Well this is officially the first blog post I’ve made on the new site! (Well, first post with NEW content that is.) I think I’ve finally settled on the design, so things should stay pretty static from this point on from that standpoint at least. Let me know what you think of the setup!
For my first post, I’ve decided to do a Teaser Tuesday post featuring an excerpt from the sequel that I’m currently working on. (Teaser Tuesday is when someone posts an unedited portion of something they’re currently working on to get feedback and, let’s face it, to show off. :P) There’s only one bit in this portion resembling a spoiler, and it’s so excessively minor that you needn’t worry about it. Without further yapping from me, here it is:
The rather unfortunate thing about important, newsworthy happenings is that they have an uncanny ability of occurring when one isn’t at home. A person will blissfully go about the day’s business, completely unaware about the major event unfolding that’s making everyone’s head spin. Once they finally do get home to hear the news, they’re as shocked as everyone else was initially, and proceed to call everyone they know to find out if they’ve heard yet. Inevitably, everyone they call will have already seen it and mostly recovered. Recovered, that is, until the caller reminds them of what happened, stirring up the feelings of anxiety all over again.
With the advent of faster and faster means of communication, this rather awkward and irritating cycle was supposed to be eliminated. Telegraphs rose and were replaced by the telephone, which was supplemented by the television, which was then further supplemented by the internet, which was replaced by the portal system, which was supplemented by the implants… and so on. Of course, the endless loop of bad news being freely accessible didn’t reduce the anxiety cycle as people originally suspected, but instead intensified it, making things worse than they originally were.
This led to one scientist rediscovering a long forgotten, crude little device called earplugs. Upon realizing the seemingly magical power they had to reduce anxiety brought on by bad news, he began to market and sell them to the masses. He lived the next year of his life in a blissful, peaceful tranquility. Indeed, he would’ve lived a full, happy life, but he made the mistake of taking his earplugs off one day and died of an anxiety attack when a random passerby filled him in on everything that had happened in the past year. Thus, the government banned the earplug, and earplug addiction centers opened all over the world, gradually weaning people of their dependence on them.
Still, the problem remained, and steps were taken to try and reduce anxiety for the masses in small doses. One such step was to ban televisions and require the installation of portal service blockers in certain public places, such as fancy restaurants and nightclubs. Thus, Thomas, Lyla, Darin, and Doug were completely oblivious to what had just been revealed by Lydia Shults at the press conference in London. Vera could, of course, call them and tell them, but the laws of etiquette—which Vera was rather fond of following—would prevent that from happening.
That’s it for this week! I’ll be sure to do another Teaser Tuesday post later on. I can’t ensure that it’ll happen every week, but I’ll try to do one at least once a month. Let me know what you think in the comments!