Cloud Dragon

Posted by Piscis on

I saw this guy over the Nevada desert last week:

 

Cloud Dragon (Front)

 

Something like a dragon blowing smoke out his nose, eh?  It was extremely clear in person, but I couldn’t get a very good photograph without optical zoom.  I fiddled with the contrast and tried to enhance the details as best I could.

Here’s another from his side, several miles away.  Look closely and you can make out his neck, horns, eyes, and snout:

 

Cloud Dragon (Side)

 

Dragon in the cloud,
Are you proud?
Are you cowed?
Would you deign to flutter down
And say “hi”?

Dragon in the sky,
Tell me why
Do you cry
When the wind begins to blow
Way up there.

Dragon in the air,
Do you care
If I stare?
For I must admit I’m struck
By your gleam.

Dragon wrought of steam,
I must deem
You a dream,
As I know I’ll never see
You again.

 

Bene scribete.

Wednesday Writing Word: Epanalepsis

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Epanalepsis

/ˌɛpənəˈlɛpsɪs/  |  EP-ah-nuh-LEP-sis

 

Epanalepsis is the repetition of a sentence’s (or occasionally clause’s) first word or phrase at its end.  Used for a particular sort of poetic emphasis, it can sound pretty awkward if not done carefully.

 

Examples:

  • Wretched is the slog, for its intentions are wretched.
  • You must be wary of the slog‘s embrace; it is cruel yet inviting, and of its allure you must be wary.

 

Epanalepsis.  Use it.

 

Bene scribete.

Reading Habits

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Throwing a book

 

One of my fellow book-clubbers* came across this interesting article on personal reading rules (which in turn was inspired by this one), and I thought I’d continue the chain here, as it makes for a fun topic of discussion.

 

So here were my own responses:

  • I often find myself reading five or so books at a time.  I don’t necessarily like to…it just happens.
  • I don’t use bookmarks.  I just remember what page I left off on.
  • I suppose I appreciate the idea of dust jackets (fancy graphic cover AND classy textured actual cover), but in practice I also kind of hate them.  I try to leave them on when reading, since I don’t like having to find somewhere to put them, but they’re just…slippery and annoying.  I’d prefer all hardbacks be print-on casebound.
  • I take care to preserve not only the spine, but also the page edges.  I can’t stand the green streaks that manifest toward the middle from prolonged holding (mainly an issue with the cheaper acid paper used in mass market paperbacks).
  • I hate writing in books, even if they’re workbooks or madlibs or what-have-you meant for writing in.
  • My eyes will sometimes jump to the middle or bottom of a page to spite me (particularly in interesting passages).  When this gets particularly bad, I’ll put a hand over the lower part of the page to prevent myself from reading ahead.
  • A book has to be really, really awful or boring for me to actively give up on it once I’ve committed to reading it.  But I tend to have a longer attention span than most (ironically enough, considering the first point), and am more willing to force myself to seek the merit in things.

 

Anyone else up for confessing your own?  (>^-‘)>

 

*Does that sound like someone who beats books with a stick?

 

Bene scribete.

Wednesday Writing Word: Polyseme

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Polyseme

/ˈpɒliˌsim/  |  PAUL-ee-seem

 

Polysemy is the semantic relation among identical words of affiliated or derived meaning.   A polyseme can be as simple as a word with multiple similar contexts (mattress pad / paw pad / mouse pad), but they are more interesting and useful when they cross part-of-speech borders.  If we say “He will bat the bat with a bat,” bat (swat) and bat (baseball) are polysemes, whereas they are merely homonyms with bat (animal).

 

Other examples:

 

Polysemy.  Use it.

 

Bene scribete.

The Amber Ring – Free on Kindle

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The Amber Ring

When the twelve-year-old Heroine of the Fairwoods dies, her morose twin sister reluctantly joins her trusty gryphon sidekick on a quest to save the enchanted land in her stead.

 

The Amber Ring (my cynical fairytale novella) is now free to download on Amazon’s Kindle!  At least in the U.S. – other territories are hopefully soon to follow.

So go snag yourself a copy!  You won’t regret it.  Unless you hate it.  In which case…you’ll probably regret it.

 

Bene scribete.

