Friday, February 28, 2003

 

I am a programmer.
I am a pagan.
I am a skeptic.
I am a romantic.
I am a sex goddess.
I am a geek.
I am a loving friend.
I am a flake.
I am a forgetful friend.
I am a loving friend.
I am an independent.
I am an anarchist.
I am a strong proponent of democracy.
I am disillusioned.
I am disenfranchised.
I am displaced.
I am an impassioned orator.
I am an irrational bitch.
I am a frightened child.
I am a tender lover.
I am a ferocious warrior.
I am a defiant rebel.
I am a corporate drone.
I am a rock climber.
I am a skier.
I am a klutz.
I am a writer.
I am surprised how long it took that to come up.
I am a poet.
I am an artist.
I am a dancer.
I am a child of the moon goddess.
I am a daughter of the sun.
I am a person my mother likes.
I am an adult my father is proud of.
I am a friend who inspires love.
I am a casual astrophysicist.
I am a dork.
I am an introspective spiritual traveler.
I am a nudist.
I am a fat girl.
I am a wild child.
I am a bottle-blond.
I am the architect of my destiny.
I am the weaver of my tapestry.
I am the sculptor of my spirit.
I am alive.
I am in charge.
I am indecisive.
I am frightened.
I am mighty.
I am out of time.

by Sharon 11:23 AM

 

Who are you?

by Fred 2:02 AM

Wednesday, February 26, 2003

 

Amy could feel it breaking. She had broken shards in her lap, chunky pieces of pottery pushed around by clumsy, fumbling fingers. This was a thing breaking.

She had hung so much on this relationship, flown out here to see him, and now she was flying back. And it hadn't fixed anything. Amy felt like an ogre in her confining airplane seat: Huge and stupid and destructive. She'd broken it. He didn't want to see her ever again. He'd said as much, and then left her to find a cab to the airport.

She tried saying his name again, but her tongue was swollen and stuck to the roof of her mouth. Her lips felt cracked and ready to bleed. Too much crying. Big, blundering, ugly... ruined the best thing in her whole life, something she could never get back, never replace. Recirculated air cooled the red splotches next to her eyes. A few tears welled up, aching over a mistake made 17 years ago, that she no longer had the power to fix.

The crisp sunlight reflected into the oval window pierced her eyes, made them water. Taking satisfaction in the deserved discomfort, Amy stared out at the vast floor of perfect white clouds. She wondered if she could walk on them, where she could go.

And then: a sob. A rainbow halo had exploded around the shadow of the plane, a radiance of colors on the flat, bright clouds, with the center of the circle pinpointed on Amy's own window. She wept freely, for herself, for her son. With mumbled private thanks to that which had sent the glory, she dared to hope.

by Sharon 11:59 PM

 

glory

by Sharon 2:49 AM

Tuesday, February 25, 2003

 

That'll do, pig:

Fish Shoes Slipping on Gunmetal Sidewalks

There was a man who lived in leeds, and filled his wife all full of lead, when he looked back and he could see, he knew he'd shot the woman dead...

by MisterNihil 5:20 AM

Friday, February 21, 2003

 

Kat hated it all the while she needed it.

Stark, silver-etched trees clawed questing fingers at the night, and cast shadows on the damp earth. Kat sat amongst rotting leaves, feeling bark raise pulls in her shirt. The silence was complete.

She looked at her hand in the moonlight—knuckles, palm, knuckles—and thought about what she might do with it. What power it might wield, were it liberated. She pictured cutting it off, raising a butcher knife—no, an axe—and sweeping down in a grand arc to sever it in one clean chop. It wouldn't be like that, though. Real life, no special effects: It would take several hacking cuts. And then it would only bleed, and scream agony, and fail to crawl off to feed the starving or wield Excalibur. She turned her hand over in the moonlight—palm, knuckles, palm.

She sighed, just to make noise in the night, insert herself into these woods, while she waited. Kat was hungry, starving, but the gnawing empty ache sat behind her breastbone, instead of under her rib cage. This waiting could end any time, in Kat's opinion. She adjusted her back against the tree trunk and scraped blood from a shoulder blade. An end to the waiting, then launched into fire with a kiss of pain: That is what she craved. To be bigger than everything, and hold it helpless in her fingers, even if for only a few hours.

Sucking wet slug sounds insinuated themselves into her senses. Ah, here it comes. This thing she had found, a creature in the woods but not of the woods, shambled and oozed its way between moon-limned oaks. Kat turned her face up to the night and closed her eyes, welcoming it to feed.

by Sharon 11:57 AM

 

   She called him Frenchie. It was a term of endearment, and also she hated the name Jacques. First, it had a silent s. This disturbed her. Second, it reminded her of a time when, in school, some boys had teased a foreign exchange student be calling him "Jacques Strap." When they gave him a wedgie, he'd been so insulted, he'd gone back to Japan. Children are ignorant.
   So she called him Frenchie.
"I love you more than the diamonds in the sea," he said.
"Don't start that again."
"No, no. Ah, I love you more than the King of Prussia loved his Second Concubine?"
"Don't even try Frenchie."
"I get this right. Jus' wait. Ahhh, I love you, 'owyousay, Like the monkey loves a bee?"
"No. Look, Frenchie, we have to talk. I just can't do this any more."
"I will try one more time. Jus' wait. Hmmm. My love for you is like small creeping things in the moonlight; it is like an octopus! Yes. Octopus!"
"No, Frenchie. Look, I'm sorry. We need to see other people."
"NO! I am wounded! Love flows from me in waves of pink-footed, clean-burning natural gas! Ah! 'Ow will I go on?"
"You'll keep seeing the other three women you've been seeing behind my back for two years."
"Wahll. Yes. I shall. Good day, then, my smallest pig, my little flea."
   With that, he was up and out of the restraunt. Sticking her with the check for the last time.

