Friday, December 30, 2005

 

The caress is filled with many scents, each one overpowering the other . . . yet they are all distinguishable. The memories flow; past becomes present. I am somewhere else. Someone is laughing. I return the favor. It is akin to being out of my body, yet within it at the same time. The paradox is not quite as confusing as it ought to be. The sun shimmers off the water, I am momentarily blinded and the laughter continues in the background, tickling my ears and soul. Again, I return the favor. The afterimage brings forth a new memory, one of pain and desperation. The shouts of panic are shrill and call me to a place I do not want to be, yet I am swept there in a cascade of private agony. I feel like an intruder. Death is in the air. And life . . . the paradox continues . . . I am weightless. My perspective shifts yet again as a quick gust of ocean wind rouses me to my current reality. I long to shut my eyes and experience what just passed through the very essence of my psyche all over again. But that cannot be. It does not belong to me any longer. I reluctantly allow it to pass through me to the sands beneath my feet.

by ArchHallJr 12:44 PM

 

Standing at the shoreline, I feel the wind blow against my face.

by ArchHallJr 12:29 PM

Wednesday, December 21, 2005

 

Today, I make my stand. Today, I assert myself over the powers that be. I have talked and talked about this for far too long without doing anything about it. I refuse to tow the line I have been forced to carry all these years any longer! Let others continue with their sycophantic gestures. I no longer want any part of it. It seems to me that one would be better served listen to their inner rage about what is wrong with the situation than letting the days pass by as though nothing truly important to that individual mattered. It’s all one big joke when you look at it. I mean, when you really look at it from the inside out. We are told, “Tote that barge, lift that bail.” And we sometimes . . . get paid for it! Well, la-dee-freakin’ da! Today the barge will NOT be toted. The bail will NOT be lifted. Not by me. I’ve had all I can stand. The revolution WILL be televised and I will be the poster child for it. Think you can stand in the way? Try me. Just do it and see what happens! It’s 4:59 . . . get out of my way!

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

It's not gonna be a long day.

by Fred 7:59 AM

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

 

by Fred 7:27 PM

Monday, December 19, 2005

 

wire-tap

by Fred 2:05 PM

Thursday, December 15, 2005

 

Sometimes it skips a generation.

by Fred 12:30 PM

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

 

There's nothing good about winter.

by Fred 2:13 PM

Monday, December 12, 2005

 

spiders in the stars

by Fred 10:52 AM

Saturday, December 10, 2005

 

I don't remember how Christmas used to be, if that's what you're wondering. Back when I was a kid, thirty or forty years ago, there was a war against Christmas and a lot of good people died. A lot of blood was spilled. I try not to think about those days if I can help it, and I'd like to think the past is now behind us. Whatever victories or losses that war brought us, whatever lessons we learned or failed to learn, they're over and done with nowadays. There's no point in asking about what's done.

So, no, I don't remember those Christmases, really. Sure, there were presents. There were sales, and there were discounts, and there was pasteurized eggnog flowing everywhere like rivers from a tap. There were carols in the air 24-7.

But then somebody had to go and spoil it and call it a "holiday season." That's how the war started, the first volley fired. That's what led to all the senseless killing that would follow. And you know, I think the truth of it is, that was maybe the worst of it. I saw a lot in the years to come -- brother pitted against brother, the snow-laden streets drenched in blood, young men and women strangled in their beds with strings of blinking, colored lights -- but that first "happy holidays" instead of "merry Christmas," that still burns after all these years.

Why? Dear God^TM, why?

I wish you hadn't asked me about it. There's no point in dwelling on the past. It was a terrible time, but...well, we won it in the end. The secular humanists were rounded up and sent to the work camps. Even then, some people said it was too cruel, but I don't know. Nowadays, it seems like you can't get a decent Christmas tree or sleigh bell or blacklight Jesus poster from anywhere but the camps. Somebody must be getting rich. So yeah. Maybe, in the end, we really did them a favor.

God^TM knows, they'd have just as easily slit our throats in our sleep.

by Fred 6:47 PM

 

Childhood Christmas Memories

by Christy 6:27 PM

Friday, December 09, 2005

 

the price of coffee

by Fred 3:06 PM

Thursday, December 08, 2005

 

alien fisheries

by Fred 10:35 AM

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

 

by Fred 3:05 PM

Saturday, December 03, 2005

 

Sleep is coming. I feel it as each word is read and I comprehend it less and less. Any minute now. Huh? What? Where am I? Oh yeah, reading myself to sleep. There’s the flashlight, the book and my neck hurts. Time to turn off the flashlight and set the book on the dresser. Time to sleep. Lord, thank you for today. It was good. Give me another day tomorrow if you would be so kind. Hmmmmmm. What did I do today? Was it worth the effort in getting up? I suppose it was. I got a lot done today. I paid into my emotional bank account and withdrew some. Yes, indeed. I think my kids are growing up just fine. I am growing in my job. My wife is happy. Things are all around swell……………
What? Huh? Is that light? Where am I? Dammit! Am I in bed? What are those fucking dogs barking about? Who’s moving in the house? What? Huh? Dammit! It’s morning already. I think. What time is it? 5:41? The hell? Thanks God! Let me get up an hour before I’m supposed to get up. That sucks. Wait. Did I just say that? I need a new perspective here. Hmmmmm. I awoke alive, just like I asked God. Thank you for giving me another chance. I just wish morning wouldn’t come sooner that I would like it to at times. How’s that for perspective?

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

Morning came much sooner than I wanted it to.

by Christy 2:07 PM

Friday, December 02, 2005

 

You're not like all the other kids, are you?

by Fred 2:02 PM

Thursday, December 01, 2005

 

Time travel may not be the most efficient use of company resources.

by Fred 12:41 PM

Wednesday, November 30, 2005

 

becoming a scientist

by Fred 1:23 PM

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

 

or maybe not

by Fred 3:21 PM

Monday, November 28, 2005

 

back to work

by Fred 1:39 PM

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

 

travel plans

by Fred 10:25 AM

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

 

Joe's film wasn't finished, he told everyone. The version they were watching in class was just a rough cut. Some of the dialogue still needed to be looped, and he knew the ending was a little rushed. But he planned to spend most of that weekend in one of the editing bays on campus, making the necessary cuts and additions, until the film was perfect. Right now, though, it wasn't.

"So where by Monday I'll have a concise examination of man's struggle against man and the existential dilemmas that plague our day-to-day," Joe said, "right now I just have some dancing girls."

There was, in fact, some twenty minutes of dancing-girl footage. Some of the women, and some were in slow-motion, but most were clad in a darting suggestion of multicolored scarves. If asked, some of the class might have described the music that played over this footage as at least vaguely pornographic.

"And where I'll have a detailed examination of the social mores that govern our lives, along with a side-by-side comparison of the mores of both Edwardian England and fifth century Macedonia," Joe added, "right now all I have is...well, clearly more dancing girls."

Joe's film was the sleeper hit of the season.

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

rough cuts

by Fred 12:46 PM

Monday, November 21, 2005

 

What am I forgetting?

by Fred 8:32 PM

Friday, November 18, 2005

 

space food

by Fred 10:19 AM

Thursday, November 17, 2005

 

I signed up for pottery classes at ClayWays starting in January. I had studied wheel-thrown pottery for a semester in college and gotten rather competent at it, so part of my reason is just wanting to get back into it. But the bigger part is that I want new plates, smaller than the typical American monstrosities, but bigger than a salad plate. So I figured I'd make my own. Which means I need a kiln. And a wheel. And a sink that can handle a few pounds of mud. Hence, classes.

I stopped by ClayWays last weekend, to check it out before signing up for classes. They were gearing up for this weekend's Empty Bowl Project, frantically glazing bowls. I got roped into helping, which was a delight.

ClayWays reminded me of The Creative Oasis, my old creative outlet in State College. One striking characteristic of the Oasis, though, is space. That place is huge. You could hold dances there. I could spread my calligraphy out over an entire table. In ClayWays, I feel like I have to constantly watch my elbows. But the Small Business feel is the same: A couple of artists, and their business-capable friend, pursuing a dream and sharing art with the community. I could be a part of this.

by Sharon 11:59 PM

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

 

I'll try to explain what I meant when I said
It makes no difference if you're alive or you're dead
There's still good evidence they'll get inside your head
Even if you hide in the dirt

You'll say they're a myth, they're not real, a bad joke
But into your thoughts they'll soon steal and soon choke
With dark fingers that feel for all the world like a yoke
Even if you're dead it'll hurt

by Fred 6:09 PM

 

I'll try to explain.

by Fred 12:49 PM

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

 

inside your head

by Fred 1:15 PM

Monday, November 14, 2005

 

[removed by author]

by Fred 5:48 PM

 

not while I'm eating

by Fred 12:41 PM

Friday, November 11, 2005

 

war veterans

by Fred 2:24 PM

Thursday, November 10, 2005

 

evolving in front of your eyes

by Fred 1:35 PM

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

 

It was only luck that Jane found the message at all. For almost a week after the funeral, her cell phone had been acting up, or not acting at all; it would refuse to charge when she plugged it in, or it would dial the wrong number, calling complete strangers whenever she tried calling work or friends back in New York. On Saturday, the battery seemed to die altogether, cutting off just as she was scheduling her return flight to LaGuardia, and when she called back from the phone in her sister's kitchen, she learned that none of her information had been stored in the airline's computers. It would take maybe another twenty-five minutes to re-enter her name and credit card, book the flight, and get a confirmation number.

She didn't have time for that. Jane was meeting Tom, her sister's fiancé, across town to discuss what he wanted to do with Beth's things, whether they should donate the clothes to charity and if he wanted to keep any of the books. She didn't want to keep him waiting too long at the restaurant. Jane was worried about him, partly because she thought Beth would have been, and because she already felt bad enough for forcing Tom to go through with this so soon after the fact.

She told the airline she'd call them back -- which she'd have to do soon, she told herself -- and then she hung up and headed out the door.

It was only later, at Tom's apartment sometime after midnight, as she was stumbling in the dark from the bedroom to the kitchen to get a glass of water, that she heard the familiar chirping and realized her cell phone maybe wasn't dead after all. Finding her purse among the rest of her things tossed on the couch, Jane dug out the phone and pressed the little button on its side to light up the display.

