A prediction from 2001 that now appears to be a forecast of 2014: “…it’s some fairy-tale of the future—someone to have kids with, to grow old with, to buy a house with, to go on vacations to Hawaii or Puerto Vallarta with.”

One of the concepts in Perdido Street Station is “crisis energy.” From what I understand, it is a magical energy created from crisis situations that ends up acting in opposition to what seems inevitable. For example, one of the possible applications discussed in the book is the act of flying. Let’s say you cast yourself aloft by throwing yourself off a balcony. If you have a crisis energy engine, the impending catastrophe of splattering on the street below ends up propelling you upward instead. The higher you go, the more catastrophic your plunge downward would be, the more crisis energy is generated.

I find it amusing and disturbing that China Miéville repeatedly uses the words “judder,” “nacre,” and “moil,” to name a few.

I am reading a book whose main character is a linguist, so I can’t help but ponder the use of words. What is language for, really? If not for connection?

Now I realize that most people find it extremely boring to read blog entries that discuss the blogger's profoundly mundane personal life, but, well, (1) I am clearly not doing this for my vast throngs of readers and (2) I find this situation sufficiently absurd as to warrant comment.

When I was in 8th grade, our English teacher would give us a prompt every day, and at least 15 minutes to write about it. This is probably the first time I thought about becoming a writer. Sadly, despite the various signs that the universe has given me, and because of my faith in the inevitable heat death of the universe and the odds that favored the outcome that I would become a mediocre writer at best, my path has turned quite bizarrely astray. But sometimes I still dream.

Don’t you love it when a woman talks as if you aren’t there? Story of my life.