Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
I was born in the U.S. in 1956. I’ve seen many changes. I never thought I’d live in a time when people would be ordering fast food from a place like McDonald’s on their phone, and it would be delivered.
Course, I didn’t expect to be typing about it on a computer in a coffee shop and sharing it with strangers, wirelessly, at that.
Didn’t think phones would be called cells, either.
Mood: subjective
Hi world. Began this Wezday, March 27, 2024, with a recap of weird dreams.
The ‘Wezday’ thing came from this cute little girl visiting the coffee shop today. Looked like she was two. Dressed in yellow, with pink plastic boots with pictures on them. She was in line with her group a few yards away. I don’t know what was being discussed by the adults but she suddenly announced in a huge stage voice, “I know tomorrow is Wezday. Tomorrow is Wezday. I know.”
That bought a laugh from many of us.
It’s rainy today, 50 F, with an expected high a few degrees north of 50. Blue sky and sunshine are both shying away from our valley for the moment. They might emerge to show they exist later.
Left the house at 7 AM to take Tucker in for his surgery. Arrived there ten minutes early. He was not pleased. He’d been cut off from eating last night at 10 PM. I fed him the best that I could because I know what was coming.
Today at 6 AM, he went to where his kibble usually resides. When he discovered it wasn’t there, he began grumbling. It was soon as loud as approaching thunder, if the thunder had a meow sound embedded it. I get him back between three and five this afternoon. My fingers are crossed, etc, that all goes well. I have a good feeling about it, but these things can go awry fast.
So after my dream recap, I was talking to myself, Tucker, and Papi. Papi wasn’t going to be fed until after I left. My wife would give him food. I wasn’t eating until I came back from dropping off Tucker. Just a sympathy thing; wasn’t fair for me to eat if he couldn’t.
Anyway, while having this conversation, I might have employed the expression, “I’m not crazy.” Within a short while, The Neurons had Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty singing, “I’m not crazy, I’m just a little unwell,” in the morning mental music stream (Trademark evaporating). The 2003 song, “Unwell”, sat well in my pscyhe as music for today. Give it a listen and let me know what you think.
Stay positive, be strong, lean forward, and vote. Is that too much to ask? Ask me again after my coffee, okay?
Mood: coffeetastic
Hey, Terra fans, welcome to another edition of Tuesday. Today, for the first time ever anywhere*, we bring you March 5, 2024. It’s a robust 37 degrees F right now in Ashlandia but we’ll soon be soaring to 43 F before sun pulls its light from our valley.
All the snow is gone (which somehow triggers “all the leaves are brown” from “California Dreamin'” by The Mamas and the Papas in the morning mental music stream).
Rain continues its beat (bringing The Neurons to start “We Got the Beat” by the Go-Go’s in the morning mental music stream) (Trademark coming in two weeks, I swear, and it’ll be the most beautiful trademark anyone has ever seen). But then, thinking about the Go-Go’s, I ended up with “Going to a Go-Go” by the Miracles from 1965.
The version done by the Rolling Stones also floated along the meandering morning mental music stream, though. I prefer Smokey and the Miracles version. It’s just tighter to me, but one can’t easily just dismiss the Stones.
However, another song was in the MMMS, freshly peeled from a pass through the guest room. On the bed in there is a pillow which says, “Be Our Guest”, navy script on oatmeal. Goes well with the dark blue duvet cover. As I glanced its way, “Be Our Guest” kicked up in the MMMS. I knew the song but remembered nothing else about it except it was a while back that I learned it. A net search rewarded me with Jerry Orbach and Angela Lansbury singing “Be Our Guest” from Disney’s animated version of Beauty and the Beast from 1991.
Odd underlying connections do bring some of these things together more. Besides the go-go connections between the Go-Go’s and “Going To A Go-Go”, and the guest room pillow and “Be Our Guest”, the Go-Go’s debut album, which featured “We Got the Beat”, was called, Beauty and the Beat. Wild how the mind can work. Those Neurons are sly little tricksters.
As I mused through all of that, I wondered what folks remember about things like go-go’s, which were forerunners of discotheques, which were forerunners of discos, which themselves were born from dance halls (at least as I see it), and which begat things like raves and dance parties. That’s my impression of it all from what I recall at this point, just starting on coffee, from my life.
