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 |  Random Writing, Blogs and Adventures |
A mix of Random writing in an attempt to organize my thoughts, storyboard ideas and conserve portfolio space in the process.  |
| “The surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that it has never tried to contact us.” – Bill Watterson The final Blogging Birthday Bastion prompt was to write an entry inspired by the quote above. I've heard this quote a few times in the past but never knew who said. I did a little bit of googling to find a little more on the person it was attributed to. Bill Watterson was the American Cartoonist responsible for the series Calvin and Hobbes. The panel connected with it is listed below. https://scontent-lga3-3.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/69498472_3462378977109172_12352... It makes sense that it makes sense that this quote would come from that type of comic strip. It is really humorous and at the same time has a lot of depth to it. Thinking about it, it a little bit of a jab at the human race as it points out any intelligent race would want to stir clear of us. From a critical standpoint, we have done a lot of really stupid things in our history. It says something that we have the Darwin Awards - basically awards designed to honor people who have killed themselves in incredibly stupid Even looking over the past decade, there is a lot we have to be ashamed about. We been around for thousands of years and we are still fighting with one another. There are wars and conflicts all over. I feel that we have the ability to accomplish but we remain struggling. We also waste a lot of times these days particularly with social media. We have people spending time laughing at things like cat videos or people getting kicked in the groin. We have the knowledge that certain things damage our environment such as pollution and people still ignore the warnings in favor of convenience. We have the knowledge that certain things damage our health such as smoking, alcohol and junk food and people still ignore it in favor brief moments of pleasure. That are vaccines out there that prevent diseases such as the measles (offered to the population for free) and people have still been convinced to avoid them. We really have a lot to be embarrassed about. Word Count 368 Written for: "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025"  |
| Continuing with the Blog Week Birthday Bastion Posts... Today's Blogging prompt is a video one Tommy Cash, Espresso Macchiato, Eurovision Song Contest for Estonia Note: The video shared in the message board for this prompt wasn't working for met. It may not be playable in the U.S. but I was able to track down the playable version above. If you have perused this blog before. You'll know that this type of prompt falls under my wheelhouse. I love blogging about music and sharing songs. This song is new to me but it seems really enjoyable. It kind of reminds of Dragostea Din Tea by O-zone (aka the Numa Numa song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILtz5nX3_fc ). I think because it is sung by a foreign singer and sort of zany and catchy at the same time. The lyrics of Espresso Macchiato sung in Italian are fun and even not knowing Italian they are fun to follow along with. The phrase Espresso Macchiato energizes a person just like an actual shot of expresso would. The song has a nice Jazzy beat that really makes a person want to get up and dance. The music video for this is really fun to watch as well. The singer Tommy Cash has some fun dance movements. He is particularly entertaining to watch in the opening scenes where he is dancing with a duplicate version of himself in sync. The visual aesthetics of the music video are awesome. The duplicate versions of the lead: One dressed in brown suit with white hair while the other version is dressed completely in black catch the viewers eyes and pull them in. I also really got a kick out of how the Brown and black versions merge together later in the song. Thinking about it, the black and white / brown mix together in a similar fashion to how black coffee and creamy brown coffee would in an Espresso Macchiato. It is a cool connection with the songs title and lyrics. The chorus' playful lyrics involving a easily recognizable Italian words are really catchy and stick in a listener's head. I imagine I will be listening to this song multiple times over the next couple of days.  Word Count: 364 words Written for: "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025" |
