Category: Identity

  • Literary Homemaking

    Being a writer, I own lots of books.  I’m sure there are probably some writers who don’t feel compelled to own walls and walls of books, and perhaps there are even some writers who have slowed down in their reading habits at some point in their life (though I would personally see that as having…

  • Life with a house

    I feel like I’m at the end of the strangest and somewhat stressful three or four months of my life. More stressful than those first few months of living in Japan even, getting used to a different culture. In the past four months, my first novel has come out, I’ve been teaching three classes at…

  • Nature and Nurture

    I think people sometimes take for granted the kind of environment they grow up in, and how it plays a part in shaping who they become. Of course we all know that’s a given, that we’re influenced by our environment, but I myself can sometimes get caught up in what-might-have-beens. Usually when people get caught…

  • A real writer

    I have been working at one of those put-it-together-yourself shoddy desks since I moved into my apartment last summer, because it was cheap and I needed to use my money for things that were more essential at the time.  But writer friends sometimes talk about their desks and I’ve always felt like I wasn’t a real…

  • Advice we should take now, too

    Gwyneth Jones is so smart: Much of the science-fiction establishment hated the cyberpunks. Science fiction was supposed to be about progress, and how advances in technology will inevitably create a better world. But they were right, and the truth they told is highly relevant to this new century of sci-fi come true. If a child…

  • Writing thoughts and questions

    Do you have any thoughts on why writers can’t tell if their own writing is any good or not? I mean, I think there are probably some writers who do know (or believe) that their writing is good, and there are probably some writers who do know (or believe without any trouble) that their writing…

  • Is this the singularity?

    I love interesting statistics like the one in this video from Youtube, which as been making the rounds among blogs and sites concerned with economic development lately.  I feel like I should be watching Braveheart or something when I watch it, but you’ll get the point.  We’re, uh…a little behind, I think.  The world’s moving faster…

  • A fun test

    Not totally accurate on all counts, but fun nonetheless. What does your drawing say about YOU? The results of your analysis: You tend to pursue many different activities simultaneously. When misfortune does happen, it doesn’t actually dishearten you all that much. You are a thoughtful and cautious person. You like to think about your method,…

  • What is language?

    Via Cory Doctorow at Boingboing, a non-verbal autistic woman presents us with a video at Youtube, in which she speaks her own language, using gestures and sounds we don’t readily recognize as language, and visual cues that aren’t recognized as “normal” communicative cues either.  She then translates the first two sections with the aid of a text-to-speech…