Bookstooge's Reviews On the Road

Monday, July 24, 2023

Clockwork Beast - MTG 4th Edition

Sunday, July 23, 2023

Sunset at Blandings (Blandings Castle #12) 3Stars

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Sunset at Blandings
Series: Blandings Castle #12
Authors: PG Wodehouse
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Humor
Pages: 189
Words: 54K

This was the final Blandings Castle novel. Unfortunately, and I didn’t know this going in, it is an unfinished novel because Wodehouse died in the middle of writing it. He was in his 90’s and had failing health. So that’s no surprise really.

So the story just abruptly ends. Some toff decides that he’s going to write all about Wodehouse and talk about the notes he left behind and his style and pretty much shove his nose as far up Wodehouse’s corpse as he can. That’s the rest of the book. Probably would be a treasure trove if you’re the kind of person who likes knowing all about authors and stuff. I quit after about 5 pages of the nonsense.

Technically then, this would have been a dnf, but since I didn’t dnf the story part or anything by Wodehouse, I feel justified in not putting this on the dnf list. Especially since there was no indication on the cover that this wasn’t a complete novel. I upheld my end of the bargain and Mr Doofus Toffer didn’t keep his. Not really the way I was hoping to end my time of reading Wodehouse.

★★★☆☆

From Wikipedia:

The story is another tale set at Blandings Castle, filled as ever with romance and imposters. Galahad Threepwood uses his charm and wit to ensure his brother Clarence continues to lead a quiet and peaceful life.

Saturday, July 22, 2023

In Defense of the Second Amendment 5Stars

Title: In Defense of the Second Amendment
Series: ———-
Author: Larry Correia
Rating: 5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Non-Fiction
Pages: 190
Words: 68K

I included a tiny bit of a review from someone on Devilreads (down below under the details tag) because the couple of sentences sets the tone for what I’m writing here. It’s also a distinctly AMERICAN book, as it deals exclusively with our Second Amendment. Here is the Second Amendment in its entirety:

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

Correia ends the book with the declaration that self-defense is the right of every single human being, whether American or not, and that from this right springs the 2^nd Amendment. That is where I would start. I already knew I was going to go agree with Correia, because I also believe in a literal interpretation of the 2A. I didn’t read this to change my mind or to even hear an echo chamber, but for the expert opinion of someone who has dealt with this issue from many sides (personal gun owner, gun trainer, gun seller, specialized gun seller) and know the legality of what is going on.

40% of this book is Correia backing up his statements with documentation. So while reading it might come across as “Larry says….”, there are footnotes galore documenting and backing up the statements he is making. That is important. It turns it from just a mere opinion puff piece into something that has actual weight and bearing on the issue.

This was released in ‘22 and as such, many of the instances he references are from the last 5-10 years. That makes it immediately relevant and gives us the nuts and bolts of how things are working, RIGHT NOW. Not how they are supposed to work, or people wish they worked, but how they actually are. That is important when dealing with people who are making claims about gun control and how it works. He also has a whole section on media bias and the “good guy with a gun” myth (which isn’t a myth).

While reading this I made many, many highlights on my kindle. My thought was that I could do that instead of taking paper notes and simply go and look at them and automagically somehow get them into this review. It doesn’t work that way unless your kindle is connected to the cloud and I deliberately keep mine offline so amazon can’t update it and ruin everything (which has happened and continues to happen with most amazon updates to their hardware). But I made highlights. Next time I read this I’ll be sure to take my notes on paper. And yes, I am already planning on re-reading this next year. I think it would be a good companion to my American Independence Day posts, because an armed populace is the very reason why the federal government hasn’t become more of a monstrous tyranny than it already is.

This is also my first non-fiction of 2023. If I’m lucky I’ll manage to sneak one more in before years end. Anybody have any suggestions? I’m wide open.

