essays & ephemera

Oh, Oracle. Is this really necessary?

What book would you write?

"If you were going to write a book, what would you write about?"  ... I love "Question of The Day" (a feature found here in TypePad and over at Vox).   I love it so much that I eagerly logged in 3 times today to answer it.  But to my dismay it was the same QoTD from several days ago.  I guess it's the Question of the Week?

I'm not sure why I need prompting to write a blog post, but I just do.  Lots of ideas swirl around in my head on a daily basis so how do I decide which to address today with a blog post?  QoTD helps me focus the swirl, take a moment and answer the question.  Maybe it's the sign of a weak mind.  I accept my my weakness.

But damn you, TypePad, I'm done waiting for you to update the QoTD.  I'm going over to Vox to find one.  Surely they won't let me done.

Sure enough I found the aforementioned question:

QoTD: If you were going to write a book, what would you write about?

I've long thought of writing a book.  But books are long.  And they require talent and patience, two things I lack in sufficient quantities to write a book.  It takes me months just to finish reading a book.  It would take eons for me to actually write one.  But if I were going to sit down at the ole portable word processor I would write a piece of political fiction, one that sufficiently intermingled reality with imagination so as to sound plausible but wholly disturbing.

My best, most recent story idea is one that follows an alternative outcome to the American Presidential Election of 2004 leading to a massive geo-political shift in North America.  Imagine a world where America is more like one of our Latin American neighbors in terms of military participation in domestic politics: 

• The sitting President is the born-again scion of a powerful political family
• The American military is actively being used like a mob of Pinkertons to pursue the sitting President's religious and commercial vision at the behest of the President's closest spiritual, political and commercial advisers
• The sitting President actually loses the election by the slimmest of Electoral College margins
• A high ranking military official fears the new President will not continue the foreign agenda and under the influence of spiritual advice he leads his troops "out of the barracks"...
• And a powerful western Governor (wealthy, foreign-born and charismatic) aligns with a competing political family to fight back and take what he has long thought he deserves

So that sets the scene:  the peaceful transition of political power fails against a backdrop of political ego, competing domestic cultures, globalism and a fragmented media where citizens can insulate themselves against competing thoughts.

I didn't draw the map or start the conversation, but the story sounds good to me.  What do you think?

P.S. if TypePad won't keep feeding me good topics maybe you fine people will?  Leave your questions of the day in the comments or @mosjef.

LEGO: greatest toy ever

What was your favorite childhood toy?
Submitted by A Pretty:Simple Life.

 

This QOTD is easy to answer: LEGO.  Those tiny, colored bricks from Denmark were easily my favorite toy from childhood.  Sure I would mix and mingle the GI Joes, Star Wars figurines and Transformers onto the scense, but make no mistake, the scene was set in the bright, blocky hues of L-E-G-O.

I think those bricks are still around somewhere...  and I can't wait to see my daughter's eyes light up when she gets first crack at them.  But she'll have some competition.  I bet I can still build a mean castle.