Worry

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment
Daily writing prompt
What are you most worried about for the future?

I was an expert worrier.

However, the sense of worry got severed somehow and I absolutely don’t want it back. It’s like losing the sense of smell when you’re in a poorly-smelling toilet. Imagine living in the Bog of Eternal Stench. It smells awful but you can get used to it. The sense of worry is gone at the moment. I don’t miss it, and I don’t want it back. If I worry about anything, it’s worry coming back and going through my defenses.

I know several risks – economic, political, health, and age-related. But I don’t currently worry about them because worrying won’t change anything. I know a new thing could make me worry again but it has to be new. I refuse to come up with imaginary future scenarios that affect me in a way that matters.

Some movie references:

What makes a teacher great?

~ Veselin ~ 4 Comments
Daily writing prompt
What makes a teacher great?

The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled.

— Plutarch

Looking back to what my math teacher did, she would come to class, give the new material, and then give us the hardest task from the book for this new material. We had to learn how to solve problems rather than what was in the last lesson.

I’ve not been able to reproduce anything like that with my kids. I tried teaching my first kid multiplication (or something similarly complicated) and he ran away by crawling when he was 2 and forgot how to walk.

Advice from LeadDev

~ Veselin ~ 4 Comments

For a word to be spoken, there has to be silence. Before and after. (Ursula Le Guin)

I’ll prepare a conference talk one day that’s made entirely out of fantasy and sci-fi quotes. I’m sure it will be a lot of fun for myself 😀

The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik

~ Veselin ~ 2 Comments

Naomi Novik is one of my favorite authors, and The Scholomance Series is hands down the best thing I’ve read from her so far.

El is a murderous evil witch by birth who can destroy cities with minimal effort but has trouble doing basic spells. She’s trying to help and not be wicked despite her rare talent. Orion is her male counterpart, an evil of historical proportions who does good but has his monstrous nature slips. There’s something between them but the book is not a love story. It is an epic urban fantasy. The joy comes from discovering the world, the magical systems, and of course, from El getting stronger. The Golden Enclaves also highlights Liesel, whose talent is to organize people. It’s cool to have a superhuman witch but I find it even cooler to see a regular human channel the change with her brain.

5*/5