Author: Michael Seidel

Science fiction, fantasy, and mystery writer. Singer (sorry, no shows) & nudist (in my home). Beer, cat, cheese, coffee, pie and wine friend. Left IBM and Silicon Valley for the southern Oregon life but I miss the ocean. We're too far inland. Gotta move.

Another Lost Dream

Here I go again. I’m in a military service but it’s again not the USAF in which I served twenty years. Some other dream-imagined service. I was enlisted as in my USAF but very senior. Wherever I went, my rank brought me respect, honor, and VIP treatment. I was a happy camper.

I’d been away. Now I was returning to my base. My base was a huge indoor structure. Civilians lived there as well as military. The structure also housed schools, a mall, shopping, and a train system with several stations.

Arriving back, I’m informed that they changed my rooms. Sorry, but they moved everything for me. My new room number was 316. Oh, no problem, thanks, I’ll go there. I went to where I had been housed, expecting my new room to be part of that area. Wrong; that room wasn’t there. After some fiddling and walking about, I was able to contact the housing officer. Oh, sorry for the mix-up, I’m told, that’s 316 but it’s in another area. Someone is sent to lead me over there.

This is a dream, so this young kid is immediately there. White, lanky, short blonde hair, doesn’t look like he’s ever shaved. He’s in awe of my rank, which actually makes it hard to deal with him. I joke with him to put him at ease as we walk around. We arrive at the correct area. I go to room 316. My stuff isn’t there. Two other, lower-ranked people are there. My assigned handler is appalled; the two in ‘my’ room are alarmed. I want to know where my stuff is. I’m angry at this point. I’ve been traveling; I’ve been moved without prior notice; my stuff is gone; no one seems to know where it is.

I’m given the names of the people who moved me so I can get answers. They’re students in college. Zip, in dream-fashion, I’m in the school part of the structure. Children of all ages are running around from class to class, level to level — there a number of stairs and levels, all under a huge glass dome where sunshine streams in. We walk around, looking for the college section, following signs and directions from people stopping to help us. I learn the three who moved me on are another moving job. My handler and I jump on the train. We’re transported to the mall section. It teems with shoppers. There’s a growers’ market underway as well. All this complicates my search efforts.

At last they’re found. They insist they put my stuff in room 316 in the cited area. My anger grows: I was there and my stuff wasn’t there. The five of us now — three movers, my handler, and me — all round a corner; we’re right back in the housing area where I’m supposed to reside. The two people in room 316 are confronted. Oh, they moved my stuff. Someone gave them permission because I wasn’t there so they thought it would be okay, and this room is much nicer than their assigned room.

The handler takes over as I steam. Arrangements are made to get them out of my room and get my stuff back into it.

Dream end.

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Friday’s Theme Music

Someone used a palette knife to spread white from horizon to horizon over our heads. A few dabs and streaks of black and dark blue were blended in to prompt wonder, will it rain?

It’s Friday, October 1, 2021. Time to turn the page on your calendar. Hold on while I do mine.

It’s also World Smile Day. Let’s give them something to smile about. Sunrise shuffled in at 7:08 AM. It’ll shuffle out as the world turns at about 6:53 PM. While here, warmth that’ll rise all the way to 76 F will be experienced. For now, it’s 56. Air is clear, though, with an AQI of…1. Huzzah!

With all this talk of smiling on the net — did you know that today is World Smile Day? — the morning mental music stream is pulling in songs that feature smiles and smiling as part of its lyrics. After a bit, I thought “Cult of Personality” (1988) fits the need. After all, we’re still suffering in the shadow of a cult of personality here in ‘Murica, where an ex-POTUS’s lies and general BS continues to pollute the political realm and freeze meaningful movement in multiple areas. I posted this Living Colour song back in 2017 as the theme song. I highlighted these lyrics from the song back then:

I sell the things you need to be
I’m the smiling face on your TV
I’m the cult of personality
I exploit you, still you love me
I tell you one and one makes three

They still fit.

Stay positive. Test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and boosters. Here’s the music. Enjoy your day. Smile.

