Tag Archives: GRASSHOPPERS

April 14, 2023 · 8:39 am

Man in

“See you’re back to exploring Nautilus,” said Sally the bartender, part of the group mind.

“I am.”

“See you’re back to red and yellow. Not all black. Stay that way. Reno,” she warned.

“I remember.”

“Don’t bring it back.”

“No.”

“Soo, what you doing in *these* parts (of Nautilus)?”

“Welll.” He scratches one of his ears with this, grateful to have them trimmed again. Cost him Reno but it gained him more, all of Nevada in essence. Middletown, or at least future access to. “I was going to hike the trails of Quirrola Forest but it seems I’m blocked from access.”

“Go down a bit,” suggested Sally. “Toward the coast. Go in from the east. No ban lines from that direction. 1/2 of the sim is banned. Up here; down that road. That where you came from?”

“Yeah. So from the east. I guess this would be from the south. And over 1/2way up, like you said.”

“Yes.”

“Well thanks. I guess I’ll be on my way.”

“Hold on,” and she poured him a drink she already had 1/2 made. Grasshopper, extra kick. Kick-ass kick. “Get this in you before you go. It’ll help you think. You’ll be pondering Middletown thoughts as quick as you can say $499,000.”

Newt wondered if that would be the ultimate cost but he took the drink and starting swigging it anyway. 2 gulps and gone. He’d done a lot of drinking in the Old West, the wild times. Had to chug fast or else someone else would for you.  And that someone else usually could make you dead in no time too.

“Another?” spoke Sally, seeing the empty glass. “1 million, then. The population of Las Vegas.”

Dare he?

(to be continued)

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April 7, 2023 · 8:58 pm

00370515

Blue Mountain from the slopes of neighboring Pink Peak, the actual namesake for the town it towers above. Not as much from the western direction we see here but more from the north. And to its north lies not a *barren* landscape bereft of humans but comparatively so. I might be heading there next; who knows where I’ll end up. Lower Pink Peak might be closing up for the spring, what with the early encroachment of poison ivy and, quickly following behind it, other bothersome woodsy aspects like snakes and bugs thanks to a mild winter here in the NC mountains. And despite a fairly cold March much to my disappointment. I spotted some poison ivy coming out on the town’s greenway 2 days ago, about the soonest I remember it sprouting. Use to be, I swear, the *end* of April I’d start seeing it instead of more toward the beginning. But maybe its just a weird spring, and the plants are confused because of all the odd weather, hot then cold, hot then cold. But overall pretty mild still, like I said. I can’t help but think of the advancement of global warming…

That night I found a figurine of one of Batman’s archvillains Poison Ivy staring menacingly in the same direction as similarly green Kick-Ass in a Nightsity comic book store display case. The night before this we observed Edward ordering a kick-ass grasshopper, his regular, from bartender Lexi at the seedy Nightsity establishment he runs for Ben Left Horn, formerly Jer Left Horn in these here photo-novels, 37 in a series so far.

Turning to leaves, there are precisely 3 population places named Leaf in the US, the same amount as found on a poison ivy plant. One of these is in Greene County, Mississippi, and whose only notable person, according to wikipedia, is named Lloyd *Green*, a pretty famous steel guitarist featured on Ken Burns’ “Country Music”. Also according to wikipedia as I found out this morning, villain Poison Ivy uses the power of an interplanetary force known as Green for the purposes of her ecoterrorism.

Why does Edward order a drink named kick-ass from a bar in the same town as a comic book store featuring the wannabe superhero? What is Shelley being tempted into by wearing a “Crazy Blue” outfit, another type of uniform if not a wet suit? Does formerly blue clad Duke Blue Devil Grant Hill still drink Sprite? Does it still quench his thirst? And what of his less famous and less tall Duke basketball running mate Thomas Hill, who won a national championship with him in ’91 and ’92? Hills again — peaks, higher and lower. The only way to figure out more is to go inside again.

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April 5, 2023 · 9:55 am

Nightsity 01

“I seemed to have left my wallet back at the office, Lexi. Be a dear and cover for me again?”

“Sure thing, boss,” said the cyberpunk bartender back, use to such things. He’ll make it up to her in the end, she thinks. Surely he’ll make it up to her. “Soo. Whatta ya think of the act down there?”

If I wanted a Lt. Uhura I’d go back to Star Wars Academy and order me up a Princess Leia, he thought. “Okay,” he said aloud.

“Star Trek Theme,” said Lexi. “I recognized it from my time on Venus. Popular there. Star Wars is of course hated on that planet. Ever since Luke Skyhobbler declared Martian Law.”

