Shouts From Down Under

Shipping containers containing brains that designed them?!

This has been a weird week and not over yet. So I might just post another weird blog entry. This entry IS about writing and it IS about putting your mind to work as if you were a genius. Because you have as much chance as anyone of thinking up a new cross genre, new genre, new galactial IDEA for a story.

Do people really know what they want in life? How do folks determine how they want to appear to others? What is fashionable? What is acceptable? What do we picture when we talk about admiring someone else, others, neighbours, friends, whoever.

What are our goals? Green? Environment? Profitability? Economical? Recycling?

Is our goal to attract attention? Do we want to appear poor, unpretentious, humble, yet be popular, interesting, "with it", successful, financially comfortable, fun?

Or do we just want more sleep? Silly question for writers with alternatively wired thinking.

Have you ever worked a split shift, or just been really tired and slept in the middle of the day for an hour or so, and then, when you've woken from this deep, much needed snooze, you wish you hadn't A) Slept at all, and B) set your phone alarm so near the time you will be required at the next shift.
Your head is woozy, you feel crook, you can't remember where you are or even what day it is. You do feel a bit rested but there is a feeling of swimming in a muddy river complete with gritty eye balls.

I awoke after lunch today just like that.

I wondered what year it was. There is a site, a website, just for people who wonder what year it really is. Just in case they've slipped through a time warp worm hole dooverlacky.

So, what year is it?

http://whatyearisit.info/

After my "nanna nap"(even though I'm not a Nanna), I was also very cold. The wood heater wasn't burning.
As I said, this has been that sort of week, here in Tasmania, in Australia. It has not snowed here in Tasmania, where it usually does, but has dumped never seen before quantities, and caused the coldest days of winter ever, in the north. Queensland. NSW. There have been road closures. Snowmen (people) built in the most unlikely places where even some older children would now be able to say, "Yes. I've seen snow."

There was the meme, of course, that had the photo of snow and the White House. "Today was so cold I saw a politician with their hands in their own pockets."

There was also this:

This kangaroo is sitting in a snowfall at Orange, NSW.

To continue the weird vein a bit further from the intravenous idea drip (me) there were a few more YouTube videos that spoke my name in the last few weeks.
One was about shipping containers.



We have local units, or flats, or apartments- whatever you want to call them- made of shipping containers right here in Tasmania. They were built by Aldersons of Wynyard, so I was advised.



People can be original thinkers. Don't you always say, "why didn't I think of that"?

We live in an era when outrageous can be possible, and strangely, desirable.

Lateral thinking is perceived these days as clever, superior human behaviour.

Advertisements with a cleverness strike a note in the buyers' mind.



More original thinking. Even if they are just silly fragments in a corny advert.



Another idea in the next video that yes, sounds a bit ridiculous, and sounds like an extravagant activity for those with huge tax problems (rich), but nevertheless is rich in lateral thinking. I adore the minds who think like this.



Then there's bicycle parking ideas. Why aren't bicycles used more and people encouraged to use them in built up areas?



In summary, don't underestimate your own lateral writing ability. You are the same as everyone else. Plenty of people have thunk up fantastic ideas, successful ideas, and they weren't all Einsteins or Steven Hawking.

My favourite novels were those that were believable, but way outside the box. And I think JK Rowling would agree. For one. Our daughter, a fan fiction writer with quite an enthusiastic following on Tumblr (don't ask me her handle; I don't want to (and nor does she ) would also agree to loving stories that are very different. They must be entertaining and have all the ingredients of every good story. You can't cut corners and just think an original idea will be great with crappy authorship.

No. It won't work. You have to write your butt off and don't lower the standards for even one sentence.

However. Blog entries are different.

Sparky