Justin Engelbart's Bad But Constantly Improving Writing Blog

Four Years Later

2017-08-02T14:22:00.001-07:00

I guess that is a while. I haven't written in that long. I bet I've probably improved since then.

So what's new with me? I got a Masters, I had kids, I moved to the suburbs. You know that's not true, other than the Masters part.

I'm making a horror movie soon, it's called Wine Party. It's going to be pretty bloody and I doubt any of my friends or family will want to watch it. But I'll watch it, I guess. If you make me.

Revision revision revision

2013-06-10T16:37:00.001-07:00

Hey, so now I pretty much just write scripts. And they suck at first, and then you go through and make things make sense. It's a breakthrough. Here's a stupid one I've been working on.

EXCITING OPENING

Jack: Brace yourself, behind this door there’s something the likes of which you have never seen. Rarely a man has seen it.

Dom: Ok. Is it just sitting back there waiting for someone to go through?

Jack: Well yeah but this is what we’re getting paid for.

Dom: Let’s go over the brief one more time. tries to grab it from him

Jack: It’s confidential, rook. There’s nothing you need to know.

Dom: My life’s on the line, I demand to know what we’re in for.

Jack: If you know what we’re in for, you’re probably not going to want to go through that door.

Doorknob starts to jiggle. Jack grabs it and pushes it closed

Walky talky starts going off

Dispatch: This is a code six Dom and Jack, we need you to return immediately.

Dom: steps away from door Jack puts his back into it

Jack: We’re in too deep, can’t return. Over.

Dispatch: We have reason to believe the thing behind that door is not your ordinary demon.

Dom: What is it, then?

Dispatch: It might be the devil lady.

Jack: The devil lady?

Dom’s eyes go wide

He flashes back

He’s 12 years old and him and the other boys find a copy of the Necronomicon.

Mom downstairs

Mom: What are you boys doing up there?

Dom: Just reading comic books. a stack of comics sits on the table, untouched

He’s got one nerdy blonde friend with glasses (Chris), and another fat friend (Darren)

Chris: Can we just read comics?

Darren: I have to take it back to my brother, or he’s going to beat me up.

Dom: We have to at least open it.

Book makes creepy groaning noise

Darren and Chris look at eachother terrified

Dom: Cool!

He opens the cover a little, and wind blows his hair back.

Darren tries to grab the book from him and it bites his hand, he starts crying

Dom: Shut the fuck up!

The wound immediately starts to change colors, becomes black

Darren starts convulsing, not even crying

Chris jumps to his feet and scrambles towards the door

Dom opens the book anyway

Snap back into real time. The door is rocking.

Jack: Now, it’s important we’re as professional as possible here. We get in, I’ll subdue her, you get the picture.

Dom: I have a bad feeling about this.

(there are some ghosts the camera doesn’t work on)

Dom pushes through door

Flashback again to the house

Mom: Boys, is everything all right up there?

Dom: Everything is fine!

Chris: Are you crazy? What do you think you’re doing?

He punches Chris in the face. Chris runs down the stairs sobbing

Chris: Mrs. Lampley!

Dom: Reads the first page he flips to out loud Aminus parnivus mostey (change this later)

Chris screams downstairs. Runs back up the stairs. His nose looks broken, face is bleeding.

Chris: Your mom...

Dom: What?

Chris: She’s not your mom anymore.

The devil lady cries loudly. Jack (Lost Jack) slaps her across the face, as she rebounds back up Dom (Charlie from Lost) snaps a picture. Jack takes her down, and she looks up directly into Dom’s eyes.

It's stupid, yes. But it at least almost makes sense.

Stupid movie I'm working on

2013-06-07T14:27:00.001-07:00

EXCITING OPENING

Jack: Brace yourself, behind this door there’s something the likes of which you have never seen.

Dom: Ok.

Jack: Don’t be so casual about it.

Dom: I’m not sure if I want to go through with it.

Jack: What?

The devil lady cries loudly. Jack (Lost Jack) slaps her across the face, as she rebounds back up Dom (Charlie from Lost) snaps a picture. She knocks Jack onto his back, and Charlie bolts from the room.

He hears Jack scream from behind the door. He grabs a fire poker stick, bolts into the room and the door is slammed right back in his face.

We cut to his hotel room in Translyvania, he drops the camera as he opens the door. There’s obviously nothing chasing him, but he’s still obviously shaken. He hears a flapping outside, and opens the window. A guy is walking his dog and it gets away and runs off. It’s scared of something.

He lights a cigarette, steps out onto the porch. Pops a couple of pills. Does a quick prayer in Latin.

He answers a phone call. The voice is tough-guy super spy.

How does this guy live?

He packs up all of his crap into a suitcase and leaves as soon as the knocking subsides for a minute. There’s a shadow person at the end of the hallway.

He goes into the darkroom, and drops the camera again. The film has come unraveled, and we see his eyes Pee Wee Herman style as he scrambles in the dark. Someone enters his apartment, and he backs against the darkroom wall.

Dom: Jack?

No answer

He demonstrates how to mix the photo liquid, combines it all together.

A girl shows up, “no no no this is a bad time no no no”. She rings the doorbell

Dom hides, peaks through blinds

She’s waving up at him

He sees the black limo at the end of the block

Presses the button to let her up, she closes the door nonchalantly and a stake strikes against it.

Cut to him running down the stairs, he grabs her by the hand

“Dom!”

They rush up the stairs, she refuses to run.

Dom slams door

Kathy: Dom! What’s the big idea!

Dom: Shhh. they listen, there’s no sound. She rolls her eyes at him.

Kathy: You aren’t even ready.

Dom: Ready for what?

Kathy: You don’t remember what today is?

Dom: We have a lot more serious things to be worrying about right now.

Kathy: More serious than your sons birthday?

window glass starts vibrating

Dom: Get down!

He tackles her under the window, something fragile in her purse breaks

Kathy: What are you doing? she opens purse, a present is in there broken

Dom: There’s an evil energy out here...

Kathy: Are you on drugs, again, Dom?

cut to next scene, she’s rummaging through his drawers

Dom: I’m not on drugs, it’s not how it looks. This isn’t about our shit.

There’s a loud noise from outside, he grabs a gun from inside a book and closes the door and blocks it off

The picture in the darkroom has finished developing, it’s an evil demon. It moves inside of the picture.

He points the gun at the door as the key rattles. Jack stumbles through, beat up. He shoots and misses.

Jack: You left me there, you son of a bitch.

Dom: I wasn’t ready for this, I thought you were dead.

Jack: We’re both dead.

Dom: I kind of had that feeling.

Jack uses his fingerprints to activate a special service on his phone

Random notes for thesis

2013-05-17T07:32:00.002-07:00

Notes on senior theses:

“The Subjective Imagination”

Power defined as “the potential of an individual to change the behavior of another”

Relational dyads

dy·ad

[dahy-ad] Show IPA

noun

a group of two; couple; pair.

Biology .

a secondary morphological unit, consisting of two monads: a chromosome dyad.

the double chromosomes resulting from the separation of the four chromatids of a tetrad.

Chemistry . an element, atom, or group having a valence of two. Compare monad, triad ( def 2a ) .

Mathematics . two vectors with no symbol connecting them, usually considered as an operator.

Sociology .

two persons involved in an ongoing relationship or interaction.

the relationship or interaction itself.

Dyadic partners is an oxymoron?

“Arterial affect” where smaller outlets look for guidance from larger ones

“My study is unique in that…”

“When I moved from the field to academia, I found the observations I made in the field were not represented in the literature I read about journalistic news processes, and journalists’ understanding of the audience. My interest in studying journalists’ uses of social media grew from these experiences. The purpose of this thesis is to capture and explain the ways in which journalists are using social media to engage the audience, and how such uses are affecting news processes and changing the role the audience plays in the construction of the news”

Another new one!

2013-01-15T13:34:00.002-08:00

(The chef brings out a gross looking sandwich on a dirty plate)

Captain: I haven’t trusted any of the food we’ve seen since leaving port.

Duke: (Pulls out Velcro Mickey Mouse wallet)

Captain: We need to get you a new wallet.

Quentin: Say, that’s a good idea. Why doesn’t everyone take their wallets out?

Captain: Not a chance.

Quentin: Did you see what I did to the other guy?

Captain: He got thrown out.

Quentin used to be a big criminal and now he’s stranded on this island. His crew abandoned him with their boat when they came to shore here. He’s trying to steal their boat.

Quentin: Alright, anyone mind that I’m the dealer?

Duke: I’ll deal.

Quentin: You don’t know how to deal.

Captain: This doesn’t seem like a clean game.

Quentin: Siddown! How about my friend here Marco deals?

(Marco is a pretty shady character. Big scar across his face, enormous arms, wife beater)

Captain: No, see, impartial means that it’s not someone you are associated with.

Quentin: Big slick coming in here with his country grammar. Well I’m sorry this is my casino, my rules. Do you want to play or not?

Captain: No we don’t want to play, we want to be on our way.

(police boat pulls up outside dinging its police bell)

Captain: Saved by the bell.

Quentin: It’s all the same you two penniless penny pinchers probably don’t have a penny to your name.

(They’re walking quickly outside)

Duke: How do you just let him talk to you like that?

Captain: We’ll wait for the correct opportunity; maybe he’s facing the other direction standing at the end of a pier in shark infested waters. Then we’ll kick that bugger in there.

Duke: Captain, I’m just going to let you know about this for future reference. I’ve got my grandfathers bowie kni… (starts unwrapping it)

Captain: What business you have with a big knife like that? Cleaning fish? Put that damn thing away.

(Captain doesn’t like violence)

Duke: My grandfather was an admiral.

Captain: You have a little bit of a conflict of interest going on, don’t you?

Duke: What do you mean?

Captain: You say you’re here for field work, or school, or whatever. But you got pirate in your blood.

Duke: When did you decide you were going to be a pirate?

Captain: Decide? You think this is a choice?

Duke: Captain, it’s pretty clear you haven’t been out here very long. You don’t know what to do in the face of adversity, you run off pretty much every time.

Captain: That’s what a good thief does; run away unscatched.

Duke: But I haven’t seen you steal anything yet either!

Captain: Well we just got here.

Duke: Ok so look in the window of that store. There’s a golden candlestick. Steal it.

Captain: I’ll steal it when we’re leaving. We still haven’t met up with our contact.

Duke: You don’t know who he is or what his name is!

Captain: Jeez Duke, you make this pirate thing sound so easy. How do you fathom we do this?

Duke: You aren’t even a real pirate. It says in the oath that if a pirate is challenged he’s gotta take on that challenge. It’s what makes a captain a captain.

Captain: Where’s it say this? Pirates don’t use books.

Duke: You aren’t even a captain!

Captain: You want me to steal that candlestick? Alright.

Duke: Wait! Captain! You were right, we just got here! And we have to find Isaac…

Quentin: This must be their ship… what a pathetic little vessel.

Doris: Charles, there’s a strange man looking at us.

Quentin: (puts hat over heart) Excuse me miss, who is the captain of this vessel?

Doris: (looks at Charles disapprovingly) What’s it to ya?

Quentin: I just ran into an affable pair of men in the saloon, said they just parked their boat in the harbor here. I’m afraid I beat those boys gambling, and now this is my ship.

Charles: Captain’d be dumb enough to bet the ship, but Dukey wouldn’t have let him do something so stupid.

Quentin: Ah yes, Captain and Duke. Those were their names. What business does your Captain have calling himself that?

Charles: Beats me. He’s probably trying to hide some past underneath all of that fancy pirate stuff. He hasn’t exactly fooled any of us.

Quentin: He said the deed of ownership should be here somewhere.

Captain turns around right before he enters and talks to duke

Captain: Alright, duke. There’s a few skills I’ll be using in here.

Duke: Looks pretty suspicious, doesn’t it? Two of us out here talking before we enter?

(Captain smiles in at storekeeper, who looks at him perplexed)

Captain: See, doesn’t expect a thing. We hold all of the cards here. This is an old mom and pop store for sure, probably been here a hundred years. They haven’t seen the tricks I have up my sleeve.

Duke: Ok, like what?

Captain: First of all, compliment the crap out of the shop. Secondly, misdirection. I’m going to say I like something in the case in front of him.

Cut to him walking in, looking really closely at knick knacks on table, picking up salt shaker and shaking it in his ear and making weird face and putting it back down.

Captain: Excuse me sir, and a fine night to you. I like your hat.

Duke: (groans inaudibly and touches his face)

Storekeeper: Don’t be touching anything you don’t plan on buying, pirate.

Captain: I may look like a pirate, yes, I may, but rest assured I am not one. Until just a few days ago, I was an ordinary Joe working as a baker, your average baker.

Storekeeper: Baker? Why’d you stop doing that?

Captain: Place burnt down. I won’t let it get me down, though, no. I’ve came here to try to start anew, a brand new business.

(Backs over by candle, still facing storekeeper)

Storekeeper: What are you walking all the way over there for if you want to talk to me? Are you interested in that candle?

Duke: Excuse me, sir. We’re here actually more interested in these… ropes you have behind the counter here.

Storekeeper: I’d appreciate if your friend would come back over here and stop trying to misdirect me.

