Category Archives: 0315

May 15, 2023 · 3:00 am

flashion show

“Welp, we finally found her. Our Sleeping Beauty. Clockwork eye’s a dead giveaway. Right Ted? Ted?”

“Oh yeah, we can’t find him,” John the Mind Reader remembers about his wastelands partner-in-law, as they call each other sometimes — always there; force of habit to think he’s by his side per usual. “We can’t find Ted,” he reiterates with a sigh. He stares at the teddy bear the Ratcatcher still clutches tightly but doesn’t make 2 1’s out of 2. Lime green has a way of blinding you like that. Witness the truck that pulled into the Last Drop the other day. Final meeting of The Gossipers.

“Well… anyway,” he continues only to himself, “I’m going inside, Ted’s rad peepers helping me out or not. Must work fast; report to Al due tomorrow whatever the circumstances. Here goes (!)”

He spots the red doors leading to the stairs going down…

—–

Not what he expected. Sisters’ act! Of sorts.

And there’s Ted across from me, he thought. Finally! “Hi Ted!”

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March 23, 2023 · 1:52 am

party continuation

“You better get back to your Edward, Shelley, and I should get back to my packing.” Because even at this early stage he knew it was no good for keeping the Nautilus residence. 1st thing to be boxed was his pride, his ego. $499,000 dollars is a lot of money but he figures he’ll need just that to save the downtown area from the military. Because the alarm *will* be sounded, somewhere and sometime soon. His personal Sandsim police force will be usurped. Suspect 102, as they called her/him/it, must be found and interrogated for the cause.

“I only ask one thing, *Jennifer*,” for he already thought of her as a cash cow and not a real person, “is when you find it — press the button. That’s all I ask for free lodging, food, haircuts, pedicures manicures, anything you like from any of the shops and other locations. Look where noone thinks of looking. They’ve made sure I can’t be the one…”

“… to do it, yes,” spoke Shelley. “So you’ve said.”

“I’m warm weather, Shelley — I meant Shelley back there, sorry. Remember that.”

“Hmm.”

She’s weighing her options. She can’t bring Edward — that was made clear. It would have to be Arthur accompanying her (speaking of ‘hmm’). She’d forgotten all about Lemont, the actor behind the character, when making the decision. “Sold.” She extended her hand for a shake. Too bad he didn’t have a vanilla hidden in his back pocket to meet it with. Just for a joke, mind you. But she was too precious for all that. She *was*… the golden one, the one to make the change. He could see it in her eyes, all umbrella-y and such at this particular angle in the night’s light. All the books in the world resided there. No need for a library, although that’s where he’ll meet her later and reveal himself again.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0037, 0315, Hana Lei^^, Lower Austra^, Nautilus, Sand Springs, Wild West

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January 3, 2023 · 4:47 pm

gamers

—–

“The guy’s been there forever,” whispered Shelley.

“I really want to play Pac Man,” replies Arthur in a not as hushed voice.

“How… (she glanced over) how about Space Invaders? Right next to him — you haven’t played that as I recall.”

“Really?” is all Arthur could say to this, giving her a look. Pac Man is classic. Space Invaders is a game for *kids* in his opinion, a shoot-em-up. Not even on the level of archaic Pong.

—–

They went next door to sip on saki for a while but the bleeps and blips from the now lone player at the arcade persisted. “Might as well go back to the hotel, dearest. Prepare for Liz again. I’m kind of eager to try out that broken telephone booth outside — see what kind of action that can produce.”

But Arthur wouldn’t relent, not for that and apparently not for anything. He’d stay here at the upper end of Mortons Gap until the ends of the Earth.

Does this also spell the end of Arthur in our story? Shelley has many suitors available to her, it seems. But there’s Liz. Yes, Liz. Arthur also recalls that and finally relents and goes back to the hotel, eventually ending up at the booth like she desired.

“Hello?” she starts the roleplay. “Is this the Moon?” She slams the receiver back into its carriage. “Damn thing’s broke — no *4*!” On cue, a telephone repairman saunters up to the booth outside, loaded down with the tools of his trade around a maximized belt. Until he dispenses with it.

“Dang, Shelley. Just not in the *mood*. Can’t get *over* that guy back there!”

Yes, Arthur might need to disappear from our story for a while. There’s always Keanoob. And Edward, who most call Eddy these days. Might as well drag another character into the story. Appears to be a motif for the novel by this point — character overload. Location will help stabilize: Mortons Gap here. Both of ’em, actually. 2 places at once.


