Tag Archives: All Orange^*+^^+

Happy Days

Sitting on the dough, the money of the place, he’s remembering a lot. Baker. Wendy. The rented room for the night above the citrus fruit shop. Then it happened *again*, the dream within a dream.

He’d forgotten about the Strange Isle, the Temple of Light exactly 200 meters above it in the air. So much has gone on in Our Second Lyfe now.

And now another strange island, considerably larger in scope, looms before him. Some will call it Retirement Island, especially after the 28th of this particular month of 2022 (February). Actually there’s another, similar sized island not far atall to the east that might be paired with it throughout eternity — probably is. They are definitely a part of the Wild West of Nautilus, although Lands End between it and Lower Austra is just to the south and east as well, a strong focus of this particular photo-novel, 31 in a series of — I won’t say 31 again. I don’t know how long it will last. I consider it a precious gift. 🙂 There are so many advantages of writing in this manner, in this way, in terms of character development over time — through many many photo-novels in some cases; the same with *location* development; and then the final one, the most illusive: THINGS (always capitalized). Concepts sometimes. Examples for it from the current photo-novel include SEED, THROUGH THE WALL, PHEH, 102, NODAL, *BLEH* (different from PHEH), POINT FOLLOWING, WAIT!, LETTER Q, CARDS, MORGAN/MORGAINE, GREEN RING, WHITE TREES, SUN ROSE, HAT REMOVAL, TILE MANIFESTO, NEW PHYSICS, PAST FUTURE, ENIGMA, GRASSHOPPERS, SILHOUETTES, PURPLE/BLACK LAKE BUNCH, OUTER PLANETS, RASPBERRY, and RAINBOW SPHERE. Complicated — illusive — like I said. But maybe the most important in the long haul, stitching together character and location to make a larger picture that can only be, for practical purposes, faintly seen and locally enforced. This is definitely a metaphor for life itself. We continue…

So you see, for example, the phrase “citrus fruit shop” has been used twice in photo-novel 31, although I haven’t included it as a thing — yet. A linking concept is All Orange, part thing part character so far. In the post “Sameness”, we see an orange, circular in design and thus representing the whole, paired with CARDS to form a deeper study. Notice that Alice’s caterpillar is on one of the cards — a “worm” — and wormholes were talked about earlier in the photo-novel. Then All Orange refers to something Wendy saw in this same citrus shop back in photo-novel 26 I believe, when she stayed in the same apartment as Man About Time and Alysha did later, except with Jeffrie Phillips. Why the same apartment? Why an orange referenced in each case?

We can actually turn to the ORACLE (yet another thing/concept but not listed/official yet — *large*) and find WALDROP (another character and thing combo, actually) linked with both Fife and Thelma Lou and understand that Man About Time, second in command to Jeffrie Phillips in Collagesity (still?), is kind of Barney Fife of the “Andy Griffith Show” to Jeffrie’s Andy Griffith. Thelma Lou, his true love, is turning into Alysha — again the citrus fruit shop setting clues us into this. But then we also know that Jeffrie Phillips himself is married to Alysha, but it seems to be in a parallel reality to MAT’s. Imagine this — I don’t think it ever happened in the show but imagine this: Andy — Sheriff Andy Taylor — and Barney, his faithful deputy and best friend for life, dating the same woman… but not just dating her, *married* to her. Both of ’em. And take a look back if you wish at all the symbols from that show we’ve run across in 31. Tailors Tillie and Tealy become Taylors (like Andy and his aunt Bee in the show). Tangentially, Mount Airy, the factual place that translates into Mayberry, the fictional setting for practically the entire show — a cultural archetype by now — is featured in other ways, like through the original Siamese twins Chang and Eng Bunker. But this just entered the story through a random picture found by Wheeler on the Omega continent. And the tesseract — don’t get me started about the tesseract. Iowa.

—–

I forgot to even mention Opie — Opp or Campbell O’Pine, grown up and beyond his toy “childhood” starting in photo-novel 8 to become a real, true to life man.

Large.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0602, Cement Village, Collagesity Fordham-, Lower Austra, Mayberry, Nautilus

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While he was waiting for her, this Moss 03 who goes by Alysha, he decides to prepare a Valentine letter to her professing his new found feelings. ‘I looov…’; ‘I luvvv…’ Strangely he can’t get himself to write the word ‘you’ after a drawn out version of ‘I love’ or ‘I luv’. He looks around at the beige landscape instead, and the objects scattered all about the place. Crypto, he thinks. And this is where they live, all three of the Mosses, Alysha and the 2 others, the black and the blonde haired ones. Alysha: pure red. Red itself. ‘Redd,’ he thinks here, and then writes that down instead. It works!

Alysha Redd comes up from the main house, finished with her shopping. She couldn’t find the new tattoo she wanted inworld. Disappointment, but it may have distracted from the ones she already had, the tree, the orange and the violet. Sometimes she dreams about them: they are as much as part of her as her fingers or her knees. Not overdone but not underdone. To add to them at this point may be stretching it; and tough to top the tree. She’s heard tattoos don’t age well with the stretch marks that inevitably come. Nervous about meeting MAT again, she gently nibbles at at the silver metal ring in her lip. When to tell him she’s actually married, if separated? Probably best to do it sooner than later. And I suppose I’ll have to wake him up at some point as well, she tacks on.

