Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
Stalefloof (floofinition) – a position counting as a draw, in which two or more housepets cannot move because of a conceived advantage over the other(s).
In use: “The dog and cat met each morning in a classic stalefloof, standing on either side of the kitchen entrance when Carrie entered the kitchen. The pets refused to move because they didn’t want to miss out on any dropped food.”
You’ve slip into another life, putting on their skins. You pick up on their words. Their thoughts and feelings float into you. You begin to appreciate who they are.
Surroundings emerge. The plot rises. Events become clearer with a sudden squirt. You’ve followed paths that you didn’t know existed. They twist into surprising turns. The characters become deeper than you’d known. Sharper edges develop on their worlds. Their love and pain quickens as their direction grows crisper.
You walk with them, feeling it all, wanting to cry, and sometimes laughing, standing aside as you witness their existence and embrace them. Insights into their relationships develop stronger pulses. Typing and thinking, picking through words, you strive to keep up the best that you can. Their lives and times overpowers yours, and then, you stop for the day and think with a soft, private sigh, I miss them.
And you wonder, will they be okay? What’s going to happen to them?
What’s going to happen?
You think you should know because you’re the writer, the artist behind these ideas, but really, you’re just transcribing. It’s all going on whether you write it down or not.
That’s what happens when you write like crazy.
“Keep the change,” he said, turning away from the cashier.
“You always say that,” his friend said as they walked away as the cashier put the coins into the tip jar and said, “Thank you, sir, your order will be right up.”
“Habit.” The other shrugged. “I don’t want change.”
“But it adds up.”
He was about to reply when his friend said, “Hey.”
As he turned, his friend flipped a silver coin at him. He caught it without thinking, mostly as protection to keep it from hitting his face. Within a second, he raised the coin and looked at it. Seeing it was a nineteen seventy-eight quarter, he said, “Fu — ”
Then he was gone.
Puzzled, his friend blinked at the empty space. He’d lost the thread on what he’d been doing. He’d had a quarter and he’d been thinking…something…
Rubbing his head, he tried to remember. There’d been something there, but where that something had been, it seemed like there was now a hole.
Sighing, he told himself, it’ll come back to him. He was getting old and forgetful, like his parents. Turning, he hunted for a table, sure that he’d forgotten something important, growing less certain that it would ever come back.
Floofmulate (floofinition) – for housepets to gather or pile in a heap.
In use: “Kittens and puppies love to floofmulate, often creating a cuddle-puddle of sleeping little furry bodies.”
Remember the expression, sock it to me? Maybe yes, maybe no. Our culture, especially the pop side, is an ever-changing amoeba. We’ve populated our language with expressions. They catch fire, flash through, and die. Sometimes they’re distantly remembered, especially more often now, as technology aids her ability to look back and remember.
In this case, I thought of sock it to me as part of streaming “It’s Your Thing” to myself. I was singing to myself about the things I do, and the cats for the things that they do, and mentally, to my wife, in regard to the things that she does.
“It’s your thing.” We mostly address life through avenues as individual as ourselves, seeking to do our thing. Sometimes the things seem weird to others. They can’t deviate from their paths and doing their thing to acquire the freedom to understand that you’re doing your thing. If it’s not offensive and not inflicting pain on others, why do they want us all to conform and not do our thing?
So, I want to thank The Isley Brothers for doing their thing and performing this song. They were good at doing their thing, giving us some memorable funk. Sing along. Don’t worry; the words are easy to learn.
Michael Seidel, writer 