“I recall.” Thus the reason Edward, some people’s Eddie, didn’t bring up Wars. He received his Kick-Ass grasshopper, extra shot of crème de menthe. Now he could do some serious pondering about his business and its future.

“You going to tell her or should I (again)?” asked Lexi, knowing the woman was going to get the axe. Boss only visits once a week, and almost always there’s a firing as a result.

He drank a deep drink, set the 1/2 empty glass back down on the counter. “You, I suppose. Ben here yet?”

“Benny?” said Lexi, knowing Ben since he was a little boy. Couldn’t ever get the hang of the grown up name. “He’s around.”

Edward reached into the other pocket to retrieve a cigarette. “Do you know where?” He lights, he puffs, kind of in her face, just to make sure she knows he’s a tiny bit irritated at the lack of details.

“Sure, sure,” she responded, trying not to cough even a little. No one smokes in here but the Boss anymore. Rules of the Boss, actually. Only he is allowed to break them. Typical.

(to be continued)

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January 16, 2022 · 6:54 pm

antomic

It’s time to tell the story of the Ant and the Elephant, both chics. CUE MUSIC

“First off, the elephant is a Trojan Horse, pardon the mixed metaphor of sorts.”

“Pardoned,” she said, because she had that power. She was queen over her own little land which wasn’t little atall to her. Like Rose Wells before her. Or after her. We continue…

“We know that because of the triangle that can be opened with stuff put inside. Like a *bomb*.”

Attagirl gasps, throwing her hands cartoonishly to her mouth. Because she was. Would her subjects do such a dastardly deed? And why in Dennis of all places? Or a TV shooting screen in Dennis?

He stared at red, the cover closed for now, the puzzle incomplete, the TV shooting screen: disabled. But luckily we can view remotely.

Grasshopper is dead.

Her bugs are responsible.

The proof is in the pudding… and the sandwiches, and the cake, and the sausages.

Boomb!

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December 2, 2021 · 7:04 am

Wild West

He kept looking toward the window beside the door at me instead of the action in the ring. In the ring.

“New around here?” asked Lichen Roosevelt, tending bar in this here town until her big break as a singer comes, national anthems being her specialty.

Axis-Windmill kind of looks toward her, kind of doesn’t. “We’ve met many times before, Marilyn,” he deadpans.

Marilyn? she thinks. Hadn’t heard *that* name in a long time. “Well… can’t recall. Many, huh?” She keeps wiping the wine glass in her hand, although it’s perfectly transparent now. She looks through it at him, watching his distorted steely eyes move here and there, sometimes toward the door, sometimes at her, sometimes in-between. But not at the action. Another lift, another slam to the canvas for Joey. Poor Joey Avatar. Looks like a rain of pain coming tonight. How did *she* get into this mess?

“That’s right,” he finally answered Lichen. He walks toward the door. He opens the door, telling me to come in and join him. He indicates the tables to his right. We sit down, no words between us. We watch Lichen tend bar. The action in the ring (in the ring) wraps up. Victor Eugenia O’Neill moves toward the bar, decided what kind of drink to order for Joey to make up for breaking a couple of her nails tonight. Usually: so gentle, so careful. Must have been the full moon, she reckons. Grasshopper should do it, extra mint.

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October 23, 2021 · 8:13 am

00290512

He was not far behind them, in Ross. He stared at the 3 primary colors under the red and white umbrella that represented candy. Cotton candy in this case, doubly meaningful. Because he’d also learned of Peter Cotton, inventor of the world famous cottonpicker from Kick-ass Bogota, as well as about Marion, a fellow pilot of WWWWI. “Flew a mission with me the day I went down,” he said at the bar drinking a tall grasshopper, as green as his outfit. Greener, Axis-Windmill realized. “Came to get me — only reason I’m standing here with this metal plate in my head. *Borneo*. Get that: Borneo. And all the maps said it didn’t exist, said there was nothing beyond the Elephant of Celebes or the Giant Rat of Sumatra. Rose knew all along where the cube-box was hidden. In one of the deepest corners of space. Marion took me there one night. We were up drinking and drinking and he said he knew of a place where we could get the best whiskey in the solar system, nay, the *universe*. Mind you, we were really drunk. He would have never told me otherwise — said so the next day. We climbed this low granite hill near his new airport over at… I think it’s Enchiladas. Anyway, something that starts with an ‘E’. Some wooden box type thingie was at the top. We reached it. He pointed west, I believe. A particular star, he said. Just rising… over there.”

“Alpha Centauri?” I offered, just saying the brightest one I knew.

