Author: Uncle Josh

Uncle Josh on Themes

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I have not done much writing in the past few years, and I have not submitted a story in at least three. But I have been writing, slowly, haphazardly, and sometimes way too cautiously. I didn’t make the 50K wordcount for NaNoWriMo last year, but I did get a first draft of a short story …

Uncle Josh looks back at 2021

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Highlights of my 2021: Got “evicted” and bought a house. Oh my God we bought a frikkin’ HOUSE Okay, it’s technically a condo but we have a mortgage I’m still not sure if I need to ask the landlord’s permission to hang a poster Our rector resigned from the parish Stephanie’s father had to be …

Uncle Josh on Change

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For some reason, I dislike change, which is an odd thing to dislike, as it is the only constant in my life. As Stephanie and I come to closing night in this townhouse, I think about change. Maybe too much. When Stephanie and took our first road trip together, before we were dating, we went …

Uncle Josh on Contributions to Society

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I have recently finished The Tyranny of Merit: Whatever Became of the Common Good by Michael J. Sandel. There is an idea in Meritocracy that people are paid what they deserve, and that is based on their contributions to society. It’s just another bullshit excuse for oligarchy in the western world. The examples that are …

Uncle Josh on Novelty

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Many years ago, my wife went to her first convention. I had gone to this convention for a couple of years and encouraged her to join me and go to the costuming panels. My wife and I are both introverts, and a convention is very good at draining our reserves for dealing with people. On …

Uncle Josh on Past Failures

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My father died when I was 28 years old. Because of my fierce and overblown sense of independence as a kid and teenager, I was finally getting to the point where I not only was capable of listening to him, I wanted his advice. I wanted more of his life story. I was a bit …

Uncle Josh on Power Fantasies

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A little while ago[1]longer than a week, less than a year I answered some question on Reddit. I think the question was along the lines of “Why do Star Wars fans hate Kelly Marie Tran” and of course the real answer was “Real Star Wars fans love her” but that’s fangating and not cool. There …

Uncle Josh on Reclaimed Words

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I love words. I have a strange passion for knowing words and an annoying desire to use the right word in every situation. I like my language to be precise. So when I encountered a Twitter thread about the word “dyke” (in terms of lesbians, not water resource management) and I thought “what’s that called?” …

Uncle Josh Had A Day Under the Bar

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Yesterday my brain was firing on all cylinders. My thoughts were jumping through associations that I had to stop several times and ask “how the hell did I get here?” I’ve lost the ability to think slowly, to connect thoughts together in any meaningful way that would let me organize them. Then I went out …