Wordzzle 97 - Marshmallow threats

This is my contribution to this week's Wordzzle. Wordzzle is a game in which each week word lists, used to create stories, are given on the blog Views from Raven's Nest. Participating users post their stories on their own blogs.

This is my entry number 41, for Wordzzle week 97.


Ten Word Challenge:

teflon,
idealistic,
marshmallow,
opportunistic,
kittens,
beef,
sawing logs,
slapped,
tickled,
scissors

The marshmallows rolled and tumbled over the land, burying everything in their path, the good little kids and the ones who ran with scissors, the invalid in the bed and the lumberjack sawing logs, the kittens and the pit bulls, the slapped and the slapper, the tickled and the tickler, the idealistic and the opportunistic, those who ate beef and those who ate pork and those who ate no meat at all. Everyone fell beneath them, everyone was buried by them, no one was spared. And still the marshmallows went on, mile after mile of them, until there was hardly any place in the land that they had not been, and they were now nearing the sea.

As they went over a low ridge, they found a knight waiting for them on the other side. His armor was dark in color, Teflon coated and flame resistant. He was more used to fighting dragons than marshmallows, but he stood firm before them and raised his sword and pointed it at them. "You have destroyed this land, but you shall not pass on to other lands. This ends here."

The marshmallows paused a bit, building up in height as the ones behind kept on coming, then they went forward, flowing at him and around him. He swung his sword through them, slicing into some but mostly knocking them aside. Again and again he swung his sword, and they kept on coming, as high as his waist, as high as his chest, as high as his shoulders, as high as his head. He continued to swing his sword, and after a while only his sword was seen, and then only the tip of it, and then only a ripple in the marshmallows, and then there was nothing at all.

The marshmallows came to the beach, and neared the very edge of the sea, and paused again, raising up in height, growing taller and taller.

A dragon flew in, huge in size, and landed before them. "How has this happened," the dragon said, "that you have come all this way, and the knight has not stopped you?"

The marshmallows continued to raise in height, building up in an arc in front of and around the dragon, and then there was a ripple coming forward, and something tumbled down the slope of marshmallows and landed in front of the dragon. The dragon looked down at it. It was an armored glove. The dragon slowly bent down and gently picked it up in his claws. "I always thought it would end when one of us killed the other, or when we died together, fighting. The battle between us has been going on so long, year after year, it almost seemed like it would never happen, though I knew one day it must. I never thought it would end like this." A tear rolled down the dragon's cheek. "What will I do with myself now, what will I do..." He took a deep, ragged breath, seeming about to burst into sobs.

And then he released the breath, in a stream of fire, blowing a long column of flame across the marshmallows, turning his head from side to side. An awful keening sound began to spread among them and the fire burned on and on, black acrid smoke going up, the fire growing so large that it created its own wind, which grew stronger and stronger, sucking everything into it. The dragon crouched down, wrapping his wings about him, and let the wind blow past him.

Finally it was done. The dragon raised his head and saw a desolate, blackened, gooey landscape. All the marshmallows were destroyed. He looked down at the armored glove he was still holding, then turned around and, still holding the glove, sadly flew away.

After a while there was some movement in the blackened landscape, and part of it heaved up, gooey strands stretching, and a dark figure emerged. He raised a fist at the dragon, now a distant figure, far away. "Curse you, Dragon! That glove cost me good money!"


Mini Challenge:

ripen,
shelve,
laminate,
goofy,
Siamese

The bookshelves were once like Siamese twins, bolted together, but the room had been redone, and they were unbolted and one was left outside all summer and then all winter, and was now like a fruit that had ripened too much and had gone into decay, its laminate faded and coming undone and peeling up and away. Sitting at a slight angle in the dirt, more like a country cousin now than a twin, goofy looking and bucktoothed, good natured but without much schooling, it stood there and pondered the outside world.


Mega challenge:

teflon,
idealistic,
marshmallow,
opportunistic,
kittens,
beef,
sawing logs,
slapped,
tickled,
scissors

ripen,
shelve,
laminate,
goofy,
Siamese

The marshmallows began to ripen, but were not yet ready to pick. The kittens ate their roast beef sandwiches, and wanted more. A Siamese twin was sawing logs, and dreaming of sawing off his brother. Teflon laminated itself along the sidewalks, and then laminated itself again. A person who was tickled slapped the tickler, who responded with a goofy grin and a portrait of a pair of scissors.