★★★★★

From the Publisher & Devilreads

“In Defense of the Second Amendment is a book that people who are either for gun rights or are ambivalent about them. If you are entrenched and in favor of gun control, you likely won’t enjoy or get much out of this book. That’s because this book takes almost every gun control argument and deconstructs it thoroughly.”

~David Broussard

What Part of the Second Amendment Don’t You Understand?

That’s the question posed by award-winning, New York Times bestselling author, and professional firearms instructor, Larry Correia.

Bringing with him the practical experience that comes from having owned a high-end gun store—catering largely to law enforcement—and as a competitive shooter and self-defense trainer, Correia blasts apart the emotion-laden, logic-free rhetoric of the gun control fanatics who turn every “mass shooting” into a crazed call for violating your rights, abusing the Constitution—and doing absolutely nothing to really fight crime.

In his essential new book, In Defense of the Second Amendment, Correia reveals:

Why “gun-free” zones are more dangerous for law-abiding citizens

How the Second Amendment does indeed include your right to own an AR-15—and why that’s not an “outdated” concept

Why “red flag” laws don’t work, can be easily abused, and ignore a much more commonsensical approach to keeping guns out of the wrong hands

The insanity of “criminal justice reform” that frees dangerous criminals and “gun reform” that penalizes your right to self-defense

How we can return to a society that has a safe and healthy relationship with guns—as we had for most of our history

Correia’s promise: “Believe me, I’ve heard every argument relating to gun control possible. I can show you how to defend your rights.”

Urgent, informed, with vitally important information for whoever who owns a gun—or is thinking about owning a gun—or who cares about the preservation of our constitutional rights, In Defense of the Second Amendment is a landmark book of enduring importance.

Friday, July 21, 2023

Xenocide (Enderverse #3) 2Stars

Title: Xenocide
Series: Enderverse #3
Authors: Orson Card
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 671
Words: 182K

Man, when I read “The Detective” earlier this month I thought I had done my time in Navel Gazing Land and would be scot free. Phawwww. Card must have read “The Detective” and thought “Hold my beer Thorp, I’ll show you how to really examine all that lint in your belly button”. We also get an indepth look at Morman metaphysics and their ideas on what a “soul” is.

And Ender, now in his 60’s or 70’s I believe, is still so passive that he does nothing as his wife of 30’ish years just walks away from him. He just shrugs and is like “oh well, she is hurting really bad so I just have to understand her and let her be”. It made me sick. You fight for your marriage, you little cowardly sad sack of crap. I now have zero respect for Ender as a character. My respect was pretty low after the last book, but after this, he is now dead to me.

I do not understand how this Ender collection became so popular. It has zero connection with Ender’s Game and really, it’s boring and depressing. I have two more books in this series and I am seriously debating whether I actually want to continue or not. Forcing myself to read Shakespeare is one thing, trying to do the same for Orson Scott Card is quite another.

★★☆☆☆

From Wikipedia.com

On Lusitania, Ender finds a world where humans and pequeninos and the Hive Queen could all live together. However, Lusitania also harbors the descolada, a virus that kills all humans it infects, but which the pequeninos require in order to become adults. The Starways Congress so fears the effects of the descolada, should it escape from Lusitania, that they have ordered the destruction of the entire planet, and all who live there. With the Fleet on its way, a second xenocide seems inevitable.[2]

Lusitania

Following the events of Speaker for the Dead, a group of characters are depicted living as members of a Brazilian Catholic human colony on Lusitania, a unique planet inhabited by the only other two known species of sentient alien life: the Pequeninos “little ones” and the Hive Queen. The pequeninos are native to the planet, while the Hive Queen was transplanted to this world by Ender, partly in penance for his near-total destruction of her Formic species in Ender’s Game.

