Five-Hundred Word Challenge 1161: Just Gotta Wait

Posted on September 23, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

What’s the time? Where is the day? What happened to the weather?

Once more I was in La Perouse yesterday and I was hoping for rain but the rain stopped when I arrived. Alas, this means that I was not able to view what I was there to view under what would be optimal conditions for viewing. That said, it still made for a nice walk. Now I’m here, inside, typing away and hoping the weather shifts to something less dreary. The plus side is I’m inside but I want nice sky. I want to see the sly and I want it to be a little more dry than it currently is.

I want my right hand to warm up a bit more too, but you can’t have everything.

So I sit here and I think about things and I think about how change is both rapid and slow and sometimes we can control this. Maybe it would be better to say that sometimes we can influence this, but this is not a place for saying things in a way that is good, though sometimes it is. Depends on the day, really.

I want to be outside watching the waves and seeing how they interact with the coastline but instead I am here in suburbia working, which is what is expected of me at the moment and that’s fine. That’s okay, but at the same time it is not and that is due to a series of reasons that I won’t get into right now as it’s not worth the time and effort.

Right now I’d much rather spend my time creating and trying to conjure worlds and settings and see what comes of it all. I don’t know if I could do that in a reasonable amount of time at this particular juncture. That said, I have to wonder as to what constitutes a reasonable amount of time. Right now it’s probably between now and the point where I get too tired to do much more, if anything at all. Who knows when that will be.

It’s gloomy but that’s fine. It’s fine that it’s gloomy but I just want some nicer weather. Can’t have that right now and that too is fine. Just gotta wait and keep on powering on and hope for the best. Maybe expect the worst but I doubt that the worst will be something that I have to engage with on any level at any point of today.

Perhaps I’m overthinking it, but I won’t worry about that until a bit later on today as I need to think about the now and I need to go on and think more about the day and all those other things that I need to think about, but I don’t need to and really what I’m doing is stalling for time, but it’s time being spent on something and it’s an attempt at being productive, though it seems misguided.

Anyway, that’s all until the next thing.

The time it took to write five-hundred words: 05:52:13

Not great and meanders but it came forward pretty easily.

Written at home.

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A Poem About A Yawn

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I threw this together a lot faster than a good portion of the scraps of rough poetry I’ve written. It’s almost lazy but I feel it works well enough. Just a simple thing that I threw together. It’s not fantastic; it’s just something that talks about the mundane and it does so in a mundane way.

I hope you enjoy.

—

I feel a yawn
It wants to leave
I hold it in
To fight it off

If it leaves
It will suggest
That I need
To rest quite soon

This is not
What I want
So I ignore
The desire

It grows strong
And I grow weary
So before long
The yawn escapes

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Masayoshi Soken: Limitless Blue

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I kind of threw myself into this one. There isn’t much going on in it and I imagine that was the intent. This is something I don’t often like writing about as I tend to get a bit stuck but it worked here. There were parts where I was thinking more than necessary but overall I didn’t get bogged down and I didn’t feel as though I was stalling.

Most of this is just description of the song itself which is fine. I cover it well enough, I think. There were bits here that were more influenced by the song’s title than how it sounded and I feel those are interwoven well enough.

Masayoshi Soken’s (祖堅正慶) “Limitless Blue” (“果てなき蒼 ～蛮神ビスマルク前哨戦～”) is from Heavensward: Final Fantasy XIV Original Soundtrack. It’s the soundtrack for Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward, the first expansion pack for Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, as well as patch 3.1 which I believe came after the expansion pack. The soundtrack was composed predominantly by Soken but it also features contributions from other composers.

I hope you enjoy.

—

Beat starts whilst synth oscillates around the bass. It almost seems as though the percussion is spilling out and splintering and unable to stay steady but it remains steady and firm and driving. Something akin to strings comes in and draws low and seems to glide on up, though maybe it is surfacing and it falls away soon enough.

The beat drops away for a moment; it continues but it remains bare and minimal. Then the bass drops off before everything picks back up. The strings come back and slowly guide through everything as the rush continues. All bolt forward and fly and swim and shoot along with a great sense of speed and thrust.

Once more the beat drops away and once more the bass drops away and once more all resumes and it continues on. Tension could be there; it could not, but it doesn’t matter for the coolness of an expansive environment is summoned and the beat continues its steadiness, as does the bass and the oscillating synth. The strings continue their soft gliding around and its almost as though there is an anchor point around the percussion and all is following that. Maybe there is no unison and it just seems like there is, but it doesn’t matter and all continue on as they fade out and the song ends.

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A Series of Falls

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I’m pretty sure the water for these is cycled from a lower point, but I haven’t done enough looking into it and so I can’t give a solid confirmation.

Anyway, when I took this photo I was thinking only of trying to capture the waterfalls and not the sky or much of anything else really. Light balance was important, but beyond that it was only the waterfalls.

Anyway, this is a pretty straightforward photo with a sense of depth. I like the simplicity of it but there’s not much else I can say.