“she just wanted to be included”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0036, 0315, collages 2d, Corsica, Kentucky, Northwest^

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October 29, 2022 · 10:32 am

preservation

My Lebettu Castle is still there in all its glory, seen here in a “Phototools — Still Life” environment. The library remains at its center, its core. However since I’ve been retired from same for *8* months now, it may be time to move on. I revisited the co-workers I was probably closest to a couple of weeks back and exchanged pleasantries and caught up with the latest. My old position had shifted into something new which helped the team, but also probably marked the end of a more interactive involvement with the overall campus in the way I fostered, a continuation from past practices. *Writing* is my job now, that and the accompanying art and photography. And also I view daily hiking as an extension of this, a needed opposite and balancing pole to virtual reality. It’s a good life. 🙂 I explore both.

Moving forward, I’m almost 1/2way done with the current Sunklands photo-novel, 35 in a series of “we”ll see”. Characters keep evolving. I am almost as much there as I am here.

I did not maintain contact with others outside my team. I was as much a part of campus as a whole as the library — theoretically. It was a perfect balance for a while, me acting as one man juggler. But it could not go on. I passed into retirement as naturally as about anyone could, thanks in part to the pandemic and the changes it wrought. It certainly contained echoes of actual death. I know better what to expect.

There have been other libraries in other times. Even now, in a virtual setting and obviously on a much smaller scale, I still have one, another echo. A friend died there.

I can still go inside the special part created by new-ish head Miss Ouri and read books, some of which are even my own.

Like this one.

There still exists a dividing point between Ordinary/Mundane and Special. It’s all in the pages.

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August 19, 2022 · 7:55 am

mightier?

She’d left the water in the shower running but it was on purpose: to prove a point. Or, better, to remind her of something. A key, 2nd shower really not needed since no poop is involved.

She was finished with her clients but there was more work to be done tonight before going home bed. Check on the Duck. Because she was about ready to kill someone…

… with writing. “Dear,” she called over to her ex but both still using Gold for a surname. “How do you spell asimilation? With that extra s I’m always mising? Dear oh dear. There I go again!”

“Answered yourself of course,” he responded, not staring up from the folded newspaper. 20 dead in Uptown this year so far. What is Gold City coming to??

“Yes,” she realized. “All I have to do is look down.”

“Or straight ahead…” *sip*

“… if a computer is involved, yes.” Which it wasn’t in this Gold City experience of hers. She preferred pen over keys here. Must be something about running away as fast as possible from the Ebony and the Ivory. Dove’s where it’s at now. She just used it in fact. In the shower. Which she needs to take another of. *No*. She has the key, she reminds herself again, still writing, still scribbling sideways across the yellowing paper, perhaps parchment. *Barry* is the one. He needs the shower. But where is Barry?

Still scribbling, still writing.

Newt sets the paper down. He’s had enough bad. Now for good. “I’m glad I found you again Eyela. Just mised you in the church, ha.”

She looked down, emitted a small laugh as well. Good one, Newt. Then she took the pen and struck out that sentence. Then another, and another until the whole paper was full of lines. Newt was gone. Newt, her ex, perhaps even still her husband since she’s reverted back to Eyela and/or they still share the same last name, was never here. Or else he left earlier. She writes alone.

Later she sits in bed staring at the sword, wondering how to turn it back into a pen. Looks like actual killing is in order if she doesn’t succeed with this.

Because the Duck is right beside her.

“Paul?”

“Yes?” he quacked.

“I think… it’s… time…” STAB

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June 15, 2022 · 9:56 am

00330315

He corrected me as soon as it came out of my mouth, perhaps before. “Bono, I’m Bono here,” he said. “And you’re Newt — we can’t change that.”

“But Peggy –”

“Peggy Smeggy.” He took a breath. “You don’t understand the implications yet. Darkside is *here*.” He looked me square in the eyes now, black inside black. He wasn’t evil but he came from a place of called Intensity. In Mississippi I believe. Very focused in his tasks, he was.

“So… you brought them here.”

“Yup,” with the “p” emphasized with a pop. I reviewed what I knew. I thought he was Nemo but he said he was Bono. Bono Jores, fresh from the bowels of Mississippi. Or was it Arkansas? Anyway, he presented me with the book; said it was the way out. He did this now.

“This is the way,” he said, scooting it toward me. “The Way.” He scooted it closer. “Open in the middle and start reading.”

“I–,” I started to protest. Closer. He even opened it for me, eyes still boring. But he was no Sherwood Anderson. Or was he?

—–

3 hours later — sunset — I finished the book that was the same as 1/2 a book. Everyone had left in the meantime, Bono to my right and Peggy Gertrude to my left. Peggy was still here with her friend over at another table in the establishment. And that’s where I headed next — to give her the good news. All was not lost.

The convincing took a while. Her hometown was still gone; I led with that. But there’s *another* hometown coming up where gravity’s not as much up in the air. “Aerial,” I said, and demonstrated with my hand.

