Always down there looking for that extra “R”, Fanny Mae Palm Branch thought about her boyfriend/fiancee Robert Dee Generic, an Ordinary originating from Pasttown.
Ain’t gonna find it. This is *Reality*.
“And stop trying to perv on that pink girl!” she wanted to shout over as well.
Marsha “Pink” Krakow tries to decide what she wants to search for on the internet today at the nearby Wired and Wireless coffee shop.
Led Zeppelin or The Who is always a good start.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0302, Corsica, Storybrook-
Especially before the introduction of Corona-V tall stouts into the local bar, the red topped town church at 56 Rose Lane was a way for people to set aside their different realities and gather together to pray toward a unifying deity most often called God. But, as we know, David A. B. was his “real” name, and he worked somewhere in the aether above Corsica Prime, making sure the right people got placed in the right spots on this continent, the other mainland masses be damned. We also know that Stranger Creek sim just off the northern coast was not one of his best works — a cock-up he called it on this here blog for all to witness. A cockamamie plan I added just afterwards, having been to the spot through the avatar known as Illuminatus, and also Arthur Kill. Yes, I, baker b., played both roles, as I always do on these nightly excursions in the virtual reality most often called Our Second Lyfe. Or, individually, Your Second Lyfe or My Second Lyfe. Because, you see, we are all experiencing different (virtual) realities when we come here. And that, I think, is what I’m trying to illustrate with Marsha and SEAN here. They exist in *similar* realities, sharing, for example, a church to go to in town. But — yes — reality is breaking down now due to the, ahem, beer. The local bar is also open on Sunday mornings for some inexplicable reason, but everything is to go these days, including the beer. In short, people are drinking at home this delicious but highly intoxicating brew and forgetting all about the gathering, the worshiping, the unity. They are all separated in their individual spheres, Marsha’s Second Lyfe over here and SEAN’s over there and “3rd wheel” Olive’s even different from either. Same with Mr. Fix It artist Gene Kelley, same with Lester the police car mechanic, and anyone else we’ll run into in Storybrook during our present story. The brook flows rapidly but with different currents. Currents. Each is row row rowing their boat to a different set of islands in the bay. And that boat, those islands, keep shifting around.
Inside the church, the lone occupant feels pleased at his work. Marty is a kind of God as well, one that wants to replace the starless black Bible with something red. And so it will come to pass, he declares. However, the real God has allowed this placement as well. “‘Starless and Bible Black’,” he deems, “will still reside inside ‘Red’, hidden like the ‘Lark’s Tongue in Aspic.'” But David A. B. was probably drunk when he spouted all this nonsense. We’ll see.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0211, Corsica, Storybrook-
NOMAD // Love Meter
whispers: Welcome Marsha Krakow! Now, let me see what your sex appeal is…
[00:27] NOMAD // Love Meter whispers: Innocent
“Innocent, huh? I’ll show this stupid machine *innocent*.” She turns.
“And where is SEAN ‘Green’ Penn today? Why won’t he come out of his house? It’s as if no one *lives* there, hrmph.”
She moves toward the dock binoculars and uses them again. “And *where*, pray tell, are these *islands* you went on about so much? Nothing.”
—–
“Oh well. 10 more minutes, SEAN. *10*.”
But then she fell asleep for 2 hours on the bench beside the NOMAD Love Meter, woke up, and waited 20 instead. Nothing.
—–
“Wonder where Pink is?” SEAN pondered while staring out at the islands in Southside Bay.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0210, Corsica, Storybrook-
“What is this place?” SEAN asked after accepting the teleportation offer from Marsha “Pink” Krakow. What *is* that girl up to now, hum? he asked himself before clicking the button. One way to find out.
“It’s the center. *The* center. Now look at where we are. The old Perch residence. Moved away, though, like so many others. Heard he’s over in Heaven’s Gate now.”
“*I* may be next, hmph,” responds SEAN “Green” Penn. “I’m *tired* of being moved all around town. First I’m down at Southside Bay in a teal cottage. Then I’m up in town again at a *green* one. Like my name — it all builds around that house now. Trouble is, I have memories of *both*. When I, er, went out to that island in the bay. You know the one.”
Marsha “Pink” Krakow didn’t know the one and said so.
