Do you know the feeling that you get when you're very thirsty, and you can smell water? The water takes on smells it could not possibly contain, silver and mars and happiness. It seems to call to you with a fishing line in the back of your head, pulling you toward it. That's the feeling. That's the one. It's something I'll only explain in person.

Do you know the feeling, the one you get when you should feel bad but you feel really good instead? Yeah, me too! It's called Unexpected Pineapple Chunks! WooHoo!

Do you know the feeling you get when you are about to break up with somebody you should have broken up with a year ago, but you stayed with them longer because you knew they needed you more than you needed them, and you knew that if you left you'd just destroy them, or at least make them very, very sad?
It's so hard to speak to the everyman, when you're just one.

They tell me this might take 48 hours to work, but it seems to do OK right now: My Fictions!

I'd like to try something. Chime in when you're ready:


Knock Knock...

I've been too hard on the British, really, about their food.
Any culture that gives us the meat salad and the cheese salad can't be all bad.

C'mon downtown & stay with me tonight.
I got a pocket full of Kryptonite.
-Spin Doctors.

I used to be so funny. What happened to me?

     I love Texas. I love Discounts.
     I feel that every time you get a discount, you've stolen a little something back from Death. No, I feel that every time I get a discount, I've stolen a little something back. Mark Griffin, American poet & musician, wrote a wonderfully evil piece about a woman who achieves this effect through fast driving. She feels that the ticking of yellow lines past her car is like the ticking of grains of sand in a hourglass. This way of thinking, it turns out for her, is backwards and she dies, perhaps before her time, but really before she might otherwise have died. He doesn't examine it closely, because the piece is a work of genius. He doesn't have to examine it. The point is made to his satisfaction and the rest of the world be damned.
     Texas is wonderful today. When I left work for a break and a constitutional, it was 95 degrees in the shade with a hot breeze barely lifting its weak little head out of the blacktop. The sky was mostly cloudless and threatened to turn into a Proper Texas Summer, here at the end of a gracefully mild one. I ducked into a store for a moment to browse, and stayed for nearly fifteen minutes. When I stepped out, the day was still hot, but a cool wind had picked up, probably here to avenge its sad little brother smothered by the heat, and the sky had clouded beautifully. Black clouds were collecting under the sun and the temperature had dropped five degrees. If you don't like the weather, stop and bug a shopkeep for a few minutes.
     I love Discounts. I love Texas.

I'm glad somebody got a photo of this stencil before it was removed. They used to be all up and down the sidewalk here on sixth. They've been replaced, though, with ones that say "Your President Lies." A clever person came along and painted a well-placed "f" in that one, making it, and here I'll admit to an attempt at humor, SUPER!

I have a pain. The only way to kill it is to leave work early. Who am I to argue with the best interests of my body?

I've been writing a lot lately, just not much here. There are actually two better places to see fictions by me, if yer interested:
600 Seconds
One Story A Week!
And now you know...





where I'm posting the rest of my stories.

You can dance if you want to.

     I'm offended! I'm incensed!
     An author whom-I-won't-name contacted me to get an event order in the works, and the tone of the contact was just so intolerably derisive. The phrase "they are a large distributor and might set up an account for an independant bookstore such as yours" was used.
     Oh! Well! Your largesse is astounding! Goodness! For little old us? We're just a bunch of down-home nobodies, running the biggest goddamn bookstore in Texas. We're practically a lemonade shack compared to what you've been up to.
     Oh? You signed at Borders in Houston? THE Borders in Houston? Goodness. They must be, I don't know, world famous! I mean, the prestigious Houston Borders doesn't take just anybody, do they?
     Grrrrr.
     So, I called the publicist to whom I was recommended, only to find out the book is distributed through St. Martin's. The author didn't know this. The author was sending me through MacMillan, who are distributed through Pearson, although, the suggestion was made (kind of rightly) that the book was being distributed by Palgrave, which is true until you realize that Palgrave is just a subsidiary of St. Martin's. I found it puzzling that I'd have to go through all these hoops, but I've never dealt with a big-shot like this author.
     Oh, but wait! It gets better! I spoke to the publicist, who asked did we have an account with VHPS? The publicist corrected me when I suggested we'd just order them from the same person we order from for every other St. Martin's event.
     No no, said the publicist, this isn't through St. Martin's. It's through VHPS.
     Well, that's fine until you relize they're the same company. I don't expect the average person on the street to be able to say, "VHPS is the same company as St. Martin's. When you call one, you're calling the other," but then the average person on the street doesn't work for one of these companies.
     Anyway, back to the piddly-squat world that is my tiny sad little bookstore. I ordered the books. We're getting 40, but that's a huge order for a little place like us.
     
