Next Birthday
Anyone want to buy me a ticket for this?
http://www.zorb.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ljbOmNX7x0
http://www.zorb.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ljbOmNX7x0
That which does not kill me is my family- part ii
While my mother berates Frank Lloyd Wright for his perfidious loins, my brother has arrived back from a trip into Boston. He is officially broken up with girlfriend, which is rather sad in light of their apparently recent cute three month anniversary.
He seems rather more chill, or at least centered, knowing that he is broken up than he did yesterday, when he was still deciding what to do.
As for me, I am deeply involved in writing nothing of importance, ignoring my studies for the sake of the heat, and re-reading novels I liked already. This means The Venom Factor by Diane Duane is making another appearance. I have to say, rereading this book is a pleasure overall and I am really quite pleased at the amount of detail and thought that goes into the canon characters and the ones that Duane makes up to flesh out the book. Duane is smart and likes her characters and it shows. I would highly recommend this series as a whole.
However, I finally saw "Little Miss Sunshine", and I have to say I am just so totally grossed out by it that I don't even want to wonder what the film makers were thinking. Up to the last twenty minutes, I was willing to consider the movie to have its good points and be worth watching, but I find the ending so off-putting and played so much for laughs that I can't really stand to even think about the good parts of the movie.
He seems rather more chill, or at least centered, knowing that he is broken up than he did yesterday, when he was still deciding what to do.
As for me, I am deeply involved in writing nothing of importance, ignoring my studies for the sake of the heat, and re-reading novels I liked already. This means The Venom Factor by Diane Duane is making another appearance. I have to say, rereading this book is a pleasure overall and I am really quite pleased at the amount of detail and thought that goes into the canon characters and the ones that Duane makes up to flesh out the book. Duane is smart and likes her characters and it shows. I would highly recommend this series as a whole.
However, I finally saw "Little Miss Sunshine", and I have to say I am just so totally grossed out by it that I don't even want to wonder what the film makers were thinking. Up to the last twenty minutes, I was willing to consider the movie to have its good points and be worth watching, but I find the ending so off-putting and played so much for laughs that I can't really stand to even think about the good parts of the movie.
Entry tags:
day 14: the professional
Day 14: the professional
“What, is this some kind of a joke?” The manicurist looked down at my hand and then looked back up at me- she truly did seem to hope that it would be a jest. I thought it was incredibly tactless, but I smiled and did the nice polite thing. Let her think she was being punked, as long as I got my manicure.
“No, I really would like a manicure. I’ve had a little bad luck in trying to do them at home.” I only realized how that sounded after the fact, when she looked up at me as the color faded under her heavy foundation. “No! No, that’s not how I lost my fingers. I was in a car accident. I mean, I just have trouble holding the brushes.”
“Oh. Oh.” She tries desperately to project a façade that the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind. I was personally very tempted to ask just how a home manicuring accident could leave someone with only eight fingers, just to see what an expert in the field might think of, but I figured that she was uncomfortable enough. She was tactless, yes, but she was also stuck giving foot rubs to idle old ladies every day, and that is enough of hell for any one person to suffer, at least in my books.
She finally took a seat, pulled back her hair, and seemed to slip into a more professional persona. She picked up my undamaged left hand first, and then seemed to think the better of it. “Are you left or right handed?”
“I’m naturally a righty, but it’s pretty much the same to me these days. I still write with my right hand mostly.”
“Then I’ll start with the left,” she declared. I am almost certain that if I’d said I was left handed, she would have made the same decision. I made a silent vow not to come back here. It’s one thing for me to think my right hand looks ugly. I don’t need to take it from people I’m paying to fawn on me. She started to dab a cotton pad over the nails of my hand with something pungent smelling, making sure to get into all the little crannies.
“Been a while since the last manicure, I see?” she asked. I only suppose it was a question.
“Actually,” I mentioned lightly, “I’ve never had one. They never seemed worth the money.” Really, it was more that I was deeply uncomfortable with the idea of having someone act as my servant in such a personal way. I dislike massages for the same reasons. She finished dabbing and stuck my hand in a bowl of warm water. She took my hand in both of hers and started to stroke slowly and gently down from the wrist in alternating waves. It felt lovely.
Of course, I really could get used to servants. If I had to.
She finished her unexpected massage by rubbing a rose-scented lotion into my hand and kneading the base of my thumb. When she was finished, she dabbed something (which was most certainly not nail polish) at the base of each nail bed before enshrouding my hand in what I can only call saran wrap.
Pondering my hand’s new status as a leftover, I almost did not see her hesitation as she began on my right hand. The moment of truth had arrived.
“What, is this some kind of a joke?” The manicurist looked down at my hand and then looked back up at me- she truly did seem to hope that it would be a jest. I thought it was incredibly tactless, but I smiled and did the nice polite thing. Let her think she was being punked, as long as I got my manicure.
“No, I really would like a manicure. I’ve had a little bad luck in trying to do them at home.” I only realized how that sounded after the fact, when she looked up at me as the color faded under her heavy foundation. “No! No, that’s not how I lost my fingers. I was in a car accident. I mean, I just have trouble holding the brushes.”
“Oh. Oh.” She tries desperately to project a façade that the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind. I was personally very tempted to ask just how a home manicuring accident could leave someone with only eight fingers, just to see what an expert in the field might think of, but I figured that she was uncomfortable enough. She was tactless, yes, but she was also stuck giving foot rubs to idle old ladies every day, and that is enough of hell for any one person to suffer, at least in my books.
She finally took a seat, pulled back her hair, and seemed to slip into a more professional persona. She picked up my undamaged left hand first, and then seemed to think the better of it. “Are you left or right handed?”
“I’m naturally a righty, but it’s pretty much the same to me these days. I still write with my right hand mostly.”
“Then I’ll start with the left,” she declared. I am almost certain that if I’d said I was left handed, she would have made the same decision. I made a silent vow not to come back here. It’s one thing for me to think my right hand looks ugly. I don’t need to take it from people I’m paying to fawn on me. She started to dab a cotton pad over the nails of my hand with something pungent smelling, making sure to get into all the little crannies.
“Been a while since the last manicure, I see?” she asked. I only suppose it was a question.
“Actually,” I mentioned lightly, “I’ve never had one. They never seemed worth the money.” Really, it was more that I was deeply uncomfortable with the idea of having someone act as my servant in such a personal way. I dislike massages for the same reasons. She finished dabbing and stuck my hand in a bowl of warm water. She took my hand in both of hers and started to stroke slowly and gently down from the wrist in alternating waves. It felt lovely.
Of course, I really could get used to servants. If I had to.
She finished her unexpected massage by rubbing a rose-scented lotion into my hand and kneading the base of my thumb. When she was finished, she dabbed something (which was most certainly not nail polish) at the base of each nail bed before enshrouding my hand in what I can only call saran wrap.
Pondering my hand’s new status as a leftover, I almost did not see her hesitation as she began on my right hand. The moment of truth had arrived.
Entry tags:
Day 13: fashion
Day 13
“Low gravity,” Letitiana proclaimed, “has changed only two things in fashion: fake tits and beehive hairdo's.”
The table laughed uproariously as the tipsy fashionistas toasted themselves once more. They were well into the fourth bottle of champagne by now, and the Earth-born members were beginning to forget their strength in the lunar gravity. Letty grinned at them before she continued. The audience, captivated, sleek and well-fed, was lapping from the palm of her hand, and she was determined to bask in the pack’s approval as long as she could.
“No, truly! Remember the fad in Fall 2098 for the self-supporting gyro-tits? The ones built from recycled Segway parts?” Most of the table grinned, with only perhaps two or three lapsing into outright hysterical giggles as they recalled the extremes to which the trend was taken on the New York runway. At least one pair of breasts had malfunctioned and smacked a model in the face before making their antigravity getaway like a pair of lost balloons.
“One had to make an investment of at least half a million €¥RO just to make sure that the models didn’t all rush to get them done at one of those back alley wire-runner stations and end up with a set of laser cannons instead. So much cheaper this way- let nature do her work and then just bring the girls up sky-side and bid Nature a fond farewell!” Letty gestured with her still-full shot glass for emphasis. She was flushed from the heat and noise but not from drink, so even across the room she immediately spotted a curious piece of couture.
One of the models from a competitors show, a wirey thing with a conservatively colored Mohawk plaited sedately down to the waist, looked delicious in a suit jacket and kilt ensemble that she (or he, Letty was honestly not sure) had clearly snitched from Letitiana’s personal collection. Since Letty hired all her models personally, this was clearly a message or a very clumsy theft. Letitiana pantomimed a trip that let her dive graceful in low grav to sink into her neighbor’s lap.
“George” she hissed, “whose show was That One in?”
“Letty, you are melting the ice crystals in my waistcoat!”
“George, those are plastic shards that you hot-glued to your jacket because you didn’t have the money to get your personal coolant system replaced this month- you blew it all on vintage muslin, I was there when you got the bill. Now, you silly synthoid, tell me who that is!”
