Schrödinger’s Head

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And every tongue blogs in a several tale, and every tale condemns me for a villain.

Okay, well, welcome to another Thursday and to another edition of my weekly blog post.  This being the second Thursday in July, this would have been an edition of “My Heroes Have Always Been Villains”, which ran briefly, way back when, but which was stopped after not many people seemed to read it.  This surprised me, given the fact that so many people are so interested in the great villains of popular fiction:  Sauron, Hannibal Lecter, Thanos, Darth Vader, and so on, to say nothing of the quintessential dastard from whom I cribbed the title of this post.  I guess people often follow such characters on the DL, as a kind of guilty pleasure, and openly reading or talking about them is not as popular.

Oh, well.  I’ve been disappointed by the lack of popularity of that series, but the world is hard, and it’s under no obligation to conform to my expectations, let alone my hopes.

This fact was driven home yet again for me last week with the difficulty relating to my “single” Schrödinger’s Head, which had to be delayed because of restrictions on the word content of the cover art.  I quickly and easily (but not without grumbling) altered the cover to remove the warped opening lines of the song, and then adjusted the rest for better balance.  I also changed the official title of the song to include the umlaut.  This latter bit didn’t bother me nearly so much, especially since I’d already used an umlaut made from a tiny white cat’s head and a tiny black cat’s head above the “o” in the graphic (see below).  I’m not sure the umlaut in the official title was necessary—it’s hard for me to imagine that being something distributors and song sharing and selling sites would notice much—but it was satisfying, unlike the removal of my opening lyrics.

Bottom line, in short order, once my corrections were made, the song was distributed and has gone live and is now available for your listening pleasure on Spotify, iTunes, Amazon, YouTube Music, and numerous other venues of which I know the names of only a few, such as TikTok.  If anyone listens on one of those other venues, please let me know; I’d love to share the link.

The song is a folk-rock style, lighthearted, silly thing in which the singer (me) asks various binary questions, mostly about what the titular physicist might be thinking, arriving at the lamentable conclusion that nobody knows.  There’s a little more to it than that, including some deliberately contradictory wordplay, but it’s not supposed to be deep or to carry any message (unlike my previous release, Like and Share, which involves heartfelt, sad commentary about one aspect of social media).  The main guitar sounds are mostly “clean”, since I was really just learning to use it, and that’s part of what gives it the folk-tune feel.  I think.

Anyway, have a listen if you’re so inclined (though you won’t actually know if you are or not until you listen, and then the wave function will have collapsed…Ha Ha Ha!).

In other news, of course, Unanimity continues to hurtle toward completion, though never quite as quickly as I hope.  I, however, am schooled not to rely on the specifics of my hopes too much.  The Tao te Ching counsels us to act without expectation, and I think that’s very good advice, though not as simple as it might seem at a superficial glance*.

Anyway, my novel moves ever nearer to release, and I at least am excited about it.  It’s not for the faint of heart, though.  If you’re the sort of person who requires trigger warnings for anything at all, they are all hereby given.  I am not trying to avoid traumatizing you with this book; quite the contrary.

Not that traumatizing you is the point—or at least not the main one.  The main point is to tell a story about what happens when an innocent college student—Charley Banks—takes part in a neuroscience experiment at his university, has a seizure in an MRI machine during the process, and in the aftermath develops a seemingly impossible, potentially limitless, paranormal power to take over other people’s bodies and minds with just a touch.  Unfortunately, in the process he also appears to have suffered damage to his moral compass**, and he begins to do truly terrible and horrifying things with his new ability—things no one else could ever recognize as his handiwork.

What could be the nature and source of this impossible ability?  How can Charley be cured and/or stopped?  Can he be cured and/or stopped?  Will anyone even figure out what’s happening in time to do anything at all about it, if anything can be done?  How could you even detect a danger that potentially comes from all the people you know and love?

And will Vanessa ever be able to get Brad to notice and return her feelings, or will her poor, lonely, yearning heart be broken***?

Some of these questions—and others not mentioned—will be answered in Unanimity.  Some will remain mysteries.  To find out more, you’ll have to read the book.

TTFN

transformed s head cover no words2

*I urge you to look into it.  It’s not religion, though a religion has been made from it; as I see it, it’s really a book of practical philosophy in the form of 81 very short, evocative poem-oids.

**Or it could just be power corrupting, and corrupting fast, or revealing and releasing a side to Charley that was always present, or perhaps some dark, supernatural force is at work.  Who can say which it is?  Well, I can, of course, but I’m not saying, at least not here.

***Okay, that last question has nothing at all to do with the novel.  I don’t know where that comes from.  There are no such characters in my book.