"Perhaps we should shelve this thing," a voice said. "What kind of world is this, that makes no sense at all?"

"Some people will think that of any world, while others, digging deeper, will find an underlying order."

"Those who are idealistic are unlikely to be happy with these results."

"Then let the opportunistic be happy, for there are many opportunities here. The idealistic are seldom satisfied anyway."

"Do you really think it can work?"

"Yes indeed. In fact, there's even room for a dragon and a knight..."

300th post

This is the 300th post on this blog. As with the second hundred, it came fairly quickly, in a matter of months rather than years. A couple of major events that happened this time were the transfer, with some modifications, of the files from my site at Yahoo Geocities, and the completing of a rough draft of a small novel for National Novel Writing Month.

My posts on these can be found here:

My time at GeoCities (Sunday, November 01, 2009)

National Novel Writing Month 2009 - Winner! (Tuesday, December 01, 2009)


Related milestone posts:

200th post (Friday, August 21, 2009)

100th post (Saturday, January 31, 2009)

Well, here we are (first post, Monday, August 22, 2005)

Dream - The road like a dog frame

Around October 8, 2008, I dreamed I was at a military base, probably in Arizona or New Mexico. A lot happened in the earlier part, at or around the military base probably, but I don't remember it anymore. There was a large warehouse-size room there, though.

Then I was driving, showing some other people how it was done, and what they had to do. It seems like some people were after us, or were going to be after us. I was driving through a mostly flat area with some low hills. It was mostly dirt, kind of an oily looking dirt.

I went to an area that had a road like a dog frame, as seen from the top and back and slightly to the side, like an inner frame for a toy or perhaps a stick figure outline for a drawing. There was also a faint body outline, but it was not part of the road.

I drove along the framework, watching from far above and maneuvering the car like it was a toy, making tight loops along the dark line of the frame, loops that also appeared dark like the road. The loops were so tight and close together that they appeared mostly as a dark mass, obscuring the line of the road. I was trying to show the people how they were supposed to drive, how to cover their tracks.

Toward the end I was getting very tired, and as I went down the last leg, at the back of the figure, the tight loops became zigzags with visible space between them. It was going to have to do, just finish it. I was saying something to the effect to them that they got the idea, anyway.

Dream - A block wall across the back yard

Around October 10, 2008, I dreamed that it was around midday, and I was in the house talking with my mother, who was somewhere nearby but not necessarily in the same room. Looking out a window, perhaps the one in the kitchen door, I saw a block wall in the back yard, and went out to examine it. I found that it was being built across the middle of the back yard, going from one side to the other, starting at the east side, but was only about one half or two thirds of the way across and was obviously unfinished. The dogs, the Pekingese and the Boston terrier, had been trapped in small rooms, boxes really, built of concrete blocks attached to the wall. They were apparently put there in the rooms/boxes, constructed for them, to keep them from bothering the person building the wall and also to keep them from escaping into the alley. The wall wasn't very tall, maybe three or four feet, but I think it was intended somehow to be a replacement for the old wooden fence by the alley.

I didn't know who was building the wall, or why they thought they had to do it. I talked with my mother about what was happening. I looked out at it now and then, but I was having trouble catching anyone actually out there working on it, though the wall seemed to progress sometimes between the checks.

I finally caught someone. He seemed to be some kind of Asian person, like a Korean. I went and talked to him and tried to explain that he couldn't be doing this. I seemed to be having trouble being understood, though. He seemed to be trying to ignore me most of the time, with an almost desperate look on his face. When he did talk to me, he was very hard to understand and his English seemed to be limited. Finally, he left.

After a while a middle-aged man came out. I guessed he was the house owner. I got the impression also that there was a somewhat thin teenage son involved earlier or who might have been involved. I had the impression that the Asian man was someone they hired, though it seemed that sometimes he might have had a tendency to change back and forth into the son, at least when he was back or in their yard.

The middle-aged man went over to where the wooden fence had an inset for the time, long ago now, when garbage cans were used instead of the large plastic containers supplied by the city. The inset was gone now. That part of the fence was taken down and the man was trying to put a heavy, bent, angled metal bar across a gap between the block wall of the neighbor and the remaining part of the wooden fence, which seemed to have been extended some at that point, perhaps by some of the inset portion that had been taken down.

The metal bar was about three feet long and had a pale coating of some kind, with a little rust showing through along the edges and an occasional spot of rust along the sides. It seemed to be intended to be part of the new gate, which by appearances was going to be slightly wider than the old one. Most of the rest of the gate was still just open space, though it had a vague something in the bottom third, like a bunch of one inch slats almost matted together.

