Kou > Newt
Heading back inside.
mistletoe doorway (heater presents again (6578 (Xmas mugs)))
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_of_Bernice_Raspberry
Bernice Raspberry, also called Ed Lively, was a 23-year old African-American man who was murdered in Leakesville, Mississippi, on May 25, 1927.[1] Raspberry was arrested for an infraction in Leakesville, but then the sheriff was told he was wanted in nearby Bothwell for “alleged improper conduct with a white woman”. Raspberry was taken to Bothwell but then taken back to Leakesville, for safe keeping. A group of some 100 masked man took him from the jail, strung him to a tree, and shot him many times.[2]
https://bakerbloch.wordpress.com/2021/12/29/00300701/
“You!!??” they cried even louder, seeing before them now the white woman associated with raspberries who loves black. “What *is* this??!!” they demanded.
—-
Returning to the scene of the crime:
“Blue and yellow are overrated, Arthur. Red and green have redeeming qualities too, despite not being quite as perfect together.”
“Like us!” Arthur Kill emitted with this, and leaned over to take a drink.
“Which one is darker, which one is lighter?” said Shelley, also partaking of her own drink. “6 and 7. Very close indeed.”
“Soo… this is about TILE?”
“No, silly. It’s about a *kiss*.”
(to be continued)
the future is *now*
Grant! she calls, jumping up and down on the grapes (?), pulverizing them. Grant!!!
They heard the yelps all the way over at the Annaberg central plaza. “Decatur Lively” reader Jimmy Dieselengine tried to ignore them so as not to alarm the youth with him, his charge for the day, or at least the morning. If only morning would be quiet around here like it use to be, he lamented in his older age, closing in on 64. Retired over a year back and loving it. More time with the grandkids. Like Pete here. Peter Pistle. But that girl, that *witch*, needs to *shut* the *f-* *up*. He rattles the paper to release his irritation, clears his throat. She’s done finally, he thinks, hearing the end of it, fruit kaput.
She produces purple stained feet to prove where she’d been, what she’d been doing. The same colored glass of wine sat at their tip, ready for consumption. Different dimension; didn’t work. He knew there hadn’t been a proper vineyard in town for a number of months, just some leftover, stray vines surviving here and there, not enough to mask the issue. Rose/Eyela/Leila was accomplishing something else. Like raspberry, something the townspeople wouldn’t swallow.
Mike requested she put the feet away and face the consequences, which had actually already happened. Banishment. Burial even. Like Paul and Ringo and especially John before her. Only the wine was left to prove she ever existed at all.
“Buh bye,” he whispered. “Buh bye now.” And threw it into the earth as well.
scenes
Some call them Clear Lake and Black Lake, although the 1st wasn’t quite clear and the 2nd wasn’t quite black. Separated by only a small dam, they were closer in color than many wanted to admit. And it is here our Annaberg story must continue, kind of a new development since my first visit to the place back in late ’21, just after I learned I could retire the following March. Which, I suppose, sort of makes *my* story the same as Jimmy Dieselengine, formerly of Ossemotor, keeper, at least for the morning, of grandson Pete Pistle, who may be the same as Pete Piper from other places. His African mansion was raized because of his political beliefs. Here:
square of misery
—–
It was 5:18 in the afternoon when he walked into the bank and took out 499,000, a whole Reno’s worth of money as they say in Sunklands speak. Cory Piper, father to Pete (perhaps), still looking for his maw, still banking on the state of affairs to improve and that the wall between Nevada and California would finally be ripped down. Fat chance, I say. Will free the tree people inside for one thing, who some, perhaps many, fear as green monsters. The ones who don’t want east and west merged will block it, I predict. Wally will live.
—-
10 months later and just below, a dog named Spider floats into the Cavern bar from the sky and orders 24 drinks, all with the same 4 numbers just rearranged a bit. All the bits, in fact — every possible permutation. Current bartender Edwin doesn’t know how to handle it and goes overload, which brings a small manager named Bach from the back for aid and assistance. Veiled, mysterious Alessandra looks on very interested, pretending not to be somebody else. But Bach notices before turning his back on the resolved bar situation and going back inside again. Whores of Babylon, he thinks, seeing a bit of black projecting from the white gown’s back, just enough to be tell-tale. What is *she* doing black, I mean, back?
00380405
Hmm, no answer, she thinks. But *someone’s* gotta feed all these animals. She tries again (knock knock knock).