“That’s how you *find* it,” he replied, and then pointed me west to the famous cross of somewhat fainter stars, the crux of the matter as things turned out. His buddy studies it, he said, which I later learned referred to Philip Strevor, a professional pill popper over in Heaven Town.

“Dead?” I guessed about him after learning his job title and the name of his town.

“Might as well be,” came the answer from the green guy, almost as green as his drink he was still sipping, still nursing. “‘To death do us part,’ he said one night on the same low granite hill actually. He was staring at the star and said that, like the star was going to kill him or something.”

“Or marry him,” I added to the story. I was, of course, channeling in the moment. I’d gotten very good at that, in fact.

“We better get to Bartholomew,” he then said, turning toward me, or perhaps looking behind me for someone. I turned as well. Who were we looking at? 102? Something that can’t be edited because it goes in a perpetual circle, editing itself in the process as it revolves around and around and around? Could be.

We were both psychic is all I knew for sure.

He turned away from the cotton candy dispensers and headed toward town.

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October 21, 2021 · 7:48 am

akin to Pandora’s

I was always the smartest girl in school. I was always first to raise my hand to answer questions from the teacher. But my *brother*… we didn’t know until much later his special special talent. He *couldn’t* be edited. Let me state that again: He *couldn’t*… be *edited*. No wonder he got frustrated by his 2 dimensional family, including me (me!). He was 3d all along, working on a higher plane than us. A *channeled* plane, true, but still: highly psychic, more than the rest of us. I had to step out of myself and turn into Jennifer Lane to understand better. Before, I was Jenny Lane, a kid at Forest Hill School for psychic children. Jacob I. was there a bit later — he went over to Hillside on the other hill side of town for his elementary years. Now I was grown up; all weedy. But I didn’t smoke pot to get high. Grown up — but I felt my apples were too small. I wanted to exchange them with another’s. Harrison Ford Jett seemed a perfect (imaginary) candidate. I was always a Star Wars fan growing up, not even learning about Star Trek until the 11th grade, almost done in school. My classmates called me Spock but I thought that was because of my glasses, before I got my (umbrella) contact lenses and could read with my eyes. The library remained a far away and fuzzy edifice after that, shrouded in distance producing mists by then. I proceeded forward with my new life with Tommy beyond academia. Family became priority.

A child is born, a child is given. Julius, although I wanted a Julia. Sex happens. Then the second: a mini-me of sorts. I projected into her. When I got my new eyes (in effect) I realized we were the same deep down, where it counts (166). We made a pact: she *became* me and I became her. Then we hid this fact to others in a carefully placed box. Where was this box? (Borneo) We had both forgotten where we hid it. (Borneo) And the umbrella design has a story of its own as well.

*Ding dong.*

Oh dear, that will be the neighbors, the Wells. Rosie or Rose, my sister from another mother, as we say, then Indian — love of my life until I met Tommy over at a tailgate party. Tommy Tailgate he was after that. I became pregnant that night.


turning into Jennifer Lane

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October 18, 2021 · 9:54 am

base

It’s time to bring a new character into the picture: Jennifer Lane, twin cousin to our Shelley Lane, right down to the all seeing umbrella eyes. She remembers the bombing, the underground, the… flight.

“Another one, sweetie?” Lichen Roosevelt asked from behind the counter, presently cleaning a glass, perhaps the one she would pour a new drink in for Jenny.

Grasshopper? she thought. No: too obvious.

“Just another stack of potatoes.”

“Coming up!”

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October 15, 2021 · 8:43 am

BonBon

Kick-ass Boos said to sit at the table with the Bigfoot book, so here he is. He picks up another book laying nearby by John Shaw Billings, which he quickly gathers from his reading was a librarian for New York city in the US of A, Earth.

Kick-ass Bogota, Boos’ brother, strolls into the bar. His brother said he’d “mark him” to make sure Axis-Windmill knew who it was.

Yup. That’s him!

“Grasshopper please, Bertha. Extra mint.”

“Coming right up, Ted.”

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October 1, 2021 · 8:50 am

the planet’s 3rd eye

“I recall now. I am your hairy… neighbor. To the North. Remember? Like Canada. Some called us friends. Like me. Remember? Not Arthur but me. We were sent here (to Mythos) together.”

I recalled. There was lots of pain in his direction, more than mine. The US of our A had it easier. A single child (functionally). A loving *father*. “You didn’t know,” he wanted to say to me now. “You were involved… in your own world.” I couldn’t argue. At least he didn’t declare war on me, like Cofmo. Ants, mechanical ants. My grasshoppers never had a chance. June bugs bombed but all were underground.

I know why my artist friend from Our Second Lyfe was named that. For this.

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