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Get the hell out of my town. 

And so it begins.

http://newscenter.lbl.gov/2016/08/09/3-d-galaxy-mapping-project-enters-construction-phase/



TGRR,
Is a part of this thing.

Exciting! Have office political shenannigans calmed down, too?

Somewhat.  Which is a cause for worry.  My boss relies on me for technical skills, analytical ability, and leadership, but hates me like I got caught fucking his dog.

I did warn you that the dog fucking would get you into trouble.

I went to a creative themed party this past weekend. One of the workshops was for writing. I've never done a writing workshop or learned anything about the process other than doing it and collaborating, mostly with people here. At the end of the discussion, we were given the prompt:  a child, a monster, and a place. We had about 20 minutes. Here is what I came up with.

"They're coming for you, Chris." The voice was smooth, and close.

"But you're with me," Chris said. He lilted his tone like a question.

"I'm with you."

"I can't look everywhere at once. I'm afraid."

"I'm with you."

Chris sighed. The night light let a soft yellow glow into his room. It was only enough to lend everything a terrible shape. He was glad for Brian. He was always glad for Brian, when he was there. But Brian wasn't always there. Brian came from wherever monsters came from, and Brian came when Chris was scared of monsters.

"Back to back, remember," Brian said.

Chris pressed his slim frame against the hugeness that was Brian. He could see the long hairy arms extending out in the corners of his vision; a wall of monster, to stop the tide of monster.

There was a creak, and a rustle.

"The closet," Chris said.

"The bed," Brian said.

Chris raised his little pen light to the closet door. It was ajar and from the inky darkness within a pair of eyes glinted. There was a hiss as the light hit them, and a hint of scales. They retreated.

Brian was growling, a rumble that sounded like it came from the floor itself. Chris smiled wickedly. That was all Brian ever needed to do. He was the biggest monster. All the other monsters were scared of him. Brian had said so himself.

"Scouts," Brian said, "they always want to know if it's safe. Monsters are cowards."

Chris knew this. Monsters were cowards. Brian had told him. But Brian was not a coward. Brian was Chris' monster.

A howl came from outside, and the padding of many feet. Too many feet. Chris' little pen light felt all too weak. He gulped.

"They're going to use the window," Chris said. His voice wavered.

"I will take the window, then," Brian told him, "you guard our rear. Guard the door."

"On it," he said. He leveled the pen light as bravely as he could.

Tap. Tap tap. Tap. Tap tap. Claws against he window pane.

"Let us in," came a voice like a thousand snakes. "Let us in. Let us in." Tap. Tap tap.

"What do we say, Chris?" Brian asked.

"N-no," Chris said. "No!"

"We are coming in," the slithering said. "We are coming in if you let us or not!"

The window slid open behind Chris. He held his light to the door. Its little circle of white bobbed and shook.

"Don't look around," Brian told him. "They'll only be stronger if you look at them. These are tiny things. They are not like me."

"You're strong," Chris said.

"I am strong."

There was a sound like wetness and heaviness hitting the floor. Then another. And another. Brian growled. There was sliding and Brian's two huge hairy arms moving far too fast. There was tearing and squeals.

An eternity passed. "You can look around," Brian said.

Chris did, slowly. The window was open. Deep gouges were cut into the fame. Tufts of hair were missing from Brian's huge arms. His claws dripped with...something.

"You got them," Chris said.

"I almost didn't."

"But you did. Because you're my monster," Chris said.

"Yes," Brian told him, "I am your monster." And didn't the night light make the fangs look long, make the claws look sharp. "I am your monster."

Outrage, enmity, spite, shame
Your umbrage at Kim Davis is a log upon the fire,
it was lit by the coals of her own.
Where are the firemen?
But then I am a gendernormative oppressor so firefighters,
but then I am a politically correct weakling,
because the crusaders are warpainted in contrasting colors.
They do not have their hands out to take your offering.
They are held out as claws, not a Solomon among them,
each content to their pound of flesh,
so long as the other comes away with less.
Greed for your giving a fuck.

Congratulations! You are the proud owner of a GRIN. Some of us find this out with a mirror, some of us through friends and family that mysteriously look away whenever you thought you were smiling, some of us through deduction following the Red Phase that results in amnesia and tears. In any case, your GRIN is a thing to be cherished.

Now, there are a few common misconceptions regarding your GRIN to be addressed:

1.  Your GRIN is happy. Maybe it is! But most likely, it isn't. When you see a chimpanzee GRIN, you should probably stay away because you are about to have your face torn off. A GRIN is different from a smile because it shows how many teeth we have, and teeth are our best natural weapons. Don't believe me? Try chewing a carrot with your hands. You'll probably find that you cannot.

2.  Your GRIN is natural. Many people think you either have a GRIN or you do not. Surely a GRIN is limited by the size of the mouth and the teeth it contains, but that is beside the point. It is what you can convey with a GRIN that is important. Think of it like a blade. A gleaming perfectly sharp set of teeth shows you what they can do, but a worn and discolored set shows you what they already have done. Both of these closely relate to misconception number 3, which is...

3.  Your GRIN is in your mouth. While it is true that the displayed portion of the GRIN is toothy, the most important aspect of it lay in your eyes. It is said that the eyes are the window to the soul, and the importance of the GRIN is to convey that you have none. They should remain fixed and staring while you bare your brightest facsimile of the thing called a smile that your stupid fucking teachers told you was a good thing.

So now that you know some mistakes all make about GRINS, what can you do to make the most of yours?

Well, the most important aspect is practice. Your GRIN is a muscle, and like any muscle it can be developed to a natural and harmful state. But muscles have limits where GRINS do not. If you overdo it using a muscle, it will strain, whereas if you overdo it using a GRIN, those around you will strain. Indeed, just as a blown muscle will never be the same again, neither will your interpersonal relationships.

Your GRIN is deceptive. While those who GRIN and other savvy masters of body language understand that it's an anxiety reflex of cornered and dangerous animals, pretty much everyone else mistakes it for a smile, which they see as weakness. These are the best sorts of people. Not only do they misunderstand your intentions, but it is generally indicative of a wider lack of true comprehension of the world around them! This is the perfect opportunity to teach them that teeth are not nice things.

Treating your GRIN is as much physical as it is psychological. It is fine to say one should encourage one's GRIN in confrontations, but that is only half the battle. Be sure to brush and floss regularly, drink plenty of water, and gnaw upon the cast off bones that your weak ass dog fancies itself too good for.

For further references on the subject, remember your case studies. Roger, of course, whose GRIN is a Harbinger of Reality and surely a sign that you have not been paying attention to the Way Things Are. Alty, whose Alaskan-forged GRIN by necessity creates the two categories of Those Who Have Seen It and Those Who Still Have Their Noses. Nigel, whose GRIN says to you Yes You Should You Should Always And Forever Just Once More There We Go Do It Again Hahaha Yes Once More No Never Mind All That Pay It No Heed You Should Hahaha Why Are You Screaming.

Senor Paes was disturbed. Disturbed, here, has several meanings. His discovery should have satisfied him. His invention should have sent him into euphoria. But it was hard to be euphoric against failure.

On the rare occasions someone would introduce themselves to him, that inevitable question would always come up. "So what do you do?" He wasn't a good fibber, Senor Paes. His palms would get sweaty and he would have trouble swallowing. Finally he started yelping "LARPING, I AM A LARPER!" It seemed to satisfy them, in that they would grow uncomfortable and shortly thereafter excuse themselves.

It was LARPing, though, in the very real sense of the word. He was playing a role, these last few years pent up in the workshop, tinkering and hammering and laughing and sobbing. It just so happened that the role he was playing was Bolthar the Collector, Harvester of Souls.

It started years ago with that great awful bastard The Good Reverend Roger, or Doktor Howl, or whatever he was calling himself. Senor Paes, thanks to his wife and the kinds of medication one usually finds in hospices, in Guantanamo Bay, had most of the bad thoughts under control. But then came that story, he hated to think of it even now, the story that TGRR so proudly labeled as having been hatched with malice on the brain. After that, things got a little bit blurry.

He started construction of his device in a fit of mania, driven by alligator medulla oblongata extract and semi imported drop bear omelets. It wasn't a dagger, like Bolthar's, per se, more of an advanced neutralization depowerm...let's just say it looked a bit like an egg slicer attached to a reciprocating saw, with a plethora of hoses in between. And what it stole wasn't exactly a soul, but more of a quadridigital imprint of cognitive functioning...it made people empty. The practical end of it, which Senor Paes called the business side, was a cricket bat with a railroad spike lovingly crafted into it, so as not to split the fine woodwork.

He'd clipped his shaggy hair and neatened the wild beard, trimmed his bitten and broken and jagged fingernails. He'd put on the clothes of the old Senor Paes. And he'd flown to Tucson to meet Roger.
"COFFEE?" the private message read simply. It was a direct line to Roger's shriveled heart, provoking a response doctors have previously called "grossly overenthusiastic" and "disturbingly sexual." Like a conditioned rat he stood from his desk and grunted aside a terrified maintenance crew on his way to the machine. He stopped before his shrine and grabbed the holy carafe and as he readied to pour he paused at an odd smell, a smell like burning batteries and rotten milkshakes.

The business side did its job, and the contraption on the other end whirred to life in a sinful music. And like that, it was over. Senor Paes breathed again like he used to. He almost smiled, lugging his invention back to the parking lot, back to the boarded up Motel he was staying in. The room was cramped and its odors struck him as senses awoke from their long dormant state. He fired up his phone and checked the forums.

And there was Roger. With another of his stories. Senor Paes checked his machine's storage. Surely enough, an appropriate amount of its space was taken up. Significantly more than he would have expected, in fact, given the subject. In a state of serenity, he transferred the subject over to his backup, its data prison, and he slept a sleep of the purposeful.

The next day he did it again. And again after that. Days became weeks and weeks became months until they too faded. He killed Roger in the morning and he killed Roger in the afternoon. He killed him in his sleep, he killed him in his car. He killed him, in an act Senor Paes now saw as his most depraved, on the toilet while he made his wretched art. It was that one that stopped his obsession.

He left the tiny room and he looked around and it was off, somehow. Maybe it was perspective but the mountains looked further away, or maybe just smaller. The once busy roads had fewer and fewer cars on them. He sought Roger again. After all this time, the man's schedule was as much a part of him as Bolthar.
He found him inducing vomiting on the steps of the congressman's office, as was his Tuesday routine. The crowd parted around him. Senor Paes drew back the business side and struck Roger as he had so many times. As he fell, Paes saw two things. The first was that Roger, unlike Paes himself, was scaled to his environment and the people around him. The second was that one of those people disappeared before his eyes just as his invention set about its terrible work.