I went over to him and tried to explain that he couldn't just be doing this, that it wasn't right, that this wasn't his yard. He seemed to be having trouble with the concept though, and kept insisting that it was his right. I seemed to finally get through to him though, and he finally agreed to stop, and as a final effort got the metal bar to latch properly onto the wood. Then he left. I was left there with the unfinished work, and I would have to somehow get something put together with it myself.

Wordzzle 96 - Pixie party

This is my contribution to this week's Wordzzle. Wordzzle is a game in which each week word lists, used to create stories, are given on the blog Views from Raven's Nest. Participating users post their stories on their own blogs.


This is my entry number 40, for Wordzzle week 96.


Ten Word Challenge:

Badger,
roll out the barrel,
amazing,
a lovely cup of tea,
pressure,
frozen,
gandalf,
pixies,
top gear

"Roll out the barrel," the badger said, "and we'll have a lovely cup of tea." A gandalf and some pixies watched, and giggled merrily. "We'll eat and drink, and eat some more, and have some frozen treats. Then we'll shift the party into top gear, and dance amazingly." And the floorboards danced with them then, under the pressure of their feet, and even when the kegs ran dry, they never ran out of glee.


Mini Challenge:

smelly,
politician,
favourite,
token gesture,
garden

A garden grew on the compost pile, a somewhat smelly feat. It was a favorite politician's token gesture, an attempt to keep his seat. He said he cared about the land, and would stop eating meat. But alas his skills were a little too green, and he went down in defeat.


Mega challenge:

Badger,
roll out the barrel,
amazing,
a lovely cup of tea,
pressure,
frozen,
gandalf,
pixies,
top gear

smelly,
politician,
favourite,
token gesture,
garden

It looked like a lovely cup of tea, but closer examination showed it to be both frozen and smelly. He had no idea how that happened, particularly since he had just boiled the water a few minutes ago. He opened the door and threw the cup out into the garden. A gandalf, in the process of rolling out the barrel that held the small flowering bush, looked at him, startled. A badger, talking about something with some pixies, shook its fist at him. "Sorry," he muttered, and closed the door. At one time it would have been an amazing sight, but no longer, and he just wanted to block it out.

Things had been bad for a while now, since he had somehow insulted the little people, but it seemed to have shifted into top gear lately, and he was really starting to feel the pressure. Perhaps they had been bothered when he took out the mound and put in the garden. He wasn't sure, but it seemed to have started around then. He had tried to talk it over with them, but they had done a lot of yelling, and he had finally started yelling, too. He wasn't much of a politician in these matters. He didn't want to have to move, and he wasn't sure he could sell the house anyway with them playing tricks like this. It was probably too late to put the mound back. The dirt was long gone, and he wasn't sure he could recreate whatever it was they saw in it.

He fixed himself a lunch meat sandwich while he tried to consider what to do. When he tried to take a bite, though, the lunch meat shot out and flopped around on the floor like a dying fish. He stared at it and set the rest of the sandwich down. He wasn't hungry anymore. It had been one of his favorite foods, too.

He needed to figure out something pretty quick. He wondered if it would help to give them some food. He remembered reading that people used to set out butter for them, but all he had was margarine, and he wasn't sure that would be viewed in the same way. It needed to be more than a token gesture, though, and he didn't know if just getting some butter for them would be enough.

He heard a strange wailing cry and gritted his teeth. Maybe he should just leave, go somewhere, anywhere, even if he couldn't sell the house. He could just throw some things in a suitcase and find a motel for now.

He had finished packing and was about to leave when he heard a knock at the door. He opened it and saw a hooded figure holding a scythe. Beyond him was an old fashioned coach drawn by horses. The figure turned slightly and raised an arm toward the coach, indicating the open door with a bony hand. The man stared at the coach for a minute, then picked up his suitcase and walked toward it.

Nice of them to provide transportation.

Dream - Driving on a road on the side of a vertical cliff, then throwing an odd device into the backyard

Sometime in January, 2008, I had a dream in which I was driving, and the road became too steep and the engine couldn't produce enough power. I finally went to the right across the lanes, and the road got more and more lanes, lanes that kept turning up toward the left and going almost vertical, and the lane markings contracted to perhaps a foot wide at the curve and the painted dotted lines on the road turned to continuous stone ridges. I drove sideways across the lanes and the road was now for all practical purposes vertical and slightly bulging, a cliff that curved around, with me driving horizontally across the bulge.

