Editorial – January 2025: Matter Over Mind.

Hello everyone.

With illnesses or injuries, I adapt to its needs, believing that while my mind is busy, the body can heal itself.

However, on the 7th of December, I had an argument with a stubborn outside door that refused to shut. It’s happened before, but this time, the slamming broke the door handle off in my hand, and I went flying. Initially, nausea, but I could get up and recover, but it became apparent that I’d nudged a muscle in my right side and some strain on my right lower arm, making it hard to rotate. I know enough biology from art that I’d messed up the radial tendon in my right lower arm. Looking at the bruises here, it spread out, but it’s not an everyday occurrence, but you do depend on rotating your arms for all manner of things, even as mundane as holding a spoon or fork.

I helped my brother change the door the next day, mostly holding the screws, provided I didn’t use my right arm and shock set in the day after. The bruises on my arm surfaced on the third day, primarily due to a strained right radial tendon and limited rotation. This is the end of the fifth week, as I type here, and I still have limitations that I’ve adapted to getting by with. At least I can type for increasingly longer periods, although I pay for it later unless I rest my arm.

According to Googling, such an injury lasts from 2–3 weeks, hopefully not as long as 6 months. Living alone does present significant limitations. Laying down flat was out of the question, so sleep at night was in the chair with a blanket. Changing upper clothes was out of the question because I needed to rotate my right arm. Even if I was successful, how would I dress again? I did a little typing just to give the arm a little exercise but only in moderation, relying more on my left hand. You just adapt to the limitations.

All of you who’ve had any injury know how the body acts as a whole. Sometimes, it’s the littlest piece of the body that causes the most problems. Given the expected resilience of tendons, I must have suffered some strain. The old door is ready for dismantling.

Some good came out of it. I watched and reviewed a lot of old films, even a lot of books. I also spent a significant amount of time reflecting on these experiences. I finally figured out what was causing the problem with my TV and the DVD recorders, as you can see from the article posted online today. There’s a separate article about it just in case Google decides to spread the information, especially as it works.

Although it won’t help with closing a door, I do know now how to open a stubborn one with a piece of plastic.

I’ve also become rather proficient at using my left hand with a spoon and manipulating things with my right elbow. I learnt many exercises to improve my left shoulder, and they continue to be effective.

Lessons learnt. Despite having to quarter-drain a large lemonade bottle before I could pour from it, I learnt a valuable lesson. When clenched, it also gave out a measured amount of liquid in a glass.

Getting a coat on is practically impossible, let alone getting it off. Using some creative thinking, I managed to secure a poncho. If I used my left hand, I could get that over my head; supporting it with my right was agony. It felt like a giant scarf but, before the temperature dropped, allowed some walking outside.

You adjust to the problem and test your limits daily. Anything became a therapy for mind and body. To play Fortnite after a couple of weeks, albeit briefly, was seen as an achievement to use the other tendons. Fortunately, the radial tendon isn’t used much in moving a mouse if working from the elbow, and I saw it as therapy. It’s likely more beneficial than my previous experience with a left shoulder injury, where a 6-month sling on my left arm didn’t significantly improve my tendons, especially given my current limited mobility. The lessons from that have helped a lot. I know what exercises to do and rest my arm. Doing things first thing in the morning is better than later in the day. Always have a long ruler to scratch with and a grabber for picking things up off the floor; even closing the curtains is an asset. Applying lateral thinking is a way of life. It makes it easier to work with my diabetes and agoraphobia, especially as I can’t take painkillers because of side effects.

Optimistically, things could be a lot worse. Fortunately, I managed to avoid any injuries.

Thank you, take care, have a wonderful night, and sorry for letting loose on my woes, but I have been productive.

Geoff Willmetts

editor: www.SFCrowsnest.info

A Zen thought: Pain management is not giving into it.

What Qualities Does A Geek Have: Being confidential. After all, its only me and you here.

The Reveal: An angle-poise is handy when a lamp goes off.

Observation: In digital games, does a digital chest complete opening when you can’t hang around to find out?