My housefloof, the black and white cat hailed as Tucker, is doing much better as he prepares for his dental surgery later this month. I cut back on his pain med because he was sleeping all day long. I wanted him to be a little more active and eat more, which he didn’t do while asleep. He seems to like the shift and ate very well today.
Stay positive, be sensible, remain strong, lean forward, and vote. The list is getting lengthy. Coffee helps me remember it all. Here’s the music. Cheers
* We don’t really know if this is the first time that there’s been a March 5, 2024 but as far as we can tell from memories and all the records so far discovered, this is it, kids.
Ackfloofedge (floofinition) – 1. To recognize an animals’ rights, authority, or status.
In Use: “Basically joining the housepack as a kitten, the petite callico was soon ackfloofedged as the pack’s leader, even though she was the smallest, youngest, and quietest.”
In Use: “It was Nan’s home but she had to ackfloofedge her imperious cat’s decision-making influence. For example, no other animals were permitted in his home, and human visitors better be on guard, too.”
2. To take notice of an animal.
In Use: “The old brown dog rarely stirred in the shelter, but seeing his eyes watching her forced Nancy to ackfloofedge him. After a meet and greet was arranged, she discovered a happy and energetic fellow who was just waiting for the right person to take him home.”
In Use: “Squeaking outside the kitchen window caused Kevin and Valerie to ackfloofedge a clowder of kittens in need in their backyard. So began the tale of the beans, the five kittens given legume names who took over their the house.”
Mood: Coffeemplative
Hello, fellow sojourners of season and space. It’s Tuesday again, but this time it’s Feb. 20, 2024.
Sunshine is crashing through the eastern and southern windows and it’s already 54 F outside, though a bit ‘o wind is still stirring up the trees and ruining the cats’ outings. Layers of grey clouds smother my western view, darkening the pines’ green lines with long, heavy shadows. Rain is expected, but so is a high of 67 F. Can you dig it?
Ah, rain falls through sunshine. Where is the rainbow?
Tucker, my black and white house floof, continues improving. A side effect has emerged. He’d become less interested in Papi while he was feeling ill. Papi thus became bolder. Now Tucker is feeling better and beginning to notice Papi more. Papi has noticed he’s being noticed and is letting Tucker know he knows he’s being noticed, and warnings have been issued.
Finishing up Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism by Rachel Maddow. It illuminates corners of United States history I didn’t know, such as the conspiracy circulated by the Silver Legion or the Silver Shirts. Led by William Dudley Pelley, they believed all Jews are communists, and all communists are Jews. Rising during America’s Great Depression, the movement seemed to flourish in small, rural towns and was favored by white Christians. (Any of this sound familiar?) They believed Jews were starting all the wars in the world and wanted to turn the United States into a communist nation. To save the United States, they wanted to instead turn it into a fascist nation and were looking for America’s Hitler.
I’m summarizing, of course. Ms Maddow offers more details in rousing style. This is just one of many surprising stories about fascism in America. Depressing and infuriating, it’s more history that we Americans should know. I hugely recommend the book. I, for one, was unaware of the deep roots about conspiracies that have circulated through right wing circles for decades. I always believed that my fellow Americans supported the principles espoused in our Declaration of Independence, Constitution, Bill of Rights, and subsequent amendments. My ignorance embarrasses me but also blows my mind. Just shows again, I know so little about so much.
On the fiction side, I’m finishing Crime Manifesto by Colson Whitehead and beginning Widows by Lynda LaPlante.
Today’s music comes by way of JJ Cale, Brian Eno, and a television show called “The Bear”. The show often uses interesting and diverse music. I’ve been a fan of JJ Cale and Brian Eno since the early seventies. When they collaborated and released an album in 1990, I went right out and bought it. The album, Wrong Way Up, didn’t fail me. The first song on it was “Lay My Love” and showed up on “The Bear”. Since hearing it, “Lay My Love” has flickered in and out of my personal mental playlist. Today, The Neurons pushed it through into the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks).