After the rebellion of the small human colony on Lusitania in Speaker for the Dead to protect the future of the intelligent alien species, Starways Congress sends a fleet to Lusitania to regain control, which will take several decades to reach its destination. Valentine Wiggin, under her pseudonym Demosthenes, publishes a series of articles revealing the presence of the “Little Doctor” planet-annihilating weapon on the Fleet. Demosthenes calls it the “Second Xenocide,” as using the weapon will result in the obliteration of the only known intelligent alien life. She also claims it to be a brutal crackdown of any colony world striving for autonomy from Starways Congress. Public anger spreads through humanity, and rebellions nearly ensue on several colonies.

After quelling much public discontent, Starways Congress finishes their analysis of the situation while the fleet is en route. Fearing the Descolada virus, further rebellions by colony worlds, and other possible unknown political motives, Starways Congress attempts to relay an order to the fleet to annihilate Lusitania upon arrival. After conferring with friends on whether a cause is worth dying for, Jane (a compassionate AI living in the interstellar ansible communication network) shuts off transmissions to the fleet to block the order. As a consequence of this action, she risks her eventual discovery and death, should the government shut down and wipe the interplanetary network. No known smaller computer system can house her consciousness.

On Lusitania itself, Ender attempts to find solutions to the looming catastrophes of the Congressional fleet, Descolada virus, and conflicts among the humans and intelligent alien species. Much on Lusitania centers around the Ribeira family, including Ender’s wife Novinha and her children. Novinha and Elanora, the mother-daughter team responsible for most of the biological advances countering the complex Descolada virus, are unsure if they can manufacture a harmless replacement virus. Conflicts arise on whether they should even do so, since the Descolada is intrinsically tied in with the life cycles of all Lusitanian organisms and may even be sentient itself. In addition, to try to devise methods to escape the planet, Lusitania’s leading, troublemaking physicist Grego is persuaded by Ender to research faster-than-light travel, despite Grego scoffing at the idea. The third biologista of the family, Quara, is convinced that the Descolada is an intelligent, self-aware species, and deserves attempts from the humans for communication and preservation. An additional sibling and Catholic priest, Quim (Father Estevão), is determined to use faith and theology to head off another form of xenocide: a group of warmongering Pequenino who wish to wipe out all Earthborn life via starship, carrying the deadly Descolada within them.

World of Path

Starways Congress wants its fleet back. After all else fails, it sends the dilemma of the fleet’s impossible disappearance to several citizens of the world of Path, a cultural planetary enclave modeled on early China. Path’s culture centers on the godspoken – those who hear the voices of the gods in the form of irresistible compulsions, and are capable of significantly superior intelligence. It later becomes clear that the godspoken of Path are victims of a cruel government project: granted great intelligence by genetic modification, they were also shackled with a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder to control their loyalty. The experiment is set in a culture bound by five dictates – obey the gods, honor the ancestors, love the people, serve the rulers, then serve your self. This is a further safeguard against rebellion. The superintelligent godspoken are considered the most devout and holy of all citizens, and any disloyal thoughts in a godspoken’s mind are immediately suppressed by overwhelming obsessive-compulsive behavior, believed to be a sign from the gods the thoughts are wrong. The most respected godspoken on Path is Han Fei-Tzu, for devising a treaty to prevent the rebellion of several colony worlds after the articles published by Demosthenes. Great things are expected of his daughter and potential successor Han Qing-jao, “Gloriously Bright”. While doubting the existence of the gods himself, Han Fei-Tzu promised his dying wife he would raise Qing-jao with an unwavering belief in the godspoken. The two of them are tasked by Starways Congress with deciphering the disappearance of the Lusitania Fleet. Han Qing-jao’s secret maid, Si Wang-mu, aids her in this task, her intelligence (partially) unfettered by the rigid caste system.

The young and naive Qing-jao eventually traces the identity of Demosthenes. Discovering that Demosthenes is Valentine Wiggin, Ender’s sister – but that Valentine has been on a starship en route to Lusitania for the last thirty years – Qing-Jao concludes that the only possible explanation is advanced computer software closely tied to the communication network. This software must be hiding Demosthenes and publishing her work, while also causing the disappearance of the Fleet. All but discovered, Jane reveals herself to Han Fei-tzu, Han Qing-jao and Si Wang-mu, telling them about their genetic slavery and begging forbearance on their report to Starways Congress.