Duke: I excuse my uncle, he’s a little bit seasick. You see, he’s telling the truth, he really doesn’t like to be out at sea.

Captain: I don’t get seasick, Duke, and you know it.

Duke: (blank faced) Do we still need that rope? You know, to tie the cannons down. You see, we’re such amateur pirates that we don’t even tie our cannons down, and they roll around down in the basement of the boat all over the place…

Captain: It’s called a galley, not a basement.

Duke: We don’t even have cannonballs!

Storekeeper: S’at right? You’re also two of the worst thief’s in the world. What, you think I wouldn’t notice you picked that up?

Captain: Just admiring the craftsmanship, that’s all. Real artisan work here.

Storekeeper: Say, you two boys aren’t from (wherever they’re from, I forget), are ya? Look just about right, younger weasily guy and incompetent older guy with a death wish.

Captain: Maybe… (pockets candlestick)

Storekeeper: Been sent about a week ago?

Captain: That’s us!

Storekeeper: So where is it?

Captain: Where’s what?

Storekeeper: Don’t tell me you think the queen would send you here just to chat with an old shopkeeper like myself.

Captain: Oh, yeah *snaps fingers*. The… the…

Storekeeper: Should be a box about this big (gestures).

Captain: What’s in it?

Storekeeper: That’s none of your business, pirate.

More stupid pirate story

2013-01-12T14:39:00.001-08:00

(They pull into port. There’s plenty of other pirate ships, most of which are way bigger than their own. Their giant squid is held in a net dragging below the ship)

A one eyed, grizzly bearded, torn up looking guy greets them as they steer the ship into the shipyard

One Eyed Official: Greetings travelers, looking to dock? It’s a hefty price for undocumented travelers such as yourself.

Duke: (Surveying the goings-on around the area) Captain, this looks like complete anarchy out there. These are real pirates.

One Eyed Official: (starts to laugh but it turns into a cough) Who’s your number two? This errand boy? Are you sure this isn’t some sort of vacation cruise you’re taking these boys on?

Captain: This isn’t no cruise, I’m under secret orders from the magistrate herself.

One Eyed Official: Oh, you’re letting a woman order you around?

Captain: How much to put up my ship?

OEO: I’m having some second thoughts about it. How’s 200 dollars sound?

Captain: Dollars? All I’ve got is gold coins.

OEO: You ARE old school, aren’t you? No one uses coins anymore. They’ve been phased out.

Captain: Wait… but… it’s gold. I mean look. It’s shiny. Just like the kind they have in Fort Knox.

(gangs of suspicious looking perps gather around the outside of the boat)

Duke: I don’t like the looks of these guys, captain.

(Captain takes OEO aside)

Captain: Look, we were stranded at sea for months. Could have been years. I lost track of time.

OEO: What’s it to me?

Captain: We found this magic rock, and it lead us here.

OEO: Where’d you get this?

(Police come out)

OEO: There’s an old man near and dear to our hearts carries this rock on him at all times. Sure, it’s not really a magic rock, it’s actually from the guest shop, but nonetheless it’s one of a kind. He wouldn’t have given this to you.

(Don steps up aboard)

Captain: Don go back down this ain’t got nothing to do with you.

Don: How do you screw up being able to park the ship? This has to be one of the easiest things to do.

OEO: What are you doing down in the cargo hold? It’s easy to tell you’d be a hell of a lot better of a captain than this guy.

Don: I apologize for our captain. We’ll pay any amount of money necessary to compensate you and set feet on solid land again.

OEO: Not so fast! We’ll have to inspect your cargo first. No sense bringing in some sort of seaborn illness.

Don: Take the ship as far as I’m concerned. This is as far as I needed to go.

Captain: Don?...

Don: Do I have to explain this to you, Captain? I needed to get out of that Podunk, hillbilly town. I want to start a new life.

OEO: We all want to start over sometime, don’t we?

Captain: You can’t shake your heritage. Where you came from, what you did.

Don: That’s where you’re wrong, Captain. Look around, look at how foreign this place is. No one knows me here, no one recognizes my face. As far as these people are concerned I’m just another guy on the street.

Captain: Well that’s alright, granted you want to be just another guy on the street.

Don: You mean as opposed to you? A captain? Maybe we aren’t so much different after all. You just one day decided you hated your terrible wife, your brat kids, your awful job, and here you are out at sea. You’re only running away, aren’t you? You think that pirate hat gives you status?

Duke: You got it all wrong, Duke. That isn’t why the Captain is here.

Captain: Shut up Duke, this isn’t your battle. Don, I believe you’ve gone too far. (takes the gloves off)

Don: You’re a real man now? And you want to fight me with the police surrounding us? You’re off to a bad start here in… where the hell are we, anyway?

OEO: This is the pirate town of Latevia.

Don: Can you believe that?

OEO: What?

Don: The Captain has somehow got us where he said we were going.

Duke: Even I admit that was Quixotic at best.

Don: (Takes out wallet, turns out he’s loaded) Here’s 300, take an extra fourty for yourself. As for you fellas, good luck out there. Hopefully I’ll never see you again.

Isaac comes up from brig

Duke: What are we supposed to do once we’ve come here, again?

Captain: Supposed to meet up with our contact. Only thing is, we lost the order sheet the day after we pushed off. Lucky for us Don remembered what the name of the town we were supposed to go to was, I lost it a long time ago.

Duke: You’re going entirely on intuition.

Charles: Think it sounds more like he’s a crazy son of a bitch with nothing to lose.

Captain: Right in between both of those.

Charles: So you plan on going around town asking people if they’re the contact you’re supposed to meet?

(Isaac scurries up from downstairs)

Isaac: Where’s my uncle?

Captain: Oh no, Isaac! I don’t know how to tell you this, but your uncle is gone.

Isaac: Gone? That son of a bitch gone and abandoned me again? (he runs off into the city)

(Duke starts chasing after him)

Captain: Let him go, Duke.

Duke: Captain, he’s one of ours. We don’t have many loyal men.

Captain: He isn’t loyal to us he’s loyal to Don. Frankly, he ain’t gonna catch that son of a bitch one way or another.

Duke: Well what if he gets killed?

(There’s an uproar on the shore)

Duke: What do you think it is?

Captain: Shhhh.

They overhear a man yell, “This is him! This is our islands grandpa!”

Captain: Better we run after Isaac than we get sucked into in the judicial process.

Duke: Why don’t we just tell them the truth? That Don threw him overboard?

Captain: That’s an extremely convenient story for us. I’m not exactly sure these people are as rational as you are. Real world doesn ‘t work like your books.

Expanded and revised

2013-01-11T14:07:00.001-08:00

So I'm going to keep working on this one, I think. Just see where it goes. I'm loosely following the journey of the hero (which is what Duke will be talking about most of the time), and yeah that's about it.

Duke is into traditional pirate stories, Blackbeard, Robert Louis Stevenson, Pirate talk, etc. He’s also superstitious. He’s pursuing a life in pirating in subversion of his parents plans. He’s going to get college credit for the trip, and is supposed to be conducting fieldwork but is lazy about it. He ends up on the looking post most of the time because Captain is afraid of heights.

The Captain insists on making his own rules on the sea. He was an extremely unsuccessful businessman with a broken family on the land, and although he spent most of his adult life on ships as a cargo man he has only recently decided he’s a Captain. For years, he’s referred to himself as one. It’s a dream, but as they say, a dream that comes easy has little value.

Don Works in the cargo hold. He has a iffy past, and is a bit of a man of mystery. He doesn’t even like to set foot on deck because he’s afraid he’ll be identified remotely. He’s searching for the fountain of youth, or a desert oasis, or a beautiful island to live on. He also wouldn’t mind coming back a millionaire. Also, he’s under the impression the Captain is a much better Captain than he actually is.

Accountant Was looking for a quick route to Moltenegro, where he believes there’s a fortune to be made in cane sugar. He’s an old friend of The Captain’s, and is embezzling money.

Captain: Duke what do you see out there?

Duke: You know, it’s pretty dark. I can’t make heads or tails out of it. Just looks like a dark fog.

Captain: Yeah I know it’s dark braniac.

Duke: Why don’t you just look yourself?

Captain: Duke, I’ve told you a million times not to address me that way. I am your captain. The Captain.

Charles and Doris are playing some old person card game

Charles: Give the boy a break, a power trip won’t ingratiate you to anyone on this ship.

Captain: Charles, stay out of this. Do you want to get land or not? That’s what I thought, Charles. Shut up, Charles.

Duke: Hold on, look, a light is flashing out there.

Captain: Where?

Duke: See, way out there.

Captain: That’s probably just a buoy or maybe a… what light?

Duke: That’s funny, it went out.

Captain: Gimme that. (camera switches to his zoomed in view) There’s nothing out there, Duke. (sighs) Thank you for your service, keep an eye on the sea.

Duke: Aye aye, captain.

Captain: No one says that, Duke. Goddamn it Duke, we were going to end the night on a good note and everything.

(He checks out food parlor)

Captain: No midnight snack for me… Cured beef!

Old cook lady bursts in

Florence: Captain, we’re on a strict regimen! (knocks it out of his hand)

Captain: What good is it going to do anyone in the middle of the floor?

Florence: Captain, you’ve had us sailing in circles for nigh on two weeks. I have 3 grandbibbies at home, wondering where there woman is at. If there’s any luck, Charles hasn’t got himself sick and in bed again.

Captain: Charles, best thing that happened to him was marrying you. If he worked as hard as you you wouldn’t even have to be here.

Florence: Flattery will get you nowhere, Captain. And another thing, how do you even intend to pay us?

Captain: Would you keep it down, morale is low enough as it is! I don’t need a mutiny! If we don’t find land and reach that treasure, I’ll pay you out of my private collection, how’s that?

Captain goes to office of accountant

Accountant: Come on in, sit down, sit down.

(He’s mixing a bright blue concoction)

Captain: What the hell is that? Some sort of poison?

Accountant: This will put me into a coma for about a month. By that time, we’ll be at land. My body will freeze into a temporary stasis, so I won’t need food. I know rations are getting scarce…

Captain: I forbid you to drink that coma juice! Givey here!

(Accountant chugs it while holding him off with an outstretched arm)

Captain: What am I supposed to do if you die?! I can’t talk to any of them city slicker folks. They see me for exactly what I am. No one on this ship respects me.

Accountant: If you want people to like you better, show a little bit of confidence here or there. If only there was some sort of way I could do this work remotely, we wouldn’t be in this situation.

(Duke shouts from upstairs) Captain come quick!

(Captain runs out)

Captain: A god damn seamonster?! (Accountant collapses audibly)

Duke: I don’t know if it’s a seamonster.

Captain: That was a goddamn tendril and you know it. Irregardless, we best be loading up the cannons.

Down below, the munition people are asleep on bunk beds

He shakes a midget, who punches him in the nose. His nose breaks, and he has to pop it back in. Everyone laughs because it looks funny.

Captain: Fuck. I’ll kick your ass later, you little midget asshole. We’ve got a seamonster up there, arms going crazy.

Don: (Soft spoken, logical) You want I should go up and have a look at it?

Captain: We’re running out of time. What I want you should do is load up the goddamn cannons.

Don: We don’t have any ammunition. (Don is upset that he wasn’t made captain, and is uncooperative)

Captain: What good is it to employ all of you boys when we don’t even have any ammunition?! Well, we’re going to be killed, aren’t we?

Isaac: Captain, do I need to remind you again that none of us are trained seaman? Although, we may have a few good ideas! Why don’t we just change course, then?

Captain: We’re out in open water, no one knows exactly how big this bath tub is. Could change course and end up out here for days.

Isaac: I don’t know, we have a general idea.

Captain: The fact of the matter, Mr. Fancy Pants, is that we should have touched land nary 3 days ago. If we changed course now, we might be running out of food.

(Ship starts shaking)

Captain: Lot of good it did us standing around and talking, looks like we’re on a collision course with the beast itself.

(They’re back out on the deck)

Captain: Isaac, you been down there since we took off haven’t you? Your skin looks like it saw a ghost and went bright white.

Isaac: It’s my condition. I can’t get too much sunlight.

Duke: This is too early in the story for the belly of the whale portion.

Captain: Now relax, Duke, this creature ain’t got a stomach big enough to swallow our ship. Stab at it with your swords, men! Its suction cups are especially susceptible to piercing. Kind of a clunky creature, trying to eat a big old ship like this. And it’s big eyeballs are right in stabbing distance.

Duke: Yeah, this isn’t exactly a kraken.

Captain: I almost feel sorry for the sucker, look at his big overgrown whiskers. Looks like a hobo hasn’t shaved in a while.

They sever a tendril, it reels back in fear.

Don: Look, one of its big old paws is stuck. I think it got all tangled up with us on accident.

They cut open the beasts face, and a man wearing a barrel pulls himself out like he’s just being born.

Don: Another mouth to feed, what do you say we just toss him back over?

Captain: That’s inhumane, sir, we won’t be doing that. Let’s wake this sucker up (he slaps him around a little bit)

Old man: Huh, what? Where?

Captain: You’re aboard the SS Constantinople. I’m your captain, Harvey Blackface. These are my boys, Don the shipwright, Isaac our marine life specialist, Duke the intern.