I saw a few people and a small building or two on the land not far below, and I stopped and went down to them. It became dark, and I was looking with a flashlight in the building for something. There was some object in a far corner under a thick shelf that reflected the light back at me. I discovered that it was a small shiny dumbbell with cylindrical ends, with one of the ends almost pointed at me. I felt that it contained something dangerous, some device of some kind, and was not what it looked like. I left, and the room turned out to be the utility room at home. I told my mother about it and she was concerned, and so I went to have another look. I took the device and threw it out in the yard toward the fence. I thought it might be something left by a spy.

Dream - Crashing the car, then saved, then a woman who was drinking

On Sunday, August 25, 2002, or thereabouts, while sleeping in the afternoon, I had a dream. The first part of the dream is lost, but later in the dream I was driving somewhere, perhaps from Fallon, Nevada. I may have been going to Reno, but the roads were closer to what exists going back to Arizona. The road was not a complete match for reality in any case.

I was driving the dark blue 1987 Oldsmobile and was extremely tired. The road led uphill and was only two lanes. Rain was falling. The road turned to the right and leveled out. I turned the steering wheel, but had to turn and turn for the wheels to turn enough. I finally had the steering wheel turned all the way to lock, and it wouldn't turn anymore. It was still not enough. For some reason, the car couldn't turn at a tight enough angle, and instead turned in a broad arc that sent it around the corner and onto the opposite side of the road. The road bordered a cliff at that point, and did not have a guard rail. Both wheels on the driver's side went off the road, and then the car turned nose down and tilted until the windshield was pointed at the ground. I saw muddy ground and puddles far below, rushing up very fast. I wondered how I was going to get out of this one and grimly thought "God be with me."

There was a period of blankness and then I woke up, still in the dream, and found myself parked off the side of the road. I was still in the same area, but the road now had a long, wide paved parking area at the edge along the cliff and a guard rail. I was parked at a slight angle facing the guard rail. Another car was parked a ways back, along the way I had come. I was concerned that the person in the other car was watching me, but I was also amused by it.

I was not as tired after my nap, but I realized that I had forgotten to pick up the Saturday paper before I left town, and had completely forgotten the Friday paper. It was too late now for the Friday paper, but I figured I should go back to town and get the Saturday paper. I was reluctant to do this, but turned the car around and did it anyway. It was now early morning.

When I got back to town, a relatively short distance, it was evening. I drove through the parking lots of adjoining small businesses, directly from lot to lot, looking for a newspaper machine. Eventually, larger businesses appeared, such as grocery and other stores. They had large doorways on the sides, near the front, and I slowly drove through them into the stores and inside along the fronts of the stores, still looking for newspaper machines. People were in the stores shopping and paying for things, but the stores were not especially crowded. I felt that the stores had been built to allow cars to drive through like this, and nobody seemed to notice me, but I became increasingly disturbed and decided to go back into the parking lots after exiting this store. I went into the parking lot and turned right, heading in the direction of the street. It was dark, and may have been extremely early in the morning, just before dawn.

At some point I was no longer driving the car. A Mexican woman came out from the store. I felt that I knew her slightly. She was going home after working there. At the sidewalk, there was a dark spray pattern, in a Christmas tree shape a few feet long, like a bottle or glass had been violently knocked over. The stain was dry, but I felt that it was relatively recent.

The woman, who was perhaps in her thirties, thought that her sister had left it and was concerned that someone would find out that she had been drinking again. The woman searched for a cork that she was sure was there. She wanted to find it to remove the evidence. I finally found a small cork, but it was really tiny and got away when I tried to pick it up. It bounced energetically several times, perhaps going eight feet in the opposite direction, that is, behind me. I was not able to initially relocate it, but finally did. I woke up before securing it, however.

Wordzzle 95 - Other realities

This is my contribution to this week's Wordzzle. Wordzzle is a game in which each week word lists, used to create stories, are given on the blog Views from Raven's Nest. Participating users post their stories on their own blogs.

This is my entry number 39, for Wordzzle week 95.