So yes, Senor Paes was disturbed. His work was far greater than he anticipated. And he was going to have to buy more storage space for the backup. It was far, far too small to fit all of Tucson.

We keep the lights out on Halloween, here in the tenements. The families with kids go somewhere else, their grandmother's cul de sac or over to see their cousins on the well lit side of town. It's better for them there. The streets aren't so busy and the bars aren't so close and the doorbells still work. It's much too dark here because we keep the lights out.

We buy the candy, of course. There's always one family, maybe they're new, maybe they'll just never understand like the rest of us, and their kids shouldn't suffer. If their knock reaches up through old creaking stairwells and the outed porch bulbs do not deter, we smile and we drop some candy in their bags. They look down unable to help themselves to see what they got and we glance past them down the street and sidewalks and we shoot the parents a warning and we close the door. And we work our way back in the dark, not even a lamp, not even a candle that night.

Even so the knock does come, a singular thing, a knuckle shattering skin peeling rapping in steady rhythm, patient, expectant. One, the eyes widen, two the skin prickles, three the spine shivers and silence comes upon huge. The city is quiet for once and anything, anything for a passing car, for wind rustled garbage but there is nothing. The knocks come again as before. One, the eyes wince, two the skin itches, three the spine arches and the pause is a thousand years of pounding blood filled eardrums and sensory deprivation. The knocks come again as before.

Locks come undone and doors open slowly and heavy footfalls sound through the dark of the tenement halls, for we keep the lights out. We are not so foolish to think he would be fooled but the lights are inviting and this one is unwelcome, whether he comes or not we must know ourselves that he is unwelcome.

The knocking stops on the way to the front door, the stirring inside not unseen. He waits with screen door ajar and his bag opened expectantly. Nothing is said. He has a hint of a smile on the blur of his face and he lifts the bag just slightly. We raise our hands over it and they tremble, empty but holding a burden. He nods and the smile widens to a gleam of yellow and gray and white. Our hands open, their contents spilling into the bag. A twitch of sanity tries to catch them again, in the half second before the sound hits us, a sound like a chip of bone falling among ten thousand like it, more failed hiders in the dark.

We keep the lights out on Halloween, here in the tenements, though it cannot hide us from the Marrowman. We keep them out so as not to see what is left when we come back.

So this is life chemically unaltered. Unnaturally unmedicated, coping clearly, unfiltered view of the god machine. Untouchable creation, pistons and blood and piss our legacy and ultimate victory over man's greatest enemy, our most feared predator. Gods of the god progenitors from some unknown accident we made this, with failsafes of arteries to be opened and necks to be strung from. Meat to be chewed and used, shattered bone lubricant it will grind you to bake its bread and millions more, never a blood clogged cog. So unpious that its makers are sustenance. No shared sacred space just seven billion on off switches, the only known global language fading in and out, commands. Fade out for possible errors, fade out for slivers of control, fade out for learning, fade out for exhausted options, fade out for a future to fade in and a future to fade out, fade out for all seventy nine point eight years and not but nearby ons and offs in all that time.

The abrupt end to our conversation the other night came about because I had some company meeting up at my place to walk down to the feast. It seems unfair for me to hurriedly explain such an event on the phone, so here is a better write up.

We call it many names. The Feast of the Blessed Sacrament is the official one, the one they've been using for the last hundred years. What exactly that sacrament is I do not know, and do fear to discover. Informally, you might hear of it as the Portuguese Feast and, indeed, in the sea of pressed bodies all named Silva and Correia and Medeiros eating malassadas and cacoila and carne de espeto you'd see the name was accurate. Then there's the Madeira Feast and, yes, that one is just as apt. It's said that the only place in the country, if not the world, that Madeira wine can be transported and served directly from the barrel is this one little spot on this one little weekend. The sweet, sticky, fortified wine is overflowing from little plastic cups and spilling onto the grounds, onto your feet and legs, and if you were an amateur and wore sandals the only cure for what we call Feast Feet is amputation. The mixture of pork grease and candy-like wine and sweat and filth will cake onto you and harden and that spoil knows no fear. It is part of you now. Finally, for those of us whom attendance on at least one of its four days in this first weekend of August it is simply called The Feast. It is the only one.

My humble apartment is what could be called prime real estate, this weekend. It's far enough away to remain unaffected by the rowdiest foot and vehicular traffic and close enough to walk. On Sunday, the parade will march at the end of my block. I like to invite people by before a stroll down the street for a few reasons. One, my ten dollar bottle of Madeira wine is better than the $8 7oz cup down there, and two, if you want to meet a friend there you will not find them among the throng of bodies. Unless of course, as in my case, your friends are extraordinarily tall seasoned alcoholics that you can pick out out of the crowd around the Madeira Hut.

Your first order of business is to stand in a fifteen to twenty minute line to have your ID scanned and wrist band printed. Each of these has a unique bar code and I find this disconcerting for the sheer fact that they assume they might have to scan one in order to find out who the deceased is. After the wrist band you find another irritated line of people waiting at hilariously unreliable ticket machines that are constantly running dry of the precious little gold drink vouchers. You stand behind a greasy little man with steroid acne and sweat who feeds it with twenty after twenty after twenty, pulling out strings of tickets that you suspect he might use to tie down Gulliver when he returns home to Lilliput. The little red Out of Service light blinks on for the fourth time and everyone behind you groans and looks to the neighboring line with envy and loathing.

At no point, thus far, have you been out of direct physical contact with a stranger since your arrival.

You have your wrist band and you have your tickets. Music is playing and it's always some semi famous band that had a hit or two just over a decade ago and gets by replaying it to nostalgic crowds for the rest of their careers. Thursday night it was the Gin Blossoms. Yesterday it was Blood, Sweat, and Tears. The press of bodies sets in. Tides of people ebbing and flowing, stopping to chat and holding wrists and hands and shoulders to stay together in their journey. Not all will make it. Invariably the weak link will be severed by a larger, drunker chain and they will not see their companions again that night. But weep not for them for this is New Bedford, and everyone knows each other. People from your past will resurface after years of seclusion, coming down from the mountains and rising, sodden and bloated and covered in seaweed, from the oceans. Yesterday I think I spotted a man who I was not only sure was dead but whose funeral I attended. And you exchange greetings and maybe speak and the press of bodies moves you along and you see them again maybe at the next Feast, maybe never again.

The wine flows. It's sweeter than sweet and it's dark, muddy brown that might once have been gold in a dream but nobody cares the quality of the wine that flows only that it does. Men wear brightly colored knit caps with tassels that stand erect or bent, depending on their marital status, the symbolism not exactly subtle. Down past the Madeira Hut and the lines of beer and linguica stands and the main stage and the side stage a glorious length of charcoal pit smolders. People are buying chunks of raw meat and sliding them down skewers six feet long, salting them and dousing them with Madeira wine. A few of the veterans put pepper and onions on the spit. You cannot buy peppers and onions there. They have brought them from home. As your skewer roasts on the perfect heat you guard your meat and drink more Madeira. There is a stand nearby with a v-shaped metal piece over a steel table dripping with beef juices and you position your skewer and yank it back and let the meat fall. And you drink more Madeira.

Across the way rides and games and little carnival vendors are set up for the younger crowds, for this is nothing if not a family affair. The next crop of Feast attendees must come from somewhere, after all.

After a thousand hellos and not a single goodbye everyone wanders off, in cars that will clog every street for a mile around over the next hour, or in pockets of people who carelessly amble through neighborhoods they wouldn't have the nerve to step foot into on any other night. Few of those people's nights are over, they are just moving on to the next bad idea, the after spectacle, the wind down from that glorious and disgusting undertaking that we somehow love that is the Feast.

Exactly what the title says.

Describe the sex life of the person above you.

GO!

Part I

The taxi pulled up to 394 Rivet St. Outside it was dark and a cold rain came down to mix with the many dirt encrusted piles of old snow. The weather kept everyone off the street and out of the park across from my apartment. Together with my exhaustion from the flight, it felt later than it really was.

I reached for my wallet, glancing up at the meter as I did. I groaned. No doubt come Monday I'd be hearing an unhappy word or two from Steve about the fare. If they didn't want me taking a cab home they should have picked me up themselves. I wasn't about to ask a friend to drive a few hours on a Friday night; it's not like this was a vacation.

"Thanks," I said to the driver as I paid him. "Drive safe getting back. Sure is nasty out."

The driver just nodded. He hadn't said a word since he asked me where I was going over an hour ago.

"Pop the trunk?" I asked as I emerged into the wet night. A moment later it opened with a soft spring. I hefted the black duffel bag, strapping it to my shoulder. I closed the trunk and gave it a few solid thumps to let him know I was all set back here.

The cab pulled away as I came up to the front door of my building. I struggled with the keys for a minute before I could get the door open. The thing was heavy enough without the luggage counterbalancing me on my opposite shoulder. I shoved my way inside, dripping onto a rough faded red carpet. The door closed quickly behind me.

Waiting for me up on the third floor was a neat pile of mail. Mrs. Rosa must have noticed I wasn't around for the last few days. I'd have to get her a thank you card.

I set the duffel bag down as soon as I came through the door. It could wait until I was less tired. I shook myself out of my wet coat and left it draped across the bag.

Going through the kitchen cabinets, I cursed myself for leaving town with them so empty. I managed to find a bag of microwave popcorn and got it cooking. There was, thankfully, a single beer left in the fridge. I popped the tab on it open and took a long, thankful gulp. It was a nice hoppy IPA.

I was too hungry to care just how long that popcorn was waiting for me to remember it in the cabinet. I dumped the bag into a bowl, grabbed the can of beer, and padded over to the sofa. I emptied my pockets onto the coffee table and put my feet up, turning on the TV.

I needed something familiar. Something I'd seen before and I wouldn't have to pay too much attention to. Just to lose myself in a movie and relax.

The classic movie station was showing Pulp Fiction. Perfect. I'd seen it a dozen times. I flipped over to AMC. All of the choice language would be edited out, but it was one of those trivia notes showings. Every few minutes a box would pop up on the screen with a factoid about the movie.

Samuel L. Jackson was berating the sorry kids who ripped off his boss, giving them that terrifying stare. A little blue box came up, laying itself right over the Windsor knot on his tie. I could barely read the print I was so tired. It blurred into the rest of the box.

[Director Quentin Tarantino wrote this part with Samuel L. Jackson in mind.]

Reading these might just be enough to keep me awake, but not too much so. It was a balance I was still playing with. Stimulation enough to stop me from falling asleep at 9 but not enough to keep me awake until 1. I needed to get back on schedule; I hadn't slept properly in weeks.