Who could be calling her now? Could it be Alex, she wondered, back in New York? She hoped not. She didn't think she was up to lying to him again. He hadn't called since Thursday, the day of the funeral, and she'd told him she couldn't talk. He'd been hurt, but still, maybe he'd called earlier, when --

But no. It wasn't Alex. It was just a text message, and Alex never sent those. He didn't own a cell phone, refused even to use hers unless it was an emergency. Jane didn't recongize the number at the top of the phone's display, and there was no name attached with. The message had been sent around nine o'clock that evening, around the same time that she and Tom had arrived back at his apartment. She didn't know who it was from, but it wasn't very complicated.

It said simply, "Don't go."

by Fred 6:31 PM

 

message from the flipside

by Sharon 1:22 PM

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

 

The only way to throw your vote away is not to vote.

Some people hold that voting against popular opinion in a landslide election is a pointless exercise in shouting into the wind. What a lazy, cowardly, sheeplike, apathetic way to think. Every vote counts as much as every other. Every voice has equal weight. The minority opinion won't rule the day, but it will be heard. It does make a statement.

Yesterday, 3/4 of Texans approved an amendment to the Texas Constitution to ban gay marriage, but 60% of Austinites said that was hooey. That counts for something. That says something about where I live.

But this notion of "throwing your vote away" transcends any particular issue. Many countries don't let their citizens vote. Not long ago, this country didn't let its black or female citizens vote. That right is hard won and precious. Shame on you if you don't vote. You might as well waive your status as an American.

by Sharon 11:59 PM

 

throwing your vote away

by Fred 5:15 PM

Monday, November 07, 2005

 

You won't believe some of what I have to tell you.

by Fred 12:53 PM

Friday, November 04, 2005

 

The Tale of the Disillusioned Illusionist

by Fred 12:51 PM

Thursday, November 03, 2005

 

April is the cruellest month? Something tells me T.S. Eliot never tried his hand at NaNoWriMo, thought Louis, with a laugh -- not because it was a particularly good joke, or because he expected anyone else to find it amusing, but simply because he felt like he might crack up if he didn't laugh. After just three short days of trying his own hand at NaNoWriMo, he'd come to just two conclusions: first, his had was tired; and, second, he was going to lose it if he had to keep up this pace. He was starting to worry the whole thing had been a terrible mistake. He just was having any luck with the words.

Louis hadn't expected to burst out of the gate with the Great American Novel, and he knew the chances of coming up with anything of real value at all were against him. He knew that NaNoWriMo was more about simply forcing your hand and making you write than in getting a publishable novel under your belt. But knowing that and knowing it were two different things.

Maybe, thought Louis, writing a novel about NaNoWriMo had been a mistake, too cerebral and postmodern and self-referential a topic. He couldn't wrap his head around it. Who could? Was there even a plot? A man writing a novel? How could he have hoped to make that interesting? How could he possibly beef up that word count?

And how, he wondered, to get rid of this feeling that he was going to break apart into a million little pieces if he kept it up any longer -- that all he'd have to show for it, in the end, would be some cramped fingers, some lame scribblings, and possibly a year or two's stay in a sanitarium to recollect his sanity.

by Fred 5:49 PM

 

"I wanted so much to write that I couldn't write a word." - Walker Evans

by Fred 1:39 PM

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

 

"Ladies and gentlemen -- space spiders! The only space-saving arachnid for the home or office! Guaranteed to spin a web out of any cluttered closet, desk drawer or dank attic crawlspace..."

"Space Spiders. They came from beyond, but from beyond what, nobody knew. These weirdly misshapen, eight-legged monstrosities came to devour anything in their path, but they didn't count on that path running right by Dr. Clarence McCloud, international crime-fighting exterminator..."

"Okay, type space, then spiders, then another space, and then bite. Put in exclamation points. Not too many, but use your own best judgement. People need to know these spiders can be dangerous. They need to know they can bite. Why, just last week, little Timmy Wilkins' left arm was bitten clean off by one of those wild tarantulas. Well, no, I didn't see it myself. But a friend of mine, he assures me he was there and that it really happened, honest..."

"No space for spiders? Do you find that in your daily grind of a dog-eat-dog world you just don't have the space you once had for the arachnids in your life? Do the creepy crawliers you used to know and love keep falling by the wayside? Then you need spider-boxes, patent pending -- the first and as far as anybody can prove only box specifically designed for arachnid portability..."

"Space spiders eat their weight in dead flies,
Enough to dwarf every sun and blot out all the skies.
They've got giant jaws and such gargantuan thighs.
They've got their own systems of gravity welled up in their eyes..."

by Fred 5:24 PM

 

space spiders

by Fred 10:47 AM

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

 

You find these words hidden in the margins,
And you're not at first sure you recognize what they mean,
But you sense something familiar about the language,
Something you heard whispered, years ago, in a dream.

And as you slowly turn the rhythm of the pages,
The melody of the words is there revealed.
You piece together music in the missive,
Though something of the song's meaning's still concealed.

You speak the words aloud to see if you remember
They shape they ought to make on lips, in throats;
Their meaning, still obscure, still confounds you,
Though that night you dream of giant ships and distant boats.

You dream you're on an ocean built of language,
Where words are cresting waves that'll knock you to your knees,
Where you're lost sight of all the shores, there the margins,
And all you know now are the written seas.

by Fred 7:30 PM

 

find these words in the margins

by Fred 3:52 PM

Monday, October 31, 2005

 

boys and ghouls

by Fred 12:50 PM

Friday, October 28, 2005

 

inky

by Fred 11:35 AM

Thursday, October 27, 2005

 

If he had just one wish, it would be
"don't steal the fish."
It's for a special dish, the rich fish-knish.
Though they don't often mix,
the knish and the fish,
it's real foody bliss, says his girlfriend, Trish.
Yes, Trish says all this.
She says it's delish.
This Trish is a wit.
She says the fishless knish
would just make her sick,
would make her sick with a spit that's as thick as a brick.
But she says there's a trick
to this special dish
that one could miss
if one isn't quick.
The trick to fish and the knish, says Trish, is just this:
for the rich fishy knish,
you need a fish.

by Fred 6:35 PM

 

As he approached the house, he noticed something odd. The door was open a bit.

“Did I forget to close and lock the door?” he thought.

No. He always did that. It was automatic. And as he drew closer, he knew that he had. But the door was opened by force. Someone had kicked their way in! He had been, or was in the process of being, robbed. He dropped the groceries. Fuck the eggs. He ran into the foyer and noticed immediately the sorry state his home was now in. It looked like a small tornado had been through. Cushions were everywhere; furniture turned upside down, books strewn across the floor after having been flung from overturned shelves.

“The fuck?!?!?” He screamed, “Why me?!?!?”

This was just the living room. He wondered what had become of his den. He ran down the hall toward the room. The door was barely hanging on its hinges. He held his breath as he walked in and turned the corner. Absolute chaos. He was stunned. The trophies were all gone. All except one. He sighed with relief as he spotted the huge bass he’d landed just last summer still hanging on its mounting plaque just above the computer. He could replace everything else. The fish was there. And he didn’t have to be disappointed.

by ArchHallJr 12:53 PM

 

He'd be disappointed if they stole the fish.

by Fred 11:47 AM

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

 

Half the time travellers in the joint are gone by the time Josey gets there, like it's pre-arranged or something, which of course it is. Not that you need a quantum computer or a temporal widget or any of that shit to know what Josey's going to do. Damn, you can read that girl like a book. A time portal just gives you someplace to go that the rest of us nobodies can't manage. Saves you the embarrasment of maybe guessing wrong by half a second, just long enough for her to maybe spot you out of the corner of her eye before you duck out of the place. A pre-scheduled rip in time sure as hell beats trying to sneak out the back door, only to have her goons corral you out of the alley behind the joint and back inside. If Josey never knew you were there, she can't ever be mad at you for trying to leave. And trust me, there's nobody wanted to stick around for the pleasure of Josey's company. She's boring in ways they don't have words for in socialite magazines, and the things she'll have her goons do if she sees your attention start to waver...well, the less said, the better. Best just get your time-traveller shoes on and kick it.

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

I spend half the time looking at pictures, the other half reading the captions. It’s a wild prospect; all these people from different walks of life writing funny lines. Some of them have many things in common, most of them very little. But one thing that unites all is the thrill of knowing someone is laughing at what you wrote. Not everyone will but you do know that like yourself, as you read through the many captions, someone will come across yours and either chuckle, guffaw or downright pee their pants. It is the beauty that transcends the political and social difference among us. I would venture a guess to say that 95% of all people who ever lived at any time during humanities reign in this planet like to laugh. Perhaps that’s the eternal optimist in me; perhaps it’s just wishful thinking. But I want to believe it, even if it isn’t true to all. It is true to me. And I am all the happier for it. All people are funny; some just don’t know how to express their humor. So half the time I am wondering who is in touch with their inner clown, the other half I am busy recognizing who actually is. One thing is for sure . . . when I’m capping, I don’t have to wonder.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

half the time

by Fred 9:28 AM

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

 

pharmaceutical grade

by ArchHallJr 12:00 PM

Monday, October 24, 2005

 

Tougher than leather, hide hard as nails,
In any dark weather, sharp steel for its scales
Eyes shot with fire, breath hot with flame
The skies like a pyre when it's in the game
The world is its oyster, charred, broken and black
Go hide in your cloister and don't you ever come back
It'll eat you up raw and singe your poor flesh
Once you meet with its maw...well, I'm sure you can guess
Its steely dark stare will stop you quite dead
It'll scorch the whole air til the blood all burns red
You'll be turned to ash 'neath its withering gaze
And with sharp teeth it'll gnash your bones for a ways

by Fred 7:21 PM

 

tougher than leather

by ArchHallJr 12:29 PM

Friday, October 21, 2005

 

