Decisions, Decisions.

I find myself in a bit of a quandary. It seems that I have somehow found myself at a crossroads of sorts mentally. If you have read the previous post you will know that I eluded to the fact that I do not put much weight behind conspiracy theories and other such "stories", because that is what they are... stories. As a fiction writer I often use real factual people, places, and things and sort of inject them into a story that could take place if certain occurrences take place. This is common as I am not the only writer who does this. It is imperative to utilize the state of affairs between governments, the causes of wars or conflicts, or the reasoning behind terrorist attacks to formulate a story. Especially in science fiction.

Another step to putting together a story is research. Unless you want your story to be very simplistic and dull you must do a vast amount of research and to a wide variety of subjects. What comes out of this is a wealth of knowledge about a great number of things. That is, providing of course, the writer is actually doing all of the above and not just, shall I say, mailing it in.

So I find myself a couple days ago reading up on the theories and claims of what turns out to be a group of people associated with Alex Jones and Infowars.com. In reading (and listening mostly. They put much of their material in video format) some of what they/he is saying about various topics it got me thinking. Just how far do I want to take this? Just what exactly am I doing here and what am I trying to accomplish?

See my original goal here was only to look into some of the stuff that my son was viewing and maybe, possibly, write-up a quick rebuttal to a couple of the more "ignorant" points this man was making. That was it. I would then go back to working on my short stories and book(s). The problem with this is the information I was finding would lead to another source or more information. This circle would then get me to a point in which I was intrigued and I wanted to learn more. Soon I was researching more out of my curiosity as opposed to strictly for the article or piece I was meaning to write in the first place.

So what is the problem with that then? Well, in a sense, nothing really. But I have done this before. I have put myself into a position of wanting to uncover the big conspiracy. I have engaged my curiosity to a point of no return, and while the result is a lot of reading, learning, and note-taking, it can be better summed-up by saying it is a lot of time and work. OK fine. So work I am not afraid of. I have always been a hard worker and I am very, very capable of working very hard and for long hours. However, this is not the problem. The problem is time. Time right now, for me is a valuable commodity. It is something that is in short supply so I have to budget what little I have available for whatever project I am working on.

Now obviously my plans and schedule are of vital importance to myself and you, my reader, could care less. That is how it should be. As a matter of fact, the very nature of this post is more of a "that's your problem dude" kind of thing. That is just fine, and like I said, expected.

Personally, I would like nothing more than to outline a detailed response to the groups claims (some of which I could actually get behind), but for now I will have to stick with my opinion-based articles based on news of the day and science/tech sector news. Aside from that, writing both my book and my short stories must be prioritized a bit higher as the need to complete these projects increases. Rest assured that I will "go after" or utilize some of the material that has come from their camp both good or bad (or stupid) in an article here or there and I always cite sources where appropriate. Trust me, you will know when I am posting something related to one of the theories from Infowars.

Until then...