Duke: Folklore expert and writer, actually.

Old man: What’s that to me?

Captain: What were you doing inside of that squid’s brain?

Old man: Huh? Oh shit. Now I remember. Oh shit oh shit oh shit.

Captain: Calm down calm down.

Old man: I reckon you boys don’t know where you’ve sailed yourself into.

Captain: I’m a pretty competent sailor, I’d like to say. We’re heading to Montenegro, ever heard of it?

Old man: You boys have sailed right into the Devil’s triangle.

Captain: Devil’s triangle?

Duke: I’ve never heard of such a place.

Old man: Well I kind of just call it that. (Starts coughing uncontrollably)

(There’s a tag on the giant squids ear)

Duke: Hey, this squid is tagged. Do you think that these waters are moderated?

Captain: Sure, yeah. Hey, that’s a good sign. Must mean we’re getting closer to civilization.

Old man: You guys got anything to eat around here?

Captain: Maybe we fry up this giant squid? Some sort of octopus soup?

Old man: I ain’t eating this nasty old octopus. I tasted it as it tasted me when I was inside of there. It smells like troll feet.

Captain: Trollfeet? There’s trolls around here?

(Suddenly an octopus arm juts out and catches the old man, suction cup makes a noise and when it comes off he’s got an enormous bloody circle on his chest)

Duke: Some sort of old wise man that was.

Don: You have a lot more compassion for animals than people, huh Duke?

Old man: I resent that. It’s just as well, however. I don’t even know how old I am, where I’m from, where I’m going. (aggravated) It’s almost like it attacked because it didn’t like that I said it tasted like trolls feet.

Captain: Well, we’re just going to have to cut the head off.

Duke: You can’t cut the head off! This thing is definitely an endangered species.

Don: We don’t know where we are, it’s about survival out here.

Duke: So we lose all ethics just like that?

Don: Well some of us have to survive in the real world, and some of these questions aren’t as clear cut.

Duke: Maybe this tag has a connection to the creatures life, and when it dies they’ll know and come hunt us down.

Don: Who’s they? And you know for damn sure there ain’t any technology that can do that.

Duke: Well I’m not going to prison.

Captain: Well we do have to eat something.

(Captain is asleep in his quarters. He looks at picture of his wife and kids)

Captain: Bernice, how I miss you. (suddenly he’s extremely sentimental/his lighter side) The kids, not so much.

(flashback)

He walks into his lighthouse home with a briefcase

Captain: Honey, I’m home.

Bernice: (Loud hacking) Bring any food?

Captain: (Walks into living room, Bernice is in a fuzzy green chair in front of the TV with a beer bottle balanced on her stomach.) (Checks watch) Well, it is after 5. I’ll have one with you.

Bernice: Food, Cap’m. The kids, too. We gotta eat.

Captain: Those were good times. Sigh. But nah, being a Captain is better.

(He opens a window. The rubbery scent of burning squid emanates into his nostrils. A carrier pigeon flies through the window and he removes the attached letter)

He opens the window and sniffs a pungent odor. Walks out on deck, which is covered in fumes. Seagulls are huddling up on the far side of the deck. He shoes them away with his hat.

Duke: I will not eat this squid. First of all, it’s purple on the inside. It smells like melted rubber.

Don: Go ahead and starve.

Captain: Don’t we have any real food left?

Don: No, you ate all of it.

Old man is imprisoned in the dungeon part

Captain: Sorry we didn’t have a guest room for you, this is the best we can do.

Old man: Blood, corpses, as far as the eye can see.

Captain: Are you alright?

Old man: The island is a volcano.

Captain: What island, where?

Old man: Even the animals try to leave. The squid left. Tried to save me, too. And you barbarians killed it…

Duke: I’ve looked through all of my books of lore, all of my *sneeze*. (Looks around at group of people, no one blesses him) No one’s going to bless me, huh? That was a one of a kind squid. Half expect the old man to start going on about the ides of March next.

Old man: Those who plunder… will run asunder.

Duke: The compass tells us we’re going due north… *shakes it* there’s no way this thing is broken is there?

(Captain grabs compass and throws it into water)

Duke: That’s my grandfathers!

Captain: Well your grandpa oughta have taught you to trust your instincts. Do you think my years of expertise could so easily be replaced by a simple little gadget like that?

Duke: I think you just about crossed the line, Captain.

Captain: What are you going to do about it, shrimp?

Duke: I could easily kill you in your sleep. Or steal your precious picture of your wife you’re always ogling. You’d do better to never look at that picture again.

Captain: Watch yourself, Duke. You’re treading on thin ice.

(Old man moans)

Duke: Hey I think he’s dead.

Arnold is another shiphand who doesn’t talk much.

Arnold: Why’d you put him in my bed? I’m the only one who does any kind of work around here and after slaving for 20 hours…

(Before anyone can say anything, Arnold picks up the body and walks out onto the deck)

Duke: Whoa what are you doing?

Captain: I think he’s overreacting.

(He runs into the door with him trying to carry him through it lengthwise. A crystal falls out of his pocket)

Captain grabs it, it glows

Duke: The boon?

The light leads the captain out onto the dock, it points westward

Duke: According to legend, this is supposed to point us toward the unkown.

Captain: We’re already in the unknown. Water, as far as the eye can see. Like the tundra.

Duke: Well if we follow that light, it might take us to something even less familiar.

Captain: Less familiar than what? I know this water well.

Duke: Like land, Captain.

(Don is at telescope looking out at land)

Don: I don’t like this, look at the buildings. They’re taller than we’re used to.

Captain: Tall buildings a problem for you? You can stay on the ship if you want to. I’m going to kiss the land.

Duke: Now let’s not let what happened last time happen again, Captain.

Captain: What happened last time?

Duke: We were on land for months! You completely disappeared the first few weeks.

Captain: We spend months at sea, we spend months on land. It’s only fair.

Duke: This might be life for you, but I’m supposed to be back before next semester.

Captain: Oh, right, school. Think about it this way, Duke. You’re getting real life experience out here. That’s what you’re supposed to want as a scholar. No one wants to hear stories about you sitting around on land in a library reading books. Isn’t that why you’re here in the first place?

Duke: I’m here studying you, I’m not a part of this.

Charles: Isn’t this suspicious to both of you, all of a sudden land pops up? I don’t know if it doesn’t feel like we earned it.

Captain: You all were just complaining twenty minutes ago about the lack of food, seasickness, jaundice. All of a sudden no one else wants to find land.

Doris: We wanted Montenegro. Beautiful tropical paradise. A woman could die comfortably there. Or an old couple.

Charles: You keep me out of this, Doris. I will be doing no such thing. Maybe I’ll even start a new family. Do you think there will be ladies with hanging…

Doris: You’re the only one who’s going to be doing any hanging (hits him with hat?)

Duke: Whatever happened with that old mans body?

(They hear a splash)

Arnold: Yeah sorry it took me a minute. I’m throwing out all of the sheets and the mattress as well.

Captain: Why don’t you just switch with the bunk above yours?

Arnold: I’m not sleeping underneath where an old man died. He’s going to haunt us for sure.

Duke: He’s already haunting me. I’m shocked you guys are so unaffected by the death of a person on this ship.

Captain: He’s not one of mine.

Duke: Oh so you’re into the pirate morality now? Great.

Charles: Someone died on this ship?!

Captain: It’s alright it was peaceful. Probably natural causes.

Doris: I don’t like people dying on my ship!

Captain: Maybe I pick up a whole new crew here. Some worthy seaman.

Doris: Some cruise this has been. We get attacked by a giant squid, find an old man inside, and then he dies.

Captain: Well atleast he left us this rock.

Duke: Hey, I think it’s giving away our location. Look, they’re gathering on the shore.

(Don comes running out)

Don: We can’t go this way, turn the ship around.

Captain: What, do you recognize something?

Don: No, I just have a bad feeling about this.

Captain: We’ll do no such thing.

Don: I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do this. (grabs Duke) I’ll kill him, you know I’ll do it.

Captain: Makes no difference to me. You really should have grabbed me. But then I don’t know who you’d negotiate with.

Don: Turn the wheel

Captain: No. Besides, that isn’t even how ships work. I turn the wheel, it slowly maneuvers around. It’s not like I can do a Y turn and turn around, we’re 200 feet away.

New fiction! Stupid pirate story!

2013-01-09T10:59:00.001-08:00

I think I'm going to stick at this stupid pirate story as a writing exercise for awhile. Nothing feels better than getting some writing out there onto the page, I can tell you that! And you'd believe it because you know it's true.

Now I don't write as much because the letter n broke on my keyboard.

Duke is into traditional pirate stories, Blackbeard, Robert Louis Stevenson, Pirate talk, etc. He’s also superstitious. He’s pursuing a life in pirating in subversion of his parents plans.

Captain: Duke what do you see out there?

Duke: You know, it’s pretty dark.

Captain: Even if it’s dark! What do you see out there?

Duke: Why don’t you just look yourself?

Captain: Duke, I’ve told you a million times not to address me that way. I am your captain.

Charles and Doris are playing some old person card game

Charles: Give the boy a break, a power trip won’t ingratiate you to anyone on this ship.

Captain: Charles, stay out of this. Do you want to get land or not? That’s what I thought, Charles.

Duke: Hold on, look, a light is flashing out there.

Captain: Where?

Duke: See, way out there.

Captain: That’s probably just a buoy or maybe a… what light?

Duke: That’s funny, it went out.

Captain: Gimme that. (camera switches to his zoomed in view) There’s nothing out there, Duke. (sighs) Thank you for your service, keep on looking out there.

Duke: Aye aye, captain.

Captain: No one says that, Duke. Goddamn it Duke, we were going to end the night on a good note and everything.

(He checks out food parlor)

Captain: No midnight snack for me… Cured beef!

Old cook lady bursts in

Florence: Captain, we’re on a strict regiment! (knocks it out of his hand)

Captain: What good is it going to do anyone in the middle of the floor?

Florence: Captain, you’ve had us sailing in circles for nigh on two weeks. I have 3 grandbibbies at home, wondering where there women is at. If there’s any luck, Charles hasn’t got himself sick and in bed again.

Captain: Charles, that no good husband of yours. If he worked a day in his life you wouldn’t even have to be here.

Florence: That’s another thing! Even if we do find land, is there any guarantee you’ll even be able to pay your workers?

Captain: Would you keep it down, morale is low enough as it is! I don’t need a mutiny! First thing tomorrow morning, we’ll drop anchor and do some fishing.

Captain goes to office of accountant

Accountant: Come on in, sit down, sit down.

(He’s mixing a bright blue concoction)

Captain: What the hell is that? Some sort of poison?

Accountant: This will put me into a coma for about a month. By that time, we’ll be at land. My body will freeze into a temporary stasis, so I won’t need food. I know rations are getting scarce…

Captain: I forbid you to drink that coma juice! Givey here!

(Accountant chugs it while holding him off with an outstretched arm)

Captain: What am I supposed to do if you die?! I can’t talk to any of them city slicker folks. They see me for exactly what I am. No one on this ship respects me.

Accountant: If you want people to like you better, show a little bit of confidence here or there.

(Duke shouts from upstairs) Captain come quick!

(Captain runs out)

Captain: A god damn seamonster?! (Accountant collapses audibly)

Duke: I don’t know if it’s a seamonster.

Captain: That was a goddamn tendril and you know it. Irregardless, we best be loading up the cannons.

Down below, the munition people are asleep on bunk beds

He shakes a midget, who punches him in the nose. His nose breaks, and he has to pop it back in. Everyone laughs because it looks funny.

Captain: Fuck. I’ll kick your ass later, you little midget asshole. We’ve got a seamonster up there, arms going crazy.

Don: (Soft spoken, logical) You want I should go up and have a look at it?

Captain: We’re running out of time. What I want you should do is load up the goddamn cannons.

Don: We don’t have any ammunition. (Don is upset that he wasn’t made captain, and is uncooperative)

Captain: What good is it to employ all of you boys when we don’t even have any ammunition?! Well, we’re going to be killed, aren’t we?

Isaac: Well why don’t we just change course, then?

Captain: We’re out in open water, no one knows exactly how big this bath tub is.

Isaac: I don’t know, we have a general idea.

Captain: The fact of the matter, Mr. Fancy Pants, is that we should have touched land nary 3 days ago. If we changed course now, we might be running out of food.

(Ship starts shaking)

Captain: Lot of good it did us standing around and talking, looks like we’re on a collision course with the beast itself.

(They’re back out on the deck)

Captain: Isaac, you been down there since we took off haven’t you? Your skin looks like it saw a ghost and went bright white.

Isaac: It’s my condition. I can’t get too much sunlight.

Duke: This is too early in the story for the belly of the whale portion.

Captain: Now relax, Isaac, this creature ain’t got a stomach big enough to swallow our ship. Stab at it with your swords, men! Its suction cups are especially susceptible to piercing. Kind of a clunky creature, trying to eat a big old ship like this. And it’s big eyeballs are right in stabbing distance.

Duke: Yeah, this isn’t exactly a kraken.

Captain: I almost feel sorry for the sucker, look at his big overgrown whiskers. Looks like a hobo hasn’t shaved in a while.