Wednesday Writing Word: Anaphora

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Anaphora

/əˈnæfərə/  |  uh-NAFF-or-uh

 

Anaphora means…two separate things.  Because why not coin long, obscure words for extremely specific purposes only to use them again for something completely different?  O.K., O.K., the etymology (Greek, ~”bringing back”) does lend itself toward both definitions, but still.

The first refers to using a word to stand in for something that came before it.  Typically, this just means your average pronoun-antecedent reference, but it can also apply to certain auxiliary verbs.

 

Examples:

  • I hate the slog because it is the worst.
  • I want to annihilate the slog; so does Billy.

 

The second (and more fun) anaphora is the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of multiple sequential sentences or clauses.  Used as emphatic redundancy.

 

Examples:

  • We are here to make a statement.  We are here to take a stand.  We are here to face the slog.
  • I don’t like the slog, I don’t like that it exists, and I don’t like that it doesn’t not exist.

 

(…technically, there’s also a third definition, but it isn’t related to linguistics, so it can just…not…be here)

 

Anaphora.  Use it.

 

Bene scribete.

Wednesday Writing Word: Antimetabole

Posted by Piscis on

English has a lot of words.  It has words for things you may not necessarily think there would be words for – particularly when it comes to language itself.

But words are fun, right?  Of course they are!  So, I thought I’d do a series on obscure linguistic and rhetoric terms.  If one or more of them are new to you, then the next time you use a particular device, you’ll…realize that…it’s a thing?

Anyway, let’s get started.

Antimetabole

/ˌæntɨməˈtæbəli/  |  AN-tih-meh-TAB-o-lee

 

Antimetabole is the reversal of a phrase when recast in a subsequent clause.  Sometimes used for poetic emphasis or humor, sometimes merely for reflection.  Think Yakov Smirnoff jokes.

 

Examples:

  • In knowing that the slog hates you, so should you hate the slog.
  • The slog lives to fail, and in doing so fails to live.

 

Antimetabole.  Use it.

 

Bene scribete.

Nightmare Fudge

Posted by Piscis on
Scary Fudge

Yep, it’s green.

 

But WAIT!  This isn’t a recipe ‘blog!

Well, shut up, you (AKA me).  Because…whatever and stuff.

Sometimes snacks are nice when writing, O.K.?

Anyway, I used to make fudge a lot.  It tastes nice.  But making fudge the “proper” way involves uncommon ingredients like extra-fine baking sugar, evaporated milk, and marshmallow goop; it also requires precise temperatures, and can generally be kind of an ordeal.  Recently, however, I came across the notion of using canned frosting as a fudge base.  It sounded a little crazy, but the basic makeup is pretty similar, so I thought I’d give it a try.

It turned out…like fudge.  And was actually pretty dang good.  I’m not sure whether to be indignant about having done things the hard way all this time, or excited about the possibilities of this method. Probably both.

Want to give it shot?  Here’s what you’ll need:

 

Blue Funfetti FrostingChocolate Chips

 

That’s it. Seriously. A 12oz bag of chocolate chips, and a 15.6oz can of blue vanilla “Funfetti” frosting (for some reason the store didn’t have any regular vanilla frosting, so fine, thought I – I’ll just make it a thing).

 

Prepare as such:


  1. Melt the frosting in a sauce pan until it’s just about bubbling, stirring constantly.
  2. Mix in the chocolate chips until you have a nasty, homogeneous green paste (I use a beater prong for this type of stuff).
  3. Remove the pan from heat and keep stirring as it thickens (it tends to want to separate).
  4. Pour in the sprinkle things from the frosting (how are you supposed to open that sub-lid, anyway?)
  5. Dump the mixture into a foil-lined 8×8 pan or pie tin (it should come out in a mostly-clean, cohesive glop) and smooth it out.
  6. Refrigerate for a couple of hours.
  7. Lift the fudge block out with the foil, turn it over, and dump it onto a plate or cutting board.
  8. Chop the block into haphazard chunks, stick ’em in a Ziploc bag, and store at room temperature.

And thus you will have the easiest fudge ever. Which happens to be horrifyingly green. With multicolored crunchy splotches.

 

Bene edite.