"Their names went down in Domesday Book when Domesday Book was made."

I was just recently pointed in the direction of Kipling's poem The Land (and a musical setting thereto which is not bad except for the perennial folk singer's difficulty with mucking up a well-considered poem for no particularly good reason. Yes, I'm looking at you, Loreena McKennet...) which I think is lovely; I'm particularly fond of the way he uses little bits of dialect in his rhyme scheme.

I've been mulling over another link for a while: The top idea in your mind, which is one of those overarching theories about how those thoughts your brain drifts back to in the in-between times have a subtle but vast effect on one's life; there's also another angle on the problems inherent in dustballing. I strike off at an angle from his point, and begin observing that this is why reading too many books is detrimental to the writing process-- both by filling up one's brain with other thoughts, and just by giving one less time to let the backbrain out; I imagine TV is as bad or worse about this. In fact, this kind of thinking is probably why I do better, writing-wise, when it's either the main thing I'm doing (during NaNo, mostly) and thus I'm mainly concentrating on plotting, or when I'm working at a semi-mindless job (ah, temp work...) and daydreaming about all the mix tapes I could be making or novels I could be writing instead. Only, of course, then I never get to them, because by the time I get home, my brain has done with its contemplations and wants to read a book. This is, also a main reason why I made more plot headway on my currently-in-contemplation novel while taking Pennsic classes than I did in several months before. (There were other reasons, including the influences of various historical trivia, of course.)

It all ties in with the debates about what sort of person ends up being an author, and one of the answers involves having the drive to do it-- to care about your story enough to get it all out of your head and make it work. Martha Wells has a rant about how people seem to assume that if you write it must be with the goal of getting published, and that there is no reason whatsoever for writing not to be a hobby just like anything else. Pulling together a story to your own satisfaction can be a lot more personally fulfilling than having to deal with rejection letters or unfavorable reviews. (Which is not to say that I don't intend to keep trying; I feel that the appropriate place for a book is on people's shelves, and I'd like some of mine to get there. But by no means must you agree.)

Also of potential interest: a new theory on literary criticism, or rather, a suggestion that there should be a new theory on literary criticism more in line with OSI (computer reference; it's explained in the essay...) that takes into account not just language or historical context, or psychoanalysis of the author, but also what the reader gets out of it... and that is also not just of use for critiquing a story already written, but in writing one's own. Quite long, but I found it worth reading, except for the slight quibble that humans are not actually the only life-forms who could accurately be described as having "minds."

Now I shall go back to dreaming about paralytic elves (ok, only one, who could move magically with sufficient concentration; this just made him a bit useless in a fight...) or somesuch, and trust that the moth infested bag of catfood continues not to haunt my dreams. I have discovered, however, that the Petco returns system includes "infested" as a reason for returning something.