I believe, though they won’t confirm it, that the lines hooking The Neurons were, “I am the crow of desperation” and “I am the termite of temptation”. Instead of those, though, my head rang with “I am the bastard of misinformation”. The Neurons continued my imagined stanza, “I live with what I don’t know. I try to find and remain behind, the knowledge that goes before.” Yeah, I know, I’m not a songwriter.
Stay positive, be strong, lean forward, and vote, please. Coffee drinking has progressed. Onward. Here’s the music. Cheers
It was the best of stuff and the worse of crap.
I’m working on two items in parallel: a new novel and a finished novel now undergoing its fifth revision.
The new project has that exciting blush attached. Unencumbered by an ending, story and characters emerge through flash floods of thoughts and poured through fingers and keyboards into the ‘puter, evolving into a novel. Great, let’s keep it going. It’s the fun, creative part, where anything goes. I’ll see if it works later.
Meanwhile, on the editing side, I’m facing the dark side of my process. The chapter under the knife in the finished novel makes me gag and cringe. What happened here? Why isn’t it working, I whine to myself. Can no one save me? Or it?
No, this is up to me. After working on it the other day, I shut it down and told myself, leave it for a bit. Let it vacate my mind. Let it ferment untouched and see what happens after the interval. Perhaps insights will arrive; or maybe it won’t seem as bad.
Good plan but when I took it back up, insights were like peace talks with Russia: nothing there. And it was just as bad as before. As waiting didn’t work, I’ve concluded, I’ll increase focus and concentration, drop back one chapter, and read back into it. On reflection, after writing that, I can see that I was confused about what I was writing about, feeling through it, and unsuccessfully capturing and refining what I know, what I’m showing, and its impact on the story. Part of that is that although the novel is in its fifth cycle of revision and editing, this chapter was added in during the fourth round. I thought it was needed; I still feel it might be, but I’m flexible on the matter. I’ll see how it flows.
Alright, time to coffee up so I can novel up and work through this revision.
Happy writing, y’all. Cheers
Mood: excited
Ahoy, brothers and sisters from other places and spaces. Today has arrived in the guise of Thursday, 1/25/24. Blue skies escorted the day in, with a few dancing clouds joining the sunshine parade. It rained earlier and will probably rain later. Temperature now is 49 F under a sunny sky, and today’s probable high is just below 60 F. Not bad for a sprinter day. Actually registers as typical.
Les floofs are enjoying this weather as it allows them to exercise their lion and panther sides and explore our yard without being cold or wet. It’s one thing to be wild, but quite another to be uncomfortable.
Nikki Haley inspired today’s music. She’s on the trail, campaigning to be the GOP nominee for POTUS. The schedule had her in New Hampshire for their part of the ritual, and the press was following her. One NTY writer, Charles Blow, addressed her campaign rally music, calling it an oddball selection. Among the performers whose music was used were Bruce Springsteen, Cheap Trick, Blake Shelton, Janis Joplin, Norm Greenbaum, REO Speedwagon, Queen. Hardly a staunch conservative list. Springsteen, for one, actively supported Barack Obama and Joe Biden in their campaigns. I agree with Blow’s conclusion, as he wrote, that the music choices are a headscratcher.
I wonder if the Haley campaign got permission to use these performers’ music and what they would think. Political campaigns’ use is a complicated issue involving copyrights, fair use, and the creator’s rights and intentions, and whether they’re comfortable with the politican’s views. As example, this week, The Smiths’ guitarist, Johnny Marr, told Trump’s campaign, stop. You don’t have the right to use that music, and we don’t want you to.
“I never in a million years would’ve thought this could come to pass,” guitarist Johnny Marr said in a message posted on social media on Tuesday, according to an article in The Hill.
“Consider this shit shut right down right now,” Marr added.
Anyway, after reading Mr. Blow’s piece, The Neurons began playing “No Surrender” by Bruce Springsteen in the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks). That’s the Springsteen song Haley’s campaign used in NH. That’s just how The Neurons work in their diabolical way.
Be strong, stay pos, and keep leaning forward. I’ve been sucking coffee down, thank you, but you do what you need to do. Here’s the music. Cheers
Floofstrapping (floofinition) When an animal helps itself.
In Use: “Smart animals will often use floofstrapping to feed themselves or satisfy their desires.”
