Margaret Atwood famously said that her work wasn't science fiction (despite having, yanno, alternate- and future-history dystopias) because it didn't feature "talking squids in outer space."
Now me, I love SF, even when it's very silly, even sometimes when it's very serious. But I didn't feel like I could call myself an SF writer until, y'know, I could tick that "Margaret Atwood would consider my work SF" box on my internal mental success checklist. So I'm writing a story with talking squids in outer space, and just in case that's still close to an ambiguous line, I'm throwing in some space ninjas for good measure. It's a world of fun to write. (-:
Re: creeping?
Now me, I love SF, even when it's very silly, even sometimes when it's very serious. But I didn't feel like I could call myself an SF writer until, y'know, I could tick that "Margaret Atwood would consider my work SF" box on my internal mental success checklist. So I'm writing a story with talking squids in outer space, and just in case that's still close to an ambiguous line, I'm throwing in some space ninjas for good measure. It's a world of fun to write. (-: