Creepypasta and more

 by Sybil Johnson

Today it’s random thoughts day for me. I don’t know if it’s because I’m a writer or if everyone has random thoughts throughout the day. I pretty much have them when I’m driving or walking or watching TV or reading a book or.... Something catches my attention and I feel the need to look it up or make a note. Sometimes I get stories out of them, sometimes I just find them interesting. Here are some of my most recent thoughts:

Creepypasta – I was watching an episode of the French crime series, The Art of Crime, and they mentioned creepypasta. What? I double-checked the English subtitles (I don’t know French) and, sure enough, it said “creepypasta” all one word. The episode was set in the world of ballet. Students at a ballet school were scaring each other with what they called creepypasta videos. They’d dress up as a Degas ballerina statue that was rumored to come to life and scare the crap out of each other, then post it on the internet.

What is this, I thought? Is this a thing in real life or made up for the episode? So I looked it up. Turns out it’s real. A creepypasta is any horror story or video that is posted to the internet. The name comes from “copy and paste”. Not sure I get how that works, but that’s okay. I’m old. I may have to come up with a story that features creepypasta stories. Hmmm.

Cats of Disneyland – I love Disneyland. It’s my happy place. I always feel better after I’ve been there. I see ducks that live in the park all the time. I knew there were also cats who lived there, but I’ve never seen any of them. They generally come out at night and help keep the vermin population in check. A friend pointed me to this video about the cats. Made me smile. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLCoFx4Hrns

Pronouns – I recently read a book by John McWhorter, a linguistics professor, called simply Pronouns. I found it highly interesting, particularly the chapter on “they”. Worth a read. When writing a mystery, I don’t really want to use he or she for the murderer because that might give something away. Unless the police are absolutely sure the perpetrator is male or female, of course. I tend to use they a lot.

Hen pronoun in Swedish --- I’ve been “learning” Swedish for a while now. Still don’t know it well, but I am learning more and more each day. In the above book on pronouns, McWhorter mentioned that Swedish now has a “hen” pronoun for use when you don’t know the gender of a person or for someone who is non-binary or where gender doesn’t matter. I was not familiar with this at all. In my studies, they just mention han(he) and hon(she). Hen seems like a nice addition so I looked it up.

According to various sources on the internet, hen originally came into being in the 1960s, but did not reach the “masses” until 2012. It was officially added to the Swedish Academy’s dictionary in 2015. It was inspired by a Finnish pronoun which refers to anyone at all. This was an interesting article on its origins and current use: https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/swedish-hen

 aibohphobia – This is the fear of palindromes. I saw this on Jeopardy! I really, really want this to be a real thing. Can you imagine having this fear and your name is Anna? Anyway, apparently the word was invented in response to a challenge to invent a new phobia. The word is, of course, a palindrome itself. No one has been diagnosed with this as of yet.

Murderbot Diaries – I recently discovered the Murderbot Diaries, a series of books by Martha Wells. I am currently in the middle of book 4 of 7. They are full of adventure. What I really like, though, is the personality of the Murderbot. I hear AppleTV has made a series out of the books. I want to finish the books before I watch it. I wonder if I’m going to enjoy it as much as the books. 

Those are my random thoughts for today. What are yours?