They sever a tendril, it reels back in fear.

Don: Look, one of its big old paws is stuck. I think it got all tangled up with us on accident.

They cut open the beasts face, and a man wearing a barrel pulls himself out like he’s just being born.

Don: Another mouth to feed, what do you say we just toss him back over?

Captain: That’s inhumane, sir, we won’t be doing that. Let’s wake this sucker up (he slaps him around a little bit)

Old man: Huh, what? Where?

Captain: You’re aboard the SS Constantinople. I’m your captain, Harvey Blackface. These are my boys, Don the shipwright, Isaac our marine life specialist, Duke the intern.

Duke: Folklore expert and writer, actually.

Old man: What’s that to me?

Captain: What were you doing inside of that squids brain?

Old man: Huh? Oh shit. Now I remember. Oh shit oh shit oh shit.

Captain: Calm down calm down.

Old man: I reckon you boys don’t know where you’ve sailed yourself into.

Captain: I’m a pretty competent sailor, I’d like to say. We’re heading to Montenegro, ever heard of it?

Old man: You boys have sailed right into the Devil’s triangle.

Captain: Devil’s triangle?

Duke: I’ve never heard of such a place.

Old man: Well I kind of just call it that. (starts coughing uncontrollably)

It's been too long, I know

2012-11-17T12:51:00.005-08:00

It's been a pretty long time, yeah. I've been writing other things, and grading papers, and teaching writing classes, and being a TA, and working on my Masters, and working at Whole Foods, and watching TV. I've been playing a lot of Earthbound, of course, like usual. It's what I do.

So I thought I'd do this as quickly as possible and then get back to grading stuff.

DOGS

"You haven't rode in my car before so you don't know what I do, do you?" Jeremy asked Janelle.

"What do you do?" She asked.

Cars whipped by on both sides. He inched forward and backwards out of the spot, like a dog wiggling its butt.

"I sing. That's what I do."

He accidentally sung the N word. Janelle is black.

"I didn't know you felt like that."

"It's a lyric in the song! That's not how I feel. I'm just singing along."

"No no no no, you're racist."

"How can I be racist? I like the music."

"That's like saying you have black friends so you can't be racist."

"But I do have black friends! And I'm not racist."

He expected her to thank him for the ride.

They showed up at the party.

He normally wouldn't have been home on a Saturday night at all. With all of this free time on his hands, he ended up using most of it to play videogames.

Opening coffee store

2012-10-21T10:27:00.001-07:00

        "Think of it, in just a few days this place will be covered in grime and dirt, young couples will be making out on our upstairs sofa, we'll have to continually fix the expresso machine."
        "Homeless people will have conversations with our baristas about whether or not World War 2 happened."
        "Drunk passerbies will vandalize our windows! If we're lucky, we'll get some graffiti."
   Charlie wiped down the counter. It felt like moving into a new apartment. Other than the rent check, which was more and didn't include heat or electric. And all of the annoying certificates they had to file for.
   John opened up a UPS envelope and pulled a plastic sign out that read "Now Hiring".
   "Seriously, you ordered a sign online? That's an unnecessary expense."
   "But look, it's nice."
   "Write that into our budget." Charlie said, drawing out a sign on a piece of computer paper that said "Now Hiring", and placing it next to the plastic one.

   "Welcome to the neighborhood." A man wearing a suit with the pant legs rolled up said, extending his hand at the door.
   "You've been here for awhile?"
   "Yeah, I run the bar across the street."
   The sign read "Bar and Coffee Lounge." This was a massive oversight. They had direct competition across the street.
   "I think we can coexist. My clientele is mostly college kids.   They'll get bored of my store and go to yours, then get bored of yours and come over to mine."

         "We better open earlier than him." Charlie said to Damian.
         They changed the "open" sign to 6:00 AM. That was a full two hours before the Bar and Coffee Lounge opened.
         "We should probably have a more interesting name for our little shop than his, too."
         They produced a sign.

Study guide for Rick Popps 562

2012-10-13T12:12:00.000-07:00

Geertz: Social Anthropology
Symbolic anthropology studies symbols and the processes,such as myth and ritual, by which humans assign meanings to these symbols to address fundamental questions about human social life (Spencer 1996:535). According to Geertz, man is in need of symbolic "sources of illumination" to orient himself with respect to the system of meaning that is any particular culture (1973a:45). Turner states that symbols initiate social action and are "determinable influences inclining persons and groups to action" (1967:36). Geertz's position illustrates the interpretive approach to symbolic anthropology, while Turner's illustrates the symbolic approach.

Carey: Communication

Two alternative conceptions of communication have been alive in American culture since this term entered common discourse in the nineteenth century. Both definitions derive, as with much in secular culture, from religious oirigins, though they refer to somewhat different regions of religious experience. We might label these descriptions, if only to provide handy pegs upon which to hang our thought, a transmission view of communication and a ritual view of communication.
The transmission view of communication is the commonest in our culture–perhaps in all industrial cultures–and dominates contemporary dictionary entries under the term. It is defined by terms such as "impaffing," "sending," "transmitting," or "giving information to others." It is formed from a metaphor of geography or transportation. In the nineteenth century but to a lesser extent today, the movement of goods or people and the movement of information were seen as essentially identical processes and both were described by the common noun "communication." The center of this idea of communication is the transmission of signals or messages over distance for the purpose of control. It is a view of communication that derives from one of the most ancient of human dreams: the desire to increase the speed and effect of messages as they travel in space. From the time upper and lower Egypt were unified under the First Dynasty down through the invention of the telegraph, transportation and communication were inseparably linked. Although messages might be centrally produced and controlled, through monopolization of writing or the rapid production of print, these messages, carried in the hands of a messenger or between the bindings of a book, still had to be distributed, if they were to have their desired effect, by rapid transportation. The telegraph ended the identity but did not destroy the metaphor. Our basic orientation to communication remains grounded, at the deepest roots of our thinking, in the idea of transmission: communication is a process whereby messages are transmitted and distributed in space for the control of distance and people.

Guy Debord: Commodity as Spectacle

The Commodity as Spectacle

  The commodity can only be understood in its undistorted essence when it
  becomes the universal category of society as a whole. Only in this context
  does the reification produced by commodity relations assume decisive
  importance both for the objective evolution of society and for the stance
  adopted by men towards it. Only then does the commodity become crucial for
  the subjugation of men's consciousness to the forms in which this
  reification finds expression.... As labor is progressively rationalized
  and mechanized man's lack of will is reinforced by the way in which his
  activity becomes less and less active and more and more contemplative.

Raymond Williams:  Cultural Materialism

cultural materialism. This book was in part a response to structuralism
 in literary studies and pressure on Williams to make a more theoretical
 statement of his own position against criticisms that it was a humanist
 Marxism, based on unexamined assumptions about lived experience.

Paul Willis:  Symbolic Creativity

"Every day is full of ideas which, although they are not art, share the same

symbolic creativity of art processes."

Language, active body, drama, symbolic creativity.  "Remaking the world for

ourselves"

Jonathan Gray: Blowing up the brand
In the realm of film and television, promotional culture is often a key
and indistinguishable part of the artistic product. Behind corporate conglomerates’
horizontal and vertical integration and plans for synergistic
conquest of the audience are frequently videogames, posters, ad campaigns,
merchandise lines, toys, and trailers that are active sites for the creation,
consumption, and enjoyment of the narrative. Many of these “spinoffs,”
“extratextuals,” and “peripherals” surround film and television texts with
hype, generating revenue themselves at times but also serving the larger goal
of directing audiences to the film, show, or franchise. Comparatively little
has been written about them, even though they command an inordinately
large amount of public space.

Adorno: Pop music snob

Adorno believes that there are 'two spheres of music'. He calls these, serious and popular music. In this article, Adorno talks about the differences between the two. He talks about 'standardisation', how all popular music is the same. It repeatedly uses the same subjects and the same rules.

In comparison, he says that every detail of a serious piece of music is unique, if notes were missing the music would not be the same. Unlike popular music where, 'every detail is substitutable; it serves its function only as a cog in a machine' (Adorno, On Popular Music, 1941). Therefore, to listen to this music you don't need to think or be engaged.

Another one!

2012-09-27T20:51:00.001-07:00

        So I'm driving up to the fancy art place to meet her. It's an exhibit and I have a free ticket. The hall is packed with finely dressed people and I am wearing a green hooded sweatshirt and jeans that are too long (all of my jeans are too long).
        I drive up to the valet parking guy, because up and down the block there is bumper to bumper parking. There's even some people parked on the grass, but the grass is on the other side of a construction barrier and it's hard to tell how they got there.
        "10 dollars." The valet states. He is wearing a white tuxedo and a hat with a red feather in it.
         "Do you take cards?" I say.
        He looks up at me nonplussed. This is the perfect opportunity to use that word.
        The silence continues.
        I ease off the break a little and he slaps the hood of my car.
        "Can I just park for free?"
        "No one ever asks that." He shows some humanity.
         It seems like he is going to let me do it when a car behind pulls up.
         "That guy is going to know you didn't pay if you don't pay, so you have to pay." He says.
         "But I don't have any cash."
         "Then you can't park here."
          I put on the brake and get out, and knock on the tinted window of the black limousine behind me. A gentleman with a monocle and a top hat is driving... and there's no one else in there.
         "Are you the limo driver?" I ask. "Why are you driving a limo with no one else in it."
         "Sir, what are you doing?" The valet pulls me aside. The line of cars is full of well behaved drivers, still.
         "Can I have 10 bucks?" I ask.
          He just stares at me through his one squinted eye.
       ___________________________________________
         I park a few miles away, in a section of downtown by the Chili Store. I don't like chili, but I like that places chili. So I get chili and then I'm on my way.
         I look at my watch. I'm already 20 minutes late. The plan to initiate this part of the plan was more fun and interesting than the actual plan.
         I pivot on one foot and nearly turn around and stumble back into the car and drive it home. My raggedy legal pad has all of the questions I've planned out to ask her on it.

Continuing my Fiction

2012-09-26T11:52:00.001-07:00

           This is a secret, don't tell anyone this. You know the internet? Of course you know the internet. Let me stop trying to be funny.
          Well, you can look up any celebrity on the internet. You know this as well. You can find most celebrities email addresses on here, sometimes their PR teams. It does not take very much energy to write an email, and some celebrities are susceptible to personal appeals.
          Find someone who has done some minor work, someone who does not feel like they are famous yet. Maybe someone who wrote an article that you kind of enjoyed, not one that will change your life or leave any kind of lasting impression, just a decent story. They probably slaved over this writing for longer than you would ever imagine, to them it's probably the equivalent of one hit wonder band that has been touring for 30 years and playing that same song over and over. Write them and tell them that you enjoy that article, maybe break that article down sentence by sentence, apply it to real life situations, tell them that it made you feel better when you're having a bad day, something like that.
            Let them email gestate for a few months. Maybe drop one here or there about their recent goings-ons, google them occasionally. Tell them you do a lot of writing but you aren't confident enough to let them read it, they probably will offer to. This is called a personal connection.
            Now you can use this relationship for whatever reason you want. At any given time, you can send them an email with a humble topic line like: "Remember me?" or "Your biggest fan." (Your biggest fan in the outro line is a winner every time as well). If it turns out somehow that this person is extremely successful, atleast at whatever place they happen to work, write and ask them about available internships, random writing advice, if they have any friends who are looking for personal assistants, etc.
            I'm writing this because I did this. Not me, the blogger, me the character in this fictional essay. This is a fiction blog, so everything contained here is fiction. Even the real stuff.
            So this woman who was a quasi-successful writer in the late 50s (came in second for a Pulitzer, something like that) has offered to lend me her tutelage. She has a basement room with wall to wall file cabinets of correspondences with other semi-successful writers, newspaper articles of importance, dirt on the now defunct newspapers she worked at, and many more odds and ends. She doesn't do anything now, doesn't even write (picture a wilted flower), but she still has a name that semi-famous people in the area will recognize.
           It's called networking. It works retroactively this way. It's about getting your feet into as many doors as possible, metaphorically as well as literally.
          Then the problem sprang on me: What do you do when you get there? You wonder if she's worrying about the same things, but it's the next morning already, and this is when you planned to get together. You watch The Graduate that night, and wonder if she's going to be attractive.

Internet Sign On

2012-09-17T13:52:00.001-07:00

This has become more of a mission to get as many words onto the page as possible in increasingly short periods of time. Since grad school started my creative writing has really taken a hit.

Hamburgers. He wanted hamburgers.

"I'm on the phone, buddy, can you wait just a minute?" His bespectacled old man waved him off.

"You want hamburgers, buddy? Hamburgers?" The maid asked, stooping down to his eye level.

All of the internet connections were titled things like: "Funny cock" and "Pocket pussy." The kid better not learn any words like that, he thought.

First update in awhile

2012-09-13T12:50:00.000-07:00

Hey it's really easy for me to just keep on typing. This is an exercise in typing. I have twenty minutes before a class.

So there's this guy.

He lives in a cave.

He has sandwiches that he makes from the animals that he hunts. He looks in his pantry, which is a pile of rocks. There's no more sandwich stuff left. There's a residue left where the blood was.

