Category Archives: Canada

July 5, 2025 · 6:57 am

00470311 (level 9223372036854775807 = trap?)

I spoke clear and distinct into the Air. “I’m here looking for a BOOK.”

No answer for about 15 seconds, then:

“WE ARE HERE.”

I think that’s *Lauri*, I realized. I pondered what to say next. Simply repeating the request didn’t seem right. They knew.

I had to specify.

“31 pages with a 32nd ripped out,” I tried.

15 more seconds, then:

“CHECKING.”

10 more seconds, then:

“LIMITING QUERY TO PICTURE BOOK, 32 PAGES MAX. PLEASE RESTATE REQUEST.”

Picture book? I thought. I didn’t even know what that really meant. I assumed: children’s book. What children’s book did I know?”

“‘Little Black Sambo,'” I said once more into the Air.

2 seconds later: “THAT REQUEST IS NOT ALLOWED.”

O-kay, I thought. Good the library has some kind of racist filter, I suppose. Although someone old enough with a valid ID should be able to request the material anyway. Just then:

“PERHAPS SPECIAL COLLECTIONS CAN HELP YOU SELECT A PICTURE BOOK. OPENING A CONNECTION…..”

Hmmmm. Dare I? It would mean returning to the beginning of it all. Perhaps losing everything that’s happened since in the process. All those hard earned years of service.

Couldn’t do it. Like Denmark, something rotten went on there. 42. Bad juju.

I’d have to keep working from outside the system. Nibbling away on the periphery.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0047, 0311, Back Rooms, Canada/Picturetown

Tagged as Baker Blinker^^++++@, Baker Bloch^*+++++@, LBS, LIBRARY, NODAL

April 26, 2024 · 4:23 pm

00420601 (Castle Town)

He often came here to rock and think about the battle of rock vs. paper vs. scissors, which for him was won by putting paper (1) before scissors (2) before rock (0). 102 if read left to right, with rock always in the center like the ground zero it is.

He hears a noise outside. It’s 3:25 in the morning — no one else up, he imagined. Except ghosts.

He stops rocking, gets up, leaving the maple leaf throw pillow behind and thoughts of Canadian Picturetown along with it. “Who goes there?”

The right Wendy walks through the door of the establishment…

… with her first words inside being: “This entrance has changed.”

It certainly has, thinks Barry De Boy, very happy at the sight. It certainly has. No demo over her head now; he was seemingly dealing with a real flesh and blood girl again. They can… well, you know. This is what boys think. Boys like De Boy.

“The gatekeeper said I’d find you down here. Said it was his last night to work, the last hour, the last minute. Said he was here for me and then he could go. He put a Help Wanted sign on the door as he locked up behind me. I turned around just in time to see him leave. Go figure. Guess I’ve found my work in town after all.”

“Wendy!” he exclaimed, not knowing how to follow it up. Shock!

“In the flesh.” She twirled around, showing him the different dress. “And blood I suppose, ha.” She approached him. Dare she kiss him this early? It’s been years after all. Instead: “Share a cup of coffee with me?” She tweaked him on the nose, a sign of things to come.

“Of course! Over there,” he pointed to a nearby table. “I’ll find the brew.” He started rummaging around the back of the counter. “As you can see, we’ve also turned the tables to the side.”

“We?”

“Yeah, Me and Grumpy. We run the place now. Or manage it — Stew’s still the owner. Technically I suppose.”

“So no jobs I suppose,” Wendy spouted as she took a seat. She so so didn’t want to be the new gatekeeper of the town. Boor-ing, she knew. She’d heard Devil Dave complain enough about it back in the day.

“No… sorry. Can’t can Grumpy, you see. He has a wife and two children now (!).”

“Who could have imagined.”

“I know.” He’d found the coffee. Now to make the concoctions. “Espresso alright? All I can find.”

“Yeah. Perfect, actually. Make mine a double. No… triple. What the heck, let’s go with 4.” Could be a long night, she knew. Lots of restaurant talk to get through, potentially. Lots of talk about success and then failure. Utter failure. All tests show 5% human DNA, PHEH. I’ll get that Okama Majo, she thought. If it’s the last thing I do.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0042, 0601, Canada, Canada/Picturetown, Castle Town, Omega^^

Tagged as 102+, Barry DeBoy^*+++++%%, Drew "Grumpy" Cleveland^*++++, GROUND 00, Hot Dog ^*!, NODAL, Okama Majo^*+++++$, Wendy/Breeze^^+++++$, Wendy^^+++++$

July 27, 2022 · 4:41 am

00340110

“What did you do to him Jerry?”

