A work of art is never finished...

I heard it said once that "a work of art is never finished, only abandoned."

I've lost count of what draft I'm on now.  Mostly because redrafting doesn't involve a neat start to finish read through improving as you go along.  It involves realising you can improve this part - but if you do, that bit back there needs a change and, oh, while I'm there I'll just improve this...

So I decided it would be a good idea to print out my novel and read through it front to back on paper.  For one thing it's easier that reading on a screen, and for another it allows me to make notes on things without getting distracted by rewriting there and then.

To save paper, I figured I would print both sides of the page.  Well, that turned into a nightmare!  After managing to put the paper back in the wrong way around, having the printer spurt a nice chunk of it onto the floor and mix the pages up, and then running out of ink three quarters of the way through printing, I finally have a paper draft in my hands!

Some bits are getting a touch up.  More than I expected is being left alone.  Maybe after this one it's time to abandon it to the wild...

Liquid Water on Mars

Interesting discoveries, which will lead to interesting new inventions.  It's amazing how inspiring a dark streak on Mars could be:  The possibility of alien life, new robots which have greater precision and accuracy... humans visiting our red neighbour... and from there?
Maybe some dark streaks have kickstarted the possibility of our interstellar civilisation! :)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34395569

Renewable Energy

I can hear the wind turbines thumping.  Thrum.  Thrum.  Thrum.  Day and night they turn.  Sometimes I imagine what they look like, picturing them just on the other side of my wall; the blades sweeping past just centimetres from my ear.  Sometimes I think they’re far away; barely seen ghosts, hazy through the clouds which cling to a distant hilltop.

The thumping rhythm has driven more than one person mad.  I hear them screaming for the turbines to stop; pleading to be taken away.  But not me; for me they are the only thing keeping me sane.

My world is rust-streaked concrete, congealed cold porridge and a single buzzing light which flickers but refuses to ever go out.  The wind turbines are the only thing that I know exists beyond these walls.  If ever they stopped, would I even believe that there is an outside?

I’ll see them one day.  I’ll count the pillars, feel the air brushing past my skin.  But for now all I can do is close my eyes and listen to them turn.

Amazing Fairy Sculptures

These are just beautiful.

http://www.fantasywire.co.uk/index.html

The solar system

"Space is big.  Really big.  You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is.  I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's  just peanuts to space." - Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

This is a beautiful video showing just how big our solar system is.  Well worth a watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR3Igc3Rhfg&feature=youtu.be

The Frozen Forest

Here's a short fantasy story I wrote for a competition.  I did it in a fairytale style.
Enjoy!

Worlds

The hall is astoundingly huge - a polyhedron of impossible dimensions formed of some sort of semi-transparent crystal.  Through the glass-like surfaces stars and galaxies wheel in a spectrum of incandescence... and every surface is covered in doors.  Wooden doors and metal doors, opaque glass doors and even some stone doors.  There is no clue to where they might lead, no marking or symbol upon them.  There is no guide in the hall, nothing but vast empty space between them.  It is not until you find the key that you notice the key-holes...
But which door to use the key on?
You walk to a stone door and peer through.  Beyond is a planet of orange and red swirling clouds, its moons slowly spinning around one another.  You look through the next door, black glass, and see a rocky, lifeless world, cratered and grey.  You walk a few paces before seeing what lies behind a wooden door - this one is a bright mass of blue and green with rings encircling its waist.
Each door you look through shows you a new world.  Some you know are not places you should go - whether they are meant for others or no one you can't tell, but you are certain they are not meant for you.  With others the only thing that stops you from turning the key in the lock and stepping through there and then is the niggling feeling that another door might hold a better world - might be a better match.
You walk and walk and look and look, telling yourself that when you see your world, the path that was meant for you, you'll know, and then, and only then will you use the key.
But you're never certain.  There are too many doors to see them all - and you know that by the time you have walked the length of the hall you would have forgotten what you had seen at the start anyway. You stop and look back and forth, trying to decide on how many more doors you should look through until you choose.
You know that whichever you do choose, you will always wonder what lay beyond a different door.
But still, better to see a world in all its glory and life and magnificence than to always stand on the edge...
Time to make the choice.