by MisterNihil 11:04 AM

 

Shawn's off-line for a few days (How do you survive?), so you're stuck with me:

small creeping things in the moonlight

by Sharon 8:33 AM

Thursday, February 20, 2003

 

Eddie The Fish looked at the menu. He knew about half of the items there. He hated Aji, he hated tako and nama-tako, he hated tamago (although not so much as tako. The thought made him shiver.), he hated buri and buta. In fact, he'd tried pretty much everything he had any will to try, and didn't intend to start taking stabs in the dark. He'd tried that once, and had been brought a large plate of stuffed squid, raw, with cabbage and something the waiter would only identify as kanimiso. So never again.
   He ordered a coke, and sat and waited for his guy to show up. Jimmy would come by at 7:32pm, and ask for his table. He hadn't made a reservation and was using this to bluff his way in. He was coming in on a whim. He didn't know Eddie was waiting for him.
   The waiter brought him something on a dish, covered. When he asked what it was, the waiter pointed to the menu, and a line of text (極小の紫色の魚 / 微小紫色鱼). He told the waiter he hadn't ordered it, and discovered he was alone. He took the cover off of the dish, and looked at the food inside. Two nondescript rolls, a pile of some form of greens, and two glasses of water with bits in them. He sat and looked at the dish for a moment, and realized that the bits were moving. He looked closer and saw that inside the glasses were living fish, swimming in circles.
   Jimmy was bluffing his way inside. Eddie was looking at the tiny, purple fishes. The waiter was nowhere to be seen.
   Jimmy was seated at his table, and Eddie stood up. Jimmy ordered a beer and sat looking smug. He'd bluffed his way into a place that required reservations. Eddie walked toward Jimmy's table.
   Eddie placed his hand on Jimmy's shoulder, and Jimmy fell face-down into his napkin. Eddie walked back to his table and looked at the dish again. He picked up one of the glasses, and drank it down quickly, then walked out of the restraunt. He left a five on the table.






Don't know? Look it up.

by MisterNihil 10:53 AM

 

tiny purple fishes

by Fred 2:02 AM

Wednesday, February 19, 2003

 

Freddy wandered back from the barn, hands in pockets, and whistled a low, tuneless song. He seemed very interested in the clouds, the tops of the house and trees, the birds taking flight.
   His sister, Maggie, sat on the bottom step up to the house. She glowered at him, waiting for him to make eye contact in the hopes that she could tear his soul from his body. Martha Staples said you could do that. She said her mother did it to the mail man when he brought her the phone bill from her father calling his aunt in Europe and leaving the phone off the hook for three hours. Maggie hoped to do it to Freddy. She didn't know how she'd know. Would he just fall over? Or cry? She hoped he'd cry.
   Freddy ambled up to the steps. He put his hand on Maggie's head and tousled her hair. He seemed absolutely fascinated by a cobweb in the top corner of the porch.
   She hoped the hate would boil up through her head and melt his hand like so much pale wax. She could just imagine him howling in pain, and then accidentally lowering his eyes to hers and having his soul sucked out. She slitted her eyelids, thinking of how much he deserved that.
   Freddy turned his head down, making deliberate eye contact with Maggie. He shook his head sadly and said, "Sorry Maggie. It had to be done." He went into the house.
   She was shocked and disappointed when her brother didn't shrivel up and die horribly there on the concrete, and angrier because she couldn't hate him as much as she had. He was right. It had to be done.
   Next, her father came out of the barn. He was wearing overalls and carrying a shovel with fresh earth on it. His right hand was rapidly turning bown with drying blood. He walked up toward the house from the barn.
   She didn't want to suck his soul from his body. She just wanted him to know he was wrong. She was shaking inside with impotent rage as he neared the house.
   "Maggie, Honey, your cat was sick. There wasn't anything else to do." He looked sadly at her. He wanted her to stand up and hug him and realize that she couldn't be mad forever. She didn't move, and wouldn't look at him, so he went into the house to clean up.

by MisterNihil 2:24 PM

 

damnation

by Sharon 12:16 PM

Tuesday, February 18, 2003

 