     Oh, and Brian Herbert and Neal Stephenson are signing near the same time. I hope they don't feel dwarfed by the titanic talent who bugged me today. Oh, wait, they won't.

In order to succeed, you've got to try.
In order to try, you've got to believe.
If you believe, you've already succeeded.
If you've already succeeded, why bother trying?

I've been handed poetry by local poet Neil Meili. I've got three books, and have opened one, entitled the Austin Book of the Dead. I've read two of the poems. The first, "Austin," was unremarkable. It's OK but it doesn't appeal to me.
The second is called "Dodo bird." It ends with the line
The world is a grain of sand you know
and sometimes that whole world can depend
on the shit of a Dodo.
Heehee. Silly.

They didn't even try to sell me anything...

I got an email from "Jenifer Hickman," sent to "barry" (why I got it I couldn't tell you). Here's the beginning of the text:

Hi Everybody I'm back from mexico. the beaches were great and the chicks even more. remind me you all to show you some pictures. cheers Konan sallow intimalelliot dickey persianfrankfort bellman blanchnonchalant phalanx focallumbermen showman...

There is no "buy this," there is no link to a Viagra sales page. It's the spam equivalent of the flaming paper bag of shit. I got another piece of spam (surprise surprise) which is titled "Backi to school special with biggun pills." They sell to children. Those lousy pukes. Grrrr.

A Modern Horror RPG

By MisterNihil

First, this isn't a game about combat, it's about storytelling and character. It's a metaphor for the human condition, intolerably executed in a manner in keeping with an adult game. Be warned! This game is not for children. Also, don't really stab people or kill them. That's bad.

Part 1:Character and stuff.
OK, so make up a character with a name. Ooooh. Scary is good. Do real scary stuff, like vampires or ghosts or something. Do all, names and backgrounds or whatever. You can fill that stuff in later. Your character is, like, this person and the other ones are these other people and you FIGHT MONSTERS, or you ARE MONSTERS or whatver. Maybe do, like, Frankenstein from the Monster's Perspective, all tall and green, but do it like the book where he throws the girl down the well, not like that new movie with Al Pachinko. Mary Shelly was all sexy and stuff. She ROxxors, but all victoriana style, like
0- -0
  |
v---v
Yeah! OK, so now your have your character. Go and do stuff, and then, like, get experience. You don't need numbers or nothin. They detract from the modern horror feel of the game and stuff.
PERSON RUNNING THE GAME ONLY: Ok, so no players are reading, right? OK, so, to make it horror, the bad guy has to be like a bad version of them. Make them be all blacker and nastier than the characters. And make them kill cats. That's evil. And at the end, be all "Oooh. The bad guys was YOU! UR THA 5UXX0RZ! and he's IN THE HOUSE! It was a BLOODY HEAD!" That'll get 'em good.
OK EVERYBODY AGAIN:So, like, when you want to do stuff, use our kewl combat system. It's really kewl, and it makes up for the fact that we have a numberless character system by assigning numbers to a character's stats. Right? Awesome! Let's Go.


OK, Part 2: We didn't want to include a combat system, but here's on just in case. I mean, it's not about combat. Or something.
COMBAT in ten easy and three difficult steps