No luck once more. Annabell seemed not to be at this residence any longer. Her old shop next door is empty and being repainted and remodeled in general. What gives? What happened to her only friend in town, its namesake, some say? One of the few that were understanding to her and her beau back in the day.
Yes, she could ask the workers; she hadn’t thought of that for some reason. Would they even put down their paint brushes and rollers and tools long enough to talk to her? One way to find out.
The first to be spoken to was shocked to find her back in town. Because of the recognition there was no way in hell he was going to give her any useful information. Whore of Babylon, he thought rightly. Or wrongly.
“Excuse me, sir?” Nothing. Word had quickly gotten around. Too quickly. Must be the work of a local chapter of The Gossipers.
The ones outside pretended to be involved in their blueprints and drilling their holes, but obviously blanking her too.
Well screw the whole lot of ’em, she thought. I’ll go talk to the horse’s mouth. Jimmy. She eyes the cafe across the way where he’s now sitting with his pal Artung, his stint as babysitter to little Pete over, father Cory returned from the bank (see, it *is* all falling into place!).
Annaberg Annabell
He barely looked up from the paper to acknowledge her presence. Artung with him ignored her completely, pretending to be absorbed in his own words. He was instead thinking. Back in the day this girl was *poison*. Yet she stood her ground before them defiantly, daring them to speak or act in some way. Jimmy Dieselengine finally rattled his paper loudly, which we know now is a sign of agitation and/or disapproval, and then rolled his eyes upward over the top, cooly meeting hers. “If we have to speak let’s do it in the cemetery where no one else can see us. 5:19 this afternoon.” And then he was back to reading, or at least pretend reading. Because he too was spacing out about the past now. The dancing. The playing of cards. Or so they heard.
—–
She had to pay 250 just to get him to sit down with her. He knew she had lots of cash because of the wall between the states. The tree beings she allied herself with back in the former era horded away beaucoup green within their narrow, dark confines, ready to burst forth at the Freeing Day, as they called it, and spend it hither and thither on overpriced trinkets and baubles, the opposition said of the impulse. The same considered her one of those trinkets or baubles, depending on what faction you asked. She was capitalism embodied, em*boldened*.
—–
She was a weed to be removed, she remembered a senior councilmember saying about her as she stared down at one of her kind, according to them, growing from a crack in the pavement. The meeting with Dieselengine was over. Someone was approaching with a ho. Better amscray before I am recognized again, she thought, and moved back into the shadows of the place.
—-
“The Monolith,” he summarized earlier at the bench in the far part of the cemetery, giving her what she wanted, what she could handle. The cold breath kept flowing out of her body like an expulsion of good from evil. “They had to push you out,” he said, watching it.
put some quotes around it, move on
She expelled the black from herself in another thought to be safe zone underneath the old council chambers, a ratskeller they named it. Weed caller outer Heidi (?) use to sit right over there in the place, she recalls, her spot like Sheldon. Where was councilman Sheldon Leonard these days, the big ol’ fern? Anyway, back to the bathing suit beauty across from her. Shelley Stuthers, object of desire for Albert Douglas, Biff Carter, and maybe a bunch of others. Vying for her hand. It wasn’t open for business. She continually held the 5 fingers that represented a stop sign up. “Have you seen my latest portrait?” she says to the up and down white clad double opposite her. “Just a hand; combo of 2 hands, really — hanging in the gallery upstairs, we could say. Let’s go; I’ll throw on a robe to protect us.” And so they go up to stare. Stairs work, actually, ratskeller just around the turn.
“Do you see it?” she said. “10 fingers reduced to 8 if that helps.”
White gowned Alessandra saw Toy, Play, Mine, Thing. And that became its title, attributed to Barry De Boy again since it naturally fit into his “Does this look square to you?” series, being exactly 814 x 814 pixels in size. But he didn’t like to explain the work in any detail. Later, comparisons with Dali’s last painting called “The Swallow’s Tail” would come about.
https://rosiehelendale.wordpress.com/2013/08/01/dali-art-my-personal-favourites/
(to be continued?)
wood (another jumper)
How Ruby Roo got those spirals on her leg.
ice cream dress
After donning her last remaining Flasherman’s outfit, she crossed with the good leg, force of habit. Her Boyfriend noticed.
