The Cheese Grates It: The Cheesy One's (Gloomy, sorry) Holiday Message for 2017

Happy holidays, People, however you may celebrate them.

Apologies in advance for being a killjoy with a somber PSA. Please keep in mind that the holidays aren't happy for everybody. This doesn't make the unhappy person "bad" or "a Scrooge." It just means the holidays are hard for them.

I am having an extremely blue Christmas, partially for reasons that I'm sure most people could understand at least a bit. The majority of the big losses I've had have come in the Winter months, particularly in November. I jokingly said that I have re-named November Butt Month because nothing good has ever come of it, and people got mad at me. For fuck's sake, I'm not saying that if you have a birthday in November you're worthless. I'm just saying that I've had a lot of losses in November and this was my hyperbolic, snarky, and ultimately worthless and impotent way of striking back.

It was like an extra twist of the knife to have my Star Shower projector stolen. I don't put up a tree because the cats just destroy it. I didn't want to get another cheap string of lights because the instant one burns out, you might as well throw the whole string away. What a waste. So I got the Star Shower for something a little different. Then it got stolen, and I didn't end up getting any other decorations. 

I know it's a small thing, not like that guy whose son is getting a kidney transplant and some lousy porch pirate pilfered $5000 of very important medication that was left on his porch. I know I'm overreacting. Not on the outside, I appear calm and rational. It's all on the inside. I have bipolar disorder. My brain loves to do that shit. 

He once said that the only place he found peace was when he was playing.

I hope he is finding peace now that he is free of his very ill body.

I know people also think I'm stupid for grieving a person whom I didn't know in life. I can't really explain how or why this affected me so strongly, but it has. There is a certain magic gone from the world and the realization has come hard that I had a lot of useless and futile dreams for myself when I was younger. I was a foolish and unrealistic person.

The truth is, I would commit suicide, but I worry greatly about what would happen to my son if I were gone, so I hang on. Aside from my son and his well-being, I have nothing to live for.

Do me a favor and don't whip out the old "but, counseling and meds!" chestnut. I'll be 53 years old in less than two months. I've lived with a mood disorder at least since I hit puberty. I was nine years old when the hormones kicked in and I started growing boobs which I didn't want because I knew the gross way in which men reacted to breasts, and I started to get hair on my bits and pits. I didn't want that either. That bit of WTMI gives you the idea of how long I've lived with this shit. There's nothing new under the sun.

Just believe me that I already know what the options are and they haven't worked. I'm being honest about how I feel. Let's leave it at that.

I once learned a song called "What If A Day." It was written by Thomas Campion in the Elizabethan era. I have a horrible voice not fit to be heard by anything with ears, but I often sing this to myself. For me, it embodies the truth.

What if a day, or a month, or a yeare

Crown thy delights with a thousand sweet contentings?

Cannot a chance of a night or an howre

Crosse thy desires with as many sad tormentings?

          Fortune, honor, beauty, youth

          Are but blossoms dying;

          Wanton pleasure, doating love,

          Are but shadowes flying.

          All our joyes are but toyes,

          Idle thoughts deceiving;

          None have power of an howre

          In their lives bereaving.

Earthes but a point to the world, and a man

Is but a point to the worlds compared centure:

Shall then a point of a point be so vaine

As to triumph in a seely points adventure?

          All is hassard that we have,

          There is nothing biding;

          Dayes of pleasure are like streames

          Through faire meadowes gliding.

          Weale and woe, time doth goe,

          Time is ever turning:

          Secret fates guide our states,

          Both in mirth and mourning.

And there you have it. 

I hope you have a happy holiday. Forgive me if I don't.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

Friendly Fill-Ins December 8 2017

I know that Vinnie Paul is missing his little brother Dimebag Darrell today and always. For those who don't know, Darrell was senselessly gunned down by the very disturbed Nathan Gale on December 8, 2004. He was 38 years old.