I don't know how significnat the socks were, per se. I know that Robert definitely thought they were, and that was enough for Rosalind, who refused to buy another pair, and who toyed with rhe idea of staging a nationwide protest and boycott until Robert told her it wouldn't make any difference. They didn't make the socks anymore, Robert told us; the company had apparently gone bankrupt. This was, he didn't know, maybe five years earlier, years before he'd even stumbled upon his own pair in the bargain bin at the nearby mall. There was nothing to protest. There was no one to boycott. It had been a small company to begin with, and, unlike some larger, couldn't stagger back from a bankruptcy. If it had been the socks in question that led to that bankruptcy, Robert could not say, but Rosalind certainly believed it. She had only to point at their weird unfinished ends, sigh at the holes where on other socks there would be toes, to feel that her point had been proven, that a protest would have been justified if circumstances were different. Robert could certainly credit the socks with the frostbite he had suffered that winter, but -- and this was something I would never have suggested to him, much less to Rosalind -- he could also credit his own stupidity at having bought and worn the damn things in the first place.

by Fred 7:31 PM

 

significant socks

by Fred 9:06 AM

Thursday, October 20, 2005

 

Are you full of money? Are you tired of that nagging feeling of not knowing what to do with it? Then we have a solution for you! Too many products these days give you the promise of separating you from your money and actually giving you something in return! Who needs that? If you wanted more stuff, you would have been seeking it out instead of trying to get rid of it! Right? That’s why we have developed this 90 day program to completely separate you from your cash! And it only takes a few minutes of your time to calculate! Are you ready? First, work out exactly how much cash you have. Bank accounts, investments and actual currency on hand. When you come up with a final figure, let us know and we’ll provide you with several options on how to make that cash disappear completely within 90 days. You can do hourly, daily, weekly or monthly. You can even give over your money in one lump sum payment! It’s just that simple! Whatever works the best for you! And here’s the most excellent part! You don’t need a money back guarantee if you are not satisfied with the service because . . . you are trying to get rid of that annoying capital in the first place! We pledge to remove that wealth in the manner you specify within the 90 day period or we’ll take your house too! Sounds like a great deal, doesn’t it? Call the number on the bottom of your screen to get started today!!!

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

full of money

by John W. 8:01 AM

Wednesday, October 19, 2005

 

When comparing these two unlikely breeds of humanity, one must consider that perhaps they are not an unalike as one might suppose. They both are frontiersmen in a way that no one who preceded them was. While the caveman did not need an environment suit to explore his world, he did have to survive considerable danger from predators and harsh environments. While the astronaut does not have to live a cave, he does have to spend many hours in extremely cramped quarters, cursed with immobility all the while. The caveman may not have understood the necessity of sanitary toilet habits (he must have at some point or we wouldn’t be here) but at least he had the freedom to relieve himself whenever and wherever he needed and/or wanted to. The poor astronaut was relegated to defecating, urinating and expelling flatulence in his clothes. Astronauts drank Tang and ate food from a toothpaste tube. Caveman drank fresh spring water and ate raw steak. I’m beginning to see a pattern here. However, with all the cool things that cavemen had in life, most not mentioned here, nothing they had could compare with the spectacle of watching the earth from geosynchronous orbit.
Astronaut wins.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

"Get over here, Ogg!" screamed Armstrong in frustration, but Ogg just kept circling. The stench of gazelle skin was overpowering; meat and grass and who knew what all else, and all that over Ogg's sweat. You would think, thought Armstrong, that with that scent you'ld be encouraged to invent curing. Or take a bath at the very.. Christ! Barely dodged that jawbone. Who knew he had a jawbone? What moron carried a jawbone?

Ogg.

Ogg grinned stupidly at him. It infuruated Armstrong, Ogg standing there smirking and sniggering like he knew something special, like he was the smart one, and he charged Ogg, dodging low and reaching behind to put Ogg in a hammer lock and coming up short on Ogg's knee to the groin. Goddamn it, if only he hadn't lost his blaster; Ogg wouldn't stand a chance then. But he didn't know how to fight, did Ogg; he kept biting. Who bit? Damn savages, that's who.

Armstrong's suit absorbed much of the hit; they might make him look like the Michelin Man, but they did that at least and rendered a good bit of Ogg's dirty fighting more of a psychological, rather than physical threat. He took advantage of Ogg's over-confidence, turned his hammerlock mid-stream into a quarter-nelson wristlock. Ogg howled in pain and anger, but the more he struggled, the worse off he was. The pain, Armstrong could see, was excrutiating. Cords stood out on Ogg's neck, sweat beaded in his temples and in the corners of his eyes. "Wararrgh," Ogg protested. "Grararrgh!"

"In English!" Armstrong insisted. Damn him if he was going to give an inch. Not now. Not at this point.

"Grargh!" sputtered Ogg. "Mrph!" he continued. And finally, concentration and the wristlock twisting his features, "Uncle!"

Armstrong immediately let go and took three quick paces back, narrowly missing another diner who had been staring, slack-jawed, at the sudden eruption of violence.

"Yeah?" said Armstrong.

"Yeah," gasped Ogg between breaths, he said, and started digging in his pockets for his rabbit-skin wallet Armstrong reminded himself: he had to win graciously. But he allowed a small bit of himself to celebrate silently. Armstrong really had come a very long way indeed. Finally, for the first time since they had known each other, Ogg was finally picking up the check.

by John W. 9:00 PM

 

astronauts versus cavemen

by Fred 10:23 AM

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

 

I couldn't stop
the words from coming out all
wrong, or
not at all; I tried
but couldn't think of anything to say or
rather
couldn't
think
of anything that wouldn't sound ridiculous,
like something
only
other people say.
I couldn't stop
to say hello, or if
I did, to say
anything else than that:
a nod, a smile, you
would have missed it even if you hadn't stopped to blink.
I couldn't stop
from wanting to say more, to think of
something
more
to say, like
...but that's just it. What could I
say?
What excuse for saying
more?
I'm aware that people,
other people,
don't make excuses, or
find them easily, or
don't
think
of them like that,
think of them, if at all, as
conversation,
just words.
I couldn't stop
for conversation. I couldn't
stop for words.
Put me on the spot and all
I
think
to say is I'd like to
say
more.
Forced to
talk, and I
say
only
that I want to talk, would you like to talk?
What's there to talk about?
Words are
treacherous things,
and I couldn't stop.

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

It became like breathing. An overwhelming urge to continue down a dark path that would surely engulf me in a cloud of controversy if what I was doing became public knowledge. That’s how it is when you are a public figure. But that is what made it all the more exhilarating. The thought of being caught whilst engaging in an act so . . . socially unacceptable . . . certainly had its appeal. Like no other act I had ever attempted before. And would not likely ever again. It wasn’t really a question of if, it was a matter of when. How would I be viewed? Victim? Sinner? Hero? Saint? Probably all those and many more. The sheer desire. The passion to complete. All intended to mislead those who would keep me from doing what it was that I needed to do. The water. A facsimile for a life unlived. It could not be otherwise. Why? Why couldn’t I stop when it started? Now, I have no choice but to wait for the end of it all. All. The chances man takes when obsessed with consuming zeal boggles the mind. Especially when the chances absorb every shred of awareness of the sublime. It doesn’t matter. It must be done.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

I couldn't stop.

by Fred 10:56 AM

Monday, October 17, 2005

 

It isn’t what you think. Forget all you know about what you read in the ads of Boy’s Life. These are the real deal. You may want to meditate before putting them on. You will see everything behind the flesh. Skeletons will be among you. And it may be a bit disconcerting. Voyeurs should avoid this product at all costs for you will not see what you think you will see. Unless, of course, what you want to see is bone. Or fibers. Or subatomic particles when used in conjunction with a microscope.
You really want to see something? Use the specs with an electron microscope. You will see God in all His glory. I have discovered the secret of the Trinity. Neutron, proton, electron. He truly is in everything we see around us. And it is with my invention that you can see Him, too.
This changes everything. You cannot begin to fathom the depths of True Knowledge until you have seen the Divine Presence that resides within all of everything. And the beauty of it is . . . you won’t need the specs after you use it long enough. It was only a week of prolonged usage that I began to see the universe as it really is at its core. I looked within and saw it all staring back at me.
It isn’t what you think.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

My xray specs arrived (four to six weeks) and I
wore them down to the corner store. They just
look like shades after all. They worked.

I could count the peanuts in the goo-goo clusters.
I could see what toy would drop next from the quarter machine.
I could see the girlie mags on the rack behind the plastic,
Naked women stacked on top of each other so I could not tell one from another.

I could see the ladies underwear, the hooks and wires and clasps.
I could see the engines working in the cars. I could see through walls,
And what people were doing inside. It was not as exciting as I had hoped.
I could see Mr. Harmon's new hip, and I could have done without that.

I could not see any more deeply than that. No meanings of life, no
visions of God, no evil that men do, no secret codes abandoned by alien masters.

And I'll I really wanted, anyway, was
to see through Wendy's shirt. And I did.
But I could see through Wendy, too, which is not the same.

So I keep them in my dresser. You can have them if you like,
You can buy really good candy bars with them, with lots of nuts.

by John W. 11:59 AM

 

X-ray specs

by ArchHallJr 11:22 AM

Friday, October 14, 2005

 

The funny thing was that I didn’t know I had violated any custom at all at the time. Yet they kept on going like I knew the rules and would soon admit the error of my ways. I think they wanted to punish me from the outset. Just for being an outsider. I should have seen their xenophobia for what it was but the explorer in me was much too interested in making contact with this primitive people.
They staked me out on the ground, spread eagled. Leather thongs securely fastened me to bamboo pegs sunk deep into the earth with heavy wooden mallets. It wasn’t until the chief came forward with the stone knife that I knew that I was really in trouble. I thought that this was some ritual I was going through to be accepted as a friend to the tribe. I prayed that it still might be. The chief held aloft his instrument and screamed a chant that curdled my blood.
I thought to myself, “How could I have been so stupid to come this far into the jungle without knowing all of the languages spoken?”
I am back in the states now and every time I look at the unique scar on my chest, I am reminded of the customs and social mores that weave together our society. And then I think about the Mjani’s society. How strange. The symbol that was carved into my chest represented a word that has no clear translation into English. The closest thing was:
One who does not look upon women with leering eyes.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

custom engraving

by ArchHallJr 12:17 PM

Thursday, October 13, 2005

 

She whispers

It’s alright.

