Too many drugs. In most of his realities, Raymond Eawest hated drugs, and he was full of too many drugs. Or something worse? A demon? In me, a righteous man? Too many realities. Too much time. They've drugged me for too long. Can't think. Can't make these worlds fit together. No. One world. One God. Joe is my son and I'll raise him right. No, he's grown up. It's the future? Ten years? A billion? Am I just a puppet for a mad scientist? My head hurts so much. I can't keep track of this. I don't know which is when. I don't know the order to prevent. How painfully tepid can this ice get? Why is the grass in the park so foamy?
Raymond screamed. Suddenly, everyone died.
A new story began—or was it still the same?
Saturday, November 4, 2017
Tuesday, July 25, 2017
Mama Bran
Joe the Hefty sat at the bar. He may or may not have been in Limbo, but there was a dude who looked like a young Lemmy tending bar and boy, Joe felt as if he were on a cloud. He saw another Joe across the crowded room, talking to a Katryn, and a guy who looked a lot like his friend José, but that was like, totally impossible. On the dance floor, a swarthy, lanky older gentleman danced with a young red headed woman. She seemed like she was young enough to be his daughter yet looked upon him like she might a hot young stud. Joe the Hefty wished in vain that he wasn't so HEFTY. His current situation was an archetypical American nightmare. A wife who loathed his touch and was convinced he had failed her and was little more than a sometimes amiable female roommate and of course, wonderful mother to his boys, Bobby and Enrique, and the flea tortured cat, Moses.
Joe ordered another beer and watched the couple dance, wistfully remembering former romantic escapades and withering in his longing and pain.
How desperate he must have become, to put his heart in the hands of such a woman. His ignominious death as a proud and lone bachelor was complete with the utter failure of his first marriage. After all, he had told himself that this time it would be different than all the girlfriends who had both worn out their novelty and grown sick of him, whom he'd cast off to look for new quarry in the deep sea of young and available nubile ripe-fer-pickin lusciousness. He had told himself that the woman he chose to procreate with would totally understand and love him and that there would be this great harmony. Instead his great worrisome fear had come to pass and he had become his short tempered father, and now he was getting a D-I-V-O-R-C-E. What's worse was that he had let her sabotage his soul. He ordered a shot of bourbon.
A young black lady with an enormous fro sat right next to him. He dared not look at her. His lust had destroyed his fucking life. He hated life and wanted to die. The very worst part was that his music was suffering. His very drive to be a creator was drying up, replaced by a blank blackness, a depression that was deeper than that sea of poon that he so longed to get back to. Joe the Hefty really feared that his heart really would break. He lamented the fact that his wife would not even care if he died. He was saddled with responsibilities and enormous debt, and in a dead marriage that was literally sucking the fucking life out of him.
Just then the foxy Cleopatra at his side spoke up.
"Hey, baby. Whass yo name? I'm Mama Brain".
Joe was lost in his thoughts and misheard her.
"Did you say 'Mama Bran'?"
Just then, Dougie walked in.
Joe ordered another beer and watched the couple dance, wistfully remembering former romantic escapades and withering in his longing and pain.
How desperate he must have become, to put his heart in the hands of such a woman. His ignominious death as a proud and lone bachelor was complete with the utter failure of his first marriage. After all, he had told himself that this time it would be different than all the girlfriends who had both worn out their novelty and grown sick of him, whom he'd cast off to look for new quarry in the deep sea of young and available nubile ripe-fer-pickin lusciousness. He had told himself that the woman he chose to procreate with would totally understand and love him and that there would be this great harmony. Instead his great worrisome fear had come to pass and he had become his short tempered father, and now he was getting a D-I-V-O-R-C-E. What's worse was that he had let her sabotage his soul. He ordered a shot of bourbon.
A young black lady with an enormous fro sat right next to him. He dared not look at her. His lust had destroyed his fucking life. He hated life and wanted to die. The very worst part was that his music was suffering. His very drive to be a creator was drying up, replaced by a blank blackness, a depression that was deeper than that sea of poon that he so longed to get back to. Joe the Hefty really feared that his heart really would break. He lamented the fact that his wife would not even care if he died. He was saddled with responsibilities and enormous debt, and in a dead marriage that was literally sucking the fucking life out of him.