1. Roll forty six-sided dice, or roll one six-sided die forty times and record each roll.
2. Make a list of the following stats: Strength, Muscle, Brawn, Sleekness, Speed, Beat-Downity, MisterT-ishness, Arm Strength, Leg Strength, and Brains.
3. Assign four dice (or four numbers) to each stat. Add the numbers together, giving each stat a value between 4 and 24.
4. Add Brawn, Muscle, Sleekness and Speed together, take the square root of the Cosine of the resulatant number, round to the nearest whole number higher than thirty, convert to Hexidecimal and record it as Hard-to-Hittedness.
5. Add Beat-Downity, MisterT-ishness, arm strength and Hard-to-Hittedness, cube this number, divide the resulting number's digits, and look on a world map or globe at the coordinates dictated by the numbers there. Convert the name of the nearest city to the point obtained to a number (a=1, b=2, c=3 etc), and record it as "Kikk-Assery".
6. Make a new stat, Tactics, which is equal to smarts.
7. Begin combat by comparing the digit of Pi found by counting down (not counting the 3) to each character's Sleekness+Speed. The character with the lower digit of Pi acts first for ALL COMBAT MANEUVERS.
8. Each character may take one Smith action (see step 9) and one Michigan action (see step 10), or two Michigan actions. Combat rounds pass to the right. See step 11 for Damage.
9. Smith Actions: BeatDown (Compare Beat-Downity to target's Hard-to-Hittedness), Smack (Compare Brawn to target's Hard-to-Hittedness), Kick (compare Speed+Leg Strength to target's Hard-to-Hittedness), Wildcard (compare any two non-Brains traits to target's Hard-to-Hittedness and describe action)
10.Michegan Actions: Whine(compare Sleekness to target's leg-strength), Wildcard (compare any two non-Brains traits to target's Hard-to-Hittedness and describe action), Preen (compare Sleekenss to target's Brains+Brawn+Speed+Beat-Downity)
11.Damage: Every character takes one six-sided die of damage every round to his MisterT-ishness, no matter what. On any successful action, a character reduces the target's MisterT-ishness by the attacker's Muscle. If a character is reduced below 2 MisterT-ishness, that character LOSES!
12.Damage Part 2: If you fail at a Michegan action, you take damage to your MisterT-ishness equal to your opponent's Beat Downity.
13.Go back to step 8. Continue until one character is the LOSER! Lose interest in the game and never play again.

This process must be performed each time combat is required.

For some definition of "Roses," everything's coming up them.
For all definitions of "Rose," nothing's smelling like one.

"Repair, Repeal or Repent! Fifty Four Forty or Fight!" The robot sat in the Stationery-Max section of Office Depot, calling out to customers and the single employee available, indiscriminate. "Reduce, Recycle, Remove! Rejoyce, Repo, Rewharton! Jaundiced eyes see what hampered tendons cannot!"
A customer in need of Max'd Stationery snuck behind the robot, snatched a pad of paper, and dashed quickly away. Said customer was away and gone before the robot could react, but it was aware of the intrusion.
"Defective Cat! Deploy Massage Swedes, Grammatically Recombine defective Smithy?" The robot turned in tight circles on its wheels.

"No, Resplendant Moron!" The robot ran back and forth in front of the orderphone at the Tastee Freeze. "I have Washers in My Pants!"
"hrrzzzzle ggghhrzzzzzrl zzzzzszaaawwwzsszzrrr?" asked the order machine.
"No Defenseless Badger on my watch! Resplendant Moron! I have Washers in my Pants!"
"hzzzzzzssss srrrrawwwwwszzzlllrrr?"
The robot stopped dead for two seconds, then started moving quickly, making jerking its tiny, T-Rex arms back and forth. "NO! RES. PLEND. ANT. MOR. ON. I. HAVE. WASH. ERS. IN. MY. PANTS!"
There was a long pause, then the order phone answered, "rzzzfzzpzz mrrrmmm zzzzzz spzzzzrzzzrzzzzzzzmzzzzppzzzz?"
"Thank you, please drive up! The grass is always greener on The Other Side! Death! Death!" The robot rolled up to the window, cash in one hand, pistol in the other.

"Remain ignorant!" said the robot to the manager of the Orange Julius. "When the sun is out, make hay, and there is no rainy day!"
The manager looked from the robot to the pile of money, and started punching in the order. "Two Juliuses," he said.
"Hampers are the Devil's Playhouse! A Collander makes a Super Hero Helmet!" replied the robot.
The manger took its money and backed away.

My head hurts. I think it's the sun. I can't stay awake. I can't sleep. The fluorescent lights are making it worse. I can't look at a monitor for five more hours today.
Ugh. I haveta deal with customers this afternoon.
I so hate humans.