My comfort in the death of life.

I cannot breathe, yet

When I try

I know I must

It happens as it always has

As she has always been

Before I knew her

She was there for me

Loving me

Caring for me

And I for her

I could never have known it would have been her

But I did

My life in a snapshot

Includes no one but her

And her disdain for my discomfort

I do not know why this is

I only know it is

I move on and on without knowing why

Yet I know if I stop

Death will surely follow

All depends upon the feeling of security

The goings and the comings

The slippings and fallings

The perseverance

To know that this life is not mine alone

She whispers

We are mine.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

she whispers

by Fred 12:45 PM

Wednesday, October 12, 2005

 

As the scarecrow slid off his post, he began too wonder if his decision to leave was a good thing. After many years as the farmer’s faithful servant, he grew tired of being called upon to do nothing but hang on a nail, day in and day out as a warning to birds that what had happened to him, might happen to them. At least that’s what he thought his purpose was. He wasn’t sure. He had witnessed the farmer enter the cornfield to shoo off birds when they seemed to be ignoring the scarecrow and not once did he hang one up on a post like himself. ‘Too much rain’, thought the scarecrow. Sure, he was bored out of his mind doing his thankless job without a vacation or even a vacation. Sure, he wanted to broaden his horizons. Sure, he wanted to see the world. But most of all he wanted to stop diminishing physically. Every time it rained, he lost a little bit of himself. Literally. The farmer never bothered to put more stuffing back inside him. He never understood this. So he was leaving. For good. He wasn’t sure what he would find, but he was positive his life would change. For better or for worse remained to be seen.
As he walked down the road, he noticed a slight breeze blow through his body. He felt free yet, a bit distressed. What would he do now that he was on his own? His new life lay before him with endless possibilities . . .

He shook awake as he felt shit on his shoulder. ‘Damn birds ought to respect a scarecrow that’s sleeping on the job.’ he thought.

It began to rain.

by ArchHallJr 11:59 PM

 

too much rain

by Fred 12:05 PM

Tuesday, October 11, 2005

 

The debate has raged for years. Was it my fault? Was it Mark’s fault? Personally, I think it was Mark’s but I’ll let you be the judge.
It was July 4th, 1989. The place was Davenport beach, just north of Santa Cruz along Highway 1. We sat on the sand with a nice bonfire going, watching the fireworks launch into the night. Earlier, we had had our own fireworks confiscated by overzealous law enforcement who thought we may just burn down the Pacific Ocean.
We were drinking rather heavily. I had polished off a bottle of peppermint schnapps and was using it to spit tobacco juice in.
Everyone has a friend that shouldn’t drink. Mark was that friend. A very nice and intelligent guy while sober, Mark turned into dumb guy the moment alcohol hit his bloodstream. As I sat with the schnapps bottle full of ‘baccy spit watching the various rockets explode in the sky, Mark approached me. He grabbed the bottle to get a hit off of it. I yelled:

“Noooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

at the top of my lungs! Mark apparently thought I was bogarting the rest of the bottle to myself because he turned the bottle upside down and began to chug. I never saw a face change from glee to horror ever in my life before or after that moment. He then proceeded to do what anyone would do after drinking someone else’s saliva mixed with chaw sap. He barfed all over the blanket.

“Why didn’t you tell me?!?!?” he wailed after recovering, “Jesus, God . . . why didn’t you say something?!?”

“Mark”, I began, “I thought that the simple screaming of the word ‘no’ would be enough.”

“Dude, how about ‘chew juice!’ or ‘don’t drink the spit!’?” he retorted.

“I am just as drunk as you are, or were rather, and I wasn’t thinking anything but ‘no!’. You would think that would be enough!" I defended myself, "Sorry, my desire to see you drink my ‘baccy juice just wasn’t motivating me.”

To this day I am known as the guy who let his friend drink chaw spit. Unfairly, I might add.

What do you think?

by ArchHallJr 11:16 PM

 

There's never any warning,
even when there is,
even when it's
expected,
predicted,
just a question of time.
There's never any question
that you're going to be prepared:
you're not,
you won't know what to do,
or say, or think about what's happened.
You'll be caught up in the current.
You'll be forced into the moment.
You'll know that it's coming
but
that
won't
matter.
You won't know what to feel
until you feel it (or you don't),
until you're numb with grief
or shivering with anger
or suddenly lightened with a sense of
relief,
relase
from your fear
that you wouldn't know how to react when it happened,
when the moment was finally there.

My grandmother died last night,
or early this morning.
She hadn't been well all year,
but there was,
these past few months,
a steady decline,
a fading-away
as she was replaced slowly
(not so slowly)
by discomforts and pains
and oxygen tanks to help her breathe.
She'd been in a nursing home for almost a year.
We knew it was coming.
Last Sunday, when my father and I visited,
when we came up to her room,
there was not
a hint
of recognition,
which is not to say she didn't know us,
but to say that I don't know
if she knew anything at all.
She slept almost the entire time.

This is the sort of death
that people will call a blessing,
a relief,
release
for those of us who saw it coming,
who staved it off as long as we could.
For at least the six months since
my grandfather died
we knew,
suspected,
knew
that she did not have many years left.
And yet,
there was no warning.

I don't feel numb with grief,
no shivers or lightened heart.
I'm glad to know,
or think,
she didn't suffer,
she's in a better place.
There's none of the shock of my grandfather's death,
which came unexpected
in the span of less than a night.
I don't know what it is that I feel.
I haven't had any warning.

by Fred 6:32 PM

 

"It's not like I didn't warn you."

by Fred 10:50 AM

Monday, October 10, 2005

 

There was a time when changing languages was normal. It was what you did when you moved from one place to another where the languages were different. Sure, it was expected. Why wouldn’t it be? People like to be understood and in turn understand. I say fuck ‘em if they can’t understand you. I moved from the west coast to the south. They speak a whole different language down here. People are always looking at me funny when I talk. And I tell them to speak fucking English when they try to tell me things. Just the other day . . .

“I would like to know if you dudes would like to go to lunch?”

This is what I asked of a few of my co-workers gathered around a copy machine.

“Jim, ya’hear ut that boy said?”

“”Yeppers. Don’t rightly know what he meant by it.”

So, I’m like: “Speak fucking English you yokels!”

They all just stared at me. I think the only word they understood was ‘fucking’.

“Y’all, I think ole Bobby here is gittin’ a might excited.”

“Huh? Dammit, it's Bob! Dear God, I can’t make out anything anyone is saying.”

“Yasee? He got one them thar big ole veins a stickin’ out his forehead.”

“Huh? What?”

“Aspose he’s a thinkin’ folks ‘round these parts cain’t unnerstand him.”

“Yep. Asposo.”

“Arrrgggggghhhh!!!!!!!”

I’ve had enough. I’m moving to Canada.

by ArchHallJr 10:52 PM

 

She changes languages the way most people change their clothes.
Her original port of call, it's safe to say nobody knows.
She calls nowhere home; it's everywhere she goes.
Some call her femme fatale; some say it's just a pose.

She changes languages the way some people change their mind:
pretending it was never different, the past on quick rewind,
a contradictory nature to which they're forever blind.
Her mother tongue's been vanished, and never will you find.

She changes languages the way most people change the world:
which is to say not all, across their life as it's unfurled.
For all that she's in transit, she's a stationary girl,
each new language the same mask kept on for another twirl.

by Fred 6:21 PM

 

changing languages

by Fred 9:21 AM

Friday, October 07, 2005

 

The time machine was a real piece of work. If Louis thought to ask how the thing had been build, much less how so quickly, he kept his questions to himself. His skepticism was evident just by the way he eyed the machine, glancing time and again back at the tally of invoices the research team had charged against their accounts, the pile of which he's carried with him as he and Dr. Helprin toured the facility. Louis felt he shouldn't have to question the science to disbelieve it. Asking for explanations would only insult everyone's intelligence by exposing what so clearly was a fraud. Helprin and his team be held accountable for each charge, but there was little cause to force the man through the pretense of explaining the damn thing.

But Helprin seemed determined to do just that.

"Mathematically," he said, "it's astounding. The work that Rathore and Beery have done... we couldn't have gotten this far off the ground so soon if it wasn't for them."

Soon, thought Louis. Yes, it had definitely been that. Just three weeks. Four-point-five million dollars in three weeks. It was astounding.

"Of course," said Helprin, "there's some evidence to suggest they used the machine to go back and tell themselves how. Their future selves did, is what I mean. Rathore and Beery deny this, of course, but Dr. Cylde swears he saw two Beery's exiting the lab shortly before they unveiled the work they'd done on the equations."

Louis said nothing.

"Of ocurse, Dr. Cylde also swears he first met Beery in 1958," added Helprin," and the man's clearly only in his late twenties. Roger suggests this may be yet another future Beery, but there's been no proof offered as yet. Why, just the other day --"

by Fred 5:32 PM

 

just the other day

by Fred 9:45 AM

Thursday, October 06, 2005

 

“Well of course we are, if we’re to know what it is you think you see,” agreed the captain.

The video display choked off, ran a bit of interference and then the clear pictures began to run again.

“There!” I said, “Do you see that?”

“See what?” inquired Rolo.

“You can clearly see a line of demarcation beginning here and ending here where it does not belong at all. Natural propagation should throughput here and here.” I pointed to the quite obvious location on the image, which showed the offending areas of focus. It shouldn’t have been there, yet it was. There had to have been some rational reason for the output to show in this configuration but all the actions preceding would never have pointed to this, not now, not ever. It was just physically impossible. For our technology.

“What you suggest is impossible.” The captain echoed the first half of my thought.

“Yes, it is if we are thinking on our terms and technology.” I countered, “But if we are to presume that we are the end all, be all when it comes to knowledge in this universe than I suggest that we may all be mad.”

“You can leave your condemnations of the human race to yourself, Doctor.” The captain directed his annoyance at me, “What are we to do if this is in fact what you say it is?”

