasm generates power. A person with enthusiasm is able to overcome laziness and pursue wisdom and higher spiritual levels.”

Live today with enthusiasm. “But,” you might say, “there are many things I have to do that I’m not interested in doing.” But wouldn’t you do it with enthusiasm if you were being paid a large amount of money to do it?!

Knowing that you have the ability to generate enthusiasm will transform the entire quality of your life. Hear the inner sounds of enthusiasm. Feel the feelings of enthusiasm permeating your entire being.

Today, pick a task you’ve been procrastinating – and generate enthusiasm to accomplish it!

See Chochmah Umussar, vol.2, p.172; cited in Gateway to Happiness, p.25

Quoting: Talking to the Little Child Within

pliskin

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin – Found at the website promoting the book “The Light From Zion.”

We all have many positive messages stored in our mind since childhood. Counterproductive and limiting messages are stored, too. We may have outgrown many of them. but often, not all of them. Now, in the present, we have the ability to talk to the “little child” within, as it were. You can immerse your childhood self with positive and life-enhancing messages.

Some people find that giving encouraging and empowering messages to their “inner child” helps them do more than just develop new attitudes and mindsets.

What is the main message that is so important for every child to have? It is the awareness that he is a valuable human being. He is lovable; other people will like him and want to be friends with him. He has positive qualities now and he will be able to continue developing these and other positive qualities throughout his life. He is competent and able to do many things, and he will be able to keep learning new things throughout his life.

People who already have these positive attitudes, beliefs, and mind-sets are fortunate. Those who don’t yet have them need to make it a high priority to keep developing them. By talking to your “inner child” directly, you can make it easier for your mind to integrate these basic and fundamental attitudes towards yourself and your life.

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Blowing Bubbles

bubble

MorgueFile May 2018 file1831341080767

Kent Ingram had been chasing the hyperfold for decades. The first time he encountered it was in 1916 during the Battle of Jutland. The HMS Indefatigable exploded, German shells having penetrated her ammunition magazine, but instead of being thrown over the railing, he fell into what looked like a large, misshapen bubble…and found himself in Springfield, Missouri in the U.S. The year was 1894.

Since then, it had appeared randomly in his life, sending him from one place, one time to the next. The last time was Los Angeles, California in 1980. After five years, he got tired of waiting, and, with his accumulated knowledge, established a life, married, and had children. They had a home outside of Shasta, plenty of countryside for the kids.

“We’re out of bubbles.” Five-year-old Emily held up her wand in one hand and the empty soap container in the other.

Before Kent had a chance to react, his eight-year-old Todd burst out of the tool shed. “Found some more.”

“Me first,” Emily demanded as she ran toward him.

“Finders keepers,” Todd laughed and then blew a large bubble that continued to expand until it looked very familiar to Kent. But should he step through this time?

I wrote this for Week 35 of the Flash Fiction for the Purposeful Practitioner photo challenge hosted by Roger Shipp. The idea is to use the image above as the inspiration to craft a piece of flash fiction no more than 200 words long. My word count is 199.

I’ve written before about time travel and mysterious portals, and the bubble in the photo seemed to fit the bill. I had to look up 10 Significant Battles of the First World War (The Battle of Jutland was number three) and do a little bit of Googling, but otherwise the story wrote itself.

To read other stories based on the prompt, visit InLinkz.com.

So That’s What Happened To Grandma

shed and mirror

© Dawn M. Miller

Lionel thought it was a strange place to put a mirror until he saw a piece of paper taped to it saying “Free.” Then the glass was a swirling black as if thousands of iron filings were being moved around by an unseen magnet.

He gaped in awe as another image appeared. “Grandpa’s shed.”

He remembered playing there as a boy. Then a younger Grandpa appeared.

“What’s that he’s dragging? The man slipped and the heavy tarp unfolded for a moment, spilling out part of its burden. Lionel recognized the corpse from old photos. “So that’s what happened to Grandma.”

I wrote this for the Rochelle Wisoff-Fields flash fiction challenge. The idea is to use the image above as the prompt for crafting a piece of flash fiction no more than 100 words long. My word count is 100.

Given the mirror, I thought I’d add another wee chapter to my Dark Mirror series along with tales such as Reconstructing Gwen and Darfur Misspelled. If I had more than 100 words to play with, I could have expanded this a bit, but hopefully it tells a complete story anyway.

To read other stories based on the prompt, visit InLinkz.com.

Quoting: Thanks for the Criticism

pliskin

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin – Found at the website promoting the book “The Light From Zion.”

Be resolved for the next two weeks to thank anyone who criticizes you.

Visualize yourself being able to do this with a sense of inner joy. Since you’re mentally prepared to do this, it will be much easier to implement.

-from Rabbi Zelig Pliskin’s Gateway to Self Knowledge, pp.184-6.

I suppose this one is good for me today, since when I checked my emails a little earlier, I found two rejections of my submitted short stories, one from a Christian speculative fiction magazine. That brings me up to about thirteen, including two stories that were rejected twice. The other periodical said that they had received more than 400 submissions, so I guess competition is pretty stiff out there. Well, at least people are reading my works before saying “No.” I love Rabbi Zelig’s commentaries, but I must say they aren’t always easy to accomplish.

Another Troll Has Surfaced

hater

Screenshot taken from Fandango’s blog

Yeah, that’s a real comment from a troll on Fandango’s blog and it’s pretty shocking. I suppose stuff like this goes on all the time, but I don’t see a lot of this unless I deliberately go looking for it.

After a brief Google search, I discovered you can report such comments to WordPress. You can also blacklist people and, in an extreme case, make your WordPress blog private so people have to ask permission to view your content (sort of self-defeating for a notorious blabbermouth like me).

I sometimes suspect these trolls aren’t actual people and that they’re operating from fake accounts, but as it turns out this guy is real (I assume it’s a guy based on the comment plus some of the content on his blog). If you’re curious, here’s his About, though I’d recommend not knocking on his door (he’ll probably get a “pingback” since I posted the URL).

Remember, any body who can blog probably will, so opinions in the blogosphere widely vary.