Everybody shut up & leave me alone.
I'm going straight to Heaven.
-MC900

Hey! It's about time! If the Collected Calvin & Hobbes is as cool as the treatment the Complete Far Side got, it'll actually be worth looking into. Hot damn! I wonder when the Collated Bloom County is slated...

OK, so here's the skinny: My eldest brother, whom I refer to as AngelBob, was hit by a car yesterday in the fast-lane of a highway (880? sure, why not). He was on a mototcycle, and is no longer on said motorcycle. He has been operated upon and is stable-if-drugged at last update. I haven't heard directly from him, but I've talked to Mom who has talked to people who have talked to him, and she's talked to his doctor who has become familiar with the situation, as doctors do.
The damage: So, from what I hear, his right arm is broken at the wrist & one additional place, he's got some stitches on the back of his left hand, and he's done a bad thing to his right ankle, which in turn has become dislocated and distant. After coersion from the doctor, whom we all have only gratitude toward, his arm and leg are ready to kiss & make up and resolve their differences. They've agreed upon separate housing (the trendiest casts available!) for a period of not less than four weeks, and personal attention in the form of physical therapy.
Hmm... I'm making light of this. It's overwhelming and I don't know how to deal. He's OK, and he's not going to die. That's the important part. Bruised, scraped & a little broken, but alive. I hope he gets better fast.

AngelBob won't read this for at least a while, but he needs to mend quickly. We're all thinking good thoughts his way, if that helps. He's going into surgery as we speak, and we all hope he'll come out right as rain, as it were.

Under a pile of work. Be back soon.
Kochalka is still the king of everything sweet & cool in web comic world. His little strippers make me want to draw in the same way that Elvis makes me want to pick up a guitar. Elvis was the motivation to get me to where I am on the guitar. I hope Kochalka's work will be the kick in the ass I need to put a pencil to paper.
But first, work. Lots and lots of work.
And my parents are still looking at tomorrow, but there may be a delay. I'll post that separately.

My parents are coming to visit. I think they may bring me steps. I should go buy something to cook for dinner tonight.

"Technique" is a word that looks funny truncated, pretty much no matter where you truncate it, with the exception of choppin' off the last eight.

And once more, once more unto the breech my friends.

     So, when Freddy died there wasn't any funeral. I told myself it's how he'd have wanted it and it helped me sleep through the night. I couldn't have given him a funeral. I was in China at the time, but I felt bad just the same. He had to go and die while I was away. I didn't ask him to and I didn't ask him to be my friend.
     When Roberta went while I was in Pittsburgh, I figured it was just a fluke. I mean, people die all the time and Roberta was pretty sick. The doctors said it was just a matter of time, but that she had a good chance at going into remission. I guess a good chance wasn't good enough for her.
     After that, Jeremy died while I was at the store. His wife called me first and I ran over there. He'd been hit by a stray bullet from the shooting range eight miles away. I know, right? I guess the effective range on those guns is shorter than the actual.
     From there, I went home, and then realized I'd forgotten to buy carrots. I was at the grocery store again when I got a panicked call from Jeremy's elder child, asking me what to do: Jeremy's wife shuffled off this mortal coil in their living room and the boy was alone. I abandoned my shopping basket and drove like a demon to their house, calling 911 on the way. I instructed Jeremy's elder, Samuel, to do the same, but more warning couldn't hurt couldn't hurt, I supposed. At the house, I waited with Samuel until the police arrived. Together, he and I called his two relatives in town: an elderly aunt and a ne'er-do-well cousin. When they arrived, I turned Samuel over to them and bowed out. I couldn't deal with another death.
     I drove home, and flopped on the couch before I realized that I'd forgotten my carrots again. I didn't even get all the way to the car in the driveway before the phone started ringing. It was my mother. She was alarmed by a loud bang from the neighbor's house and wanted me to come over to investigate. That's the problem with living five minutes from close family. I drove over and, with Mom, went over to knock on the door. It was broken open, the lock splintered. I called the police immediately and insisted that Mom not enter. She nudged the door open with the toe of her shoe and moaned. On the living room floor was our neighbor, lying in a pool of blood. I heard the back door bang open and the rattling of a man climbing a fence, then the sound of the back door of the next house opening and slamming.
     I don't exactly remember what happened next. The following six or so hours are a blur of blood, cops and questions. They took my mom and me down to the station, sat us in separate rooms and asked questions we couldn't answer. We were released, and as we left we saw her next door-once removed neighbor being brought in. He had blool all over his hands.
     I haven't left the house again. I think I left my car unlocked before, but it's been four days now. If anybody's going to take it, they would have it by now. I've called in sick from work. I told them it was a 72 hour virus and showing no signs as yet of clearning.

