Michal rejects the soundness of enlarging his voluminous Fiction Corpus with some good fiction; cites fatigue
Posted:
I regard highly the feasibility of exercising English as a common language for the world. I do question the formalistic blueprint with which the English language is taught.
Boosting one's adeptness with a language isn't like pioneering a stronger wheelbarrow. A language is not just an instrument that you can learn to employ with a greater amount of precision. A language can't be fractured from the philosophical currents of a community of which it is a description. A language isn't recited; it happens - and keeps happening as long as a circle of people keeps using it.
Teaching a person to recite English is to rob her of its cultural context. A capable teacher must find a method of introducing it; the discerning pupil ventures out to seek it.
A dictionary - properly used - can become an influential tool. A decent dictionary will define a language on the basis of a specific corpus, a body of written works of varying scope and consistency. They might include everything from a book about literature to a lot of fiction books. I burned many candles laboring on my "handsome" Fiction Corpus in order to form a new kind of dictionary based on the ability of one man to tell a story in myriad forms. It is a labor of love and listening.
I have devised a million words and I have investigated them, reformulating them - not just to teach an American tongue but to promote the human soul, and to pressure that spirit or soul not just to recite but to happen.
A word can represent many things. First and foremost it represents a type of gesture. A specific way of speaking. A specific way of inscribing a mark. A specific way of moving your hand. To know one of these kinds of gestures is to know how to pronounce the word steam in some kind of way.
If you want to communicate an idea using the word steam, you will need to know what other people are made to think when you make the gesture. You will never have complete awareness of or control over the associations or identities that are invoked by a set of words, but you can know what was and what is a single word's jointly accepted definition, at least for a given place, thereby tracing a direction which will help you to understand what kinds of associations and identities are driving its use.
By using the word yourself, you enter into a long-standing albeit oftentimes unconscious debate over its definition, forever entangling yourself into the history of its use. The way you use it, and which other words you use it with carries weight.
The more you know about where the word steam is located in the fabric of a language, the better you will be at exploiting its cultural power.
Pronunciation of Steam
I have yet to publish a pronunciation for the word steam.
Video of me pronouncing "steam."
Definition of Steam
I have yet to publish the definition of steam.
I'm sure it won't take too long.
Common use of steam in illustrative example sentences
I have yet to come up with a fifth sentence using the word steam.
Audio of me saying the sentence:
I have yet to come up with a sixth sentence using the word steam.
Audio of me saying the sentence:
I have yet to come up with a seventh sentence using the word steam.
Audio of me saying the sentence:
Usage of Steam in Michal's Fiction Corpus
Michal's Fiction Corpus of Acceptance Literature (FiCAL) is presented under the Bare Bottom imprint. It is currently comprised of six bodies of work, each representing a different pillar of culture and incorporating a wide variety of writhing styles.
I have yet to make a morphological analysis of the word steam.
That doesn't mean it's not high on my list.
Table of Frequency for the Word "Steam."
This table lists in descending order the total number of times that the word steamand any of its morphological derivations appears in the Fiction Corpus, along with a breakdown of frequency by title, the respective rank of each word in the complete list of all words in the Corpus, as calculated both densely and competitively, as well as the percent increase in frequency of the word over the frequency of the next lowest rank in the complete list.
Percent Increase over next rank
RANK
WORD
Frequency
TOTAL # of occurences
MCDONALDS
JESUS
SEX
TSIGA
JACKSON
DINGBATS
dense
competitive
modern/sloppy
biblical/terse
poetic/high-brow
hard/fast
talky
mixed salad
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
I have yet to publish the table of frequency for the word steam, but I will get to it shortly. -Michal
A story bible for a comic book series set in a post climate-change California narrated by eight characters who live through a natural disaster that sinks Los Angeles and triggers a war with an expansionist Mexican government covertly supported by China.
Frame #1953
im in the banya. drinking beer poolside. kohls's getting a massage in the steam room. i better be careful. its not very crowded.
