Month: March 2022

Of ROKon Magazine & Curious Hong Kong Webstats


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Ahhh, my Webstats. How very addictive you are. Nobody reads this blog. Maybe 100 people a day and, from what I can tell, I have a few stalkers who are completely obsessed with what I write…and everyone else. Given that at the moment, I’m a complete and total nobody, anyone who is obsessed with me must know me in some direct, personal capacity.

I’m not the easiest person to get along with — let me tell you — so I doubt my stalkers have a very high opinion of me. I simply assume their hate reading this blog because of this or that slight I do towards them at some point.

Anyway, the reason why I bring any of this up is the curious case of someone in Hong Kong looking at this site. I used to live in Asia, so it is within reason to believe that it’s just some bonkers expat from way back when curious as to what I’m doing these days.

Annie Shapiro and me during the ROKon Magazine era.

But that’s no fun. I’m a “delusional jerk with a good heart” as the late Annie Shapiro once said, so let’s be delusional and think of other possibilities. Whomever it was, was first interested in ROKon Magazine, the magazine I started with Annie way back when. Which leads me to believe it might — might — be Jennifer 8. Lee, who I did a personality profile of for the magazine. I think she’s got family from Hong Kong, so maybe she had some reason to look me up?

But it gets more curious — they came back again through my Instagram account, as if they were doing a general search of me. I am delusional, so there’s only one other person I can think of with a link to Hong Kong who might be that interested in me — Alexa Chung or one of her “people.” Ha. That would be hilarious.

And, yet, that’s really, really reaching.

Then, there’s a somewhat more ominous possibility — someone has been given a tip as to what a great story the rise and fall of ROKon Magazine is. The story of what happened to me and Annie with that fucking magazine is so great that huge chunks of a five novel thriller series is a direct interpolation of the events of that brief moment in late 2006 – early 2008 when some very dramatic, interesting things happened to both me and Annie in an explosion of Oscar -worthy depicted events.

I mean, Holy Shit.

But I long ago realized that if that story is ever going to be told, it won’t be told in a 1 to 1 way. It will be told, like it is now, as part of a far more obvious story. Anyway, lulz, nothing matters.

Hard Power Vs. Soft Power


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

One thing that is so interesting is how my Traditionalist relatives are not satisfied with having hard, legal power. MAGA and the conservative movement in general is ascendant.

If they don’t manage to bungle the transition into autocracy and push the United States into a needless Second Civil War, there’s a good chance that they’ll have very hard power for decades to come. But that’s not good enough for them — they want soft power, too.

The Traditionalists in my family are enraged by the soft power of the “woke” movement. Even after I beg and plead with them to see how the woke movement has only soft power, they just don’t care. They hate that “Woke Culture” exists at all and want to destroy it. Period.

I assume this comes from how much they hate the perceived media narrative where they fear they will be “canceled” just for being conservative. While this is a valid fear, sad to say, if push came to shove, I would much rather have hard legal power than the soft power that woke people have.

Mike Pompeo — future autocrat, fat fuck.

So, I don’t know what to tell you. In the end, it’s likely that my Traditionalist relatives will be the backbone of America’s autocracy. My relatives will have only one red line — ME. And by the time I vanish because I cross President Mike Pompeo by constantly calling him out as a fat fuck, it will be woefully too late.

Acting — The Creative Path I Didn’t Take


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Let me be clear, the likelihood that there is some alternative universe out there where I went into acting instead of journalism as a young man is very dubious to some extent.

Some pretty big things would have had to have changed at a very early age for that to have happened. I knew from a very young age that I wanted to make a living off of writing. And, for sold 20 years of my life, I thought that meant being a journalist.

But there were a lot of problems. I’m 100% extroverted. My personality is too out there. I’m something of an eccentric. I like to daydream too much. All the successful journalists I’ve ever met were introverts with very “dry” personalities. They see journalism as strictly a job, not a part of their identity like I did.