I don't wanna do nothin. But I haveta. Darn.

This is unfinished, but I like it anyway, so I'm posting it. So Nyah.

It was this morning that I found myself driving north along a bumpy south-austin road, holding in my left hand a betta fish. To be more accurate, I suppose it was this morning that I discovered that I had to drive north alongs said street, holding said fish in said hand, while driving my cranky stick-shift Jeep to work.
It started with oversleeping. This is a hobby of mine, in which I cannot often enough participate. Before Toshi started having to get to work early with me, I could fall asleep for twenty minutes at the drop of a hat. I'd find all kinds of excuses to fail to awaken at the proper time, from cloudy weather to even the mildest tickles in my throat. Now, with the juggernaut of wakefulness that is Toshismurf in the morning, I tend to be on my feet and bathed as much as an hour before work begins.
This morning, though, I decided to polish my rapidly rusting oversleeping skills, and sent her on to work before me. I snoozed, reveling in how smart I felt for allowing myself an extra forty minutes or so of unconsciousness. I took a liesurely shower and was out of the house by 9:15. It's the latest I've risen in longer than I care to remember. I remembered the fish.
The fish, a betta, a gift won by a friend of ours at a family reunion for happening to sit in the right chair at the right moment, was to be given to a coworker of mine who has a fondness, even a soft-spot for such fish. It's hard, though, to have a soft spot for more than about two, with limited office space. You can't double them up in their bowls, as they will kill each other. He kept a pet betta alive for some months, and has since replaced it with an albino individual. I was bringing him a blue and purple one.
Backing out of my garage wasn't difficult. The driveway has a distinct slope and I just gave the car the gentlest of nudges and let it roll backwards. I had to maneuver around two cars in the driveway, which I managed with no trouble. I'm a very good driver. Dad lets me drive in the driveway. I gave the wheel a pull and was on the street and facing north. No trouble, right?
At this point, I carefully put the car into first gear, holding the steering wheel steady with my left knee, and let off the clutch. The car jerked a little and a single drop of water made the short journey from the very-full fish bowl to my left wrist.
"A single drop never hurt anything." I thought momentarily of bankers on Black Monday, and smiled without correcting myself.
I set the car to moving, holding the steering wheel with my right hand. I switched and held it steady with my left knee while shifting. As long as I never had to turn while shifting gears, I was fine. I made it to the bottom of the hill near my house, turned left onto Manchaca, and, holding the wheel steady, accelerated north toward my work.
I am lucky, in that it only takes me some ten to twelve minutes to commute, discounting random traffic jams. At 9:30 in the morning, there tends not to be another car on the road. I made most of the lights, and managed not to cause any mayhem on the ones I missed, all the way to Ben White. At Ben White, known variously as 290, 71 and 21, and Manchaca, I stopped and waited at the light.
The fish was being remarkably calm. It retreated to the bottom of its bowl as we started, but was now swimming around, inspecting the two bits of betta chow I'd dropped into the water and which were now floating dejected at the sides of the meniscus like the crumbs of sad little cheerios. I also brought the blister-packed food with me. By using a cunning pair of chutes, the food managed to remain in the pack, despite its being open, unless the card was turned 180 degrees, so I was not alarmed at the pack sitting upside down on the seat.
The light opposite me turned green with an arrow, and two cars lumbered slothfully through and across my path. I saw another who would not make the light. The car approaching was a small import, white with a brown door, and was approaching at nearly forty five miles per hour. He did not slow down when he lost the arrow, and I waited to accelerate until he was past me, despite my green light.

Dragging my fat ass to the store, I noticed a hole in my pocket. Why, I asked my self, holding the rope in my left hand, had I had my right hand in my left pocket in the first place, and how, I asked myself, holding the rope in my left hand, had I not notice that equine animals, even fat ones, can walk themdamnselves to the store?