Month: June 2025

Reverse Engineering an Ending

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I’ve been trying to figure out how to end my book. Today I’ve been reading the last third of the book to see if I can force an exit strategy into the story. The good news is I’m enjoying the narrative. It’s almost as if someone else wrote it. So that’s good. The bad news it’s taking a while to figure out a satisfying ending that leaves all the major characters with a satisfying “landing.”
But I’m glad I’ve re-engaged with the writing on a more robust schedule. I think the story is well written so it gives me motivation to get the darned thing out there. Onward and upward.

So, has Trump really ended the Iran/Israeli War? Well, here’s hoping.

Volatilized Radioactive Cloud

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Reading the reports last night, the United States of America attacked three Iranian nuclear material production facilities with a combination of Tomahawk missiles and GBU-57 series MOP’s (Massive Ordnance Penetrators).  Depending on which side you get your news from either all of the targets were completely destroyed or no damage at all was done.  Okay, that seems to cover the full range of possibilities.

The part I’m unsure of is whether we are now in a state of active war with Iran.  Iran thinks so.  Probably Israel hopes so.  But President Trump doesn’t feel that way.  He says hostilities are limited to the already completed attacks and so we should all just move on.  I’m going to go out on a limb and say there will be “reverberations.”

But maybe Trump knows more about the situation than I do.  I guess I have to hope (fervently) that he knows a whole lot more than I do and that this deeper knowledge led him to approve the attacks without fearing dire retaliation.  Yes, that is the hope at this point.

But I’ve got to say I’m quite worried that this will ramp up terrorist attacks by Iranian and Iranian-proxy groups.  We know that for the last four years foreigners have entered our southern border with impunity.  Would it surprise anyone if this included Iranian sleeper cells whose training would allow them to kill a large number of Americans in terrorist attacks almost anywhere in the United States?

And if there are attacks with large numbers of casualties will this lead to a full-blown war with Iran?  Will our sons be sent to the desert to fight?  Again?

I don’t know the answer to any of these questions.  That’s why we hired Donald Trump.  He said no more “forever wars.”  And for better or worse he’s going to be held to that statement.  So, Mr. President, get on with your big beautiful bill and your deportations and your energy agenda and all that but don’t think for a minute we want another George W Bush or even a Joe Biden.  No more body bags, no more lives wasted sitting in tanks in a Mid-East desert for twenty years.  We could get that from the Democrats without even trying.

Well, that’s my two cents.  Maybe some folks want to cut him some slack because Iran has been a thorn in our side since 1979 and blowing up their stuff seems like payback.  Well, if that’s the game then nuke them and be done with it.  Give them both barrels and put an end to it.  But I’m pretty sure that would be just the beginning.  We’d end up with a harvest of mushroom clouds stretching right around the world from Moscow to Beijing and Washington to San Francisco.  And even the Neo-con psychos would probably agree that would be a “suboptimal outcome.”

Alright.  Let’s wait and see.  Back to my chores and summer fun.  Back to my writing and photos.  I have to process a bunch of shots I took at a truck show.  If I’m not a volatilized radioactive cloud by tomorrow I’ll have those pictures ready by next week.

21JUN2025 – An Interesting Day

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A recent post called “Where Will We Be in 2,500 AD”  reminded Ed of an old song from 1969 called “In the Year 2525.”

“Remember this one?

In the year 2525, if man is still alive

If woman can survive, they may find

In the year 3535

 

…    (very long series of verses)   …

 

Now it’s been ten thousand years

Man has cried a billion tears

For what, he never knew, now man’s reign is through

But through eternal night, the twinkling of starlight

So very far away, maybe it’s only yesterday

In the year 2525, if man is still alive

If woman can survive, they may find”

 

And that produced this comment by me:

“I remember it well. I was in the family station wagon heading for Long Beach Island on the Jersey shore for the summer vacation when it came on the radio for the first time. I was reading a science fiction anthology edited by Robert Heinlein called “Tomorrow, the Stars.” Life was simpler then.”

Well, of course that got me thinking.  As I remembered that was a pretty good anthology.  But unfortunately, it was a trade paperback from 1969 so it fell apart about fifty years ago or so.  Curses!

But Amazon.com has some redeeming value.  I found a hard back copy (seventeen years older than the paperback I owned but in much, much better shape) and purchased it for a very reasonable sum.

And, as remembered, there are several very good stories inside; C. M. Kornbluth’s “The Silly Season,” Kurt Vonnegut’s “The Report on the Barnhouse Effect” (I forgot he was the author), Isaac Asimov’s “Misbegotten Missionary,” William Morrison’s “The Sack,” Fritz Leiber’s “Poor Superman” and several others that I still like.

So now that will allow me to enjoy some excellent short science fiction from the golden age (or was it the silver age?).

And I’ll need it.  I was reading Heinlein’s posthumously published alternate novel to his “Number of the Beast” alternate universe story; “The Pursuit of the Pankera.“  But I just couldn’t read it straight through.  Just like in the “Number of the Beast” the four main characters just talk way, way too much.  It was like an endless struggle session to see who could out-Heinlein who.  I also developed a strong antipathy for his character Hildy.  I wanted a monster to squash her when she started hectoring them.

I will admit it was better than “Number of the Beast” but I couldn’t finish that one either.  Maybe it’s me but after his illness in the ‘70’s I don’t think his writing ever recovered the vitality it had before “I Will Fear No Evil.”  Or maybe something changed in me.

But anyway, Heinlein’s picks in the anthology I’ll be rereading show good taste at least in conventional science fiction from the 1950s.  Thank goodness he didn’t have access to his continua craft in his old age and could go back and change his story selections for that anthology.  I’m not sure I’d enjoy them.

Today I also received my handy-dandy manual chain saw doo-hickey (in the same box as the book).

It’s the chain for a chain saw with carabiners on the ends to allow it to be used using human power.  I went back to my downed tree and took a three-foot length from the trunk and it only took about twenty minutes of sawing.  Of course, I took another twenty minutes of breaks to restore strength to my tired old arms but still this is a factor of ten faster than it took me to cut the last chunk using the bow saw.  My next gambit is to see if I can attach the ends of a chain to the frame of my bow saw.  That would make it more convenient to use.  Alternatively, I could imagine attaching the chain to the rear wheel of a stationary bicycle and really improving my efficiency.  I guess I’m anticipating a future without gasoline or batteries.  But I do think strangely.

Well, it was an interesting day.