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The aged man that coffers up his gold is blogged with cramps and gouts and painful fits

Hello, all.  Good morning and welcome to Thursday again.  It’s time for another of my weekly blog posts.

Of course, the major news in the human world—such as it is—is the ongoing international tour de force of the COVID-19 virus.  I’ve expressed (elsewhere) my frustration with the irrationality with which people are responding to this pandemic*, including the hoarding of toilet paper, which makes little to no sense, and believing sub-moronic videos that say, for instance, that you can cure the virus or prevent its spread by aiming a hot blow-dryer into your nose and mouth.  These are such things as make me wish—only semi-facetiously—that people needed a license to reproduce.  Don’t even get me started on the various absurd prophecies and conspiracy theories many embrace and share about this and other global events.  It’s bizarre that people can simultaneously think so highly and so poorly of human nature, in such unjustifiable ways.

Behaviors such as these tend to exacerbate my baseline melancholy, and have in the past led me to, among other things, write a song about depression.  The song, in this case, was Breaking Me Down, of which I shared the “final release” earlier this week on Iterations of Zero and on YouTube.  When I originally wrote it, I wasn’t thinking explicitly about depression, but I was going through a pretty bad exacerbation, so when I wrote a poem/song about my thoughts and feelings, that was what came out.

I have recorded and released earlier versions of the song, but they suffered partly from my inexperience with mixing and production, and from initially being too low (the final product is up two full steps from how I initially wrote it), and too slow.  The original vocals were not so great, either, both in recording/mixing quality and in the singing.  However, as with most things, practice makes better, though it’s unlikely that it ever makes “perfect”**.  So, now, the song is in a higher key and at a quicker tempo, such that I playfully refer to it as a song about depression that you can dance to if you feel like it.  I think that’s a pretty cool accomplishment, though you may or may not agree that I’ve succeeded.

After fixing this song up, I realized that if I remaster my first, sort of jokey song, Schrodinger’s Head, I’ll have enough for about half an album(!).  That’s five original songs, running a total of roughly twenty-five minutes.  Of course, being the lunatic that I am, that thought immediately led me to go back and start tweaking Schrodinger’s Head, including re-recording vocals and doing some harmony.  That’s not so hard—the good thing about singing is, one always has one’s instrument.  And the actual remixing/remastering process, though time-consuming, is weirdly entertaining and satisfying.

The real issue is that once this is done, I will no doubt feel the urge, or the drive, or the compulsion, to make more songs for the other side of an album***.  I do have here and there the beginnings of other songs, and even have a longer portion of something I mean to write about a manga character, but I just know that this is going to consume a lot of time.  Of course, if I were in one of those industries that’s been forced to take a hiatus in response to COVID-19, writing and recording songs might be a good use of my extra hours.  Unfortunately—well, fortunately, really…let’s be fair and positive, if that’s possible for me—my job is going strong, and I continue to be in the office five to six days a week.  Thus, this little musical hobby tends to eat into my real work, which is writing.

That being said, though, Unanimity is coming along well.  I’m nearly done with the latest run-through, and it’s getting closer and closer to publishable form.  It certainly is a long story, but at least I don’t find it boring.  Whether anyone else will share my assessment only time can tell, but at least liking it myself is a good starting point.

That’s pretty nearly it for this week.  I hope you all do your best to stay well…but don’t do crazy and stupid things, okay? For my part, I’ve always frequently washed my hands and coughed and sneezed into the hollow of my elbow, but then, I am an MD.  As for social distancing, well, that’s something I haven’t ever had to think about much.  It seems to be a task at which I’m particularly gifted, and I’ve only gotten better, if that’s the correct term, over the years.  Remember what I said about practice?

Ironically enough, I—someone very far from being attached to existence—am relatively protected compared to all the many people who want so desperately to cling to their lives.  I wouldn’t call it cosmic irony—that would probably have to involve quasars, galaxies, black holes, dark energy, and the like—but it is certainly irony at a high level.

TTFN

*I know the root words are different, but I can’t help imagining that the word “pandemic” should somehow mean “bread for the people,” or maybe “bread made out of people,” such as Jack and the Beanstalk’s giant might enjoy.

**In most cases, the term “perfect” isn’t defined, and is probably undefinable.  Unless one has a clearly delineated set of criteria by which to judge something, declaring perfection is mere wordplay.  I’m a fan of wordplay, of course, but in this case, people seem to think they mean something, formally, when they use the term.  It leads to much confusion.  It also leads many people to drive themselves to distraction, often to despair, and occasionally to destruction in the dreadful pursuit of “perfection”, a hallucinatory goal that never comes nearer than the horizon.  By all means, strive always to improve yourself.  But sincerely trying to achieve perfection can lead to a life of frustration and self-loathing.