Ten Word Challenge:

alternate reality,
shadows,
frantic,
tomatoes,
field,
lilies,
DVD,
snow mobile,
aggravation,
music

Tomatoes grew in the field, among the lilies, almost hiding the rusting snow mobile. The wind blew, and shadows ran across the field, like beings from an alternate reality. A DVD set at an angle among the plants, like some crashed flying saucer. Whatever stories or music it may have held, it kept hidden. A squirrel came and scolded it for a while, than turned and ran when the wind came through again. An ant came by and waved its feelers frantically at the DVD, then finally went around it. A raccoon came and picked up the DVD, but then an eagle swooped down and grabbed the DVD in its claws. The raccoon waved a fist in aggravation, then began sniffing around the snow mobile, and the scattered bones there. The eagle soared high in the air, clutching the DVD, but then it slipped from its claws and fell, turning slowly, catching the light, flashing brighter and brighter, blindingly bright. The man groaned, and tried to move his head away.

"Take it easy," the doctor said. "You've been unconscious for a few days, but it looks like you'll be alright. Next time you're on a snow mobile, though, spend a little more time watching where you're going and a little less time watching DVDs."


Mini Challenge:

grounds for divorce,
pink panther,
salutations,
wavering,
lasagne

It would be grounds for divorce, he thought, except that he wasn't even married, and didn't even have a girlfriend. He knew that lasagna had been in the refrigerator too long. It had been looking a little gray, but he thought if he had some wine to drink with it, the alcohol would kill anything. It didn't seem to be that simple, though. So he had some more to drink, and finally started talking some leftover medicine he had, several types of it, all of it expired, and most of which he didn't remember anything about. He still felt sick, but also a lot different, and he wasn't sure if that was an improvement. He started watching cartoons on TV, afraid now to go to sleep. The Pink Panther looked out at him from the screen, and seemed to wink at him. He lifted his wavering hand and raised his glass toward the figure and said, "Salutations." The Pink Panther lifted his glass, too, and they seemed to click together.


Mega challenge:

alternate reality,
shadows,
frantic,
tomatoes,
field,
lilies,
DVD,
snow mobile,
aggravation,
music

grounds for divorce,
pink panther,
salutations,
wavering,
lasagne

A pink panther moved silently through the field, gathering tomatoes and lasagna from the plants there. A nearby billboard for coffee had the slogan "Grounds for Divorce" and showed a happy, smiling couple. A snow mobile got up on little cat feet and moved away, casting shadows in various directions, none of which looked like it. A badger watched a DVD on a portable player, its mouth wavering and a tear rolling from an eye. Some lilies beside it frowned, and took an occasional drag on a cigar. From somewhere music began to play with increasing aggravation, reaching crescendo after increasing crescendo, while waves of alternate reality after alternate reality rolled across. A kind of tense, frantic silence followed, finally settling down into a simple stillness.

The pink panther paused at one of the lasagna plants, but finally passed it by, evidently deciding it was overripe.

"You're smarter than I am," a voice from somewhere said.

The pink panther turned and saw a man on the other side of a window that was floating in the air. The man raised a glass towards him, nodding at him. The pink panther produced a glass of his own from somewhere and raised it also, and the glasses met in the air in a kind of mutual salutations.

Dream - A game with superheroes and a villain

On Sunday, January 4, 2009, a little before supper, I fell asleep and had a dream in which I was driving in Nevada going north, and became involved in a game with people playing superheroes and a villain.

In the dream, I was in Nevada driving back to Fallon, on a small two lane road. I was apparently in some place like the area north of Beatty or maybe the Walker Lake area. It was an area with mountains around it.

I turned to the left, went a ways on a slight downhill grade, turned to the right, went a ways, turned to the right again, making three sides of a box, and went a ways on a slightly rising land, going by the side of a mountain. There were also mountains by the earlier sections of road, but they sloped back more. I then turned to the left, the land still rising some. I kept turning to the left, going around the other side of the mountain, finally making an almost U-turn and going down a slight slope through generally flat but slightly wavy land, with mountains around here and there.

I would get to around that area and then stop and redo it, over and over, sometimes not reaching that far. It didn't seem exactly like the scene was being replayed, it was more like a game was being played over and over, a new game each time. There were superheroes and supervillains, but they were just people pretending to be them, playing a part. They weren't professional actors either, just people, sometimes different people in different games. It was basically some kind of race, with the hero trying to beat the villain and the villain trying to beat the hero and each one trying to stop or hinder the other. Other heroes would show up along the way to assist. I was the main hero.

The villain was generally somebody bald and wearing dark glasses and some kind of tight, padded tan coat with dark raised lines outlining his chest and I think shoulders, some other places too. I kept thinking of him as sort of a Lex Luther type, but he seems more like something the Flash would have fought.