Just then the foxy Cleopatra at his side spoke up.
"Hey, baby. Whass yo name? I'm Mama Brain".
Joe was lost in his thoughts and misheard her.
"Did you say 'Mama Bran'?"
Just then, Dougie walked in.
Monday, April 10, 2017
Intermezzo: Flat Surfaces
Flat Surfaces
I see illusions on flat surfaces.
Big, small, far, near.
They bring me things that aren’t real.
They bring me things that are realer than real.
I see Pliny on flat surfaces.
True glory resides in flat surfaces.
It is cold outside of them.
I shiver like the ancients.
In flat surfaces it is neither hot nor cold.
I see illusions on flat surfaces.
Big, small, far, near.
They bring me things that aren’t real.
They bring me things that are realer than real.
I see Pliny on flat surfaces.
True glory resides in flat surfaces.
It is cold outside of them.
I shiver like the ancients.
In flat surfaces it is neither hot nor cold.
Thursday, March 16, 2017
Tape's Runnin'
"Tape's running," announced Klaus.
He had been working feverishly on some sort of plan since ten minutes after coming back from dreamland. Nobody could make out what it was. Nobody could make out half of what he was saying, either. And when they could, it didn't make much sense. Like now. It was true that he was standing at the analog deck though, and the tape probably was running. The whole time he'd been doing this, Ralf and Florian had been debating on the why's and what's, and bit by bit after turning down each others' other theories, they were pretty sure he wanted to record a song. Maybe all three of them together, maybe Klaus'd stay at the deck. They weren't sure.
Now Ralf couldn't hold back his curiosity any more. "Is this... is, uh, song - izzissong called 'Tape's runnin,' or y'just we're - mean we're starting soon?"
As far as Florian could tell, Klaus' mumbled response was halfway between both expected answers, like "Truhhoon" or something. Flo was tired of waiting; he sighed and picked up an acoustic guitar that was lying around listlessly, as acoustic guitars in electronic musicians' secret hideaway studios tend to do. Flo was slightly less shitty at this instrument than the other two... in Flo's opinion. He underestimated himself, and his improv was fairly pretty. It seemed to be what Klaus wanted, too. Ralf started improvising a renaissancey melody in what seemed to be French. Flo wondered if it was good French or shitty, and if it *was* shitty, whether that was pretend shittiness like with Ralf's German (which was pretty good when he wasn't pretending to be crap at it). Klaus meanwhile seemed to be content to run the sound board. Or more like, obsessed with it. Maybe he thought it was a computer game.
Just then, the doorbell rang. "Who the hell?" Flo thought. Practically nobody knew about this place but them. All was explained when, without waiting for Flo to answer, the impatient Flo outside the door jangled the key from his pocket and rushed in. "We've got -"
"Tape's runnin'," noted Klaus, still wrassling the sound board unfazed.
"Is this... is, uh, song - izzissong called 'Tape's runnin,' or y'just we're - mean we're starting soon?" wondered Flo 2 aloud. Flo 1 went back to his guitar playing... he figured it'd be for the best. Ralf was too focused on his French Renaissance "scat" to have even noticed anything odd.
A Klaus 2 rushed in past Flo 2, mumbling "Tuhrroon" as he continued towards the sound board. Klaus 1 nodded approvingly and then, for as much as he showed any emotion at all, seemed to look relieved.
Ralf 2 arrived too of course, at a leisurely stroll. This Ralf wasn't singing; he had a battery-powered effects board and wasn't afraid to use it. His improv began immediately and tended towards the percussive.
Flo 2 carefully closed the door behind him, making sure there was no-one in the entry corridor, and then reached into his nose. For long, disgusting seconds he pulled out nothing but snot, but at the end of the string was a tiny Mama Brain. He dropped her at arm's length like a sponge in a really roomy shower when you're very, very high and dropping your sponge at arm's length with an air of importance seems like a momentous thing to do. She inflated to normal size gracefully, unfolding straight to the ground. She looked impatient. She looked impatiently at Klaus 2.
"Tape's runnin'," said Klaus 2 with a distant look as he distractedly reached into his nose with one hand as the other still slaved away at the deck, and then dropped a tiny Glenn Danzig gracelessly from a snotty umbilical cord at arm's length.