“I strongly suggest you get the other one done to match the first. Else you’ll go around lopsided the rest of your life, see?” But that would mean going back.
Ruby Roo stared into the mirror at her one remaining good gam, wondering if she could do it. Her Husband still sat beyond the wall of spirals over there, savoring what he’d just seen (the jumping). Her Boyfriend over here was helping her adjust to the new, post-California, Nevada style life with a wooden leg covered all over with those same type of spirals. “You could say the war did it,” he suggested. “Both of them, in fact.”
SUDDENLY he was gone, along with the hubby, along with all the cool furniture of the place. Then the skybox residence as a whole disappeared; just winked out of existence. She fell fell fell from the sky. We’ve been here before…
Of course she didn’t die when landing from her almost 4000 meter drop, merely bounced a bit. Afterwards she dusted herself off, as was standard for Our Second Lyfe avatars undergoing such a thing, and looked around, spotting a skyscraper on a nearby parcel. She walked inside, explained her situation to a handy bartender named Marilyn. “I was with My Husband. I was with My Boyfriend. Now I’m not.”
“We’ll put you up for a while,” she said, and knew just where. She’d heard such Wall stories before.
ice cream dress 02
She woke up at 8 o’clock, another force of habit, in her starry tent, still wearing her similarly star studded ice cream outfit — the reason Marilyn knew where she belonged. She checked her legs underneath the sky purple covers. Wooden one still there, ugh. What was she *thinking*? Her Husband assured her that California was safe, and that navels were still in the center of bodies and the supreme deity known as All Orange would protect the rest. “You just have to make sure it shows a bit,” he said as they packed to leave, and demonstrated it on himself, tying his shirt above his somewhat bulging stomach. Outie. Not her cup of tea, but then some of the other parts made up for it. She recalls walking around an art gallery across the road from Rhodenwald with original hubby Axis, staring at the red and green paintings. “‘Green Monster’ — over there.” He pointed. Ruby’s life changed. She suddenly remembered the wall, the tree beings, *everything*. And Wally and its Wallytown still lives, last time she checked anyway. Not far atall from her old sim. Protection at last?
She had to go back, she determined then and there. And, dangit, she thought — checking the inworld map in her head — only a couple sims to the south and east from here. Fate. She went downstairs and thanked ever-bartending Marilyn for the good night’s sleep and trodded in that direction, trying to compensate for the slightly shorter leg and not walk around in circles.
00380411 (turning)
“I don’t know why they renamed this part of the lake Clear. ‘Bout as black as the other part as far as my eye can tell.” Eighty knew Forty couldn’t see with the other one so no need to correct the singular. Another victim of the war, let’s say.
“Meddling, pure meddling,” she replied. “Boredom maybe. The more things change the more they stay the same.”
“Amen to that.”
They kept staring at the still pretty murky water, despite the acquired name. Eighty spotted the octopus again, reminding her she had to meet her counterpart Eight at the town ratskeller. She excused herself from this wonderful but ultimately fruitless conversation. Her last uttered sentence here says it all. Black split up with a dam to make Black and Clear but it doesn’t matter. Everyone can *see* what’s happening, even half-sighted Forty here, Eighty’s wannabe boyfriend but only part of the way there so far. And, spoiler alert, it doesn’t get better for him moving forward. Because she’s got an extra 8 on top of the one she already has. Sometimes they forget which is which.
—–
“I forgot you were coming,” Eight admits. “Sometimes I…”
“… forget which is which yeah yeah yeah.”
“You too?”
“Me too,” Eighty reciprocates. She has to ask why to a lot of things to help remember the y, the letter that makes all the difference. Why split Black Lake with a dam that was formerly just a footpath bridge to create Black and Clear? Stuff like that. She stays outside most of the time because of it. Eight: usually here… in the relative dark. Sometimes sitting with Rag Doll instead of “sister” Eighty. Which is how turning Alessandra remembers the scene, finished studying the newest work of boy-like genius Barry De Boy. Men, she thinks. So full of themselves. She’ll stick with bathing suit clad Shelley, however imaginary she is… no one else can see; black instead of clear.
“Welcome back Miss Aless,” Edvin the matre d spoke up to her, like a page to a queen. Table for one as usual?”
She wanted to say, “make it two tonight,” but knew she couldn’t. Busboy Peterson had starting clearing her regular spot as soon as she showed up on the stairs, studying that painting from the future. Almost done.