Sometimes he would attack me at various places and get the upper hand for a while, even being considerably ahead going across the wavy land, at least for a while. Sometimes I would get the better of him in the area with the turns, or if I didn't sometimes he would be caught by the other superheroes. I think one of them was kind of like Aquaman, one of them was kind of like Green Arrow, and there was also a woman who wore a mostly white costume and had black things around her eyes with long black costume rays coming out from them. She had some kind of small creature that was associated with her, though earlier I think it may have been more associated with the Aquaman type character.

The creature was a small, maybe golf ball size, vaguely gray thing, sort of roundish but with flatter ends, almost like a chunk cut off a branch, with long physical ray-like things coming out from it. Earlier they were more like long brownish strings, but later they were long, black, slightly transparent rays, very thin and flexible. It was supposed to be some kind of strange sea creature with special powers.

There may have been one or two more heroes. There was also an odd vehicle they had. It just seemed to be by the road without them doing anything with it, like it showed up with them like a prop, though I guess the thought was that it had flown in with them. It almost seemed like a Flintstones-type vehicle.

The people were all aware that they were just playing roles, and frequently all or most of them would get replaced with new people for the next game. It seemed to be some kind of touristy thing.

At least a couple of times toward the end, the villain, who had gotten past me, was stopped by the other heroes, who started showing up just before the second right turn and then in force between the second right turn and the left turn that eventually led to the wavy land. At least one time the villain glumly complained about his situation, about the heroes showing up and capturing him again.

Though I had been driving at first, the cars we were using got smaller and stranger, like they weren't really cars, just odd very small little vehicles of some kind, open, one person things, sometimes only a few feet long. Sometimes it wasn't much more than a strange chair with bars that looped around it and maybe wheels underneath. Sometimes it was something ridden standing up, maybe even being pushed along with one foot.

The last two times that the superheroes captured the villain in the stretch after the second right turn, I took the small sea creature and ran with it held out high in one hand. The first time pale brown strings came out from it, going way out toward and behind me, stretched out by the wind of my passage, the second time it was the black rays stretched out by the wind, wide initially but narrowing to points at the ends, a faded black, slightly transparent, very thin, like plastic the thickness of ashes. One of the points kept trying to get in my eyes, which was an annoyance.

The first time, an additional right turn appeared before the road turned left and I think this was retained with the second time, but the second time the road extended further back toward the way I had come, back toward Arizona, and the road went on to higher land and after a little while into and through the gas pump area of a service station. Both times the woman hero had made some kind of comment when I took the little creature. This second time she followed after me, talking to me and trying to get me to stop, to come back.

I think I went through the pump area but came back, maybe a couple of times. I was thinking that maybe I should get gas or maybe just food. Gas did seem to be a concern, though I didn't seem to be using a car at that point. Maybe I planned to later. The woman also seemed to be thinking about getting gas. I may have encouraged her to, also. She was still trying to get me to stop and come back.


There was also something about a big multistory old house, either before or after, something about going in and out of it, in and out the windows too, even upper story windows, and maybe going on the roof. Someone may have been after me or trying to get me. I also think I may have been looking for something, maybe something hidden in the house somewhere, perhaps even in the attic.

I was either awakened by my mother asking about supper, or I woke up by myself just before she came.

Wordzzle 94 - Slip sliding away

This is my contribution to this week's Wordzzle. Wordzzle is a game in which each week word lists, used to create stories, are given on the blog Views from Raven's Nest. Participating users post their stories on their own blogs.

This is my entry number 38, for Wordzzle week 94.


Ten Word Challenge:

space cadet,
silver lining,
wood,
turtle soup,
minaret,
ice,
grease,
sales,
mandala,
mug

"Have another mug of turtle soup," she said. "Space Cadets need to keep up their strength."

"Space Cadets are also not supposed to gain weight. Our superiors get mad when we do that. It costs more to send us into space."

"You won't be able to do your best if you're as skinny as a minaret."

"I think one will do, though," he said, putting down the mug. For some reason it seemed terribly greasy. He started chewing on the ice in his drink.

"There's not much nourishment in ice. You should finish your soup."

He reluctantly took another sip from his mug. It didn't taste any better.

"Why couldn't you have gone into sales, or something like that? Then we could have had a normal life."

"I didn't feel like I needed a normal life. There are advantages to this job, you know."