He rolls out of bed, it's a large log. He has cut out the inside. It's pretty comfortable, so far the termites haven't gotten to it.

He picks up his sling and his bag of rocks. He hates carrying the bag of rocks, but he hasn't thought of any easier way. It leaves a big red line on his shoulder blade, and the line has slowly became an indentation.

He walks outside with his rocks, waves at the mailman and next door neighbors.

"Going down to creek, yup." He says to himself.

The neighbor ladies are outside drinking tea. They wave. He is handsome. They knew his mother.

He comes to a stop sign. It's a big red circle painted on a rock. There's a lot of noise coming from the forest. He ignores the stop sign, if that's what it's supposed to be. He's unclear whether or not it's trying to keep him out of the forest, but hunting is always dangerous. He's been trampled by boars on multiple occasions.

There's an animal he hasn't seen before.

A new one

2012-08-23T13:49:00.000-07:00

I have not proofread this, but I did write it. I write every day yadda yadda yadda. You can see improvement (maybe).

It hadn’t been a year since my accident at Dr. Shoeman’s Shoe Emporium had got me all of the money I needed to last for a year on my own. Mr. Shoeman was still angry with me like I had stolen the money directly out of his pocket, and my lawyer Hank Hannigan was still calling every day asking for his piece.

I didn’t feel like the rest of the bums at the unemployment office. A lot of these people were unemployable, as you could imagine. Others looked like they had been forced to go by an angry spouse or money-mongering relative.

“If you haven’t yet filed for direct deposit,” The automated voice on the overhead speaker said. “You can not yet appreciate the convenience.” I had no bank account, no credit cards. I cashed my checks at Walmart after they handed them over. The front of the line was blocked by two elderly african american women with giant steel cage looking walkers, who were complaining about something completely unintelligible.

Lucky for me, my old friend Bernard popped up. “I can help YOU down here, sir.” He said. I skipped others in line who scoffed, a man on a cellphone looked particularly annoyed (although it could have concerning what his cellphone conversation was about.)

I looked at the check, which was once again more than I felt like I should be getting. 1,100 dollars was far more than I had ever accrued through gainful employment at the shoe store.

Don’t get me wrong, I love shoes. I love Nikes, I love Siconi’s, I love Adidas, sports shoes in general. They have that appeal of a nice sports car, except they are much more comfortable.

I always got weird looks from cops. I think maybe they could tell I was nervous around them.

“Good evening, officer.” I said to this particular mustachoed bespectacled gentleman as I stepped out onto the steps adjacent to city hall.

“What have you got there, buddy?” He asked with a smile.

“Just a little unemployment check.”

“Are you disabled?”

“Nope, not that I know of. Other than maybe my will to live.”

“Sorry to hear that, friend. Good luck.”

He ended it there, it was nice of him. I was sweating bullets.

I decided to intern at the new Carnival Style Theme Park for a minute. It was still a week before the place opened, and everyone looked generally nervous.

“Mr. Simon is going to be here in a minute, cover all the sharp edges.” The owner, Mr. Belvedere, proclaimed. You could see the sweat poring out in a thick line from his balding mountainous scalp as he typed haphazardly into a dirty wordpress.

I put everything from on top of my desk into the first drawer, pulling them off like I was attempting to pull a table cloth out from under some dinnerware.

“My desk looks good, boss.” I said, with feigned compliance. “Don’t have to worry about my desk.”

He didn’t even look over. His boss, ostensibly the man who had put together these rides and architechtured the setup, was storming up with two stocky gentlemen wearing hardhats and carrying machines that wouldn’t have been out of place on an episode of Star Trek.

“The tiltawhirl is running fine, fine enough.” One of them said. “We need a test run, would you like to volunteer?”

They weren’t talking to me, they were referring to Mr. Simon. I knew this was a pretty good opportunity to jump in and earn my place.

“Me? I don’t ride these things. This is for my sons and daughters, the kids, the greater good.”

“If you think these rides are safe, you should give them a shot. A day from now they’re going to go through endless wear-and-tear, obese people and sticky disgusting kids will be sitting in those seats. Not that I care about those kids, but any sort of accident in the first week is bad publicity all around. Hole In The World Themepark would do greatly to avoid any conspiracy.”

So there I was, a guinea pig. I usually enjoyed themeparks while growing up, mostly because I didn’t have to pay for anything. This was more of the same.

They watched as I spun guilelessly, the most basics of blues and reds spinning into my eyes as the ride thrust me against the side of its inner chamber. I reached out with an arm to attempt to regain balance and pull myself to the middle of the ride, but I was stuck much like the Gravitron would do to me later on.

I played some of the carnival games, which inevitably proved to be fixed. I played some baseball all the way through college, and although the reader tracked my fastball at a measly 65 miles an hour I’m sure it was atleast mid 70s. It struck the pin which was in a state of frozen inertia. Each ball fell sterilly to the ground.

They allowed Mr. Randy and Mr. Dove to take me on the rest of the ride-proofing, while Mr. Simon and his Honchos walked off nervously. Mr. Simon looked very guilty, and his dark blue polo did little to hide his excessive armpit sweat.

“Let us know if there are any problems at the end of the night, Charlie.” Mr. Simon exuded the utmost confidence in me. I did a stunted double take, stunted in that I really only did a single take before I realized how he was trying to make it sound.

“Yes sir, only the best from me. Do you expect anything else?” I oversold it.

Mr. Randy turned to Mr. Dove. He had an oversized pineapple head, and his ponytail looked like a horses tail. He really could have used a hat.

Mr. Dove looked completely normal, only his jaw hung open when he talked or was being talked to, the lip disappearing under his lower row of teeth.

“Ya know, Mr. Dove,” He started.

“What’s that, Eugene?” Mr. Dove added unfelicitously.

“I think there’s something they ain’t telling us.”

“What do you mean? We don’t get paid to think.”

“Well, they’re aiming to open this place tomorrow, but they’re doing the first test rides today.”

“Naw, I know what you’re getting at. Have you seen the serial numbers on this rollercoaster?”

“I have.”

“Well, does anything surprise you?”

They stood over the V-Shaped blue beam that anchored this beast.

“I ain’t never seen one like it.”

“Yes, that’s true. Well, you already know this, but you probably don’t, Charlie. Get over here.”

I threw the flavored toothpick I had been chewing on towards the blue aluminum garbage can, and it dinked off the side somewhere.

“Well, me and my partner here have been working in this business quite a long time. Really long time. There are three major rollercoaster builders. This one wasn’t built by any of them. What do you make of that?”

“A private contractor built the coaster? Or it’s from someone’s personal collection?”

“Could be from a personal collection could be. There ain’t no other coaster like this one. Most such coasters vary minimally in design, usually based on whatever promotional gimmick gives the ride its name. Superman has upright cars so you feel like you’re flying, Batman is supposed to make you feel like being in his Batwing. Get a load of this middle part here, by the loopty loop.”

I looked up at it, there was something peculiar about it, or maybe I jumped to that conclusion based on the fact that he was trying to get me to find it.

“What’s wrong with it, Charlie?”

I bit my lip and rubbed my eyes.

“Maybe we can get a closer look?” I asked. “I could probably tell from closer.”

“He could probably tell from closer.” Mr. Dove laughed. Mr. Randy shook his head.

“So how’s this one run?” Mr. Belvedere asked sheepishly, leaning against a load bearing pole.

“You probably don’t want to lean on that pole.” Mr. Randy cautioned him. “It’s bad luck in this business, seeing as no one has ridden the ride yet.”

Revisions revisions revisions

2012-07-06T17:52:00.002-07:00

Look at how different this is after my first series of revisions. You can't say that's not constantly improving.

Ron stared out of the window of his little shack with eager anticipation. He read the letter from Stacy over and over again.

“I hate my mom,” He read to himself with zest. “Remember that movie star auntie you said you had?”

Ron shook continuously as he drank coffee straight out of the pot. A police cruiser came down the street and he ducked, reaching up to twist the blinds shut. He heard the car door slam and the crunching of footsteps coming up the drive. Two sets of feet.

The doorbell rang and Ron ran into the bathroom, parting his hair with a wet comb and throwing a polo shirt on over his mother of pearl wife beater. There were a couple of loud knocks, followed by a few more rings of the doorbell. He could hear his step daughters voice outside.

“Officer McKenzie, first division. I found this young lady wandering down the side of the road.” Officer McKenzie said, flipping up the shades on his eyeglasses. The air conditioner blared in the window, the cool lines coming off of it were almost visible powder blue squiggles.

Ron was taken aback by the unfriendly greeting, and used it to buy time to think of something to say

. “Your mother couldn’t give you a ride? That woman is no-good. Do I have to do everything for this family” Ron said unconvincingly.

The officer looked over at the closed blinds. “Why’d you close the blinds? Is there something I should know?”

“No, I just don’t like the police, you know?” He looked at Stacy pleadingly.

“Step aside. I’m going to come in and take a look around.” The cop said.

“Don’t you need a warrant or something?” Ron said weakly as the cop pushed him aside with a flattened outstretched hand.

Ron stepped outside and looked desperately at Stacy. She removed a piece of gum from its tinfoil and rolled her eyes up at him.

“I think I hear your police radio.” Ron said. “It sounds like something important is going on.”

“You know it’s illegal to lie to a police officer, daddy.” Stacy said with narrowed eyes.

Luckily for Ron, he had cleaned up a little for Stacey. He vaccuumed the purple shag carpeting, although it still had a few inconquerable stains. The wicker coffee tables flanking the lumpy loveseat looked clean enough, granted you didn’t remove the coasters and lamp that were stuck to them. The beads hanging off of the multicolored chandelier were dust free. However, the garbage can sitting next to the TV was overflowing with empty soda bottles, and a few had jumped ship onto the few on the floor next to it.

“You weren’t planning on having this girl stay with you here, were you?” The officer asked. Ron walked back in sheepishly. “This looks like a single mans apartment if I’ve ever seen one.”

“I was gonna sleep on the couch. They’re fumigating her mom’s place.” Ron said, the cop crossing his arms. His moustache stood bristling at full attention.

Ron knew he had to lay down on the couch. The cushions crunched underneath him, and the best he could do to get his whole frame onto it was to cram his legs and head into a V shape.

“It’s not comfortable but I have done it before and I’ll do it again.” Ron said. He added: “I’d do anything for my little girl.”

The cop gestured at Ron to come over into the kitchen and whispered.

“I saw the periphenalia in your bedroom. I smell drugs all over this place. I know you aren’t thinking of taking that car out front and running away with her. You’ve got your rough spots, but I think you’re an honest man. I don’t want to embarrass a man in front of his daughter.”

The police officer rubbed two fingers together.

Ron looked up dumbfounded for a second and then understood he was being solicited for a bribe.

“I’m a little short, right now.” Ron said. The cop crossed his arms and shook his head.

Ron and Stacy stood in the driveway silently as the cop pulled away. He drove slowly, and Ron rearranged the thick stack of money in his wallet, unbeknownst to him Stacy was watching the entire time.

“Are you sure we should even be driving this thing?” Stacy asked. Ron stepped heavily on the gas and a stream of smoke formed around each window like they were sitting on a hot spring. Stacy rolled up the passenger side window and wiped dirt out of her eye.

“It’s my car, Stacy. It’s tougher than it looks. Got a lot of character.” Ron responded and dropped the car back into neutral. “Get out and help me push it.”

“Ron, I heard that cop say you shouldn’t be driving it.” Stacy said and picked at peeling sea-green paint covering the rust that grew like a barnacle underneath. She dropped to her knees and looked under the thing, and stood up and kicked the rotting exhaust pipe. It fell off easily, like a dead part of a house plant. Ron grabbed it and pushed it into the black circle it occupied.

“We gotta get going or we’ll never get to Auntie Fiona’s house. The pools a lot more fun during the day.”

“I’m going to call mom.” Stacy said as Ron pushed from the open drivers side door. The front tires plopped up on the lawn, the car looking temporarily like a hungry killer whale.

“What? No, no no! You know mom, she gets jealous.” Ron said, hitting the red button on Stacy’s Iphone. “As a matter of fact, I’m going to hold onto this in case she calls. We’re going to have a nice, quiet, relaxing day. Besides, she’s always been jealous of Fiona’s looks and success. You know your mother used to want to be an actress. It will only upset her.”

The car started fine, three gutteral coughs and then a long wheeze that diffused into palpatations. It sputtered like Porky Pig’s car in an old cartoon as it flung pebbles in each direction as it scurried onto old Arvsdale Avenue.

“Wave goodbye to the house.” Ron said wistfully. Stacy found this remark more ominous than Ron intended.

“This death wagon.” She said under her breath, popping her head out of the window and breathing in the hot, musky desert air.

Mr. Beasley stepped out onto the turf for his ten A.M cigarette. He pulled off his plain blue sweatstained visor and squinted.

He was down to the nub of it when he noticed the gaping hole between his tractor trailor and haywagon. He took his flip phone out of the front pocket on his overalls and dialed whilst swearing to himself under his breath.

“Boy ain’t paid his rent in months, now he’s taken my old Impala.”

“Ursa-Mae, get your sister.” Rita said between puffs. “That girl could sleep through a thunderstorm.”