“I do not condemn us, sir. It appears an alien intelligence of superior intellect has already done so. The unnatural wobble over the millions of years of observation of the M31 confirms its expansion is artificial and is designed to wipe us out entirely.”

by ArchHallJr 11:26 PM

 

If we're going to figure out where we're going,
we're going to need to watch that again,
because the boat shows no sign that it's slowing,
and we're headed right round the bend.
As of now there's no way of knowing
where it will land, on whom, or just when.
We could keep on blindly rowing
and hope we reach shore before nine or ten,
but the river that's beneath us now flowing
has killed its fair share or women and men,
and the strength of its current's been growing,
and it's getting tougher to hold onto my pen.

by Fred 6:15 PM

 

"We're going to need to watch that again."

by Fred 12:37 PM

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

 

Don't bury me where the puppets go to die,
where there isn't any sky
'cause that's where they hide their strings.
Please don't leave me with those things,
with all their lifeless eyes
and death-like widened grins.
Please don't put me in that ground,
where there isn't any sound
'cept the occasional puppet sigh;
even the worms are marionettes,
teeth of felt, the ideal pets,
but it's not a place to die.
The heart of puppet town
has no heart,
just bits of fluff where the heart should be.

by Fred 5:37 PM

 

Please don't bury me on the puppet island.

by Fred 10:59 AM

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

 

Science be damned. Sometimes one has to think outside, inside, around, through and into the fifth dimension of the box. Fantasy is where it’s at. Life is nothing like it should be. Why not physics? I mean, remember when fat people used to stuff their asses into spandex? Where was science then? I’ll tell you. Breaking the limits of common decency, that’s where. And sure, fantasy definitely played a rather obvious part.
What about ESP? Is that science? Most people seem to think so whether they’ll admit it or not. All you have to do is take a drive in moderate to heavy traffic anywhere. You’ll see what I mean. Didn’t science invent the turn signal? Or did it necessitate it’s invention? Or did the lack of ESP in most individuals do that? Difficult to say. Now we’re getting into behavioral science.
Which brings me back to fantasy finding it’s way into science. People in general are under the most incorrect assumption that just because they perceive something to be a certain way that that is the way it is for all. Life is fantasy imitating science. People don’t need facts; they need to feel they are right. Up until their ass goes right through the windshield.

by ArchHallJr 10:37 PM

 

We used to live in the future, but that got old pretty fast. I don't know, Debbie says it's all pretty relative anyway.

"You were born when?" she says. "1982? And you first went through the portal maybe seventeen years later?"

Debbie still insists on calling the thing we went through a portal.

"So yeah, from your frame of reference everything twenty-first century and after is the future. Everything before that's the past. But somebody living in 2386 or something would think of where we were living as the distant past. They'd think it was quaint."

She has a point, but my problem with where we were living was that I found it quaint. There wasn't a whole lot I found futuristic about the time where we'd landed.

There'd been some kind of mass repudiation of technology and science maybe half a century earlier, and civilization has gone pretty much dark. I was still new to the whole time-travel thing when we first got there, and I don't know if I was expecting flying cars, ray guns or trips to the moon, but when Debbie offered to take me forward to see where she'd been born and meet her folks, I guess I wasn't expecting some kind of post-apocalyptic Luddite paradise.

Debbie wasn't even supposed to have the time machine, really. Apparently it and its kind had been at the heart of society's whole techno-revolt, and it was only chance she found the thing buried in one of her father's fields and got it activated.

by Fred 5:28 PM

 

What about science?

by Fred 11:06 AM

Monday, October 03, 2005

 

My eyes watered as I read about my childhood hero. He could do no wrong for most of his life. He could do nothing right, it seemed, the last few years he was alive. The man was essentially an overgrown child who trusted everyone as a child is inclined to do. But his safety net was ripped out from under him and like a cruel joke, the pressures of real life became all too apparent. Gone were the humor, the adoring fans, and seemingly the assurance of the sun rising in the east and setting in the west. Our hearts all had hairline fractures from that day forward. Some of them were completely broken, never to mend. He knew nothing of our pain yet if we had known his, we would not have cried for ourselves but for the man who gave us everything he was. When the end finally came, he was not surrounded by his friends, as he should have been. Oh, they did show up on that last day. Them not being there all together as his last breath was drawn was mostly his fault for allowing old wounds to fester and separate love from those who truly felt it for the man-child. But his old friends did get to say goodbye one last time. They spoke of decades of making people laugh, love and think. They spoke of the friendships that were newly repaired at the last moment. It wasn’t the time to speak of differences and hurt. It was the time to cherish all that had been and all that wouldn’t be.

by ArchHallJr 10:53 PM

 

What it came down to, thought Lionel, was preferential permutations. In the end, when you examined the evidence and the trends spelled out by the time machine's logs, it was hard to reach any other conclusion. Some futures got better treatment than others, it was just that simple. Some alternate timelines were protected and nurtured, while others were left to wither and die. The station commander of course denied this, and official departmental policy all but forbade the practice, but the records showed a different story. It was quite clear to Lionel that some timelines, whether because they offered limited resources or because they did not conform to someone's priorities of what the future should be, were being allowed to simply wink out of existence.

He'd interviewed several of the station personnel who spoke of friends or family who no longer -- or, rather, now never -- were: husbands or wives they'd met on missions that they now remembered only because the logs told them they'd occurred, children who had been excised from the timeline before being born.

And yet the commander's decisions almost always proved right and the station had prospered.

by Fred 6:23 PM

 

This isn't the time.

by Fred 10:20 AM

Friday, September 30, 2005

 

I once had a picture of a Model T that used to hang on the wall in my kitchen. It would fall askew when someone would walk in the back door and let it shut by itself. And each time I had to straighten it out afterward. It wasn’t always in my kitchen. Sometimes it had been in my bedroom, sometimes a hallway. I don’t remember a domicile I lived in that that picture wasn’t hanging somewhere. When I was a small boy, that old time car sparked my thoughts of a future when I would actually drive. I lay in bed at night, dreaming of long rides, getting lucky in the back seat (such as it was), driving to school . . . you name it. If you could do it in a car, the Model T was what I was going to do it with. So when I got my first car, a hand-me-down 67 Plymouth Valiant, I felt I had traded up. The dream had become a reality.
The romance died away within the week. My mind turned to more fanciful dreams. I used to think about what I would do if I had wheels. I looked over to the living room and gazed at the biplane model suspended from the ceiling. Now I dream of what it would be like if I had wings.

by ArchHallJr 11:44 PM

 

if I had wings

by Fred 1:23 PM

Thursday, September 29, 2005

 

I was halfway to City Hall when the drugs began to take hold. I was assigned to write a ’story’ on the council meeting that was to begin at 7:30PM. I think I made it. But it was like no other meeting I’d ever been to in my short and consequential life. Or like all of them, I don’t remember. It seemed as though the fun began trying to find a parking spot among all the official vehicles, some of which included cop cars and dogcatcher vans. There were also a few toboggans, a canoe and five minibikes with Marlon Brando impersonators on them. Navigating the parking lot with all these conveyances was tricky. Add delicate when I tried to squeeze my automobile in between that gathering of fat asses that sat around debating tribal regulations and what the white man had to do with helping Indians gain true sovereignty over their lands.

“Hey you injuns! Get inside and discuss that crap about your squaws and bastards! Don’t make me have to pass around bottles of firewater and blankets tainted with smallpox! And if I have to do that . . . you better get me some of your peyote because goddammit, I’m out!”

They all looked at me funny and one of them started farting the main title to Billy Jack. I got nervous and pulled out a pistol.

“Oh, you think it’s funny, eh?”

They didn’t think it was funny. They disappeared and left behind a war bonnet. I picked it up and danced into the building. I stopped the hooker outside of the judge’s chambers and asked her what time it was.

“9:30, hun.”

“Fuck! Don’t move! Wait. What is that on your shoulder?!?”

“Huh?”

“You can’t be too sure for being sure!”

I punched her in the arm and she screamed.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“I don’t know . . . but there IS something wrong around here and I intend to get to the bottom of it. Do you wanna do some mescaline?”

by ArchHallJr 10:46 PM

 

going gonzo

by Fred 1:47 PM

Wednesday, September 28, 2005

 

The hike in was rather uneventful. Just me, my buddy Pete and the nature that showed us the way to camp. Starting out early in the morning, we arrived shortly after 3:00 PM. Tents were pitched, the bong was loaded and the JD flowed freely. Nothing quite like the great outdoors to make you want to party hard. As enjoyable and peaceful as the site was, it needed one more thing to make it a hair shy of perfect. Music. Pete had lugged a boom box over hill and dale so we could rock out to our favorite tunage. Suddenly, the chittering of squirrels and babbling of a brook was replaced by the sound of Ozzy Osbourne wailing on about going off the rails on a crazy train.

“I don’t appreciate your racket! I come up here for peace and quiet!”