(to be continued)
observation point
Important SODA representative Christopher “Sound of Music” Piper knew Eighty and Eight could get to the bottom of this Black vs. Clear, sight vs. sightless thing. If they could keep straight which is which and who equals ten and who equals one. They keep multiplying on top of each other, passing through each other in effect. Odd if it wasn’t even. It represented his top priority about the village: keeping these guys on the straight and narrow, up and up.
And, oh yeah, bringing all the old war zombies back to life. They have wrongs to right too!
00380413
“My card, sir.” And then he took his leave. When the matre d asked who to say left it while he was walking away, he just shot back: “Someone very smart; say it was from Albert Einstein.” “Very well, sir,” Edvin replied. The stranger made a turn up the stairs past the site of the future Barry De Boy painting and was out of sight if not out of mind. Even though Edvin thought he might be. Odd, he kept thinking, staring at it. How can odds be evens? And was there an s cut off at the end? But Osse-Motor. That spelt trouble. Christopher’s more visible brother Jimmy lost a mansion because of it. Perhaps several. Forty lost an eye.
One hour later, Eight was with town gossip and bigot Rag Doll instead of counterpart Eighty, wasting time instead of making hay. Deadly time. Edvin moved toward them with the redeeming card. “Someone left this for you,” he said, extending it. Eight took, read. “Albert Einstein?” she questioned, looking top left. “Throw it away,” Rag Doll opposite her suggested after quickly grabbing and reading it herself, knowing the name. “Worthless. Nonsensical.” She knew what Osse-Motor meant better than anyone in town. Dang, she could lose her *own* house if Eight (or Eighty) took this seriously. An eye!
(to be continued)
00380414
Good fishing in Black Lake, she’d always heard. At least before the Big Split, as some people ’round these parts call it.
Why was Ruby here? I thought she was heading to Wally in Wallytown, I can hear the reader express. Confusing enough! But we decided to place her here in Newt, in Annaberg taking up the whole sim of Newt, because the wall had been sort of torn down in Wallytown, formerly interior trees exposed to the harsh light of reality, spirits within perhaps removed to some more spiritual plane of existence. The Wall has been demystified, and the town had changed along with it. No more California over there, Nevada over here. No more Green Monsters to worry about, stashed away in a dark inside ready to pounce on unsuspected passerbys. All that was in the past. Capitalism, the worrying about bits and baubles, was front and center now. So Ruby felt the place worthless to her and her own peculiar dilemmas and issues and moved on. Black vs. Clear represented a more updated version of all that. So we slotted her into the Newt history, which is kind of overlapped with Osse-motor’s history now, thanks to Jimmy Dieselengine, or so she understood. Help me! I heard Ruby cry. Help us! I cried in turn. Bring your ice cream outfit and ice cream eyes over here! Set yourself down at a convenient place, use your observing eyes to *see*.
Fisher Island’s Wallytown with now exposed trees
The Line (Upside-Down)
Doc Brown had about given up. He just can’t quite get this whole alien pregnancy in a ball concept down. He’s tried basket, he’s tried soccer now. He wanted a blue one but couldn’t find it in his inventory. Blue would set the correct position, right-side up instead of upside-down. This wasn’t working. He needed to get some sleep. He dozes on the spot. Right next to his creation. The girl from Venus, maybe Mars, with Jupiter and especially Neptune a much longer shot. He wanted her to be from a planet you could see and observe and not hide from. So Jupiter still in play. Even barely noticeable Uranus. Here he is, spacing out about space again, he laments. Can’t… sleep…
But he was.
He wakes up next to his wife of 17 years and stares over at the expanded stomach, the child they made together. Finally, after so many attempts. He’s going to teach him or her how to play basketball or soccer, his or her choice. Then he remembers the plug, the thing you’re not suppose to see but somehow he can. Just like Ruby. This indicates the alien nature after all, his greatest fear.
(to be continued)
00380416
A flat place to rehab my back and still get away from it all. A void space between Haze County’s 2 primary towns of Blue Mountain and Boulder. A home away from home of sorts. Jenny Lane, all grown up as it were and lacking in signage if not tell-tale weeds.
Won’t be there forever; trying to enjoy while I can. Got a reading tree which is apple, etc. Wedding chapel just beyond one end…
… Barney car just beyond the other. Barney car! We’ve been here before.
Sunklands 