Week 83: December 8, 2017:

1. The best part of last week was actually Sunday of this week. My son and I saw Thor Ragnarok at the Alamo Draft House.

2. The worst part of last week was the persistent pain from the tendonitis in my left arm.

3. The 31 Daze of Xmahanukwanzyule is a Winter project that I will be working on.

4. A holiday gift that I always buy for someone is: I doubt I will have money to buy gifts for anyone this year.

The Cheese Grates It: Drawing Parallels

I couldn't find an appropriate picture, so here's a picture of a Babirusa

I know that I'm pretty much the most defensive person in the world and that I likely overreacted to certain things that people said recently. I have a tendency to do that. As a friend pointed out, certain things which got my hackles up were well-intentioned. All I can do is to apologize and to hopefully explain why sometimes well-intentioned statements about developing a brighter outlook can rub a person who lives with a mood disorder the wrong way.

I think the best way to explain it is to draw a parallel to certain other conditions I live with which are strictly physical conditions, but which can also affect my moods.

I have diabetes.

I would like to draw a parallel between my use of insulin to control my blood sugar and my use of dark, sometimes hyperbolic poetry as an outlet for the bleakness that often inundates my mind.

My body produces little if any of its own insulin at this point. Insulin helps the body process sugar in the blood. Without it, the high sugar levels begin to cause damage to the vascular system. 

Now, let's say someone were to say to me "if you'd just act like people who have a normal pancreas, you'd learn to be like people with a normal pancreas."

To which my reply would be "I will literally never be like people with a normal pancreas because my pancreas doesn't work normally."

"Yes, but if you behave like people with a normal pancreas, your pancreas will start to behave normally."

"No. It literally will not. If I try to behave like people with a normal pancreas, my elevated blood sugar will start to damage my body fairly quickly."

"Really, though, Positive Pancreatic Thinking will heal your faulty pancreas!"

At this point, somebody might be getting stabbed with an insulin needle, and it isn't going to be me.

Most people can see that the above scenario is a bit ridiculous (although anyone with diabetes can tell you that we've heard a million and one tales of "miracle cures" for our condition.) However, a lot of people can't see that they're doing a very similar thing when telling someone who lives with a mood disorder that if they just practice positive thinking they'll become a normal, happy person. It literally doesn't work that way.

I'll be 53 years old in February. 

I had my first mixed episode when I was ten. I didn't know that's what it was then, but with the knowledge I've gained, I now know that's exactly what it was.

I had my first severe depressive episode when I was twelve. I also became bulimic and made my first half-assed suicide attempt by swallowing a bunch of aspirin, which made me sick. 

I was labeled as overly dramatic and attention seeking and told countless times to just stop thinking and acting as I did.

I've learned a lot of coping techniques over the years. One of the ways I channel the darkness rather than cutting myself or self-medicating is by writing.

I've been through a lot of undesired changes this year.

I live with chronic pain and am not sure how long I'll be able to keep working. My situation is precarious. 

I would never tell someone who tends to have a positive outlook on things that they need to create things that are dark and gloomy. However, people don't think twice about telling me that I need to write things that are more cheerful and that I need to have a brighter outlook.

It also minimizes and belittles my struggles when people say things which imply that what I'm going through is some sort of a phase. If it's a phase, it's a damn long one. It's lasted most of my life.

Sometimes I write funny stuff. I actually do have a sense of humor, which most people don't get.

Perhaps people like me do serve a purpose. We often have high levels of empathy. Perhaps by pointing out the hurtful things in the world we can teach others to be kinder.

Hell, I don't know. I haven't figured it out yet and I rather doubt I'm going to.

I do know that I like German chocolate cake. That much I've figured out for certain. I wish I had some right now.

My mind doesn't work like yours. I know most of you can't understand a mind like mine, but I ask you to please try to respect that maybe people like me do know our own minds and maybe it would be nice to be treated not as broken half-people who need to be fixed, but as whole and worthy of consideration exactly as we are.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

This is my Always Keep Fighting tattoo.

It's a real, permanent tattoo.

Some days its easier to keep fighting than others.

This is a reminder for me to keep fighting on those days too.

It's also a tribute to me and those like me.

OctPoWriMo 2017: Day 28: LONE

Copyright: grandfailure / 123RF Stock Photo

LONE

Lonely

Lonely me

I feel unwanted

I feel undeserving

I fear I'm fatally flawed

LONE, lonely me, fatally flawed

~Cie and Pepper~

Notes:

Here is another work which is autobiographical to the author and also descriptive of Fetch's female protagonist, Pepper Baiij.