George grimaced and then swiveled his free-floating eye array towards the model.
“Huh. S/he was in Dolce & Gabbana & Clones Retrospective Show- the Androgen Collection. Isn’t that jacket one of your? S/he carries it off much better than that ginger tart you assigned.”
Letty squirmed out George’s lap and slunk behind his chair, to the amusement of those at the table who were still sober enough to notice she was no longer toasting. She emerged from behind the chairs coif first, but still managed to take the model by surprise as s/he walked by. She sprung out and spread her arms for a giant hug before air kissing both cheeks at dizzying speed. Suitably bamboozled, the model stopped and then blushed like mad. There was no escape, and s/he knew s/he was caught.
“Now, then, darling,” she linked armed with him/her as s/he tried to walk around her. “ You must tell me where you got this fabulous coat!” Letty smiled, slowly revealing a set of chrome dentures, spiked like a shark’s happy dream. “Or I just might have to beat it out of you.” She cooed.
“Low gravity,” Letitiana proclaimed, “has changed only two things in fashion: fake tits and beehive hairdo's.”
The table laughed uproariously as the tipsy fashionistas toasted themselves once more. They were well into the fourth bottle of champagne by now, and the Earth-born members were beginning to forget their strength in the lunar gravity. Letty grinned at them before she continued. The audience, captivated, sleek and well-fed, was lapping from the palm of her hand, and she was determined to bask in the pack’s approval as long as she could.
“No, truly! Remember the fad in Fall 2098 for the self-supporting gyro-tits? The ones built from recycled Segway parts?” Most of the table grinned, with only perhaps two or three lapsing into outright hysterical giggles as they recalled the extremes to which the trend was taken on the New York runway. At least one pair of breasts had malfunctioned and smacked a model in the face before making their antigravity getaway like a pair of lost balloons.
“One had to make an investment of at least half a million €¥RO just to make sure that the models didn’t all rush to get them done at one of those back alley wire-runner stations and end up with a set of laser cannons instead. So much cheaper this way- let nature do her work and then just bring the girls up sky-side and bid Nature a fond farewell!” Letty gestured with her still-full shot glass for emphasis. She was flushed from the heat and noise but not from drink, so even across the room she immediately spotted a curious piece of couture.
One of the models from a competitors show, a wirey thing with a conservatively colored Mohawk plaited sedately down to the waist, looked delicious in a suit jacket and kilt ensemble that she (or he, Letty was honestly not sure) had clearly snitched from Letitiana’s personal collection. Since Letty hired all her models personally, this was clearly a message or a very clumsy theft. Letitiana pantomimed a trip that let her dive graceful in low grav to sink into her neighbor’s lap.
“George” she hissed, “whose show was That One in?”
“Letty, you are melting the ice crystals in my waistcoat!”
“George, those are plastic shards that you hot-glued to your jacket because you didn’t have the money to get your personal coolant system replaced this month- you blew it all on vintage muslin, I was there when you got the bill. Now, you silly synthoid, tell me who that is!”
George grimaced and then swiveled his free-floating eye array towards the model.
“Huh. S/he was in Dolce & Gabbana & Clones Retrospective Show- the Androgen Collection. Isn’t that jacket one of your? S/he carries it off much better than that ginger tart you assigned.”
Letty squirmed out George’s lap and slunk behind his chair, to the amusement of those at the table who were still sober enough to notice she was no longer toasting. She emerged from behind the chairs coif first, but still managed to take the model by surprise as s/he walked by. She sprung out and spread her arms for a giant hug before air kissing both cheeks at dizzying speed. Suitably bamboozled, the model stopped and then blushed like mad. There was no escape, and s/he knew s/he was caught.
“Now, then, darling,” she linked armed with him/her as s/he tried to walk around her. “ You must tell me where you got this fabulous coat!” Letty smiled, slowly revealing a set of chrome dentures, spiked like a shark’s happy dream. “Or I just might have to beat it out of you.” She cooed.
(no subject)
My brother, who over the past few days has been remarkably pleasant and cheerful, is now being pissy as hell over the past few days because there is the possibility that his girlfriend might dump him. Or, at least considered it and failed to hide it from him. Since I only met this girl last week and she seemed fine, it kind of makes me wonder what is wrong with the whole damned world.
The whole thing kind of sticks in my throat a little bit.
I forgot how difficult it is to be at home with my family again.
Later:
I forgot to post this sucker for something like two hours. Downstairs Jack Lemmon is discovering that the cute elevator girl he likes is schtupping the boss in The Apartment.
I am now looking for work. Give me some!
The whole thing kind of sticks in my throat a little bit.
I forgot how difficult it is to be at home with my family again.
Later:
I forgot to post this sucker for something like two hours. Downstairs Jack Lemmon is discovering that the cute elevator girl he likes is schtupping the boss in The Apartment.
I am now looking for work. Give me some!
Write What You Know
So, those of you who have watched any Star Wars with me will recognize me in the last posting for the 365 days writing thing. Oh, hell, anyone who has watched any movie with me at all, ever, will recognize my constant jabbering and pointless banter.
Smadar of Swelles came to visit me for the Fourth- it was really low-key and relaxed and made me happy to be at home and have a lot of time to visit my friends. But it also made me wish I lived in Boston, not out here in the boonies, so that a forty minute commuter rail ride was not needed if I wanted to get to Swelles.
My parents are following a minor quest to figure out my father's genealogy using public library resources online. I kind of wish that we could all just enter a drop of blood into a USB port and find out everything that our DNA has gotten up to in the previous editions, but I will save that kind of shenanigans for the later generations.
In other news, I need to poke some of my people to figure out what we are doing with our lives...
Smadar of Swelles came to visit me for the Fourth- it was really low-key and relaxed and made me happy to be at home and have a lot of time to visit my friends. But it also made me wish I lived in Boston, not out here in the boonies, so that a forty minute commuter rail ride was not needed if I wanted to get to Swelles.
My parents are following a minor quest to figure out my father's genealogy using public library resources online. I kind of wish that we could all just enter a drop of blood into a USB port and find out everything that our DNA has gotten up to in the previous editions, but I will save that kind of shenanigans for the later generations.
In other news, I need to poke some of my people to figure out what we are doing with our lives...
Entry tags:
Day 12- quality time
Day 12
“Shush- Vader!” The Imperial March played from the speakers, and Dave held his peace. There are certain moments in a relationship one learns that one must not rush: just-back-from-long-trip hugs, foreplay, and, for geeky partnerships, the last half hour of Star Wars Episode V: the Empire Strikes Back.
At the sound of rushing carbonite, Dave was foraging for a beer- Kate glared at him when he came back. One of his few duties as a boyfriend was to be always physically present at the exchange between Leia and Han Solo (“I love you.” “I know.”) before Han got dunked in carbonite. That and spider relocation were one of the few non-negotiables of dating Kate.
“You missed it!” Kate poked him.
“Sorry- I thought there would be a commercial break there.” He hadn’t really, but he was rather thirsty. He passed her his beer in silent apology, and she sipped while Boba Fett made off with his captive.
Finally, the moment of truth arrived: the final fight between Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. The commentary that accompanied this was one of the first reasons that he’d noticed Kate from among her group of friends. While they waited this part of the movie out, she was making active commentary about the bloopers and fighting tactics.
“Listen to this, this is the really cool part.” Dave listened obligingly to the silence while Kate held up her index finger like a conductor poised for the next note. “Aaaand, now!” Suddenly Vader appears swinging and takes the hero by surprise. Kate grabbed his beer again before she went on.
“You notice what they did there? How Vader cut out his respirator to sneak up on Luke? He never does that at any other time in the movies- he never has to, in any of the fights or even when he’s talking to other people. He’s so into getting Luke, that he literally wills himself into not breathing so that he can pounce on him.”
“Truly, the man is all that is badass.”
“Shush- Vader!” Dave leaned back as Vader leaned out over the dangling Luke and explained how they could end this conflict and bring order to the galaxy. Kate continued her running commentary.
“Honestly, that’s about the worst job pitch that I have ever heard. I would not take a job that’s best perk was bringing order to the galaxy aaaand now it’s the family business,” Kate drew the words out as Vader revealed Luke’s parentage. “Gee, that makes it sound so appealing.”
“Still, this scene kind of makes Luke for me,” Dave added. “He’s so whiney in training with Yoda, but in an actual fight you throw all this daddy poo at him and he still devises a sneaky way out using the airlocks.”
“I think those things are a garbage chute. But that would be kind of a repeat from the last movie, no?”
“In any case, I am not particularly impressed by the waste treatment options in the future. Particularly how inconsistent they are. First movie, trash gets compacted in a room with an alien tentacle monster. Second movie, the fleet jettisons trash in space before lightspeed, or they have these big chutes in the floating cities that just poop it all out on the planet. Not environmentally sound, these options are.”