   "Thanks for calling Invisitech's Tech Support, this is Humbert speaking. How may I help you, Franklin?"
   "Hi. Um. My computer is broken."
   "Do you have your customer direction number?"
   "Um. No?"
   "Ahh. I'm sorry, we can't help you without your customer direction number."
   "Well, how would I find that?"
   "Did you buy your computer from us?"
   "Yes."
   "When you bought your computer, did you get an invoice in the mail?"
   "Yes."
   "It'll be on that, in numerals three inches high, with the words 'Never Forget This Number' above and below it in letters with a flame motif, set against a flashing light, although the battery is probably long dead."
   "I didn't see any number on the... Oh, I see. The big one?"
   "Yes sir. If you like, we can have a tech come around and tattoo it on your person for safekeeping."
   "Uh, no, thanks. It's 17."
   "Alright Mister Hinkley of 127 Expressive Place, Agamemnon, Montana, what can I do for you? How are your two children, Roberta and Hymdal? Your wife, Ynga?"
   "Um. Fine. But, my computer is broken."
   "What seems to be the trouble?"
   "Hey, how did you know about my family?"
   "Oh, all that information comes up when I enter your number. How are your bunyans?"
   "Fine, they've stopped hurt- Hey! How'd you know about that?"
   "Do you remember the application for your computer? Do you remember checking the 'Absolutely, Emberrasingly Invasive' radio button?"
   "Well, I remember the button, but I unchecked it."
   "Yes sir. That button allows us access to information you would never want us to know, like your scorching case of Herpese, which, of course, we don't know about. The information we have here is just the requirements, not preferences. If you'd checked that box, we'd know everything. Even your history of cheating on your wife with a man named 'Huber.' But, of course, we don't know about any of that."
   "Right. Well, good. I mean.. What?"
   "So, sir, if it's not too much trouble, what's wrong with your computer?"
   "It keeps popping up a window that says 'Please enter Last Paycheck Amount.'"
   "Yes sir, that will be the budget program."
   "I deleted that, though."
   "No sir, you deleted the porn we installed on your computer as a distraction so you would think you deleted the budget program. We prefer you not delete the budget program. If it were actually gone, your computer wouldn't upload your spending habits to our server, and we couldn't serve you with such accuracy. By the way, there's a smoothie bar just six minutes walk from your house."
   "Well, I... Thanks? Um. I don't want a smoothie, though."
   "No sir, but you will, seven minutes from now. As for your problem, we ask that you go ahead and tell the computer the amount of your last paycheck. And Franklin, please don't try to change any more settings. We'd hate to get upset with you."
   "Um. But I don't necessarily want all of-"
   "Franklin, we need to get off the phone. You need that smoothie, and I need to help your wife. She's on line two. Her hard drive froze up after she knocked the computer off the desk during her affair with your brother. Thanks for calling Invisitech, where requirements, not preferences dictate your level of service. Oh, and Mister Hinkley, I've scheduled a tech for next Wednesday for that tattoo. He'll be in around seven. Be at your house."
   "But I don't want-" (click)

by MisterNihil 2:44 PM

 

requirements, not preferences

by Sharon 2:01 AM

Monday, February 17, 2003

 

[removed by author]

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

  "What is the meat?"
   "What? You wan' Yee-Roh?" He said, holding the knife, quivering over the rotiseree.
   "No, no. Is it Lamb? Beef? What is it?" She pointed to the chunk of meat, turning slowly, juice running in rivulets like rivers on a brown, fibrous planet.
   "Yes. Meat. Yee-Roh? Souvlaki? You wan' Yoghurt?"
   "Um, but what is it? I can't have some kinds of meat. Is it pork?"
   "Is Bif. Pik. You know, meat." The knife was still quivering, as if itching to slice off pieces of the flesh before it escaped.
   "Is it poultry?"
   "Poultry. No. Is no poultry. Is taste like chicken, no poultry." He was clearly puzzled by this. "Is Bif, pik. Is meat. You wan' pickle? With Fries?"
   "Ok, USDA, I want to see the chef." She flashed an official-looking badge.
   "Us'da? Is feesh? No. No feesh on Yee-Roh. Feesh Souvlaki."
   "No, no. I don't want fish, I don't want a gyro," She said it like a stabilizing device in a jet. A Gyro. "I don't want a souvlaki. I need to see the chef. The Manager? Boss man?"
   Finally, he understood. "Oh, yes. Boss man! You come back to kitchen, I get Aristotle."
   She stepped behind the counter and into the small, quieter kitchen. Most of the gyro-making process happened out front. Here were the fry vats and a chopping board for lettuce. Also a door to a back office and the freezer where the meat was, ostensibly, kept. She opened the door and saw six more shanks of meat, as unidentifyable as the one out front. There were, however, odd shapes on them, a row of circular bumps on each shank, evenly spaced and in a double row. They looked familiar, but she couldn't place where. She turned around and was startled by a small man behind her.
   "Hello. I'm Aristotle. Was there a problem with August?" His accent was as thick as that of the man outside, but more understandable.
   "Um, no. I just need to know what kind of meat that is on the rotiseree out there."
   "And may I ask why?" He wasn't hostle, just curious. There was something odd about his eyes that she couldn't place.
   "Rutherford, USDA. We got a call from a customer."
   "I be happy to show you. You know, we grow our own meat here on site."
   "I didn't. Do you have the appropriate licenses for on-site slaughtering?"
   "Of course. Back here, in office." He walked backwards, never facing away from her, quickly behind a door and into a small office in the back, closing the door partially behind him. She moved up to it, and pushed it open.
   The first thing she saw was Aristotle, hanging some three feet in the air, suspended by a tentacle. The tentacle was attached to a central mass, with one staring eye, surrounded by teeth. The smell of fish and rot suddenly hit her, like walking past the dumpster behind a fish market. She felt another tentacle move behind her, pull her into the room and shut the door. The other moved and set Aristotle down and pulled out of his back, where it had been holding him up like a puppet. As the tentacle wrapped around her, she realized the shanks of meat had not growths on them, but suckers. As the realization hit her, she was lifted off her feet and pulled toward the gaping maw and that one, terrible staring eye.

by MisterNihil 2:11 PM

 

Green Men in Souvlaki Shops

Although, if you prefer to do "Sociopathic Blind Bondage Lawyer with a Stick," that's OK too.

by MisterNihil 9:02 AM

Saturday, February 15, 2003

 

"What's a shoggoth?"

