Category Archives: California

00490509 (Violet)

She got tired of waiting for her alternate self to grow up — understandably, because it could take *decades*. She decides to do some investigating on her own about the subject. Shamon. From the inn. Place of thorns. Not much of an inn aspect left to the place — no beds as far as she could tell. More a museum for the lower floors, she supposed. And then she found the letter in the middle of an antique book just chosen at random from a first floor bookcase. Hmm, she thought, separating the 2 pieces of paper from each other and laying them side by side. What’s this? She started reading. Plain it was at first to her. Mundane, run of the mill, no special qualities at all. A journal entry by someone named June about a trip across the western part of our US of A. Then she read it again. And again. And again, starting to put the 2 sides together to make 1; actually, let’s make that she simply eliminated the second to make one. Here’s what she had left…

Dear Dairy,

We’re finally in Missouri! Almost home! Bryan was so exhausted with today’s drive that we decided to have a sleepover at a cheap motel off Route 66. Madry Wise it’s called and the owners Martha and Theodore are just adorable! They welcomed us with open arms and invited us for dinner so we can share our Route 66 road trip experience with them. Bryan is just having a little nap and we’ll go once he wakes up.

I can’t believe how lucky I am. It’s been the best summer ever!!! Two weeks ago we started the journey from Santa Monica, CA and went through several states through Barstow, Kingman, Sedona, Winslow, Monument Valley, Durango, Santa Fe, Albuquerque, Roswell, Amarillo, Oklahoma City until now Missouri.

So that’s all of page 1. She checked all the mentioned locations from its last sentence on a map. Santa Monica, Barstow, Kingman, Sedona, Winslow: yes, everything to this point was on Route 66 or, in Sedona’s case, quite close, only about 25 miles away. But June and her boyfriend Bryan start to veer away from that famous highway after Winslow AZ and only clearly pick it up again at Amarillo TX. In other words, June may not have even used 66 through the whole of New Mexico, going from Durango CO down to Santa Fe then Albuquerque then Roswell to its south before heading back up to Texas. *Crossing* 66 in Albuquerque but not necessarily travelling along it. While pondering this, Shelley Johnston Struthers realized, if so, that another motel might have been visited on the journey between Albuquerque and Roswell. Was this what was being implied all along?? Fictional Madry Wise Motel actually standing in for the most haunted hotel in America?

They should have never left some of the swastikas on the building because photos can be flipped and time reversed along with it. 1923: not that far away, then, not far atall.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0049, 0509, Arizona, California, Jeogeot, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, Xilted

00490506 (high no more)

On and on they played, well into the night, past 2, almost past 3. Bed called, but the drive for success trumped all, kept them going. “How much now, babydoll?” Philip asked about his losses across the card table to oft times girlfriend Nada New Year, soon to be downgraded to “some”, perhaps inevitably heading to “none”, even. He’d passed 10 long ago. Thirty… forty…

After Nada didn’t answer (weariness? disgust, even?), Frank laid down the last card in the Mille Bornes marathon as if in slow motion. Everyone, including worn out Daisy to make 4, exhaled their tired, collective breaths as 50 was determined to be a limit, SCREEEECHH! They can sleep well now.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, Jeogeot, California, 0506, GTA, Nawt Vaya+, NVFS, 0049, Frank's Moving Castle

00490505

And now… we come… to Static. It’s always been there, always been a part of us. Question is: how will we rise above it? Do we even need to? Why not dwell in Static forever and ever, become part of the machinery.

Russel here eventually sees Hollywood and the portal opening beneath it and shakes himself out of his stupor to go tell his band mates.

What do YOU see in the Static?

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0049, 0505, California

00490504 (2-D)

“So you see, I had to escape the (Cross of the) Lamb. Else: absorbed. Devoured like the purest blue flower that I’d become, all because of a cult’s desire for permanence. Both them *and* us. One and the same deep down — like a hole inside a hole with a monster who is the machinery waiting at the bottom. Waiting for his chance.”

Will he get it? Gonna be razor’s edge close if not!

Only his band mate, his primary running partner, can save him at this late point. Essence of Murdoc. Tied right now, ha. (TBC?)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0049, 0504, California

00460601

“Morro Bay??” Dreaming Frank Lynn was expecting a sign for Paleto Bay but got a surprise, Real Life location intruding in on Virtual here. He suddenly has another important piece of the puzzle. Now to find the Rock.

“There!” he said, seeing it coming into view in the distance after passing a large beach dune. Well… sort of, he thought. Not quite Morro Rock but pretty obviously the duplicate down here. And out there in the bay beyond it: the 4 islands with the, um, bodies. 2 apiece, he knew. A central mystery. 4 islands, 8 bodies. Infinity.

Carolin manifests back at the center.


888 Infinity Lane

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0046, 0601, California, GTA, Jeogeot, Juho, Nawt Vaya+

00450108 (Red Arrow (Coming back to Earth))

“This one’s gold. Annnnd (grunts while reaching into the wagon for another one)… *this* one’s gold.”

She pauses in her work to look around the Badlands business. “Jeez, looks like they’re *all* gold to me, huh.”

Her boss comes out of left field and tells her it’s quitting time.