“Like Yoda you speak,” Kate replied, and kissed him while she stole his beer again. Dave pretended not to notice and stole it right back.
“Shush- Vader!” The Imperial March played from the speakers, and Dave held his peace. There are certain moments in a relationship one learns that one must not rush: just-back-from-long-trip hugs, foreplay, and, for geeky partnerships, the last half hour of Star Wars Episode V: the Empire Strikes Back.
At the sound of rushing carbonite, Dave was foraging for a beer- Kate glared at him when he came back. One of his few duties as a boyfriend was to be always physically present at the exchange between Leia and Han Solo (“I love you.” “I know.”) before Han got dunked in carbonite. That and spider relocation were one of the few non-negotiables of dating Kate.
“You missed it!” Kate poked him.
“Sorry- I thought there would be a commercial break there.” He hadn’t really, but he was rather thirsty. He passed her his beer in silent apology, and she sipped while Boba Fett made off with his captive.
Finally, the moment of truth arrived: the final fight between Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. The commentary that accompanied this was one of the first reasons that he’d noticed Kate from among her group of friends. While they waited this part of the movie out, she was making active commentary about the bloopers and fighting tactics.
“Listen to this, this is the really cool part.” Dave listened obligingly to the silence while Kate held up her index finger like a conductor poised for the next note. “Aaaand, now!” Suddenly Vader appears swinging and takes the hero by surprise. Kate grabbed his beer again before she went on.
“You notice what they did there? How Vader cut out his respirator to sneak up on Luke? He never does that at any other time in the movies- he never has to, in any of the fights or even when he’s talking to other people. He’s so into getting Luke, that he literally wills himself into not breathing so that he can pounce on him.”
“Truly, the man is all that is badass.”
“Shush- Vader!” Dave leaned back as Vader leaned out over the dangling Luke and explained how they could end this conflict and bring order to the galaxy. Kate continued her running commentary.
“Honestly, that’s about the worst job pitch that I have ever heard. I would not take a job that’s best perk was bringing order to the galaxy aaaand now it’s the family business,” Kate drew the words out as Vader revealed Luke’s parentage. “Gee, that makes it sound so appealing.”
“Still, this scene kind of makes Luke for me,” Dave added. “He’s so whiney in training with Yoda, but in an actual fight you throw all this daddy poo at him and he still devises a sneaky way out using the airlocks.”
“I think those things are a garbage chute. But that would be kind of a repeat from the last movie, no?”
“In any case, I am not particularly impressed by the waste treatment options in the future. Particularly how inconsistent they are. First movie, trash gets compacted in a room with an alien tentacle monster. Second movie, the fleet jettisons trash in space before lightspeed, or they have these big chutes in the floating cities that just poop it all out on the planet. Not environmentally sound, these options are.”
“Like Yoda you speak,” Kate replied, and kissed him while she stole his beer again. Dave pretended not to notice and stole it right back.
Entry tags:
Day 11: the Cuckoo
Day 11
“You knew?”
“Yes, of course I knew. Your mother was already pregnant when I met her- I mean obviously pregnant. We dated a little, but after you were born things just fit into place. Your mom was… she was just wonderful, you know that…” My dad starts to tear up again, and even knowing that he’s not really my father doesn’t change the fact that I’m still watching my dad cry- it’s like watching the moon fall into the sea. The world is broken.
When my dad starts crying, you know someone is dead: he only cries at funerals. And I cannot express accurately how angry I am at him for lying all these years when he tears up like that. It gets mixed up with how much I love him, and how much it hurt watching my mother die, and how utterly unjust it is that he’s not related to me by blood. It’s all still there, but all I can do is hand him a handkerchief and stare at my knees until he’s composed again.
He catches his breath. “It was perfect. I walked right into the family I had wanted, and it was just after I found out I couldn’t have kids- you both needed me so much. It was like God planned it out exactly just for us to fit into each others’ lives.” I nod. He’s a great dad- he just puts everything into it. I can’t imagine the waste it would have been for him never to have children of his own.
“I did not know she’d put it in her will. I didn’t know that. We’d talked about telling you, but she’d asked your biological father to stay away- she still loved him even after she had you and she met me. She still loved him.” He clutches the hankie and for just a second he grimaced like he was in pain before going on. “He did ask to see you- he wasn’t a bad guy, kiddo, but she just couldn’t stand the idea of you and him meeting.” Like I wasn’t really your father, he does not say, but my dad can’t lie worth a damn and he can’t hide either.
It’s not fair, but it’s how my mother would have thought of it. I’d grown up used to obvious adoptions and Asian schoolmates with white parents, but she was always shocked to see that anyone would do something like that. She thought adoptive parents were good people for taking in a child in need, but she never seemed to accept that they were family in the same way as blood parents. That she was just so much of a hypocrite, to tell me that my dad was really my biological father when it was a lie, never crossed my mind.
My dad was crying again. My mother was dead, and my dad was crying but he wasn’t my real father, and there was some stranger in California whose name and face I knew from billboards and he was my real father. It was like someone was granting every hateful wish I’d made at seven years old, fourteen years too late.
“You knew?”
“Yes, of course I knew. Your mother was already pregnant when I met her- I mean obviously pregnant. We dated a little, but after you were born things just fit into place. Your mom was… she was just wonderful, you know that…” My dad starts to tear up again, and even knowing that he’s not really my father doesn’t change the fact that I’m still watching my dad cry- it’s like watching the moon fall into the sea. The world is broken.
When my dad starts crying, you know someone is dead: he only cries at funerals. And I cannot express accurately how angry I am at him for lying all these years when he tears up like that. It gets mixed up with how much I love him, and how much it hurt watching my mother die, and how utterly unjust it is that he’s not related to me by blood. It’s all still there, but all I can do is hand him a handkerchief and stare at my knees until he’s composed again.
He catches his breath. “It was perfect. I walked right into the family I had wanted, and it was just after I found out I couldn’t have kids- you both needed me so much. It was like God planned it out exactly just for us to fit into each others’ lives.” I nod. He’s a great dad- he just puts everything into it. I can’t imagine the waste it would have been for him never to have children of his own.
“I did not know she’d put it in her will. I didn’t know that. We’d talked about telling you, but she’d asked your biological father to stay away- she still loved him even after she had you and she met me. She still loved him.” He clutches the hankie and for just a second he grimaced like he was in pain before going on. “He did ask to see you- he wasn’t a bad guy, kiddo, but she just couldn’t stand the idea of you and him meeting.” Like I wasn’t really your father, he does not say, but my dad can’t lie worth a damn and he can’t hide either.
It’s not fair, but it’s how my mother would have thought of it. I’d grown up used to obvious adoptions and Asian schoolmates with white parents, but she was always shocked to see that anyone would do something like that. She thought adoptive parents were good people for taking in a child in need, but she never seemed to accept that they were family in the same way as blood parents. That she was just so much of a hypocrite, to tell me that my dad was really my biological father when it was a lie, never crossed my mind.
My dad was crying again. My mother was dead, and my dad was crying but he wasn’t my real father, and there was some stranger in California whose name and face I knew from billboards and he was my real father. It was like someone was granting every hateful wish I’d made at seven years old, fourteen years too late.
Entry tags:
Day 10- Ding, Dong
Day 10
Yield unto the Hive Mind, and all your pain shall cease. Allow us to awaken you to the manifold blessings of Unified Existence…
“No, thank you. I’m not really interested in merging with a Hive Mind.” Jenny interrupted early on, which was the only way to deal with members of the High Church of the Unified Mind- all that personal satisfaction with being part of a single mental entity had a way of making itself very forceful when they showed up your doorstep. Polite but firm was the only way to go.
Defensiveness only shows that you have much to fear in your singular existence. It will only take a moment of your time to explain- “No. Thank you, but I have no interest in becoming a member of Hive Mind, and your time would be better spent elsewhere. Have a nice day.” With that, Jenny smiled and slowly, but clearly, moved to shut the door.
One of the Hive Mind’s physical bodies, an incongruously sweet-looking Indian gentleman of perhaps 60, literally stuck his foot in Jenny’s door. Wait, please! Could we at least leave you some pamphlets?
“No, again, I am not interested. Goodbye.” Jenny glared at the particular body until he grudgingly removed his foot from her door, and then shut it swiftly before he could try again. She stayed by the door to listen to the other personalities argue on the way down the path- the newly converted had a way of being too earnestly, and he’d crossed a line.
Jenny mentally congratulated herself for not yielding to her good manners and inviting them in- that one seemed like he would have taken the invitation to lemonade for a concession to his arguments. She wished she could have told them the plain facts, but there were still some social stigma attached to her beliefs. Even the Hive Mind looked down on Jehovah’s Witnesses.
