Miss Ouri looks to her right now with her matching orange eyes. “Come out, child,” she urges manifested Shelley. “Come out from under the lamp and become big before us so we can properly see you.”
“No.”
Good girl.
Tag Archives: LIBRARY
00470317
Voodoo doll holding Miss Ouri observes Pietmond Boy patiently waiting outside SC’s Secret Door for a father who seemingly never shows. Wait for it… Wait for it…
There.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0047, 0317, Collagesity Fordham-, Lower Austra, Nautilus, Perch-Mistletoe, Upper Austra
00470314
Something’s happened over in Crooked, psychic Myrtle Beech intuits from her position at the center of the island while spying the distinct looking Constantynople building through a gap. One person would definitely know and that’s Old Orange (= All Orange). On her way…
“Okay, Old Orange. Start moving your dangly red legs which are the same as your forked tongue and spill the truth for a change!”
Old/All Orange complies.
—–
MEANWHILE… world maker Philip Linden had made it over to Constanynople library’s Special Collections, despite his head blowing up about 57 times now on his journey across the island south to north. “What’s in those crooked bookshelves over there?” he couldn’t help asking room attendant Swanie Rivers, trying not to flap her wings in disgust and irritation despite the gum. And the gun; both poppers, if both dormant for the moment. Tough stretch of land in the middle of the island — The Abyss some call it — and he decided to pack some heat in his pocket beside his pack of Wriggles chews already planted there. Back to the crooked shelves, he believes he’s seen them in a dream.
Flattie cleaning robot-lady Ross C. slides through the secret door connecting SC with the rest of the library and takes a listen while dusting the totally straight shelves — easy work. Is this really Merk Coolie Brighton in disguise? she thinks. She’d only seen him twice since his death almost 3 1/2 years ago, job killed off along with his Records Center, which he had become the functional manager of down through the years. Blue Boy, she thinks. He called me Blue Boy! Do I *look* blue to you, Merk Coolie Brighton? But I can hear him say he was just trying to kill off the library in turn, making everyone he actually cared about within a color of his TILE, red yellow green blue, with me at the end timewise. It was all up to me to find out the truth, she thinks. 42. Bad juju, and so on and so forth.
But she can’t quite make out what they’re saying, what Philip Linden or what appears to be Philip Linden actually came here for. If it’s that book, that one single book, then she can slam the door on the subject, case closed. But if it isn’t… then the door remains open.
It all depends on what happened in Crooked.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0047, 0314, Constantynople, Nautilus
00470311 (level 9223372036854775807 = trap?)
I spoke clear and distinct into the Air. “I’m here looking for a BOOK.”
No answer for about 15 seconds, then:
“WE ARE HERE.”
I think that’s *Lauri*, I realized. I pondered what to say next. Simply repeating the request didn’t seem right. They knew.
I had to specify.
“31 pages with a 32nd ripped out,” I tried.
15 more seconds, then:
“CHECKING.”
10 more seconds, then:
“LIMITING QUERY TO PICTURE BOOK, 32 PAGES MAX. PLEASE RESTATE REQUEST.”
Picture book? I thought. I didn’t even know what that really meant. I assumed: children’s book. What children’s book did I know?”
“‘Little Black Sambo,'” I said once more into the Air.
2 seconds later: “THAT REQUEST IS NOT ALLOWED.”
O-kay, I thought. Good the library has some kind of racist filter, I suppose. Although someone old enough with a valid ID should be able to request the material anyway. Just then:
“PERHAPS SPECIAL COLLECTIONS CAN HELP YOU SELECT A PICTURE BOOK. OPENING A CONNECTION…..”
Hmmmm. Dare I? It would mean returning to the beginning of it all. Perhaps losing everything that’s happened since in the process. All those hard earned years of service.
Couldn’t do it. Like Denmark, something rotten went on there. 42. Bad juju.
I’d have to keep working from outside the system. Nibbling away on the periphery.
(to be continued)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0047, 0311, Back Rooms, Canada/Picturetown
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)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0302, Oooo
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)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0216, Nautilus, Upper Austra
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)
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0045, 0215, Nautilus, Upper Austra
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.
Filed under **VIRTUAL OT, 0045, 0116, Witcher
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)
Filed under **VIRTUAL OT, 0045, 0115, Witcher
00400611
“I still have a home on Nautilus. It was a retirement gift — very pretty there. Lots of vegetation.”
Dr. Rabbid Baumbeer, still dealing primarily with bodily fluids but hoping to graduate to full blown psychiatry soon, looked at his e-machine and gauged this was true. “Describe… gift,” he decided to say.
It was the end of 31 and it was the end, period. March 1 of last year, 12:01 AM we’ll say. Eddie D’Aigle, who sometimes preferred D’Aigle, Eddie, especially if he was traveling in the Orient, had just retired from the private sector of the records management business, having made his fortune archiving the files of rock stars Ozzie Osbourne, Ozmo Daredevils, and the like. His last blog article for the latter, the last he did overall, was about how the song “Jackie Blue” was changed from “Jackie Pink,” which drew the attention of Pink, Marsha, Krakow. He had the evidence before him as he wrote: the altered lyrics, everything. “It was suppose to be about a man who peddled drugs during the day while working nights as a bartender, a very Dada affair,” he reinforced to her in a reply email, then, seeing her avid interest, invited her up to [Blue Mountain] to look at the actual, revised lyrics herself. “Come with your driver’s license or a birth certificate,” he said, “and our staff will bring the whole box out to you; I’ll put it on reserve and not reshelve. You can look at one file at a time, and just mark what you want copied with green (START) and red (STOP) paper we’ll provide.” She ended up photocopying the whole box. New 3d scanner the office just purchased did the trick in a 10th the time it would have taken the old fashioned way. Marsha’s, in fact, was the first request accomplished using that method. Boxy Marsha, she went down in office legend as. Prototype. Especially since Eddie, on his last day of work, helped her tote the (wrong?) box to her still hot pink car, soon to change to yellow. Thanks to what was inside. In many ways, she became the box she requested, a black and white facsimile of herself.
Filed under **VIRTUAL SL, 0040, 0611, Blue Mountain, Nautilus, Omega, Retirement Islands, Urbane Blue/Fishers Island, Wild West
Sunklands 