***Don’t ask me what I mean to do with such a collection once I make it, assuming that I do.  It’s not as though I have any experience in making or releasing albums.  I would, however, almost certainly call it “Iterations of Zero”.  Consistency is good.

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Give me some music; music, moody food Of us that trade in blogs.

Good morning, good Thursday, and welcome to the latest posting of my blog.  I hope the year is going well for you all so far.

Those who follow my second blog, Iterations of Zero, will note that I recently posted the lyrics of a song, “Schrödinger’s Head.”  This is rather new and out of the blue, I know.  I certainly gave no explanation when I posted it, so I thought I’d tell the story behind it here.

Last week, a coworker and I were idly chatting between tasks (we sit next to each other at the office), when it occurred to me that “Gwyneth Paltrow’s Head” would be a great name for a sort of indie punk band.  I did a quick Google search and couldn’t find such a band, so between us we thought we should—at least in our imaginations—invent it.  Of course, the name of the band’s first album would be “What’s in the box?”*

After a bit of thought, though, it occurred to us that, at least if the band were to seek real commercial success, it might be better not to call itself “Gwyneth Paltrow’s Head.”  Ms. Paltrow is a curious character, and it’s hard to know how she would react to such a dubious homage.  We thought it might work okay if we switched it around and called the band “What’s in the box?”  We decided, further, that “Gwyneth Paltrow’s Head” was probably not even a safe name for the first album, and regretfully concluded that it would be better to go with “Tracy’s Head.”

At some point after that conversation, with my thoughts meandering like a restless wind inside a letter box, I decided that “Tracy’s Head” was just too banal and context-dependent.  The idea popped into my mind—possibly the result of quantum fluctuations—that the answer to the question “What’s in the Box?” might very well be Schrödinger’s cat, one of the world’s all-time most noteworthy box-dwellers.  And, since the Schrödinger’s cat thought experiment is all about superposition, it seemed fun to meld my metaphors and call the first album “Schrödinger’s Head.”  My colleague found this amusing enough, and he gave his approval.  It occurred to me then that if one is going to have such an album title, there ought to be a title song.  I’d had a good night’s sleep the night before (a rare occurrence) so I was full of pep.  Thus, when a lull occurred in the business of the day, I grabbed a piece of scrap paper and scribbled out the lyrics to such a song.

I’ll be honest:  for the last two of the final verse lines, I had to go online and look up more rhymes for “head.”  Not that they’re particularly difficult rhymes, as I’m sure you’ll note, but even so, I was drawing a blank by then.

My colleague looked at my rough draft and said that, of what he was able to read (my handwriting sucks) he thought it was fun.  So, I typed it up and loaded it onto Iterations of Zero.  I had some trouble dealing with WordPress’s new, supposedly better, editor; I found it cumbersome and non-intuitive, but that may just be because I’m not used to it.  In any case, the song is there, for your delectation.  I’ve even started writing a tune and chords for it, but that’s going to take longer than the words, and I don’t know that I will ever share it with anyone even privately, let alone publicly.  If I do, of course, I’ll let you know.

Okay, enough narcissistic babble about making up bands and writing songs on a whim.  I now turn to some narcissistic babble about my books and stories.

Penal Colony is almost ready to publish, but we still need to get a cover put together for it, which is behind schedule.  Nevertheless, it will probably be out before the end of January.

Speaking of the end of January, the final catastrophes of Unanimity are happening, the final confrontation is well underway, and I really should be done with the book by the end of the month.  Wow.  It’s the longest thing I’ve ever written, that’s for sure.  It’s longer than all but a handful of books that I’ve ever read.  Fear not!  I will cut it ruthlessly in rewrite and edit, of course, and the final product will be much shorter than the first draft, but still, there’s no way it’s not going to be a meaty book.  (For vegans such as the aforementioned Ms. Paltrow, fear not:  any such meat is lab-grown, clean meat, and no animals were harmed in the production of the novel…other than the author).

That’s about all there is for this week.  I hope you get at least a little tickle out of my song lyrics, if you bother going to check them out.  Be on the lookout for Penal Colony.  You can even just begin to scan the distant horizon for the eventual approach of Unanimity, but please don’t hold your breath.  It’s still going to be quite a while.

TTFN

*All this refers to events at the end of the movie “Seven,” for those of you who don’t recognize the references.  In case you haven’t seen it, I won’t explain further.  I don’t want to give any more spoilers than I already have.