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Interfloofcutor

Interfloofcutor (floofinition) – An animal who takes part in a dialogue or conversation.

In use: “Of course the bird was always an interfloofcutor, whether the conversation was on Zoom, a phone, or in person, but her participation always woke the cats, who also needed to join conversation, which brought out the Husky, who then added his opinions.”

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The Beer Loop

Devil don’t rhyme with evil

But mirror rhymes with beer

Their sounds like there but

Where sounds like wear

and both sound like ware

Which makes it hard to bare

especially if you’re a bear

Care rhymes with stare

which also sounds like stair

They all rhyme with chair

which only seems fair

But the fair offers fare

Which many are willing to share

Except Cher who gets scared

when Donna cuts her hair

Chris is a liar

Who won’t leave his lair

He stares into his drink

And thinks

Devil don’t rhyme with evil

But mirror rhymes with beer

*Inspired by Chris Rodell, who urges you to Use All the Crayons.

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Thursday’s Theme Music

It’s a soft Thursday morning, here in Ashland, Oregon. Blue skies hug the low mountains of changing colors. Cool air — 48 F — hugs our bodies. We expect it to reach the upper seventies today. Looking forward to it.

It’s September 30, 2021. I go through the old rhyme, “Thirty days has September,” confirming, this is the final September day, turning to look at the calendar in confirmation. Yes, September’s last day. It’s hectic in some places: the quarter’s last day. The last day of FY2021 in some realms. Spend the money, get the orders, book ’em, Dano, because the books are going to close. Such an artificial construct, but a critical element of book-keeping, accounting, sales, taxes, and profits and losses.

Sunrise was later yet, an effect felt in the house. Sunrise didn’t arrive until 7:07 AM. Lights were required for activities in different rooms, a dispiriting acknowledgement that the hours of daylight are drawing down. It’s my preference to get up to bright morning sun, like the sun we get in the summer mornings. But I like the fall’s ambiance and temperatures. Its occasional rain. It’s a friendlier season than summer, who can become quite brutal. Sunset will be at 6:54 PM. Too early for my taste, but wait: it’ll be earlier yet tomorrow, and so on, until we ‘fall back’ with our clocks. That takes place November 7 in the U.S. this year.

Today’s theme song arose from reading. I read a NY Times article yesterday evening ‘When the Times Book Review Panned the Classics’. What other doesn’t like reading how critics trashed great books and novelists? One of the books trashed was Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald. That’s also the title of a 1983 Jackson Browne song from an album I enjoyed, Lawyers in Love. My ever waiting mental music stream jumped onto the connection and played it in my head. I thought I’d played it for you.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and vax, if your body can handle it. Some people’s underlying conditions won’t react well to the COVID-19 vaccine. Do it if you can.

Here’s the music. Enjoy.

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Another Dream About Pennies

I dreamed about pennies again. They seem to be a recurring dream theme for me. In this particular one, I was knee deep in shiny new pennies. They were moving like the ocean. Swells of pennies rose and fell. Penny waves lapped against me and broke on my thighs.

I had a pushbroom. I was expected to push the pennies to one side. I laughed at this, saying, “This is crazy. These pennies are like water. How am I supposed to sweep them?” I kept muttering to myself about that and didn’t make much effort at sweeping them. Thinking about how new they appeared and also wanting to feel them — because they moved like water — I scooped up a handful of pennies. I looked at the date on one and saw, 2022. I began looking at as many as I could, searching for other dates. All I found was 2022.

Holding the pushbroom out to one side, I looked across the sea of pennies under a clear, dark blue sky. Far away to one side was a stretch of rising land. The sun just about them, drifting toward setting. I laughed and thought, “This is so cool.”

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Flooflovian

Flooflovian (floofinition) – Relating to classical conditioning conducted by an animal to create a predictable behavioral pattern.

In use: “The rescue cat, Elsa, was a flooflovian master, teaching her new ‘master’ to share her food, surrender her pillow, and generally do as the cat desired, mostly through purrs, gazes, and quiet meows.”

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