Stumbling a bit from his clumsy, slimy fall, Danzig looked up at Klaus 2, saying, "Is this... is, uh, song - izzissong called 'Tape's runnin,' or y'just we're - mean we're starting soon?"
"Tuhrroon," mumbled Ralf 2, laying off the effects board for a bit.
All seven of the other faces in the room turned to stare at him.
He had been working feverishly on some sort of plan since ten minutes after coming back from dreamland. Nobody could make out what it was. Nobody could make out half of what he was saying, either. And when they could, it didn't make much sense. Like now. It was true that he was standing at the analog deck though, and the tape probably was running. The whole time he'd been doing this, Ralf and Florian had been debating on the why's and what's, and bit by bit after turning down each others' other theories, they were pretty sure he wanted to record a song. Maybe all three of them together, maybe Klaus'd stay at the deck. They weren't sure.
Now Ralf couldn't hold back his curiosity any more. "Is this... is, uh, song - izzissong called 'Tape's runnin,' or y'just we're - mean we're starting soon?"
As far as Florian could tell, Klaus' mumbled response was halfway between both expected answers, like "Truhhoon" or something. Flo was tired of waiting; he sighed and picked up an acoustic guitar that was lying around listlessly, as acoustic guitars in electronic musicians' secret hideaway studios tend to do. Flo was slightly less shitty at this instrument than the other two... in Flo's opinion. He underestimated himself, and his improv was fairly pretty. It seemed to be what Klaus wanted, too. Ralf started improvising a renaissancey melody in what seemed to be French. Flo wondered if it was good French or shitty, and if it *was* shitty, whether that was pretend shittiness like with Ralf's German (which was pretty good when he wasn't pretending to be crap at it). Klaus meanwhile seemed to be content to run the sound board. Or more like, obsessed with it. Maybe he thought it was a computer game.
Just then, the doorbell rang. "Who the hell?" Flo thought. Practically nobody knew about this place but them. All was explained when, without waiting for Flo to answer, the impatient Flo outside the door jangled the key from his pocket and rushed in. "We've got -"
"Tape's runnin'," noted Klaus, still wrassling the sound board unfazed.
"Is this... is, uh, song - izzissong called 'Tape's runnin,' or y'just we're - mean we're starting soon?" wondered Flo 2 aloud. Flo 1 went back to his guitar playing... he figured it'd be for the best. Ralf was too focused on his French Renaissance "scat" to have even noticed anything odd.
A Klaus 2 rushed in past Flo 2, mumbling "Tuhrroon" as he continued towards the sound board. Klaus 1 nodded approvingly and then, for as much as he showed any emotion at all, seemed to look relieved.
Ralf 2 arrived too of course, at a leisurely stroll. This Ralf wasn't singing; he had a battery-powered effects board and wasn't afraid to use it. His improv began immediately and tended towards the percussive.
Flo 2 carefully closed the door behind him, making sure there was no-one in the entry corridor, and then reached into his nose. For long, disgusting seconds he pulled out nothing but snot, but at the end of the string was a tiny Mama Brain. He dropped her at arm's length like a sponge in a really roomy shower when you're very, very high and dropping your sponge at arm's length with an air of importance seems like a momentous thing to do. She inflated to normal size gracefully, unfolding straight to the ground. She looked impatient. She looked impatiently at Klaus 2.
"Tape's runnin'," said Klaus 2 with a distant look as he distractedly reached into his nose with one hand as the other still slaved away at the deck, and then dropped a tiny Glenn Danzig gracelessly from a snotty umbilical cord at arm's length.
Stumbling a bit from his clumsy, slimy fall, Danzig looked up at Klaus 2, saying, "Is this... is, uh, song - izzissong called 'Tape's runnin,' or y'just we're - mean we're starting soon?"
"Tuhrroon," mumbled Ralf 2, laying off the effects board for a bit.
All seven of the other faces in the room turned to stare at him.
Saturday, February 18, 2017
Cody Code Code
It was September of 1980, and Cody StandingBear was stoned immaculate. He had taken peyote a few times, and experimented with different blending of dosages of several hallucinogens before, but this time was different. This time he had perfected it.