(to be continued)

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April 3, 2022 · 10:34 am

00320315

“I’m glad at least *you* remain my friend, Joey,” she said between sub bites. Dreaming makes her hungry. Must replenish, must recuperate. For most this is sleep itself. Not Leforest. “Agents can be so thin skinned. It’s *just* an assignment. Some fits are better than others.”

“Yeah,” expressed Joey across from her, also eating a sub but with meat instead of potatoes, “they told me to wear purple hair now…”

“Wondering about that,” says Leforest Bresford.

“Yeah, purple is sometimes a sign that you’re about to be taken off a case. Like, you know…”

“Debbie,” replied Leforest, thinking back to her description of the purple door in Lorsters Worst and how she couldn’t open it. *Sign*, yes.

“But to your dream.”

“Dreams,” corrected Leforest, glad for the diversion and thinking about her own red and blue companions at each shoulder, unseen to Joey and others as she chooses at the moment. But potentially another purple situation, with her in the middle which is, as we all know, unfortunately in the way a lot of times.

“Dasher” passes by. “Morning Luke,” says thought-to-be James or Jim L. Brown.

“Morning John,” he says back as he moves on to the corner down the way, no one to push around this time. Maybe next go round.

“Did you hear that?” whispered Joey over to Leforest, watching him now dash diagonally across the road in front of her to continue his cycle. “*John*. Not Jim.”

“Or James,” her fellow sub eater whispered back.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Certainly am.” Twins.

Then in total synchronicity to the situation the other twin walked by in the distance but neither spotted him.

Only we the blog readers know for sure still.

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January 27, 2022 · 8:20 am

THIS SIM 01 revisited

He puts back on his investigating shoes as he teleports into the sim. Wall hydrant at the very epicenter, he ponders, pacing back and forth around it.

Redd, just like where he came from, this Alysha “Redd” Fox, who of course he bought dinner for, having almost *killed* her with his 57 Chevy just after he darn near drove it into that levy just minutes before on the border of Dennis and Harwich. He wasn’t drunk — it was just the mechanics of the car combined with the wonky physics of the virtual reality itself. But at least there was bounce, although he couldn’t say more about this for now. Maybe later, when the psychics arrive. Because they would.

Redd would be seen, like a bright, blooming rose. Who’s on first!?

—–

We next find him staring at an octagon shaped trampoline, a combo of 9 and 8 actually, since nine is purple as 8 is orange. But mixed up here.

He investigates remotedly.

Rainbow wheel, with rainbow sphere implied. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 reduced to 1 2 3 4, or red green blue yellow but not necessarily in that order. TILE of course. Clare should know by now. We never found her new hiding spot in the northern mountains of Snowland, though. Maybe he’ll look there next.

More remote viewing here, first…

Oh, he notes that the cars are, in order, red yellow green blue *purple* red on that Ferris wheel, purple then emphasized again seemingly. He’s taking notes in his head. He’ll write them down later. Investigating feet (and eyes) first.

Ah ha. Roses (again). Reinforcement.

Dare he?

Enigma (machine). Orange revealed. 6th. VI.

Freefall.

But he keeps landing at the same spot. Endless loop!

Must be something about VI.

Pretty good, huh, Ruby?

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Filed under **VIRTUAL, 0031, 0315, Hills of Bill^, Maebaleia/Satori, Virgin Islands

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November 30, 2021 · 5:23 pm

flutterbys (red, blonde, and blue)

She was in Between and she had to stare at it. The chair would face no other way. Turtle Hill, or, in olden days, Turtle Butte. Before the terraforming messed up the mesa effect and made it round and soft instead of square and rough. The center of the Maebaleia continent, some say, yea, some call it the center of *everything*, with religious overtones implied. And perhaps it was. In olden days again. Nowadays these Hills of Bill are emptied out of meaning, devoid of framework, like a void picture in a gallery of no design or wealth.

She sat reading a fashion and furniture magazine in her new-ish apartment in Squared Root City, waiting for Starlight to open so she could peruse the clothing again for that interview over at the fire station this afternoon. Because she considered herself to be one hot item and had to be put out. You keep your friends close, like Molly Jackson here, also a town newcomer (dancer), but you keep your enemies even closer, like the fire department. Soon everyone would know her burning desire for stardom. She would set the night sky ablaze with rockets’ red glare.

Molly had designs on wealth and stardom herself, but not with a fiery dress; instead: cool and calm and collected. She would bide her time in the shadows of the police station and attached department, blue replacing red. She would dance to the tunes of white Guy Lombardo but only after midnight and on the dark side of the moon. The situation seemed to call for it. She got up off the couch formerly shared with red garbed Elisa and moves to the window to stare out between the two stars just below toward both departments, considering balance.

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October 12, 2021 · 7:55 am

When blue turns to black…

… we will all be able to see the Devil and know that he is we.

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