Yield unto the Hive Mind, and all your pain shall cease. Allow us to awaken you to the manifold blessings of Unified Existence…
“No, thank you. I’m not really interested in merging with a Hive Mind.” Jenny interrupted early on, which was the only way to deal with members of the High Church of the Unified Mind- all that personal satisfaction with being part of a single mental entity had a way of making itself very forceful when they showed up your doorstep. Polite but firm was the only way to go.
Defensiveness only shows that you have much to fear in your singular existence. It will only take a moment of your time to explain- “No. Thank you, but I have no interest in becoming a member of Hive Mind, and your time would be better spent elsewhere. Have a nice day.” With that, Jenny smiled and slowly, but clearly, moved to shut the door.
One of the Hive Mind’s physical bodies, an incongruously sweet-looking Indian gentleman of perhaps 60, literally stuck his foot in Jenny’s door. Wait, please! Could we at least leave you some pamphlets?
“No, again, I am not interested. Goodbye.” Jenny glared at the particular body until he grudgingly removed his foot from her door, and then shut it swiftly before he could try again. She stayed by the door to listen to the other personalities argue on the way down the path- the newly converted had a way of being too earnestly, and he’d crossed a line.
Jenny mentally congratulated herself for not yielding to her good manners and inviting them in- that one seemed like he would have taken the invitation to lemonade for a concession to his arguments. She wished she could have told them the plain facts, but there were still some social stigma attached to her beliefs. Even the Hive Mind looked down on Jehovah’s Witnesses.
In which Beanie is apparently a girl.
Being home at the moment entails the application of motherly affection through sponsored shopping. I now have brand new undies of wonderfulness and some very pretty eyeshadow, as well as one of those highly useful little eyeliner brushes that make it so that you can forego the use of pencils. Oh, and a blush that looks rather light and natural-I've got something like it already that has no staying power at all and disappears after an hour.
It also entailed a nice dinner at a new restaurant that I have not seen heretofore. I rather shocked my mother by leaving one of my little cards for the waiter with the tip. I have to say that these little cards are really convenient for this kind of thing. I don't anticipate anything coming of it, but at the moment I'm just kind of enjoying how shocked my mother and family are by my apparent "make-over" in Europe. I got a haircut and learned to apply eyeshadow properly- this is clearly cause for celebration.
I should get some stuff today for the July 4th of hanging out with Smadar.
It also entailed a nice dinner at a new restaurant that I have not seen heretofore. I rather shocked my mother by leaving one of my little cards for the waiter with the tip. I have to say that these little cards are really convenient for this kind of thing. I don't anticipate anything coming of it, but at the moment I'm just kind of enjoying how shocked my mother and family are by my apparent "make-over" in Europe. I got a haircut and learned to apply eyeshadow properly- this is clearly cause for celebration.
I should get some stuff today for the July 4th of hanging out with Smadar.
Entry tags:
Day 8: the hunt begins.
“Boxes, boxes, boxes, rawhide!” he hummed to himself as he shifted through the piled cardboard mountain. Somewhere, perhaps under the next stack, was his prize: a battered copy of Wheelock’s Latin Grammar and a slightly more battered copy of Auricula Meretricula- Earlobe, the Little Prostitute. There is only so much Latin one can take over a summer, and wisely knowing this, he had stowed both these worthy tombs away lest he destroy his own zest for the subject. (Or, according to his mother, he was too lazy to pick up a book that wasn’t assigned, and he hid them so that no one could blame him. There were elements of truth to both of them- Reading Wheelocks’s description of the present active imperative would make anyone feel commanded to throw the book across the room and leave it there for the vultures.)
He shifted another box and slowly eased it open. Despite his efforts, an earwig ran out across his fingers. While maintaining the greatest dignity, he stood, hopped back three or four steps and shook himself bodily like an Old English Sheepdog leaving a lake. He really did need a haircut.
Aside from the odd bit of local color, the boxes had turned up fruitless, though presenting an oddly compelling history of his own higher education. The early physics books that remained in an almost pristine condition because he had never been assed to do the readings quickly gave way to the subjects of literature and philosophy. He stopped to peruse the odd paper, and found himself chuckling over a von Trapp family reference: How Do You Solve a Problem like Mary Stuart?: an examination of guilt in Schiller’s drama. There were still professors out there who, secretly, unbeknownst to all but their most treasured teacher’s pets, graded entirely on how amusing the title of the paper was. For this reason alone he had chosen to give up on physics, where the paper title was often just a version of the first line with all the verbs taken out- making the process of understanding the vast and enthralling weirdness of the universe dull.
There was something to be said for literature classes: They made the examination of a finite part of the world, something that didn’t even really exist except on the page and in the mind, into an entire universe of poking, prodding, and academic argumentation that spanned centuries, languages and continents. It was pointless and ultimately useless in the grander scheme of things, but it was so much fun.
Except, of course, for the moments like these, when the accumulated pack-rattery of the devoted English student prevents him from even finding what he’s looking for. Perhaps Someone was saying he should stick to one language…?
He shifted another box and slowly eased it open. Despite his efforts, an earwig ran out across his fingers. While maintaining the greatest dignity, he stood, hopped back three or four steps and shook himself bodily like an Old English Sheepdog leaving a lake. He really did need a haircut.
Aside from the odd bit of local color, the boxes had turned up fruitless, though presenting an oddly compelling history of his own higher education. The early physics books that remained in an almost pristine condition because he had never been assed to do the readings quickly gave way to the subjects of literature and philosophy. He stopped to peruse the odd paper, and found himself chuckling over a von Trapp family reference: How Do You Solve a Problem like Mary Stuart?: an examination of guilt in Schiller’s drama. There were still professors out there who, secretly, unbeknownst to all but their most treasured teacher’s pets, graded entirely on how amusing the title of the paper was. For this reason alone he had chosen to give up on physics, where the paper title was often just a version of the first line with all the verbs taken out- making the process of understanding the vast and enthralling weirdness of the universe dull.
There was something to be said for literature classes: They made the examination of a finite part of the world, something that didn’t even really exist except on the page and in the mind, into an entire universe of poking, prodding, and academic argumentation that spanned centuries, languages and continents. It was pointless and ultimately useless in the grander scheme of things, but it was so much fun.
Except, of course, for the moments like these, when the accumulated pack-rattery of the devoted English student prevents him from even finding what he’s looking for. Perhaps Someone was saying he should stick to one language…?
(no subject)
I've got a desk in my room now! And did not need the intervention of random brotherly help. He's still asleep, and I don't want to have to wake him up for something my honor demands I do myself anyways. I really just need to have a desk in my life apparently, and since this one was going begging I grabbed it for dibs. I'm also doing laundry at the same time. Which means I get points in life.
It's weird to be back in the same time zone as all the rest of my life actually is. Strange and wonderful, I suppose.
Yesterday's fiction disappoints me- I mean the day 8 submission, not the day 7. Day 8 was written while I was literally falling asleep after my brother took me out for ice cream to meet his new girlfriend, who is really extraordinarily cute.
I'm going to have Smadar over to my house for the fourth of July, which should be good fun. She sounded like she needed some time to goof off and be away from her work and constant drive to achieve. I will be glad to see her and hang out, though I was slightly looking for an excuse to get to Swelles.
It's weird to be back in the same time zone as all the rest of my life actually is. Strange and wonderful, I suppose.
Yesterday's fiction disappoints me- I mean the day 8 submission, not the day 7. Day 8 was written while I was literally falling asleep after my brother took me out for ice cream to meet his new girlfriend, who is really extraordinarily cute.
I'm going to have Smadar over to my house for the fourth of July, which should be good fun. She sounded like she needed some time to goof off and be away from her work and constant drive to achieve. I will be glad to see her and hang out, though I was slightly looking for an excuse to get to Swelles.
Entry tags:
Day 8: flying
I feel like this is very rough, but I am sleepy, so I will let it go for now.
Day 8
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
“James, get down from the roof! Please, listen to me. I know you think that things are bad, but they’ll get better. You don’t have to do this!” A voice from underneath him was screaming and seemed close to tears. James felt a brief pang of sympathy in the faint way he had for all crawling things, but paid it no more attention than the birdsong or the rising alarms.
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
He leaned closer to the edge of the roof. It was a lovely day, and the winds were right for take-off. He knew this instinctively, the same way he knew that, in leaping off the side of this building, he would not fall. It wasn’t even a question of faith. Some things go deeper.
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
He took off his shoes, and set them carefully by the edge. He stepped over the low barrier with the slight caution that bare feet bring in the modern world, and then settled himself. The wailing beneath him took on a fevered pitch. He would try to explain to them later about this, but there was only so much that he could do for the moment. He had places to be.
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
He stepped off the ledge and flew.
***
“What do you mean, he flew?” The detective was starting to get annoyed. There is only so much insanity that a single person can take in one day, and most of it seemed to concentrate into the collection of morbid gawkers that the detective would then have to question and file reports on.
“He stepped off the roof, and he didn’t fall. He flew.” The woman on the other side of the desk was taller than the detective, something the detective noted with dissatisfaction. Still the detective could loom over the suspect with ease while seated, and she did so now while glaring to make sure that the interrogee was perfectly away of what would happen if she continued this chicanery.