"There don't seem to be many. I do like that mandala they make you wear, though. It's very pretty."

"You mean the Space Cadet emblem? It's very nice, yes, but they give us a different one later on, after we've completed our training."

"Is it better than this one?"

"Some people think so."

"That's good. Now finish off your soup. You need all you can get."

He raised the mug to his lips and finished it off, swallowing it quickly. At least now she would quit nagging him. He set the mug down and put his fists on the table top, feeling very sick now. He looked at the wood grain on the table, and wondered if it should be this close. He realized, then, that his head was leaning down. He thought he should straighten it up, but it seemed like a lot of work.

"The only real silver lining here," she said, "is the insurance policy they give you. It covers death from anything, and pays off an enormous sum. It would be sad to have to use it, though."

He tried to say something, to agree with her, but found himself sliding to the floor.


Mini Challenge:

broken bones,
slide rule,
garbage,
Chinese,
sanguine

"There's a slide rule here," he said. "If you get hurt using the slide, it's your problem."

"That's garbage. The slide attacked me. I have the broken bones to prove it. Is there no responsibility here?"

He looked at me sanguinely. "You did refer to it as being Chinese, like that was a bad thing."

"It has an American name, but it says it was made in China. That sounds deceptive to me."

"It's not deceptive at all. It was upfront about where it was made. If anyone is being deceptive it's you. You don't have any broken bones at all. I'm sure your arm was hanging that way when you came in here."

"It was not! Why, when I came in here I could do anything I wanted with it. I could swing it around my head if I wanted to."

"You could do that now if you wanted to, though you might have to help it out with your other arm."

"I'd rather not. In fact I feel faint even thinking about it. Maybe I'd better just lie down and wait for the ambulance."

"You're nothing but a troublemaker. Get out."

I moved off, grumbling to myself. There was nothing left to do now but fake a fall at the supermarket.


Mega challenge:

space cadet,
silver lining,
wood,
turtle soup,
minaret,
ice,
grease,
sales,
mandala,
mug

broken bones,
slide rule,
garbage,
Chinese,
sanguine

"Sales of turtle soup are not doing well," he observed.

"Maybe it's the broken bones in them."

"Exotic dishes are supposed to be exotic. It adds to the mystery."

"They aren't even turtle bones. They're chicken."

"How can you tell?"

"Some of them have the claws still attached."

"More mystery."

"It's certainly a mystery to me."

"Maybe I should have a block of ice carved into the shape of a minaret, or even a mandala. I could even use frozen grease instead of ice, make it even more notable. Something to bring in the curious."

"It would help if the food weren't so curious."

"I'll have you know I have authentic Chinese dishes, or very nearly authentic Chinese dishes, mixed with other cuisine."

"Your chopsticks aren't even wood. They're made of plastic."

"Yes, but they're made in China."

"What about these mugs with Space Cadets movie scenes on them?"

"They're made in China too, but I can't guarantee that they're authentic."

"What kind of customer are you looking for, exactly?"

"The kind of customer who is interested in something new, who likes the strange, the exotic, who isn't held back because things are a little different." He waved his hand around at the room. "I've tried to make this place different, full of unusual things, things you don't see everywhere else. See, I've even got some ancient Chinese slide rules."

"Those just look like strips of bamboo wired together. Why do they have English numbers on them?"

"How else would you use them?"

"Look, all this stuff is just a bunch of garbage. It's alright to try to be exotic, or strange, or just different, but this is just cheap. I'd like to say there's a silver lining, but there isn't one. There's nothing here at all."

"No, no silver. I do have some nice plastic place mats with silvery designs, though."

"That's what I mean! Nothing in here is real! Everything's fake!"

"Maybe so," he said, sanguinely. "Maybe so." He stirred the turtle soup and poured himself a bowl. "However, if a person believes that they are real, then to that person they are real, and if a person believes that they are fake, then to that person they are fake. I view it, then, as a problem on that person's part, a problem that can possibly yet be corrected. If you see a movie, all kinds of things may happen in it, even fantastic things, and yet some part of you must still believe it, or at least suspend disbelief, in order to appreciate the movie. Even if the acting is bad, and even if some things could have been done better, you must still believe, otherwise it becomes meaningless. We do the same types of things when we read books and stories. If people choose to believe, or choose to want to believe, then things can become real, even if just for a while. Now, I believe I'll have some turtle soup, Would you like to join me?"

After a pause the man said, "I believe I will."