We looked up to see a disgruntled camper who seemingly came out of nowhere to express his displeasure at our use of the airwaves. I looked at Pete, who shrugged and made a funny face as the guy took off. We watched him walk about 30 yards east, rollup his sleeping bag, throw what little gear he had out into his backpack and leave the trail camp. Neither one of us had noticed the poor fellow when we had come in earlier. Pete started to sing, “There is unrest in the forest . . .” I laughed along with Pete as we dismissed the whole incident and went back to our dope, booze and music. But in the back of my mind, I wondered why the hell we couldn’t be back in my apartment doing the very same thing.

by ArchHallJr 11:38 PM

 

What are you listening to?

by Fred 1:05 PM

Tuesday, September 27, 2005

 

The jump. The leap. The call. It beckons, yet I cannot answer. I move through my day much as anyone, yet I seem stymied by . . . something. It happens when I read the paper and especially when I sit down on the toilet with a can of Lysol to pass the time away. But most disturbing is when I am writing. I’ll be hacking away at some nice new narrative or dialogue when I start a word . . . and cannot get past the tenth letter! It boggles my mind. I am a wordsmith. This should not happen to me. The other day, it sent me into a near panic attack! I was writing some back-story on one of my subjects when it hit. I was writing . . . a word that started with gubernator…and I began to sweat. My heart began to pound. I had to look away from the paper as I crumpled it up and threw it in the circular file. Had I always been this way? Would I be able to make the jump from children’s books to hard science fiction?

by ArchHallJr 10:21 PM

 

hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia

by Fred 12:55 PM

Monday, September 26, 2005

 

The days were long, the nights were short. That’s all he knew. Just how long and how short was anyone’s guess but since the shuttle’s crash landing on this uncharted world, Charlie Loops had run out of everything but imagination. The only modern piece of equipment he had left was the transponder he carried in his hip pack. Hand sized and just heavy enough to feel significant, the device would be his salvation. He had become quite adept at hunting the small fauna of this world after his rations and supplements ran out. He’d even become quite fond of the meat of the animal he had dubbed ‘walking turd’. It literally looked like a walking stick with shit for a body. It looked repugnant but it was damn good eating. As an added bonus, it didn’t kill him, either. A steady electronic whine followed by four distinct pulses sounded off on the transponder. Could it be? He had thought he had heard the signal denoting a rescue ship in orbit before, but he hadn’t heard the signal repeat. He had chalked it up to the wishful thinking of a famished castaway. He counted for ten seconds and heard the signal once again. God, he was hungry. He would wait for one more set of codes before expending the battery’s energy to deliver the homing pointer that would bring him his deliverance. There! Again! He pressed the broadcast button. He readied his weapons. Sustenance would arrive soon.

by ArchHallJr 10:56 PM

 

signal interruption

by Fred 12:36 PM

Friday, September 23, 2005

 

things that go bump in the night

by Fred 10:56 AM

Thursday, September 22, 2005

 

Attached to this e-mail,
please find a squid.
It took me hours to find it;
I'm sure you can see that it did.
If you just open it up,
you'll see that it's not so big.
Just read past the ink,
'cause that's how they keep themselves hid.

Attached to this e-mail,
please find a duck.
If you were expecting a gosling,
then you're quite out of luck.
You can blame Norman Mallard
if you don't think that's passing the buck.
He drafted this message
and claimed that it wouldn't suck.

Attached to this e-mail,
please find my evil twin.
He's shifty and shady
with a too toothsome grin.
You'd better delete this
and not let him in.
He's far worse than spam;
at least you know where that's been.

Attached to this e-mail,
please find the past 2,000 years,
full of historical stuff,
celebrations and fears.
If you wade through the mess,
you'll find it stacked up in tiers.
But don't let it topple
or you'll upset yesterday's gears.

Attached to this e-mail,
please find this e-mail itself,
like a Moebius strip
looped by some nightmarish elf.
Don't give it a thought;
just leave it there on the shelf.
You've read it already once;
a second go cannot help.

by Fred 8:34 PM

 

an unnatural attachment

by Fred 9:43 AM

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

 

I've got a vampire dentist
He's got a jones for fluoride and blood
He can shapeshift into mist
But the truth is, he's so good
That the stake I got in my fist
Never goes through his heart like it should
I can't kill my undead DDS
Even though I know I should

He says, don't mind the fangs,
Just open real wide, gargle, now rinse.
They're tipped with novocaine
You won't feel a thing 'cept maybe a pinch.
And the truth is, there's no pain,
Pretty soon even flossing's a cinch
When you join the dental undead,
Keeping teeth clean sure is a cinch.

by Fred 6:30 PM

 

minty fresh

by Fred 10:44 AM

Tuesday, September 20, 2005

 

I prefer boysenberry more than any ordinary jam. I'm a Citizens for Boysenberry Jam fan. - Simon and Garfunkel, Punky's Dilemma

The planet's rivers were made of jam. There was no getting around it; the viscous lines that seemed to snake everywhere the landing party wenty -- in valleys, around mountains, et cetera -- were unmistakably jam. In the northern continents, it appeared to be predominantly strawberry, said Science Officer William Bradley, the only one of his team to actually risk tasting the stuff. In the south, apple cinammon.

Bradley was at a loss to explain it. While the planet had its share of vegetation, it had nothing that looked like strawberries, applies or cinammon. What fruit the science team had gathered as pungent, often noxious, and the only comparable flavors on Earth, said Bradley, would be burning tires or rotted meat. The presence of jam rivers could not be easily explained.

Nor could Bradley tell Commander Charles if the fish that swam in those rivers were dangerous. They certainly looked threatening enough. Bradley would not, or could not, say, but it was the considered opinion of many on his team that the fish were in some way intelligent. Norberts had gone as far as to suggest they were making the jam, that it was somehow a fish trick and that Lt. Cmdr. Bradley would surely die if he continued spreading river silt on his morning toast.

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

“Does anyone in the audience know how to play guitar?”

I never thought I would hear that going to this old blues club but who would have? I had seen the nearly comatose Robert “The Other” Johnson, lead guitar player of the ‘The Other Blues Project’, stumbling around backstage from my vantage point on the club floor. It appeared that “The Other” would not be in any shape to play this evening. I raised both arms in the air and shouted at the top of my lungs:

“I do!”

I was told to come backstage. I was confronted by an elderly black man wearing Ray-Bans who touched his face a lot.

“Young man,” he began in a smoky voice, “Do you know how to jam?”

“Old man, I came outta my mama playin’!” I lied.

The drummer started, the bass player joined in and the keyboards rang out. They all looked at me. The audience. The band. The security guards. Everyone. I started to play and I sounded better than any time I had ever played before. A lot better. In no time, I was jamming along with the rest of the band like an old pro. They were looking at me but this time, with a look of awe. The audience was in rapture. I then felt pain on my fingertips. Blood ran from them, but I didn’t care. The music that was coming from me was unearthly. I looked at the old man in the Ray-Bans as he whacked on the keys. Were those horns protruding from under his hat?

by ArchHallJr 2:37 PM

 

jam session

by Fred 10:41 AM

Monday, September 19, 2005

 

Velcro shoes? The 15 foot jump shot? Truly scary horror movies? Modesty? McDonald’s French Fries? Customer service? The Class of ’65? Real muscle cars? Men’s cologne? Tap water? New Wave? Punk Rock? AOR radio stations? Solid color basketball shoes? Looney Tunes? Southern Fried Rock? The metric system change over? Less than a dollar for a pack of smokes? Bald guys? Medium rare hamburgers served in a restaurant? Speed Buggy? Zotz? Chimney sweeps? The Golden C.O.D.? The time when the bottling number of Henry Weinhard’s Private Reserve beer meant something . . . or at least you pretended it did? Baby Jane? Bums? Trolls? Dank? Schwag? Beanie babies? Sinistar? Holmes & Yoyo? STDs that didn’t kill you? The time when an STD was called VD? Knobs on television sets? Watches you had to wind? Really cool westerns? Really cool Star Wars movies? When the Stones were old and cool instead of old and pathetic? When SNL was funny?

I don’t know, but I know of at least one person who’d like an answer to all of these questions.

by ArchHallJr 10:47 PM

 

Whatever happened to
whatever happens?
Whatever became of
I'll always be there?
Where's it been hiding,
that you'll always find me,
that I'm right behind you.
Can you please tell me where?

How long's it been missing?
Were we too short-sighted to see?
How did this us
become just you, then just me?

by Fred 7:30 PM

 

Whatever happened to...?

by Fred 10:22 AM

Friday, September 16, 2005

 

Weird is a relative term but I can tell you that like any halfway normal (or abnormal) boy, I played my share of weird games. Most of them involved pain and violence of some sort or the other. There was one that could only have evolved in the time of big Goody handle combs. Late 70’s, early 80’s. This ‘game’ started where one guy would make a fist, hold his arm out and place the comb on the back of the hand. He would then stand there as still as he could while the other guy would try and grab the comb and hit the back of the hand he took the comb from. Of course, the other guy had to try and move his hand out of the way before the comb hit him. Sounds like fun, huh? There were penalties for flinching. If you moved your hand prematurely (before the comb left the back of the hand) then you were subject to a ‘free whack’. There were lots of bloody knuckles around school those days.
Another weird game was ‘smear the queer’. Basically it was a cross between a rugby scrum and a free-for-all gang fight. A group of at least 3-4 guys would get a football and decide who was ‘the queer’. ‘The queer’ would then have to run with the football while everyone else tried to tackle him and take the football away. Whoever got the football became ‘the queer’ and the cycle would begin all over again.
Yep, those weird games definitely involved pain and violence.

by ArchHallJr 11:04 PM

 

weird games

by Fred 12:06 PM

Thursday, September 15, 2005

 

The chilly, late autumn breeze fluttered through my half-buttoned jacket as I walked through the cemetery. I didn’t often cut through, especially not at night, as it seemed to be a disrespectful thing to do. But tonight, I was trying to make it home on time to watch my favorite TV show’s season premiere as I had forgotten to set my VCR.
It wasn’t just that it was a disrespectful thing to do; it also scared the hell out of me. All that death in one place. Who was watching me? Walking next to me? Trying to whisper a message in my ear? I hurried my pace. Then something compelled me to look at one of the tombstones. I had never really done that before. Sure, I saw the tombstones. But I never read the names or inscriptions. I stopped and read this one:

John Joseph Baden
Beloved Husband and Father
Faithful Friend
July 16th, 1918 – August 5th, 1999

Beloved. Faithful. These words did not seem to me to denote death or emptiness. I read another:

Sheila Francine O’Brien
She gave of herself to the world whatever she could
And took nothing but love given freely in return
February 23rd, 1903 – December 11th, 1976

I was no longer frightened as I walked through the cemetery that night. And I made it a point to walk through it whenever I got the chance, no matter what time of day it was. There, I only felt love and life from that day forward.

by ArchHallJr 11:45 PM

 

signs of life

by Fred 5:25 PM

Wednesday, September 14, 2005

 

Guernsey Mooler stepped back from the vat, mouth agape. At this point of her long day, she couldn’t seem to grasp the reality of what she had learned. All four stomachs churned with an acidity she never before experienced. Her whole life had been an impenetrable veil. She now knew a truth that very few bovines in the world knew. Oh, they suspected that there was prevarication involved in most of their dealings with the government, but they most certainly did not know the hideous truth.
When her mother died earlier that day, she felt compelled to follow the recyclers that took her dead body for reclamation. She had always wondered, “Reclamation for what?” And now she knew the answer. As must her whole planet know if they were to ever regain any innocence back. The Angus guards took her away on a stretcher as she screamed incoherently, “You've gotta tell them! Salient Green is made of cheese! They’re made of cheese!”

by ArchHallJr 11:52 PM

 

They're made of cheese!

by Fred 12:23 PM

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

 

“Damn. I’m sorry. I tried to get to you on time but I just can’t seem to get through this traffic.”