He wrote at a blazing speed, slipping in and out of shorthand, his mind a whir of sensations and thoughts. Another verse done. Then another. Another. It lasted for about 7 hours, until he passed out of exhaustion. When he woke up fourteen hours later he would discover in the pages he'd written a code that he couldn't remember how to break. Nor could he remember the special psychedelic recipe that had put him so perfectly in the zone.
The song was lengthy, but brilliant in its lyrical perfection and the message... Cody felt like his mind would pop. It was the most excruciating sense of tip-of-the-tongue/deja vu he'd ever felt. It was worse than right before he'd broken the Enigma code so many years back. All he knew for sure was that he had to hide this somehow. He had to make this song seem like it wasn't what it was.
He had an idea, which in his drug-hung-over brain seemed reasonable. He could subliminally feed the code to Joe, then destroy all physical copies. "Teach" the song to him when he wasn't aware he was being taught. But how?
After much brainstorming he decided upon reprogramming Joe's brand spanking new Pacman console with the cipher. He just needed to meet with a little boy named José, who happened to be the state's best player of Pacman-- well, the best player as a video game tester. Being a game tester in 1980 was probably the most cool and awesome way to get paid money.
He wrote at a blazing speed, slipping in and out of shorthand, his mind a whir of sensations and thoughts. Another verse done. Then another. Another. It lasted for about 7 hours, until he passed out of exhaustion. When he woke up fourteen hours later he would discover in the pages he'd written a code that he couldn't remember how to break. Nor could he remember the special psychedelic recipe that had put him so perfectly in the zone.
The song was lengthy, but brilliant in its lyrical perfection and the message... Cody felt like his mind would pop. It was the most excruciating sense of tip-of-the-tongue/deja vu he'd ever felt. It was worse than right before he'd broken the Enigma code so many years back. All he knew for sure was that he had to hide this somehow. He had to make this song seem like it wasn't what it was.
He had an idea, which in his drug-hung-over brain seemed reasonable. He could subliminally feed the code to Joe, then destroy all physical copies. "Teach" the song to him when he wasn't aware he was being taught. But how?
After much brainstorming he decided upon reprogramming Joe's brand spanking new Pacman console with the cipher. He just needed to meet with a little boy named José, who happened to be the state's best player of Pacman-- well, the best player as a video game tester. Being a game tester in 1980 was probably the most cool and awesome way to get paid money.
Friday, February 3, 2017
Mezzotinte: Joe Writes a TripAdvisor Review
Having been unattended to for so long, Future Joe found the boundaries of his existence beginnning to blur.
When he came to, he was a Co-creator. But rather than feeling all-powerful as he expected, he was just another weak mortal... merely living temporarily in a life that generated his own.
He found himself sitting down to a computer and visiting an Internet site, "Tripadvisor.com."
He felt compelled to write a review for his favorite restaurant. Since it didn't have an entry on Tripadvisor yet, he had to create it.
Then he wrote this review.
"Title of your review:
Get there before the (other) hipsters do!
Your review:
You've read this review, but now you're not so sure. You've just walked past a sex shop, and, because you're secretly a local and not an Erasmus student or whatever, your ears perk up when you realize that you've just passed the door into the once-notorious snakepit of U Hada, long a haunt of Brno's lamplight lowlifes.
But you press on. You're rewarded by a restaurant that was recently a bit ungemütlich, but now is just perfect... or is it? It isn't, and that's perfect. In any case, there's pho in it.
Let's talk about that.
Pho is the #1 reason why my countrymen shouldn't have been dropping bombs on the Vietnamese. Good pho is divine. The pho here is good.
Over time the friendly staff has learned to serve the pho with two napkins and not one, but pop over to the bathroom before you start and take two more. (I wish I took my own advice here.) Then plop half the insanely hot pepper you're served into your pho, and squeeze in a third of your lemon. Put in the other half of the pepper halfway in if you're not too chicken (although chicken is one of the options, alongside beef and chicken/beef), and portion out the lemon similarly. Order a beer to help put out the fire, because you're only human.
The fire is key to the pho, because spicy food makes your body release endorphins, and endorphins are drugs, and drugs are good. Enough said on that.
The reason why you are eating here and not in a crappy pho place like the new one at the foot of Masaryk street is because you've read this review and it told you to go here, and the reason it tells you to go here is heart. This place is visibly a family-and-friends affair, with a few rough edges, just how you like it. Maybe there's birthday-party decorations up; maybe loud cheesy music from the super-secret-treehouse music club is outcompeting the normal cheesy music. (Xin cam on!) Whatever's unusual this time, it's all part of your guarantee that nothing is guaranteed, and that is what you want.
