I’ve found myself writing a mildly comic sequence that revolves around the use of ‘Sanitary facilities’ aboard a Starship. By necessity, these would have to be adapted for zero gravity, and unisex. Simplicity of use and an ability to cope with varying degrees of gastric distress would be essential.

I’ve looked at the old MIR design, this rather complicated sounding solution, and this picture of the ISS space station toilet.

My own imagineered solution is a soft neoprene ‘one size fits all’ seat to make a partial seal around the relevant areas of the male or female anatomy, and connects to a pressure actuated vacuum tube to suck away the unwanted fluids or solids. There would need to be one orifice for each, obviously, but the basic shape of the whole thing would be reminiscent of a ‘Slipper’ bedpan curved slightly upward at the front and rear, with a soft barrier at the perineum. This would necessitate it being sat ‘in’ like a saddle as opposed to ‘on’ as with terrestrial toilets. A soft plastic ‘gasket’ would help create a better seal for keeping the smell under control as well. No sense in having unfortunate and inappropriate smells all over a Starship. After all, it’s a closed environment.

The inspiration for this solution comes from, of all places, 18th – 19th century Paris. There was a famous clergyman (Louis Bordalou) whose sermons allegedly went on for too long for some ladies of the congregation, and they had made small, relatively narrow slipper bedpans which could be discreetly slid into place and used; presumably so the court ladies would not commit heresy by slipping out to the loo during the service. I recall seeing one on the BBC’s old ‘Antiques Roadshow many years ago, and being at an impressionable age, the information somehow stuck in the back of my brain. Bordaloue, or Coach pot, as they are known in English.

This has me thinking about sanitation and hygiene aboard Starships, which is an issue that should at least get some literary lip service. I covered washing with the Steam tube, a shower like almost sealed chamber where high pressure air blasts water vapour at the showeree, simultaneously vacuuming out the soap and washing water. There is even a scene in ‘The Sky full of Stars’ where one of my lead characters catches two passengers using his personal facilities for sex, and takes out his own petty vengeance upon them for sullying his facilities.

There are all sorts of silly gags one can make (In space, no one can hear you **** for example), but on a Starship, personal hygiene is a very serious issue.

I’m putting my miniscule support behind the current anti-SOPA and PIPA protests by Wikipedia and Google for one good reason; I write about futures where the State and commercial interests become all powerful, with democracy and the rights of individuals undermined to the point of extinction. Where any attempt to break free is met with immediate military force, and only the actions of a few can make a difference.

It’s not that I’m worried about the existence or non, of Facebook, Twitter, Picasa, and all the Social Media. It’s more the ‘This is what we have-and you will eat your greens’ attitude of the corporations pushing said odious legislation, that gets so far up my nose it’s giving me a massive sinus headache.

What about work that doesn’t meet the corporate models interests? Stuff that would never see the light of day otherwise apart from ‘Art House’ productions? Shutting down the file sharing sites would effectively sever the small productions’ chains of dissemination and distribution.

Today’s protest matters. Why? Because it supports diversity not conformity. Because it’s grass roots, not astroturfing. Because the needs, wants and dreams of the many outweigh the demands of the few.

If there were any logic in the world, my novella, ‘The Odd Machine‘ would already be on Amazon, iBookstore and Barnes & Noble.

At the current count, I’ve had a distribution message bounced back at me in three separate emails at eight day intervals for the following reasons;

“Given author(s), title or subtitle don’t match your files” – Yes they do. The fields exactly match the selected author profile.

“There’s a subtitle on your cover that needs to be added to your metadata.” – Sorry, but no, unless Lulu.com’s conversion process is incomplete, I’ve filled in all the fields available to me.

“Please add “A Novella” from your cover to your metadata.” – Why was this information not forthcoming in the first email?

My manuscript file conversion completes perfectly every time, and no error messages ever come back at that stage. It’s the 4-5 day lag that is getting overly frustrating. I am currently approaching the end of my EVA tether, and Lulu appear to have shut down all support apart from a pro forma guide and the discussion forums. Replying to their ‘error’ email address throws up a ‘message undeliverable’ report.

Currently not very impressed.

UPDATE: For those suffering the same issue, I think I have an answer. Check ‘file’ then ‘properties’ before uploading your text file, especially if using a Lulu.com document template. If the ‘collar and cuffs match’ all should be well. Am kicking myself for not cracking it sooner.

Hardly any writing output for the past few days. Too many distractions. That, and a feeling of having been kicked in the side. I think I must have pulled a muscle shifting logs. All I know is that it hurts enough to interfere with my breathing. Being ill on Tuesday didn’t help, the feeling of being bunged up and hardly being able to see out of my left eye. Every time I coughed was like being punched in the ribs. Still a little creaky.

Began Thursday with long, rambling conversation with Angie about psychology and what I call ‘behavioural response loops’ which many substitute for real thought and awareness. The way a loss of conscious thought whole days (and for some, lives) can disappear into a kind of mental fog without significant action. Days plagued by unnecessary trivia caused by people who ‘forgot’. The feeling of being stalled because others haven’t done their bit. Nothing that can’t be fixed, of course, but nothing that shouldn’t have been broken in the first place. This has been the defining characteristic of the past week.

Daughter is currently going through one of her noisy phases, breaking into raucous song when I would rather have quiet to work. There are also passports to be renewed and a thousand other things getting in the way of sustained effort on the manuscript front. Especially on the run up to Christmas. I’ve never been much of a ‘festive’ person, and while I don’t mind doing grown up stuff, tend to baulk at being expected to get all happy clappy at the behest of others. It’s not something that sits well with me. Too artificial, too forced. Partying for the sake of it was something I left behind at seventeen.

To break the creative impasse, I’ve been doing readings to camera to put up on YouTube. Not bad, but I’d never noticed before that I have a slight stammer. Not much, just the odd stumble over some simple words and phrases, but despite my drama training my verbal glitch shows up whenever I try to read a little too quickly. Thinking about it, I’ve never been all that comfortable in my own skin, and tend to do much better when I read ‘In Character’. Perhaps I need to develop a ‘reader’ character and let him take over when I want to speak in public.

Friday night we took the evening off to go and see ‘Puss in Boots‘ at the movies. A good chuckle raised me out of my immediate fugue state, and as such I can thoroughly recommend the film. The cat specific and ‘fairytale’ gags are pretty good, the DreamWorks animation superb as always, and the 3D exceptional. Worth seeing twice. One for the DVD collection.

There’s also a music lesson to book. Perhaps a session of almost reducing some poor guitar teacher to tears at my lack of talent might help.

These past few days have taught me that some days you just to write off as too much trouble to get your head down properly.