And, yet, as I grow older, I do sometimes idly think that there was, a small possibility that under the right circumstances that I might have gone into the creative arts such as acting. Of course, all the other problems in my life that eventually threw me for a loop would still happen, but I might have gotten farther in my career before they happened.

There are other problems. It’s just not in my DNA to be able to quickly memorize lines. So, that obviously would be a problem. I also just wasn’t focused for much of my youth. I was all energy but no direction other than the general one of writing.

I guess why I think about what could have been is I’m a decent entertainer and I enjoy the spotlight a great deal. And now that I’m trying to break into showbiz via novel writing (and maybe eventually screenwriting) I long to live in New York City or LA. Ugh.

I know that even if I one day get my wish, I’m so fucking old now that the context will be totally different. It’s not like I’ll be Young In New York City or LA. I’ll be just another old fart. Or, even worse, if I become as successful as I hope to be, that, in itself, will be part of The Story.

Old Man Makes It Big, At Last will be the hook that book journalists (or whomever) will use to explain what happened. Or they’ll make comparisons to Stieg Larsson. Hopefully without the dropping dead at 50 part, of course.

This First Draft of the First Novel In This 5 Thriller Novel Series Is Shaping Up To Be Too Fucking Long


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve been spinning my wheels for some time now when it comes to this novel. I know what some of the problem is — my storytelling ability keeps improving and that forces a recalibration. This, in turn, forces me to throw everything out to take into account how I now know how to tell a story better.

Things are going really well at the moment but for one thing — the outline is just way too fucking long. I have an embarrassing high number of scenes for my first act. I was hoping that this would be my second draft of the novel, but it’s starting to looking it’s going to be a real, honest to God first draft after I finished a quasi-first draft a few months ago.

I’m so fucking frustrated with this state of things that for a few hours today I seriously thought about shelving these novels and working on a really good global climate change themed novel concept I have. I have thought about doing it as a screenplay, but, lulz, I’m 39 And Holding, etc, etc, etc.

I’m still very interested in writing a screenplay, but I also think a screenplay would be something I would be more interested in AFTER I’ve sold at least one novel.

I hate being so old.

Anyway, I definitely feel the existential clock ticking. I’ve got to put up or shut up. If I don’t get something done, I’m going to drop dead without ever having produced anything of note other than a failed zine for expats in Seoul.

Sigh.

The Curious Case of MAGA’s January 6th Insurrection Logic


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I hate to break it to you, but there’s absolutely nothing the January 6th Committee can find out that will mean jack shit long term. For macro reasons, Republicans will sweep Congress, impeach Biden and Harris (repeatedly) and set the stage for the epic existential choice of autocracy or civil war in 2024 – 2025.

Having said that, it is very interesting the logic that MAGA uses when it comes to what we all saw on January 6th. There logic, what there is, goes something like this: a combination of Antifa and the FBI organized a small group of informants to do the parts that make us look bad, while the parts that we like were done by patriots who simply wanted to “Stop the Steal.”

It’s tough to even get MAGA people to admit that the protesters were armed. You have to get very specific and pin them down that a pole, too, can be considered a form of armament. Meanwhile, other MAGA people want us to believe that just a “small portion” of the insurrectionists were to blame and, lulz, most of Trump’s policies were great, thank go Ron DeSantis will be the 2024 Republican nominee.

It’s all very, very fucking annoying and points to a very dark future ahead of us. When the autocracy comes there will be people in my family who will have one red line and one red line only — ME. When ICE (or whatever) snatches me off the street for saying President Mike Pompeo is still a fat fuck no matter how much weight he’s lost, THEN they will get upset.

Ugh.

But if that doesn’t happen, we’re going to have a civil war and we’re going to bomb ourselves into oblivion.

Some Scenes Are Harder To Write Than Others

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The hardest scenes to write for these novels is often the most important — scenes that link the more important scenes together. If you’re writing a longer type novel, there are going to be plenty of scenes — often called “sequels” — that aren’t all that exciting but have to exist to give the work some sort of ebb and flow.