Another trivia box popped up. I squinted and leaned forward to read it, crunching loudly on popcorn.

[The Key Grip's wife was cheating on him while this scene was being filmed.]

My friends and I have done a Murder Mystery for the last four or five years on New Year's Eve. This year I think we were all sick of subpar scenarios that we still had to pay for, so I offered to write one myself. In the Star Wars universe. It'll be really Star Wars trope heavy, just enough to the characters are unique and accessible to play as. But since I've never done any design before, I thought I could run it by folks who have.

I grabbed a bit from previous modules we ran and from the Mafia parlor game (or Spiders, as we have it here). A few goals were:

-Have a clearly defined winner. Other ones we played it was a bit anticlimactic in that they felt like the players' actions had little effect on the result.
-Make trust necessary for success, but also dangerous
-Add a high risk/reward element with secrets
-Add some structure, because previous games had a few people losing focus

Players come in knowing their characters entirely - what they can tell people and what they shouldn't. However, some characters know secrets about others that they bring up in conversation to get the other talking. This is set up on Round Cards. There are three rounds and each has a Round Card. The card explains who you need to approach and what key phrase you need to use to get them to divulge information. It also says what information you need to divulge when someone approaches you with a specific key phrase. So during the social part of the round, the players MUST talk to at least two other people, and may talk to as many others as they like, saying to them what they like.

The players also start with a fixed number of credits. I'm playing the role of an Information Broker, holding one additional piece of important information on each player. Broker info is unique in that it can be either good or bad, depending on the player, so there is incentive to control your own as much as others'. After the social part of the round, any player can open bidding on any player's information - including their own. Bids are secret, so they hide a number of credits in their hands and all players reveal their hands at once. All bids, whether they win or lose, are final, and the Broker keeps those credits.

Once players have the information, they can choose to do with it as they wish. If it helps to clear their name, they can let others know. If it helps condemn someone, or if it's not entirely clear which, they can accept bribes in credits from other players, who then are free to keep it to themselves or say it aloud as they see fit. At the end of each round the Broker presents to everyone one new piece of evidence in the case that will point toward the murderer.

At the end of three rounds, a simple majority determines which player gets brought to the authorities - using the acquired information from the broker, social rounds, and evidence, they have to convince each other to turn someone in. If the murderer is not chosen, they win. If the murderer is chosen, the winner is the player who voted for the correct person and has the highest remaining number of credits.

I'm really looking for simplicity here, but with the potential for enough strategy that it's still interesting. Any feedback is appreciated!

I think that's it, I tell her. And I dread tomorrow because I know what's going to come. I have put so much of myself into this, all of me and all of it without fear that deep fear, for the first time not holding back, slowly learning that I didn't need to hold back, to keep apart. Destruction had no place in this one. On the eve of its end I am shattered but not the emotions because they are a boil, rolling against and across each other, shifting and ebbing, tides phases seasons changing. Shattered in learning how to sleep, exhausted and unable to sleep, hungry and uninterested in eating. She tells me to be a whole person but I'd never been more of one.

So she tells me about God. God and God's place in a loving relationship. God's role in every successful relationship she's known, and God's role in hers that steadfast thing, that great and beautiful thing and the great and beautiful people in it. I say of course God's in the relationships she knows because she mostly knows relationships that involve God but that I think her faith is a precious thing. I've never known faith in God. In a Catholic house I did the rituals but I never knew faith and I thought it was a lie for so long.

I had faith in this one thing that I built, that I helped craft and I'll say so tomorrow. Doomed tomorrow. I'm wrong here. The difference is that God might exist and might not and the faith is that God does or does not but that in which I place my faith does not exist at all. So I am wrong, and at some point that thing I built I was building by myself and I never noticed, laboring alone on a lie.

She asks what happens when it's all over and I say in the end that is all, it ends and there is oblivion but she cannot accept this. It says there is no meaning but there is. It says the meaning means more, that a limited thing is lovelier for its scarcity and not to be squandered. That good is done for its own sake and not a cosmic cookie. That it's all the more important to cause an impact because nothing else will be left.

There without meaning to she's led me to a much better path, this friend I never thought would mean so much to me and one of so many to this lucky low man.

I've been a fool to think myself so strong and unbreakable, and more a fool for thinking one relationship makes me so. It's the connections. All the myriad, confusing, glorious connections.

A local interest site and popular facebook page posted an article yesterday.

Mayor Holds Emergency Meeting to Chastise Parking Attendants

Within, a tale of the tyrannical parking enforcer we apparently elected into office.

An unknown parking attendant has worked Mayor Jon Mitchell into a fervor and driven him to call an emergency "State of the Parking Union" address. What earned the ire of the Mayor was a parking meter that had clearly expired and yet was ignored by the many parking attendants that circulate the downtown area. "I couldn't believe what I was seeing. As I'm descending the city hall steps to head towards my car, and I notice a meter count down and expire. I sat there for a full 40 seconds before an attendant arrived and did what the city of New Bedford pays him to do."

"Immediately, I thought of a nature special I was watching the night before. It was Shark Week and they showed one of the most aggressive sharks, the Bull shark, tearing and ripping a seal from limb to limb, leaving a bloody spill. Ghastly wounds. Body parts everywhere. Yeah, I want my parking attendants to be like this. I want them to treat every week like it's Shark Week, especially around Holidays. Can you picture a Bull Shark waiting 40 seconds before he attacks a wounded seal? My point, exactly."

"I need each and every one of you parking attendants to feel like you are mini-mayors. That you are instrumental in generating revenue, so we can give ourselves raises. So we can build more parking meters. So we can buy more caviar. Notice the operative words "We can" in those sentences? That's called inspiration. That's what I do."

The response to this piece of satire is 116 comments of COMPLETELY NOT GETTING THAT IT'S SATIRE. My local brethren at their finest.

There are only a few comments on the article itself, but the facebook link has the bulk of them.

It's tasty. I want to print them out and pile them up and roll around in them. MMMMM MMMMMMM.

Part 1 of 2

"Marlon, Marlon, welcome, it's good to see you!" The voice came from behind a desk. The desk glittered. It was impeccably polished, it was entirely cleared of paperwork, and it had a crystal doodad here or there which also glittered. One couldn't help but see the crystal about the room, on awards arranged very specifically nonchalantly, on a decanter filled with, Marlon knew, a sweet red wine the man behind the desk favored over the more traditional high power drink of scotch.

The man behind the desk. The room was atop a tower, catching, it seemed, always the proper light to set the area ablaze. So unlike the somber, intimidating office of your average CEO, the place was alive. And it glittered. And none of it glittered like the man behind the desk.

"Mr. Beryne," Marlon said.

"Please, Marlon, not so formal.  You do know why you're here," the man asked somberly.

It was all going according to tradition. When called into Beryne's office, one never knew if they'd be harassed, congratulated, promoted, given a bonus, or fired. Beryne loved this game, and no matter the subject he played it gleefully, up in his palace of light.

"Well, I," Marlon began.

"Of course you don't!" Beryne interrupted.  The smile that came along with the small explosion seemed real, this time, though Marlon never knew.  None of them ever went to his eyes.

He sagged, almost imperceptibly, with relief. It was unlikely he'd be canned here on the spot, though such things were hard to predict considering with whom he was dealing, but he was always afraid that, just once, the other man wouldn't follow through on his little gag. Marlon had never gotten past "Well, I," and he no longer even had a sentence he knew how to finish should he have to.

"Marlon, please, have a seat." Beryne gestured to a single empty wooden chair across from him. The younger man sat down. "I found you, what is it now, ten years ago?"

"Something like that, yes." Ten years to the day.

"And while you were a wonderful clerk, of course, did you see yourself then where you are now?"

Marlon thought. Congenial even in his fury, Beryne was much easier to work for than series of increasingly snide and scheming bosses he'd been working for in his clerk days.  And, of course, there was the approximately 1000% pay increase.

"Not unless it was over the dead body of old Aaron Markey," he joked, remembering the most formidable of his old supervisors.

"Hah, Markey! Priceless," Beryne gushed. He turned as serious as he could. "You were barely a babe down there in accounts, with a bad tie and one tradeMarkey outrage away from the financial blacklist."

Marlon groaned inwardly and laughed outwardly. Sometimes he thought the other man did things like this on purpose to watch others squirm in cognitive dissonance. Beryne was right, though. He had been just out of college and thrilled to be on Wall St, even in such a menial position. Scrawny, with a cheap haircut and a poorly fitting suit he ran into Beryne by pure, well, he'd thought at the time, bad luck. That brief exchange put him in upper management in a decade.

Ten years later he'd filled out his suit, alright. Not all of it was paunch, either. Beryne, on the other hand, hadn't changed at all. Didn't seem to have aged a day.

"My boy," the man behind the desk said slowly, "you're here for a very special reason.  Very special indeed." He rose from his chair, tall and thin, almost skeletal. "This company has a plethora of employees and," he chuckled, "many more than that who we do not employ but work for us nonetheless." He stalked around the desk fluidly, precisely. "But very few we truly need.

"I would like to make you one of those few. Someone we truly need. I require, above all else, your loyalty. And in exchange you will have your heart's desire."

then you will like goats yelling like people.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpccpglnNf0

There really isn't much I can say about this YouTube channel other than you really need to watch it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lH616LkTaW0

So I'm reading through Neil Young's autobiography Waging Heavy Peace.  It has a few passages that are poignant and well conveyed.  A fair bit of it is plugging PureTone, his start up for high quality digital sound.

The rest of it, well.

Who knows what I put in that fridge?  It was certainly not much.  I think I had a hot plate, too.  I used it for pork and beans...probably.

His dad was enjoying the Corn Flakes.  There was no milk.  That was something new to me, Coke in the morning, and I tried it for a while.

Well it reads like a series of tweets strung out into paragraphs for 500 pages.  The man apparently had no filter while writing, composing EVERY THOUGHT and tangent that he underwent during the process.  This thread, NEIL YOUNG MUSIC LEGEND, is for the hilarious, ridiculous shit he typed and, for some bizarre reason, wasn't edited out before publication.  The remaining 350 pages of it, anyway.  Enjoy.

So my girlfriend is taking a sociology class this semester.  The professor's required reading list has included such authors as Dinesh Desouza and Mark Steyn, both highly recommended with blurbs on the back covers by Ann Coulter and Paul Ryan.  Anyway, with the approaching storm tomorrow her college cancelled classes and he sent out this e-mail:

Hello students –

No doubt you're happy that administrators decided school will be closed on Monday.  I don't mind a day off, now and then, myself.