Also, you're kind of poor, or just thrifty, and the 99-119 prices for food that would cost 30% more elsewhere are right up your alley.
Besides the phos, you'll find several other dishes, such as beef with rice noodles (delicious, more filling than it looks, and as spicy as the handy Sriracha bottle on your table will make it) and the ever-mysterious Thing With the Fish Sauce, whose name my mind has rejected out of the trauma surrounding it. That trauma comes from the taste (which lots of people love) and
the fact that I can never eat it in the Right Way, which always brings great concern to the face of the waitress, which makes me sad.
If the above has left you a bit "ehhh..." and you'd like to spend somewhat more money and get treated like a king, then go to Go (Běhounská 4) instead. You'll love it.
If you want a crappy McDonalds-like Vietnamese experience, then I can strongly recommend the place at the bottom of Masarykova instead. (But seriously, what's wrong with you?)"
When he came to, he was a Co-creator. But rather than feeling all-powerful as he expected, he was just another weak mortal... merely living temporarily in a life that generated his own.
He found himself sitting down to a computer and visiting an Internet site, "Tripadvisor.com."
He felt compelled to write a review for his favorite restaurant. Since it didn't have an entry on Tripadvisor yet, he had to create it.
Then he wrote this review.
"Title of your review:
Get there before the (other) hipsters do!
Your review:
You've read this review, but now you're not so sure. You've just walked past a sex shop, and, because you're secretly a local and not an Erasmus student or whatever, your ears perk up when you realize that you've just passed the door into the once-notorious snakepit of U Hada, long a haunt of Brno's lamplight lowlifes.
But you press on. You're rewarded by a restaurant that was recently a bit ungemütlich, but now is just perfect... or is it? It isn't, and that's perfect. In any case, there's pho in it.
Let's talk about that.
Pho is the #1 reason why my countrymen shouldn't have been dropping bombs on the Vietnamese. Good pho is divine. The pho here is good.
Over time the friendly staff has learned to serve the pho with two napkins and not one, but pop over to the bathroom before you start and take two more. (I wish I took my own advice here.) Then plop half the insanely hot pepper you're served into your pho, and squeeze in a third of your lemon. Put in the other half of the pepper halfway in if you're not too chicken (although chicken is one of the options, alongside beef and chicken/beef), and portion out the lemon similarly. Order a beer to help put out the fire, because you're only human.
The fire is key to the pho, because spicy food makes your body release endorphins, and endorphins are drugs, and drugs are good. Enough said on that.
The reason why you are eating here and not in a crappy pho place like the new one at the foot of Masaryk street is because you've read this review and it told you to go here, and the reason it tells you to go here is heart. This place is visibly a family-and-friends affair, with a few rough edges, just how you like it. Maybe there's birthday-party decorations up; maybe loud cheesy music from the super-secret-treehouse music club is outcompeting the normal cheesy music. (Xin cam on!) Whatever's unusual this time, it's all part of your guarantee that nothing is guaranteed, and that is what you want.
Also, you're kind of poor, or just thrifty, and the 99-119 prices for food that would cost 30% more elsewhere are right up your alley.
Besides the phos, you'll find several other dishes, such as beef with rice noodles (delicious, more filling than it looks, and as spicy as the handy Sriracha bottle on your table will make it) and the ever-mysterious Thing With the Fish Sauce, whose name my mind has rejected out of the trauma surrounding it. That trauma comes from the taste (which lots of people love) and
the fact that I can never eat it in the Right Way, which always brings great concern to the face of the waitress, which makes me sad.
If the above has left you a bit "ehhh..." and you'd like to spend somewhat more money and get treated like a king, then go to Go (Běhounská 4) instead. You'll love it.
If you want a crappy McDonalds-like Vietnamese experience, then I can strongly recommend the place at the bottom of Masarykova instead. (But seriously, what's wrong with you?)"
Friday, January 20, 2017
Giggy Smile
"Barth." (Joe.)
Barth blushed and smiled as he stumbled in the door.