| Today's Blog week Birthday Bastion prompt was to write an entry inspired by this quote: Quote: “Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.”  ― G.K. Chesterton. I was debating whether to write a poem about Cheese or go with a standard talking to the reader blog entry but as the blogs requested have a minimum word limit I'll have to lean into the standard blog style as I am not sure I can write 350 word poetry about cheese. My gut feeling when reading the quote initially was that can't be true... can it? However, when I thought about it no immediate cheese related poems easily can to mind. The closest ones that came to me was more of a phrase then an actual poem: "The moon is made of Green cheese". The other one that I thought of was the Farmer in the Dell which is more of song then a poem as well. I did a google search to confirm and a few showed up mostly as a way to counter the quote above. https://www.quotegarden.com/cheese-poetry.html None of these were fully familiar to me but in one the moon getting compared to cheese gets a nice call out. I am unsure if that poem itself is the originator of the comparison. I feel like there should be more. Is there a classic nursery rhyme or other poem that I am forgetting? Anyway now that I'm within the a more manageable word count, let me try an attempt at cheesy poet. There are a lot of styles to choose from but lets go with Limericks today or at least variations of it.  The word that I heard being teased Is no poems exist about cheese. Let it not be said That I can't make a spread Full of cheddars and goudas and bries! Melted swiss cheese is sure to delight Used on burgers or toast its all right Melted down with some heat It can make a mean treat And adds one tasty kick in each bite! Mozzarella a topper as well Used on pizza it is tasty as hell. But when breaded and fried It is good to be tried. It's a snack that is definitely swell! Word Count 370 words Written for: "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025" |
I am continuing with Birthday Bastion blogging this week. Today's choice of prompt included 4 artistic images. One of them was a beautiful painting by Frida Kahlo which I chose to cover. I first heard of Frida Kahlo from taking a Spanish Language course in College. A requirement of my Bachelor's degree in English literature was that I needed to complete 2 years of a foreign language. I wound up choosing Spanish which worked out well up until the final semester I needed where my ability to keep up with the expanding vocabulary that the language required caught up to me and I wasn't able memorize what I needed quickly enough. I was able to pass the exams I needed to but I did cut pretty close. Part of what helped me through the course were a few friends in the class. I remember them organizing a study group to help prepare for the exams. They were pretty fun. I remember one of them organizing a "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire" type of game to help study some of the trickier vocabulary words. One of the final Spanish projects I had to do was a group skit dedicated to a famous Spanish figure. My partner on the project who luckily had some good marks in the class recommended Frida Kahlo as the subject of our skit. Sadly our skit didn't really do Frida justice. We leaned more on the comedy side when we probably should have focused more on educational content. Frida Kahlo is a Mexican Artist who created some really powerful paintings. The image shared above is my favorite work of hers. It is probably her most recognizable work It is a self portrait depicting two sides of her personality. One version of her is dressed in traditional white dress while the the second seems to be wearing a more traditional Mexican outfit. Their hearts are linked together. Frida created this painting shortly after going through a divorce so there was a lot of pain in her life at the time. It seems to carry through in the picture as one of her counterparts in the picture is shown bleeding. As a viewer I sympathize with the with internal struggle in the picture. I feel that a lot of people can relate to having different sides of themselves that are connected with one another. They can also relate to the two sides in the midst of personal struggle. It is very thought provoking and deep. ---------------- Word Count 430 words Written for: "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025" You can read more about the Two Fridas portrait here: https://www.fridakahlo.org/the-two-fridas.jsp |
| I work in the tech field so I am really excited about A.I.'s potential. It can already do a lot of cool things and gives users access to valuable information in concise formats. It is amazing how it is able to process and understand questions. A.I. only has incredible creative potential as well as it has the generate artwork, designs and writing. While I mostly use A.I. to get information on my end, I also use it in recreationally. I enjoy trying to generate artwork using different prompts. For example I generated an image of polar bear playing chess against a tiger and it seemed to come out really well. I also used it to generate cover artwork and illustrations to accompany stories stories that I have been working on. One example can be found here where I used the Bing image creator to generate an image of a Panda dressed up as Michael Jackson and listening to music as cover artwork for my story. (See: "A Black and White Situation" )I have also roleplayed with A.I chatbots such as Character.ai and they are pretty good but still have a long way to go. I was able to roleplay complex scenarios such as Fantasy magic storylines with them and they were able to respond to the scenario correctly but wound up needing a lot of prompting to avoid looping over the same bit of dialogue. It is still much more fun to roleplay with with human friends. One cool feature though is