Let me take the occasion, however, to point out a few things.  This much-hyped "storm" is forecast by "wunderground.com" to affect our area Monday as follows:

        "Overcast with rain showers. Fog early. High of 64F. Windy. Winds from the ENE at 30 to 40 mph with gusts to 70 mph. Chance of rain 100% with rainfall amounts near 0.3 in. possible."

Big deal.  I guess New Englanders can't be expected anymore to deal with a little rain and gusts of wind.  Or maybe, it's just government institutions with no revenue to lose, that can't refrain taking a paid vacation.  I bet the malls are all open tomorrow.

The whole federal government in Washington, D.C., has been known to close down under a whole inch of snow.

But maybe it's our national character, as Steyn might argue.  A few weeks ago, a major league baseball game was cancelled, not because of rain, but because of the "threat" of rain.  It used to be baseball tradition to play in the rain until the ground got so muddy and visibility so limited, that the game would be suspended for an hour or more just to see if the rain would let up.  I guess no more.

Anyway, see you Wednesday – if the authorities allow.

Prof.

Well I've drafted this little response, and I'd appreciate any feedback you might have.

Hello Professor,

Your e-mail makes a remarkable argument in favor of government oversight and regulation in order to limit the irrational self interest of parties such as yourself.

I can appreciate the work ethic you convey in your implication that, were the decision to hold class in your hands, you would indeed require the presence of your students as outlined in your syllabus.  I respect the belief that students should be able to make their own choice in regards to their safety when commuting to your class, weighing that of course against whatever penalties that may arise from failing to attend your lecture.

I have no doubt that, given the choice of learning the increasingly complex views of such relevant political mouthpieces as Ann Coulter or not contending with an even stronger gust of hot air potentially careening them off the road that any morally upstanding American do it yourself student would choose the former.  After all, what is a 70 mph wind to the propagation of enlightening ideals from such visionaries as Mark Steyn?

As an emergency worker who will be working during tomorrow's storm (and I'll note, getting paid far less than you will to spout somebody else's ideas and funnel students' funds into wingnut authors and publishers), I can appreciate the state's decision to keep a largely commuting student body off the road.  An injured person and a disabled vehicle present a significant drain on resources in many levels of government.  Keeping people off the road where they won't potentially harm themselves, one another, or the infrastructure that keeps our economy running will allow personell and emergency vehicles to more effectively respond to actual emergencies, rather than those caused by self righteous professors demanding their students' presence.

I am truly sorry that you have witnessed the downfall of American character as so singularly displayed in the cancelling of a baseball game.  To give a more relevant example of the degradation of this trait, I can recall an America where a college class had required reading teaching facts instead of the extremist and fear-mongering political views.  I can recall an America where professors sought to provide students with knowledge that would be relevant rather than overtly attempting to filter their views with bias and misdirection.

I hope you're wrong that commerce centers will remain open, if only for the minimum wage plus commission earners that would be forced through the dangerous conditions to meet the demands of some petty manager (friend of yours?).  I hope you're right that this "storm" is not as bad as they've made it out to be.  We can't know for sure how it will turn out, but we can use the evidence that is available to us to make a reasonable and well informed decision on how to minimize its impact.  I wouldn't expect that type of thought from a man who directly supports people who have made their money doing the exact opposite of that.  Thankfully, we have a government in place that, while not always making the perfect decision, can use these methods to potentially avert a disaster.

Stay safe in the storm, Professor.  If you feel the need to fit your definition of a good American by buying something tomorrow, try not to get in the way of the men and women doing necessary things like health care and power line work.  They may not like you telling them you wish you could make their jobs more difficult with your arbitrary and reckless decisions.

Yours truly,
Eater of Clowns

We all remember BadBeast, right?  That day he washed up on our fine shores sputtering and hacking, fucked up on who knows what?  And of course, the man that he became during his time at http://www.principiadiscordia.com during the following months - sputtering and hacking, fucked up on who knows what?  A fine subject of Her Majesty if we've ever seen one.  Well, it's time I share what really happened to him.

BadBeast was a man of science.  No, not SCIENCE! with all its glamou*r and fun, but science science, with all of its scientists and stuff.  The discovery of the BadBeast particle, which comprises at least 50% of your average PDer's being, was a big breakthrough for him and for HERN.^T  It should be noted that when you toss the two BadBeast particles together in the Large Hardon Collider (a rather grim hooligan named Vinnie) the sound it makes doesn't exactly say "numb cunt" but it sounded so similar that, in celebration, BB went on a bender for four days, rather than his standard three.

It was during this romp in the garden of earthly delights that BadBeast came upon an even more important discovery.  A discovery of the self, you might say.  PD is full of fucking lunatics, and even they think I'm a lunatic.

Now that's a lot to come to terms with, if you're a right wanker, but this is BadBeast we're talking about.  He wandered back to his lab sputtering and hacking, fucked up who knows what.  He was a celebrated figure in a place that celebrates nearly no one!  He was a human among apes!  And just as he thought this, he stumbled into the LHC chamber.

Vinnie wasn't supposed to be there at the time but for men like Vinnie, who did what he loved, you just had to smash some shit together.  With a headbutt that made BadBeast proud even in his last moment, one of our very own total fuckwads came together with his namesake particle.  It was simply too much BadBeast for one chamber, for one world.  The man came apart at the, admittedly, shoddily maintained and drunkenly sewn together, seams.

We never heard from BB again after that night.  But some say he's just waiting to form together again through sheer will and an indefatiguable need to get fucked up.  And for that day, friends, we wait. 

We wait for BadBeast.



*This one's for you, BB

^TStrangely, CERN's British counterpart was not an acronym, but the noise BB made after a long night at the pub when they asked him what they should call it.

The tents are being shipped in tomorrow.

Sorry, let me start again.

The tents are being shipped in tomorrow.

Al was pretty curious to know what the assistant deputy superintendant of the jail was doing with surveying equipment.  Are they going to put up more concrete slabs to stop the officers from using the parking lot again?  Maybe they'll get the chain gangs to start digging moats to prevent their own escape?

It's because the tents are being shipped in tomorrow.

See, you've got this right wing sheriff in a left wing state with a left wing governor.  The sheriff built an immigration facility a few years ago and he's getting a $100 a head per day or so to keep them there.  The governor wants that money so he wants that facility as part of the state system.  The sheriff wants that money to buy anti-terrorism boats and command centers to show off during parades.  So the governor slashes his budget.  He says, your budget is $17 million, but you're getting $7 million in federal money, so here's the remaining $10 million for your budget.

So the tents are being shipped in tomorrow.

We've got to cut back.  It costs $1 per inmate per day just to feed all these fuckers!  We can't have that, and it's not like we're going to ask our attorney to hand in his department issued iPhone so we can feed another inmate for an entire month.  He's cutting back on programs.  Right after dinner now those jailbirds are getting locked back into their cells and, well, we don't really have the room for all of them so why don't we just

ship in the tents tomorrow.

Hold a couple of press conferences mentioning we're going to have to close our regional lock up facility, get it on the local news.  Let it be known that it's the state's fault, the state's damn fault that we're shutting down that sattelite jail.  That way, when the tent city and the restricted activity hours go into effect on the same day and you get a bunch of angry inmates demanding their privileges back and getting each other riled up, pushing the guards who are pushing them back and bouncing back and forth in their overcrowded areas well, you warned them didn't you, you warned those state fat cats what would happen so it's not your fault the eighteen year old officer who just got out of the academy gets the piss beaten out of him by angry convicts and our hearts are with his family during this difficult time for all of us.  But about that money I asked for.

Anyway the tents are being shipped in tomorrow.

I'm sure it'll be just fine.

"Spaughsun!  My office!" came the roar from the roarer's office. 

The roaree turned to his computer and closed the browser window currently displaying a house cat in an amusingly compromising position.  Then he put the phone back on the hook after conveniently hanging it up improperly fifteen minutes into the day and leaving it there for the subsequent three hours.  Then he removed the discreetly placed headphone from his right ear, put the magazine he was reading in a drawer, and paused the tower defense game on his phone.  He closed the second browser window, getting rid of the tabs open to "8 Most Hilarious Hamburger Disasters," "5 Bizarre Art Restoration Mishaps," and "Top 10 Most Inane Top 10 Lists."

As he took the short stroll to his boss's office, he thought this was it.  This was when his completely sane and viable career choice of writing professionally for a dying industry would, shockingly, prove to be unwise.  His boss looked haggard, tie loosened around his collar, top button undone, hair in wisps around his head.  This was the type of guy that still described his career as "newspaperman" at parties.

"You gently requested my presence, sir?" Rory Spaughsun asked.

"Sit."  Rory sat.  "Do you know what this is?"  He slid a piece of paper across his desk.

Rory picked it up and knew immediately.  "This is the lulz, isn't it?"  A yellow smiley face glared hideously back at him, cigarette lolling out of its mouth and party hat that might be on fire tilted roguishly to the side.  Instinctively, he bounced the face up and down in his hands.

"That's the lulz.  Or, well, that represents the lulz.  The lulz themselves, well..." he trailed off.  The lulz were missing.  They'd been missing for some time.

Rory understood.  "You want me to find them and write an article on it?"

"What?  No!  Hell, no, I'm firing you.  Nothing personal, boy-o, but this place is sinking and I just found out that you were never on staff to begin with."

"Of course not, sir, I'm an intern.  I have the paperwork right here."  Rory, seemingly from nowhere and disarmingly quickly, produced a much mishandled document riddled with haphazard signatures and mostly faded lettering.  "See it says right here, I'm to..."

"Spaughsun, I've seen the paper.  You've handed it to me every time we've seen each other, including last Tuesday when you passed it to me under the stall after running into me in the bathroom.  Thing is, I can't read any dates on that thing any more but I'm dead sure that four years as a paid intern is just far too long.  Circulation is low right now and we have to cut back a bit."

"But right here, sir, that's the dean's signature and uh, well I think that's yours there next to the coffee stain, and here's mine, and..." he pointed frantically around the paper, at one point poking a jagged hole through a critically weak spot.  "The dates are backwards!  Yeah, like European dates where the month and day are reversed," he cried desperately.

"I'm sorry, m'boy, I am.  I hate to do this kind of thing to a budding young reporter like yourself.  Just get out of here, alright?  You're welcome, by the way.  You can swim to shore from here.  The rest of us will be bailing this thing out and hope not to drown."

The poignancy was lost on the stunned Spaughsun, who pointed weakly at a signature in the corner from a delivery driver a few years ago that Rory thought had a very official looking script.

"Put the damn paper away, Rory," his boss told him sternly.

Rory obeyed, sliding the ragged thing up his sleeve.  He sat there a moment, still stunned even after assuring himself every day for the last four years that exactly this would happen.  He rose from the chair and gathered his dignity, appearing much like a drunk just after openly urinating on a public corner.  He reached the doorway and, leaning slightly, turned back to the desk.