Ursa pushed into Stacy’s room, her alarm clock blaring. The bed was a mess, girly magazines laying open. And the window was wide open, the curtains fluttering in the breeze. She pulled the blanket up to the pillows and went over to the window. Her mother was out in the yard.

“Ma, she’s run out again.”

Ursa Mae: Jealous of the fact everyone is paying more attention to her sister. The more bookish of the family.

Rita: Afraid Ron is going to have sex with daughter. 40s

“She sleep over at Harlie’s house?”

“She isn’t friends with Harlie anymore.”

“Well she better not be out that deadbeat creep Ron.”

“He’s not that bad.” Ursa said.

“What was that?”

“Ron, he’s not that bad.” She spoke louder but didn’t quite yell.

Ursa dug through Stacy’s drawers and retrieved two crumpled twenty dollar bills. She took a dress out of her closet and hung it over her arm.

“I called and she ain’t answering, phone must be off.” Rita burst into the room. “Get dressed we’re going to go find her.”

“Yer boy took the truck and he’s gone.” Words leaked out of Beasley like air out of a flat basketball.

“He isn’t MINE. We got DIVORCED. And you’re his boss, not some friend of the family.”

“No matter. If you see that boy, tell him not to come back. He’s fired, and he can’t live here anymore.”

The car rumbled past the “Population 500” sign, along a freshly paved onramp and onto the thick tar of the city road.

Stacy smiled over at Ron. He looked back sheepishly and refocused on the road, a light blush painting itself onto his cheeks.

“What’s she like?” Stacy asked.

“Oh, you know. Like any other movie star. She is nice, rich, nicest woman I’ve met.” He reached an arm over behind her head. “When I was growing up, we always looked forward to going to Fiona’s house. She would cook up lobsters on the grill, she had fancy juice in a big pitcher with ice cubes and limes floating in there, we would spend the whole day by the pool. Some of her movie star friends showed up, too. They came and went like it was their hangout.”

Stacy checked her makeup in the mirror. “You know, if you didn’t always sound like you were full of shit I’d say you were BSing me.”

“What’s all this crap?” Stacy said, climbing halfway over the backseat and putting her butt up in Ron’s face. “This is all of your shit, isn’t it?”

On the side of the road, Montgomery sat in his smoldering black leather police cruiser. Ron’s car flew by, and it wasn’t dark enough he didn’t notice their tail light was out. He reached up at the siren switch tentatively, and took a sip of his gas station coffee. He mulled it over, and typed in the license plate number on the laptop.

“Ron Durante.” Montgomery said outloud to himself, sipping more of his coffee. He picked the computer up and put it on his lamp.

Right about this time, Ron’s air conditioning decided to stop working.

“All this sweat’s making my makeup run. Hey, there’s a car guy. Pull over.” Stacy said.

“No can do, Stace.

The heat thermometer had its arrow pointing firmly off the spectrum, past H. Stacy turned the radio down and the whirring noise of the engine was truncated by a persistence bump.

“What’s that noise, Ron? That does it, I’m calling mom.”

Ron cringed at the idea of his ex wife being “mom”. He turned the radio back up, and a reporter interrupted their soft adult contemporary music.

“…on the lookout for a green rusty truck…”

Ron turned the radio off and drove in silence. When Stacy seemed like she was going to talk again, he interrupted.

“Alright we’ll get the car fixed.”

They pulled into a rest stop and Ron pushed his legs out to open the heavy door. He came around to Stacy’s side and pulled hers open.

“Go in and get yourself a bite to eat.” Ron said, handing her a twenty from his wallet.

The mechanic had a wide smile and was standing upright. With his blonde hair he looked like a ripe ear of corn.

“Jim. Nice to meet you, Jim.” Ron said and extended a hand. Jim’s handshake was a vice grip compared to his own.

“Mister,” He said, looking under the hood. “You better find yourself a place to stay, this car might going to take a very long time.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. What’s wrong with it?” Ron planted his hand on his forehead.

“Well you see,” The mechanic said, propping the hood up and resting it open. “Your coolant is out. You’re lucky the car didn’t start smoking on the way here. On a hot day like today, you could have baked alive inside this thing.”

“Ok so I get some more coolant.” Stacy looked at him from across the street, two teenager boys on each side of her.

“That fast food is going to destroy that girls figure. Damn shame too, she’s a real piece.” Jim said with a slight whistle coming from between his teeth.

“That’s my goddamn daughter.” Ron said. He looked at Jim sternly, and Jim kept glancing out the window. “Show some goddamn respect.”

“The festival’s beginning.” Jim said, tossing his wrench down onto the big metal slab the car was perched next to.

“What about my car?” Ron asked.

“No work during the festival, state law.” Jim said with his arms up akimbo. “Your daughters already there, anyway.”

“Yep, looks like he took that big rusted thing. Unbelievable he even got it started.”

Here's a new one

2012-07-04T14:32:00.003-07:00

It's day a million. Kevin Vokes has been reading this blog of mine. I am not sure but I think things are getting better. I'm understanding the role of conflict. I'm working on a second book and this one is a lot better than the first one (ie: constantly improving)

Ron stared out of the window of his little shack with eager anticipation. He read the letter from Stacy over and over again.

“I hate my mom,” He read to himself with zest. “Remember that movie star auntie you said you had?”

“I found this young lady wandering down the side of the road.”

“Your mother couldn’t give you a ride?” Ron said. “That woman is no-good.” Ron said unconvincingly.

The officer looked over at the window Ron had shut the blinds at. “Why’d you close the blinds? You in some sort of trouble with the law, boy?”

“No, I just don’t like the police, you know?” He looked at Stacy pleadingly. There had to be some way she could vindicate him.

“I’m going to come in and take a look around.” The cop said.

“Don’t you need a warrant or something?” Ron said weakly as the cop pushed him aside with a flat hand.

Ron stepped outside and looked desperately at Stacy. She removed a piece of gum from its tinfoil and rolled her eyes up at him.

“I think I hear your police radio.” Ron said. “It sounds like something important is going on.”

Luckily for Ron, he cleaned up a little for Stacey. He vaccuumed the purple shag carpeting, it looking frayed and stained but attentive. Wicker coffee tables flanked a lumpy loveseat, beads hanging off of the chandelier. The garbage can sitting next to the TV was overflowing with empty soda bottles, a few on the floor next to it. Two doors on the opposite side of the room led to the kitchen and the bedroom.

“You weren’t planning on having this girl stay with you here, were you?” The officer asked. Ron walked back in sheepishly.

“I was gonna sleep on the couch.” Ron said, the cop crossing his arms. Ron proceeded to lay down on the couch, his legs and head elevated in a V shape.

“It’s not comfortable but I have done it before and I’ll do it again.” Ron said.

“Are you sure we should even be driving this thing?” Stacy asked.

“It’s my car, Stacy. It’s tougher than it looks. Got a lot of character.” Ron responded.

“Ron, it’s a truck.” Stacy said incredulously and picked at peeling sea-green paint covering the rust that grew like a barnacle underneath. She dropped to her knees and looked under the thing, hitting the rotting exhaust pipe with the back of her hand.

“We gotta get going or we ain’t never going to get to Auntie Fiona’s house. The pools a lot more fun during the day.”

“You promise this won’t kill me?”

The car started fine, three gutteral coughs and then a long wheeze. It sputtered like Porky Pig’s car in an old cartoon as it flung pebbles in each direction like a lawnmower on old Arvsdale Avenue.

“Wave goodbye to the house.” Ron said dryly. Stacy found this remark more ominous than Ron intended.

“This death wagon.” She said under her breath, popping her head out of the window and breathing in the hot, musky desert air.

Mr. Beasley stepped out onto the turf for his ten A.M cigarette. He pulled off his plain blue sweatstained visor and revealed the tanline underneath.

“Ursa-Mae, get your sister. That girl could sleep through a thunderstorm.”

Ursa pushed into Stacy’s room, her alarm clock blaring. Her bed was a mess, which was completely unlike her. And the window was wide open, the curtains fluttering in the breeze. She pulled the blanket up to the pillows and went over to the window. Her mother was out in the yard.

“Ma, she’s run away again.”

“Yer boy took the truck and he gone.” Words leaked out of Beasley like air out of a flat basketball.

“He isn’t MINE. We got DIVORCED. And you’re his boss, not some friend of the family.” Carline said.

The car rumbled past the “Population 500” sign, along a freshly paved onramp and onto the thick tar of the city road.

Stacy smiled over at Ron. He looked back sheepishly and refocused on the road, a light blush painting itself onto his cheeks.

“What’s she like?” Stacy asked.

“Oh, you know. Like any other movie star. She is the nicest woman I’ve met.” He reached an arm over behind her head. “When I was growing up, we always looked forward to going to Fiona’s house. She would cook up lobsters on the grill, she had fancy juice in a big pitcher with ice cubes and limes floating in there, we would spend the whole day by the pool. Some of her movie star friends showed up, too. They came and went like it was their hangout.”

Stacy checked her makeup in the mirror.

On the side of the road, Montgomery sat in his smoldering black leather police cruiser. Ron’s car flew by, and since it wasn’t dark enough he didn’t notice their tail light was out.

May 10th

2012-06-25T16:52:00.001-07:00

Oops I took a lot of time off. I've been writing during that time but haven't been putting it up there. Rest assured, it's still constantly improving I assume. So here's something I have been writing today and yesterday. Notice how it's constantly improving. I'm going to try to do these atleast a couple of times a week.

“Did anyone see a man with a hat and a beard come through here?” MacDonald asked the group of onlookers, who all turned around rapidly as he rushed behind them.

A man wearing a silly hat pointed at the elevator.

“Thanks, bum.” MacDonald said.

“That could mean any floor.” O’Malley whined. “We could be here all day.”

“I don’t care if it takes us weeks, O’Malley. Matter of fact, if you want to go home, go ahead. I can’t have anyone half assing it here. Go home to your videogames and your Michael Bay movies.”

O’Malley took the stairs next to the elevator. A security guard approached MacDonald.

“Where’s your clearance?”

“Are you fucking retarded? I have a goddamn badge. There’s a very dangerous man somewhere in your building. If you don’t want any pedestrians getting hurt on your watch, you should follow me.”

O’Malley walked dejectedly out onto the street, and he stared at the little burger joint on the opposite side. Cars flew past him on both sides, but a suspended bridge accessed by two stairwells granted him safe passage across. He checked his police walkie talkie, there was no reception, and he clicked the thing off and shoved it into his bag. He grabbed the railing and started up the stairs in a halfjog.

MacDonald combed through the halls with an inexhaustible supply of energy. Sweat was seeping through his blue cop jacket on each armpit and he tipped his hat and scratched the top of his head with it. When he stopped moving his eyes focused like those of a hawks. Each floor was packed with people coming from either side, he was starting to doubt whether or not he would recognize the perp.

“Excuse me, sir.” A younger man wearing a beige polyester shir tucked into jeans approached him. “My girlfriend was supposed to meet me here an hour ago, and she’s not usually late.”

“I bet she’s breaking up with you. Now beat it, Romeo. I’m on the hunt for a dangerous man.”

“You fucking dick.”

MacDonald stared through the window of the little café on the twentieth floor of this office building nonplussed. He ducked into a little storage room and flipped the light switch on, removing a clipboard from his bag.

“So this is what we know,” He said to himself. “

O’Malley burst in and rushed the hostess at the counter.

“I need a quick table, a quick bite to eat.” O’Malley said. He looked plump and overweight in his police outfit. A group of construction workers on break laughed without turning around at the bar.

The place looked like a ritzy old hotel. The wallpaper was an ornate brown-orange, pristine condition. The wall fixtures were covered by felt that blended into the exterior, fake candleholders with lights inside of them hung above fake fireplaces. The functionality of the décor was secondary.

“Off duty cops sit over there.” The waitress said. The guys at the bars guffawed. O’Malley shrugged and took a seat at a table near the entrance of the ballroom.

“So you’re a cop now?” An old colleague of O’Malleys put his hand flat on the table and leaned over. His breath reeked of vitriol.

“Barnaby Haynesworth.”

“I’d pull up a seat but I’m afraid to be seen with you. Couldn’t get a decent teaching job?”

Barnaby returned to his table. To O’Malleys horror, he was sitting with a whos-who of unsupportive colleagues. Stitch Madsen was there, wearing his hat with the feather in it and explicating some complex chain of logic with his hands. Arnie Hemfield sat on the opposite side, celebrating what was surely his most recent academic victory with a plate of high brow dessert. Flanked on both sides were Cindy Carlisle, an old girlfriend of O’Malleys who looked nothing like the girl she had been then, and Barnaby’s girlfriend Sally. As he sat he put an arm around her and gestured over at O’Malley with a twitch of his neck.

O’Malley waved at the bar ladies for a menu and they continued gabbing. He checked his watch and looked out the window at the high rise building, and got up and hobbled to the bar to get a menu. The waitresses congragated around a table of thirty men in the back of the restaurant. The group guffawed loudly

“Hey!” He got the nerve up to say. He coughed into his hand as the room turned momentarily toward him.

A man with a bib on and a lobster in front of him removed a wad of cash from his wallet and handed it to the man next to him. He received it with his hand turned backwards, his other hand pulling the brim of his hat down in front of his eyes.