Recent Use: “Parade Magazine shared a tale about a floofstrapping golden retriever escaping his place to take a dip in a neighbor’s pool “
Mood: giddy
Beautiful windy, cloudy, sunny Saturday morning in Ashlandia, where the drivers are average and polite, but getting hit while you’re walking is close to happening all the time. The temperature is 54 F. Light rain might visit, and our high temperature will only be 57 F, but that’s better than 47 F.
It’s November 18, 2023, already. Counting down to all those things that are growing more and more imminent, from tests for students to mark the year’s end or term’s end, to buying presents and cooking foods for different holidays, to making travel arrangements to visit family or run away to somewhere warmer. All of these things speak from positions of privilege and having the money and food security to make these plans. Too, too many people will be scrambling as they have for years, trying to be safe, have a warm place for themselves and their families to sleep, and a decent meal. Their reasons for those situations are many; some are from choices made, but others arrived at their precarious situation through discrimination and bias, personal disasters, or mental health matters. Hope you can keep them in mind and help them out some during this season of celebration.
It’s time for the Leonids meteor show again. I went out to look for them last night, but the sky wasn’t cooperative. While Thursday night was fantastically clear, Friday night was hopelessly overcast. Bummer to me as I like watching the streaks and think about where they’ve been and what they represent. Three trips outside were done, and nada was seen but clouds and light pollution.
The Neurons popped an Isley Brothers song from 1970 into the morning mental music stream (Trademark marginal). “Freedom” is a song off an album called Get Into Something. I first heard it at the house of a girl I was seeing, but it was her mother playing the album. Her mom was about my mom’s age, but their musical selections seemed very different. As a thirteen-year-old heading for fourteen, I found myself listening intently to the vocals and the lyrics, and enjoying the instrumental elements of this R&B sound. I’d heard R&B previously but this was like, wow, there is such energy.
Let me tell you, this particular song, “Freedom” is so apropos as today’s theme music. Check out these lyrics.
Well, I wanna say, I wanna tell you
I wanna say when you can do what you wanna do
And go where you wanna go
And live where you wanna live
And love who you wanna love
And be what you wanna be
Join what you wanna join
Well, well, well, that’s freedom
Yeah, yeah, freedom, yes sir
When you can learn what you wanna learn
And read what you wanna read
(Free, free, free)
And write what you wanna write
(Free, free, free)
Do what you feel is right
(Free, free, free)
h/t to Songlyrics.com
Because, I’m remembering this song at a time when a group of misnamed people called “Moms for Liberty” are getting books banned, so students can’t read what they want to read. Red state school systems are pushing to limit what is taught so you can’t learn what you want to learn. And you can’t be who you want to be when state legislatures are making shit up and declaring that people who aren’t binary can’t decide what pronoun they will use or love who they want to love because these narrow-minded cultural dictators think that love and sex is only between a man and a woman. So, “Freedom” by the Isley Brothers is a solid theme music choice for this new wave Era of Repression and Fear that Republicans are pushing.
Stay positive, be strong, and lean forward with optimism and courage toward a brighter future of freedom, equality, and justice. As Martin Luther King, Jr., said, as written in a 1918 book, “Readings from Great Authors”, attributed to Theodore Parker, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” h/t to quoteinvestigator.com.
Ah, the sun is shining and rain is falling. There’s a rainbow somewhere. Here’s the music. See you at the coffee maker. Cheers
A conversation with friends about fire ants reminded me of the places where my family lived.
My oldest sister was born in Des Moines, Iowa. I was born in Arlington, Virginia. My next sister was born in San Antonio, Texas, then my late brother was born (and died) in Fairfax, Virginia.
The family split, courtesy of a divorce. My two little sisters via Mom were born in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, and Penn Hills, Pennsylvania.
My two little brothers from Dad’s side were born in Beckley, West Virginia (where my youngest brother also died).
I guess that it’s little wonder that wanderlust plagued me by the time I was seventeen and joined the military to see the world. It shouldn’t be a surprise that after almost twenty years of living in Ashlandia (the longest I’ve ever lived anywhere), I’m ready to move again.
Michael Seidel, writer 