An experimental science fiction Christology that makes Jesus the hard boiled narrator of his own early years on a bizarro earth made dark by volcanic ash and informally ruled by a man from Mars who sells bottled air.
Those were not laughing days, child. In those days, there was much hardship. Sixty-eight years before I was born, Yellowstone exploded. Five thousand cubic kilometers of boiling magma came to blanket the Earth, kill mankind, terrorize his animals, and fell his favorite trees. Earth bled, and the sky grew dark. It rained blackness. The whole planet stank like a struck match: burning brimstone, like the Bible says - in other words, black clouds of sulfur: they came to suffocate, incinerate. In faraway places, water turned to steam: it boiled. Volcanic ash came tumbling down. The wind blew steam and hot rock. Millions died; the rest wept black tears.
That night, Jesus and Zoe almost made love. Getting into bed, Jesus kissed her on the mouth. Zoe went wild. Rolling around, they kissed, pushed, pulled, hugged and squeezed. Zoe removed Jesus's clothes. She saw the tattooed Christogram upon his chest. She was sitting astride Jesus's waist. Pulling up her shirt, Jesus brought her back to attention. She removed it: she removed her shirt! and her bra and pulled Jesus up against her chest. Squeezing tightly, Jesus smelled the beautiful strength upon her breasts and kissed them. He pushed her down to the side of the bed and she spread her legs. Jesus mounted her and he was ready to do it, but there was too much: too much whirling around in his head: too much at stake: his destiny, his word, Zeus on Mars, and this half-Martian, half-Japanese creature in his bed, waiting to be fucked! Something was wrong. Jesus wanted her. He wanted to love this woman but not now: not here: not like this. This would have to wait. Jesus was quickly losing steam. The thought that Zoe must have prepared for this - must be taking contraceptives (there was no way she was looking to conceive) - was the occasion that finally prompted Jesus to cease rubbing himself up and down your mother's wet and fully engorged vulva.
Protected by the MTA (the Martian Terrestrial Authority, which was created for the purpose), the nuclear bomb was successfully transported. In the meantime, in cooperation with Panzer-Tank Mining, Yariba Corporation dug a deep tunnel into the base of Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the solar system. It's twenty-seven kilometers high! Five hundred and forty kilometers wide! I'm sure you've noticed it. They put the nuclear bomb inside the tunnel and off it went, clearing the most enormous cavern ever made. They drilled holes through the top. They drilled holes through the sides. They laid pipes. They brought water and boiled it. The steam went through the steam turbines, rose to the very top and fell back down again, going through the water turbines on the way back down to the boiler - a gigantic operation. A simple operation! A Martian child could appreciate its magnificent beauty, and, not having to wonder whence that blessed power comes, can look outside his northern window and see that brilliant topographical majesty that gives him light. Blessed Olympus! How young those Martians are when they first learn to fear her power! Give them light, Olympus! Not tyranny! Not shadow and pain! Give them light!
A literature book narrated by a pair of siblings on either side of the Atlantic whose profoundly weird sexual experiences pose a serious challenge to their traditional understanding of mathematicians, marriage, gay young men and God.
It made me wonder what kind of people were giving Luke his reputation these days. They can't be that much different from the ones we knew: no self-respecting woman would ever shag in that apartment - but I guess that goes for men too. In fact, what self-respecting person would ever choose to have anything to do with Luke in the first place? He can't possibly be raping them - the walls are too thin - unless he uses drugs - ah, but let us not speak of that.
By the time I returned to that love seat, Nike was discussing something entirely different. I sat down, not paying attention, staring directly in front of me until I could no longer resist the temptation. Macy was being silent, and my head turned itself back to his. And there they were: set in a face of sharpness, transfixing their prey, poking through the heavy brows of a lowered face, a sorcerer's face; as he prepared his incantations, there they stood, ready at arms, two cauldrons of steaming black tar, two very cold celestial discs, two empty orbs that wanted possession of two separate worlds, two very wide walnut eyes waiting to crack, two pleading for mercy, two coaxing, too ready to resist.