"I told you, you wouldn't understand."

"Oh come on, tell me!"

"All right, but...well, see, it's complicated, okay? They're sort of these indescribable, nightmarish blobs. There's a lot of that kind of thing in Lovecraft: you know, horrors too vast for the human mind to comprehend."

"So he doesn't actually describe them?"

"Well, no, not really. Or sort of, maybe. He kind of skirts around it a little. They're a little like big evil amoebas. He says they're -- where's that passage? -- 'shapeless congeries of protoplasmic bubbles, faintly self-luminous and with myriads of temporary eyes forming and unforming as pustules of greenish light all over the tunnel-filling front --' Now, see, you're not even listening to me anymore."

"I am so! It's just -- he actually writes like that?"

"Like what?"

"I dunno. It's just -- it's kind of wordy."

"Well...yeah, I guess, but that's not the point. See, they were intended to be beasts of burden for the Great Old Ones."

"Which is what you think Bob from Accounting is?"

"Exactly. I'm not sure which one -- maybe Hastur the Unspeakable, maybe even Cthulhu -- it's hard to tell when you can't see the tentacles -- but there's definitely something otherworldly and eldritch about him."

"Because he brought a Jello mold to the company picnic?"

"Not Jello. Shoggoth. Didn't you see the way it moved? That wasn't natural."

"It was pineapple. But you know what, you were right. I don't understand."

"That's okay. Nobody ever does. Say...you won't tell Bob I'm on to him, will you?"

"Don't worry. Your secret's safe with me."

by Fred 11:59 PM

Friday, February 14, 2003

 

“Of course,” White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer told reporters earlier today, “we’d need hamsters.”

When asked to clarify these remarks, Fleischer said that the U.S. will not back down from its threat of military action against Iraq unless Saddam Hussein provides the UN weapons inspectors -- and, by extension, the U.S. -- with the “name, location, size, and especially eating habits” of the many “cute and no doubt fluffy hamsters” he said are presently being held illegally in Baghdad.

“This is a clear violation of Security Council resolutions,” Fleischer said, citing recent aerial and satellite photographs of what the administration claims is an abundance of hamster cages in the Iraqi capital. He pointed also to numerous intelligence reports and recordings of intercepted phone calls between key Iraqi military personnel, throughout which, he claimed, one could clearly discern “the unmistakable scampering sound of a hamster, running playfully on its wheel.”

Were these so-called “hamsters of mass destruction” to fall into terrorist hands, Fleischer added, “there’s no telling what kind of weird-ass scary shit could happen. The administration cannot -- and will not -- allow that to happen.”

He then proceeded to read aloud from Hamsters: A Complete Pet Owner’s Manual, which he said will be the administration blueprint for war, should such a worst-case scenario become inevitable.

by Fred 11:55 PM

 

"Of course, we'd need Hamsters."
"Well then that idea's out. I mean, we need to do this tonight and the pet stores are already closed. I wouldn't know where to pick up an emergency bag of hamster chow, much less an actual rodent."
"Yeah."
"Well, what if we knocked out a guard and snuck in the back door, pouring floor wax as we went, climbed up the elevator cables and sealed the doors of the eighth and twelfth floors with crazy glue (from the inside), put a smoke bomb into the air duct that terminates between the twelfth and thirteenth floors, set the timer for sixteen minutes, slid down the elevator cables, and ran outside, slid between the guards legs on the floor wax, and ran outside in time to see people flooding out of the building (except the people from the eighth and twelfth floors, who would die of smoke inhalation), and joined the crowd? Then, when everybody was busy being worried by the smoke, we could pick the president's pocket and sneak the keys to the basement, where we could bury our tools and gloves, and then make a clean getaway."
"Of course, we'd need Shovels."
"Well then that's out. The hardware stores are closed, and I can't pay the prices at Wal Mart."
"Yeah."
"Well, what if we snuck into the building on the eighth floor by climbing up the glass, cut open the window of our mark's office, and used a poisoned blow-gun dart to take him out, then stole his ID? I could sneak up to the twelfth floor with the ID while you mixed the poisoned coffee in with the general coffee supply. I could slip into our twelfth floor mark's office and poison him with the hand-buzzer (I'd pose as a new client, of course), then take his ID, join back up with you, set off the fire alarm, and we could slip out while the office is on the lawn."
"Of course, we'd need Coffee."
"Well then that idea's out..."

by MisterNihil 2:02 PM

 

Faith made arrangements, so as her proxy, I post, in honor of Valentine's Day:

Of course, we'd need HAMSTERS.

by Sharon 2:33 AM

Wednesday, February 12, 2003

 

He was a Type A. He defined Type A. He recommended the extension of the specification to accommodate a Type AA. He was very high strung.

When I was hired as his secretary (the third that year), the grad students took out a pool on how long I'd last. At department functions, a clutch of staff assistants, after much conferring, would send out an emissary with a loaded gun: "So, ah, you work for Jim?" Never say anything bad about your boss.

There were blessed moments of peace in a week. Not during the summer, though. But during the school year, he would teach classes, and be gone for hours at a time.

I made a bad judgement call one day. He had a meeting abutting a class, so I didn't expect to see him. I took a late lunch—12:30. By 1:30, he had had an entire 30 minutes to search the building for me, cook his blood into a boil, and decide that I was deliberately thwarting his attempts at efficiently squeezing every minute out of a day.