that Character A.I. has the ability to imitate and read dialogue in the voice of the character you are roleplaying with. One thing that the tech industry warns about when using A.I. is the possibility of hallucination. Sometimes A.I. can make up information in its summaries. The big example that was used when I was taking a generative A.I. course was a Law firm that used A.I. to generate its arguments. The A.I. cited court cases that did not exist as evidence. It caused the firm a lot of trouble and embarrassment. While A.I. is constantly improving this is still a recurring as shown by the Reuter's article below: https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/trouble-with-ai-hallucinations-spreads-... It is incredible important to verify information obtained through A.I. when using it for reach. Recently Apple introduced some A.I. enhancements in the latest iphone but it seems to be a little disappointing. They include apps and features using A.I. to generate images and create custom emojis but they limit its capabilities and when I was testing it I was often informed that the prompt I requested was unable to go through. I suspect Apple is attempting to safeguard against potential legal issues as laws around the use of A.I. are being developed. They want to be careful about infringing up copyrighted material On a writing site like this one some of the concerns with A.I. can become highlighted. This site regularly holds contests where it requires writers to utilize their writing ability. Using A.I to generate writing in a contest like that is basically the equivalent of using performance enhancing drugs in sports. I've seen several contest on the site call this out as prohibited so there must be people actually trying it. The cheating aspect of A.I. aside I feel that using it also limits the amount of experience a writer would be able to get. Writing is a hard process. Writers develop by going through it fully. A.I is great tool and I feel that it is valuable and useful technology. The applications are amazing and it can really help our society develop and grow. Word Count: 595 Words Prompt: The difference with last year’s celebrations is the implementation of Artificial Intelligence. AI/ChatGPT: A pest or a blessing for writers? Give us your thoughts. Written for: "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025" |
| I'm dusting off this blog after going radio silent for the last couple of months. An eventful summer pushed me to be inactive since May. When last I blogged I was in the middle of a 100 day Blogging marathon. Life events (which I'll probably cover in future entries) forced me to bow out at day 69. While I am still struggling to organize events in my personal life, seeing all the cool WDC birthday festivities were enough to push me into participating in the site activities this month. I wanted to help WDC celebrate 25 years. As shown by the title of this entry, I am currently participating in a blogging activity called Blog Week Birthday Bastion (see "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025" ). The activity has users responding to 7 different daily prompts. Today's prompt covers the ups and down of my time at WDC. The site is one of my favorites to visit so the highs greatly outnumber any lows that I can think about. I have a lot of accomplishments that I am really proud of such as participating in Writing challenges and succeeding in ones that I never thought that I would be able to complete. Some of the achievements here that I am most proud of were my Interactive story which has expanded to 2000 chapters, obtaining over 600 merit badges and award icons, successfully collecting over 1000 trinkets, making a lot of friends on the site and completing and finishing some extremely rigorous writing activities. 3 activities that I am particularly proud of are making it through were the Wonderland writing exercises (see: "Adventures in Wonderland" ), the Ultimate Trinket Adventure (see: "Adventurer's Journal" ) and most recently one of the legs in "Tour de Ports" . I have been on this site for over 18 years so of course there have been a few lows too. There are times when my workload was too heavy and I had to stop writing projects I was hoping to complete or contest activities that I was not able to finish before their deadline. There have also been times where I was too burnt out to write. In some of those periods I have been inactive for over a year. My most frustrating moments here involve not having the time to complete all the projects I visualize. I should mention that even in the moments where I am inactive, I still enjoy visiting the site to read other peoples work and it has been a source of relaxation in times of stress as well. This site has been one of the places I really enjoy visiting very much and it has definitely helped me grow as a writer. Congratulations on 25 years Writing.Com!!Word Count: 438 Words Written for: "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2025" Prompt: 25 years of Writing.com. Let’s celebrate! Guide us through your writing life at WdC. Ups, downs, hiatus? What happened with you being part of this wonderful community? |
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