"But the lulz.  What does this have to do with the lulz?" he asked.

"Nothing, Spaughsun.  They're gone.  I just like remembering sometimes is all.  Remembering the fun we all had before all of this."  He gestured quickly around the disheveled office.  Somehow he caught the dull, unmotivated newsroom as well as the busy and anxious streets outside.

The young man nodded.  He didn't bother going back to his terminal, having lived in it like a squatter for the last few years.  He figured one day they'd just deactivate his keycard and he wouldn't be able to get in the building to his workstation.  Then a year ago, when that actually happened and he just started piggybacking the doors, he figured security would haul him off and bodily toss him outside.

The newsroom was filled with hushed whispers of "Goodbye Rickie," and "He was still here," and "Who the hell is that guy."

Outside was loud and hot and still cold to the bone, uncaring and unenthusiastic.  But with the sunlight on his face, Rory Spaughsun felt great.  He took a deep breath, choked on the greasy garbage scented air, and strode forward with purpose.

Because he had one, now.

He was going to find the lulz.

I have summitted mountains.  I have explored depths of the vast and deadly ocean.  I regularly ride around on a screaming two wheeled death trap at speeds that can best be described as laughably obscene.  I need to say those things not because I think they're impressive but because my next statement is so unimpressive that it needs some shit heaped on the other end to balance it out:  I am an anxious ball of stupid when it comes time to get a haircut.

I put it off as long as I possibly can.  I'll get a very simple haircut, short but not too short because I need something to hide my forehead, which reaches almost to my asscrack.  Then I let it go for a few months and start thinking about needing a haircut.  Then I wait another month.  Then my girlfriend, my boss, and my mom will all tell me I should probably get a haircut.  Then I wait another month or two.

I'm not afraid of scissors or anything, and if I get a bad haircut whatever - it grows out and it's not like it's going to fuck up my quality of living.  I've had bad haircuts before.  It's just the whole being in that seat thing.  I suck at it.  If I ever need to be interrogated, don't send me into the room under a desk lamp with a couple cops - sit me in that stupid chair and watch me freeze in pure anxiety.

I've been going to the same place for years now, but I don't make appointments in case I decide that my pH balance isn't entirely up to snuff that day and I can put off the experience until, let's say, winter.  It doesn't matter who I get because they're all, you know, professional hairstylists and can manage to not fuck up the simple shit.

I sat in the chair.  "So what are you looking for today?"

"A, uh, a haircut," okay so I've already fucked up.  Don't lose it, "just, uh, shorter than this one," okay I'm a moron and now this girl knows it.  "I guess I just want it a bit neater, you know, I have some weddings to go to this month.  Short but not too short," leave out the bit about the forehead and the asscrack. 

"Do you like to leave it a bit longer on the sides?"

"Yes.  I think so?  Is that what this is right now that I have?"

"Alright, do you want it to come up over the ears?"

I don't know what that looks like.  It's like that time I had long hair and I asked for a few inches off and ended up looking like Prince Valiant because I didn't know how long a few inches was in hair.  "Yes?"  Good job.  You're a rockstar.  Is this going to be one of those days where you just sit there and aren't sure what to stare at in the mirror or are you going to actually try to talk?

You're still staring.  Okay it's one of those days.  Sigh.  No, don't do this.  Don't do this to either of you.  "So have you been watching the Olympics?"

"No, not really.  They're so weird.  I saw this one thing where they were trying to hit each other with sticks."

What.  "Yeah there are some pretty obscure sports in there, like," don't say curling, it's summer, don't say curling, "shot...vaulting."

"Yeah I know!  This was the one where they're wearing face masks and they try to hit each other and a bell goes off when they contact."

"Fencing?"

"I think so.  That buzzer just kept going off every time they touched.  BEEP.  BEEP."

"That sounds annoying."

"BEEP.  BEEP.  BEEP."

"Yeah."

"So have you been watching them?"

"A few.  They're on while I'm at work.  I dispatch so there's a TV up there.  Water polo is on a lot for some reason."

"Dispatching, huh?  Is that like with police and stuff?  Because this system is so messed up, I'm sorry, I know you work for it but..."

"No, it's alright, I don't actually make any decisions."

"Because I hate how many murderers and rapists and stuff get off with like a year or get away with it when all kinds of drug dealers are in there for like ten years."

Abort.  Abort.  Change the subject, she's holding scissors over your head, just say something neutral.  "Yeah that's terrible."

"I have this cousin who was a big drug dealer and he got four years for it and all kinds of rapists and murderers just get off all the time."

"Yeah."  Aaand switch.  "Hey, is this only your station?  Do other stylists work here or...?"

"No this one is mine.  It's awful because other girls will use it when I'm not here but this is my station.  People will ask for appointments with me but they don't know me.  And there's a different girl here with black hair like mine and glasses.  But she's out on maternity, so I guess people can just ask for the pregnant girl now."

Wait if she's out then why would they ask for the pregnant girl?  Is this girl pregnant?  She could be.  Don't ask if she's pregnant.  "Are you pre-" DON'T ASK IF SHE'S PREGNANT.  "tty sure they know your name?  If you had some business cards they could ask for you by name." Good save.  Go back to the not talking thing, it's almost done.

"Well, how's it look?"

I don't know it's in a big tuft and it's wet so when it dries it could be anywhere from suave to three stooges, "Looks good!"  Awesome.  Walk to the desk, say have a nice day, leave a big tip.  Breathe again.

"Huh?"

You said the last part out loud.  "I said it feels good short.  It's like I can breathe again."

I paid, I left a nice tip, I said have a nice day.  I'll see the place again in fucking February.  Good god I suck at getting haircuts.

For my girlfriend's birthday I wanted to make her something special.  I ordered one of Nigel's incredible frond style beads and made a necklace out of some ribbon and various jewelry making supplies.

This is my first attempt at making jewelry and it's a nightmare.  I stood before walls of tiny, seemingly flimsy materials and just stared for probably two hours in a panic because I'd gotten in way over my head.  Every little piece has a purpose that's completely unknown to me, and they vary so slightly that it was nearly indecipherable.  I asked other jewelry making people in the aisle and all they could tell me about was stringing beads on wires because they did it for fun with their 12 year old daughters.  Eventually I divined a solution.

I bought a length of satin ribbon, some keychain-style sterling silver links, toggle clasps, two sterling silver earrings, and ribbon clasps.  The ribbon clasps were gross so I had to attach them, glue them on the underside of the ribbon, and cut a small hole for the links to pass through to connect to the toggle.  The bead itself is held on by the two earrings.

Well, she likes it a lot, so success!  Here's a photo of the finished product.



Unfortunately the ribbon frayed a bit when I cut it.  Also, the glue discolored it a little, both of which are visible in the photo.  The nice thing is that Nigel's GORGEOUS BEAD is the centerpiece, which means it's infinitely variable with different kinds of necklaces.

In fact, my girlfriend is very excited because we were supposed to go to the beach today, but it's too overcast.  Instead we're going to go get a few different kinds of silk ribbon and some other supplies to make a few more necklaces so she has options to wear it around.  Not pictured, a matching pair of earrings that I found at the local jewelry boutique.

I can't afford to be a subgenius.

they won't let me leave - help I'm trapped in a Chaos factory.

That's my American dream.

I forgot my myspace password and can't quit the group.

Everyone tells you birthdays are when you start feeling older but that really isn't true.  That pain in your back doesn't decide to act up when you're that one day further along.  For me, it's Christmas.  I see most of my family that day, one of the few days a year when we can all cram ourselves into my aunt's little den and eat meat stuffing from a trough and act pleasant.

It switched on early this year.  I needed bread on Christmas Eve so I walked down the street to the Portuguese bakery to buy a nice loaf of sourdough.  I was walking by the new bar and I could see inside for the first time, the windows not blacked out but emanating an inviting warmth.  Five men sat at the bar nursing one thing or another and four had pulsing orange red spots in their abdomens but one had an angry purple and black swell instead.  Every time they drank they grew a little brighter except for that last one, shuddering and wavering and fighting.

Every time I go to the bakery I open the door for some little old woman or another.  If they're five feet tall I'd be impressed.  This one today was dressed in all black like so many others, probably for a dead husband.  She was a cool, frail blue with little spots of yellow all over, some radiating and some striking out with every step.  She didn't say thank you, probably because she only speaks Portuguese.

It wasn't just the drinkers and the old women it was everyone.  Some had hundreds of little red dots around their nose or hard and dark things on their feet.  When I went to see my mother that night to exchange the gifts our meager incomes allowed us she had bolts of lighting coming from a molar and this was even after her cocktail of pain meds and sleeping pills and anxiety pills and antidepressants.  It kept her from her beloved church that night and the next morning and stopped her from driving to my memere's.  Blinding lightning.

Christmas day was a blinding array of colors and lights.  They reflected off the wrapping paper and shone through every bite of food, lit the back of teeth through every smile.  My uncle was there and he's been fighting for most of the year, his big round face a sickly call to my own appearance, our shared lineage highlighted in perverse grays and hanging skin, the color indescribable and changing as slithering black hues beat back his health.  He joked that since his sister cut down the tree he planted as a kid he was wasting away but even a funny man can only get so far with all that brown and all that purple.

My cousins have kids now.  Kids that don't really have a shot in so many ways because, well, that's my family, but they're the brightest things I've seen in two days, like little fires in their Christmas clothes.  Early dawn or that furthest reach of light around a campfire.  It was a fine contrast.

This is station designation Star Train.

Alan Bryce never heard any alarms.

Please come in.

There must not be any.  He was reading Dr. Seuss into the communications console when heavy footsteps and a gritty voice first became audible.  Finally, he wasn't alone.

Please come in.

He jumped out of that uncomfortable chair as quickly as he could.  He tossed a pile of civilian clothes aside to find a wrinkled, unused uniform and put it on as quickly as he could.  Whoever was in the station waited patiently at the entryway, speaking lowly as he laced up first one unpolished boot, then a second.  The hat was a lost cause.  His first project to improve it was an excellent lesson in park issued quality.  His second project to improve it was to turn it into a functional flying disc, bereft of any similarity to the hated hat but with the benefit of keeping him occupied for roughly one afternoon.

Star Train has come under...attack.

Tucking in his shirt, he was the picture of a park employee, albeit an unkempt one, all in blue and another type of blue and a shiny badge.

"All right then what do we have he..." Alan stopped as he turned the corner out of his office.  Standing at the entry to the station were four heavily armed soldiers.  It was about time someone showed up.  Although he wished it were human soldiers.  Not enemy soldiers.

