June 21, 2021 · 7:22 am

chasm

Finally finished with the bong hits and passing it on, school jock Nick Barkley reveals something to sometimes friend always lover Nef R. Titi about himself that he’s never done before.

“I think (*snort*)… that I’m becoming a (*choke*)… head (*final exhale*).

“You *think*,” she exclaims back with likewise glazed eyes. Might as well be 2 deer in the headlights.

“No (*wheeze*)… you don’t… understand.”

“Oh, I understand.” Nef was always under control, no matter how high she was, or so she claimed. Inside she had her doubts of course.

Nick just decided to lay down the cards and show her.

Open mouth response here; yes, she had finally lost control. She tumbled tumbled tumbled into the dizzying darkness, only to land at the bottom without something of her own. Her last name.

“I don’t know who I am!” she yelled in the blackness of the pit.

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June 20, 2021 · 10:39 am

cross purposes

He should still be hopping mad but he couldn’t help cave in to his emotions.

“I love you, my little Sapphire, and I always will. No matter how many bong hits you take, no matter how many hitchhikers you pick up on the side of the road and then take to the nearest motel to make uninhibited love.”

“Oh dad,” she complained again. “You’re *soo* behind the times. But — I love you too.” She kisses him on the cheek and promises not to solicit any more wanderers of the highway until at least she’s set up at the motel.

—–

My twin sister, thought a white woman nearby. Didn’t even come to the airport to see me off. Busy with her *Social Circle*. White supremacists, pheh. Might have well be dressed as white rats for a Nazi lab experiment going way too right for them, cheese nabbed every time. Well she wasn’t biting. And she’d met a man while here, one who prefers to go simply by L.A. Doris can know *nothing more* of him, she understands that now. But they’ll keep in touch.

The bearded man reading an ancient book of spells sees and hears everything.

(to be continued)

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June 20, 2021 · 9:53 am

solo

Often while waiting on one of his fantasyland clients to show or not show up, Marion Star Harding revisits the past through these series of pictures along the southern wall of his Southern Cross Airport hanger. Flying Cowboy, my first plane, he ruminates here. Star meant a different thing back in those days before the coming of newspapers and accompanying coffees and cigarettes. Simpler times, where the only reading occurred when you were perusing the assembly instructions for the latest flight device you’d just purchased.

Speaking of which: his still uncompleted bi-plane. Didn’t come with any paperwork. “I’ll finish it one day,” he speaks aloud to his completed plane just behind, thanking the Gods again that at least the old Flying Cowboys gang chipped in to help him finish that one. Else: no business! No flying fantasy people *anywhere*.

He then moves to the southwest corner of his hanger to check progress on that crazy, upward spiraling road his neighbors are building. Not much accomplished since last week, which puzzles him since he doesn’t know about the whole young’n vs. oldie war they’re going through right now.

Back to coffee cigarette and paper at his desk.

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June 20, 2021 · 8:26 am

a farmer and his dog

They’re building a roadway to heaven, these Harmony Heighters, but it seems a long way from finished. Maybe the oldies and young’n’s can’t agree on a direction, wouldn’t it be typical.

The road begins here, just behind the Commons House.

“I’m not talking to you this morning, *kid*,” grumpily spoke just risen Jack Pants without turning around, digging into his first stack of sausage pancakes.

“No, I’m not talking to *you*, gramps,” responded up-at-crack-of-dawn sixteen year old Nick Barkley also without pivoting, having finished his blueberry yogurt and granola breakfast 3 hours ago and just staring into space and killing time before the typically delayed group meeting.

Nick got little sleep on account of Jack DJ’ing at the ranger house until 2:30 in the morning, starting with the traditional “B-I-N-G-O”, which the oldies sang with gusto at the top of their lungs after a completed game of same.

(to be continued)

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June 19, 2021 · 8:13 am

heavenly hooves

Concert tonight in Harmony Heights. The Rolling Joints, coming all the way over from Minnesota or Michigan, a long long ways indeed. They’ll obviously play their recently released hit single from the 70’s called “Money” to get to the root of the problem. This is a band with a strong political statement, and with their 3rd eyes squeegeed wide open, they know what it’s *all* about. Everything. They have a direct talk with God on at least a weekly basis, and I mean *direct*. Strangely he doesn’t appear to them as a flamey bush or a fiery, golden sphere or anything you would imagine, but a horned deer, a stag, claiming to actually be named Jon but without the usual “h”. He’ll yell something like, “get it the hell out of here!” when you insert such between the “o” and the “n” of his true, tripart title (they claim). “The 4th is not to be found anywhere upon my being or my soul!” Jon-God doesn’t like the number 4, and, in turn, usually leaves it out when he’s calling the citizens and denizens of Earth. Tip for the trippers, then: that’s how you know who’s dialing.