Already harboring suspicions about the godspoken’s condition, Han Fei-tzu accepts the news of Congress’s atrocity, as does Si Wang-mu, but his daughter Han Qing-jao clings to her belief that Demosthenes and Jane are enemies of the gods. Feeling betrayed by her father, who is violently incapacitated by OCD from the disloyal thoughts, Qing-jao argues with Jane. Jane threatens shutting off all communications from Path, but Si Wang-mu realizes this would eventually lead to the planet’s destruction by Starways Congress. Understanding Jane to be truly alive and compassionate, through tears Si Wang-mu states Jane will not block the report. However, Qing-jao compares Jane to the servants in Path’s caste system, merely a computer program designed to serve humans, containing neither autonomy nor awareness.

Knowing she has exhausted her last possibilities of stopping Qing-jao, Jane sacrifices her future and life, unwilling to bring harm to Qing-jao or the people of Path. A triumphant Qing-jao reports the knowledge of Demosthenes, Jane, and the fate of the Fleet to Starways Congress. Qing-jao recommends a coordinated date set several months from the present, to prepare the massive undertaking of setting up clean computers across the interplanetary network, after which the transition to a new system will kill Jane and allow Congress full control again. Allowing the message to be sent, Jane restores communication with the Fleet, and Congress re-issues the order for the Fleet to obliterate Lusitania.

Han Fei-tzu recovers from the incapacitation of his OCD, despairing over his daughter’s actions, and his unwitting aid in deeply brainwashing her to serve Congress. He and Si Wang-mu assist Jane and those on Lusitania in finding solutions to their impending catastrophes. Planter, a Pequenino on Lusitania, offers his life for an experiment to determine whether the Descolada gives Pequeninos sentience, or if they have the ability innately. Eventually, Elanora Ribeira is able to come up with a possible model for a “recolada”: a refit of the Descolada that allows the native life to survive and retain self-awareness, but doesn’t seek to kill all other life forms. With the available equipment, however, the recolada is impossible to make, and they are running out of time against the soon-to-arrive Fleet.

Outside

While this research takes place, tragedies occur on Lusitania. Father Estevão Ribeira, the priest attempting to sway a distant warmongering sect of the Pequeninos from their goal of attacking humanity, is killed by the Fathertree Warmaker, who took Quim hostage and denied him the food with the anti-descolada chemicals, so the descolada infected and killed him on the 7th day of being hostage. Grego Ribeira spurs a riot of humans to burn down the warmaker’s forest, but the violent mob gets out of his control, and rampages through the neighboring Pequenino forest instead, massacring many of its inhabitants – the original friends and allies of humanity. Under the terms of the treaty with Pequeninos, the Hive Queen is brought in to hold the peace, setting a perimeter guard of hive drones around the human colony and preventing further escalation of violence between the two groups. Grego is locked in jail, despite eventually stepping between the surviving Pequeninos and his own riot. The town realizes their horrific rage, and constructs a chapel surrounding the fallen priest’s grave, trying to find penance for their actions.

Finally, a breakthrough is made. Knowing the Ansible communication network allows instantaneous transfer of information, and through knowledge of how the Hive Queen gives sentience to child queens, Jane, Grego, and Olhado discover the “Outside”. The Outside is a spacetime plane where aiúas initially exist. (Aiúa is the term given to the pattern defining any specific structure of the universe, whether a particular atom, a star, or a sentient consciousness.) Formic hive queens are called from Outside after birth, giving awareness to the new body. Jane is able to contain within her vast computing power the pattern defining the billions of atoms and overall structure comprising a simple “starship” (little more than a room), with passengers included, and take them Outside. By bringing them Outside, where relative location is nonexistent, then back “Inside” at a different spot in the physical universe, instantaneous travel has been achieved, finally matching the instantaneous communication of the Ansibles and Formics. They quickly arrange to take Ender, Ela, and Miro to Outside. While Ela is Outside, she is able to create the recolada virus, which is a safe replacement of the descolada, and a cure to the godspoken genetic defect. Miro envisions his body as it was before he was crippled by paralysis, and upon arrival in the Outside, his consciousness is contained within a new, restored body. Ender discovers, however, the surreal unwitting creation of a new “Valentine” and new “Peter Wiggin” from his subconscious, who embody idealized forms of his altruistic and power-hungry sides.

