The Word Cloud

I'm writing this off the top of my head and in blogs because they seem to get more of a response than putting something on a wall.

I've mentioned this before, but why has no one joined Word Cloud from America?  In fact I don't know of any members from Canada, the USA, South America or Australia.

Is it a time difference thing?  Would members in the West find fewer people on-line when they signed in?  But it's a shame that we don't have anyone from the countries which have given us so much great literature.

South America is the home of Magic Realism as well as writers like Marquez, Borges and Coelho.  So don't tell me there isn't anyone with writing ambitions of their own?

I'm glad I joined Word Cloud early on and watched it grow.  But I do feel we're missing out from not hearing from people on the other side of the Atlantic or in Australia.

Any thoughts?

Cold comfort, but life in the 1500s was pretty different.

The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be. Here are some facts about the 1500s :

Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odour. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.

Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies.. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying ...   Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water..

Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Hence the saying... It's raining cats and dogs.

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house.. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.

The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt. Hence the saying, Dirt poor. The wealthy had slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entrance-way. Hence the saying a thresh hold.
(Getting quite an education, aren't you?)

In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while.  Hence the rhyme, Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old..

Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, bring home the bacon.  They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat  ...

Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.

Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.

Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky. The combination would sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.

England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift.) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, saved by the bell or was considered a .... dead ringer..
And that's the truth...  Now, whoever said History was boring ! ! !

Women portrayed in Science Fiction may be the most maligned species in the Universe of this Genre. I say this more as a point of discussion, however, when I look back at my old Pulp SF books, graphic novels and I see the princess of Mars characters often beautifully illustrated by the likes of Boris Velejo. Women are often sexy cyber-chicks like the bespectacled assassin in Neuromancer, or helpless busty blonds who needs to be rescued from her virginity to save the Universe. True or false?

Where next for Woman?
I write with female characters and I'm finding that I envisage them to be beautiful, highly intelligent, adaptable, and high adept at many skills. I wonder though whether I'm missing the point about using female characters. Should they be just people who happen to be female, or should the feminine and the female become a representation of the modern. Should woman become the new man in the future or does the woman transcend sex and develop into something more than either male or female?

Society
Female utopias and dystopias have been written about such as Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale where there is a tipping of the balance in favour of women, or where the female has found that society is more stable without the male. I’ve yet to explore this area. I do wonder if this concept is maybe outdated as feminism has moved on considerably from the eighties let alone the sixties.

Body
Still I find myself looking at women’s physical beauty as being a major theme in many books, comics and other visual media. Is this simply the adoration of the female form or titillation? In the book of Genesis Women comes after man. This, to me, is not a signifier of women’s inferiority as I know for a fact that women are anything but inferior, I would say from my male perspective that God got the body better with Mark II than the Mark 1 version, probably the same with their minds. Evolution would suggest that there could come a time where we gain a critical mass of change and become something different – this will be inevitable as our environment changes, but what effects do our thinking and society have on our evolution?  

Mind
What literature is there that explores the way women think. Am I being sexist in thinking that women think differently? I don’t think so as women do. They perceive life issues differently and can solve problems using different approaches. Of course there is a problem with that thought as people think differently but I’m sure people can clarify that better than I can here. I wonder if the way that a woman’s brain operates is more efficient or simply adapted to the roles undertaken of millions of years. If that’s true will women in the future think faster than men or develop senses that man does not have. Some say that is already the case when looking at mothers with their children.

Men
Now as you may know I’m an artist by background and I love figure drawing especially women I see, as countless artists before me that the female form has transsexual appeal. The male figure is not something that men like to talk to other men about but it’s funny how they can spend so much time working on keeping their body good; quite right too. I should exercise more often rather than typing on a computer. Men and women’s bodies representation over the last thirty years seems to have changed so much. So will women’s bodies change in the future? If there was no need for menstruation, natural birth and longer life span would women become more like men or something different all together. If we did not need to physically ‘interact’ with each other, in other words have sex, would become similar?

Superwoman
The obvious theme of women is where they have become superior to men, they become stronger and more aggressive – Amazonians. Six foot goddesses with laser guns. There we go now I’m doing it. The Barbarella movie springs to mind now. In the real world, women are now doing more of the jobs previously considered male only. The soldier is now a brave young career woman, a devoted mother, a prudent house owner and a loving wife. That’s a tall order. 

I think men have a problem dealing with this multi-role lifestyle. Yet there are already so many women who take on incredible responsibilities. Where next? Prime Minister. Well Margaret Thatcher was proof that a woman could lead a country (joining ranks with Boadicea). Women politicians I feel can be really scrutinised by the press looking for an excuse to discredit them. Jacky Smith has had a hard time – her husband let her down. I tell you chaps we’ve got to do better. I should say we’re not all the same, but we all have our moments.  

So is what new areas of the female condition can we explore? We’ve covered: boy meets girl, girl meets boy, girl thinks about girl but feels obliged to meet boy, girl think boy is rubbish and goes for the other girl, girl doesn’t need to meet boy or girl, and girl knows best and is better than boy. What does girl do now? 

Do I need to be a woman to be able to do this? I hope not, otherwise I’m in trouble.

As ever I will love to read your feedback and advice.


For information on Feminism in Science Fiction visit:
Feminist Science Fiction on Wikipedia