I hope you enjoy.

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Five-Hundred Word Challenge 1160: Thinking About Frogs

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Sitting here like a frog, but I don’t quite know how frogs sit. I have an idea but that is merely an idea; I don’t know how they sit.

How do frogs sit? Do they sit the same way on different objects, or do they change the way they sit depending on what object they are on? I imagine it’s the latter as different things have different weight tolerance thresholds and so could change how a frog would sit on them, but I have no idea. I didn’t study frogs and frog behaviour. I know a very small amount of information about frogs, but it’s very general stuff.

There once was a frog in my bathroom and neither my partner nor myself could work out how it got in there. We guessed it came up from the toilet, but that’s the best we could guess. It didn’t seem likely that it came into the house and then made its way to the bathroom, though that too is possible. Anyway, we put it in a container and released it outside as there wasn’t much, if anything in the way of food for it in the bathroom. It was easy to capture and so it was easy to release, and it was just sitting on the floor, though maybe it was standing and it looked like it was sitting.

To be honest, I seldom, if ever think about frogs but I do enjoy hearing them when I’m out somewhere. Sometimes I wonder if I’m actually hearing crickets though. I’m sure the sounds are more distinct than I realise and sometimes I feel I’m certain when I hear something that it’s a frog and not a cricket.

Anyway, frogs are something that I appreciate hearing when I’m in certain places. It reminds me to think about how diverse habitat and environment can be, especially when we are caught by surprise by something we did not expect to see or hear in certain areas. Of course these things could be one-off or highly irregular, but even so it still prompts thinking about what we see and hear and experience.

These things helps us think more about the world we inhabit and our immediate surrounds and so it’s a good thing, I think. I think it’s good to think about these things as it means we’re considering our surrounds more, and perhaps if we’re thinking about that, we’re thinking about how to better look after said surrounds, as well as be more involved in what I hope is a more practical and positive way.

There’s a lot of nature out there in small and large pockets and there are a lot of organisms, and sometimes we see and hear frogs in places we don’t think about them existing within, and it’s nice. It’s nice to experience that as it shows we still have a lot to learn and a lot to think about. It can reshape how we view things, even if a small amount.

The time it took to write five-hundred words: 08:49:78

There was a bit of active thinking that went into this but the direction of writing happened with little, if any active coercion and I like that. Not exactly a smooth writing but I feel the way it progressed is pretty logical and clear.

Written at home.

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Five-Hundred Word Challenge 1159: Rambling About Something

Posted on September 21, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I decided not to do any more rambling for today and decided that it was more important to rest. Then I decided that I would indeed continue rambling. However, I do not have a thread to run off and so I’m just sitting here and I’m wondering about what it is that I should write about. Sure, I could do some more writing about some world I’m building but I don’t have the energy to do that and so instead I will write about something.

The interesting thing about something is that it is indeed something and so therefore it is something that exists. It can take on many forms and yet it always remains something. There is no changing something into something else as even if you do that it still remains something. It changes and it remains utterly, completely static. Nothing changes and yet everything changes and that is the way that it is for something. Sometimes there is nothing but even so nothing remains something and that’s part of the beauty of something, though only sometimes. Sometimes there is no beauty in it and all that is happening is that it is something that is being observed.

What happens when something is not observed? Does it still exist? Does it only exist when it is being looked upon and otherwise everything is just nothing at all? Is it just the absence of something when we are not looking at something and so therefore all that is is not and all those other things? Are there fundamental properties that we are not aware of even if we like to believe that we are aware of everything?

Do I even exist? Is there a me outside of these series of thoughts? What if all of this does not exist and even the thoughts I have do not exist? What if all of this is nothingness in the form of a lack of something and so therefore there is a nothingness in the truest of senses?

But even so, in the absence of something and in the presence of the truest nothingness, there still remains something and so therefore there must be something out there and slowly, yet surely more things will become apparent and so therefore there is no need for me to go down a path of thoughts that share loose connections as that is not what I want to do at the present moment. All I want to do is think about something and then go from there, but I’m afraid I should’ve taken a turn earlier and I didn’t and now I don’t know where I am.

Maybe I should just turn around and see what else lies on back the way I came. I’m sure I’ll think about some more things and I’m also sure that, at the end of it all I’ll be able to think about whatever it is that I want to think about. I’m sure that there also will be something.

The time it took to write five-hundred words: 05:53:22

Messy but not fussed. This was fun to write and it sort of went somewhere.

Written at home.

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Firekites: Antidote

Posted on September 21, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

I’d heard this song a few days ago and decided to write about it, but alas, being tired prevented me from moving ahead. Maybe. Anyway, I did this in one go but there was a bit of a pause due to needing to take care of other things, but it’s done now and so… yeah.

Mostly stuck with describing the song and I’m not sure if that was the best thing to do, but it worked. Not the strongest writing out there but I think I get across an idea of the song well enough.

Firekites’ “Antidote” is from Closing Forever Sky.

