I can writez sci-fi.

Yes, I'm writing again, I just got a little bit of an Idea of a science fiction story.  I decided to write it on-line, sharing the process with my friends and random strangers.  Feel free to critique, but don't get your feelings hurt if I don't incorporate your suggestions into the story.  I don't have a title yet, I don't really know where it's headed yet, my protagonist hasn't even left his bedroom yet.  But here it is so far.

Tim woke to brilliant sunshine, it burst through the window pane, stained gold the opposite wall.  He blinked, rubbed sleep from his eyes, and stretched.  It was a week day, but he had nothing to do this morning, so he turned over, closed his eyes and indulged himself in the simple joy of a warm bed.

Light, tinted red through his closed eyelids tugged at his consciousness, he frowned, without opening his eyes, snaked an arm from below the covers to swipe across the window fader, turning it opaque, and drifted off to sleep only to be nudged awake by the increasing pressure of his bladder.  Finally giving up to the inevitable, he threw off his covers, swiped the window transparent once more, stumbled out of bed and towards the open washroom door.

While still urinating in the toilet, he dragged a rectangle across the deep golden wood of the bathroom’s panelled wall.

“Rec reflect” he mumbled, and the rectangle he had drawn out with his fingers faded to the reflected image of his own face.  He momentarily entertained the idea of a goatee, decided to go clean shaved instead, wiped the mirror effect away, and turned towards the shower stall as the toilet flushed.

Tim opened the shower door, stepped into the steamy sudsy mist and sighed heartily,  A warm shower makes even a bad morning bearable, today, with no clock ticking away the minutes of his free time, it was pure bliss.  Almost too soon, the water and cleanser was replaced by warm breezes, and he leaped out across the washroom, refreshed and invigorated. crossed the bedroom to gaze out the window, It was a real window, a large piece of clear plastic with only controls for polarity and opacity, and looked down on the small but well groomed garden below.

“Outside temp,” he said, gazing down on the rose vines and sun-dappled grass of his mother’s back garden.  

“Twenty-four point six,” replied the room.  He smiled to himself and slid the window latches aside, lifting the window up half way, breathed in the pleasant scent of roses and fresh cut grass.

“Vivaldi, Springtime”, he sang out, crossing the room to the closet as his room came alive to the thrilling sound of strings, “mirror full length.”   A section of the closet face faded to a full length mirror surface, he called up window of shirts and pants, picked a pink cotton polo, a pair of white shorts, and matching white running shoes, turned around, checking out the fit of the ensemble on his reflection, swiped away the pink polo, dialed up a blue and white striped tee, touched the accept tab on the window, picked the clothes out of the drawer as it slid out and dressed.

What was your favorite toy to play with as a child?

I can't think of a single toy that I enjoyed most as a child, but as a class, I'd say constructive toys. I had a 200 in 1 electronics experimenter toy (or something like that), essentially a set of various caps, resistors, transistors, diodes, 7-segment LEDs speaker and mic, a collection of wires and a cookbook with lots of electronics projects in it, from Radio Shack. I really liked that.

Then there was the Legos, the sets that had gears, pistons, rods cams and such that one could use to model machinery with. I played with them for a very long time.

But mostly, my personal computers, especially my C64, because it was the first microcomputer I owned that had enough memory to do anything.

Thinking back on it, the "toy" I probably got the most joy from as a child was simply a piece of paper and a pencil.  I remember drawing for hours on end, lost in the drama of creating imaginary worlds.

Later, the same thirst for creative toys showed itself in the kind of books a I've always preferred books that left me a universe that I could continue to toy with in my mind long after the last page in the novel.  That's probably why I like science fiction so much.  And why I prefer stories that don't quite tie all the threads in a neat little knot at the end of the book.  If the characters are interesting, I want to follow them around a bit in my head after I close the back cover and place the book back on the shelf.

Same for games, I like to be able to explore the game world, find out how to effect it, and make something unique with it.  I get bummed out if I run into invisible walls, find out that an environment doesn't allow you to move around freely, or that nothing you do changes the environment or final outcome of the game.  Oh, I enjoy shmups and FPSs just as much as the next boy, but I'll tire of them after a while, and games that push you in one direction are likely to find themselves unfinished on my shelf.  While open-ended games like Sim-City, Civilization, Flight Sim and the Sims will keep me coming back night after night for years on end.

Ask me anything