He blustered. He fumed. He sounded irrational. And something snapped in me. Forgetting to be cowed by his experience, prestige, seniority, education, and accolades, I stated quietly, innocent and respectful, "Would you like to start working now, or would you like to continue to yell at me?" He shut his mouth, blinked once, and sat down to work.

Later, I passed out.

by Sharon 6:08 PM

 

   Dhavi Khanuni stepped on an ant on Monday.
   Had he not stepped on it, that ant would have crawled into his pantry and set up housekeeping.
   Dhavi Khanuni slammed his thumb in the door of his car on Tuesday.
   While he stood next to his car blowing on his finger, the ant would have been discovering his bag of rice. It would have eaten rice, bringing grains back for its grubs to feed upon.
   Dhavi Khanuni split his pants while praying at midday on Wednesday.
   While he bowed, pensive and silent, trying not to think of his exposed rear, the ant would have been dancing gleefully back and forth as its grubs metamorphosed into young adult ants.
   Dhavi Khanuni spilled coffee on his shoes on Thursday.
   While he danced in the coffee shop, waiting for the liquid soaking into his socks to cool, the ant and its young would have been feasting on rice in his closet.
   Dhavi Khanuni met a girl on Friday.
   While he tried to ascertain whether she was married, the ant and its young would have spread into the neighboring apartments, including Khanuni's mother's next door.
   Dhavi Khanuni had a date on Saturday.
   While he chatted with a young, unmarried woman whom he had met just the day before, the ants would have bitten several people that Saturday night, and it would have become obvious that, while they looked like normal sugar ants, they contained a venom to which most people are severly alergic. The ant nest would have spread to other apartment buildings, and killed most of the people in those buildings, including Dhavi Khanuni.
   Dhavi Khanuni ran out of rice on Sunday.
   While he thought of what else he should purchase from the corner market, the ants would have marched upon Cairo, taking over the country and driving out almost all of the people. Egypt would have become a no-mans land, populated only by these ants.
   Dhavi Khanuni stepped on an ant on Monday. A week later, he was out of rice, and the ant was still dead.

by MisterNihil 3:02 PM

Tuesday, February 11, 2003

 

It isn't the cold that bothers me. I own a comfortable fleece that keeps me warm and a good pair of gloves. I don't especially like the cold (and it wouldn't kill me to invest in a hat or a scarf), but I get by. I can manage. I turn the heat on in my car or in my apartment, and soon enough I've lost track of how many degrees above or below zero it is outside my window. I'm looking forward to the day when I can once again leave that window open, but until then, like I said, I can manage.

It isn't the snow that bothers me. It sticks to my clothes, gets in my car and my shoes, makes it difficult to walk without slipping (or worrying that I'll slip), chokes the road, and makes driving difficult and dangerous. But snow melts. On rare occasions, enough of it means that I can get to work late or leave work early. A thick blanket of snow usually acts as a layer of insulation, absorbs the sun, warms things up just a bit, just enough. And sometimes I don't even know that it's snowing; it's started and stopped before I've even had a chance to get a good look.

It isn't the road conditions that bother me. I sometimes wonder if the streets are plowed as well or as often as they could be, and my wheels skid and swerve more often than I'd like, but I haven't been in an accident yet. I'd like to think I'm not a reckless driver. It's dangerous at rush hour, when I'm going to or leaving work, and I can't avoid making those trips. But I take them slow, and if a fifteen-minute drive takes me half an hour (or an hour) -- well, worse things have happened.

And it isn't the lack of sunlight that bothers me. I wish there were more bright, sunny days and that the ones we have lasted longer, but it's not perpetually gray, rainy, or overcast. I know Sharon's called State College the third cloudiest city in the US, but there are plenty of days when I don't agree with that, or when even the possibility that it's true doesn't seem so bad. The clouds part and the sun comes back, and ultimately that isn't what bothers me about winter.

What bothers me -- or at least what bothers me most -- is this persistent sameness. It isn't that it's cold; it's that it's always cold. It isn't that it snows; it's that it never stops. It isn't the driving; it's knowing that I'll need to scrape snow and ice off of my car two or three times a day, knowing that by the time the roads are plowed, they'll need to be plowed again, that I'll have to go through the same thing the next day and the next. It isn't winter that I hate, but the way it lingers, never leaves, how there's nothing to look forward to about it because it's all the same. I can deal with a few cold, gray days of difficult driving, but it gets tough when they're all strung together like this, when you start to feel like that's all you're going to have for the next two or three months.

Ultimately, I'm okay with winter. I just wish it was shorter.

by Fred 5:51 PM

 

It starts with fear. Then
pressure pain inexorable
squeezing shoving expelling
rejecting
And a scream.
Mine. Yours.
Assault on every nerve!
when the pain subsides
fear abates
longing insinuates icy tendrils
creeping vines of cold
regret
to wrap
and squeeze
the heart until you forget how it felt
to beat.
Squeeze.
Squeeze.
Strangle.
And grow up.

by Sharon 1:05 PM

Monday, February 10, 2003

 

