Saturday, February 13, 2016

Wow, you have made a whole art out of this, haven't you? Your whole 'accuracy'.

Se7en Years Later <-- Okay, Seven. Conceit.

.

A resource was lost to the world. It had just simply disappeared.

"What do you mean, 'simply disappeared'?" asked Roger. Roger was an older type of gentleman with a respectable beard and what we would call an 'earned' coat of arms. If you went right by him, you'd be okay. But if you didn't--"Like Bilbo Baggin's or wot?"

"Yeah, just disappeared, Roger."

"At least say 'vanished'."

"But it did not vanish. Vanish implies some type of indication of malevolence or some unseen hand. This resource, it was there, bright as a light, and then it just disappeared."

"I'm sorry that I'm not as intrigued as you are about how magical this disappearance was. You, also, are soon to be 'disappeared', as you put it," said Roger. "Unless you give me more valuable information."

"Roger that," and here was where I broke a sweat, because I had not been lying. And then I, too simply disappeared.

It is a real mental toll to wake up into a new reality just like that. Because one minute you're really focused on something, and the people around you have become important. Some of them know all about music. Some know all of the movies out there. A special friend knows all of the best TV shows too. Which one was I this time?

"You're the one that can just disappear," said a dude next to me. "Not vanish, but really disappear."

The content was still negotiating, so I took a moment to sit back and enjoy a small fruit. It was a sour little thing, with promising circles of sweetness. "Looks like we're in the same boat, buddy," I snapped.

"No, we aren't," said the Ninja. "You're heading into the worst place ever. Because you're drunk."

I said nothing, but I pulled a small blade from a secret pocket.

"No, wait," said the Ninja immediately. "Because you are a drunk."

"I'm learning to sip slowly," I told him. I knew the guy didn't give a shit about me--he was off on some fantastic mission, and I was (as he knew) going to the worst place ever. But it was nice to speak frankly with someone, for a change. It was just nice to feel similar to another person, and not have to worry all the time about 'appearances', as is the parlance.

And I really was making an improvement with the drinking. Gone were the days of gulping entire distilleries in one evening. It had been easier to do that in the beginning, you see. Your reality shifted so easily, and suddenly you were living in the roaring 20s as a telephone operator. You got shit-faced enough that you could cruise through these 'troubles' that you were visiting with great ease, and it was always a positive thing. You were always working to make things better.

Usually you have to overcome some kind of hate dilemma or insecurity. I had been quite stout of heart, so I was very cavalier about it. They even started calling me 'Ace' (this is an inside Red Dwarf joke). I suppose I was tempting reality every time I smirked inwardly about how I could 'live this person's life with my eyes closed'.

Yet, despite my frivolousness, I was extremely careful. I would always make sure that whatever I did was understood, and that even if I happened to disappear, the returning to the stream of consciousness would be in the best possible situation. I liked to think of myself as the ultimate set-up for good feelings.

So, that's what happened after I disappeared. I saw a drink and immediately drank it.
"What the fuck," rumbles a bellow from an angry man, who had come from the stage, barging directly into me. "We hadn't even started recording yet!"

"I'm sorry, man," I waved him off. "Guess I was really excited about this holy matrimony," I smiled at the...group. This was my style. Overwhelming charm. But this group--it was kind of weird. Nobody was smiling. Nobody was happy. Was I at a funeral?

"Who died, guys?" I rolled my eyes. "This guy again?" I was searching for that nexus wherein you become part of the group, or at least you appear to be part of the group. But nobody in the audience would meet my eye. It was like nobody gave a shit about me. I began to wonder why the hell I had appeared in this place, if I was that insignificant.

Then the angry man slapped me hard, in the face. "It ain't complicated, putz. You just sit down and listen, yeah, you hear the click, and that's the tape recorder, ok?" he said.

"Oh. Okay ... ? Then what?" I winked. "Something good?" I was hoping this was some kind of out-of-bounds bachelor party or something.

"You are in the First Seat. It was *all* depending on you. You were to hear the click, then you drink the koolaid," said the man.

Friday, February 12, 2016

manners in an eco-sphere ripe with aliens

There's a problem with me as I get older,
especially if I'm traveling within public transports,
where I've suddenly become in synchronization with
the slowness of it.

Why, only yesterday I had filed into the slow-lane,
emerging from the subway on 28th St, when there was a kerfuffle.
A man to my left, who had chosen to 'run past traffic',
was facing denial of progress by the natural barrage of people
who sought to go *down* the stairs.

Because during peak times, stairs in public areas are typically
gorged with two-way traffic. People on one side going up,
people on the other side going down.

This speed monster had assumed he could be faster than everyone else by overtaking the people going up, and was now being denied progress by, basically, the traffic going down.

Then he bumped into me, and tried to create a 'third lane' in the middle.

I put on my best Michael Douglas in "Falling Down" and refused his creation of a third lane in my surroundings, as we moved up.

He *quietly* (quietly!) persisted to imagine some kind of non-existent third dimension in this stairwell.

Finally, I had to physically *use my hand* and *move* this crazy person back, and said loudly, "Come on man, get the fuck in line!"

I was really pissed that I had to resort to physical action like that.

So I added, "Where the fuck are you going, anyway, your mother dying fast or something?" Loudly.

It was as I kept walking up that I finally heard this son of a bitch's squeaky whiny fucking voice yell back from somewhere down the stairwell: "Fuck you, you asshole, how dare you! My mom died three years ago, okay?"

As I finished the stairs, I said loudly back, "Well obviously she didn't teach you any manners before she went."