They hired these tree sized deer in order to appease their master. Twirling, early bird groupie Confusion Animesh obviously approves (stumble/*fall*).

The rest of the concertgoers will shortly be crowding the stage. The band will go on as soon as they finish talking to Jon.

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June 19, 2021 · 6:08 am

center star

“Kolya *does* rule this land. It’s as if it all takes place in his rain damaged head.”

“Upper part,” elaborates [delete name]. “The lower still belongs to bottles.”

“Okay,” I responded, happy for the half.

—–

“I need to get out of here, sir. I’ve tried air, I’ve tried water. I’ve even tried land.”

The old man chuckled. “You’re a funny one, Kolya. Drinking from a bottle. Talking about *leaving* here, heh. Why would anyone want to exit such peace and harmony? You’ve seen the waterfall that rules us all. We’re all under the umbrellas under the rainbow, safe and sound. Mama’s home. Good cook’n.” Marvin Baggy licks his lips and pats his belly satisfactorily here, then kicks his feet out, props them against the white porch railing of the ranger tower that has become a popular hangout for the old and feeble. Someone further north — or perhaps east — told Kolya he could get answers here. Maybe they were pulling a prank on him, especially since they told him to make sure to drink out of a bottle down there (or over there) and not a can. “That’ll give you away,” the man said to him, or perhaps it was a woman. A tomboy, yes, that was it, a grown up tomboy, Asian in race if not complexion, which was instead red.

“Ahh, I feel sorry for ya, stranger,” admitted the geezer on the porch of the tower, waiting for the others to show up. Bingo night tonight, and afterwards some kind of rave I’m sure. Always is. Sometimes the young’n’s (as they call them; some: whippersnappers) down at the bar have to complain about the noise and the lateness of it. Ahh, yes. Salty Bobs’ a sleepy place in comparison, full of stoners taking naps and druggies shooting craps. Dice are not that noisy if covered with fuzz, which they always are soas not to wake the stoners. Originally designed to dangle from the rear view mirror of your car, the ornaments have moved inside and reacquired their original purpose, shrunk down a bit in the process.

“Someone’s coming down from the old house, Nick,” spoke Gotham on the couch, probably already stoned out of his mind and thus the lack of a joint or bong. “I can *feel* it.” He lifts his arms in the air while still reclining, much like a clairvoyant does just before channeling a spirit hovering somewhere nearby, ready to enter the body. Gotham’s own body starts convulsing. It worked! He quietens down; he stares glazy eyed at the roof of the establishment, ignoring the sea barnacles and peering directly into the great beyond.

Nick Barton looks over, notices the grey in his beard. “Isn’t it about time you moved up the hill to the old folk’s place and livened up a bit? You’ll turn into a corpse just laying there like that!” Nick flushes and turns toward the crappers on the other side, emitting a small “sorry” for shouting.

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June 18, 2021 · 3:38 pm

d & b

“We have something, Hucka, er, W. Something not from the Oracle but directly from the land. BAT overlaps a southern wall of BATfield (sim) just beyond.”

(no answer)

“Here’s a link to this Bat d’ Af which I knew nothing about before. Probably, most likely, just an accidental overlap or conjunction, highlighted here through my photo.”

(no answer)

“Anyway:”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battalions_of_Light_Infantry_of_Africa

I wondered about Marilyn being involved too. Breezy.

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June 17, 2021 · 5:45 am

star laden

“This *arm* of the lake,” he spoke to me, well aware that his own arm represented the other at the moment, “is private, say, from the elbow down. But the shoulder to the elbow, where it’s glued to the rest of the body?: well, that’s something else. That’s where *I* fit in. And a good deal of others like me.” He looks to the water with this, and others of his kind dotted here and there. Like these fishermen, good men all, except for the one they call Blackbart staring in a different direction from the rest.

“Any of you boys got any… coke?”

“L-leave us alone, Blackbart,” spoke the stockier fisherman on the pier. Trying to ignore the just arrived renegade seaman, an ex special op naval medic discharged for mechanical reasons some say wrongly, didn’t work for the pair and now they would have to interact. “We’re just simple fisherpeople. We don’t deal with *cans*.”