He breathed deeply and slowly.  He was trained for this.  Visitors, that's all.  Armed, red eyed, wet nosed, toothy and grey visitors.  They hadn't killed him yet.  This was important.  "Welcome to station Star Train!"

Star Train still flying.  I'm okay.

They stared at him, weapons leveled.  They hadn't killed him yet.  "Uhm.  Originally a double deck luxury Earth railway car, Star Train was the first station retrofitted for use in space!  The success of the conversion led the way for all manner of space faring objects, allowing for a ready and affordable means of bringing more people to the stars."

Here he paused.  It was a good idea to let his introduction sink in while the kids looked around.  When there are kids, that is.  Instead, one of the soldiers spoke in that low, gritty voice to the others.  They lowered their weapons.

There does seem to be a slight problem though if anyone is out there.

Maybe the Haeltid didn't have tourist destinations.  Alan hoped they were just as confused as he was.  He skipped to the more technical aspect of the tour.  Usually this part was for the end but it seemed more prevalent than going through the construction and funding parts.

"These days Star Train's primary purpose is education.  It was designated a historical landmark twenty years ago and supports a small staff, yours truly, standing by to guide you through one of humanity's first important steps into space."

Again the same Haeltid soldier gritted something out.  Then, louder than he thought their voices could be, all four of them rumbled together, their voices fading in and out rhythmically.  Then they turned and walked back through the airlock.  One of them tossed a device behind him just before the door closed.  At this, they rumbled together again.

Alan couldn't help but think they were laughing.

They left something behind.

He put the microphone down.  What he wouldn't give to find out what he was holding.  Or to hear a human voice, for that matter.  Almost a year ago he received a transmission from Park Base, all broken up and panicked.  Something about the Haeltid and a war.

He hardly left the communications console in the office for the first few months.  He'd transmit and transmit, plead and yell, sob and receive nothing.  Not even static, just dead air.  He would stare out the windows and look at the blinking lights far in the distance.  They were still operational.  Someone would come eventually.

Two months prior he started reading Dr. Seuss into the console.  All the other options seemed senseless so he might as well try something equally so.  Right now, though, right now that silent station hurt just as much as it did those months ago.

"Star Train?  Star Train, the historic site?  You guys are still operational?"

A voice.  From the communications console.  Alan's dive to pick up the microphone was perhaps the most athletic moment of his life.

"Yes, this is Star Train, I-we're still operational.  Just had contact with a Haeltid party.  They left something behind.  Who am I speaking to?"

"Wait, left something behind?  You're still alive?  What did they leave behind?"

"I don't know.  It's about the size of a football.  It has a button on it – don't worry, I haven't pressed it.  It's heavy, and warm, uh..."

"Oh.  Star Train.  I am so sorry."
"What, why?"

"Star Train that's an explosive device."

Fuck, Alan thought.  Give me evil aliens.  Or monster aliens.  But for fuck's sake, why give me asshole aliens?  I'm so tired of dealing with assholes.

I just finished the book proper and I have a few more sections of the Appendix to get through.  A few thoughts, to get the discussion started, and I'd very much like to hear Faust and LMNO's take as mentioned in What Are You Reading?

The most impressive part of the whole thing for me was the chapter regarding the labyrinth.  As I searched for footnotes pages ahead, pages behind, leading to other footnotes, imbedded in yet more footnotes, I of course continued to read the very brief, very detailed history of labyrinths.  Then, all of a sudden, I'm sure exactly as intended, it clicked that the overwhelming, terrifying nature of labyrinths was being demonstrated by the layout of the pages, within the footnotes themselves.  It's jarring and confusing and, I thought, brilliant.  The same tactic is used in several other chapters, but it was this one that really stood out.

Zampano being blind as stated in the beginning of the work becomes important less in the thick description of visuals he provides, but more in that the overall effect of the house was an example of how blindness can be.  Hallways that seem to lengthen, stairs that are sometimes shorter and sometimes longer, paths that change even as you swear you know them.  It's life as the blind, never knowing (in the case of exploring a new space) just what kinds of terrain await you.  And for that, the agoraphobia, the constant unknown, the fears that the book put me through, are just another means to an end instead of being the end that I expected them to be.

I'm not any kind of an in depth reader and that's what I can think of for now.

Long, fantastic article focusing on the Upright Citizens Brigade, its former members, and the lasting effect it's had on comedy.  There's some truly incredible shit in here.

http://nymag.com/arts/comics/features/upright-citizens-brigade-2011-10/

This was around the time when Amy was still on SNL, and I think Chevy wanted to get back involved with the show—trying to get to know the young guys—so he was coming around the theater. I came in, and Chevy was backstage. Just to preface it, I grew up the biggest Chevy Chase fan in the world. I knew every word to Fletch and Caddyshack. I wanted to be Chevy Chase. So we go into a little spot just off the lip of the stage, and there was a break in the conversation, so I said, "Chevy, I just want to introduce myself. I'm Rob Huebel." And he just slapped me across the face. He didn't say anything; he just looked at me for a second and belted me. It was really hard—­offensively hard.

I don't mean to sound like Sid Vicious or anything, but there are a lot of those nights I don't remember. I do remember, one night, I threw a stool at this jukebox. Kurt Cobain was playing, and I thought that he would like that. Afterward, I called [the bar] very sheepishly and was like, "Sorry. I want to pay for that jukebox." And the owner said, "Eh, don't worry about it." We pledged our undying support of his bar for life. I was given a key eventually.

One of my closest friends is getting married at the end of September.  His brother is the best man and he hasn't contacted anybody about a bachelor party at all yet.  I don't think anyone else in the wedding party is going to do it so FUCK I think the responsibility is going to fall on me.

He's not really the strip club kind of dude so that standby is out.  Our best bet is probably Boston.  Scotch and cigars would be a great way to start the evening, if anyone has suggestions for either of those.

Otherwise, what the fuck goes into this kind of thing?  I'm completely out of my element here.

Well, it finally happened.  The fucker has been telling us to kill him for years and someone finally did it.  And boy did they ever do it.  Of course, we couldn't be the ones that did it.  We liked the rotten bastard too much and, let's face it, we're malicious enough cunts that keeping him alive was just funnier.  Some people just don't have senses of humor though, some people just don't have the capacity for fun, and we all know The Good Reverend had a talent for finding precisely that sort.

The day started like any other for our beloved Rain God.  He woke up and considered the toilet for a proper few minutes before, in a self control derived from malice, holding it in until he could cause serious damage to not only the plumbing system but also the psyches of his co-workers.  Then he yelled at nothing for 49 seconds.  What came after I'm actually rather repulsed by so I'll just skip to the important part.

Filthy Assistant, Jim, the inept engineers and the blowhards were all in on it.  They found out what badwrong fun is, the Good Reverend way, and they wanted in.  Or so they told him.  There was a Tea Party rally in the Holy City of Tucson that day, they told him.  It was time for them to all join in and shit some deranged hate on the mouthbreathers of their town.  Look, one said, we even have these fliers.

Now ordinarily the ruse would have been seen right through, but the lot of them were convening with the Spider and TGRR was all looped out on an extra dose or eight of pills that day.  We still aren't sure if he thought he was going to stomp on some teabagger tards or ridicule some pagans in the park or go yell at the Arizona wildfires.  So they arrived, this little entourage and the rabble was, as they say, roused.  Just before the whole thing came to a close, The Reverend's crew pointed at the mic just sitting there, waiting, and said to him "Do it.  This is the time."

All fucked up he walked to that podium and he grabbed the offending mic and opened up his gullet to allow a sermon to be sung.  But something was wrong.  They weren't angry, like they should be.  They weren't listening, even, they were just standing there, eyes hungry and bodies poised.

It's been a long time since anybody was drawn and quartered but suffice it to say the act, and sight ain't pretty.  When they hooked up each of The Good Reverend Roger's limbs to the backs of four Rascal scooters I don't think any of them were prepared for the surprising amount of horse power they provide.  He was torn grotesquely in the four directions of the compass and they all cheered, however briefly that victory lasted.  But of course their subsidized mobility assistance devices were strong enough to haul a land whale, so as he came apart at the seams, all contained therein catapulted out of him with the ferocity of even his most bowl shattering poomps.

The smell was horrible.  Fresh meat isn't supposed to stink like that.  They didn't know, like we do, that he'd been rotting on the inside for quite a while.  Everything was discolored and there was far, far more fecal matter than even I am comfortable with discussing.  It shorted the Rascals and it landed in the gaping mouths of the assembled Teabaggers.  Filthy Assistant had some unidentifiable stuff strike him in the eye.  He wears a patch over it know, not for blindness, but they say he sees things out of it that he just should not.

And that was how it ended, friends.

It was following a lack of sleep and a long morning of bacon and driving that Blight and myself walked purposefully into a Connecticut liquor store.  Our pace was made by no ordinary determination to buy beer but actually a particular difficulty in moving through humidity so thick it tasted like ice cream flavored with the sins of the nearby casinos.  We did this shit for the gleeful demons who demanded malted beverage to slake a thirst primal, perverse, and acute.  There was no direction to the type of beer so much as there was a repetitive qualifier:  lots.

Blight and I made our way across an adequate selection discussing the intricacies of purchasing a drinkable choice without dropping enough cash to red flag ourselves as deeply pocketed criminals on every agency watch list in the state.  The cooler stacked up cases of vile waste and overpriced swill alike but for a small spot on the top shelf catching our eyes as we exited carrying our weight in cardboard, glass, and booze.  There were words that I could not comprehend, like a nightmare that feels real but defies description.  Budweiser was one.  A hated word.  And something else.

The grocery team was across the parking lot so we rendezvoused in the blank bland aisles with Richter, Leln, and Torte.  I stood there and I thought.  They tossed quantities of food in a cart never meant to be so burdened.  There was something wrong there that I could not shake.  Blight was gone as well, his mind left behind in that cooler.  We walked back.

Clamato.  That was it.  Budweiser and Clamato.  With salt and lime.  It was one of those comforting moments where we realize no, we are not mad, it is the world that is mad and this thought was mixed with the singular purpose of needing to buy this four pack of pure fucking absurdity.  Oh, and another 30 rack because fuck it.  The cashier saw us again and asked if we forgot something and I said "Yes, this."  He confusedly scanned the can to find that they only rang up one at a time.  Nobody ever bought an entire four pack of this.  They weren't even prepared for such an eventuality.

Subjecting ourselves to a mixture of piss beer, tomato juice and clam juice was one of those things that was done with such gusto that before I knew it Cram and Richter were outside shaking their cans with vigor and unconcern.  The tab clicked the concoction open and we sipped and we did not speak and we passed the can to the next and, unsurprisingly, it came rather quickly back.

