PROMPT: Cities

Daily writing prompt
How would you design the city of the future?

I suspect cities are on the way to becoming passé. They worked great for an economy built around humans exchanging time and effort for a salary, but in an economy in which machines do virtually all productive tasks better, faster, and more efficiently than humans, the benefits seem less clear.

Plus, there’s a lot of discussion of an epidemic of loneliness, and so it seems — as a basic organizational structure — cities (admittedly ironically) don’t serve humanity well. People are adapted for families and tribes — more close-knit communities.

Furthermore, Asia is already beginning to see the problem of downward scalability of cities, as many cities shrink less elegantly than they grew. Birth rates are declining everywhere as humanity reaches its upper limit for this planet.

Maybe the future is artist colonies.

PROMPT: Name

Daily writing prompt
Where did your name come from?

I wasn’t consulted on the matter. Like most, I labor under the impression that it came from my parents, but for all I know it was just a random person off the streets who scribbled it on the clipboard hanging off the hospital bassinet. If there even was a hospital…

PROMPT: Motivates

Daily writing prompt
What motivates you?

When tigers chase, I run. When sunsets glow, I sit and watch.

PROMPT: Movies

Daily writing prompt
What are your top ten favorite movies?

No particular order: Kung Fu Hustle, Caddyshack, Matrix, Inception, John Wick 4, Airplane, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Blazing Saddles, Hero, and Drunken Master II.

PROMPT: Writing

Daily writing prompt
What do you enjoy most about writing?

EPIPHANIES.

But, if you think about it, writing is miraculous. In the scheme of gifts that nature grants, it is way out beyond left field. Encoding ideas and images in simple characters in a way that can evoke emotional or cognitive responses in readers is kind of a superpower. (As is reading.)

PROMPT: Live

Daily writing prompt
What do you love about where you live?

It continues to offer daily learning opportunities. Plus, the people are friendly and the climate is quite good.

PROMPT: Positive Emotion

Daily writing prompt
What positive emotion do you feel most often?

Curiosity. I exist in a state of perpetual perplexity. For example, is curiosity an emotion? If so, is it a positive one? I know it includes a feeling that drives me to make a decision or take an action, which would be an emotion by definition. But I don’t see it on a list of emotions. I consider it positive, but I also try to avoid putting value judgements on all things. Maybe it’s neutral. Can an emotion be neutral?…

PROMPT: Plan

Daily writing prompt
How do you plan your goals?

Haphazardly with a side of slapdashery.

PROMPT: Emergency Preparedness

Daily writing prompt
Create an emergency preparedness plan.

1.) Run like hell.

2.) Dive headlong (with perfect timing as the blast begins.)

3.) Sigh with relief as I look back at the roiling fireball.

PROMPT: Word [Overly Used]

Daily writing prompt
What is a word you feel that too many people use?

“Nazi” and other terms used to hyperbolize the villainy of those who are, at most, moderately villainous. It allows people to dismiss – rather than debate – beliefs with which they are in disagreement, while – simultaneously – it diminishes understanding of the extremes of horror the world has known.