"All you ever do is comedy"
"All you ever do is stupid."
"You don't write anything real. Stop writing."
"You haven't written an original piece in almost six years. Start writing"
"And now you're sick of funny. So sick, you can't even write Happy Little Monkeys."
"Well, you're so sick of retreading the same ideas over and over, you can't write Happy Little Monkeys either."
"How would you do it, Hack?"
"I'd write about monkeys eating babies in the Congo. They schmooze their way in, pretending to be friendly and domesticated, then eat babies. And don't call me hack, hack. How would you do it? Orcs again?"
(taken aback)"No, no. Um. No.     I was gonna have them be hanging from a tree, and this guy comes along, and... um..."
"They steal his hat. Right? You were going to steal his hat."
"NO! OK, yeah, but then he'd get a gun, and-"
"It wouldn't work, and he'd have to throw it at them, and they'd shoot him instead. Oooh. Twist ending. Oooh. Hack."
"I'm not. It's better than eating babies."
"No. It's hack. Eating babies is at least different."
"Well, how would you do it if you were me?"
"I'd probably have the monkeys go into a bank and try to make a withdrawal."
"That's how you'd do it. How would I do it?"
"They'd shoot the guard?"
"Yeah. That's how I'd do it."
"You're pretty predictable. You just do comedy with nasty twists."
"No, that's you. Ben got confused. Count back from here, and you'll see that I do the retreading, and you do the comedy."
(counting)...three, four, five, six... Yeah. You're right. I mean, you just do the same old ideas with nasty twists."
"Right. So, are we gonna do the 'eat the babies' essay now?"
"Nah. I don't feel like it. Let's just wait for the new topic. I mean, this one'll be backdated to go yesterday. I can probably do this again today."
"No you can't, actually. There's a dentist appointment. Remember? They're fixing those two fillings."
"Oh yeah."
"So, tomorrow then?"
"Or this evening."
"Sure."
"Bye."
"Bye."
(both simultaneously)"Hack."

by MisterNihil 11:40 PM

 

happy little monkeys

by Fred 9:07 AM

Saturday, February 08, 2003

 

second-hand treasures

by Sharon 2:01 AM

Friday, February 07, 2003

 

Clarent counted on his fingers the reasons he was here. 1: Slept with my brother. 2: Four fur coats. 3: Married me for pity, convenience, and money, and, 4: said as much. Yes, this was the right answer. The only answer. She had driven him to it. Yes, driven. He was simply following the only path she'd left him.

He yelped when the fire leapt up. The light danced in the old witch's merry eyes. She grinned wolfishly at him, and cast another handful of powder into the fire. She reached into a ceramic bowl and dug her fingers under purple, glistening entrails. "Slippery chicken, oh ho ho," she sang to taunt him as she plucked pieces to offer to the pyre. Then she began to moan, and gibber, while frothy, white spittle seeped from the corner of her mouth.

Wow, it's really starting, now. Clarent thought frantically of stopping her, calling it off, but the moment passed, and he became transfixed by the Voo Doo witch's unseeing eyes.

She leapt over the fire. Pressed her face up to his. Her eyes focused straight into his soul. "Frightened, bok choy?" She ripped a hysterical cackle from her chest. Then she thrust out her palm, snapped her fingers impatiently. Clarent dug numb fingers into a pocket, his gawping mouth forgotten.

A small tuft of hair. Stolen, with the kitchen scissors, in the middle of the night. The crone had laughed at him, three days ago, when he'd arrived with a clot of hair pulled from his wife's hairbrush. It had to be fresh, and it had to be stolen, not discarded. But he'd done it. Last night, not daring to breathe, he'd cut off a lock of her hair. And he lingered a moment, standing by the end table, and weighed the scissors in his hand.

The witch smiled toothily and snatched the hair from his clumsy fingers. She fed it to the fire. Then she whirled on Clarent, grabbed his shirt, and threw him, so that he had to jump to avoid stumbling into the flames.

"Yes!" she cried. "It is done! You shall have your revenge."

by Sharon 12:50 PM

 

"Yes, but I'd like the War Shu Duck."
"We don't have War Shu Duck. We don't have duck at all. I gave you the menu."
"But this isn't a menu. A menu has choices. This just says 'Slippery Chicken and Frightened Bok Choy.'"
"That's &."
"That's what I said."
"No, you said Slippery Chicken and Frightened Bok Choy. The menu says Slippery Chicken & Frightened Bok Choy. The chef's very particular."
"What is Slippery Chicken?"
"It's like the chicken with almonds, but with more sauce."
"You don't have chicken and almonds."
"Look, sir. I'm going to have to ask you to leave if you keep this up."
"What?"
"It's Chicken with almonds, not chicken and almonds. It's actually illegal in this country to make chicken and almonds."
"No. What?"
"What?"
"What?"
"You said 'know what.'"
"No, no, I was denying the illegality, then asking what you meant."
"Oh. I see. Well then, it's illegal. It uses one of the eighteen slicing techniques banned by the Hempstead act of 1906, and also must be cooked au mutuel, which is heavily taxed-"
"Au Natural? Naked?"
"No, Au mutuel."
"What does aw muchooel mean?"
"Au mutuel is a way of cooking chicken. If I even describe to you what it means, there's an $800 tax we have to pay."
"Oh."
"Yes."
"OK... Well, could I have the Slippery Chicken & Frightened Bok Choy, and a small soft drink?"
"We don't have soft drinks."
"What kind of restaurant is this?"
"Why, Szescuan."
"Szechwan?"
"Again, no. Szescuan. It's a province of Liechtenstein."
"I didn't know Liechten-"
"Of course you didn't."
"Now, what's that supposed to mean?"
"Well, it's hardly common knowledge. We keep mostly to ourselves. We've just come over. With the war on, and all, we couldn't stay."
"What war?"
"You don't follow the news, then?"
"Well, I do, but I never heard of a war in Liechtenstein."
"You don't know the Liechtensteiner-Schweitz war? It's been going on for almost four hundred years. It started as a battle for Most-Neutral-Nation status, but in four hundred years of fighting, you kind of forget the whole purpose. Damn those Swiss."
"Wow. You're really bitter about this."
"Well who wouldn't be? They've murdered almost six people in the last four hundred years!"
"Almost six thousand?"
"Good God, no. There aren't six thousand extra people in Liechtenstein who could be murdered. Almost six. Unless Fritzy has died since we left."
"Oh. War is hell, huh?"
"You don't have to be patronizing. If you think about percent of total population, that's the same as almost a million people from this country dying. You didn't lose a million people in World War Two. We lost four, which is, again, a higher percentage of our total population that you lost."
"Um.. I'm sorry?"
"As well you should be. And then you come in here and criticize our traditional Liechtensteiner Szescuan cooking! How Dare You!"
"I didn't mean to. Um. Maybe I'll just have the Slippery Chicken."
"You can't just have the Slippery Chicken! It doesn't work that way! It's like asking a Brit for some Squeek. Why in the world would you want Squeek without Bubble? For that matter, why would you want boiled cabbage and potatoes anyway? That's beside the point! You wouldn't ask for just Squeek. It's Slippery Chicken & Frightened Bok Choy. That's the menu. That's what you can have."
"Ok. One order, please."
"Thank you. Please come again."

