Tag Archives: LIBRARY

December 18, 2024 · 7:41 am

00450302 (opened up)

“What you see before you is the Power of the 4. Let’s start with green, okay?”

“But — we’ve already *done* green, he he,” said talking dog Jack.

“Oh,” said Bill looming above them in his deep, lispy voice. “Alright. Then: blue. Okay? We haven’t done blue yet, have we?”

“Uh, I don’t think so,” says Fink, still human as far as I can tell. Much like *Susan*, but we’ll get to that. Su-san.

“Okay, great. I’ll just put a little gemstone in the slot representing green, and…

“… close enough. So are you ready for blue? This shouldn’t take as long.”

“Okay, alright,” agrees Jack.

“Sure, why not,” says Fink.

“Nice. So let’s begin.”

—–

“After retirement on that fated day of 3/1/22, err (checks his notes), we have no further contact with green and blue is to pay. So you approach blue, tell him who you *really* are and that you actually have a life *outside* the library. You tell him you’re a writer, a creator (by nature). You don’t tell him about the photo-novels but he didn’t ask either. He is *busy*. He was going to respond to your email but hadn’t had time yet. You must be patient with him. His story is not yet told. I suggest we come back to him in, say, 5 years?”

“*5 years,*” I exclaim. “But I need to resolve this *now*.”

“Oh.” Pause; deep sigh. “Very well. I’ll accept that blue’s story is done for now even though it really isn’t. Yes (smaller sigh), we should move on. To red.”

(to be continued)

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December 17, 2024 · 4:31 pm

00450216 (end (430 (words)))

“This would have probably been Fall 2015, or maybe even back to Spring 2015. But probably Fall 2015. Or even Winter 2015, or at least before the death of Bowie in Jan. 2016. This started several things. It, in a way, started the photo-novels themselves. Bowie *came* to Our Second Life and its Collagesity for a visit on his way to other destinations. This happened right after his death. He flirted with Baker Blinker, even propositioned her to go with him to the stars and leave Collagesity. This would have, of course, null and voided her relationship with Karoz Blogger (occurring just afterwards), so crucial not only to photo-novel 01 but all the photo-novels to come. They may *not* have come, you see.”

“I see.”

“Your double played a part in this. You synchronize further over the death of Bowie and the release of his last album, ‘Black Star’. Playing it right after Bowie’s death, you were amazed at its depth, how good the music was. You’d only known Bowie through his singles before this. Thus the can was opened to explore his oeuvre in a much more thorough way, which you did over the next several years. And your double went right along with you in a way, reliving his own appreciation of the Thin White Duke. After ‘Black Star’, you then moved to ‘The Next Day’, his previous album. As you told your double, there’s not a weak song on the album, which he agreed with. You also gave him a copy of ‘Black Star’ which he didn’t have. More synchronization. You were kind of moving as one. Or at least so you thought.”

“I thought?”

“Even at the start, you were not as synchronized as you thought at the time. You were a damaged soul by then. Your double represented a light in relative darkness, someone you connected to. You, in a way, in a strong way maybe, needed him more than he needed you. He had enough friends. Maybe he had *too* many friends, too many connections. You didn’t have enough, he had too many. And he had ambitions in the library, desired to be a major player there, which finally worked out for him by the time of your retirement in 3/1/22. The date is significant. It represents a place you separate from the double, are born *away* from him and back into your own sphere. You are on your own after that, just in terms of male friends. You thought you could continue that friendship beyond the library. But a wall was built at 3/1. (Photo-novel) 31 — remember that.”

“I will.”

(to be continued)

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December 17, 2024 · 4:08 pm

00450215 (beginning)

“So let’s start with the doppelganger, the green one.”

“Fern.”

“Welll.”

—–

“We first have to get to rhythm and pitch. Opposites. Remove pitch and you still have rhythm. Remove rhythm and you still have pitch. Keyboards (which I play) are pitch. Drums (which he plays) are rhythm.”

“Okay. Good start.”

“These are the musical differences, stark right up front. But then dig just a little deeper and you have similarities within these differences. The Kinks represented the first bonding point, before Bowie.”

