Bricks Without Straw

I recently finished reading the wonderful novel, TRUE GRIT. Portis's voicing of Mattie Ross is exceptional, and, having seen the Coen Brothers' movie before reading the book, it was impossible to not see Hailee Steinfeld, Jeff Bridges, and Matt Damon behind the words. Also extraordinarily impressive is the job the Coen Brothers did in bringing the book onto the screen. There is a southern lyricism and bare-faced honesty in the writing, which they preserved, which is truly inspirational. So what does this have to do with zombies?

The first story I wrote (or to be more specific, the first story I remember writing that was not required for school-related work) was called Joshua Hamilton , a science fiction piece about 3700 words long that consumed me for about a week during the summer I was 15. My father was taken with it, and ran copies of it off one of the photocopiers at work and passed it around to several people, which was kind of embarrassing, because, really, it honestly sucked.

One: strtok().  See, the thing about strtok() (we're talking c here) is that you can't call this function when it's being used elsewhere. Say you have a function: void DoSomething(void) {       char MyString[] = "Hello all you people";       char seps[] " ";       char *token;       // get the first token in a string:       token = strtok(MyString,seps);       printf("token: %s\n",token);      while (token!=NULL) {            token = strtok(NULL,seps);            printf("token: %s\n",token);       } } All well and good. But, say you're in another module of code and want to use strtok() again,  called from a function within your DoSomething() function: void DoSomething...

Until the 19th century, explorers were the R&D leaders of the planet, finding new ways to exploit desired resources. The business developers of the day turned exploration into economic gain by funding better ships, with regular schedules. Ultimately, there was a consumer whose demand for goods supplied the reason for the huge expenses of energy and time by the few who were forging ahead.

This remarkable poem was written by my late brother, Robert Barker, sometime around 1969. At this point, he was using a variety of source material including newspapers and dream imagery, combining them in what might be described as word-collages.

A story in the paper on March 2 in the Philadelphia Inquirer (and carried by The Vancouver Sun) talks about the use of zinc fingers in experiments that for the first time demonstrate the technique of actual gene editing. Unlike genetic engineering that uses viruses to transmit new genetic material into the nucleus of a cell, zinc fingers are protein folds able to attach to specific genes, and make it possible to cut a DNA strand, insert or remove a single gene, then splice it together again. The report describes how nine HIV patients' T-cells were modified to eliminate a receptor that HIV requires to enter a cell, making those in the experiment invulnerable to the virus. The modified T-cells proliferate in the body. Research on zinc fingers has been going on for decades. Now, actual applications are being developed that use them. It doesn't take much to understand the implications. This is a remarkable advancement in genetic engineering for fighting diseases. It may not be...

My short story, If Ever I Should Leave You, is in Morpheus Tales #12, coming out in April. Check out the preview, then buy a copy! http://www.morpheustales.com/preview12.pdf