"And some salt?"

by MisterNihil 9:54 AM

 

Slippery Chicken & Frightened Bok Choy

by MisterNihil 8:28 AM

Thursday, February 06, 2003

 

First, you have to picture my father.

He is a large man, with domineering eyebrows perched atop a withering glare. His bullshit detectors are always on, and he'll call you on it. When he plays chess, he thwacks the pieces into position with such confidence that your knights are nervous and your pawns are as likely as not to break file and flee. He was the Delaware state chess champion when he was 14, and when asked about the outcome of his game against song-satirist Tom Lehrer, he replied, "I must have won; I only remember the ones I lose."

He reads the Wall Street Journal and watches 60 Minutes. He canceled his subscription to Time because it contained too much fluff. The last fiction he read is a Harry Potter book, because they received such press in the Wall Street Journal.

Having recently completed his dream house, he sits high on his hill with an imperious view of the valley. Furniture is spare—or so you think, until he quotes you the figure: "37 bottoms. We can accommodate 37 bottoms." And you realize that the greatroom is simply that big.

Stationed in this greatroom is the entertainment center he has owned my entire life. It has been rewired frequently, usually when guests are due to arrive, leaving my mother with a pile of wire casings while Dad dashes off to shower as the guests pull up the drive. The stereo has a remote control (and binoculars, so that you can read the display from the couch). With this remote control, my father—demanding, stern, serious, and driven—will crank up the volume on his favorite song, nestled on a CD that Mom hunted up on the internet to satisfy childhood nostalgia, and he is likely to sing along:

If you go down to the woods today,
You're sure of a big surprise.
If you go down to the woods today,
You'd better go in disguise.
For ev'ry bear that ever there was
Will gather there for certain, because
Today's the day the Teddy Bears have their picnic.

by Sharon 2:49 PM

 

"I never did trust snakes."
Paul nodded his head, and he and Sammy walked along the forest path to the west.
"Not since that time when I was a boy.", said Paul, "But here I am, though, walking in the forest with this half-wit, looking for a snake. How do I find myself-"
"You know," said Sammy, "your internal dialogue is leaking."
Paul slowed down and looked at Sammy.
"I'll be damned."
The path forked ahead, one path looping around to the south, the other going still west, but bearing north.
"It's not polite, Paul. I mean, you don't know me. Calling me a half-wit without knowing me, that's just rude, that is."
"I can't help it if I'm one to believe the word on the street, I said emphatically."
"See? And you call me a half-wit? I don't have to internalize all the time, and I certainly don't feel the need to internalize out loud."
They arrived at the fork, and took the South bend.
"I was sure we should have taken the North bend, but the evil look in Sammy's beady eyes brooked no discussion."
"OK, that's it. You find the stupid snake alone."
Sammy whirled around and headed back toward the fork.
"Sammy turned angrily and walked away. Just like a half-wit to desert me in the middle of the forest."
"This isn't the middle of the forest!" yelled Sammy. "We're not quite ten minutes walk from your house. If your wife hadn't insisted, I wouldn't even have come! I hate you people. I'm moving back to Eastwich!"
"Ahh, an Eastwicher. They're all bad news. Maybe you should, I yelled back!" said Paul.
"I mean, your wife said 'If you go out in the woods today, looking for that stupid snake, you take Sammy with you.' I swear, I wouldn't have come if my wife hadn't shamed me into it! 'You take care of that lunatic,' she said. 'Don't you lose him, Sam!' But I mean to! I mean to!"
With that, Sammy turned and ran, leaving Paul in the woods.

by MisterNihil 2:38 PM

 

If you go out in the woods today...

by Fred 1:18 PM

Wednesday, February 05, 2003

 

Part I | Part II

Ooh, I bet you're wondering how I knew 'bout your plans to make me blue...

"I've heard through the grapevine," said the Weatherman, "that you've been looking for an umbrella. My associates and I would very much like to help you find it."

"Oh yeah, you're a regular pal," I said. "I guess that's what accounts for all the blood." I spat.