“Right.”

“And we liked the same albums by The Kinks. Unlike the guy who worked for Norwegian.”

“Yes, he liked ‘Arthur’ and ‘Muswell Hillbillies.’ You liked ‘Village Green Preservation Society’ and ‘Lola Vs. Powerman’. These albums all line up 4 in a row from ’68 to ’71 (their ‘golden years’, along with ‘Face to Face’ from ’67), subtract the ’70 soundtrack ‘Percy,’ which was considered a more minor work.”

“Right. And my doppelganger also liked ‘Village’ and ‘Lola’. And he expressed difficulty getting into ‘Arthur’ without my prompting. *I* had difficulty getting into ‘Arthur.’ And as I recall we both really dug ‘Village.’ Hard to say they made a better album, although I perhaps like some of the individual songs more on ‘Lola’ than any on ‘Village.’ ‘Village’ is, in a way, a perfect rock album. Better than ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ I would venture.”

“Yes, so that was kind of an original link. Now you must ask: why? Why the mutual attraction to The Kinks and even the same albums, unlike that dude who worked for Norwegian?”

“The guy who worked for Norwegian represented a contrast. To instead show the similarities between my doppelganger and myself, and how it could be different. We *speak* very easily.”

“Yes, so we have a foothold. Now move to Bowie (and others).”

(to be continued)

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December 7, 2024 · 8:42 am

00450116

Look at them. Hard at work. Whatever they’re doing. Alchemy alchemy alchemy, he then thinks. That’s where the real work happens. Must get back to my lab in the cellar to test out some stuff. Let’s see, I bought a new pestle at the marketplace. Will try that in an old mortar first, or, what Young might call, a marriage of male and female forces to create the hermaphroditic whole. Can’t wait.

Just because it’s a pretty girl doing it doesn’t make the activity any more hygienic, he thought while passing the grape stompers. I’ll have to ask Barney if there’s any other way to do this. “What you’re name?” he asked, thinking she might be unemployed soon. “Pricilla Plum,” came the answer. “Well, that’s a plumb beautiful name,” he quickly shot back. “Just like you.” She titters while still stomping away. What a grating laugh, he thinks while walking away. Now where was I? Oh yes, the lab.

“Bob, Carol, Ted,” he addresses each individual at the table before him, eating heartily on a meal between breakfast and lunch. Let’s call it luckfast. “Do what do I owe the honor?”

“What do you mean? Witcher?” said either Bob or Ted, reader’s choice.

“Gerald, please,” insists Gerald over his more formal name.

“Yes, of course,” said Ted. Pretty sure it was Ted this time. “Gerald. With a D right?” then said Bob opposite him. “And not a T as more commonly spelled.”

“Spelt,” insists Ted, making Bob grin.

“That’s right,” says Gerald about his name.

Carol between them begins to titter in a way not unlike the grape stomper before, making Gerald visibly wince. “Don’t you see fellas,” she followed. “*Gerald* has forgotten where he lives. *Again*.”

Now hearty laughs from all 3. Gerald realizes his mistake. This was not his vineyard. He had gotten confused in the maze of Beauchamp streets and exited the wrong gate. It wasn’t the first time. In a dream of alchemy he was, ever since the library.

“Down the path over there and take a right at the bottom of the hill,” said Bob between laughs. “Just ask one of your workers if you get lost again, ha ha ha.”

“Ho ho ho,” echoes Ted. “And, ho ho, ask them where *I* live, he he he.”

“Hu hu hu,” goes Carol. Gerald had had enough. His cheeks red from embarrassment, he spots the indicated path and was on his way again. At least he remembered their names, he tried to console himself in the moment. The Fishers. Not *his* vineyard but theirs.

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December 6, 2024 · 6:58 am

00450115

Once my eyes were opened to TILE in the city…

… I started to see the sacred 4 colors everywhere…

… not only in buildings but in people’s clothing, the arrangement of fruits on a market counter, the list goes on.