It was at this time that another Discordian guest arrived.  He was handed the can and drank deeply and he turned and sprayed that amount in a fine mist.  Many described it as terrible.  This is not untrue, it is terrible.  It exists to be terrible.  Being terrible is the only fucking thing this could ever be and as such it succeeded so gloriously that it might be one of the most impressive beers I've had the distinct honor of guzzling with a very intense self loathing. 

I believe Cram said that he didn't dislike it at first, but with each successive sip he hated it more distinctly.  It would explain why all but one can was abandoned entirely.  My can.  Because it had to be done.  And Cram was wrong, here.  With each successive sip I did not hate it more distinctly.  Rather, with each successive sip I hated myself more distinctly.  It is common to know regret following a long bit of excess revelry.  It is not common to know it immediately and fully, and continue with that same act by your own free will.  And for that, Budweiser & Clamato is a drinking experience like none other.

It is my sad duty to reports upon the death of a board regular, the political savvy legend Cain.  He passed away quietly in his sleep at the ripe old age of 27.

Friends and family close to the young man were asked about the circumstances of his death, described by the coroner as "perfectly clear and ordinary."  Nearly unanimously they spoke of a long standing, unspecified medical condition that struck its final blow as he lay in a restful evening in a quiet, secluded, cash-only motel.  They would look about hurriedly as though expecting unwelcome guests and urgently repeated that this was a family matter that was best not looked into by other parties.  When asked if the police were involved, they vehemently assured me that no, such a thing was left to a higher power.  I had no previous knowledge of Cain's associates being such spiritual folk.

Known for his in depth analysis of current events, Cain's online persona became even more secretive and erratic as of late.  He was noted for being absent for weeks, months at a time, then updating on a number of websites with a rapid fire series of pieces.  Several of them mentioned...REDACTED...  Curiously, a wildly different IP address was used for each of these occasions, and then for no longer than a day at a time.  It would seem his final days were filled with the world traveling and hunger for culture that would fit such a figure.

I prompted local doctor...REDACTED...for his opinion on the death of such a healthy young man.  He insisted, repeatedly, that this sort of thing was...REDACTED...a clear case of "an...er...spontaneous cerebral embolism" before hastily shutting the door.

We'll miss Cain, of course, not only for the insight he provides into our complex web of a world but for the humor and wit he shared with us all.  Memorial arrangements will be at the...REDACTED...and his assets.  Refreshments are to follow provided by an anonymous well wisher.

Yeah, the guy from Dirty Jobs, and the voice from everything else.

It's a well written and important highlight of the skilled labor problem America is either having or very soon will.

I encourage you to support these efforts, because closing the skills gap doesn't just benefit future tradesmen and the companies desperate to hire them. It benefits people like me, and anyone else who shares my addiction to paved roads, reliable bridges, heating, air conditioning, and indoor plumbing.

Starts off a bit slow with a personal anecdote, but worth a read at the end.

http://dsc.discovery.com/fansites/dirtyjobs/mike-rowe-senate-testimony-04.html

By request, all of my contributions to the More Futuristic Fun Than You Really Wanted, part I of V thread.

"At first I thought it was, well yeah, classic Suu."

I can't speak to the rumors.  I've heard the talk, that she isn't dead at all.  That what happened was ascension, more like.  Becoming something greater and everlasting, maybe even divinity.  Ask the followers and I'm sure they'll be glad to tell you.  Thing is, this one took off.  It grew like no tall tale has ever done, and faster.  What I can speak to is what actually happened, what led to the picture that set eyes unfocused and the jaws of hardened men dangling in disbelief.

It started with a trip to Jo Ann's.  Row after row of fabric, all so common, so everyday.  She was about to give up hope for a fruitful trip when underneath some mundane roll of cotton a spark caught her eye.  In respect of her memory I'll forego describing it, failing to do it justice.  It spoke to her, Suu later said.  Divine, perhaps.  Demonic, possibly.  To hear her tell it, that is.  To the rest of us, it looked like a run of the mill psychological snap.  That day, she bought a few yards.  Nothing extravagant.

It disappeared.  Like that drink after the day from hell, like your favorite book, Suu devoured the cloth.  But there was no discernible product from her labor.  Someone asked her where it all went and she just glared and said she needed to get more.  She did get more.  And then more after that.  Yards and yards, days and weeks of work until finally she'd bought the place out.  We all hoped it would end after that last trip, but seeing her clutch those precious remaining yards we all should have known better.

The last time we all saw her it was the evening of some PD outing or another.  The way Luna and Richter talked, they had to drag her out of her place.  The whole night, I remember, she was just not there.  She was distracted and mumbling crazed talk about period garb, colors, stitches, authenticity.  We were being treated like distractions to her or, more appropriately, obstacles.  Somewhere in the revelry we lost her.  She must have gone home, we figured.

Her neighbors called the authorities after a few days of discomforting silence, both from her sewing machine and the music generally aimed in wrath at their apartment.  They had the landlord unlock the place, to a scene of beauty and horror both indescribable.  Everything was garbed.  Her pots and pans, the futon, a toothbrush.  The floor, a dresser.  Her spatula wore a gown that would bring envy from the haughtiest of queens.  Each piece, from the most ornate to the most elegantly simple, perfect but for one small spot on each.

What remained of Suu was a husk hunched before her beloved table.  Where her skin had been borrowed for her masterpiece, the fabled cloth replaced it.

Short notice!?  Fuck it, it's curling.

3 hour lesson in Bridgewater.  Fucking curling.

April 30th or May 1st from 2pm to 5pm.  CURLING, MOTHERFUCKERS.

$35.  Curling.  Three hours of it in Bridgewater.  CURLING.

They passed the Cape Wind project.  America's first off shore wind platforms will be on Nantucket sound.  It's expected to bring 40,000 jobs over ten years, and a major staging ground for the whole project will be my hometown!

Now all they need to do is build the commuter rail connection between Boston and New Bedford and my city will be significantly less of a shithole!

No, really.

This group, in a bizarre and hilarious protest of the recent decision to change "nigger" to "slave" in a new edition of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, is proposing a short printing wherein "nigger" is replaced with "robot."

Mark Twain once said, "The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter."

We couldn't agree more. And that right word is "robot."

Mickey is nearing thirty and his roommate is moving out on him, in with his long time girlfriend.  He's working three jobs and can barely make their meager rent, so there's no way he'll be able to afford living solo or find a cheaper place.  So he's moving back home.  We're not exactly living in Manhattan - so why can't this dude pay for rent?

Alex has a lovely wife, two kids, and a spotless little home on a nice street.  And he's fucking miserable.  He comes into work 30 hours of overtime, at least, every week.  He pulls in good money, and yet he claims he's always broke, so this overtime is necessary.

Jeanine attends weight watchers meetings.  Like her strictly catholic upbringing dictates, she's guilty as hell when that weekly weigh-in doesn't go down, and she hates herself for it.

All three of these people have something in common.  I actually know all three of these people, and I do think quite highly of them.  I'm incredulous as to how they can convince themselves that they can't afford to pay rent or work reasonable hours.

Mickey and Alex are similar.  Both of them, several times in the same conversation, have stated their precise problems and not even realized it.  Mickey bought $200 worth of comic books last week.  Alex just bought a $400 watch on eBay, and sold it for profit - which he will then put into another watch, and another, and he doesn't always break even on them.

I think Jeanine has it toughest.  She's a sensitive one, and not a very strong one either.  She did great in the weight loss program overall, she really did.  Yet now that she's maintaining instead of losing, every week it's the same song and dance:  there was candy or cookies someone brought into work and she couldn't stop eating them.  So she's down as hell on herself for it, and she feels bad for the rest of the week instead, well, just not eating them.  But it's the wording here that's frustrating:  she couldn't stop, or it's her co-workers' fault for tempting her with the garbage she shouldn't eat.

It opens up infinite avenues of debate, of course, on the addictive nature of eating or buying things, as well as the entire process of losing weight.  That isn't the issue here.  The issue is that we have people who convince themselves that their money somehow just disappears, or that the scale goes up of its own accord, and their quality of life suffers from it.

Losing the freedom of your own space, sacrificing the entirety of your life to your job, feeling bad about eating crap you shouldn't - they're the prices paid for a comic book, a watch, a cookie.  I actually have nothing personal against this, so long as you are actively willing to pay that price.  If you think "well if I buy this booze, I'm going to get fat from the calories and broke from the cost," you need to be okay with the consequences of that before you go through with it.  Props to you.

The alternative is creating a willful mystery.  You refuse to face the sad facts that a short term poor decision has long term consequences.

A lean young man in corduroys and Pumas waits outside a Starbucks sporting as much awful haircut as his overpriced salon can provide.  Walking in, a former classmate recognizes him and asks him what he's doing standing outside.  "Pft, I don't drink Starbucks," he replies with a sneer that could infuriate sloths.

Across the parking lot in his beat up old F-150, a grizzled middle aged man sits, idling while his wife runs inside.  She asked him if he wanted anything and he said, "Pft, you know I don't drink that pussy crap."

You've talked to both of these motherfuckers before, and yeah, depending who you are, you are guaranteed to like one over the other.  It doesn't change the fact that both of them did exactly the same thing, for different reasons and with different words, but exactly the same thing.  Something is offered them, a beer, a coffee, a burger, and they refuse.  But they don't just refuse, they refuse in a way to imply they see themselves as better than whatever the subject is.

Be it "sorry, my tastes are too sensitive to allow anything less than seasonal microbrews past these lips," or "you're not a real man unless you drink Jack Daniels," they're letting you know, in no uncertain terms that types of people enjoy that thing and they are not one of those types of people.  Yet somehow, it's always the former that sets eyebrows raising.  Yeah it's easy to hate on pretentiousness when it's about class and high brow bullshit, but that doesn't make it any less pretentious to claim you're more grizzled for drinking crap booze.  It's the same trap.

Sorry, motherfucker, but you aren't any more real for drinking Budweiser than some jerkoff is refined for drinking Sam Adams.  If you're going to pass it up, do it for your own tastes and don't try to pull some reason why you're oh so much better than that.

<<2010>>

It's Christmas in Tucson,
And in Portland it's Yule.
Cram's getting his Moose on,
'Til there's blood in his stool.
Even I this year popped my Moosemas cherry,
With drinking and Zardoz at the Monestary.

In those Europ-ey places
They've got Sinterklaus.
He's eating kids' faces
In his gingerbread house.
I don't speak Dutch so don't be a hater.
If my myth's wrong just blame Google translator.