“Perhaps you should try leaving earlier.”

“Hadn’t thought of that. I’ll see you when I get there.” Beep.

What the hell? Does she think I don’t care? Of course I do. Don’t I? I really hate it when people give me that whole ‘better plan on being delayed so you get there a little early instead of a little late’ jazz. I expect that from a boss. But from my girlfriend? This relationship is going nowhere fast. Or is it? Last week our Saturday night date consisted of us going to some friends of hers house and talking about . . . what the hell were we talking about? Hell, did we do anything? All I know is we didn’t watch TV, we didn’t drink booze and we didn’t even play a stupid game like Twister or Jenga. I would’ve been bored but at least I would have remembered it. It must have been so boring that I blanked out the whole episode from my mind. I sometimes wonder if dating a clinical hypnotist is worth it. I then think about that perfect body and the fantastic sex. Who knew a 60-year-old woman could look so . . . striking? All I know is I am going to leave earlier for our dates.

by ArchHallJr 11:32 PM

 

"If the good doctor will cease his dematerializing, we can get on with the questioning."

So spoke Senator Charles Rosewater, the ranking Democrat, near the close of the opening day in the US Senate confirmation hearings for the first time-traveller-American nominated to the Supreme Court in almost eighty years.

Dr. Wilson Paul O'Donnell, hereinafter referred to simply as the nominee had of course been the clear choice of then president Mathias Smith -- who, despite the hardly surprising controversy surrounding O'Donnell's^* nomination, stood by the choice and had lauded the nominee as recently as that day's Good Morning America.

Now, however, well into the seventh hour of the senate hearings and with many more days ahead, tennsions were already starting to run high. Rosewater, in particular, had been repeatedly angered by the nominee's apparent refusal to remain in any one place (or, rather, time) for very long.

"I recognize that, as a time traveller, dematerialization is par for the course," said the senator. "And that, as some studies show, it may not wholly under your control. But it does make this more than difficult. If you could refrain...? I submit, sir: can't you sit still?"

The nominee murmured his apologies and soldified.

"Just skipping ahead an hour or so, Senator," he said, taking a sip of water from the glass in front of him. "I admit, I wanted to see how this would turn out."

The senator bristled at this.

"The nominee has been warned against that sort of behavior," Rosewater said. "Time travel is to be kept to a bare minimum while these hearings are underway."

And therein lay the heart of the controversy: the nominee's status as a time traveller and questions of whether he would use the ability to retroactively overturn court decisions he found unpopular so he himself would never need to rule on them at all. If you could travel back in time and prevent Roe v. Wade from ever happening, no one could ever question you about the decision. You could remake the court however you -- or your president -- saw fit.

* Okay, hereinafter.

by Fred 6:09 PM

 

If you're not here, where are you?

by Fred 10:53 AM

Monday, September 12, 2005

 

What can one say about cave paintings that hasn't been said a thousand times already? One hesitates even to bring up the subject in conversation, such is the extent to which they have permeated our cultural subconcious. One is reminded, of course, of the paintings discovered in southwest France in 1940, but also of lesser cultural "events" as well -- such as the cave-dwelling trolls of the much-loved Zork chronicles or of those oft-lampooned Batman villians of the mid-1960s: the conniving Airbrush, the duplicitous Pastel, and that dreaded nadir of comic book art, the Van Goghginator. There is also Andy Warhol's frequently quoted observation that, in the future, everyone will be spelunking for fifteen minutes. Yet there is little evidence to suggest that Warhol himself was a spelunker, or much of an outdoorsman-artist at all. One of his proteges, Jean Michel Basquiat, even went so far, after a notorious split with the other artist, to suggest that Warhol had never heard of caves, nor could he even spell the word cave.

by Fred 5:45 PM

 

cave paintings

by Fred 10:31 AM

Friday, September 09, 2005

 

Sometimes I just don't feel like writing
Sometimes the words just aren't my friends
When I can't get past the beginnings
Don't get me started on middles or ends

Sometimes the words just aren't coming
Sometimes I've got places to go
Sometimes can seem like forever
At times when the writing's so slow

Sometimes I just want to be elsewhere
Anywhere but with paper and pen
Sometimes five minutes can feel like an hour
I don't dare stretch it out til it's ten

Sometimes I just don't feel like writing
But that's when I most need to write
It's whenever you think that you're beaten
That's when you don't dare give up the fight

by Fred 6:07 PM

 

Sometimes, I just don't feel like writing.

by Fred 12:56 PM

Thursday, September 08, 2005

 

Instead of ____________, I think I'll ____________.

by Fred 11:24 AM

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

 

I was an English major. While science and math hold some interest for me, I have no great faculty for either, no untapped talents that will lead me to chalkboards awash with theorems or books intended for anyone other than the layperson. I am the layperson. I don't understand math and science the way I hope I understand the written word. (Not that I don't still have miles to go in that regard, too.) The point is, I'm not too terribly scientifically or mathematically inclined. And yet I've worked for a professor of mechanical engineering, and I'm currently employed as an editorial assistant in chemistry and mathematics/statistics. I think it may help that I don't understand the books we publish -- or, back when I was on the other side of it in academia, the books we submitted for publication. You could call it a regrettable incuriosity, but it's hard for me to muster much personal curiosity, much less enthusiasm for Bayesian statistics or Abelian geometry or surfactant scinece. I'm not the intended audience. I just help the process along and ensure that the books are publushed. We have editors and advisors to let us know if a topic is worth pursuing, and the editors for whom I work go after the books they think will do well in the market. I recognize titles and key words that reappear, but I don't understand it. I'm not a math person.

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

mathematical oddities

by Fred 10:20 AM

Tuesday, September 06, 2005

 

sleight of hand
height of a man
who stands maybe six,
maybe seven feet tall over the audience
with a rabbit-filled hat on his head,
mustache like polished steel
curled toward the heavens
(you could poke out an eye with that thing),
and a gleam in his own eye
that's already got them
looking the other way,
even before he points there with his wand.
and
presto change-o
a-la-kazaam,
nothing happens:
some smoke or a scarf,
and all of them are
sitting on the edge of their seats;
they are the edge of their seats,
like the edge of a knife,
waiting to be whetted, honed,
waiting to be amazed.
"That should have worked,"
the magician says.
"I just know it should.
It always did in rehearsal."
And now they're
looking the other way,
not at the rabbit ears
drooping down the side of the hat
or the wand he knifes through the air,
but at the door,
thinking,
"we paid good money for this?"

by Fred 6:06 PM

 

sleight of hand

by Fred 9:13 AM

Friday, September 02, 2005

 

lately

by Fred 12:32 PM

Thursday, September 01, 2005

 

it's no use hiding
there's nowhere to hide
they'll find you within
they'll find you outside
they know where you are
they've searched far and wide
they know you're afraid
your fear's been their guide

it's no use hiding
there's nowhere to hide
you can search all you want
but I tell you no lie
they'll search you out
nowhere you go they won't spy
your fear gives you away
wherever you fly

by Fred 6:41 PM

 

It's no use hiding.

by Fred 12:29 PM

Wednesday, August 31, 2005

 

It'll never be the same.

by Fred 9:12 AM

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

 

You begin at the beginning,
'cause that's where it starts,
the first moment of many,
first piece of your parts.
You could jump in the middle,
but that's just not as smart.
By the time that you're finished,
You'll know the whole thing by heart.

You begin at the beginning,
'cause that's how it's done,
from the opening scene
on page number one.
You could skip to the end,
but that's just not as much fun.
You'll get there soon enough;
there's no need to run.

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

Where do you begin?

by Fred 12:54 PM

Monday, August 29, 2005

 

"So how did we wind up penguins?"

"No, that's wind-up penguins. Like with a knob or a key you twist at the back?"

"Whatever. It seems like a weird way to go through a video game."

"Well, I told you, they've made some modifications. New levels, new bosses, new avatars. We're penguins."

"That wind up."

"Yeah."

"Do we have weapons?"

"Only what we can hold in our flippers."

"So that's what? Like bombs, grenades, knives..."

"Mostly fish."

"Fish."

"Yeah. But only if someone comes by and winds us up first."

"Let me get this straight. If someone wants to attack us in the game, our only defense is a piece of fish -- and we still have to hope they're nice enough to wind us up first?"

"Yeah, pretty much. And the way the game is set, usually you don't throw the fish so much as...well, eat it."

"We eat the fish."

"Yeah."

"Do we get life points or something for that?"

"Not really. The, um...the other players will probably kill us before that happens."

"Let me guess: they have bombs and grenades and knives?"

"Oh yeah, definitely."

"Man, this new game sucks."

by Fred 11:59 PM

 

wind-up penguins

by Fred 10:11 AM

Friday, August 26, 2005

 

might

by Fred 9:01 AM

Thursday, August 25, 2005

 

It's the sort of thing that never happens,
unless you count the times it does,
the sort of thing that simply isn't,
unless you could the times it was.
It's the impossible you never dreamt of,
unless you count all the dreams you ever knew.
It's everything you weren't thinking.
(The thoughts, perhaps, were thinking you.)
It's every moment you thought forgotten,
Every witching hour that's ticked past.
It's all those things you said just weren't,
yet secretly wished would last.

by Fred 6:05 PM

 

the sort of thing that never happens

by Fred 9:56 AM

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

 

You don't even have to try too hard and you can feel it:
the way August
shuffles into fall,
the way it almost falls over itself
trying to get out of the way.
It thinks it's subtle;
it thinks it's cool;
but there's a cooling-off you can feel a mile coming.
If you think September just happens,
you're not paying attention.

Or maybe you live in one of
those places
where there are no seasons, where
there's hot,
and there's cold,
but the transitions between
are like myths you maybe read about it books
or hear about happening to another people.
Maybe August and September are just extensions of the same thing
where you live,
part of a blur of months that separate
dead of summer
from dead of winter
(or summer's death
from a hint of chill).
Maybe you don't feel it.
Maybe there's nothing to feel.
Maybe you do try.