I desperately want to get back to working on stories again. I am lost without them.

At least I met Gem on the astral plane while in a troubled sleep that I hoped never to wake from.

In a world that wants sunshine, flowers, chirping birds, and unicorn farts, I bring you depressing poetry. Hence, I walk alone through this life.

~Cie~

OctPoWriMo 2017: Day 18: Everyone Went On Eating

My life is a mess

She said, grieving her lost dreams

Feeling dead inside

At the family table

Everyone went on eating

~Cie~

Note:

This is autobiographical.

I didn't feel up to trying the Palindrome poem today and thought it would be most effective to keep my work brief.

30 Days of Haiga 2017: Day 11: End of Story

Background Image Copyright: tomertu / 123RF Stock Photo

Text manipulation by The Real Cie

Notes:

Without going into too much detail, which would detract from the viewing of the image, I have had a difficult year. I have changed jobs six times and eventually ended up changing careers entirely. 

There are aspects of my current job which I really appreciate, but it is not an easy job and I do not make as much money as I did in my previous profession, which there are several reasons I can't go back to, the biggest one being changes in my diabetes which lead to fatigue and weakness if I don't pace myself.

I feel like I have lost the things that made me who I am: my imagination and my ability to enter other worlds astrally and psychically. My heart is heavy and I feel broken. I feel that I am constantly being punished and that there is no need for external hells when all the hell I need is here in the loss of that which made me who I am.

Cross-posted to:

Crazy Creatives Cheerleading Camp

Dark Hearts Love Too

Dream About Me Sweet Brother

Encyclopedia Netherworld

Esoteric Escape

Fetch

Netherworld Writer's Guild

One Love

Starry Demons

Strands of Eternity

Fiendly Fill-Ins

https://mcguffysreader.blogspot.com/2017/07/fill-in-statements-week-62.html

Week 62: July 14, 2017

 

1. My inner child really and truly hates me. This part of my psyche does not understand the concept of doing what you have to do to survive, and most of the time that doesn't involve creativity.

2. My favorite month is probably October.

3. My favourite commercial is I avoid commercials.

4. Personally, I don't care for the way this life has turned out. I want a do-over. Or maybe I don't. Perhaps I just want to fade.

The Cheese Grates It: Sticks and Stones

Copyright: yeletkeshet / 123RF Stock Photo

I recently signed up to become a participant at a site which encourages people to write a certain number of words every day. I am not going to "name and shame" the site, as they were not being intentionally mean-spirited. They did, however, use the old "shame as a motivator" principle, and this is an approach which I cannot abide.

I have been working hard at becoming my own boss during the past six weeks. The situation was forced on me by a lack of hours in the home care nursing field. However, during this unplanned hiatus, I realized that I no longer wish to work for other people, and I am willing to do whatever it takes to make that goal a reality.

I have been dividing my time between delivering food as an independent courier for Uber Eats, taking the necessary steps to become a rideshare driver with Uber and Lyft, and attempting to build my independent recruiting business. I would need a Venus-length day to accomplish all of my daily goals. A day on Venus is equivalent to 117 Earth days.

I do not want to let my craft fall by the wayside while I pursue my chosen trade. Thus, I need tools to help me hone in when it's time to write, as my mind can be a bit of a jumble. A word count goal or a story spark, generally both together, can help me shift from business mind to creative mind.

I don't enjoy the NaNoWriMo model of writing. When I am forced to produce a large number of words (1667 daily for a month) to meet my goal, the result tends to be garbage, and I never want to see it again. However, I fully approve of the Office of Letters and Light's encouragement of participants. There are clear winners with NaNoWriMo--a participant has to write 150,000 words during the month of November to claim prizes. However, while there are clear winners, there are no losers. If you participated, go you! Pats on the back all around.

Hence, I joined a site which features a challenge to meet a certain word goal daily over the course of a month. I felt that having such a goal in mind would motivate me to carve out time to write regardless of everything else currently demanding my time.

I ended up very quickly withdrawing my membership from the site when I saw that they have not only a wall of winners but a wall of shame.

Seeing the word "shame" literally made me sick to my stomach.

This is an extremely loaded word. Many people who have a history of abuse in their backgrounds feel ashamed constantly. Shame should never be used as a motivating factor, particularly, I feel, with creative pursuits. Creativity should be healing. It should not be yet another damaging element in a difficult life.