The recolada begins its spread across Lusitania, converting the formerly lethal virus into a harmless aid to native life. The cure to the people of Path’s genetic-controlling defect is distributed, yet Han Fei-tzu is tragically unable to convince his daughter Qing-jao this was the true course of action. Confronted with the possibility of being lied to all her life and dooming many sentient species to destruction, or an alternative of believing all she ever loved and trusted has betrayed her – Demosthenes, her father, her friend, her world – Qing-jao instead continues her godspoken rite of woodgrain tracing until her death and is honored by those on Path who still believe in the gods as the last true godspoken. She is elevated to god status after her death. Si Wang-mu sets off with Peter to take control over Starways Congress to stop the Fleet closing in on Lusitania. The new Valentine-persona journeys to find a planet to which the population of Lusitania can evacuate. The stage is set for the final book of the four-part series, Children of the Mind.

All My “Enderverse” Reviews

Thursday, July 20, 2023

Groo and the Siege (Groo the Wanderer #19) 3.5Stars

Title: Groo and the Siege
Series: Groo the Wanderer #19
Author: Sergio Aragones
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comics
Pages: 24
Words: 2K

Hahahahahahaa! Grooella is trying to get her castle back and of course Groo tries to help. With predictable results. Of course, even when Grooella tries to kill Groo by having him shot by arrows, he manages to escape. What a scamp! 😉

And the funny thing is, the castle still isn’t recovered by the end and so Grooella makes sure to tell us that this IS STILL NOT THE END.

This reminds me of the Alcatraz vs the Evil Librarians series by Brandon Sanderson. Each of the Smedry’s had a power that was utterly ridiculous, but they all found ways to make use of it. Everyone in this comic keeps trying to use Groo as a conventional weapon when what they need to do is some very unconventional thinking. Of course, then things wouldn’t be nearly as funny 😀

★★★✬☆

From Bookstooge.blog

Grooella is besieging her own castle to take it back from the cominos. Groo attempts to help with creating a catapult and destroys it. He attempts to dig some tunnels under the castle walls and ends up digging under Grooella’s army, nearly destroying them.

There are also some flashback scenes of Groo and Grooella as kids where Groo is attempting to play with Grooella and her friends. Every attempt ends in disaster.

All of My “Groo the Wanderer” Reviews

Wednesday, July 19, 2023

The King of the Swords (Eternal Champion: Corum #3) 4Stars

Title: The King of the Swords
Series: Eternal Champion: Corum #3
Author: Michael Moorcock
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 127
Words: 45K

While I still enjoyed this, I did not find the story as engaging as the previous two. Part of that was just how weak the gods of Law are. They control 10 of the 15 planes of existence and yet the single god of Chaos is more powerful alone then all of the gods of Law combined. They came across as weak and effete. So when I found out at the end that Kwll and his brother Rhynn had killed ALL the gods, both of Chaos and Law, I didn’t shed a tear. It did make me wonder what that meant for the Cosmic Balance, as Kwll seemed to go out of his way to emphasize how he and Rhynn didn’t believe in the Cosmic Balance and thus weren’t under control by the rules of it.