“What did *you* do to him… Gerry?”

Pause. “Well whoever did whatever I’ve got to go on patrol. You can stay here and bare the stares — figure it out.”

“We could just go talk to him.” Both laugh. Jack would have no useful information to give the pair of security guards: what he’s apparently pissed off about with one of them or perhaps both of them, or anything about Ontario in general. He’s a bad ass, in a bad way. He does the bidding of the Big Boss and that’s it, period. Doesn’t share anything with no one except for the highest level, the Mayor, the King, perhaps merged now as the Mayor-King. Hafta check; hafta think about that. New angle. Maybe Mexico-Canada related.

“He’s got that gun shop, you know,” states Gerry before he goes to punch keys on his rounds. “He could be toting one right now, ready to go on a killing spree.”

“Nah,” offers seated Jerry. “Wouldn’t come to that. He’s a company man. Doesn’t want to ruin his standings in the hierarchy.” Jerry leans in closer to Gerry. “There’s a potential slot opening for no. 3, you know. The guy in the middle.”

“Not North not South — I’ve heard,” he says back not far above a whisper as well. Mayor-King it is.

Meanwhile, a duck-man on a neighboring rooftop had more useful information, but no one knew how to reach him, least of all Jem, who could use it the most right now. 3 more days and ticking.

Even John had forgotten and he invented the anthropomorphic fellow — let the SOB loose unto the world at large. Repeated cloning comes with a price, but I can’t remember what it is right now (wonder why).

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0110, Canada, Mexico, Wendy-Ontario

Tagged as Axis/Tropp-Opp/Campbell O'Pine^*++++@, Jack^*=====, Jem^^+++++$, Jerry and Gerry^*=====!, Jim/John L. Brown^*+++++%, MAYOR, Newt/Windmill Man^*+++++&, NODAL, Paul Duck^*+++++

July 26, 2022 · 1:17 pm

00340109

The next time I saw Jack he was pushing me against the wall of a clothing shop I was examining in the plaza where the space pod took me upon exiting the station.

Didn’t take long for him — one of his selves that is — to give me a pointed message. Don’t meddle in the affairs of this town. Stick to the rules, the instructions as he called it. Play the game and then leave. Else everyone gets confused, fearfully so. And, most likely, violently so.

But I was determined not to leave without the information I *wanted* (not needed). I was ruthless like that. I didn’t know that, just underneath the surface, was an interplanetary and interdimensional conspiracy ripe for revealing. I had stumbled not into a bottomless pit this time but the unveiling of the face of God at the bottom of it, Mexico and Canada combined unto one.

Later Ruth showed up working the plaza’s coffee stand and I was back to need not want. Trouble is, John was there too, staring at me staring at her. She was aware of eyes on her but decided not to acquiesce — play hard to get, as her character demanded (she had a secret). And then another John passed in the distance but I missed it.

And then Jack shows up walking toward that clothing store again, pheh. Clones. Town’s full of ’em. I fit right in.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0034, 0109, Canada, Mexico, Wendy-Ontario

Tagged as Axis/Tropp-Opp/Campbell O'Pine^*++++@, Jack^*=====, Jim/John L. Brown^*+++++%, Newt/Windmill Man^*+++++&, Ruth^^+%

June 24, 2022 · 7:41 am

Boos 27 and 26 (“2 Fer 1”)

“It’s one of the ones that we had to give up when we moved to Rooster’s Peninsula here, Hucka Doobie. But as you can see, there’s (Mr.) Bean, there’s Tom (Kite) — front and center here. Combined: Tom Bean.”

“Fascinating,” Hucka Doobie admitted. “So we go back to Tungaske? Canada?”

“Ontario at least,” replied Baker Bloch.

“Ahh. Picturetown.” Hucka Doobie suddenly felt sorry she/he wasn’t directly a part of those Canadian based collage series, the In and the Out. With his/her analysis, I mean.

Baker turns. “You seem to be changing back into a bee-man,” he observed.

“Admittedly I’m slipping. A bit.”