I wrote a letter to the site owners explaining my very strong feelings in regards to this matter. I will share this letter with you here.

Dear Site Owner,

There should be no "failures" with writing or other creative pursuits. Nobody should be "shamed" for not meeting a certain goal. 

I would very strongly encourage you to change the name of the "wall of shame" to something like "Runners Up" or "Other Participants". Change it to something encouraging rather than discouraging, in other words.

During my entire life, I've felt ashamed for not being some sort of Grand Prize Winner Superstar. Most people are not Grand Prize Winner Superstars. We are simply trying to do our best. 

Shame and browbeating, even done in a "humorous" fashion, can be extremely daunting to some people, particularly those with a background of psychological abuse. I learned early on from my family that I seemed to be incapable of doing anything right, and, even at 52 years old, I continue to impart this message to myself.

The word "shame" is so upsetting to me that I cannot possibly participate in a challenge which places me on a "wall of shame" for not completing it, particularly when I am unlikely to be able to. I am working massive numbers of hours a week. Being able to engage in creative pursuits should be a gift, not a punishment.

Of course, those who complete the challenge should be awarded a prize for doing so. But those who do not should not be "shamed" or called failures.

I like to support anything that encourages people to engage in creative pursuits. However, my money is limited, and I cannot support anything which shames those who do not "measure up" to an exacting standard.

I know it's only a word. But some words hurt--a lot.

I will be glad to become a member of the site again if the Wall of Shame becomes a Wall of Participation of some sort. Until then, my money is very limited right now, and, sadly, since I literally cannot participate in something where the cost of "failure" is being "shamed", I must cancel my subscription.

I wish you well.

~Cie~

We all sometimes need a little "kick in the pants" to get ourselves going.

However, that kick should not come from a steel-toed, hobnailed boot, and with creative pursuits, shame and degradation should never be used as motivators.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

Charge

Image by Dora Wednesday

If it gives me a charge

To escape this miserable world with its forced marches to an early grave 

And run away to a realm extraterrestrial, extradimensional

To find a small portion of imaginary happiness

I care not if you believe

For I need to retreat to this realm which is often more real than the real to survive

~Cie~

Prompts Used:

Daily Post

Daily Text Prompt

Six Sentence Stories

Victorious Vocabulary

Cross-Posted to:
Crazy Creatives Cheerleading Camp
Dark Hearts Love Too
Encyclopedia Netherworld
Esoteric Escape
One Love
Strands of Eternity

Friendly Fill-Ins Week 55

Week 55: May 26, 2017

1. My idea of roughing it is what I'm doing right now. I'm rationing my food and trying to take my mind off the fact that I'm hungry. It sucks.

2. I never get sick of talking about something I'm not going to talk about because nobody understands.

3. My youth was wasted on a young, delusional idiot.

4. My "golden years" can kiss my ass, and so can my zombie pancreas. 

The Cheese Grates It: Is it PTSD with a side order of depression, or Depression with a side order of PTSD?

Whether you believe in the metaphysical or not doesn't matter here.

A Tarot reading helped me realize what's been going on with me the past month.

That reading can be found here.

http://teamnetherworldsstrandsofeternity.blogspot.com/2017/05/trials-and-tribulations-mostly-on-me.html

I always felt that the Tarot could be used as a tool to help others, regardless of a belief in the esoteric. I once had the idea to get a degree in psychology and become a counselor using the Tarot as an instrument of discovery. That is highly unlikely to happen in this lifetime. However, that isn't what I came here to talk about.

I came here to talk about PTSD and depression.

I don't adjust well to change, especially unexpected negative change.

When I got fired from my job with the agency I'd worked with as a homecare nurse for close to two years, it really took a toll on me. On the surface, I accepted it well. I didn't cry. However, stoicism is not the same thing as actual acceptance. Internally, I was filled with self-loathing. My suicide ideation was extremely high.

Fortunately, I wasn't out of work for long. The agency I'd been picking up PRN cases with put me on full-time.

Things went okay for about six weeks. Then the patient I was caring for went to the hospital.