That kind of philosophizing permeated this book much more than in the previous two. Corum gets to meet Elric and Erekose (other incarnations of the Eternal Champion. Erekose is the only one who remembers every incarnation though and maaaaan, is he a whiny pants cry baby) and Moorcock waxes on (yes Mr Miyagi!) about the nature of reality, blah, blah, blah. I think the ideas here are great for teens and young adults to be exposed to, because thinking about the nature of reality is important. People are ignoring biological facts today, which is reality, and are reaping the consequences by going insane.

We do get to see Corum go whizzing around in one of the flying boats and boy howdy, does he go all over the place. He travels his own world, he travels to other planes of existence and has adventures. He even goes to Limbo. I would say this ends happily with him and Rhalina being at peace, but knowing there is another trilogy to come means Corum is going to get boned somehow. Eternal Champions are Eternally Unhappy.

Why Moorcock chose that line of reasoning is still a mystery to me. Maybe it was pure marketing? When you’re writing for the teen and YA crowd, tortured anguished heros usually sell better. I’d like to believe that he had better reasons than that but I don’t care enough to find out. I don’t even know if there are any biographies on the man. He is just a name on the cover to me and I suspect it will be better for me and everyone, if he stays that way.

★★★★☆

From Wikipedia.com

A spell – determined to have been cast by the forces of Chaos – forces the inhabitants of Corum’s plane to war with each other (including the City in the Pyramid). Desperate to stop the slaughter, Corum, Rhalina and Jhary-a-Conel travel to the last five planes, ruled by Mabelode, the King of the Swords. Rhalina is taken hostage by the forces of Chaos and Corum has several encounters with the forces of Chaos, including Earl Glandyth-a-Krae.

Corum also meets two other aspects of the Eternal Champion: Elric and Erekosë, with all three seeking the mystical city of Tanelorn for their own purposes. After a brief adventure in the “Vanishing Tower”, the other heroes depart and Corum and Jhary arrive at their version of Tanelorn. Corum discovers one of the “Lost Gods”, the being Kwll, who is imprisoned and cannot be freed until whole. Corum offers Kwll his hand, on the condition that he aid them against Mabelode. Kwll accepts the terms, but reneges on the bargain until persuaded to assist. Corum is also stripped of his artificial eye, which belongs to Rhynn – actually the mysterious giant Corum had previously encountered. Kwll transports Corum and Jhary to the court of Mabelode, with the pair fleeing with Rhalina when Kwll directly challenges the Chaos God.

In a final battle Corum avenged his family by killing Glandyth-a-Krae and decimating the last of Chaos’ mortal forces. Kwll later located Corum and revealed that all the gods – of both Chaos and Law – have been slain in order to free humanity and allow it to shape its own destiny.

Corum: The Coming of Chaos Trilogy (2000 “Review”)

Tuesday, July 18, 2023

The New Verboten Word

I came home today after work and jumped online to check the blogosphere. I always check my spam comments folder because people get caught in there and I don’t want them to be stuck for days 🙂

Well, I had over 100 flipping spam comments all saying something along the lines of “This was a great movie, everyone should watch it” along with a link. I’ve had this going on for a couple of weeks, but never this bad.

When the russian spammers hit me, in cyrillic, I simply copy/pasted one of their letters and put that in my “goes straight to trash” rules for comments. However spammers work, once the programs realized the comments were going straight to trash without even the spam folder to check things, they dramatically decreased. To the point where I get 1 or 2 per week, instead of 10-20 every day. 2 years ago I did the same thing for the spanish spam bots. Just put in an upside down question mark and voila, they went straight to trash. And I haven’t been bothered by them for over a year now. So making spam comments go straight to the trash definitely stops them from mobbing my site.

Therefore, I am going to take some seriously drastic action, for about 2 months. I am going to make the word “movie” verboten in the comments here on Bookstooge.blog. Any comment with that word in it will go straight to the trash without me ever checking it. I realize this will cause chaos and confusion on my ever popular “movie review of the month” post, but I suspect you all have the intestinal fortitude to weather such vicissitudes. I also realize this will hit some bloggers much more than others and for that I apologize in advance. I just can’t think of any other way to deal with these forsaken movie link spammers.

