Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
Ecfloofsiastical (floofinition) – Of or relating to animals.
In use: “Although laws protecting animals have been established for several decades, the net has been a catalyst for more ecfloofsiastical laws, with growing insistence that these laws also be staunchly enforced.”
Summer’s prelude to summer in Ashlandia has settled into a new weather routine. Blue sky. Plentiful sunshine. Cool, 50s to 60s F, in the morning. Rising to high 70s, low 80s by mid-afternoon. Roll in some clouds. Cue the thunder. Spark some lightning. Now, turn on the rain. Repeat for a few hours.
This is Thursday, June 8, 2023. Yesterday afternoon and evening on the storms squatting on Ashlandia. The climax was a twenty minute deluge of big drops, dense, falling fast and hard. What’s striking about all this lightning (couldn’t resist), thunder, and rain is that it’s so rare for Ashlandia, especially of this intensity, duration, and repetition. But it’s been a growing trend in the last several years. It could be part of a larger cycle and we all just don’t live long enough to experience it, so it strikes us as odd. But it’s also a continuation of an odd weather year.
The cats aren’t pleased. The weather even brought Tucker in, who is usually indifferent to these things. Papi, though, decided the best place to be was with us in a lit room, awakening, waiting, ready to run, and willing to be comforted. Tucker decided that he’d be wherever Papi was.
We’re seeing a lot of deer on our street this week. Two bucks strolling up the street the other evening. Three or four deer — or maybe the same few again and again — wandering around our house and across the street at the neighbors. Well, no recent cougar sightings in our vicinity, so maybe that has something to do with it.
I stood in the front doorway last night, protected by the porch, to watch the rain. Not just watch, but breathe in the fresh petrichor, and enjoy the sounds. Lightning frequently flashed to enliven the experience. As I stood there, The Neurons fired up a 1981 song by The Rolling Stones, “Waiting On A Friend”. Song is still in the morning mental music stream. The Neurons made a good choice. The storm broke me out of my normal routines. The smells and sounds also made me nostalgic for similar times experienced around the world from different phases of life where I was waiting for a friend to arrive as part of our plans to go off somewhere.
Stay positive, and enjoy Thursday as only you can. I have coffee, so I’m pleased for the moment, sipping hot brew, windows breathing in cool air on my back, sunshine slinking around the house, cats wandering in and out to give news updates. Here’s the tune. Love the video’s end, when the band gets up to play in that tiny, tiny space. Cheers
Dreamed about a cougar last night. Yes, it was a gorgeous creature, full grown with impressive fangs, and not an older woman out to seduce me.
I was visiting family, and sometimes the four seemed like RL family. But my dream mind played tricks, shuffling different people in and out, disheveling my thoughts.
The four were in a small and crowded apartment. Wearing a harness and chain, the cougar was their pet. The chain wasn’t short and the cougar could go anywhere in the little space it pleased. Often gazing with intense eyes, its sharp teeth on display, the animal scared the hell out of me.
“Oh, he won’t hurt you,” they told me. “Just feed him.” They threw a chunk of bloody raw meat to the cat, who took it up in its mouth and trotted away behind a sofa.
Two large white dogs were also present. I kept worrying that the cougar would attack and kill one of the dogs. They seemed like they were constantly running away.
“Oh, don’t worry,” the people told me. “That cougar won’t hurt anyone.”
I remained dubious about that, trying to keep attention on the cougar’s location and activities. Then I fed him several times, throwing chunks of raw meat to him. That didn’t seem like enough food for an animal of his size. Eventually the huge carnivore came over and lied down beside me. I petted his muscled body and he purred, prompting me to wonder in the dream, do cougars purr?
Okay, that’s enough, weather wizards. Gonna be 88 later today. Already 70 F. Let’s just put the pause on the rising heat.
Today is Tuesday, 6/6/23. Yesterday afternoon delivered us waves of thunder. When that begins, we eye the horizons and sniff the air, wondering if lightning strikes have started fires anywhere. Then you get on the news and net, searching for reports. Your mind actively engages everything for signs of fire. Is that haze over there? What’s causing that?
So far, so good, though, knock wood, release breath.
When I arrived home yesterday from the writing session, I glanced out to check on Tucker. He likes sleeping out front around the porch where he can move from sun to shadow to warm or cool himself as desired. He was asleep behind the front pillar. Two feet away from him was an adult doe. I let them be, of course, checking every half an hour. I imagine when she first arrived, Tucker quizzed her in floofish — name, species, intentions. She asked him for particulars about this him, this house, and the neighborhood. Then both chilled. Eventually, the thunderboomers seemed to put her on the move.
Papi, of course, was immediately shifted into the house when the thunder came. Papi no like loud noises. Thunder is second only to fireworks on that list.
I have the Thompson Twins with “Doctor Doctor!” rising into the morning mental music stream from 1984. Just came to me as I was puddlin’ around through morning tedium of feeding, eating, dressing. Not a bad song, so I let it stay (as if I have a choice). May as well use it for a theme song.
Stay pos and be comfortable. Hope all works out for you today. Here’s the music. I’m shifting into the kitchen for a little roasted bean water. Cheers
Frontfloof (floofinition) – The animal who stands up to represent other animals as act as figurehead presenting their requests and complaints.
In use: “Three cats, four dogs, two birds, and multiple fish, amphibians, and reptiles, Lemon the goden retriever — named for her habit of stealing lemons and eating them — was the household’s unquestioned frontfloof and their respected enforcer. One woof from her brought treats out and ended fights and arguments.”
FloofsNotes (floofinition) – 1. Abbreviated notes and pamphlets prepared and maintained by animals summarizing people, places, and events.