I didn't get a new case. I was without work for nearly a month. Then, to add insult to injury, the nice car (one of only four nice cars I've owned in my entire lifetime) was damaged in the hail storm that hit the Denver area on May 8. 

I felt done. I felt worthless. I felt like I was shit in the eyes of the Universe.

I wanted to stop taking all my medications and just allow myself to die. The fact that I'm an insulin dependent diabetic makes this a pretty realistic way to commit suicide.

I've found that I can bolster myself with my writing if I'm strictly experiencing a depressive episode. When PTSD comes into play, something else happens. 

I have trouble writing.

I don't feel like I deserve to write.

I find myself asking "what the hell difference does this fluff I'm creating make?"

This happened to me back in 2013 when the flooding hit Boulder. I was working at a retirement community there. While driving to work, a wall of water struck the side of my car. I was able to stay on the road, but by the time I got to the facility, I was shaking badly. I went and took a shower before reporting in. I don't know how long I was in there, but I stood in there until the storm knocked the transformers out.

I had trouble writing for around a month after that. Part of me was saying "you nearly lost your life, you moron! What the hell is this wittering you do worth?"

Another part of me felt survivor guilt. A lot of people lost their property during that flood. Some lost their lives. In the area where I live, it was only a heavy rain that hit. I evidently survived that damn wave hitting my car.

Losing my job earlier this year socked it to me. Not working for a month has taken a toll. Having my car damaged the way it was by the hail is not irreparable damage, but it may have brought back emotions from what I experienced in the flood.

In any case, doing the Tarot reading helped me examine what's going on with me. 

PTSD and depression are socking it to me. I'm not entirely sure what to do, but at least now I know, and you know what they say--knowing is half the battle.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

The Cheese Grates It: Psychiatry and the Push for Normal

This is a response to a post by Russell Duffy about a journey which included dealing with depression and therapy.

https://fishywords.blogspot.com/2017/04/depression-then-and-now.html

Many a person, both licensed and unlicensed, has told me that my mental health issues require me to be medicated and that I am a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad crazy person for refusing to be so.

I'm not saying that medications never help anybody. However, for many people, the cure is worse than the problem.

I can't, for instance, take SSRIs, which are the darlings of modern psychiatry. They fuck with my perception, big time. I normally am not psychotic. I have rapid cycling type 2 bipolar disorder, and my biggest issues are depression alternating with an elevated mood although not full mania, where before being properly diagnosed I would often do things such as take on a second job and/or party a lot. There can also be mixed states, which feature irritability and paranoia, but not psychosis.

If I take SSRIs, I become psychotic. Not like axe-murdering psychotic, which is what most people think of when they hear the word. I'm far more likely to hurt myself than anyone else, however, my thoughts are not grounded in Earthly reality. For instance, Zoloft gave me the perception that my brain had grown tiny hands and was trying to pick its way out of my skull. With Effexor, I jumped up on a counter and was preaching. Prozac made me flat and had me staring at my arm, contemplating cutting it, not for the usual self-harm reasons but because I wondered if I could still feel.

The only thing I take is a form of Lithium which is available without prescription. I take a much lower dose than I would have to if I were to take Lithium Carbonate, because Lithium Orotate is far more bioavailable. 

The therapeutic dose of Lithium, as it happens, is just slightly below toxic levels. Since much lower doses of Lithium Orotate have the desired effect of minimizing the irritability, paranoia and impulsiveness of my disorder, why the hell would I want to ingest nearly toxic amounts of Lithium?

Although psychiatry has come a long way since the early days when those deemed "insane" were locked away in torture chambers, there's still a lot of work that needs to be done. I think there is still a tendency to try to make everybody fit the definition of textbook "normal," and that is not realistic or compassionate.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

Cross-posted to:

http://crazycreativescheerleadingcamp.blogspot.com

http://crazycreativescheerleadingcamp.tumblr.com

http://openmindedsearchfortruth.blogspot.com

http://trifectaofmess.tumblr.com

NaPoWriMo 2017: Day 30: Zero Chance of Escape

Without fail

The black dog

Comes around again

There is no escape

Bipolar 2 is 4 Ever

Without fail, someone tells me

To just cheer up

To just stop feeling that way

To just thank their god

That I get to live another day

Bipolar 2

Is 4 Ever

There is zero

Chance of escape

~Cie~

Cross-Posted to:

Crazy Creatives Cheerleading Camp (Blogger)

Crazy Creatives Cheerleading Camp (Tumblr)

Dark Hearts Love Too

Proud Diabetic: How to prevent insulin injections from hurting

Proud Diabetic: How to prevent insulin injections from hurting: The other day I wrote about an article in USA Today , dispelling some of the myths surrounding diabetes.  In addition to the 5 myths debunke...