I will re-examine things in September and make a decision about continuing this ban on the “M”-word then. I really hope that this drastic action will take care of things however.

Cheers!

Monday, July 17, 2023

Clockwork Avian - MTG 4th Edition

Sunday, July 16, 2023

X-Men (2000 Movie)

X-Men, directed by Brian Singer, was one of the first really well done Super Hero movies. The first Spiderman movie hadn’t come out yet, but neither had such flops like Ghostrider, Elektra or the Fantastic Four duology. A brand new cinematic world was opening up to us.

And it was glorious!

I was rather hesitant to re-watch this, as I had such good memories and did NOT want to sully them; Marvel has done that well enough on its own. But my goodness, I had so much FUN watching this.

It definitely helped that much of the storyline was familiar to me from the 90’s X-Men comics. But it was a comic book and it just reveled in it. I mean, Magneto has a massive mutant making machine already installed in the torch of the Statue of Liberty? Come on, that’s ridiculous. And it worked perfectly because it is exactly how badguys always operate in the comics. This was not a Zack Snyder grimfest or deconstructionist dystopia. Singer has a love of the goodguys kicking butt, overcoming great odds and looking good doing it 🙂 It also wasn’t 3hrs long. Ain’t nobody got time for that!

While I have enjoyed the Infinity War story arc that the MCU took us on, by the end I was ready for it to be done. I was ready for standalone movies with standalone stories. Kind of like this movie in fact. Which might explain just why I enjoyed it so much. While there are 2 sequels, this could easily be watched as a standalone. That really appeals to me.

So if you are a comic book fan and you want to watch a superhero film that is just plain fun and gives you a good time, watch X-Men.

Saturday, July 15, 2023

Blogshido: I Know Post-fu!

While Blogshido is as varied as the people who practice this ancient art, the core of the discipline has always been the same. You can remove the Monthly Kata and still practice Blogshido. You can even ignore the venerable, honorable and most inspiring Taekommentdo and still practice Blogshido. But if you do not practice Post-fu, then you are not practicing Blogshido.

Some Masters of Blogshido, when practicing Post-fu, will pour out their very life essence into it, an artistic outpouring. You can almost feel the blood, the sweat, the tears, the absolute agony that went into the creation of their mastepiece of Post-fu. You know you are watching something special, something never to be repeated even while longing to perform it so well yourself. The downfall of this kind of practice in Post-fu is that the artist themselves know they will never reach such artistic heights again. It can easily turn into a self-defeating spiral of doom instead of a celebration of something wonderful.

Other Masters of Post-fu take a much more workmanlike attitude towards it. They make posts like they make a bologna sandwich. Bread, mayo, bologna, cheese, bam, put it all together, wham, done. Eat and enjoy. And they can do this day after day, week after week, month after month and even sometimes, year after year. The audience isn’t wowed, they are not moved to tears, nor are their hearts shattered. But they get a nutritious and filling bologna sandwich every day (well, as nutritious as a bologna sandwich can be anyway!)

A grounded Master of Blogshido will know which style suits them best for writing. But they will also know the proper balance in the choices they make of which blogs to follow. If I follow 100 Workmanlike Masters of Post-fu, while my Taekommentdo might become second to none through practice, when will I have time to practice my own Post-fu? And if I follow 100 Artistic Masters, who only post once a year, that sets an impossibly high bar for myself when I do go to practice Post-fu.

Personally, I only follow people who practice Post-fu at least once a month. Now there are always special circumstances and that is fine, but if someone isn’t practicing once a month on a consistent basis, I don’t consider them a follower of Blogshido anymore. How can I call you a Sandwich Maker if you never make sandwiches? And don’t even try to pull that “There is no sandwich” crap on me, Neo tried it with the spoon and look what happened to him, he got Matrix Resurrections. I trust that is warning enough for you all.