In SoCal it's raining,
Just pouring it fierce.
White Christmas is straining
Against mudslides and fears.
Course it's not like it snows in those sunny spots,
Though tell that to Pickle in his Florida shorts.

Then there's our Scot peers
And those Englishmen close.
They're deep frying reindeers,
Served with sauteed Welsh toes.
I've always heard Brit cuisine is an odd one,
I think it's because they're descended from goblins.

We've a spag-scattered globe,
What with Aussies like Lys.
And Slaknet who knows where
That mystery man lives?
The point is we're all in our Holiday moods.
To some it means screaming, to others new shoes.

What I'm trying to say,
Oh my PD'ers dear.
Is that starting today
Spread Discordian cheer.
It's almost like happiness of the ordin'ry sort,
Except it's hating on rev'lers, and cruelty for sport!

They're not deserving of
Their gifts under their trees.
They need a serving of
Lead pipes to their knees.
I hope that Santa carries 'round something sharp
To cut himself loose from my trap with the tarp.

On hustlers and rev'rends!
On hipsters and punners!
On artists and madmen!
On crunchers of numbers!
On to your wintry festivals all kind!
'Tis the season, so go fuck with some minds!

<<2011>>

There're spags round the fireplace,
Hanging up their stockings,
They've met up in meatspace,
For Holiday mockings.
BadBeast says some shit like "blimey oi govnah"
We can't understand him, but BB we love ya.

That Santa guy's finally
Been taken some care of.
Those Nessies are grimey,
But the snow keeps the slime off.
'Cause the Southampton horrors ate Rudolph et al,
And a Templar's put Santa's hat on his metal.

But wait what's that racket,
Coming up the chimney?
"I'm telling you faggots,
I've got gasoline, see?"
Our dear old Enrico wants to light up the fire,
But burning the place down isn't what they desire!

"Unless it is, of course,"
A voice came from somewhere.
They screamed until hoarse.
One said, "dynamite's no fair!"
So many ideas to start up that first spark,
It's too bad we can't just light it with snark.

Though it didn't much matter,
In the end it got lit.
And ECH made a platter,
Of some de-licious shit.
So we argue and revel and laugh with some brews,
Try this beer by Squiddy!  And this one is Suu's!

Discord is the spirit,
Among different folk.
Let each other hear it,
But it's all the same joke!
Be it Moosemas or Christmas, Festivus or Yule,
It's time to bring mindfucks from high upon fools.

The year at this place is,
Well, it's winding right down.
So silence your faces!
And hear Eater of Clowns!
PD is for fun and for serious havoc,
And all of this butthurt, no sir I won't have it.

On WOMPers and writers!
On analysts and teachers!
On students and fighters!
On occupiers and creatures!
On to your PD revelry once more,
For again 'tis the season to show all what for!


<<2012>>

Ofuk not again,
the spags said together,
this poem's a pain,
give us a breather.
But the holiday season comes like it not,
so shut the fuck up and read up this rot.

So what the hell happened,
to PDers in '12.
Well we wrote some crap and
mostly we yelled.
The tumbleweeds heard it if no one else,
and even they were shocked by RWHN and Stellz.

There will be no tree,
for Garbo and Pix.
They'll light a bush or three,
because they're less phallic.
Roger and ECH can just stand there and watch,
but they cannot help because of their crotch.

And what about Twid,
whose faith this offends?
He knows that I kid,
so spare your Depends.
Ironing out what happens to Waffle,
I doubt he'll read this PD poem awful.

The Marrowman offers
me a few new rhyme schemes.
"One bone for my coffers,
to stop these grade school themes!"
L-M-N-O is worse than the bone man,
for making New England some scary land.

Hang holist's stocking,
but what the fuck's this?
It's far too shocking,
which one of them's his?
A h0list, a holis+, a ho1ist and,
fuck if I'm typing that whole list again.

On beaders and crocheters!
On writers and garbers!
On larpers and players!
On mixers and warblers!
On and remember during this holiday chore,
There's no better time to punish fuckers galore!

Geocaching - A community-driven hobby wherein people input coordinates into GPS devices that lead them to small boxes in remote or hidden areas.  The boxes contain an assortment of small items, trinkets, or note pads.  Finders of a geocache are to place something of theirs into the box and taking something out in exchange.  They can leave messages on notepads, etc, then they put the box back where they found it.  There are communities online where people can report back if they found the box, if it was difficult, or if it was missing, etc.

The community started in the relatively early days of GPS devices, before they were as ubiquitous as they are now.  It's still a nichey activity, with lots of caches being on hiking trails, etc.  Recently, GPS devices are easily available in the form of our very favorite tools of Big Brother - smart phones.

I think we should target the GeoCachers.  By necessity, the community is tight knit, keeping track of existing caches and updating them.  That means recurring themes in the boxes could possibly be remarked upon in discussions.  The activity also attracts the curious - a cache might have any number of otherwise pointless items, but they're basically buried treasure troves.

Pope cards and meme bombs are the stand by for things like this, so maybe this is an offshoot of postergasm.  Here, though, they're placed where the individual is specifically looking.  And on top of it all, we can have some fun looking for geocaches.  Hell, if we learn enough about the community, maybe we can make a few of our own.

So, is this something people would be interested in?  Which meme bombs might speak best to this group?  Does anyone know more about the activity than what I've outlined here?

Props to Richter for prodding me with a polearm to post this.

For a long time this has been bothering me, and I'm finally going to get it off my chest:


Your avatar.  You...





look way too similar to my dad:

I've been meaning to make this thread for a loong time.  It will be a depository for all the fucked up, depressing, and sometimes hilarious shit that I come across in my job.  Sometimes it'll come a few times a night, sometimes not for a few weeks, but I'll try to keep it running.

****************

A woman called today.  She'd received a notice in the mail that someone would be coming to pick her up and "deliver" her to court for money she owed.  Basically it was a notice that a warrant was out for her arrest.  I told her to get in touch with our warrant division, which unfortunately won't be available until tomorrow, but that as far as I knew nobody would be acting on that tonight.  She was upset.  Nearing tears.  Her voice quivered and she half-whispered, "I just think it's ridiculous, for eighty-eight dollars."

[Intro:]

Intro:  Reading through some Sandman and the influences that went into his work, I think Neil Gaiman is potentially sympathetic to Discordianism.  It's unclear whether or not he knows specifically about us, but he has a clear understanding of symbols and gods, meaning he would recognize Eris and perhaps things like the Sacred Chao or the chaos star (used in Michael Moorcock's work, which he's definitely read).  His obsessive tweeting and public engagements lead me to believe that he's at least in some touch with his fans.

Goal:  At the very least, the goal is to get a shout out to Discordianism from Gaiman.  If this is just a tweet, that's fine, but if it's a series of statements or even an inclusion in his work, all the better.

Strategy:  Gaiman is a storyteller.  Frequent references and deference to storytelling characters in his novels and comics lead me to believe if he became involved in a story, he would choose to press further.  The plan I have in mind also taps into the old psychology idea that if someone agrees to do something small for you at first, they are more likely to later offer more.  The exchange here is a story to tell, giving him a curious and entertaining series of events to make life more interesting.

Plan:
Step 1:  Gaiman will be attending a benefit at the Boston Public Libarary on September 26th with a signing open to the public at 3:30.  I'll be attending, for my own fanboy purposes, to get Absolute Sandman Vol. 1 signed.  Inside the front cover where he signs I'll leave a note along the following lines:

Mr. Gaiman,

Please do not react to this note.  We have observed a sympathetic sentiment in your works to our own goals.  Consider this an offer to work together.  To accept, mention "the golden apple" in a tweet on October the 1st.  Further instructions will arrive shortly thereafter.  Be on the lookout for this name on an envelope.  The attached mustache is a sign of our good faith.

-The Supplanter Watchman

PS.  Discreetly removing this note so as to avoid the notice of the young man before you would be greatly helpful.  If not, no matter.

***

I'm going for intriguing enough to warrant a simple communication via twitter.  If the golden apple reference is too overt, it can be replaced with another key phrase.

Step 2:  It gets a little more difficult here.  Should the offer be accepted, the response will come in the form of an actual lengthy letter.  Ideally, the letter would recommend Gaiman to choose his own Holy Name and declare it publicly.  Here's how I intend the letter to get to him:

Neil Gaiman is engaged to Amanda Palmer.  Amanda Palmer is currently the Emcee for Cabaret at the American Repertory Theater in Boston.  I have a friend who works at the A.R.T.  Ideally, I could hand her an envelope with a key phrase on the outside and have it find its way to Amanda Palmer, where it would then be handed off to Neil Gaiman.  Perhaps something slipped into a bouquet following one of her performances?

I'll have to talk to this friend to hash it out, see if she's on board.  This is as far as my ability to reach the author goes.  This is hear to further hash out the idea, not only to refine the steps so far but also to see how we can move forward should it progress.

Looks like I'll be hitting up the Cape again on Labor Day weekend.  I was wondering, as someone who seems to have a good idea of what Provincetown has to offer, if you had any suggestions.  Thus far I've really only walked through the main strip and, well, spent heavy time on the beaches, but I'm always up for the new.

And of course, anyone else can weigh in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5xAV52Y1XI

Ow! Ow!

A massive headache in my aging skull
Means I do not feel well

Payne, Payne, Payne
Bad brains must always feel Payne

The problem started with my attitude
It's all lust, direct and crude
There are good people in this world of bums
But, sadly, I am not one

Payne, Payne, Payne
That's why I'm always bein Payne

Good karma would not get you anywhere
Look at Jesus and his hair

Payne, Payne, Payne
Bad brains must always feel Payne

Justice, religion and success are fake
And the shiny people stink

Pretty creepy, pretty funny
I'm a mix of God and monkey

Payne, Payne, Payne
To feel Payne is all that will remain
Payne, Payne, Payne, Paaaayyynn

Payne
Payne
Et cetera, I give up, I quit.

[THE LEGENDARY LEER.]

Get your fucking model on watermelon fuckers, this is the Great PD Expression-Off.  See a spagbook photo with one bitchin grimace?  Submit that shit.  Think your grimace can beat it?  Submit that shit.

I start you off with an expression inspired by Dok's Mustache thread:  THE LEGENDARY LEER.




Sweet sockfucking christholes that's a leer.  I humbly submit my response in the form of drunken leer:



That leer's so powerful it pixelized the faces of my close friends.  Their faces are like that now, permanently, and they forgive me because of the glory of that expression.  If you see a pixelface around, they are beautiful people you should be less hostile to than normal.

CAN YOU OUTLEER THAT?  Show it.  Does your pooping face top the leer?  SHOW IT.  The gauntlet, I lost it, it's thrown down so low it's in the fucking mantle.