“Oh, you know, with the kind of robotic lady with the different colored eyes. Like David Bowie.”
“David Whoie?”
“Bowie.”
“Oh, you mean Buie.”
“I meant what I said, girl. So, anyway, erm, she was there. On the island. I just row row rowed my boat over there.”
“Where did you get a *boat*?” Marsha responds.
“It was just there. Underneath the teal house. Or in the boathouse I suppose. *Inside* it. Downstairs inside… ohh.”
“Anyway — can we get to why I brought you here?” Her voice was reduced almost to a whisper now.
SEAN looked around. “Where’s, um, *Olive*. She hasn’t been –”
“She’s up in the monastery for a while. Because, you know, that thing with the giraffe.”
“That’s just something she made up. She doesn’t want to hang around us any more. Thinks us *juvenile*.”
“Not true.” But was it true? “*Anyway*, speaking of Olive — glad you brought her up — because she showed me a *trick* before she left.”
“Another one?” SEAN responded, use to such things.
“Yeah. So you’ve got your advanced menu on your viewer we told you to show a while back. Don’t you?” She stared at SEAN until he nodded. “Uh huh.” He then checked and breathed a sigh of relief that he’d actually done something they requested for a change, the crazy gals.
“Well, pull that down. Go to, um, *render*, then uncheck ‘volume’.”
“Okay. Trying to follow.”
“Ho. What is *that*?”
“That, my green friend, is Kraken Hill. And *that’s* what this town is trying to cover up — *has* covered up. That’s why everyone is moving away. It’s all baloney on the surface. Hogwash.”
“Watch your mouth, girl.” But then SEAN “Green” Penn kept staring around with volume unrendered, trying to take it all in. It made sense! This was truth she spoke.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0209, Corsica, Storybrook-
“I’m worried Hucka Doobie,” spoke Baker Bloch to what was obviously his closest confidant these days, with Baker Blinker over the hill and far far away back in Chilbo with Karoz. He points to the newspaper with the missing piece.
“This plot is more full of holes than a Swiss Cheese Mountain in Ant Town.”
Hucka Doobie looks over at him with, love? She is more aware every day that he is the one. The chiseled face, the sloping debonair hat that originally came from a Rhinestone Cowboy. The leftover traits from his father Spaced Ghost, including the power bands and the, well, she’s heard rumors anyway.
“Listen to that music from the gramophone,” she said, trying to distract. “It’s called — ‘Melancholy’. Originally etched on a 4×4 magic square but in 1961 committed to a round piece of wax and released to the world. 365 singers for 365 days. And those *bells*…” She listens again, lost in a trance. Nap time, like when you meditate but can’t shut off your thoughts.
“It’s very nice, Hucka Doobie,” Baker spoke plainly in his announcer-like voice, just made for a tv or radio show. Just like his dad. “But we have *problems*.”
Hucka Doobie looked at him again. No love in his eyes for her. She knew the rumors to be false, perhaps started by Wheeler herself, the *bitch*. No, she must think peace and love and happiness thoughts. Like the Tibetans she’s been so engrossed in lately. That music — so soothing. She’s almost cutting the z’s again — but, *no*, she must stay alert. She stares at Baker Bloch once more. No reciprocation — yes, that’s what she was thinking about. Then the bells start…
15 minutes later, Baker Bloch was staring at her through the hole in the paper when she awoke. “*Now*?” he queried.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0113, Corsica, Storybrook-
After that horrible scissors accident the local police are still investigating wiped out both his parents, SEAN “Green” Penn inherited the beach house and made it his own. For one thing, he painted it green to match the color of his perpetual outfit. He was a 28 year old black man with rheumatoid arthritis developing in his back and neck, but gave the appearance of a 15 year old white boy with developing acne to acquaintances and friends. The *green* was always a constant, though, framed by this house. The house makes the boy/man makes the house in a repeating, reciprocal action, like yin and yang but with no opposites involved except that pitting flesh against wood. Each night he slept, they — structure and body — exchanged energy, paint for clothes. One day he might wake up with the body of the house and the house that of a body but it would be far in the future, if so. These things don’t work that fast.