I went to the library to study more about alchemy to try to understand the phenomena. 3 aisles over, in the 600s according to the Dewey Decimal System, were the wine books. Being an owner of a wine making business I should logically be over there more, studying those old dusty tomes instead of these ones in the 100s. But the winery, thanks to my trusted right hand man Barney Basil-Fawlty, the majordomo who’d been there for decades, basically ran itself without my help or input. And anyway, I *did* have an alchemical lab set up in the cellar of my new house, my crypt as I call it. It just didn’t produce any money unlike the vineyard proper. That was about to change. Thanks to the gold.

Ah ha! This more modern alchemist Karl Young seems to recognize the phenomena too through what he calls a mandala. Another lead! Might be here the rest of the day. Probably should get a message to Barney so he won’t worry about me. Make sure someone walks Chomp, and so on.

(to be continued)

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October 18, 2023 · 1:43 am

a punk is born (zooming in on yellow (1st thing in the morning))

Many famous musicians have walked the roads of Gaston, and many famous musicians have left from such roads. Not George, though: he remained glued to the town through his car as it were, white in the daylight here but silver at night, as silver as Maxwell’s Hammer.

And now his soul has returned as the strumming punk known as Ketchup Tom because of his red mohawk if not visa versa, Marsha “Pink” Krakow his new drummer in tow, owner of her own VW Bug and one she perhaps is glued to as well, and even perhaps the *same* bug. Paired silver and gold as we’ve mentioned before — or white and yellow in the daytime. The Portal. Mimosa. Probably dusk and dawn as I’m writing and thinking this out.

George also existed here as Duncan Avocado, a character very important to the blog and attached photo-novels up until and including 31. 3-1 (March 1). His birthday which was also kind of his death day, at least in my eyes. He lay in a blue-yellow tent on the floor of the Collagesity library after that, a virtual structure last seen in Constantynople which has recently been destroyed/derezzed, with a final friend in the library *still* a friend — but simply too busy with a young kid to have much time for anything else, including our promised hikes. Important thing: I don’t hold it against him. And I should probably get over my disappointment with Duncan too. Put it in the rear view window. Thing is, we’re *doppelgangers*.

Red blue yellow houses in a row to begin. Again.

“Ugh, my head. W-where am I? And *who* am I?”

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August 17, 2023 · 6:29 pm

he bats right he bats left doesn’t matter

“That was some pitch… Pitch. Explosive, even!”

“Thank you. I tried hard on that. Bit of spit, admittedly, to cut down on the Lively. Return to dead ball era, where I was *king*.”

‘Of course you were, Pitch. And Buster was a marvelous shortstop back in those days too.”

“Damm right!” Both laugh then quickly compose themselves. Serious stuff now. Library. Saving Constantynople.

—–

There he was, in Special Collections again. Looking for himself. I’ll have what I’m having and all. Self service. He already had his eye on something.

“Can I help you?” reading room coordinator Swanie Rivers jumped in, trying not to flap her wings this time despite the head, the gum. Calm and cool, like a waterfall or attached stream. *Not* a volcano or any kind of lava flow. Blue, clear, ready for tubing on a sticky ass hot summer day. She’ll let him select something and then tell him. No f-ing gum in Special Collections! But… calmly, cooly. No wing flapping.

“What’s in that more crooked shelving, those ring binders over there?” Philip believes he’s seen it in a dream. Several times in fact.

“Oh, yes, that’s part of the Merk Coolie Brighton collection. He use to work here!” Swamie told herself not to get excited and shout in the room, even though no one is currently there except Philip and her. But… he use to *work* here!

“Am I in it?” he asked, throwing Swanie for a loop. A closed one. Not-what-she-seems cleaning lady Ross C. slides through the cracks in the front door to observe.

Philip pops his gum one…

last…

time.

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June 5, 2023 · 4:23 pm

ML Gazebo 91b

She’d blocked herself off from the hill, her property, never intending to return. Of course she did. Kicked out that All Orange creature (with the red prison legs) from her house, as stated, found only Philip and the big caught fish next door when she returned, pretty Xia and Zimmy gone forever, it seemed. Philip exists on here to tell another tale. I personally know he has to visit the newly set up library over at my Constantynople, see what’s been written about him for the archival record. A lot! Small and big fish alike. Some whoppers once more. He had to stay on the island.