“I swear to god, he just walked off the roof and didn’t fall. He didn’t seem to even start flying- he just looked like he was standing in the clouds getting farther and farther off. He was gone.”
“Uh huh. And how do you know this James?”
“He was a friend of mine, sort of. He is incredibly unpushy: I didn’t notice him in this larger section of the office, and I just thought that maybe he was depressed or something, but when we went on a date, he looked incredibly uncomfortable. He said that he was already promised to some one, and that I should leave him alone. Then, next thing I know, he’s come back from stupid meeting with a con and then he started to pack for a trip to god knows where, and then he jumps off the roof the next day.”
Day 8
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
“James, get down from the roof! Please, listen to me. I know you think that things are bad, but they’ll get better. You don’t have to do this!” A voice from underneath him was screaming and seemed close to tears. James felt a brief pang of sympathy in the faint way he had for all crawling things, but paid it no more attention than the birdsong or the rising alarms.
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
He leaned closer to the edge of the roof. It was a lovely day, and the winds were right for take-off. He knew this instinctively, the same way he knew that, in leaping off the side of this building, he would not fall. It wasn’t even a question of faith. Some things go deeper.
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
He took off his shoes, and set them carefully by the edge. He stepped over the low barrier with the slight caution that bare feet bring in the modern world, and then settled himself. The wailing beneath him took on a fevered pitch. He would try to explain to them later about this, but there was only so much that he could do for the moment. He had places to be.
I will fly. There is nothing to stop me. I will fly.
He stepped off the ledge and flew.
***
“What do you mean, he flew?” The detective was starting to get annoyed. There is only so much insanity that a single person can take in one day, and most of it seemed to concentrate into the collection of morbid gawkers that the detective would then have to question and file reports on.
“He stepped off the roof, and he didn’t fall. He flew.” The woman on the other side of the desk was taller than the detective, something the detective noted with dissatisfaction. Still the detective could loom over the suspect with ease while seated, and she did so now while glaring to make sure that the interrogee was perfectly away of what would happen if she continued this chicanery.
“I swear to god, he just walked off the roof and didn’t fall. He didn’t seem to even start flying- he just looked like he was standing in the clouds getting farther and farther off. He was gone.”
“Uh huh. And how do you know this James?”
“He was a friend of mine, sort of. He is incredibly unpushy: I didn’t notice him in this larger section of the office, and I just thought that maybe he was depressed or something, but when we went on a date, he looked incredibly uncomfortable. He said that he was already promised to some one, and that I should leave him alone. Then, next thing I know, he’s come back from stupid meeting with a con and then he started to pack for a trip to god knows where, and then he jumps off the roof the next day.”
Entry tags:
Day 7: Geeks in the mists (later submission)
Day 7
“There’s something on the wing of the plane!” shouted the tv. Sharon looked over at it wistfully, but turned back grudgingly to her computer. Classic Twilight Zone would have to wait for after the finals for her.
Not so for her roomie, of course. With a double major in English (focus: Creative Writing) and Cinema, Rachel’s apparent goofing off was actually the sign of a focused mind at work. Her final was to take apart and analyze a short cinematic piece of less then an hour- part of the grade depended on the professor accepting that the piece was in fact worth the effort. But science fiction was not Professor Rothburg’s thing, and though Rachel had been able to suppress her urge to go over the great points of science fiction history with her, she wasn’t going to give up her last chance of bringing Rod Sterling into her academic career. It was the culmination of a lifelong dream.
“Okay, the action of camera is fairly static, but this functions to reinforce the viewer’s feelings of claustrophobia on the plane, at the mercy of whatever is attacking….” Rachel also muttered and couldn’t stand to wear headphones. Her relationship with Sharon was sometimes strained for just these reasons, but a shared love of geekery in all its myriad forms smoothed many a ruffled feather.
“Shar, do you think I can get away with saying that planes are inherently frightening?” Rachel’s willingness to discuss any and all minutia of her current thoughts also tended to have a bonding effect- there are only so many conversations one can have about the comparative visibility from within Godzilla suits versus Mothra suits without either goading one into a murder/suicide or an abiding friendship. As both women yet lived, love prevailed at the cost of sanity.
“If not in real life, (which I certainly think they are), at least in the realm of the movie, I think. Don’t the people who think he’s crazy think that he snapped from the strain of flying on the plane?”
“Ooh, point.” Rachel scribbled, and then unpaused the DVD to return to her scrutiny.
Sharon turned back to her computer again, and just tried to focus on Billy Collins. Ironically, her desk was covered in repeated prints of the same document, all wreathed in red pencil around the center text. “Marginalia, my ass. I’ve written a whole damned new book about this guy.”
“I thought you were going to write about Shakespeare being gay.” Rachel asked.
“Tried. The professor said too many people are picking that topic this year- something about a Doctor Who episode. I had to switch to a modern author. I thought this guy would at least be easy- I mean, poet laureate, he’s got to have something going for him.”
“Pah. You lost your heart to iambic pentameter- you don’t even see anything that doesn’t have a metrical system. Why bother?”
“I asked the professor, and he said I had to change it. It’s just the one paper.”
“It’s just your brain! If you don’t want to have to write about something, you don’t have to. See what I’m writing about?” Rachel gestured broadly at the tv. “I spent the whole semester writing about what the professor liked. This is my last chance to do what I want, so I’m going for it. Don’t just write about a modern poet just because of the grade. You had that gay idea first, and if you hadn’t gotten sick, you’d have already have registered it before all the That Girls got into it. It’s your damned brain- you want to think about Shakespeare? Do it!”
Sharon sighed and then smiled. Rachel was kind of wonderfully impractical at times. “Intellectual purity will not save my scholarship if the professor sacks me, kiddo. You take the high road, and I’ll take the low road, and I’ll get to grad school afore ye, for me and Bill’s gay love will often meet again on the muddy muddy banks of English Lit.”
Rachel gaped in awe at Sharon for a moment.
“… How long had you been storing that up?”
“Honestly? I’ve been doing variations on that sucker since high school.”
“Sharon. I says this with love: you are such a fucking geek.”
“Thanks, dearie. You too.”
“There’s something on the wing of the plane!” shouted the tv. Sharon looked over at it wistfully, but turned back grudgingly to her computer. Classic Twilight Zone would have to wait for after the finals for her.
Not so for her roomie, of course. With a double major in English (focus: Creative Writing) and Cinema, Rachel’s apparent goofing off was actually the sign of a focused mind at work. Her final was to take apart and analyze a short cinematic piece of less then an hour- part of the grade depended on the professor accepting that the piece was in fact worth the effort. But science fiction was not Professor Rothburg’s thing, and though Rachel had been able to suppress her urge to go over the great points of science fiction history with her, she wasn’t going to give up her last chance of bringing Rod Sterling into her academic career. It was the culmination of a lifelong dream.
“Okay, the action of camera is fairly static, but this functions to reinforce the viewer’s feelings of claustrophobia on the plane, at the mercy of whatever is attacking….” Rachel also muttered and couldn’t stand to wear headphones. Her relationship with Sharon was sometimes strained for just these reasons, but a shared love of geekery in all its myriad forms smoothed many a ruffled feather.
“Shar, do you think I can get away with saying that planes are inherently frightening?” Rachel’s willingness to discuss any and all minutia of her current thoughts also tended to have a bonding effect- there are only so many conversations one can have about the comparative visibility from within Godzilla suits versus Mothra suits without either goading one into a murder/suicide or an abiding friendship. As both women yet lived, love prevailed at the cost of sanity.
“If not in real life, (which I certainly think they are), at least in the realm of the movie, I think. Don’t the people who think he’s crazy think that he snapped from the strain of flying on the plane?”
“Ooh, point.” Rachel scribbled, and then unpaused the DVD to return to her scrutiny.
Sharon turned back to her computer again, and just tried to focus on Billy Collins. Ironically, her desk was covered in repeated prints of the same document, all wreathed in red pencil around the center text. “Marginalia, my ass. I’ve written a whole damned new book about this guy.”
“I thought you were going to write about Shakespeare being gay.” Rachel asked.
“Tried. The professor said too many people are picking that topic this year- something about a Doctor Who episode. I had to switch to a modern author. I thought this guy would at least be easy- I mean, poet laureate, he’s got to have something going for him.”
“Pah. You lost your heart to iambic pentameter- you don’t even see anything that doesn’t have a metrical system. Why bother?”
“I asked the professor, and he said I had to change it. It’s just the one paper.”
“It’s just your brain! If you don’t want to have to write about something, you don’t have to. See what I’m writing about?” Rachel gestured broadly at the tv. “I spent the whole semester writing about what the professor liked. This is my last chance to do what I want, so I’m going for it. Don’t just write about a modern poet just because of the grade. You had that gay idea first, and if you hadn’t gotten sick, you’d have already have registered it before all the That Girls got into it. It’s your damned brain- you want to think about Shakespeare? Do it!”
