A Fitting Punishment for Human Folly
And unto Humanity did GOD saith: “Thou have become too Proud of thy gadgets and internets and planes that move thee across the span of My world in hours. Verily, thou are taking Pride in bobbles that by My Grace thou has invented, but which thou have used to Generally Screw Things Up.”
And unto GOD did Humanity say: “Thou meaneth like the wars and the injustice and poverty and the oil spill and the…other stuff?”
“Verily!” saith the Alpha to the Omega. “So to smite thou in an Ironic Way—and I liketh Irony; witness Babel—I shall allow thee to invent an Infernal Bobble to which thy whole lives shall be beholden. It shall be a Trinket of Anguish that shall allow thee to power the smallest and most precious of thy riches, but that for the lack of this Small Thingy of DOOM thou shall be without contact with thy brothers and sisters of folly, and which thou shall mistakenly leave at Home when thou are in the greatest need, and which thou shall always forget in thy Hotel Room until thou are far enough away from Yon Hotel to make turning back sour and unprofitable. And in the constant loss of this Fiendish Cord, thou shall be reminded of the Humble State of thy True Nature.”
And hearing this did the Children of GOD tremble and weep for they knew that a small fraction of What They Deserved was about to fall upon them the way a hard and Uncomfortably Cold rain falls on the Back of a Dyspeptic Cow. “But what is it?” they cried. “What righteous Plague shall we now invent and so Condemn ourselves to Annoyance?”
“Thou shall now invent,” saith the Ancient of Days, “The Cell Phone Charger!”
Comments
19 Responses to “A Fitting Punishment for Human Folly”
Tyson
3:24 am Jun-7-2010
Welcome back baldy! Hope you had fun. Now get to work writing me a sequel!
blakecharlton
10:30 am Jun-7-2010
thanks amigo, how’s the writing going at your end of things? just got word from the editor that he’s liking SPELLBOUND and that an intern really loved the draft. good signs. hope the edits will be pretty shallow and we get an earlier pub date. of course nothing’s certain in publishing…except uncertainty *small gong*
Tyson
5:06 pm Jun-8-2010
The writing isn’t going as well as I would like.
I’m convinced I have no talent and will never finish this thing. But that’s normal for writers, right?
I think Spellbound will be better than Spellwright. I say that based on the second half of Spellwright being better than the first half. It had a more mature writing style, and I’m betting that Spellbound resembles the second half more than the first.
blakecharlton
9:42 pm Jun-8-2010
if you thought you had talent and/or felt good about yourself, we’d make you hang out with terry goodkind.
*ZING!*
thank you sir. i feel like it’s a better book. i reworked spellwright over and over and over for 10 years, so a lot of the 20 year old me stuff got mixed up with the 29 year old me stuff. there’s something good and bad about that. but spellbound is purely 30 year old lets get this thing going faster bc i have to get back to medicine self
Elicius
9:02 am Jun-7-2010
Hah! Happened to me last summer. And verily did it suck! Although really I’m here ’cause I just wanted to swing by and say “Hey”….So Hey.
‘though it has been sitting on my pile of next-to-read for a few days [pffsh, exams], I just read Spellwright in one sitting. I’m pretty sure anything else would’ve been impossible. Gorramit that’s a good book!
Just wanted to swing by and say “Thanks” for that 350-page chunk o’ awesome.
[Which I didn't buy off Amazon.com
muttermutter#Amazonfail(s)mutter, heh]
blakecharlton
10:39 am Jun-7-2010
Hey! Thank you kindly for stopping by and for the wonderful words about Spellwright. It’s wonderful to hear people like the first book before digging into the edits for the second one. As for Amazonfail, well, at least it helped me catch your consideration. silver lining, meet cloud.
Elicius
11:08 am Jun-7-2010
Actually I believe I heard about you through either Peter V Brett or Brent Weeks. I read your post on #Amazonfail, however, and it made me laugh a touch - glad it didn’t stop me hearing of your work [seeing how it stopped me using Amazon].
Best of luck with revisions!
Adam R. Stephens
10:51 am Jun-7-2010
Welcome back to the states, my favorite bald author! As if I needed reminding, this GREAT blog post reminded me of your AWESOME way with words!!! That ending was particularly my favorite, because it was one of those inevitable but PERFECT endings.
Take all the words in all caps and use them now as synonyms for BLAKE CHARLTON whenever you read a bad review.
GutterBall
11:29 am Jun-7-2010
And there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth and tearing of hair across the land, and then silence fell upon the face of the deep, for verily all cell phone batteries ran slowly down until all, even unto the last, were dead. Woe unto the Age of Man, for communication has ceased.
Ramen.
blakecharlton
7:09 am Jun-8-2010
The Gnashing of Teeth! How could I have missed a chance to employ the GoT? Much less the ToH? Clearly, vacation has made me soft. My friend, you have taught me an important lesson today
GutterBall
3:04 pm Jun-14-2010
*bows*
I have only followed the glowing path you have unveiled, my friend. All is well. Except for the whole end of existence thing.
blakecharlton
12:50 pm Jun-15-2010
i’m still Gnashing my Teeth that i didn’t think of this one. The big EoE thing?
GutterBall
12:21 pm Jun-16-2010
Dude, no working cell phones? EoE. I’m seriously. *snerk*
blakecharlton
12:43 pm Jun-16-2010
ooooh, yeah…right. sorry. not my sharpest moment ever.
GutterBall
11:31 pm Jun-17-2010
‘S all good. I blame the koalas for all my lapses in intelligence. Did you know that they have fingerprints?
Best. Accomplices. EVER.
Nadie
11:55 am Jun-7-2010
I own four.
I /never have one when I want it/.
blakecharlton
7:10 am Jun-8-2010
i think maybe we need to start making accessories / jewelry (necklaces, bracelets, belts, etc) that double as chargers….hrmm…maybe i’m in the wrong business!
DanielChuter
6:58 pm Jun-7-2010
All phones should be chargable via USB cable imo. And not one of those big end, little end ones either, two big ends, lol.
blakecharlton
7:13 am Jun-8-2010
DC! hey, amigo, good to see your still alive and kicking. as for everything by USB, sounds brilliant. think you might have to convince cory doctorow that he didn’t come up w/ it first though