PLAYING SPEAK OUT | WITH FREYA

Hi Sisters and Misters! I was looking for character inspiration to write a new story, and I thought these girls were great! Look for the intro today!

Love,

Sally

What You Need To Know Before You Leave Design School

I ended up dropping out of graphic design school.

I tried to post this video directly from You Tube twice. I don't know where it ended up!

~Lady Eddie~

Let The Wrong One In

I generally don’t participate in writing challenges. Writing challenges are for nice, normal people whose thoughts work in a linear direction and resemble the web of a proper spider, not one of those messed-up spiders who has been given, say, LSD.

My thoughts resemble the web of a spider on LSD.

At first glance, I pass for normal. I’m astoundingly plain. I’m a gray-haired, middle-aged woman with a body far rounder than those bodies which are deemed beautiful. I’m someone that nobody looks at twice. This is fine. I wouldn’t want to be one of those people who is celebrated solely for their physical appearance.

Realizing from a young age that I had a great face for radio, I believed that I might be able to make a living with my writing. I have always been highly imaginative, my head filled with unique and sometimes controversial ideas. I am open-minded and empathic. I thought I could combine these traits of imagination, empathy, and open-mindedness, I could reach those who, like me, were different and misunderstood.

I learned that nobody is interested in the works of a person who can’t tie their ideas up in a neat little package. I have tried, but outside of short stories, I can’t do it. My novels will always have a myriad of subplots. When I try to constrain my thoughts into a tidy parcel, the end result doesn’t feel authentic.

This is the result of my anomalistic mind refusing to conform to the rules of proper writing.

I did not do well with writing in the sixth grade, where I had a teacher who insisted we make an outline first and then follow that outline exactly, but not too exactly, or he’d know we wrote the story first and then made the outline. This teacher quite literally gave me PTSD regarding the use of outlines.

A scan of the weird world inside my skull would reveal that my brain looks something like a bowl full of radioactive cherry Jello with a few amusing blobs of lime Jello thrown in for fun. Another type of scan would reveal that my synapses always think it’s the Fourth of July and they are fireworks.  Even in a balanced state of mind, known as euthymia, and performing mundane, non-stressful tasks, my synapses would be firing off with inappropriate levels of excitement. The way my brain works is similar to having a person begin dancing around in brightly colored clothes at a staid and formal affair.

This world dislikes people like me. I have come to understand that those things which interest me do not interest anybody else. I am strange, I am eccentric. At first glance I pass for normal, but I am not.

When writing a novel, I could try to do it the way everybody else does. I could try to kill all the subplots that dance into my mind. I could try to write a nice, ordinary book which might sell, but it probably wouldn’t because it would be awful. A book written without spirit is a dead world.

I cannot weave my thoughts in the manner of a normal spider weaving its web.

My thoughts will always weave in the manner of a spider on LSD.

It is exhausting to be me.

Yet me is the only thing I know how to be.

I have had people ask me why I don’t ask a doctor to medicate away the overstimulated state inside my head.

I tried this once. The cure was worse than the problem.

Most antidepressants don’t make me less depressed, they make me manic and psychotic. The exception is Prozac, which makes me flat and turns my thoughts to self-harm, not for the usual reasons, but because I start wondering if I can still feel.

I am normally neither manic nor psychotic, and usually I can feel, perhaps too much.

I have type 2 bipolar disorder, which manifests hypomania rather than full mania.

Hypomania can be equally destructive, but its presentation isn’t as extreme as full mania. This is why bipolar 2 tends to be misdiagnosed.

I am not psychotic. I have an esoteric belief system, but I know the difference between the metaphysical and physical world. I am grounded in reality. I am all too aware that there are a myriad of horrific things happening in the world at any given time. I wish that I could stop these things from happening. I know that I can’t.