“Or bottles,” spoke the other fisherman in a thinner voice to his counterpart. “It comes in bottles in this part of the country still. Bottles too,” he doubled down.

“Okay, okay,” exasperated Gemini Roadhouse McCutcheon Sullivan O’Reily. Most just call him Al, as will we. He was eager to keep the story moving, going past the whole bottle vs. can war of the 50’s and perhaps the 70’s as well, hard to tell because time was slipperier back then and had more variant arms to it. Like this particular arm of Starfish Lake, which some call the Starfish Sea because it is a pretty big lake, and could logically be bumped up on the scale of water body names. Up here, say, it’s the 70’s still, and cans are all the rage. Go past the elbow and suddenly you’re in the 50’s and the only Elvis singing on the radio is the white one. Bottles everywhere; they just threw them on the ground when done with their sodey pop back then. Littering was okay back in the day. Heck, they even made posters touting the benefits of such. Don’t have to hire garbagemen, a whole arm of the city workforce deemed unnecessary. An arm for an arm they said back in the day, which is still today past the elbow again mind you. Luther, the other fisherman was from up near the head hand of the arm (Hand o’ Arm), what they call Fingerboro, another fantasyland, then, I suppose. His mother father’s house was actually made from bottles, discarded waste put to use. The farsighted fisherman had glasses made out of bottle bottoms; his first hat was bottle caps stitched together to make a whole. Basketball? Try bottleball: it was a heck of a sport to try to keep up with with all the cracking and cutting. You’re lucky if your star kid came back from such a war with both his arms intact. But of course they could just grow another one if so.

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June 17, 2021 · 4:34 am

opposite sides of arms can be different

“Thanks for serving me bottles, guys. I don’t care much for cans, because of the name and all. Pepi “Can” Kolya at your service. I say that so you can see me for who I am, like friends.” It was here they noticed the holes in the head, and why this dude probably just missed his flight out of here to a fantasyland of his choosing. The Lake will do that to you; lull you to sleep. This Starfish.

“‘Nother one, bud?” asked one or the other, take your pick.

“Nah, better amscray. Gotta catch a 5:15 outta here.”

“6:15, now,” said the one that didn’t talk before, the other bartender. They may have been twin brothers but they may not be as well: picks again.

“Whattt??” exclaimed Koyla. He’d been following the wrong time zone, which was the right time zone before crossing the Centalia Line. He liked to be conveniently late but 1+ hours won’t hack it. He’d have to reschedule.

—–

“Another one bites the dust,” says Marion “Star” Harding to his Project Humboldt v1.4 CM plane, use to it. “Fantasy people, pheh.”

“I hear ya,” he imagined the plane saying back to him through his or her propeller.

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June 15, 2021 · 9:05 am

00270103

“Picturetown, huh?” He glanced back at his prospective new customer, unable to see the holes in his head from this angle. Well, he *does* take the flights that no one else will cover, including flying to imaginary countries, counties, and cities if needed. Last week it was Oz. Week before: Wonderland. One of the Alices wanted to go home to visit a sick aunt who might or might not be on her deathbed, hard to tell. But she had to find out. Then before that: he couldn’t recall. Maybe Texarkana. “Sure, I’ll do it,” he said, not wanting to delay his reply any longer, wanting to exude confidence that he could get the job done. He’s checked all the maps in the meantime. No Picturetown in Canada or anywhere else in the world. But he’ll get him there. All he needs is the coordinates, and he can get them from Chuck and his special computer tapped into the Lemon World, the one no one is suppose to know about. Chuck connects him to the fantasy lands, and for that he gets a hefty wage in *real* money, not that fake green crap they peddle at, say, Oz. Rubles, someone tried to hand him the other day after a flight to Borneo. “No rubles,” he said in return. “*Real* money,” and he kept his hand out until actual, metal coins were laid in it, signifying a completed sales transaction. Paper money doesn’t hack it for our Marion “Star” Harding, former ace pilot in the World Wide Web War, version 2.0. Since then they’d come out with 3.0 and he was back at his desk, back to being a private pilot specializing in the weird and even profane, like sneaking the elf hookers out of Santaland and back to Easter Isle where they belong. Bunnies, he thought here. Nothing but bunnies. “5:15 tomorrow okay for you?” he asked the prospective customer, working with numbers on his computer at the same time he thought all this other stuff.

“Sure.”

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