It’s fun and easy to write scenes that are exciting. And beginning scenes, to some extent, are also easy to write because you have they have the implied excitement of being at the beginning of the story.

Then you have scenes that are very important and yet don’t have much action. What’s worse, they can be a lot of work to write because, by definition, you have to show what’s going on in the scene in an interesting manner — even though the scene is just showing building block information.

Anyway. Back to writing.

WMD: The Dogs Of War That Haven’t Barked — Yet — In Ukraine


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

We are in a very dangerous period in modern world history. Putin has put himself in something of a public relations box. Either he loses this war or he escalates. It’s my understanding that it’s standard Russian war doctrine to go down fighting — to escalate using WMD — if it appears clear that they’re going to lose.

I still don’t believe that, in real terms, Russia will face all that much in additional consequences if they decided to use low grade battlefield nukes on Ukraine. Hell, the Russians could use tactical nukes and I still don’t think anything would happen.

What is going to happen to them? NATO and the US don’t really have any desire to defend Ukraine directly as it is. They will have even less reason should nukes be used in some capacity. So, after the shock of the 75 year old taboo against the use of nukes being broken was passed, we would all move on.

Now, that doesn’t mean that there would not be consequences. It’s very possible that the Ukrainians would be even more enraged than they already are and the Russians would again have to either lose or escalate. But, even more importantly, the issue of how other nuclear powers would respond is something we would need to think about.

It seems as though the post-WW2 liberal order really would be over if the Russians attempted to nuke themselves out of a Ukrainian debacle. So, China might use nukes against Taiwan, the list goes on. Name a geopolitical hotspot where one or more of the potential combatants has nukes.

Anyway, we’ll see I guess.

Things Are Improving With These Novels

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m slowly beginning to feel like I’m no longer spinning my wheels. But I am really beginning to feel that I simply did not think this first story through very well.

The story had no conflict and no stakes.

Now I have both. But I had to radically rethink some structural elements of the novel’s plot and focus to get there. I had to, as I’ve said before, shoehorn myself into the novel as the hero. You’re really not supposed to do that, but I was desperate.

Very desperate.

So things work now. There’s a good chance that I will now actually get past the first chapter and start to work my way through the rest of the outline. Only time will tell, however.

I’m Growing Concerned About The Imminent Threat Of WW3



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It seems to me that the likelihood of some sort of mistake leading to a shooting war between NATO and Russia is growing every day. I always thought that if WW3 happened it would be because China invaded Taiwan or the DPRK invaded South Korea.

But given how aggressive NATO is being, it definitely seems as though something might go wrong and there could be the nightmare scenario of an actual shooting war between NATO and the Russian bear. Everyone involved would have a reason not to go nuclear, but that doesn’t mean a lot of people might not die in the process.

Or, put another way, some sort of limited nuclear exchange might happen between NATO and Russia — think what might have happened had the Cuban Missile Crisis gotten hot. If something like that happened, then all my hysterical doom shit about the rise of fascism in the United States definitely would take on a different context.

Just the EMP alone of a major American city being vaporized would be enough to change life for the millions who didn’t die in the blast itself. I’m just nervous in general, I guess.

These continue to be unprecedented times.

‘Mindreader’ — #Lyrics to a #Pop #Song

Mindreader
lyrics by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
Please give credit if you produce or perform

I walk by your place
with shame on my face
wondering where it all went wrong
knowing all I got is this song

wish I could have read your mind
that would have been sublime
wish I could have read your mind
that would have been sublime
sublime, sublime

maybe if I was a mindreader
things would have turned out differently
you’d still be by my side
I’d hear your sigh when I held you tight
knowing everything would be alright.

wish I could have read your mind
that would have been sublime
wish I could have read your mind
that would have been sublime
sublime, sublime

(bridge)
now I can read your mind
you don’t want me in your life
no matter how much being there
for me would bring you delight

wish I could have read your mind
that would have been sublime
wish I could have read your mind
that would have been sublime
sublime, sublime