I’m getting really tired of hearing the words “community” and “collaboration” used as empty buzzwords with no substance.

I couldn’t be happier with how the cover turned out for my sci-fi short. Still trying to sync the PDF with different platforms/decide how I’m going to distribute the final product, but that’s how it goes.

It seems that a culture of instant gratification calls for constant posting as a given. There always needs to be a new post, and it has to be better than the last. It has to perform better than the last, is the real criterion.

I’m glad that I have a more systematic way to make and organize my posts now, but I always need to stay flexible. If I do quality assurance before I send anything, then I can simply post when I’m scheduled to post, let the posts speak for themselves, and paradoxically, keep my posts “performing” at the level they should be.

I’m working on the cover art and putting it all together for a digital download. Already ran into some problems with that yesterday, but I’m going to keep with it and use yesterday as a learning experience.

I think I now know what people are talking about when they say they’re “cautiously optimistic.” I’ve become so used to disappointment that lately I’m almost inured to any situation that would provide me with disappointment, especially with my academics, the present focus of my disappointment.

I’m looking at finishing up earlier than planned at my current college and starting at a different college that fits my needs better. I think I’ve found “the one,” but I’ve thought that before and been wrong. I’ve heard stories of worse, stories of better educational situations than mine.

The overall picture of my academic life has been postponing both what I want and what I need in order to cater to the concerns and interests of universities. I’m thinking that I will finally be able to move on now and carry with me what I’ve learned about academia and myself.

A Flash Fiction Piece in Parts by Matt Maday

Even a—tentacle—is admittedly subjective: connective tissue, an appendage—do you know which one or both? I know the captain and the pilot had/have physical corollaries, but Earth and space are relativistically abstract—like a cardboard pilot and captain in relation to a captain and pilot composed of human blood and tissue. There were so many tentacles that the waving arms of the captain and pilot were merely more of the same.

What life form am I now—and how did I get that way? Is hybrid electro-squid human a possibility? I’m getting close to finding out. The squid didn’t transplant squid parts into my body but rather transfused my consciousness with electric squid awareness. As soon as I get the call to go, I’m leaving Earth, and the squid have explained why better than the captain and the pilot ever explained how to run the ship alone—in the end, the squid taught me how to manage and pilot a ship myself, succeeding where the captain and the pilot failed.

I’m now sure that my supplementary neural network composed of tentacles—and squidnaptic clefts—suffices to explain my cognitive restructuring. I retain fluency in their language —I can always talk squid if I have to, yet there is a cosmic language that I also now speak—or speaks to me rather. There’s a cybernetic bloodstream and a central processor star of a heart that balances the squid solar system through light and sound wave communication.

The night sky pilots and captains me toward brief euphoria because it appears in fractal, brightly colored geometry to me—but those who are disconnected don’t see the enlightened relationships lightly forming from star to star. Those without my experience fail to connect with others—human constellations are inconstant and inconsistent. The squid, however, reorganized my psychologically charged intra-meanings, and they connected my establishment-electro-identity with lightwaves and bio-frequencies in harmony with a solar ecosystem I hear more about every night when I tune into the squid channel. When I finally get the call to rejoin them, I’ll be ready.