"Well...yes," he sighed. He threw an angry glance across the room toward the two goons who had brought me here. "I suppose I must apologize for the behavior of my underlings, Mr. Elliot. They can, at times, be a tad...overeager, shall we say. Appalling, I know, but your lip will mend, and I think given the circumstances -- "

"Which are what, exactly?" I asked. "Maybe you'd better fill me in. I'm kind of hazy on the details."

The truth was, I was still reeling from that morning's martinis, and getting roughed up on the ride over to the warehouse district hadn't helped. One thing the goons hadn't been eager to do was chat -- we'd had one conversation whose sum total was the connection of a fist with my mouth -- and so I was still trying to piece together what little I knew. There was an umbrella, which from the sound of it was maybe more than an umbrella. There was the redhead, who'd called herself Smith, and whose legs still haunted my dreams. And now here was the one they called the Weatherman, who'd had me dragged down to the docks, and whose goons gave the phrase "hired muscle" a bad name. I didn't trust any of them, and I was starting to feel like I had back in junior high algebra class. Nothing ever added up for me there either.

"It's really quite simple," said the Weatherman. "We don't want to see the umbrella stay in the wrong hands. It would be a terrible shame if this dry spell were to go on much longer."

"Bound to rain eventually," I said.

"That is what we are trying to ensure," he said. "And that is why we wish to help. You have to understand, Mr. Elliot, with the umbrella still in play, my associates and I are something of a disadvantage. We cannot predict the weather if the weather never changes."

"Wait," I said. It was starting to become more clear, and since I wasn't used to that feeling I wanted to take things slow. "Are you telling that me this umbrella...it stops the rain?"

"Yes," he said. "That is precisely what it does. Open it up, turn it on, and nary a drop will fall. As long as it is controlled by other forces, Mr. Elliot, I fear this drought will continue."

"Well that's not good."

"So," he said, throwing a second glance across the room, "do we work together, or do I let my anxious friends over there bloody your other lip?"

"No need for that," I answered. "Just tell me: what'd you have in mind?"

by Fred 6:19 PM

Tuesday, February 04, 2003

 

I learned to dance at CTY.

I mean, I'd attended school dances before, and my father and my grandfather taught me to waltz and foxtrot and twist, but it was at CTY, with cool grass under my feet, and sun chased by stars wheeling overhead, and accepting, nerdy friends all around, that I truly danced.

Never mind that it was to 80s music.

I remember one of those CTY dances in particular. Organically, spontaneously, we had formed a big circle, about 20 of us or so, bopping in our places around the perimeter. And then Billy Idol came on—If I had the chance, I'd ask the world to dance, but now I'm dancing with myself—and someone with a delightful hat leapt into the circle. She twirled and hopped, bounded across the diameter, and pounced on someone else, plunking the hat on his head.

He knew what to do: Laughing and grinning, he sprang into the circle. And then he put the hat on someone else.

And we danced, each having a moment, each in the moment together. With a hat, she asked the world to dance.

That is why goofy, weird, and ever-so-80s Billy Idol brings a reminiscent tear to my eye. That song's going to be in my head all day now.

by Sharon 11:59 PM

 

"But no, mama, you're too short!"
"Hush, little boy. I will do this for the good of the tribe."
   With that, my mama stepped out of our home between the walls of the JonzHowz to face her fate. We were all convinced that it would be truly horrendous, but in the end she seemed to have rather a good time. She curtsied to the Prince and they began to whirl around the emptied kitchen. His subjects were holding the Jonz Giants at bay, and the rest of our family sat on the kitchen table and watched the festivities. It wasn't entirely a glorious occasion as the marriage was a political one, but I knew that our future depended on this waltz. We sat with bated breath, twittering our wings and watching.
   The Prince, it turned out, was as accomplished a dancer as our mother. He doffed his little felt hat, and bowed low. Besides the hat and his sword belted to his waist, he wore no clothes. We could tell that his fur had been thoroughly cleaned (inasmuch as they ever cleaned) for the event, and we appreciated the effort.
   If the rodents or fae were to survive, it would have to be with mutual cooperation, and the best way to guarantee that was with a political marriage between the senior faerie and Prince HashMatzit (the grey and tufted).

(hee hee. Get it? Dancin' with mice elf?)

by MisterNihil 1:59 PM

 

dancin' with myse-elf

by Sharon 12:40 PM

Monday, February 03, 2003

 

"One day it's hornets, the next day it's ants?"

"Could be coincidence."

"Why take that chance?"

"You weren't worried 'bout beetles."

"In the moment it seemed fine. But now I'm starting to wonder."

"I think you need to unwind."

"Don't patronize me. The place is crawling with bugs!"

"Is that what this is about, or do you just need a hug?"

"Don't come near me like that, or I promise I'll bite!"

"Well, if nothing else, at least you're starting to write."

by Fred 11:59 PM

Saturday, February 01, 2003

 

The project lately has been "Be here now." Be fully present in the moment, experience and enjoy it for what it is, without harping on the past, fretting about the remote, or anticipating the next. It's very difficult.

Gibson's thoughts on cyborgs have also had me thinking lately, assessing my interfaces with the machines in my life. And I have to conclude that I live too much of my life remotely.

Evenings, Jon and I will come home and sit in the den, surfing independently, rapt with our square-headed lovers. What am I doing? I'm married to the best man in the world, and I'm seeking my interactions out there, living my life on the interweb?

Perhaps the first step in "Be here now" is to unplug. The command menu even tells you that this is the way to begin:

Start > Shut Down

by Sharon 11:59 PM