Fun with the DOS prompt

Years ago, back in the 1990s, there was a man who was in charge of a computer network for a business. We worked mostly in DOS back then, and I changed his DOS prompt, which normally gave the drive and directory, to say "A file server could not be found", then a couple of blank lines, then the drive and directory, so it looked like the normal DOS prompt accompanied by an error message. The error message was the same as a real error message that sometimes appeared when there was a problem with a file server or the LAN (Local Area Network). He was there while I did it, so he knew about it, and endured it when it kept appearing on the screen.

Then he went into a program in which the DOS prompt did not appear. He was in there for a while, and when he exited it the fake error message appeared again. His eyes got big as he stared intently at it, then he calmed down and reached for the CTRL-ALT-DELETE keys to reset the computer.

I said, somewhat nervously, "You don't really have to do that."

He said, "Yeah, I know...," while doing it anyway.

Dream - Band of brothers

A long time ago, perhaps around 1973, I dreamed that I was part of a band of brothers, four or five of us in all, who went on a bunch of adventures and defended each other. It was a very long dream, but I didn't write it down at the time, and eventually forgot almost all of it.

The dream ended with us walking together in a field of grass perhaps a foot or so high, somewhere out in the country, in the early morning or early evening. I think everything that we needed to do was completed, at least for now, and what was left was being handled by other people. There would be other things ahead, though, other adventures, and, as the band of brothers, sticking together and defending each other, we would be able to face them when they came. It was a peaceful feeling.

Dream - Me and Mr. Monk

Wednesday, November 19, 2008, probably some time in the morning, I had a dream where we were at my grandmother's house in Arizona. It was night. There was some situation where someone broke into the house through the front door. There was some confrontation involving a few people, some of them neighbors, and the person stole something before leaving. It kept replaying itself, and eventually a woman was injured or killed and left lying in the living room. There were neat small piles of things, in rough short lines perpendicular to the direction of travel, evenly spaced before and after where she was laying.

Eventually, in a replay near the end, Adrian Monk, from the TV show "Monk", showed up. He was called in, I believe, and started to look at the body and the piles of things, head bent down slightly and his hands held up to frame what he was looking at. Everything was still dark. I don't think the lights were turned on in the room. The scene was slightly illuminated, but the light seemed to be coming from somewhere else.

Much more happened in the dream, particularly earlier, but I don't remember it.

Dream - Superheroes on surfboards

Very early Monday morning, September 1, 2008, I had a dream in which I saw some superheroes, one like the TV Superman, on motorized surfboards.

In the dream, I was in Nevada, at least for much of the time. The 1970 green El Camino with white vinyl roof (a car that was partly a small pickup truck) was in an early part of the dream, maybe just when I was in Arizona. I don't think I was driving it later. I was driving back to Nevada now, and I had possibly driven from there to Arizona earlier.

Much later, partway through Nevada, I saw some superheroes on motorized surfboards, one of them like the TV Superman, George Reeves. They were coming or maybe going through a pass cut through a mountain. I was going through that same area back toward Fallon or work. I was still a long ways off, and I think I passed them whether or not they were going my way.

This was a long dream, but I initially didn't write much down. Coming back to it two weeks later I found I couldn't remember very much more, but managed to fill in a little.

Dream - The inflatable boat

Around the end of April or beginning of May, 2008, I had a dream where I was in my bedroom, talking to someone, and I opened a package that I guess had been left there. It was perhaps fifteen or eighteen inches on a side and maybe a couple of inches thick. I was discussing with the other person about what to do with it.

With the wrapper off, it was densely folded heavy plastic. I started unfolding it and pulled some device on the side, activating it. I think it was a spur of the moment thing and I was a little surprised that I did it. The other person was more surprised than I was.

It turned out to be a narrow rubber raft or boat, that was now inflating. I took it out of the bedroom and down the hallway. It was already long enough that it was bumping and bending on things as I took it through the doorway and down the hallway.

In the living room it fully inflated. It was very long but not very wide, and the sides were very small and not very high. I looked at it in amazement. I thought it was a stupid design and would be difficult or impossible to ride in without the part where the person sat getting water in it.

There was more to the dream earlier, but I can't remember it now.


Early in May, no more than a few days after the dream, an issue of Discover magazine came that had a picture of a similar appearing boat, though the appearance of being extremely shallow was an illusion caused by it being very low in the water. It was an interesting coincidence. Perhaps I had a precognition of it in the dream. It was not the only time something like that had happened.