Sharon sighed and then smiled. Rachel was kind of wonderfully impractical at times. “Intellectual purity will not save my scholarship if the professor sacks me, kiddo. You take the high road, and I’ll take the low road, and I’ll get to grad school afore ye, for me and Bill’s gay love will often meet again on the muddy muddy banks of English Lit.”
Rachel gaped in awe at Sharon for a moment.
“… How long had you been storing that up?”
“Honestly? I’ve been doing variations on that sucker since high school.”
“Sharon. I says this with love: you are such a fucking geek.”
“Thanks, dearie. You too.”
On the road again!
I am in London, Heathrow, and wasting the last of my pound coins showing you how bad I've gotten writing on an English style keyboard.
There was MAJOR STUPIDITY regarding my first flight, to the tune of sitting on the ground for an hour in Vienna before we could get up and go. Meaning that I then had 20 minutes to get to my flight and check in before it flew off. I did not make it.
However, since the fuck-up was distinctly not on my end of the deal, I found myself getting a new set of tickets. This will however destroy my family plans for a welcome back dinner and I will never meet my sister's boyfriend, who is apparently a phantom. Which makes me sad, as by all accounts he is indeed a pleasant fiction.
Gah. Life goes on, I have not yet written my bit of writing for the day, though I am gratified by the love received for the fish post yesterday. (Apparently, I secretly desire to make thelauderdale giggle. It's one of those life goals you don't even know you have until you're in the middle of completing it.)
Going now, and leaving some poor fool to use up the rest of my time. I love you all, and here dismiss you all.
Edit Later> I am pathetic and feeble and home and my wireless is not set up right and I have blisters and and and. SO day 8(?) will not happen tonight, but rather two morrow.
There was MAJOR STUPIDITY regarding my first flight, to the tune of sitting on the ground for an hour in Vienna before we could get up and go. Meaning that I then had 20 minutes to get to my flight and check in before it flew off. I did not make it.
However, since the fuck-up was distinctly not on my end of the deal, I found myself getting a new set of tickets. This will however destroy my family plans for a welcome back dinner and I will never meet my sister's boyfriend, who is apparently a phantom. Which makes me sad, as by all accounts he is indeed a pleasant fiction.
Gah. Life goes on, I have not yet written my bit of writing for the day, though I am gratified by the love received for the fish post yesterday. (Apparently, I secretly desire to make thelauderdale giggle. It's one of those life goals you don't even know you have until you're in the middle of completing it.)
Going now, and leaving some poor fool to use up the rest of my time. I love you all, and here dismiss you all.
Edit Later> I am pathetic and feeble and home and my wireless is not set up right and I have blisters and and and. SO day 8(?) will not happen tonight, but rather two morrow.
Home again home again
So, I'm on my way home, in about 40 minutes or so. Right now, I would be eating breakfast only I have no food. Hopefully something will be open at either the train station or at the airport for me to eat.
Oh, and Spain won the Euro Football championship. This lead to a lot of happiness and joy late into the night and early morning, in which I could not partake for reasons of a) not being a Spaniard, and b) not giving a damn.
However, if I thought the Austria-Germany game was tense, oh, sweet cheese, how much worse was the German-Spain demonstrations yesterday. Roving bands of people wearing German colors would burst into song whenever they saw people wearing the Spanish flag. There were clear divisions.
I am really happy that I have not read Harry Potter. Dropping out of that massive societal brouhaha gave me practice for dropping out of this one.
I am underslept.
Oh, and Spain won the Euro Football championship. This lead to a lot of happiness and joy late into the night and early morning, in which I could not partake for reasons of a) not being a Spaniard, and b) not giving a damn.
However, if I thought the Austria-Germany game was tense, oh, sweet cheese, how much worse was the German-Spain demonstrations yesterday. Roving bands of people wearing German colors would burst into song whenever they saw people wearing the Spanish flag. There were clear divisions.
I am really happy that I have not read Harry Potter. Dropping out of that massive societal brouhaha gave me practice for dropping out of this one.
I am underslept.
Entry tags:
365: Day 6: I believe that fishkind was meant to transcend our wetter nature.
Day 6
“We should never have left the ocean at all.”
“Shut up, Mike.”
“Really! The whole process was just embarrassing. I don’t know what to do with myself without gills and these nose things are such a poor decision- they stick right out into your field of vision.”
“Mike. Really. Shut up.”
“Why? We’ve made a bad choice. Let’s just face it. This whole surface idea was a whim on my part and it was just not a good fit for us. We can go back and asked to have it reversed.”
“I like the surface world.”
“Sue, there’s nothing up here but us and some other weird religious fanatics! No society to speak of!”
“Also, no bigger predators to eat us, no competition for food and good places to live in coral reef, no need to throw the weaker relatives out to the sharks when they come by looking for their ‘protection fees.’”
“But we know how to deal with the sharks and the predators. We had family back in the deep- now we’re some sort of new species- my mother wouldn’t even recognize me!”
“Your mother was a salmon, Mike. She wouldn’t recognize any of her hatched eggs, because she died laying you all! “
“As it should be! Don’t tell me your looking forward to this insane idea of mammerailian reproduction- popping live, squirming hatchlings out of your body.”
“Mammalian, Mike. They say it worked out fine in all the test subjects and their spawn.”
“Yeah, the ones who did live through it!”
“You just said that fish should die in spawning. Mike, if you don’t want to be here, you don’t have to be here. You can have the process reversed and go back to fins again. You don’t believe in the Doctrine of Evolution. You shouldn’t have to go through with it if you not a believer.”
“Religion, again! Look, Sue you know I didn’t mean it like that. I’m… glad that you get so much comfort from the idea of a Drier Being. I just…”
“You just think I’m crazy to take it this far? That it’s all a pleasant delusion until I actually start to carry it out? Mike, I believe that fishkind was meant to transcend our wetter nature. We are supposed to ascend to the Drier Realms of Being, and the only way to do that is to give up our gills and breathe.”
“Sue, I didn’t mean anything bad by it.”
“But you’re not happy here on land. This is a dream come true for me, and you’re not happy.”
“No. No, I’m not. But. I love you. So, if this is what you need, I’ll get used to it. I’ll just have to put my best fin forward.”
“Foot, Mike, you have feet now.”
“Yeah, but ‘best foot’ just sounds silly.”
“We should never have left the ocean at all.”
“Shut up, Mike.”
“Really! The whole process was just embarrassing. I don’t know what to do with myself without gills and these nose things are such a poor decision- they stick right out into your field of vision.”
“Mike. Really. Shut up.”
“Why? We’ve made a bad choice. Let’s just face it. This whole surface idea was a whim on my part and it was just not a good fit for us. We can go back and asked to have it reversed.”
“I like the surface world.”
“Sue, there’s nothing up here but us and some other weird religious fanatics! No society to speak of!”
“Also, no bigger predators to eat us, no competition for food and good places to live in coral reef, no need to throw the weaker relatives out to the sharks when they come by looking for their ‘protection fees.’”
“But we know how to deal with the sharks and the predators. We had family back in the deep- now we’re some sort of new species- my mother wouldn’t even recognize me!”
“Your mother was a salmon, Mike. She wouldn’t recognize any of her hatched eggs, because she died laying you all! “
“As it should be! Don’t tell me your looking forward to this insane idea of mammerailian reproduction- popping live, squirming hatchlings out of your body.”
“Mammalian, Mike. They say it worked out fine in all the test subjects and their spawn.”
“Yeah, the ones who did live through it!”
“You just said that fish should die in spawning. Mike, if you don’t want to be here, you don’t have to be here. You can have the process reversed and go back to fins again. You don’t believe in the Doctrine of Evolution. You shouldn’t have to go through with it if you not a believer.”
“Religion, again! Look, Sue you know I didn’t mean it like that. I’m… glad that you get so much comfort from the idea of a Drier Being. I just…”
“You just think I’m crazy to take it this far? That it’s all a pleasant delusion until I actually start to carry it out? Mike, I believe that fishkind was meant to transcend our wetter nature. We are supposed to ascend to the Drier Realms of Being, and the only way to do that is to give up our gills and breathe.”
“Sue, I didn’t mean anything bad by it.”
“But you’re not happy here on land. This is a dream come true for me, and you’re not happy.”
“No. No, I’m not. But. I love you. So, if this is what you need, I’ll get used to it. I’ll just have to put my best fin forward.”
“Foot, Mike, you have feet now.”
“Yeah, but ‘best foot’ just sounds silly.”
(no subject)
First of all: I really love this song, though it confuses me. It kind makes me want to dance and gyrate and do other random happy things.
Second: I am packed! Or, at least, I am almost totally and completely packed and I have only a few more things to do, which are mostly things that have to be done at the last second, such as throwing out my few last remnants of food and taking my shampoo from the shower. But the room looks as naked and spotless as it was when I entered. It's a little weird but nice.
