8FOLD: Mancers # 6, "Big Scary Brain"

[Scott Eiler]

On 2018-08-15 05:56, Tom Russell wrote:
> On Tuesday, August 14, 2018 at 9:07:59 PM UTC-4, Scott Eiler wrote:
>> There were a couple of weird things in this episode...
>>
>>
>> On 2018-08-13 07:09, Tom Russell wrote:
>>
>>> "I am a brilliant genius engineer," mutters Sarah upon waking. She
>>> twists her body so that it rests on her left side, enabling her right
>>> arm to swing out in search of the pen and paper on her night table.
>>> She misses the first time, knocking her alarm clock off the table. It
>>> doesn't land with a hard clunk on the hard wood floor, but rather on
>>> that pile of papers and books that she really should pick up one of
>>> these days.
>>
>> It's a good waking moment, but it's a weird thing to say to oneself in
>> *any* circumstance.  Even though you're a game designer and you're proud
>> of it, I'll be surprised if you say it to yourself when you awake.  And
>> modern-day politics have pretty well established, if you *say* you're a
>> genius, you're probably not.
> 
> Well, it was supposed to stick out a little, especially at the 
> beginning, but I hoped that the context throughout the story - that 
> she's choosing to define herself this way, that she doesn't want to
> let herself be defined by this occultish stuff that she's clearly
> terrified of, that she's fighting a sort of inner-battle against it -
> would make it "click" (that and the fact that she's saying it having
> woken up with an idea, while she's working on the idea).
> 
> But I very well could have fumbled that! Thanks for the feedback.

The story worked.  My statement about genius stands, though.

I like to say about my own engineering prowess, "I am *world-class* in 
what I do best."  But I don't say it to myself while I'm fumbling around 
my nightstand to take notes.  And I do fumble like that.

Admittedly Sarah might need her personal reinforcement, though.  And 
that might be a continuing plot point.  So you should probably not 
abandon her personal value statement yet.

-- 
(signed) Scott Eiler  8{D> -------- http://www.eilertech.com/ ---------

When you *are* the leader... whatever goes wrong... whether you did it
or not... *you* are held responsible. - Barack Obama

I know. - Archie Andrews

- from Archie #617, March 2011, scripted by Alex Simmons.