Poor Hucka Doobie. If you don’t nurture a character and pay attention to them, they tend to atrophy. Hucka Doobie became stuck on Baker Bloch, unable to deal with the stuff happening all around her/him. What does that say about me (though)?

flip side: elimination (obscuration) of Tom and Bean

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0033, 0407, Canada, Canada/Picturetown, Canada/Tungaska, Nautilus, NORTH, Rooster's Peninsula

Tagged as 6 Legged BG Horsie, Baker Bloch^*+++++@, Bean^*!+, Hucka Doobie^^+++++@%%

June 15, 2022 · 8:29 am

disattached from land

“Can’t you pull one of your Tungaske type miracles to save my village?”

“I’m afraid not. Too small.”

She shed a tear, perhaps with more to come. Probably so. These were scientist tears, the tough ones. “Hard to believe it’s gone.”

“No one under 18. Really nothing we can do [Eyela]. (pause) I’m sorry.”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0033, 0314, Canada, Canada/Tungaska, Iowa, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Squared Root City

Tagged as Axis/Tropp-Opp/Campbell O'Pine^*++++@, Axis^*+++++, Baker Bloch^*+++++@, Leila/Eyela/Rose Wells^^++++$, Newt/Windmill Man^*+++++&, Wheeler Wilson^^+++++\@

May 16, 2022 · 4:10 pm

00330108

The elimination of George.

Harrison remains. *Barely*.

“They got his knee, which knocked out the rest of his leg — sorry. A thumb was missing from the hand but they were able to regrow it with the intact others. Don’t ask about the procedure. It’s messy, complicated. But without that hand, that regrowth…”

“He wouldn’t be able to play the guitar,” the other in the room finished for Dr. Diper, fresh from the surgery. “Thank you.”

“The red and green almost got him this time,” warned the doctor. “Best not to send him back out to war.”

“Oh, we won’t. Denisce just made a bad decision sending him over there. It’s in her name, you know, bad and good.”

The doctor paused with this, then said, “oh yeah,” as he got it. “Denisce. I forgot it could be spelled that way.”

“Almost,” replied the other. Probably Marty at this point, since he’s so concerned with the hand and its dexterity. “Will he lose any chords? I don’t mean vocal chords obviously (Dr. Diper snickers here, since both knew the head wasn’t involved — nice break in the seriousness) but guitar chords. Can… will he be able to play…”

“All your songs,” the doctor finishes a sentence in turn. Like tennis they were this day, battering concerns back and forth across a net that is the separation between people. Good and bad. Sometimes it’s absolutely necessary. “Wellll.”

Nurse Jem comes in, celebratory drinks in hand. Vodka for Diper and a, let’s see, Russian Roulette for Marty, a new drink he claimed to have concocted on the spot back at the hotel after the San Francisco concert in Candlestick Park, knocking it out alongside a couple of new ditties: the embryonic form of “Back in the USSR” and the unreleased and seldom heard “Moby Prick”. A baad song, Georgge Martin proclaimed upon hearing it back in England. “Hey, we’re the f-ing Beetles, Martin. Leave us alone!” exclaimed Marty after the judgment, but then the others admitted it was sour instead of sweet too and he let the matter drop, song unrefined and left in a raw, unprocessed form. They all secretly felt it was about Marty and his character, though, but to voice this out loud would be character assassination. He was just that much of a prick. At the time — he mellowed out later. After he died.

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0033, 0108, Canada, Canada/Picturetown, Canada/Tungaska, Jeogeot, Towerboro

Tagged as Denisce^^====!, Doctor Diper^*====!%, George^*++, Jem^^+++++$, Marty^*+++++$, Professor Young Harris/Harrison Jett^*++%

October 1, 2021 · 8:11 am

fused

Accompanied by the music of Certain Death playing on the turntable, an old, religious man reads slightly pornographic manga well into the night. Did it in Kowloon where he came from, doing it here. Nothing wrong.

In another part of Horns, Jacob’s I awakes from the dead, as it were, and rolls his stiffened neck. “Ugggh. Where *am* I?”

Kick-ass Bogota’s long vigil is over. He can rejoin his brother Boos, wherever he is at the moment, probably Red’s Diner.

Yes: Red’s.

Bigfoot is a hot topic tonight. A giant spool has now been rolled onto an artist’s location and made into a firepit. Staring into the flames one last time, Kick-ass takes his leave before Jacob I. realizes who he is.