O’Malley wondered what MacDonald would do in this situation. He didn’t have to wait for long. His cheeseburger was finally on the way, he could see it sitting under the heat lamp where the chefs left the orders to be picked up, when MacDonald pushed through the door.

“…One?” The hostess asked nervously. MacDonald lumbered past her with his slightly bow legged gait. She looked around frantically for someone, and then pushed through the swinging doors to the kitchen.

O’Malley attempted to shield his face but it was futile, he was like a panda in a snake enclosure. Macdonald stood next to the bookie, facing away toward O’Malley.

“So you have been sitting here the whole time, while this has been going on?” MacDonald said. He was noticeably wobbily.

“You don’t look so good, MacDonald.” A man in a pinstriped suit asked from the back room.

“You’re not going to look good in just a minute.” MacDonald said.

O’Malley got up and went to grab the burger. He ate the thing in no time, stopping once to apply more ketchup. He licked his fingers and walked over to MacDonald.

“We are a little outnumbered, I don’t know if you noticed.” O’Malley whispered behind his left hand.

“Get out of here.” MacDonald slapped O’Malley in the face. He snapped open his holster and pulled the gun out.

O’Malley retreated to the street and turned around before he reached the door. He slammed a ten dollar bill down on the table right before the shooting started.

He covered his head and ran down the street, and noticed a bearded man leaning on a light post.

Day somethingeruther. A lot

2012-05-10T10:28:00.000-07:00

Waiting for things to become natural and perpetuate themselves. Today isn't so bad. I know it's all constantly improving.

“That guy in the coffee place, were you just talking to him to make me jealous?” Carlo talked to Belinda’s sleeping body. He congratulated himself with a nod for using the word "guy" when he had so many other options. He bit his tongue when he realized the guy was sitting across from them, reading Jim Kramer’s Freakonomics. His computer sat open on the tray table in front of him, and Carlo bitterly assumed it was parked on his Facebook page. He smiled smugly over at Carlo, his head looking like it might break backwards in a devilish cackle at any moment.He adjusted the pillow behind his head and folded his arms, and fell into a restless sleep. His dream contained a lot more death and murder than he was anticipating. In it, an old friend of his named Dougie was accompanying him with a hacksaw, they were walking down a long stretch of dirt road. The dream was one of those that was especially real, he felt the warm air, he could see heat rising off of the yellow desert like stink lines in all directions. He carried a bag which probably had a head in it, but as much as he tried to get his hands to open and release it nothing happened.

They arrived together in front of a precipice, and slid down the slowly declining dirt wall in front of a metal structure. It looked like some sort of oil refinery, the legs that were holding it up jutted from the ground like spider limbs. Dougie wiped blood off of the hacksaw before they even went inside.

They descended flight after flight of winding stairs, towering machines oscillating and filling the empty space with saturating noise. He felt his face get angrier and angrier the deeper he got, his lips becoming a carved out jackolantern smile like Jack Nicholson playing an evil part. Dougie pushed open the steel grate door at the bottom of the stairs and invited him in like Renfield, and he pushed through a thin layer of cobwebs.

Shaking his long hair free, he instictively called out, “No one can hear you! I can’t even hear you.” Belinda was strung up at the far end of the room, atleast a football field away, hanging by her feet from rusty metal shackles.

“This is how you deal with your problems, Carlo. This is always how you deal with your problems.” She ragged on him with an unflinching voice. “Oh, I see you brought a friend. Looks like he can do all of the work for you.”

She looked relatively undamaged, her complexion still the ruddy pink it always was. Aluminum foil sat on top of a wooden block, and on it there was a row of murder tools. There was the dentist drill, the hammer, a rusty hook, a blow torch, any time he imagined something new it was there. His eyes fluttered on the plane and he got a permament V-shaped eyebrow for a minute.

He grabbed the drill and stuck it to Belinda’s temple. She stared up at him nonplussed, and as he held the trigger down it went with a gurgling noise directly into her head. He felt a tinge of guilt but when he pulled the drill back out, bracing himself against the wall with his foot, the hole disappeared at the point of immersion. Dougie got to work with the hacksaw, and although it easily cut through to the other side of her neck the head remained intact.

The stewardess passed in the aisle as Carlo gave off a low humming chuckle in his sleep. She shook him by the shoulders and he roused, staring up at her like a Frankenstein monster. He rose, almost automatically, and stepped across the aisle to where Mr. Douchebag was sitting, pushing poor Connie out of his warpath.

“Excuse me sir.” Carlo said quietly. The guy had his headphones in his ears and was asleep, his laptop still open in front of him. A quiet sort of nonoffensive rock music blared. “Sir.” He reached down to pull the earphones out of the guys ears, a tough guy move if he had ever thought of one.

Belinda called from across the aisle. “What are you doing?!” She went from 0 to 50 in no time. Meanwhile, Connie was trying to figure out where the air marshall was.

“I’m trying to sleep.” The man groaned, his eyes opening to a slant. Carlo reigned his arms in and stood with his hands at his side. “What…?”

“How come a guy like you has to hit on my girl?” Carlo said, shaking his head. His self pity mechanism had kicked in. “There’s… there’s all kinds of them around here. Even just on this plane.”

“She didn’t say anything about…”

Carlo came in with a haymaker, his flabby arm bouncing off of the mans cheek and a sudden jerk of the plane laying him out flat on his back in the aisle. His arm got caught in the man’s computer power cord and it fell with him. Awake suddenly, the man rose and rubbed his face.

“What are you doing with your life? It’s no wonder Belinda wants out.” The man stated sharply.

“He’s right.” Belinda chimed in.

“Sir, we’re going to have to ask you to come with us.” A polite air marshall asked. He was short stubby and tan, with a farmers tan and sunglasses. Older ladies toward the back of the plane only witnessed this part of the incident, and assumed the worst because of Carlo’s darker complexion.

He talked to Belinda from across the glass.

“The man… Duane… has agreed not to press charges.”

“Charges for what?” Carlo asked, incredulous.

“Carlo, it was full on assault.”

There was a moment of silence.

“…Are you still going to come live with me?” Carlo asked. Belinda looked away, tussled her black hair like she did every time they watched a horror movie. “Well that’s just fucking great. A new house, a new life, all by myself…” Carlo made eye contact and was brought back into the moment, the way he could only stay mad at her when they weren’t together. He resented her for her ability to produce empathy seemingly out of thin air.

“I think it’s best that we are apart for awhile.” She said, turning to leave like she had just thrown a grenade.

“How long is awhile?” A security guard gestured at the marshall, who opened the plexi glass security cage with a key hanging from a long ring on his pocket.

“You’re free to go, get out of here.”

Carlo sat in the sunroom of his new estate, surrounded by moving boxes taller than he was. He sat on a stone bench that was part of the wall, earlier having retrieved his coffee maker and coffee cup out of the smaller box which he had purposely marked with a yellow “X” to ensure the ease of its retrieval.

It was a better cup than his last one, this he knew. It said “Washington County Steel Workers Union” on the side with big grey prison bars, and it was the perfect width and length for his optimum amount of coffee. It’s perfection made him think of it as the evil sports team from movies, the team with all of the choice prospects, the hard nosed semi-professional coach, the highly competitive clannish nature of earning playing time. His old cup, one he had bought years earlier when things with Beverly were still going good, had been smashed somehow in transit. The rest of the contents of the bag were in perfect condition, the larger superior backup cup seemed to be saying: “Your other cup had certain limitations. It’s time you moved on to a big boy cup.”

He kicked his feet out and his lower half teetered uncertainly on the edge of the bench, and as he tipped to one side he eyeballed the full cup of joe, sloshing around inside like an overflowing bathtub. He found it impossibly hard to use both arms independently, his right arm spasmodically flailing to preserve his balance. It was like watching a first time swimmer. A sudden image of him smashing his head on the cement bench behind him and laying in a pool of his own blood for the movers to find him the next day popped into his head. He looked down at the cup, which seemed to be demanding he acknowledge it’s importance, and dropped it to the ground. The coffee spilled and the cup turned upright seemingly of his own accord..

“Worse things than my whole house smelling like coffee.” He said to himself with a sheepish giggle. He jumped at the sight of his own face in the linoleum, he looked like a burly bear of a man. The coffee quickly followed the slightly slanting curvature of the kitchen and over the risers that led to his living room, a circular room with two high beams on either side and a bubble of glass window overhead. He retrieved the coffee cup and marooned it in the sink.

extremely lame things happen!

2012-05-05T12:11:00.001-07:00

Not my full thousand but whatever!

Carlo looked past Belinda and saw their window was closed. Thunder broke ominously from all directions, and a primordial instinct kicked in as he begun to sweat profusely out of his forehead. He enjoyed movies where people were stranded on desert islands, mostly because he was pretty sure he couldn’t do it himself. The classic fish out of water story.

“That guy in the coffee place, were you just talking to him to make me jealous?” Carlo talked to Belinda’s sleeping body. He bit his tongue when he realized the guy was sitting across from them, reading Jim Kramer’s Freakonomics. His computer sat open on the tray table in front of him, and Carlo bitterly assumed it was parked on his Facebook page. He smiled smugly over at Carlo, his head looking like it might break backwards in a devilish cackle at any moment.

He adjusted the pillow behind his head and folded his arms, and fell into a restless sleep. His dream contained a lot more death and murder than he was anticipating. In it, an old friend of his named Dougie was accompanying him with a hacksaw, they were walking down a long stretch of dirt road. The dream was one of those that was especially real, he felt the warm air, he could see heat rising off of the yellow desert like stink lines in all directions. He carried a bag which probably had a head in it, but as much as he tried to get his hands to open and release it nothing happened.

Belinda called from across the aisle. “What are you doing?!” She went from 0 to 50 in no time. Meanwhile, Connie was trying to figure out where the air marshall was.

“I’m trying to sleep.” The man groaned, his eyes opening to a slant. Carlo reigned his arms in and stood with his hands at his side. “What…?”

“She didn’t say anything about…”

More improving-ment

2012-05-04T14:02:00.005-07:00

I am getting better at revising these things. It's not good, but atleast some of it makes sense. I might revise that first novel type of thing I wrote last November and make it make sense, eventually. But overall I think my stories at the very least make more sense now.

He had atleast through the end of the month, he thought. Her father had paid the security deposit and the first month of rent, and before she became “exasperated” and “artistically compromised” (the words he was sure she would use), he would have to make things good again. His funds which were set aside for graduate school were going to be spent on many nights on the town, going dancing. Her costume would change completely for dancing, she was suddenly ostensibly a dancer again.

He weighed the option of leaving her first in his mind. In an episode of Seinfeld, George leaves a woman who he feels is going to break up with him before she can. It works out pretty well, but it doesn’t work as a metaphor in this situation he realizes because first of all their isn’t much continuity on Seinfeld, and secondly George never keeps the same girlfriend for more than a few episodes.

His eyelids peeled back like they were glued together in the middle and he caught himself in one of those half asleep half dreaming moments. If he really wanted to stay awake in this situation, he knew someone would have to slap him in the face. He tried to slap himself, but his hands were like big wobbily wands. Or, he could stand up. The rows of seats went on endlessly, and in his stupor it seemed like everyone was sharing casual intimate conversations. It was like one of those mirror rooms. The darkened cabin drew attention to the row of lights on both sides of the aisle, which looked a lot like night lights.

The luggage was supposed to meet him at the house later that night, and like in the movies he asked if the movers would mind starting without him. Luckily, he didn’t realize how often his plans of action were based on things he saw in the movies. They said they needed a key to do that, and Carlo told them to talk to the owner. They said it would cost extra, and he agreed although he could already see his nest egg steadily shrinking. After the plane tickets, the Bruce Springsteen concert they had went to the night before, the steak restaurant they went to, the hotel reservations.

The house was a little bungalow on a flat stretch of land, it looked like nothing more than four walls from the outside. Carlo had a collection of pictures of houses that he hadn’t actually seen on his computer, to make it look like he had done more investigation. In reality, he had decided on the first house before giving any others much thought. The selling point was a backyard that featured an enormous oak tree and an area which he thought he would convert into a garden. The yard needed a lot of weeding and fixing up, or so he ascertained from the satellite photos. He imagined himself and Belinda in an idyllic, romantic Sunday morning, tearing hands full of the yellowest dandelions from the ground and throwing them into a wheelbarrow. And then maybe having sex in a hammock or something. He looked over again, and the way she was sitting did that thing where her chin disappears into her neck. There was that lump on her neck again, he shook his head. She refused to get it checked out, but it looked like it might be the beginnings of a goiter. Maybe at some point it would act up and he’d have to take her to the hospital.

The “sit down” lights came on and the pilot assured everyone it was only for precautionary measures.

“We may be experiencing a mild amount of turbulence, as we fly directly through the approaching thunderstorm. If I may say so, it’s a thing of beauty, and if you can overcome your nervousness you may enjoy staring out of the windows.”

He adjusted the pillow behind his head and folded his arms, and fell into a restless sleep.

Day one million

2012-05-01T20:38:00.000-07:00

Did I take another day off? Oops. I think I might have. This might be my best one yet though. I think it's about confidence, still. Just keep trying everything until something works!