I take a low dose of Lithium to help manage the hypomania and the paranoia that are part and parcel of my particular and peculiar mind. Lithium doesn’t make me flat the way Prozac did. It’s more akin to turning the dimmer switch on a light to a lower setting than to turning off the light.

LIthium allows me to be less extreme. It allows me to think things through, to not be enticed into unhealthy relationships, to spend my money a bit more wisely. It hasn’t yet stopped me from overworking myself, and it doesn’t stop myriads of subplots from appearing out of left field, right field, center field, or dropping in from the Heavens above and popping up from the Hells below.

I don’t want my stories to be without multiple subplots. I like the LSD spiderweb that my mind weaves. I’m not even especially bothered by the fact that other people generally don’t care for the way my writing jumps this way and that.

What bothers me is the fact that most people believe that stories can only take a linear form, that there is only one right way to tell a tale, and if the author fails to adhere to said conventions, they are to be shamed and pushed away from writing as they enjoy.

Some minds don’t weave their tales in the manner of a normal spider.

Some of us are LSD spiders.

It’s wrong to demand that minds which are not neurologically typical work like minds that are.

~Cie~

TV Show Meme

The TV Shows Questions

1. Name a TV show series in which you have seen every episode at least twice:

Star Trek TOS and the original Twilight Zone

2. Name a show you can't miss:

I watch everything on Netflix, so I really don't pay any attention to TV schedules any more.

3. Name an actor that would make you more inclined to watch a show:

There are a few of these, although the number is decreasing as they grow old and their bodies fail them.

4. Name an actor who would make you less likely to watch a show:

Pretty much everybody who is Young and Hot (tm)

5. Name a show you can, and do, quote from:

Star Trek, Supernatural, Futurama. Bite my shiny metal ass!

6. Name a show you like that no one else enjoys:

I've liked a few shows that never quite took off.

7. Name a TV show which you've been known to sing the theme song:

I hum the theme song to M.A.S.H. sometimes. Every now and then the theme for Gilligan's Island will play in my mind.

8. Name a show you would recommend everyone to watch:

Eh, whatever floats your boat.

9. Name a TV series you own:

The first season of True Blood. The entire Real Ghostbusters cartoons.

10. Name an actor who launched his/her entertainment career in another medium, but has surprised you with his/her acting chops in television:

I absolutely adored the Chris Isaak show. It's a shame it never went to DVD.

11. What is your favorite episode of your favorite series?

I based a big part of the past life subplot of Team Netherworld's WIP novel, Fetch (peppersfetch.blogspot.com) on The Lights of Zetar, a much-panned episode of Star Trek TOS that I really loved overall in spite of the fact that there are parts of it that I could certainly nit-pick about. 

12. Name a show you keep meaning to watch, but you just haven't gotten around to yet:

I have a whole long list of these on Netflix.

13. Ever quit watching a show because it was so bad?

Sadly, quite a few of the shows I enjoyed along the way fell into this category. Happy Days, Mork and Mindy, Three's Company, the list goes on.

14. Name a show that's made you cry multiple times:

Torchwood made me cry when Captain Jack sacrificed his grandson to save the Earth. NYPD Blue when Jimmy Smits' character died. I can think of more movies than TV shows at this point.

15. What do you eat when you watch TV?

Nuts, cheese, dark chocolate.

16. How often do you watch TV?

A little bit every day

17. What's the last TV show you watched?

Currently watching Futurama

18. What's your favorite/preferred genre of TV?

I tend to watch sci-fi, but also nature shows, cop shows, crime drama, I'm pretty eclectic.

19. What was the first TV show you were obsessed with?

Star Trek TOS

20. What TV show do you wish you never watched?

Eh, I don't know. In some ways Bones was pretty good, but they had a habit of size shaming larger people, which I really didn't like.

21. What's the weirdest show you enjoyed?

I don't know. I'm kind of a weird person overall, so maybe all of them.

22. What TV show scared you the most?

I write horror, so most horror stuff doesn't scare me. The Lights of Zetar scared the hell out of me and still does. I will not watch it in the dark.

23. What is the funniest TV show you have ever watched?

Futurama is pretty funny. Monty Python is a longtime favorite. The first couple seasons of Mork and Mindy were hilarious.