In use: “The stray didn’t have FloofsNotes so a local floof shared his dog-eared copy. Using it, they were able to find a house where the lady took her in so she could give birth in safety.”
2. Records or notes kept about animals as an aid to people’s knowledge about an animal.
In use: “Adopting two new rescue kittens, Karla immediately invested in a lab notebook to use as FloofsNotes to record the health, activity, and behavior of her new fur friends. They could come in handy if something happened later.”
It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood. Sunshine and blue skies. Presently on the mid side of 60 F, up from 52 F overnight, we’ll be hunting the mid 80s before the sun skirmishes with the falling night and carries us into a new day.
It’s June and Saturday, June 3, 2023, for more exactitude. The cats are loving this weather, right? Mostly out there sleeping in part shade, part sun. Seeing them out there, and I drift through memories. Tucker has always been a little strange about doors. He goes to the linen door, coat closet door, garage door, pantry door. A drawn out merow is issued. His meowing is either very loud or barely a whisper. No midpoint for him. When it’s a loud meow, he draws out the sounds and employs several syllables.
I ask, “What? You want into the <insert location here>?”
Head nod (yes, by him), mumbling mew sounds, a head tilt at the door in question, his look shooting from it to me, back to it, conveying his desire.
Head shake (yes, by me). “Okay, buddy.” Sigh. Door is opened. He heads in for investigation, sometimes dwelling in wherever for fifteen to twenty minutes. He’s old now, a long-furred black and white stray who chose to stay with us, showing up with matted fur and bad teeth almost ten years ago, I think. Need to check the histories to know with certitude. Point is, these demands have been incorporated in his behavior since his first year with us.
The Neurons planted “Happenings Ten Years Time Ago” into the morning mental music stream. 1966 Yardbirds song. Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page on lead guitars, I thought this song was so cool when I first heard it, one of those radio offerings that had me jumping for the radio and reaching for the volume knob. Never heard it much on the radio in the years since. Don’t know when I last listened to it. But this morning, walking out of dream sleep and into the other room to begin standard morning practices, the first lines broke out of memory and into conscious thought.
Meeting people on my way
Seemingly I’ve known one day
Familiarity of things
That my dreaming always brings
Happenings ten years time ago
Situations we really know
But the knowing is in the mind
Sinking deep into the well of time
h/t to AZLyrics.com
Wasn’t long after that before The Neurons delivered the song to a loop in my head. I think it’s a related-to-writing thing. I obsess over time, reality, and questions of what we know vs what happened vs what we think we know is one that in my novel writing. Memory is a mischief maker and history is written by the winners and then revised, leaving many of us floundering about it all. So here we be.
Stay pos. Coffee drinking has commenced. Big old cup is a quarter down already. Goes well with a cool summer morning on the patio, sunshine blazing down, cats washing in the green grass, jay yelling at us all from different perches as he surveys the yard and lands on chairs and trees. Could be a good day, you know?
Here’s the tune. Cheers
The floof is there and then he’s gone,
And then back beside me like a remembered song.
Pleasing me with his looks and presence,
Causing me to give him treats and attention as presents.
So it goes for a number of years,
Feeding him, tending him, addressing worries and fears.
Till it comes, a day so still,
Death has finally broken his will.
And he’s not beside me because he’s gone,
Till my mind brings him back like a remembered song.
Made it to June — June, when a young man’s fancy lightly turns to — well, that depends on the young man. We’re all different you know. Some ask, “What’s love got to do with it?”
Now that I’ve reached June, I’ve set my sights on July. As was said in the military on performance reviews, “Set low goals and failed to achieve them.” A cynic’s coven, they were.
Sunrise was about 5:30 on the AM side of the day and the setting part will be on the B side after 8:30. Temperatures for the nocturnal portion dipped into the mid 40s F but we’ve strutted into the low 60s by now, making our way to the low 80s in Ashlandia. How do you describe a sky this blue, not smudge by dust, smoke, or cloud, just sun-kissed and beckoning?
This, ladies and germs, is Friday, June 2, 2023.
Re-installed the pet door last night for Papi’s use. T’was removed for the winter. Some trepidation clings to the decision. Cougar, you know, seen in these parts. Well, there are several ranging our town’s streets and yards. Wife suggested, “Put the pet door back on so that you can get some sleep.”
“Cougar?” I responded, a one word summary of the six sentences said to remind her of her worries about a cougar getting Papi.
“This will give him an escape route. He can run in through the pet door if he gets scared.”
Sure, in a perfect world, I didn’t answer. That assumes Papi lounges around the back yard, close to him, instead of chasing moonbeams around the block. It also assumes that Tucker doesn’t passive-aggressively sleeps in front of the pet door, blocking it. Whatever. I am like water.
Today’s song is a product of glancing at the TV and seeing something. That something — I don’t know what it was — prompted The Neurons to select Dire Straits and “Lady Writer” (1979) from the memory bins and play it through the night. It still plays in the morning mental music stream, a classic DS sound to me. Catchy tune, upbeat, with intriguing words. Hope it stirs something for you.
Speaking of stirring, I’m stirring to get some java. The coffee low level light is blinking, and a top-off is the cure. Stay pos and bounce into the weekend, wherever your are and doing. Here are the lads and the song.
Cheers
Floofnata (floofinition) – Song composed by an animal, typically with three or four movements, traditionally performed at night, when others are sleeping.
In use: “As usual, three in the morning came, and Biscuit began her floofnata, awakening everyone else in the house who began shouting at her to stop.”
Michael Seidel, writer 