You see the holidays stacked up,
one after the other,
and they are very much a product of seasons.
A true Halloween needs a little chill,
Easter a coming or present thaw;
the 4th of July shouldn't feel
like the 5th of June
or November 1st.
Calendars are a product of transition.
They crave seasons.
They all but demand them.
The calendar knows that the only constant is change,
but that some changes
repeat.

To live some place where its cravings
are meaningless,
where there are no seasons,
where mother nature tries to pretend there is no change,
or tries to compact it all together,
telescoping spring into winter,
autumn into summer --

It must always feel like
something isn't right,
something must be missing,
something needs to happen.

There are places where the seasons spread themselves out,
ease into being themselves,
where a cool breeze at the end of August
tells you autumn is on its way.
(It tries to hide,
but autumn is on its way.)
Leaves change color.
Leaves fall.
Snow shrouds the ground.
Snow thaws.
And that thaw just keeps on going
until it's gone,
and the leaves change again.
There are places that recognize transition,
that play (more or less) by the calendar's rules,
where you can tell,
on a late afternoon's walk home,
without really trying,
without trying too hard,
that autumn is approaching;
autumn is shuffling in.

by Fred 6:25 PM

 

shuffle

by Fred 10:01 AM

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

 

As luck would have it, Lloyd was not the first to arrive at the party, and his fear that Shelly would put him to use welcoming the other guests proved to be unfounded. He barely saw her once the entire evening. He did see -- and was forced into several awkward conversations with -- some of the people he'd worked with that summer, either they or he trying too hard to be polite, trying not to ruin the night with talk of what had happened before he'd quit. He could see Warren, circling a few times, near enough that the man's silence was obviously a deliberate snub. He would not even meet Lloyd's eyes. The scars on the man's face had started to heal, Lloyd saw, but clearly Warren was still upset about the accident, about the damage ot the store, and he was not going to talk to Lloyd about it. Lloyd was half tempted to use the sight to peer into the man's head, but that would only serve to further remind everyone of why he'd quit, of what the accident had done to him. Lloyd wasn't good enough yet to keep Warren or anyone else from noticing.

by Fred 6:19 PM

 

I can't swim. I've never really been able to. I mean, sure, I can stand in water up to about my chest with no trouble; I can play in the water, but I never go past the shallow end. I just can't swim. Does that matter? Well, sure, if I were in a pond or a lake, it would matter a lot. If I were anywhere that was submerged, my lack of swimming-based knowledge would suddenly and powerfully come up.

Right this minute, I am on the seventeenth floor of an office building. I can see the Fort Worth skyline, impressive in its compactness, reminiscent of Houston if one is honest with oneself, and I am not thinking about the fact that I cannot swim. I will be, though. If I could see the future, which I can't, my own ignorance would suddenly come into sharp relief for a period of some fifteen minutes in my own personal history, and forever, one could argue, in the larger history of the world.

I cannot see the future, either. It's just one more of my little failings. I can't do double ten-key entry, either, although I've often thought I could. I'm not very honest with myself about double-entry ten key accounting. I also can't swim or see the future.

Two of these will be important when the water main breaks on the eighteenth floor. The third, the one I am worrying about, will never matter in my life. I have taken employment which requires that I be able to perform double-entry ten key accounting. A water main is going to break, and I will be swept under a torrent of water from the floor above. If I were able to see the future, I might have suddenly needed to use the restroom on the twentieth floor. If I were able to swim, I might have been able to reach the stairs. As luck would have it, the only one of the three I am worrying about is the one which will never matter again in the whole of human history. Now is the end of time; some minutes from now will be the end of my time. If I believed in reincarnation, I would wonder if I might learn one of these three neat tricks, swimming, fortune telling, or ten-key double entry accounting, in my next life.

I don't believe in reincarnation; and I still can't swim.

by MisterNihil 11:29 AM

 

as luck would have it

by Fred 9:25 AM

Monday, August 22, 2005

 

A Marxist Frameup
by Mister Nihil

If you had all the tea in china ready and waiting in a boat on the docks outside the SS SAN FRANCISCO, a small vessel with no bearing on the proceedings, you'd have to wonder if the simple fact of recursivity would cause you to suddenly have both lots and lots of tea and also absolutely no tea. I suppose the answer lies in this question: at which instant do you want all the tea? If you have all the tea in one instant, then the amount of tea becomes, rapidly, zero, which means you must needs have zero tea. All the tea you had previously must then exist at some point other than "in your possession," in which case physics suggests that the low-energy state is the "preferable" one, insomuchas one considers the term "preferable" in this case as meaning "the state to which physics suggests physical matter will tend towards." History will show, the state in which "all the tea" has thus far existed is, in fact, "in china," and so it will rever to this state. Thus, if you had all the tea in China at some place other than China, then you would have to consider that it would sort of throb into and out of existance, as you would suddenly have and then not have, instant to instant, all the tea in China.
Prove or disprove. Show your work.

by MisterNihil 5:45 PM

 

Not one of them ever called the man a communist. They didn't dare. They worried about sounding foolish. So they just hinted. They let it be known, whether in dinner conversation with friends or in falsely casual asides offered at any of the monthly faculty meetings he himself was unable to attend, that it was certainly a shame that communism had taken such a strong foothold in the campus community, that to serve in this or that war, or sacrifice this or that for a country, only to find the very things against which one had fought -- the very things -- gain renewed acceptance in their college classrooms...well, it was just a shame, that's all.

They would never mention the man by name, or the classes which he taught. Though fishing for agreement among their colleagues, they made sure to keep things vague. It was just a shame, a fact they would mention as if resigned to it already, as if -- well, that's life, and what were you going to do? They could, and would, remember when Marxism was a four-letter word, when "communist" was an epithet that could ruin a man, his academic reputation, and not the sort on which that reputation could be built.

They never mentioned his name, and they never said much more than that, but they let it be known that they were displeased.

And, of course, none of them were terribly surprised when Professor Winstone turned up shot dead in his office. That sort of thing happened to communists.

by Fred 11:11 AM

 

Marxist Frame-up

by MisterNihil 2:02 AM

Sunday, August 21, 2005

 

Ragamuffin Pool

by MisterNihil 12:11 PM

Saturday, August 20, 2005

 

They say every society is just three meals away from anarchy. Truth, though, is that every society is just three meals away from learning how to fend for itself. Sure, that might seem to be a collapse of society, but what it really represents is a return to the very basics of society. I mean, what is society if not a group of people trying to feed themselves through whatever means are appropriate? The only difference between capitalism and communism and feudalism and totalitarianism is just how the food gets spread around, pardon, but the real basics of what makes it work is just, does food get produced? In modern societies, of course, the question of production v. purchase is either negligible, food's still showing up, or the single most important question you can ask, now your society needs another society to live and what if they decided they didn't like your hair and so wouldn't sell you food? That, then is the difference between a perfect society and a political one. In a perfect society, there's food; in a political one there's money to buy food.

Or maybe I'm wrong. Maybe there's some weight to be put on art. Whatever.

by MisterNihil 8:44 PM

 

Marble Art

by MisterNihil 8:41 PM

Friday, August 19, 2005

 

Lingering light from last minute morsels of prepackaged pringle flap fluidly from finality, fingerfucked apathetically around arguably argyle amoebae; rapacious regalia ragging on ripped-off ring-tossers divided deviously by druidic damsels from Damocles' Dowry. Whisky whorls of Wogglebug T.E. re: me and bees and Bobby McGee, blow flows of growth round crows feet trees, tinkle wrinkles, the fink crinkles and flushes wildly. Proudfoot's pride soot washes wishes swishing out to sea, grambling gumboots on a gambit hef a'lunching out with me, cran a'berry franklin lightning linger lingeree.

And then I open them again.

by MisterNihil 12:05 PM

 

Close your eyes. Describe what you see.

by Fred 9:02 AM

Thursday, August 18, 2005

 

But what if you just stopped taking that kind of call? What if you stopped, all of a sudden, you understand, taking the kind of telephone call that makes your life a little cheaper? The uninitiated, those who still subscribe to the lie that you don’t know what kind of call it’s going to be until you answer, may say that’s a ludicrous suggestion. Sure, I suppose that if you don’t understand the situation, you might fall for that. No, it’s as simple as wolves. It’s as easy as falling off a cloud. There’s a sense to it, I guess. Cynicism is an art that takes practice. Feel free to give away those little pieces of dead soul, learn the art of saying exactly the nastiest thing you can think of; you’ll learn, eventually, that the world is listening, and though it keeps a loose accounting, eventually even that’s enough to kick the shit out of you every so often. The world can count to several thousand and trade them for eight or ten teeth so fast you’ll honestly believe you’ve been punished for something you didn’t do.

The world knows: you deserve everything. You create your reality one pit viper at a time, one “Fucke!” at once, once nastiest-thing I don’t have to think about at a time. Whether through the conscious sickness engendered in your fellow man or the unconscious bite of a brick from thirty-thousand feet or the sudden death of fellows, punishments tend to be a long time coming and they collect interest even as you accrue capitol.

Is it the nature of the world, or is it just my own personal disease that makes me think everything is deserved? Take it how you will. Only my own personal disease matters to me, and only the way I see things will ever be the way I see things. You are welcome to perceive what’s going on as martyrdom, and you’re welcome to kick your own ass from here to hell and back.

by MisterNihil 11:02 PM

 

[removed by author]

by Fred 6:24 PM

 

the wolves at the wall

by Fred 10:18 AM

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

 

[removed by author]

by Fred 6:34 PM

 

What are the limits of learning by machines?

by Fred 8:41 AM

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

 

The new missus 'n' I
Lay 'neath a luminous sky.
Like a numinous eye
The moon shone down from above

"I knew this ruinous guy,"
Said the new missus to I,
"By the name of Louis N. Nye,
And we thought we were in love.

"Quite a humorous guy
(And quite fluent in Thai),
But never true to us -- why?"
Here my wife just offered a shrug.

by Fred 11:59 PM