I think I am channelling Isaac Asimov.
I have long been a great fan of science fiction, having grown up with Arthur Clarke, Douglas Adams, Poul Anderson, Ray Bradbury, Robert Heinlein, Anne McCaffrey, Andre Norton, …. good grief, this list could go on forever.
Each and every author gave me an opportunity to live vicariously through their writing. Each one enjoyed a special place in my heart, and yet it was Isaac Asimov I suspect I adored the most. Not only was he incredibly prolific, but his wicked sense of humour shone through many of his stories. I adored The Tales of The Black Widowers and wish he had written more of them. His puns were excruciatingly bad, but I always laughed when they hit me at the end of his short fiction.
I had the great fortune to be able to meet him when I attended an Advertising Research Foundation convention in New York, a number of years ago. What, you ask, was Isaac doing at an advertising research convention? He wondered the same thing during his keynote address to his spellbound audience. The conveners of the convention had asked him to speak about the future of advertising. Mr. Asimov admitted that whenever anyone, anywhere wanted to discuss the future of anything, they called on him. He had begun to think that his name and the word future were forever linked in the minds of men.
Did he talk about the future of advertising. I really cannot remember if he managed to bring in the topic of advertising, but he did talk about the future.
He often referred to himself as a lecherous old man. Of course, what he really was, was a great admirer of women — women of all shapes, sizes, and ages. It was one of the things about him that made him so compelling as a man. Even in his later years, with a haircut nearly as bad as that of Donald Trump, he was still attractive and extremely engaging.
I believe I have read and re-read everything he has ever written (with the exception of a few highly technical books), and as such I know I am channelling him.
If you re-read the previous blog I entered, and then read this quote from Isaac Asimov, you will know exactly what I mean.
“I write for the same reason I breathe – because if I didn’t, I would die”
Isaac Asimov”