When I am writing science fiction, sometimes I have to do research to make sure what I am talking about makes sense scientifically. With fantasy, you can pretty much make up any rules you want as long as they are consistent. With science fiction, you should be grounded in the real world as much as you can be. It is about getting the facts right. You should follow the laws of physics. Or, if you are going to break one (it can only be one) there has to be a logical reason for breaking it. It has to be scientifically plausible. My soon-to-be released Novella The Methane Sea takes place on a planet with methane ice (solid) and methane lakes (liquid), and methane in the atmosphere (gas). I had to look up the freezing point, melting point and boiling point of methane (at something like standard pressure). Even though I didn’t talk about those values in the story, I do talk about temperature changes, and the methane does change from one state to another, so I had to know what those v...
Once upon a time I was going to become a teacher. I did all the training and earned a teaching certificate, but other than some stints as a substitute teacher, I did not use it. I had a hard time getting a full-time job, and by the time my certificate had expired, I had moved on to other things. Every teacher has undergone the transition from student to teacher. I did my student teaching at Highland High School in Pocatello Idaho. All in all, not a bad school to be doing your student teaching. I remember that I was not much older than the kids I was teaching, but to them, it was like I was from another planet. I was an adult. I was “Mister Branchfield.” I had never heard myself referred to as that. I had to stop myself from laughing the first few times I heard it. It’s like somebody was joking, only they weren’t joking. I was going to be forever Mr. Branchfield from that point on. Teachers remember what it was like to be sitting in the students’ shoes, but I doubt students ev...