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There she is, talking noisily to who-knows-who. If I had been here on time, phones would be put away by now. Oh no, she’s talking to Kim. He thought to himself. That was even worse than if she had talked to Bluto. He swore that all girls had a conspiracy against him, he was sure they were bandying death sentences and not pulling any punches. Even worse, every time he nearly interecepted one of these conversations it would abruptly end. He wanted to atleast know what she was talking about.

Carlo rose after his second tiny gin and tonic and readjusted himself. In the awful Drew Barrymore movie that was airing on the TV that projected from the ceiling like an eyeball from a cartoon characters face, Drew was crying and spending a night drinking wine and eating spaghetti while watching an awful romantic comedy of her own. A few seats down, Belinda was clutching a napkin tightly and had the same watery eyed look as Drew, who was now hammering out the numbers of her ex boyfriend on an old fashioned phone. Or, atleast Carlo assumed that was what she was doing, because he didn’t have his little headset plugged into the armwrest.

He decided he was going to try to sleep and immediately had to go to the bathroom. When he reached it, the door said occupied. Standing on a plane felt a lot like being on an elevator that was in motion to Carlo, and he clung limpid fingers onto the railing on the outer wall of first class. Peeking in, he saw that they had nicer curtains in first class, and that small style upgrade made a considerable difference. Biff emerged from the lavatory and wiped a handfull of sweat off of his forehead, nodding and smiling at Carlo as he passed. was three rows ahead, noisily fiddling with his seatbelt.

Carlo had fond memories of TV dinners, and he rubbed his hands together excitedly as the enormous cart made its way down the aisle. He could get used to this airplane thing, he thought, as he contemplated how he was in an airtight sealed vessel hurdling at thousands of miles an hour suspended miles above the ground. Events happened in no particular order in the air. Connie, the server, looked like a rare bird. How could she strut around with such poise and professionality and still maintain any kind of humanity? She couldn’t.

“You like her, don’t you?” Belinda asked louder than she intended to because her headphones were still in her ears. It rung through Carlo’s bell of a head like it had interrupted a beautiful dream. Carlo was upset at first but then reminded himself that jealousy was a good thing, as long as it wasn’t coming from himself. Jealousy meant she was vulnerable, and that she was willing to meet him half way or better yet stick her neck out and allow him to either wound or cajole her.

“There are certain things I like about her.” Carlo bit his tongue to stop himself from going further. He liked that she had a job, that she seemed independent, that she might be impulsive or atleast get free airfare. Her argyle socked leg crossed over his, uh-oh, you’ve done it now Carlo, she is going to use your sex against you. He looked over and suddenly she wasn’t the burn-out uncool failure who tries to hard anymore, now she was that beautiful quirky sex object again. And she had watery eyes, which the jury was still out on.

“Sir.” Connie purred and smiled an impossibly genuine looking smile down at him. He turned his face around to meet her, and she was leaning over his seat, not unlike one of those perpetual motion birds.

He weighed the option of leaving her first in his mind. In an episode of Seinfeld, George leaves a woman who he feels is going to break up with him before she is able to dump him. It works out pretty well, but it doesn’t work as a metaphor in this situation he realizes because first of all their isn’t much continuity on Seinfeld, and secondly George never keeps the same girlfriend for more than a few episodes.

Come on, do the locomotion!

2012-04-27T14:50:00.004-07:00

Day number: Lots o days.

Yeah I think I can probably get a Masters. I watched Tiny Furniture yesterday and apart from all of the awful acting it was pretty good.

And he thought he had stolen her from the original Carlo, the other Carlo. He thought of himself as the Popeye character in the cartoons, with the other Carlo being Bluto. Except, he didn’t have spinach. He could get a gun, he had thought at one point, but he wasn’t adult enough to go through all the proper avenues and certifications. He still felt like a sham, like he was only filling prior Carlo’s spot. It didn’t help that Other Carlo was covered in tattoos (girls loved tattoos) and was nearly seven feet tall.

He heard the cat meowing noise that signified when she got a text message, and she grabbed at her back to try to silence it.

She is committed to moving but not committed to him. He’s committed to her but not to moving.

“Aren’t you wondering who that’s from?” He asked, suddenly feeling like the passive aggressive person that he had never meant to be. He walked audaciously in front of an older woman who was in front of them, her disgusting stockinged legs somehow still moving on her mummified frame. The wheels on his luggage stopped turning and the thing flipped over on its side, and he fought to turn it back right side up like a train was going to hit him. Belinda didn’t stop walking, and now she was screwing with her phone again.

Carlo was getting the silent treatment from most of his friends. This is what usually happened when someone abandoned the city they lived in for a girl they hadn’t known very long (or so he thought). And, facing the truth, he honestly didn’t meet very many girls. For awhile he could make himself happy simply by reminding himself that he was dating an attractive woman (not girl), someone whom other guys would check out when they went out together. He had reached a saturation point, and even an infinite amount of sex wouldn’t mitigate it.

He wanted to cry, the old woman he had almost passed was in between them again, but now blocked the way more consciously, like a racecar driver avoiding a would-be passer. Now the tire of his stupid luggage was wedged into the end of the conveyor belt, and half of it was running away. It made an obnoxious screeching noise as he yanked at it, and a vibrating noise when he’d let go. An older man with a white moustache pulled it loose for him effortlessly, and put it back down on its wheels. It reminded him of when he was ten and the mailman had recovered all of his papers that flew out of his backpack, rubberbanding it back together.

“Thanks.” He said, with real gratitude, and took off down the terminal. A man with no neck and a plaid shirt protected his coffee like it was an egg containing his child.

She was nowhere to be seen. Carlo slouched and slowed his pace. Another announcement sounded overhead, “The plane for Normal, Ohio will be departing shortly. This is the final call for boarding.” He started to panic, looking at the overhead signs in the long alcove and trying to decipher them with increasing incredulity.

“There’s section A-1, and then it’s section C-7, so that must mean B-3 is this way.” He assured himself that with proper focus he would make the plane, because he had been meant to make it.

He ran as quickly as he could without the bag doing a wheelie. He hummed to himself when he got nervous, and this time he was short on breath as well. It was an awful rendition of Jailhouse Rock. He passed a station where there was shuttles on each side, and he thought picking the right one would be akin to winning the lottery.

“Boy, you look lost.” A man who looked like he worked on an airline said. Carlo scoffed caustically, but since he had nowhere to go to softened.

“Do you know where this is?” He asked, cutting the smalltalk. He produced the ticket from his pocket and the man eyeballed it, taking his glasses off, putting them back on, and then finally resting them on the end of his nose.

“Boarding…must…be…” He started. Carlo leaned in to listen more closely. “Boarding is… almost over. You need to get to that plane… right away.”

The man scratched his nose between his thumb and index finger. He looked like he was channeling information and waiting for it to be uploaded to the talking part of his faculties. A few younger slacker type of workers laughed from behind a window.

“Are you putting on a fucking show right now?” Carlo asked.

The man raised his arm slowly and then pivoted mechanically, pointing down the corridor in the exact direction Carlo had been going.

“Thanks a fucking ton.” Carlo sneered, snatching the ticket from the mans hand and continuing past the shuttle system. A child had heard him say “fuck”, and it’s mom shook her head disapprovingly. “I’m not going to fucking apologize for that.” He said to himself under his breath as he entered the enormous terminal, the hands on its giant clock ticking loudly. The flight attendants were stowing the podium they took tickets at, laughing to each other almost certainly about Carlo. He weakly presented his ticket wordlessly, and they reproached him.

The one with the name tag that said “Tonya” picked up a phone, looking over at him like she was talking about a dog that didn’t speak english.

“Yes…” It dragged on.

“You know, if you’d just hurry up and get off the phone, I can go find my seat.”

“Sir, that goes against proper protocol. Now, if you’d just be patient.”

Too much time had passed, and now she would really play dumb about the text. While he prided himself on his ability to be honest about faults, he knew honesty wasn’t one of those problems. She was a brick wall, like usual. She’d talk about boring mundane things like cooking until he was thoroughly placated. But, without her in the real world he was as good as a fish out of water.

Another one today!

2012-04-26T17:04:00.000-07:00

Now I am under the impression that the most important thing to know in order to write is that you need courage! Boys and girls, all you need is some big giant balls!

The counselor stepped back and let Biff talk.

“I’m only doing this because they’re making me.” Biff said, feedback from the microphone dulling the brains of everyone in the room. “Matter of fact, I’m not doing this.”

He attempted to get off stage and Mr. Davidson turned him around, pleading with him to share his story. The rest of the campers had.

“I’m not like all of you lot.” He said, surveying the crowd of unhappy attendees. One man with angry eyebrows had the audacity to boo. Charles, the enormous security guard, looked for approval from Mr. Davidson to intervene. Mr. Davidson nodded and Charles stepped into the row, forcing his way through the aisle like he was walking in quicksand.

Carlo looked at his watch. Charles yanked at the shirt of the guy who yelled, his head lolled back and forth like a bobble head. His oversized suit coat twisted to the right, the buttons heavily burdened by Charlie’s weight. Carlo took a bite out of a corndog, tossing the bare deepfried pole into his empty box of popcorn.

“Sometimes I just get so mad, you know? I blame my father. Nothing was ever good enough for the man. I feel guilty all the time, even right now, when I’m talking about it, I feel like I shouldn’t be talking about it.”

Leroy, a man who embellished all of his intervention stories in a way to paint a more positive picture of himself, laughed at Biff’s admission.

Carlo got up and feigned having to pee, and then said “Pee” when Mr. Davidson enquired as to why he was leaving. As he entered the Airport Lobby, the water in the water cooler gurgled, like a pin needle dropping in the forest.

He walked over the moving conveyor belt, moving twice as quickly as if he had been standing still on it. He squinted at the coffee place across from the bar, which was shutting down for the night. Belinda sat there, head in hands. She wasn’t going to be happy with him.

She was playing a stupid cellphone game and held up a finger as he approached. He sat down for a moment half-assedly, and when it was clear she wasn’t going to pay attention to him until she was done being angry he decided to get a drink. He stood at a crossroads, coffee or alcohol. Coffee. First.

He ordered a red eye because their plane was leaving late and he liked the idea that he was having a red eye before going on a red eye. She stole furtive glances at him, furrowing her brow and looking away every time she looked over.

“You were right.” He said. This piqued her interest. “The meeting wasn’t funny at all. It was a bunch of depressing people whining about problems, nothing like in the movies.”

“Of course I was right.” She said under her breath. “That’s why I didn’t want to go.”

“You were scared to go and you know it. Who sneaks into things like that? Well, go-getters, go-getters like me do.”

A man with a top hat and long hair passed by, his shitty jeans dragging as he walked. Security people walked beside him on each side.

“You’re still wearing that stupid hat.” She said. “I thought it was a joke. I thought you were a funny guy.”

The man in the top hat stopped and glared over.

“I didn’t mean you, I meant him!” She said, waving her hands in front of her face. Carlo smiled at the man under the veil of his very similar top hat.

“You’re still wearing those dumbass sunglasses in your hair.” The man leaned forward with his hands on his hips and said to her. “You’re still wearing that ugly floral print skirt.”

“Mr. Provolone, let’s get going.” One of the security guards tugged at his arm like a child trying to get their mom to leave the supermarket.

“What did I say about touching me, Jimmy?” Mr. Provolone removed his arm forcefully and flattened out his suit coat. “Now I am going to have to have this dry cleaned. That comes out of your bill.”

“Dino Provolone?” Carlo said, stars in his eyes. Or they might have been dollar signs. The fluorescent lights burned his corneas as he sat unblinking for a minute at the counter. He took a sip out of his coffee and his face sucked in at the corners.

“Keep your bitch on a leash. I don’t care if you’re a fan.” Dino said, and realized the majority of patrons were looking over at him. He had inadvertently made a scene. “Heh heh, just kidding! Gotta run!” And Dino was gone, his guards lumbering after him slowly.

“Are you happy, Belinda?” Carlo asked, doing his best Jimmy Durante impression. He knew Belinda had no idea who Jimmy Durante was, but figured that joking around with her at this point was pretty hopeless anyway.

After a half an hour of silence, Carlo reading the funny section in the paper and Belinda staring mindlessly at her phone, the overhead announcement to begin boarding for their flight sounded.

“I’m a little nervous, Belinda.” He confided. “I don’t like airplanes.”

“It’s too late now, my daddy thinks we’re coming. And these tickets are a once in a lifetime thing.” She sounded softer, and he secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

He checked his pockets for the boarding passes, and began to panic immediately. “We have to go back.” He said.

“Go back where? What’s wrong?”

“Back… I don’t know. Back to the meeting. Back to the coffee bar. I can’t find the boarding passes.”

“They can look them up by our names, I’m pretty sure.” Belinda said. But, Carlo was already booking it down the hall back to where the meeting had been held. He checked his back pocket, where loe-and-behold he had the two boarding passes. The nervous jitters were starting to get to him.

He always thought traveling with a girl would be nice. Having a real girlfriend would be nice. Someone to live with, a companion on the “road of life.” But there was nothing romantic about it, when it happened in real life.