Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
When he came in, none noticed him. He drifted from table to table, touching others’ food and drinks with impunity, giving them little “Boops” on their noses like he was playing with children. He hung around awhile as others came and went, not doing anything but loitering, and not taking up much space.
They didn’t know him then but they soon learned who he was. It was always that way with a virus.
Infloofherent (floofinition) – Lacking normal clarity or intelligibility in behavior or action in an animal.
In use: “Kitties and puppies were great joy to watch because they seemed so infloofherent, jumping and pouncing in one direction, threatening and attacking another before racing off as though frightened. The little girl loved it, the beginning of a joy she’d have for the rest of her life.”
Floofmarine (floofinition) – An animal who likes to burrow under things.
In use: “The dog proved to be a regular floofmarine, stealing under the covers and finding a space alongside their legs as soon as they were in bed and the lights were off.”
She dissuades me from speaking in a thousand ways
and then asks me why I have not much to say.
Two dreams stayed with me from last night. The first was short and simple. The second was like a movie.
My wife and I came outside in the first dream. I’d helped a neighbor with something. When we came out of the house, we saw that our landscaping was trimmed, cleaned up, and weeded. We guessed that the neighbor, who had their landscaping done professionally, had their landscaper come over and take are of our lawn as a gesture of thanks. After checking it out, we went back into the house, then came back out and saw that more landscaping had been done. It looked great, and we commented on that.
The dream ended.
The next one was like a movie. I didn’t appear to be in it. It was all about a race of dark-skinned, golden-tone people. Slim and muscular, they were beautiful.
Living in the mountains, they struck me as amazingly civilized and cultured. While I was watching them, I was torn between whether this was on Earth or another planet, and whether the people I watched were humans or another species.
With a bright, hot sun burning down on us, I followed a man and woman. They seemed to be high-ranking officials, but not the ultimate rulers. Wearing a speedo and a bikini respectively, they were on some kind of cursory inspection, talking about what had been done and what needed to be done.
As they finished, they came to the top of a tall, narrow waterfall. People swam in a pool of water stories below this vantage. As they were watching, the woman stumbled. After saying, “Oh, shit,” she began plunging over the waterfall. While that was happening, the man said, “You’ll be okay, just turn it into a dive,” which the woman was already changing her body to do. As she arced down in a graceful dive, the man continued in a conversational tone, just remember to hit the water shallow, and then angle up to avoid the steps.”
I was following the woman’s dive and saw her slip into the water, then rise up over some stairs that were under the water (she stayed underwater ), and then continued gracefully swimming.
The man said, “Yes, there, you did it. I knew you could.”
The dream ended.
Puzzle number five (the Casablanca movie poster) has become Schrödinger’s puzzle for me. With such limited colors (mostly sepia, brown, lighter brown, darker brown, tan, and beige) and ill-defined shapes, it’s a plodding process of trying pieces. Hence, Schrödinger’s puzzle: will this piece fit? You don’t know until it try, it might or might not, hence it has two states at once.
You could argue that every puzzle is like this; I disagree. This one has a special frustration to it. We almost have half done. We’ve been working on it for twelve days. The others were done by now (or some it seems). This one is so challenging that getting two pieces in feels like a triumph, so we walk away, savoring the victory, knowing more remains.
Will it ever be finished? Ask Schrödinger.
Once again, we’re faced with some lies being spread. This time, it’s being claimed that Bernie Sanders said that he thinks black people smell.
First, WTF is off with our society that we carry the whole smell thing so far? We’re so aghast at gas from a fart, appalled by BO, etc.
Bad smells coming from somebody can be signs of things gone wrong, like emotional problems, economic strife, and health issues. Besides, as others have noted, everybody farts; everyone has odors. Eating black beans (which I love, damn it) (and pinto beans) will guarantee that I’ll fart. So will grapes (which I also love).
One lowpoint in my military career came about because of another’s body odor. A large white man working in another section and suffered from excessive sweating, which carried a pungent odor.
He came to me one day asking for advice, explaining his problem and breaking down in tears as he did. He’d been dealing with this, and with the taunting and bullying and looks that came with it, since he was a child. While talking with him about the multiple possible causes, I referred him to medical assistance. He’d already been there, of course.
The young officer who supervised him visited me a few weeks later, asking about the same problem. I pointed out at that time that the issue wasn’t really that the man had a sweating and odor problem, but that we had a problem dealing with it. I wasn’t forceful enough, though, looking back.
(Of course, our whole thing about smell is probably a defense mechanism carried to an extreme; smelling foulness off of another probably harkens back to diseases and are encoded in us.) (That’s just my speculation.)
Second, no one group smells more or less than another.
I’ve been with a number of races. None seems to smell better or worse than another to me. Nor can I declare that one sex or one political group or religion smells better or worse than another, as a group. It’s an individual thing. I, a white man who sweats often (and farts after eating certain foods) and walks several miles a day, can be the odor in the room, despite regular showers, clean clothes (well, they were clean when I put them on), decent health, and deodorant. Deal with it.