She reaches the table. “Okay, I’m ready for our second date.” This one should be a doozy if all goes well, she thinks to herself. The apartment above the citrus fruit shop is all prepared, including another writing desk. He can pen all the love letters he wants after we’re through. MAT keeps on writing. ‘Reddd, Reddd.’ “Ahem, *now*? This evening sometime?” MAT wakes up.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0504, Metropolis, Nautilus, Perch-Mistletoe, Upper Austra

sameness

“4 *more* friends, MAT,” she says from her position of power. “What do you recall? What is dealt in the cards tonight?”

MAT studies the playing cards in front of him He sees a heart, he sees a spade. He sees a diamond and a club. He sees All Cards. He knows he is safe.

Actually he sees this…

“Tell me what are in the cards,” she requests again, hoping to keep him focused for at least 5 seconds, pheh.

—–

She said she had to run and turned him over to what she called the 2nd Moss, one with blonde hair instead of black.

They found themselves at an emerald green table (which brought out her eyes), away from the others. 1st Moss decided 2nd Moss might have better luck, and, besides, she needed to get back to her equations. Blonde Moss sipped her wine, watching Man About Time roll his neck round and round, trying to stretch it out. “You’re tired of typing tonight,” she gathered. The light in her eyes was equal to the first. They were one.

“Hold on a little longer,” she requested, understanding what needed to be done. Besides, The Comedy Club called.

—–

“Moss 03” arrived. Perfect!

Balance round the center. Alysha and Man About Time’s 1st date. His *Valentine*.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0031, 0503, Nautilus, Upper Austra

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He’d landed in the right spot. Now to end this.

—–

You’ll have to excuse our friend Square. He hasn’t caught up with the book yet.” He looks over, notes the blonde hair. “I see you’re turning into Jennifer Lane again. Good one. Veyot likes that one.”

I took another sip of of my 4 shot latte and wrote:  “Yes, I further said it was a real place, and *now* — since I spoke to her — (the maturation) means something else. Retirement, the library becoming an increasingly far away and fuzzy edifice after that. I proceed forward with my new life, my new eyes. I will have no need for physical books any longer. I am my *own* book. I am beyond my Firesign Theatre period, having absorbed the Piera (“Billfork” through “Uncle Meatwad”). I am even beyond the positive carrcasses (“Cpt. Mouse” through “Shiny Hare”). I enter something different.”

“Good, good,” he said. “All and well.” He becomes Square and makes another collage.

“These…overlaps,” he says, now studying, now reading the physical book again while turned away, “are becoming interesting. Comings and goings. Dr. Mouse arrives at the same time he departs.” He turns the page. 5 seconds later: “And *Zach and Lena*. Aren’t they a couple already?”

I check his pronouncement with my already changed eyes. “Yes. Too much information,” I decided. “We must end and then begin again. Clean the slate.”

He switches sides of the couch again. “Downstairs first,” forward looking Circle requests. “We must speak with a few more people in this one.”

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0029, 0704, Carrcass+08, Carrcass-00, Nautilus, Southwestern

domesticity (Cotton-Tailgate Industries)

By the next spring’s fall we were married, Shelley and me, and even had a realistic looking baby to tote around by then. It was 2 months old and we still couldn’t decide on a name. We didn’t even have a sex for the kid, since those kind of things could also be chosen back in the days before severe power outages ended all that. Afterwards it was deemed best to select before birth, whilst the child was tucked safe in the womb. Sex Stealers didn’t exist then — hard to imagine now since they seem to be around every street corner, peddling their ware. Apples and bananas, that’s all it is these days. The Orangemen some called them, because that’s what each and every one of us had in common and they couldn’t touch, not even on the navel. That was our saving grace all along, although we didn’t realize it before the Big Change.

We were able to acquire a full time, realistic looking chef as well, although he had nothing to cook at the moment. I made good money at the cotton mill, since I owned it now. Part time owner. Along with Peter Cotton himself, the inventor of the world changing cottonpicker by then. Some say we worked our laborers too hard, but his likewise-wife-by-then Henrietta “Hatti” Wilson wanted it that way, said that made them sweat and glisten to her liking. She often sat outside in disguise on a bench at the front door watching them leave the mill after their shift was over and get in their cars to go home to their mostly indifferent wives. Indifference, she sometimes ponders as they all motor away from her, leaving her alone again. It will eventually destroy the Earth and perhaps its Moon along with it. But maybe at least the Moon can be saved — she’s working on it. Malyshkin. The rebirth of Crabwoo.