So his parents died, he inherited the house and made it his own. So what about the white/black part, the dichotomy he presented to first himself and then the world? It happened on August 8, 1988 in a town called 88. He woke up calling for his ma. “Mom, mom?”, and then he remembered the accident, the scissors, the *horror*. Never, *ever* run with scissors, but it was more than that. (Yes,) *mother* approached father with scissors held high.
“I will stab him,” she said aloud. “He has chosen to be the voice of evil and I will kill him. When I have killed him something will snap within myself and I will die also. It will be a release for all of us.”
But this wasn’t right either. That’s just a quote from that book everyone is talking about these days. “Winesap,” but with a twist of the bitter apple. It involved the game of rock paper scissors that every Our Second Lyfe avatar can play, large or small, old or young, black or white. Rock beats scissors because it can bang them into submission, but paper beats rock because it can cover up the past, which scissors can then expose through snipping. And so that’s what we’re doing. Making a hole, perhaps one for an Ant.
—–
SEAN’s Aunt Bee wakes up suddenly and with a headache, clipping still in hand. She recalls the past.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0112, Corsica, Storybrook-
“The Man(n) is not coming tonight, Charlie. Still — I’ll keep an eye on SEAN’s Southside Bay residence for signs of change.
Change, thinks Charlie Banana behind her, just finished with one. She’s *white* now and she talks of signs.
—–
“He’s got a boat, Charlie. A row boat.”
“And he’s heading right toward us!”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0111, Corsica, Storybrook-
The Ant returns to his temple.
As soon as he enters the tunnel he hears the phone ringing with his sharp ant ears.
Hurrying upwards, he realizes who it must be.
“Oh dear, oh *dear*.”
At the top he desperately looks around for the phone. Where did he put it last? The rings persist. She won’t let up, he knew. Maybe he left it upstairs. The rings seem closer than that, but he decides to check. Can’t find it down here after all.
Up he goes!
Yes. Closer now. But *where*?
Aah. *There* you are.
But then he remembers it’s not a ring you can actually answer.
—–
“Still no answer, Green. I bet he’s a thousand miles away from here, pheh.”
“Maybe you should give it up for today, Pink,” Marsha’s closest friend SEAN wisely advised. “There’ll be other gigs.”
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0110, Corsica, Splinterwood, Storybrook-
“Shoot girl. You shouldn’t be smoking in here. And why do you want to go to New York City anyway? There’s nothing but trouble there.”
“Because it’s in the–”
SEAN “Green” Penn swung toward her while interrupting. “*Don’t* say contract. I don’t want to hear about no contract.” SEAN knew he had the appearance of a white child to Marsha “Pink” Krakow, about the same size and also color as herself but a boy instead of a girl. He was indeed “Green,” the grocer’s kid originally from Kraken but now living down on Southside Bay in a houseboat.
“Why not? You signed one too.”
“I did *not* sign a contract.”
“But… you *showed* it to me.”
“I,” and SEAN rapped the table in front of him with an index finger to punctuate, “signed a piece of paper, girl. *Piece* of *paper*.” He sat back, looking at her, gauging her reaction to this truth. They stared at each other for a while, as if exchanging information through their eyes. And perhaps they were.
“Baloney,” she finally uttered to break the tension. “Hogwash. You just don’t want to go to New Orleans.” She threw up her arms in exasperation, and then he did too.
“Who said *anything* about New *Orleans*? We were *talking* about New York, and how to cross Arthur Kill to get there.” But then he remembered as Marsha “Pink” Krakow before him kept shaking her head. He was already *there*. In a bar that plays the Blues.
Or was it Little Rock.
Turns out the bar plays blues and a little rock. And it was in Little Rock. SEAN “Green” Penn was the main act tonight. He had yet to meet Pink. Or Olive. It was 5 years in the past. He only had 5 years to make this right, 5 years to make this right, 5 years to make this right…
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0106, Ashenlave, Corsica, Storybrook-
“Who *are* you?” Marsha asked.
“My name is Jane. But you can call me Olive. Olive Green. I’m really just a kid beneath it all. Like you.”
“So I see.” She looked at the contract again before her on the table. With all the information.
“Sign… just there.” She pointed.
—–
June Bug Jane had found her nest egg in Paradise. “Olive Green Pink”!
Two more contracts to create and she’s done.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0019, 0105, Corsica, Egg Hill Sink, Storybrook-
Sunklands 