“Do I come back tomorrow?” she asks expectantly, wiping her hands on her jeans before inserting them into its pockets.

He also looks around at all the rocks, gauges the height of the piles, their diameter, whether more rocks can be added to them right now. “Mmmmm. We’ll see. Stay close to your phone in the morning.”

“Oh. Oh okay.”

He stares at her pants, then decided to add: “I’d recommend washing your hands before leaving, err–” He stops; he can’t remember her name; he decides to continue like no awkward pause occurred. “Anyway, ahem, some of these, um, rocks might contain uranium, uh hmm. Not enough to kill you or anything (hardy laugh here). Just as a precaution. Soap’s on the sink in the bathroom over there.” He exits back to the left after pointing in that direction. Fern is alone. No call in the morning as it turns out. Another day off to enjoy the desert sun and wind. Maybe even a dust storm midday to break up the monotony. Out of sunscreen, though, with no money left to buy. She’s hoping for rain.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL OT, 0045, 0108, California, Google Street View, South Dakota, Twin Peaks

00440415

Waldo indicates downtown Lost Sanos in the distance where he soon plans to get lost to continue the game, even though he’ll be redder at the time. Not sure why there’re 2 downtowns here, though, to be honest. Have to study.

In other recent Google Earth Street View news while we’re talking about it: feet again.

Giant Foot

Just One Each

Or should I say Google Earth Feet View in these cases?

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Filed under **VIRTUAL OT, 0044, 0415, California, Google Street View, GTA

00430401 (“Alphanumerica”)

I came here…

… in a boat.

Cool! though Frank Lynn while encountering this object just beyond the edge of the faux sea and its partially sunk vessel. Maybe this is what my lost spool table has turned into. A model for a whole mountain of mystery! This made him even more excited to meet the creator.

He approached the truck not 20 yards away now that doubled as living quarters for the man both 10 and 85 at once. The one he would model, in his own manner, the character of Wayne Bruce upon later on. Builder of a whole city but derived from a mountain. This one.

“Mr Knight?” he called, not wanting to knock on the door or wall of the thing out of respect. “Yo, Mr. Knight. Big fan here. Just want a word if I could, dawg.”

Frank waited and waited. He heard sounds within. Someone was there (!). Being recreated as it turned out. Overt religious messages were fading from the truck as well as the mtn. behind. Everything was becoming alien oriented, JESUS, for example, being reconstructed as 6EQUJ5, “Love is Universal” turning into “Life is Universal”. Would he approve?

No. Mr. Night without the K emerged from the back, more devil than saint.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL OT, 0043, 0401, Art 10x10, California, collages 2d, Greenup, GTA

00410616

While Billie gassed herself up at the filling station next door, Philip had a bit of a lie down in his trailer. Gas station? he started pondering while laying there. When did Bombay Beach get a gas station? Then he laughed, a way to shake the dream off. Why did I call this place *that*? he he. I mean of course Sandy Beach. Then he realized this was wrong too: Sandy *Shores*.

He suddenly thought of Ron next door; wondered what he was cooking up. Why *meth* he realized. *His* meth. As soon as he starting dwelling on drugs he was gone from her, the Bug next door fading along with memories of Billie and even Marion, although the latter lingered on a little longer. Kept calling Ron Marion when he phoned him up, checking progress on the next batch; wondered if he’d been imbibing too much of it himself because of his peculiar thoughts this afternoon.

We have, in effect, returned him to his natural environment, his original home. Philip was no more as Trevor took over. He was soon to have a new gang of 3.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0041, 0616, California, GTA

00410615

“Anything, Philip?” asked Billie who was a Bug again. It was the next morning and the men, the boys, had gotten a fairly good rest during the night. And like I said, Billie didn’t need any. She counted 256 pieces of modern art that strolled or slid or lurched (etc.) down the road in front of them during the night. Fantastic — all seemingly benign. Maybe there’s hope for the town after all.

He stared at the house and the queer windmill blades affixed to the roof. “Nah, nothing.” But he was working on his coffee and had yet to wake up. Moving on…

—–

“Then how about his one? According to the Rock Star wiki, you picked up a woman injured in a wreck along the highway and delivered her to this safehouse, either dead or alive, depending how fast you got here.”

“Maybe… rings a bell?” Coffee sipped and done with, he was getting fuzzy memories now, unlike with the windmill house. Things were starting to get jogged up there. A woman, huh? he thinks, trying to picture her face, her… wounds. Belly, he sensed. Accident on the road, yes. Fellow… criminal? But then the vision faded. Moving on to the next structure…

—–

This did the trick, if not initially. Philip felt compelled to stop and get out of the car and explore this time. Marion was fine with it, since they still had to eat anyway. Billie turned from a car to a person again — transformation unseen to anyone else as far as they could tell — and all 3 walked up to the establishment’s door, Philip all the time staring around, starting to clearly see the overlap. Bombay Beach to Sandy Shores. But in his mind there were *2* bars with the same design. How’d that work?

And it is here that we *really* end our current story/photo-novel.

“Let’s let Philip go first,” suggested Billie. And she and Marion stood back and watched him enter.

“I’m remembering!” But they’d have to find another place to dine.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0041, 0615, California, Google Street View, GTA