 Observation: I’m still puzzling how a search widget appeared at the top of my Windows 11 screen. When you turn it on, the caption for what the three options does only appears in full as you mouse the centre to identify this one. This solution is probably going to be ad hoc. Press the first command on its right should cause it to disappear. Hands up all those who would rather have manufacturers tell what they are doing to their software and to opt out if we don’t want it. You might also consider removing PC App Store if it pops up as well.

 Observation: The Parker Solar Probe coming out of the sun missed an opportunity to send International Rescue’s Thunderbird 3 to rescue it.

 Observation: With the 2004 film ‘Alien Vs. Predator’, just what were the hunters going to hunt? I mean, they were surprised when they found humans already in the temple or were they going to wait for some to arrive?

 Feeling Stressed: Don’t let an injury stop you trying to recover.

Submissions:-

                        If you think having free books to review isn’t enough, how about reading them months ahead of everyone? I mean real months. Beats a time machine.

I did think that having a lot of text about submitting material to SFCrowsnest would attract those with a compulsion to read and understand things the geek way. The main problem with the Internet is that it tends to encourage less reading, so time to take a different approach. The original notes will be left on July2009 editorial although the links aren’t likely to work.

With your cover email, tell me something about yourself so I don’t work in a vacuum. The boss in the tower, also called Stephen Hunt, describes me as a ‘Dutch Uncle’ in that I’m good with advice and can explain when I see something that is wrong. Egos should be left at the door as I’m only interested in your talent and how to improve it.

Reviews:-

I always have a clarion call for new reviewers and if you have the yen to learn, you’ll quickly get the ropes if you’re never done it before but you must show me a sample, especially if you can follow my guidelines. We can usually get paper-based books in the UK but if you live abroad, then you might have to stick with ebooks. If you’ve picked a book we haven’t reviewed, then it stands a better chance of being used so use the SFC search engine to see first but I need to see how you would write for us.

The obvious qualification is a desire to read regularly and like to tell others about the book without giving away too many spoilers. The benefit is access to free books for the price of a review.

I want to give you the opportunity to get things right so look up the Review Guidelines link: https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/so-you-want-to-write-reviews-for-sfcrowsnest-what-you-need-to-know-by-geoff-willmetts/

Fiction:-

Although we can’t pay for submissions, what we do make up for is exposure. Only the Sci-Fi Channel gets more hits than us so it’s worthwhile getting us on your writer’s CV. Please avoid samplings from book’s you might be writing or have had in print elsewhere as I do check. New original work is best and whether I accept or reject, you will be told of any problems I see so you look your best and a grammar check that is equal to the pro-world. Even the boss finds me scarily accurate.

Flash or One-Page Fiction:-

Speaks for itself. The shortest fiction possible is also the toughest to write as no word must be wasted.

Link here for details: https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/one-page-stories-or-flash-fiction-submissions-instructions-by-gf-willmetts/

Short Stories:-

The definition of a short story is anything up to 30 pages and then it becomes a novella. Bear in mind you want other people to read it on-line, stay somewhere between 5-20 pages. At least digitally, you don’t have to go double-line as HTML will do that automatically but think about being concise. If you want to send an attachment with these, then ask first and send as a TXT file as it removes most tetchy virus codes.

Look up the Short Stories Link by linking here: https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/so-you-really-want-to-write-an-sf-story-an-update-by-gf-willmetts/

Finally:-

The worse problem I see any samples is poor grammar. Although I don’t want you to think I seek perfection, the less work I have to do, the easier it is to focus on other problems you might have. It will also serve you in good stead if you ever approach paper-based publishers because they will send back any bad grammar samples because it’s not worth their time.

Good grammar is the tool of any writer. Don’t just depend on what you remember doing at school. There are plenty of decent grammar books out there, so remind yourself of the rules. If you think there are far too many to remember, get the major ones right before moving to the next so it becomes second nature.

This link, www.sfcrowsnest.info/the-guide-to-better-grammar-from-the-harrowed-hand-of-gf-willmetts/ will show you the common problems.

To submit, use our email address by joining the spaces as shown here: letters @ SFcrowsnest.info and use the subject matter as to what you’re submitting.

If you have any pastimes that can be used to pass the time in captivity, let me know and we’ll see if it can be turned into an article.

Comments directly to reviews should still work as before.

Good luck

Geoff