The vacuum, which actually worked - thank God - was beating the hell out of the shaggy rug, shooting clouds of dust into the room - literally - there was simply too much to suck at any one given place or time.
I feared Macy, but I had not gone to Luke's room simply to avoid him. Sheltered in that warmth of steam, its gray dampness - cool drops of water gathering on the tip of my nose - warm gusts caressing my body, making me shiver with excitement - I did not admit to myself that I had come there to pleasure myself, to pamper myself, to prepare meticulously, to stare with giddy anticipation, and then, to unleash recklessly my physical beauty; all for the sake of Macy, so that I might join the party and stun him.
The bathroom was much less filthy, and this, I thought, could only mean one thing: Luke probably had not been taking advantage of it - but I'm sure that you could think of other, equally plausible theories. Enough about Luke; I refrained from cleaning his bathroom - let's leave it at that. Letting the shower run, I washed out my mouth and sat down on the toilet.
A collection of stories featuring a sexy Parisian ghost, a spooky Moon base full of vagina-faced aliens, a policeman with an Irish name, a truck full of watermelons, a flautist, and a man who has to see another man about a diseased horse.
A wisp of steam rose from the rocks. Tae felt the urge to check it out. "Excuse me," he said. He left Kwon and Do behind. He climbed the rocks with his bare feet. He heard the sounds of splashing. Two women laughed. A man said, "That bean counter wanted us to till fields." It was Kung. "I showed her. We marked out the best spots for ourselves-right next to a hot spring. We should open a resort. Charge the others admission."
"What would they pay us with?" asked one of the women.
"Rice. Why should I waste my time rotting my ankles? I could be here, rotting my entire body."
Tae poked his head over the edge of a rock. A few meters below, Kung lay naked, neck-deep in a pool of steaming water. Bei swam next to him. Fu sat on the edge, soaking her feet.
Kung suggested they cool off on the grass. Bei agreed. They climbed out.
A real play. With drama in it. Talk fast. It takes two hours. Set in a guest house. In a small community. After a murder. Lots of suspicion. The characters learn to listen to each other. It's funny.
"Steam" does not make an appearance in Sorry Miss Jackson.
A story book full of short fiction stories. An interesting bedtime mystery. A fairy tale. Science fiction romance. Adult life. Uninspiring gay fiction. Horror.
"Steam" does not make an appearance in Miscellaneous Dingbats
This table lists in descending order of frequency a selection of word pairs that appear in the Fiction Corpus and groups them according to the morphological derivation of the word steam that appears in the pair.
Type
WORD
Frequency
TOTAL # of occurences
MCDONALDS
JESUS
SEX
TSIGA
JACKSON
DINGBATS
modern/sloppy
biblical/terse
poetic/high-brow
hard/fast
talky
mixed salad
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
I have yet to perform a collocation analysis of "steam." I hope I can get it done sometime soon. -Michal
It's natural to hide dirty things. They're embarrassing. But we need to keep in mind that when we hide things that are difficult, we make them seem dirty when they're really something else entirely. And when we keep things that are easy in plain sight, we make them seem clean when they really aren't. That is dangerous.
Help maintain the "Steam" page up and running...
If you love women and art...
Michal is importing art...is he certifiable?
Michal's Sales Pitch Lot 1: Silesian Handicrafts
T-shirt fundraiser for sale
Last T-Shirt with the logo that I designed.
From a set of, I believe, twenty produced by Margo and given out to a portion of the last 20 women to finish the 20th anniversary Fiat Road Race in Bielsko-Biała, cf. the movie. This is the last one left in it's original packaging and my supporters - like the poor women of Bielsko - are going to have to fight for it. Whoever invests the most money with me, and who lets me borrow it to invest in the next lot, will not only be rewarded with some beautiful piece of art, but will get this priceless t-shirt as a reward for being my top supporter. $1000.00 or best offer. Remember to authorize me to hold the sum as credit against a future purchase and to authorize me to borrow against it.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #1 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Felt handbag for sale
Felt bag by Dorota.
