Not Exactly an Award

The very lovely Chizurue. nominated me for the Leibster Award, which was most kind. I’m something of a crazy rebel, so I’m not going to nominate anyone for questions, but I like promoting other blogs, so I’m going to link to a few that I would give an award to if I was giving out awards. I’m going to pick mostly bloggers I’m new to to try and shake up my attention span a bit.

Jeyran Main – Jeyran writes thoughtful, useful reviews of books and poems. She writes about a diverse range of writing, and the blog looks just beautiful.

The Story Hive -I’m just getting to know this collection of curious and intriguing stories, but it’s always exciting to discover a mind that takes odd twists and turns.

Fictionspawn Monsters – beautifully painted pictures, and bizarre, delightful short stories.

Living in God’s Pocket with ABI – Not a new follow this one, but  I think it’s important that this information is spread. Jasper’s writing about his experience of living with a brain injury, it’s well-written and wise.

Dominique the writer  – Poems and thoughts and some unusual posts, well worth checking out.

Today’s Echos – An entertaining reviewer who’s not afraid to criticise, making for entertaining reviews.

Be Your Own Light: A Mental Health Recovery Blog – a thoughtful and intelligent blog about living with bipolar disorder. Honest and practical well worth a read.

These are the questions Chizurue asked me to answer, anyone else is also free to answer if they fancy.

What is your crazy dream (may be the literal dream or something you want to be)? The craziest one yet or you could list ’em!

I’m terrible at answering this question. Since getting PTSD many years ago, my dreams have been haywire, they wrecked my sleep for three years. Part of learning to sleep again was being able to ignore my dreams. I’m dimly aware they’re still pretty intense (last night I dreamt I was locked in a bare room while the years passed, with people being hung outside my tiny window) but I try to ignore them.

A character you would like to meet in real life and be fast friends with (or maybe more than friends)? Why? (Anything from anime, manga, k-drama, books, tv series)

Dirk Gently would be good. Mostly life doesn’t seem interconnected, it just looks like a bunch of random, inexplicable events that haphazardly cause a bunch of other events. When something happens that seems like it was right to happen, that’s a great feeling, so I’d like that to happen more. I think Dirk Gently would achieve this for me.

To follow up that previous one: Which fictional character would be the most boring to meet in real life?

That’s tricky, because if they’re boring they’re forgettable, so I honestly don’t know. Many female characters from the past were quite dull, so maybe one of them They were so well-behaved and weak, but that’s changing (a bit) now.

Favourite music or album you could listen to all day? And why? Is it the lyrics, the melody or the vocals?

To listen all day, it would need to be something mellow like Yann Tierson. It’s the piano, I find it soothing and melodic. I don’t think I could listen to people singing all day if I could understand what they were singing, but incomprehensible chanting would be ok, something monk-like.

What book / anime would you recommend to someone who has never read / watched anything from that medium?

I don’t know anything about anime. If I had to recommend a book to someone who’s never read, then it would be The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. Not because it’s really good (it’s entertaining but quite badly written) but when I was working in a bookshop a number of customers came in saying they’d never managed to read a book until they read that one, so it’s clearly a good starting point.

What are you deathly afraid of?

Serious, chronic illness, either me getting sick or people I care about getting sick.

What is the funniest word to you? (Mine is apparently ‘pengwings’) Or anything that makes you laugh when you hear it?

Biscuits! A colleague of mine often substitutes this word unexpectedly for swear words, and it’s always funny (especially since he’ll eff and jeff most of the time without pause). A sudden ‘Son of a biscuit!’ makes me laugh.

What mythical creature would you like as a pet?

Mythical creatures are often quite scary, aren’t they? I can’t imagine a Minotaur or a Gorgon being too domesticated or easy to toilet train. So I’d go for Pyrausta an insect sized dragon, it has filmy wings, four legs and dragon’s head. It needs to be in fire though, so it’d be tricky to look after, but dragons and insects are both great, so a combination would be awesome.

What’s the most useless talent you have?

I can write backwards, upside-down and backwards and upside at the same time. I recently (after 30 years of having the ‘talent’) found a use for the writing backwards, but it’s not exactly an everyday skill to use.

If you could level up humans as a species, what stat or ability would you increase? And why?

Stamina – it would be very useful in my job.

Would you rather live your entire life in a virtual reality where all your wishes are granted or in the real world? Explain your choice.

It depends. If everyone I cared about, plus lots of other real people, were in the VR world then I’d live there. I’m not that fussed about all my wishes being granted, but I’d like to have constant good health, no pain and to go on adventures to the ends of the Earth, and to the depths of the sea and so on. I don’t dislike real life, but I don’t think it has an automatic greater value than virtual reality. The brain makes our current reality real, so as long as I can fully experience the senses and connect with people in VR, I’ll be happy there.

Great questions! So if anyone fancies answering them too, that would be ace.