“Dear, dear, you’re spacing out again. That’s enough milk for today.” Indeed, as I focused and looked down, the toddler’s navel was white with overflow. Better drain a little out before bedtime or else we’ll be up all night again. Oranges and milk: who knew they were the perfect pairing. If only it would have remained that simple.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0029, 0216, Bellisaria, Blue Feather Sea+, Continent 02, Maebaleia/Satori

back to Nautilus

He clinks his bony fingertips together in thinking mode. What ill to bring down on the world that will do it justice? he ponders. A decision is made. The soured entity begins to move out of his small forest near the center of Nautilus — not *at* the center, because that would be too obvious to his enemies. Just a little to the west, close enough to still feast on enough energy to fulfill his plans.

Moving in the right direction. Or make that *wrong* direction, just as he is *not* Jon Deere. All Orange was mistaken. This was worse.

I see you there little fellow, he says to himself while passing the much smaller forest spirit. You can’t stop me now. I have *energy*.

“Halt!” It was as much vim as the other woods entity could muster. He was spent, but he was quick to rejuvenative, the great advantage of the wee ones. Would take a minute, though, a minute he might not live through.

“Yelloo, what’s this?”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0028, 0113, Nautilus, Upper Austra

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“Queer dream,” states the now black Chief in his bar by the blue swamp in the southwest corner of Paper-Soap. “Say the girl’s name is Atrophia?”

“That’s what she said. Blue hair. Blue as Heaven.” The visiting Aldebaronian glanced at his wrist. 4:20? Not on *his* watch.

Black Chief looks out the door of the small bar. “Rain now. Swamp will be getting pretty damp soon. Better rev up the dehumidifier, um, Stu. That *is* your name today, isn’t it?”

Stu Umbriel, who goes by many names since that cursed birthday party about 1 month back now where bodies began to merge together in queer ways, smiles and says it is so. “Today,” he reinforced. He moves around back to crank up the moisture removal device, which he knows the ins and outs of better than Chief, being a regular moisture producer himself. In fact: better take a leak behind the bar after I roll this baby out in the middle of the room, he thinks. He glances down. This blue blue baby. Blue? Center? Just like the (stranger’s) dream.

The rain gets harder. “Yelloo!” he exclaims behind the bar, getting wetter all the time.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0028, 0104, Paper Soap+, Soap

circle (blue in center)

“Kolya,” she gasped, sensing him from far away.

—–

There she is, the Aldebaronian A.O. thought. My perfection, my *opposite*. But what’s this? An *intruder*. Not on *my* watch.

He decides then and there to defeat this adversary to his true love’s hand, hidden in shadow behind that right hand stone in the above photo. Later he uncovers his real name: Jon Deere. “Mow him down,” he reiterates at the time. “Like corn.”

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0028, 0103, Maebaleia/Satori, Nautilus, Paper, Paper Soap+, Soap, Upper Austra

Paperweight

He sat at the table outside the bamboo hut he’d rented several days back and thought about All Orange and what he’d lost. The phone rang (D Flat). The phone never rang.

“Hallo?” He was expecting someone jovial, not saturnine. He was surprised. He stared at the missing blue eye on the Book of Monsters before him as she continued to chatter. He dare not crack the cover lest the other one roll off. Especially now. Would he get a word in edgewise?

—–

She hung up the phone. “We’ve got to keep an eye out on him,” spoke Jeffrie Phillips, glancing over at his bamboo hut across the water. “He may even try to off himself, say.”

“No he won’t.”

Her hair was now the green of seaweed but she was no monster, or at least Jeffrey thought. Was she?

“What next?” he queried about her appearance. “Your skin turns green?”

“Maybe,” she shot back quickly. Both knew that if this happened she was lost for good to him. Maybe even the mohawk would reappear.

Something was happening on this sim. A painter paints. A complainer complains. ART appears. A perfect circle. Pooh with his honey pot moves away from the scene with little to no impact now.

A perfect circle, eh? I thought, yellow included. I knew what this meant.

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0414, Bogota, collages 2d, Crisp Sea, Ebbert, Lower Austra, Nautilus, Wild West

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After a night of, ahem, renewing their wedding vows, Wendy and Jeffrie parted ways, he back to Collagesity down in the southern part of the continent and she over to dutifully waiting Kolya just out at the bay of this same fledgling town. Apt. 2 had been put to good use after all but just for 1 day. Wendy stops at this brightly lit citrus fruit shop below where they stayed, studying what appears to be an All Orange, naval down. Lemons and limes on the side, yes, but this was the centerpiece, the center*point*.

But it can’t quite obscure the green plate hung on the wall behind it, acting like a lingering corona for a solar eclipse coming from the cool side this time. Only we the readers have the perspective to ponder what it means, as Wendy isn’t viewing remotely right now, distracted by the trees in the forest. She turns.

And an Oz colored plate! she thinks. I want it! I’ll make Jeffrie come back tonight or the night after that or sometime soon at least and I’ll get him down here to purchase it for me. Real metal! And I want those lemon and lime citrus drinks that go along with it too.

A small earthquake hit the town and the plate started ringing in a perfect D Flat. Steady Kolya walked in from the bay. “I’ll get it.”

(to be continued)

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Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0027, 0207, Metropolis, Nautilus, Upper Austra