Entirely hand-sewn. Base: polyester felt, 100% PE. Motif: South American woolen yarn, dyed, 100% wool. Hand-worked with a needle. Unique and inimitable design. Inside: cotton fabric, closes with zipper, inside pocket. Available now for $220.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #2 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Decorative collar for sale
Decorative collar by Zuzanna.
Ethnic layered cloth jewelry constructed on a cotton base and adorned with ribbons, tassels, and a yellow fringe. Fastened on the side with 11 buttons, fitted entirely with a pleasant lining. The style is an Indo-Asian-African multinational color combination. The collar is very extravagant and an extraordinary addition to any clothing, guaranteed to attract attention. Just a simple dress and a unique image is ready. Dry-cleaning recommended. Available now for $200.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #3 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Seamless handbag for sale
Handbag by Sylwia.
Handmade from felted all-natural Australian and South American wool. Entirely felted, seamless. Finished with a white lining, inside is a small pocket. Lining is sewn and stitched in by hand. Available now for $180.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #4 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Patchwork quilt for sale
Patchwork quilt by Alicja.
Bedspread made of cotton and polyester material. Inserted with polyester lining. 90 by 70 cm. Available now for $120.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #5 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Nuno-felt shawl for sale
Shawl by Sylwia.
Scarf made with the nuno felting technique (wet felting fibre into a silk gauze) using South American wool. Two-sided scarf with latticework at the ends. Wholly in the colors red, black, green in an abstract pattern. Available now for $100.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #6 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Clara the doll for sale
Clara by Alicja.
Clara loves roses and greenery, adores tormenting spiders with long legs and sleeping soundly in the afternoon. Cuddly toy made of cotton and polyester, stuffed with polyester lining. Available now for $70.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #7 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Noah the doll for sale
Noah by Alicja.
Noah doesn't know what to like and what not to like but keeps wondering and thinking about it. Cuddly toy made of cotton and polyester, stuffed with polyester lining. Available now for $70.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #8 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Black suspenders for sale
Black suspenders by Zuzanna.
Two-sided suspenders from black material with a rose motif on one side and striped cotton on the other. Connected by a leather triangle. Adjustable length. Hand washing in cold water recommended. Available now for $50.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #9 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Orange suspenders for sale
Orange suspenders by Zuzanna.
Two-sided suspenders made of denim and orange material with a Polish floral folk design. Connected by a leather triangle. Adjustable length. Hand washing in cold water recommended. Available now for $50.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #10 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Green suspenders for sale
Green suspenders by Zuzanna.
Two-sided suspenders made of denim and green material with a mountain folk design. Connected by a leather triangle. Adjustable length. Hand washing in cold water recommended. Available now for $50.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #11 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Felt earrings for sale
Felt earrings by Dorota.
Material: South American woolen yarn, dyed, 100% wool. Hand-worked with a needle. Pendant of anti-allergenic metal. Available now for $40.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #12 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Round ceramic earrings for sale
Round ceramic earrings by Dorota.
Material: Glazed ceramics, hand-molded. Available now for $40.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #13 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
Oblong ceramic earrings for sale
Oblong ceramic earrings by Dorota.
Material: Glazed ceramics, hand-molded. Available now for $40.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #14 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
'Coral' necklace for sale
Corals by Sylwia.
Necklace made of cotton pieces with organdy and decorated with beads, suspended on cotton strings. Can be worn as a necklace, as a brooch or as a belt tied at the side. Available now for $40.00. Ships free of additional charge via USPS (uninsured) unless otherwise directed.
To purchase please mail a USPS money order in an envelope clearly marked Lot #1/Item #15 to M. Slaby at house number 201 on Ridge Road in the town of West Milford, in the state of New Jersey, one of the beautiful United States of America. The postal code is 07480-3112.
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