She stood further back, knowing this was about as close as she could get to the center of the island. She stares across what would eventually become the Abyss toward her namesake hill-ridge now in the distance, wondering aloud what it all meant. “Another island? Another pitch dark center? Axis?”

“Yes?”

She twirls. Nobody there — the voice came from nowhere. But she did spot the gazebo in the distance now through a couple of the island privacy walls, portal opened, Constantynople fulfilled. An urban area for the island at last, no matter if the other residents knew it or not. She’d fill each and every one of them in later. “How dare you, so and so!” “How dare *you*, so and so!” And so on until everyone was accounted for, starting with herself.

(to be continued)

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May 27, 2023 · 11:12 am

a lane to walk down

He never could remember which one was an Allosaurus and which one was a Tyranosaurus so he ended up just calling them both Allanosaurus, a catchy name that he couldn’t get rid of, *achoo*. Darn, lingering cold.

He had just finished wiping his nose when Jane stirred in the tent.

“Ohh, my *head*.” It was here she realized she had lost another baby which was the same as a ball. It was all play and pretend except it wasn’t.

“I had to give you a sedative so you’d sleep through it all,” Dr. Brown explained to his ground 00 patient, still waiting for that ball to turn blue so he could determine a sex. Else: this keeps happening. Waking up in the woods. With the dinos, Real Self far far away.

Jane remembers the 8 corners of space, the near (Moon) and the far (Muff-Bermingham). Trouble was, she couldn’t remember which is which, more memory condensing and overlapping. Like with the Allans, as Brown eventually, inevitably shortened the name to.

“I… *died*!”

“Yes, in a way. Your baby died. You died along with it. Except you didn’t. You are here.”

Jane managed to raise herself from the tent floor, look out the door. Dinos. Allans. Everything was here that was needed to understand. South America. Land of the Dead.

“Library,” she said.

“That too,” he admitted. “I suggest we read while we wait. Cut back the talk. No need to waste oxygen. You have them in your eyes as well. Just think of a book to read… and read.”

(to be continued)

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May 12, 2023 · 7:34 am

Junkyd again

“How I got here? It was dark. I couldn’t see the road. No street lights in this place. I ended up in this there tree, one of my tires dangling beneath like an eyeball loosed from a socket. Ghouls below — dancing. Carcass roasting in the middle but it wasn’t an ordinary animal. A *human* animal. They said it was a sparkly pink cowboy, formerly. They talked backwards a lot.”

“Like Doug over there?” John the Mind Reader pointed in the direction of Doug over there.

“No, not like a German (Doug was German: Douglas Hinterbocher the 3rd or 4th, I never can remember). Like a mutant.”

“Fine Young Cannibals?”

“Kind of,” I answered to this. “Anyway, I eventually came to the attention of Thomas, short, at least at one point, for Thomasina I gathered.”

“Yeah, the Big Boss. I know her.”

“Of course you do, John. We all do. Pyramid.”

“Right. Dunes.”

“We all come from there.”

“I recall.” But John the Mind Reader *didn’t* recall that part of their shared herstory, all of ’em. It was a big ol’ blind spot, as he put it, mostly in his mind and not to others and where they couldn’t get to it easily, he figured, being the only Mind Reader in the village, or at least he believed. Not until Brunhilde Sarah Jennifer Lane, another sparkly one in fact. Shared presents. The Answer? Maybe.

“Gorman was one of the ghouls.”

“Oh. *That* explains a lot.”

“Sure does.” He shut up for a while after that, figured he’d revealed enough for now. He could still see the fire, the carcass, the smiles and grins all around, only a few with a full set of teeth, thanks to the rotten dentists around here, mostly old and displaced Tilists. Including Gorman. Knew about the evils of Sprite all along, as it turned out. Grant Hill, PHEH. What was up on that hill anyway? Another mountain?

—–

“When did she first become visible to you. This… *woman*?”

—-

“She said she came from a library.”

“Ahh. More *origin* stories,” said John to this.

(to be continued)

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