I’m a big gulp fan. I usually have one a night. Sometimes, though, if it’s a fresh bottle of a favorite pinot noir or red blend, I’ll have two big gulps, or even three.
Floofburger
Floofburger (floofinition) human food prepared for and served to housepets; (slang) an affectionate term for a pet who begs for or steals human food.
In use: “When he grilled his chicken kebabs, he always planned a floofburger, grilling a special kebab for the cats. They started begging for it as soon as it hit the grill.”
Catching Wind
I encountered a friend last night. “How’s your writing going?” he asked. I’m paraphrasing the conversation.
As I’d been socializing more, I’d created an elevator answer for that question. “Great. Finished writing a series of five books last year, and then I edited and revised them, completing that at the end of the year, wrote a synopsis of the first novel, and compiled a list of agents for submission. Meanwhile, I’ve started writing a new novel.”
“You’re already writing another book? Don’t you need to take a break?”
“No. Writing is a pleasure. I didn’t need a break. Starting a new novel is always energizing.”
“How do you come up with ideas?”
“There are always ideas. Ideas come on from watching animals, the weather, people’s voices, expressions, and stories, newspaper articles, new inventions, dreams, reading, watching television, movies, music. Deciding which one to pursue is the challenge.”
“How do you decide?”
“It’s really about which one catches the wind and takes off. I don’t make a conscious decision about what to work on so much as I start writing. Then it comes out.”
Thinking about that today as I finish my day of writing like crazy, I reflect on all the story, novel, play, and musical ideas locked up in my mind, wondering which will ever be realized. I think if I physically could, I’d be writing twenty-four hours a day to satisfy my imagination and muses, and that still might not be enough.
Ironically, I dislike socializing. Socializing is an energy thief. It requires that I carve time out, set it aside, and focus on being polite, friendly, and speaking with others. All that is exhausting. Yet, inconveniently, socializing stimulates my writing ideas. Listening to people, watching them, and breaking out of my routines fire new ideas. There’s always a catch, isn’t there?
Now, sadly, time to stop once again. Bummer.
An Infuriating Dream
While most of last night’s dreams are strong enough to recall, one dream remains a tantalizing sliver. In it, I was either told or decided – not certain of which – to go to a certain website. The website has four words in its name. The dream is creeping as slowly as the time between since the last season of Game of Thrones, tantalizing me with just…a little…more…about every hour.
Then I’ll stop and think and almost have it, only to lose it.
It’s maddening. Out, out, damn dream.
Flooforous
Flooforous (floofintion) – a pleasant sound made by a housepet.
In use: “Daisy’s flooforous barking announced how happy the golden retriever was to see him.”
Susan Also Said
Yep.
Mewincholy
Mewincholy (floofinition) – a housecat’s sound of pensive sadness, often with no discernible cause.
In use: “Sitting in the living room, not far from him as he read his book, his cat released a a deep mewincholy, breaking his focus. “What is it?” he asked, staring at his fur friend. In response, she turned to him and unleashed a softer rendition of the same sound.”
Tuesday’s Theme Music
Once again, a debt is owed to the house clowder for coming up with a song. One cat was briefly absent, prompting me to say, “Where have you gone?” That was enough to let “Good Thing” (1989) by Fine Young Cannibals shoot into the morning stream. The cat turned up almost immediately after I began singing the song. My cats are always curious about me when I start talking, singing, or typing, apparently thinking, “What’s that sound he’s making? I better go check on him to see if he’s okay.”
Eye Drops
Leaning back, he let loose with one drop, shifted to the other eye and let drop again, as he’d done every day for decades.
After a moment, he realized he’d dropped both into his mouth, and laughed. How silly he was getting as he got older.
It wasn’t so funny the next time he did it.
But the third time…well, the third time, it wasn’t even noticed.
The Bathroom Incident
A bathroom at last. Now he knew how his father felt, and his uncle, having to take a piss, asking with a fast, low voice almost everywhere they went, as soon as they arrived, “Excuse me, where’s the bathroom? Is it near? I need to go, like now.”
And now it was him, just like them. Had to be genetics. More than pissing, though, he had to do a dump. Sitting on the commode, he sighed relief as his body did its thing, and mourned what he was seeing of his future.
He’d forgotten his phone. “Fuck?” For real? Where the fuck? What the fuck? Where? When? Shaking his head, he farted and grunted and stared at the floor in concentration.
The floor…was kind of cool, like those photos NASA or someone put of nebulae on it. His uncle was always pointing things out to him about space, using an app on his phone to show him constellations and nebulae from the bubble telescope. “That’s the crab nebula. See how it looks like a crab?”
No, Dylan never saw how it looked like a crab, but the floor looked like it had nebulae. His uncle would love this fucking floor. One possible nebula looked like a friggin’ crow outlined with stars, and another —
Reaching for the T.P., he stared, eyes growing wider. That fucking thing looked like a dragon nebula, like a dragon flying through space, like a profile of a friggin’ giant dragon flyin’ through space on ginormous friggin’ wings.
Holy shit, the dragon nebula changed.
The dragon nebula was facing him.
The dragon nebula…was growing larger. He could see its wings flapping. In seconds, Dylan made out its heads, its teeth, its eyes.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Dylan scrambled to wipe his ass, pull up his underwear and pants — and flush — all at the same time so that he could leave, leave, leave, because that friggin’ giant dragon nebula —
“Is here,” he said in a whimper, pants still down.
The dragon’s head burst up out of the floor. Falling back, Dylan said, “Fuck,” not noticing that his hand went into the toilet as he fell backward. The head was soon huge, breaking the walls out. A long fucking neck followed. As it rose, breaking through the roof, he heard people screaming. Then he was looking at the beast’s pale, scaly chest. He wanted to scream but he had no air in him. All he could do was gawp, except the smell was such a stench, like the bear’s slobber on his backpack once when the bear stole it when he was camping out. He wanted to puke but he didn’t want to move. He couldn’t move.
“Hey,” he heard.
The dragon was speaking to him.
“Hey,” he heard again. “Up here.”
Dylan looked further up. No, the dragon was looking down at him, but above the dragon’s head was a girl’s head, or maybe it was a dragon’s head, maybe the dragon had a second, human head, or some strange shit. Whatever the fuck?
The girl was smiling at him.
“Hey,” she said. “You okay?”
“Where’d you come from?” Dylan said.
“There.” She pointed at the floor. “Want to ride a dragon?”
Calmness washed through Dylan. “Sure,” he said. “Fuckin’ right.” He was going to ride a dragon. Fuckin’ right.
But first, he was going to wash his hand.