Third, Bernie Sanders never said that he thought black people smell. The race card is being played, once again, and it’s a lie, once again.
A military dream, again, but with a twist.
I told my wife that the Air Force wants me to return to active duty again. She laughed. “Let’s do it. We can travel.”
I replied, “That’ll be enlistment number 191 for me.” We laughed at that.
(Real life note: I spent just over twenty years on active duty in the military, with one break in service. I’ve not gone back in since my retirement almost a quarter of a century ago.)
So I went in. I’m in a fresh uniform, sharp as hell, feelin’ good and lookin’ good, you know? We’re walking around a large multi-function building – personnel and finance offices, admin offices, mess hall and open mess, exchange and commissary, along with a food court, barbershop, eyeglass place, medical facilities, and fitness center. People are coming up and introducing themselves. We’re enjoying ourselves.
My spouse goes off with other spouses to do something. I keep wandering around on my own. I get a call. They’re offering me a promotion, if I’ll enlist one more time.
I run into my wife. She’s heard the news and encourages me to do it. I answer, “That’ll be number 192 for me.” That makes us both laugh.
That’s the dream.
I’ll hunker down against the news
and hide inside from the weather;
living life in my cocoon
just makes the time feel better.
The theater dominated, but there were several features, some of which are clichés to the max (ha), like a military phone call (that wasn’t a call), and being pantless.
To begin –
With others, including a boss I used to have, we were going to the theater. This was some special deal, a grand event.
Checking in was an odd process. We entered a pristine, glistening marble foyer, black on the floor, pink on the walls, white on the ceiling. Stunning. Machines were embedded in the pink walls. After moments of floundering uncertainty about what to do, we realized the machines would provide us with our tickets. More floundering (instructions were absent) before figuring out, look into the small bas relief image on the machine and speak your name. Tickets were issued with fast, impressive swish. We guessed that it was a security system which identified us via a retina scan and voice.
The ticket lit up with gold arrows telling us where to go. Following its arrows, we learned from an employee that the ticket was geared to our bodies, that the machine back there had also verified our weight and scanned our bodies to verify who we were. Wow, some system, we said to one another, while wondering, why would a ticket need to be so specific to an individual? Nervous jokes were made.eate
I ended up in a bedroom. This couldn’t be right, I thought, but was reassured by my previous boss that it was. She was friends with the theater owner, so had gotten this box for us. It was the owner’s personal box. But I, confused, because it was a bedroom, was ready to challenge that when one wall opened, showing the stage right in front of us. Besides that, my ex-boss showed how we could watch the play via multiple monitors.
Great deal, I thought, impressed, but still freaked. The box was obviously a bedroom, and was full of jewelry. Be jeweled bracelets and watches abounded, along with key chains with keys. I didn’t want to touch anything lest people thought I was trying to steal it.
Then, horror, I knocked a bracelet off a dresser. It landed in my pocket. With alacrity, I fished it out, hurrying because I didn’t want to be seen.
A phone rang. I realized it was the Wing Commander calling on his hotline. Punching on the connection via one of the old 306 consoles (where did that come from), I answered with my name and rank.
“Sorry,” the commander replied. “I was sleeping and accidentally pressed the button.
Time to go! Leaving the theater, we went to a party in a luxurious mansion. Bottles of expensive red wine were being opened. People were asking me, what wine do you want? What bottle should I open? I was answering, there are bottles already open, let’s not waste them. I like red wine.
Bottles were opened anyway. I had a little red wine, straight from a bottle. Wow, it was fantastic. Then —
Time to go! Seeing the wine being wasted, I tried to put corks back into the bottles. They fell out, refusing to stay. I as being urge on.
Back at my place with my wife (which I understood was a temporary place), she offered me food, which were breakfast leftovers, she explained. I selected a few pieces, even though they were cold, and ate a bit, which tasted good. Then —
Time to iron! I needed to iron some pants because I wasn’t wearing any. I found pants and two ironing boards with irons in another room. One iron was small, like a toy. They other was a standard-sized iron on a standard folding board. The two options confused me. Before I could decide —
Time to go! My wife informed me that we needed to leave to go clean up another place. I protested that I’m not wearing any pants. “Don’t worry,” she replied. “Nobody will see you.”
We arrived via dreamport (that is, we turned around and were there) in a small house that doubled as a business. It looked tidy but my wife said that we needed to clean it. I agreed but told her that I needed to iron my pants and put them on first.
Right after that was announced, several of my wife’s friends arrived. I hastened to cover my lower nakedness as they laughed, hooted, and pointed, brushing it off, they’d seen it before, before they went off into another room, where my wife served them coffee and tea.
The dream ended.
I think my subconscious (working with my conscious mind) this morning, decided this dream was about broken dreams and lost promises. But after thinking about it while walking and then writing it out, I think it’s about the imposter syndrome.
Michael Seidel, writer 