Joe and Barth had their own name for it, the giggy smile, for that smile they got when a gig was about to start (Joe on banjo, Barth on synths) and they had no idea what they were doing and people always loved their concerts and they never knew why and they were shaking inside and had no idea how they would start and they needed to put on a good face because there was an audience out there!
"Barth, the last time I saw you was just before the Towers fell. Now we're in *Iraq*. Where have you BEEN motherfucker?!" Tearing up, Joe hugged Barth.
"He got me."
"No way." Joe let go, arms limp, deadly serious now. "And you're alive and you look like this? Normal, I mean?"
"I... think I'm OK. I lied to him a lot. He certainly gave me time enough. It's been weeks, right?"
"You're not OK, Barth, it's been months, lots of months! Uhh... what did you lie to him?"
"Every... every flavor of the rainbow. He was so *pissed*. If anybody ever grills him for information on me, he'll be so confused. *They'll* be so confused.
"Like what? Like what?"
"Like, uhh... Like, he really wanted to know how you and I met, right? And I told him we met on a hunting trip a few years back. And I told him that we met when we were eleven. And I told him that he introduced you to me, and I was really disappointed in him for forgetting. I got beat a *lot* for that one."
Barth briefly lifted up his shirt in back. ("Holy shit. No shit," thought Joe.)
"And I told him that I didn't know a guy named Joe and I didn't know what he was talking about. And I told him that I'm a tranny and you picked me up because that was your fetish. I had my own special personality set up for that one and everything. And three or four more. And that was just for that question. I had just as many for every other question too. The hard part was keeping the rotation as random as I wanted. It's a good thing he never swept my cell... lots of dirt and twigs to scratch out the order with."
Calmer again, full of relief and wonder - "But why are you smiling your giggy smile?"
"Joe... you know... I'm always performing for you. I'm always performing for all my friends. For Katryn too. Damn she's gonna be so mad I visited you first... And especially no. I feel like whatever I say, it'll be another lie..."
"I'm the same, Bart, I'm the same. In all of it." He was crying now, hugging again. "But you know our audiences have always loved us."
They both smiled, and both they knew it without needing to see it.
Barth blushed and smiled as he stumbled in the door.
Joe and Barth had their own name for it, the giggy smile, for that smile they got when a gig was about to start (Joe on banjo, Barth on synths) and they had no idea what they were doing and people always loved their concerts and they never knew why and they were shaking inside and had no idea how they would start and they needed to put on a good face because there was an audience out there!
"Barth, the last time I saw you was just before the Towers fell. Now we're in *Iraq*. Where have you BEEN motherfucker?!" Tearing up, Joe hugged Barth.
"He got me."
"No way." Joe let go, arms limp, deadly serious now. "And you're alive and you look like this? Normal, I mean?"
"I... think I'm OK. I lied to him a lot. He certainly gave me time enough. It's been weeks, right?"
"You're not OK, Barth, it's been months, lots of months! Uhh... what did you lie to him?"
"Every... every flavor of the rainbow. He was so *pissed*. If anybody ever grills him for information on me, he'll be so confused. *They'll* be so confused.
"Like what? Like what?"
"Like, uhh... Like, he really wanted to know how you and I met, right? And I told him we met on a hunting trip a few years back. And I told him that we met when we were eleven. And I told him that he introduced you to me, and I was really disappointed in him for forgetting. I got beat a *lot* for that one."
Barth briefly lifted up his shirt in back. ("Holy shit. No shit," thought Joe.)
"And I told him that I didn't know a guy named Joe and I didn't know what he was talking about. And I told him that I'm a tranny and you picked me up because that was your fetish. I had my own special personality set up for that one and everything. And three or four more. And that was just for that question. I had just as many for every other question too. The hard part was keeping the rotation as random as I wanted. It's a good thing he never swept my cell... lots of dirt and twigs to scratch out the order with."
Calmer again, full of relief and wonder - "But why are you smiling your giggy smile?"
"Joe... you know... I'm always performing for you. I'm always performing for all my friends. For Katryn too. Damn she's gonna be so mad I visited you first... And especially no. I feel like whatever I say, it'll be another lie..."
"I'm the same, Bart, I'm the same. In all of it." He was crying now, hugging again. "But you know our audiences have always loved us."
They both smiled, and both they knew it without needing to see it.
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