Third: I am not feeling any particular nostalgia about leaving Vienna. It was a great experience, my German is greatly improved, I made my vow to someday live in Berlin, but it was a thing that I was always planning as temporary and I don't mind it staying that way. Getting back to the suburbs does not fill me with overwhelming glee, but it does come with my family and stuff like that. I am going to see a lot of my friends this summer- making a point of it.
Fourth: I have no idea what to write about for today. Apparently my story yesterday freaked my mother out, but..., well, she's slightly prone to that with regard to certain issues, like her children.
Fifth: Spain and Germany are playing in the Euro Soccer Championship, which means the city is now full of happy, loud people on whom I can eavesdrop. I blame the Germans for the fact that my two-step flight from Vienna to London to Boston got changed to a three step flight to Hanover then London to Boston. The Germans will be fleeing the city after the game, I suppose. Though I don't know how many will be on my flight- it's kind of early for them, really. I suppose they will be out partying late.
I am also presuming that the Austrians are divided between rooting for the Germans (shared language, cultural points, huge inferiority complex though) versus the Spanish (who are not German. That might very well be enough for some Austrians.)
Beanie out.
Second: I am packed! Or, at least, I am almost totally and completely packed and I have only a few more things to do, which are mostly things that have to be done at the last second, such as throwing out my few last remnants of food and taking my shampoo from the shower. But the room looks as naked and spotless as it was when I entered. It's a little weird but nice.
Third: I am not feeling any particular nostalgia about leaving Vienna. It was a great experience, my German is greatly improved, I made my vow to someday live in Berlin, but it was a thing that I was always planning as temporary and I don't mind it staying that way. Getting back to the suburbs does not fill me with overwhelming glee, but it does come with my family and stuff like that. I am going to see a lot of my friends this summer- making a point of it.
Fourth: I have no idea what to write about for today. Apparently my story yesterday freaked my mother out, but..., well, she's slightly prone to that with regard to certain issues, like her children.
Fifth: Spain and Germany are playing in the Euro Soccer Championship, which means the city is now full of happy, loud people on whom I can eavesdrop. I blame the Germans for the fact that my two-step flight from Vienna to London to Boston got changed to a three step flight to Hanover then London to Boston. The Germans will be fleeing the city after the game, I suppose. Though I don't know how many will be on my flight- it's kind of early for them, really. I suppose they will be out partying late.
I am also presuming that the Austrians are divided between rooting for the Germans (shared language, cultural points, huge inferiority complex though) versus the Spanish (who are not German. That might very well be enough for some Austrians.)
Beanie out.
Entry tags:
Day 5: stickies
Day 5
The wall’s color, if I remembered correctly, was actually a certain shade of pleasant and cheery blue. It was the kind of color that parents paint the room of their first born sons. But I wasn’t anyone’s son that I knew of, and the color of the wall was invisible under a double layer of sticky notes. The room was turned a dull yellow everywhere but the very tallest margins of the room.
I’ve tried before to explain the careful system of knowledge posted on that wall, the experiment I’d made it to track every thought I had while I was in the room, write it down, and connect them all together. There had to be a connection. I was sure of it. Or maybe I just needed there to be one badly enough that I was imagining.
I scribbled that doubtful thought down on a sticky, and put it up the area for April 27th, 2008. Carefully, I tracked backwards through the older notes for a common thread. The common themes, the things to which my mind always returns, are linked chronologically by lengths of string attached to push pins thrust through the heart of the sticky notes in question. I can look back over time and see how much I’ve thought about masturbation, nihilism, the uncertainty of language, and certain film stars.
I found the thread. This particular link was a common one- the tiny lengths of string spanned often mere days, or sometimes not ever that long. The first note was dated to the very day that I started this project. Other patterns can often go months without repeating, and it becomes very difficult to track them back to their origins. Some are so far unrepeated- these are very rare indeed, and mostly painful, though generally not so painful as the thoughts that reoccur often.
I have discovered through the course of this experiment that I am a creature of repetition. Cycles come and go, but there is nothing new under the sun in this room.
I have been in the room three years so far. The first three months were the worst. After that, I gave up on trying to catalogue the physical imperfections of the walls and my own body and gave myself up solely to mental observation. My own psyche has proven fertile ground, but like most farms it is suited to certain types of crops only. Others will not grow, not matter how lovingly tended. As an experiment I once tried to convince myself I possessed the ability to fly. It failed; my madness, if that is what it may be called, lies in another direction.
I will open the doors next week. It will have been three years to the day. I have received news from the outside: I am not a prisoner, and if I chose to walk out today I could. People I once knew have moved away, married, or died. They are as fluid as my own thoughts before I write them down, fix them fast upon the walls of my fortress and my prison cell in safe, predictable words on tiny slips of paper. People are unmeasured and unchartable: solitude is security. I write that down, stick it to the wall, and then trace the pattern back to the very first day and the very first note I fixed to these walls, when I decided not to come out.
The wall’s color, if I remembered correctly, was actually a certain shade of pleasant and cheery blue. It was the kind of color that parents paint the room of their first born sons. But I wasn’t anyone’s son that I knew of, and the color of the wall was invisible under a double layer of sticky notes. The room was turned a dull yellow everywhere but the very tallest margins of the room.
I’ve tried before to explain the careful system of knowledge posted on that wall, the experiment I’d made it to track every thought I had while I was in the room, write it down, and connect them all together. There had to be a connection. I was sure of it. Or maybe I just needed there to be one badly enough that I was imagining.
I scribbled that doubtful thought down on a sticky, and put it up the area for April 27th, 2008. Carefully, I tracked backwards through the older notes for a common thread. The common themes, the things to which my mind always returns, are linked chronologically by lengths of string attached to push pins thrust through the heart of the sticky notes in question. I can look back over time and see how much I’ve thought about masturbation, nihilism, the uncertainty of language, and certain film stars.
I found the thread. This particular link was a common one- the tiny lengths of string spanned often mere days, or sometimes not ever that long. The first note was dated to the very day that I started this project. Other patterns can often go months without repeating, and it becomes very difficult to track them back to their origins. Some are so far unrepeated- these are very rare indeed, and mostly painful, though generally not so painful as the thoughts that reoccur often.
I have discovered through the course of this experiment that I am a creature of repetition. Cycles come and go, but there is nothing new under the sun in this room.
I have been in the room three years so far. The first three months were the worst. After that, I gave up on trying to catalogue the physical imperfections of the walls and my own body and gave myself up solely to mental observation. My own psyche has proven fertile ground, but like most farms it is suited to certain types of crops only. Others will not grow, not matter how lovingly tended. As an experiment I once tried to convince myself I possessed the ability to fly. It failed; my madness, if that is what it may be called, lies in another direction.
I will open the doors next week. It will have been three years to the day. I have received news from the outside: I am not a prisoner, and if I chose to walk out today I could. People I once knew have moved away, married, or died. They are as fluid as my own thoughts before I write them down, fix them fast upon the walls of my fortress and my prison cell in safe, predictable words on tiny slips of paper. People are unmeasured and unchartable: solitude is security. I write that down, stick it to the wall, and then trace the pattern back to the very first day and the very first note I fixed to these walls, when I decided not to come out.
Entry tags:
365: Day 4-Nomenclature
Day 4.
There were reasons why people had started calling Eva “Boss,” all of which came before her taking over as the musical director of the Nosferatu. All of them were now on display as she addressed the assembled gaggle of singers.
“Ladies, first I want to thank y’all so much for all the work you’ve done that’s gotten us here tonight.” Eva was tall, even for a Chinese women, and as a trained singer her voice carried without strain. As usual, her pre-show nerves had dissolved once the task lay before her. Veteran captains under fire on the high seas had something of the same psychotic poise about them. “I am incredibly proud of this group and what we’ve done this year, and y’all have been a pleasure to work with. This is out last performance for this semester and for some of us, including myself, Bruiser, Killer and Sax, this is our last performance with the Nosferatu ever. Let’s make this worth it. We are ready for this. I want you to go out there and sing the house down, because you are that good, and because this, of all audiences, is going to appreciate what you can do. You ladies rock like nobody’s fucking business when you put your minds to it, so I want to see everyone telling all the competition to fuck off and get in line, because this. Is. Our. Year. Now let’s go!”
***
“That was amazing- really great performance.” Jamilla did not notice when the guy in the tux had snuck up next to her until he started to talk to her. He didn’t bother to introduce himself, and combined with his nigglingly familiar good looks, this seemed to suggest that she should already know him from somewhere. Thanking him seemed safe enough.
“They called you Bill Shakespeare?”
“Jill Shakespeare. I do some theater on the side and I’m always the MC at shows. It’s kind of a thing.”
“Ah, that would explain it. Do all the nicknames have a point? I mean, I can understand one or two people, but you all seem to have one. Some kind of initiation thing?”