I hope you enjoy.

—

It starts with quiet. Almost as soon as the quiet seems like it will last a steady beat and light guitar pick their notes carefully. Space holds whilst something soft fades into view and soon disappears, and fades in and disappears. Vocals come in and stretch out words where appropriate whilst piano plays its precise notes. Bass finds itself gentle and supporting and soon more guitar sound comes in, harsh and slightly cutting, but not dominant.

That extra guitar fades out as vocals return and the sounds remain continuous and firm in their putting forward something that could be of the night as much as it could be of something carrying a sense of grief; a sense of sadness. When the vocals leave once more the sounds get a little livelier before they step back and allow a little more space.

Steady all remains and the vocals find their place once more. A little more space finds its way in before once again filling over time. Liveliness comes in but mood reigns supreme and so the sounds pull away when required. Vocals return and they continue on and soon the beat drops out whilst the keys play a short flourish.

Upon a final set of words the percussion returns as a busier beat, though not by much. The keys continue through the space as something seems to shimmer and stretch out like ripples. A slight pause and the guitar returns and brings more melody in whilst shifting the mood slightly. Soon the bass and vocals also return.

The vocals take on a higher position and repeat a phrase. It’s not long before the sounds fill out more and reach a heavy point. There is almost a release but it doesn’t quite get there and the sounds play on, some shifting and some remaining steady, and it all plays on. It plays on until one last point and much stops, leaving a few sounds playing their last notes as though a full stop before also dropping away. Silence returns and the song ends.

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Tempe Tracks

Posted on September 21, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

A bit of a lazy photo but I think there’s a nice variation in shade.
I find the shadow on parts of the tracks really odd. Beyond that I think everything is fine enough. It’s just a really straightforward shot that seems to hold some sort of sense of quiet.

That aside, the tracks lead somewhere and where they go, plenty know.

This is my submission into Leanne Cole‘s “Monochrome Madness” for this week.
I suggest checking out Leanne’s photography, as well as checking out what other people submit.

A lot of what people are submitting will likely end up here.

I hope you enjoy.

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Lighthouse on the Hill

Posted on September 20, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

Another photo of Barrenjoey Lighthouse.

I wasn’t quite able to capture what I wanted to when I took this photo due to the amount of vegetation in the area, but that’s fine. I like that the lighthouse and the building its part of feel small. I think that’s in part due to the dulling light as well as the sense of distance.

I hope you enjoy.

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Five-Hundred Word Challenge 1158: Some Collective Action on Environment Restoration

Posted on September 20, 2022 by Stupidity Hole

So the other day I raged and despaired, and even though I’m not feeling optimistic about the state of things I want to talk about some stuff that is having a positive effect.

The Cooks River is not exactly what one would call clean. It sees a lot of rubbish and waste flow through it which eventually gets out to more open waters. From what I’ve read it used to be a river that people would swim in. Due to the pollution no one swims in it and it likely isn’t safe for organisms that rely on it more than us. However, there is work being done to clean it up.

There are rubbish traps that have been set up at some points along the river and there are efforts to transform the riverbank into something closer to natural riverbanks. It involves a lot of stone and vegetation which helps with filtration, habitat restoration and bank stabilisation. At some parts mangrove habitats are developing which further helps to clean up the waterway; hopefully one day the river will be something that people can swim in again.

In some parts of Sydney there is effort going into restoring and maintaining mangrove systems. Sure, they might not have the most pleasant smell, but they do a lot in keeping waterways clean and healthy, which in turn leads to greater abundance of biota. It also leads to more carbon sequestration over time so long as the systems aren’t removed again.

In La Perouse there is work being done to remove invasive flora for a few reasons; one of which (as far as my understanding goes) is to improve sand dune stabilisation and growth. Doing so also has benefits of habitat diversification (so long as monoculutre-based planting is avoided) which also allows fauna endemic to the area to further spread.

Dune stabilisation and growth is important as it reduces the impact of scouring from storms which in turn allows habitat and systems behind dunes to further stabilise and develop. It also helps to reduce the impacts of sand moving further inland.

These are small things and they are a lot of work, but they are things that are showing signs of success. They, much like other work on environmental restoration are a collective effort and they will pay off over time.

There are plenty of other things out there that people are doing, but these are three things that are easy for me to think of. Things might be dire, but we can still do quite a lot to strengthen the environment and reduce the impacts of climate change. When we work toward looking after the environment it pays off for us and our communities. It pays off for endemic flora and fauna. It’s hard work that has a tangible, long-term result and it’s something that we can actively engage in more than we don’t.

What’s the worst that happens from collective action on environmental restoration? We have cleaner air and a healthier environment?

The time it took to write five-hundred words: 14:58:73

I spent a lot of time thinking about what I was writing and it came through a bit clunky. Definitely could’ve written this better. I feel like the time constraint hurt this a fair bit; aside from being clunky, some of this feels a bit patronising. That said, I think I got some of my point across.

Written at home.

 

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