“It’s kind of a thing in general at the college… Some of us joined already using one, and other people just kind of picked them up after they joined. Einstein gave out a lot of them. But not everyone has a nickname. Er.” Jamilla caught herself. “Well, last year Jessie didn’t have one.”
“Do they all have a story?”
“Eh, more or less. Evageline is Boss because she’s just… a boss. She’s always got a plan, ya know? She used to clash with the last president a lot because of it, but once she got voted President herself she’s been really good and fair about it. Lesse… Well, Genevive is Legs for obvious reasons. The three Sarah’s got their nicknames first, cause we just needed to tell them apart. Einstein (that’s the Latina Sara-with-no-H) got hers cause she’s majoring in physics and she’s just kind of brilliant. Sarah M, the shorter black girl over… there! we called ‘the Lady’-"
“Lemme guess,” he broke in, “Lady Sings the Blues?”
“Nah, she ran the Renaissance Fair at the college in the fall three years running. Everyone in that group called her Lady Sarah, so we just sort of picked it up.
“Now, the last Sarah, the tall black girl, didn’t actually have a real nickname until she started dating Bruiser. Er, that’s Gina. She was kind of screwed up when she got into college- her mom had just died that summer and she’s from California so she couldn’t go home… she ended up getting into a lot of fights. She had a black eye when she auditioned for the group. So we called her Bruiser, and when Sarah S started to date her, she needed some kind of badass nickname. So, Killer. Aw, look, she’s getting Bruiser a Shirley Temple. They’re so cute. Killer really helped straighten Bruiser out. Er. So to speak.”
“They just got married?”
“Yup. They’ve been engaged a while, actually. They couldn’t get married in Massachusetts cause Bruiser isn’t a resident, so they got married here. We were all at the wedding. Ruski was the maid of honor.”
“Wait, which one is the Russian?”
“Oh, um… There! She’s over at the bar too- see the girl with the short little dreads? That’s her. She’s a Russian area studies major, not actually Russian. Her real name’s Margaritte.”
“And who’s the girl next to her?”
“That’s Rocky. I have no idea why she’s called that. Her real name’s Kevina, she really hates it, so she just always introduced herself as Rocky. I wouldn’t even know her real name if it wasn’t part of her school email address.”
“Ok, I think that just leaves ‘Spider-man’ and ‘the Boy’ to explain. Presuming that ‘Sax’ is called that for playing sax?”
“Almost. You ever see Some Like It Hot? Tony Curtis has to cross dress as girl named Josephine who plays sax in an all girl band? Well, our Sax’s real name is Josephine. Now, Spider-Man is really Latifah. She pulled this stunt her freshman year where she hung a giant net filled with water balloons between a couple of buildings on campus. But to get the net up there, she had to climb up and down the outside of both buildings with the net in one hand and a roll of duct tape in her mouth, and then carry up the water balloons in buckets. It was amazing. They still tell the newbies about it every year. So, anyway, good climber, Spider-Man. She tried to get them to change it to Spider-Girl, cause she liked that comic better, but it never stuck.
“Oh, and Lolita is not actually a Lolita. She’s Jane, really, but she always ends up dating these really old and sketchy guys. And she’s so tiny, you know? It’s a little… Nabokov.”
“Okaaay.” He stared across the room at Courtney and looked to be filing that information away. Jamilla began looking for an escape. “But what about ‘The Boy’?”
“She’s tiny and her last name is Mann. I think that explains itself. Oh, look, Boss is waving to me, I’ll just go say hi, real nice meeting you, thank you so much for coming to see the show, have a nice evening.” She made her escape, leaving the familiar looking name to puzzle out her sudden disappearance. She looked back to see him sauntering over to Lolita.
There were reasons why people had started calling Eva “Boss,” all of which came before her taking over as the musical director of the Nosferatu. All of them were now on display as she addressed the assembled gaggle of singers.
“Ladies, first I want to thank y’all so much for all the work you’ve done that’s gotten us here tonight.” Eva was tall, even for a Chinese women, and as a trained singer her voice carried without strain. As usual, her pre-show nerves had dissolved once the task lay before her. Veteran captains under fire on the high seas had something of the same psychotic poise about them. “I am incredibly proud of this group and what we’ve done this year, and y’all have been a pleasure to work with. This is out last performance for this semester and for some of us, including myself, Bruiser, Killer and Sax, this is our last performance with the Nosferatu ever. Let’s make this worth it. We are ready for this. I want you to go out there and sing the house down, because you are that good, and because this, of all audiences, is going to appreciate what you can do. You ladies rock like nobody’s fucking business when you put your minds to it, so I want to see everyone telling all the competition to fuck off and get in line, because this. Is. Our. Year. Now let’s go!”
***
“That was amazing- really great performance.” Jamilla did not notice when the guy in the tux had snuck up next to her until he started to talk to her. He didn’t bother to introduce himself, and combined with his nigglingly familiar good looks, this seemed to suggest that she should already know him from somewhere. Thanking him seemed safe enough.
“They called you Bill Shakespeare?”
“Jill Shakespeare. I do some theater on the side and I’m always the MC at shows. It’s kind of a thing.”
“Ah, that would explain it. Do all the nicknames have a point? I mean, I can understand one or two people, but you all seem to have one. Some kind of initiation thing?”
“It’s kind of a thing in general at the college… Some of us joined already using one, and other people just kind of picked them up after they joined. Einstein gave out a lot of them. But not everyone has a nickname. Er.” Jamilla caught herself. “Well, last year Jessie didn’t have one.”
“Do they all have a story?”
“Eh, more or less. Evageline is Boss because she’s just… a boss. She’s always got a plan, ya know? She used to clash with the last president a lot because of it, but once she got voted President herself she’s been really good and fair about it. Lesse… Well, Genevive is Legs for obvious reasons. The three Sarah’s got their nicknames first, cause we just needed to tell them apart. Einstein (that’s the Latina Sara-with-no-H) got hers cause she’s majoring in physics and she’s just kind of brilliant. Sarah M, the shorter black girl over… there! we called ‘the Lady’-"
“Lemme guess,” he broke in, “Lady Sings the Blues?”
“Nah, she ran the Renaissance Fair at the college in the fall three years running. Everyone in that group called her Lady Sarah, so we just sort of picked it up.
“Now, the last Sarah, the tall black girl, didn’t actually have a real nickname until she started dating Bruiser. Er, that’s Gina. She was kind of screwed up when she got into college- her mom had just died that summer and she’s from California so she couldn’t go home… she ended up getting into a lot of fights. She had a black eye when she auditioned for the group. So we called her Bruiser, and when Sarah S started to date her, she needed some kind of badass nickname. So, Killer. Aw, look, she’s getting Bruiser a Shirley Temple. They’re so cute. Killer really helped straighten Bruiser out. Er. So to speak.”
“They just got married?”
“Yup. They’ve been engaged a while, actually. They couldn’t get married in Massachusetts cause Bruiser isn’t a resident, so they got married here. We were all at the wedding. Ruski was the maid of honor.”
“Wait, which one is the Russian?”
“Oh, um… There! She’s over at the bar too- see the girl with the short little dreads? That’s her. She’s a Russian area studies major, not actually Russian. Her real name’s Margaritte.”
“And who’s the girl next to her?”
“That’s Rocky. I have no idea why she’s called that. Her real name’s Kevina, she really hates it, so she just always introduced herself as Rocky. I wouldn’t even know her real name if it wasn’t part of her school email address.”
“Ok, I think that just leaves ‘Spider-man’ and ‘the Boy’ to explain. Presuming that ‘Sax’ is called that for playing sax?”
“Almost. You ever see Some Like It Hot? Tony Curtis has to cross dress as girl named Josephine who plays sax in an all girl band? Well, our Sax’s real name is Josephine. Now, Spider-Man is really Latifah. She pulled this stunt her freshman year where she hung a giant net filled with water balloons between a couple of buildings on campus. But to get the net up there, she had to climb up and down the outside of both buildings with the net in one hand and a roll of duct tape in her mouth, and then carry up the water balloons in buckets. It was amazing. They still tell the newbies about it every year. So, anyway, good climber, Spider-Man. She tried to get them to change it to Spider-Girl, cause she liked that comic better, but it never stuck.
“Oh, and Lolita is not actually a Lolita. She’s Jane, really, but she always ends up dating these really old and sketchy guys. And she’s so tiny, you know? It’s a little… Nabokov.”
“Okaaay.” He stared across the room at Courtney and looked to be filing that information away. Jamilla began looking for an escape. “But what about ‘The Boy’?”
“She’s tiny and her last name is Mann. I think that explains itself. Oh, look, Boss is waving to me, I’ll just go say hi, real nice meeting you, thank you so much for coming to see the show, have a nice evening.” She made her escape, leaving the familiar looking name to puzzle out her sudden disappearance. She looked back to see him sauntering over to Lolita.