BAGGAGE CLAIM II: ANALOG SEX

Lesli was fiddling with a bag from the airport cafe when a distinguished gentleman in a flat beanie and a beautifully-carved walking stick of redwood and a gold eagle cap lumbered along to her to help. also, he had a curvy beard and one wrinkle, two hands and unpolished walking shoes which blended with the airport floor. no earrings. when he laughed his belly shook like a bowlful of diet orange marmalade.

Lesli: next. (with bright eyes)

Duvid: let me help you with that, young lady. (he instead of going for the top of the bag, slides his finger along a secret tab in the middle of the package for easier close and open). there.

Lesli: well how about that?! you made my day, mister! that's a switch from normal. it was good enough to just steal the last bag of mint Oreos, but that little trick makes the happy glow more.

Duvid: what's old is new again (obviously referencing his age). just remember, child, and i say this not because i'm old, but because i've survived: as with bad things, good things, too: this, too, shall pass.

Lesli: okay, starting off on an awkward foot (she thought). usually i'm the one in command seconds upon the first chitchat. let's see where this goes. could be my first equal ever, my first real challenge. (and now speaking out loud:) what's your name, old timer?

Duvid: Duvid. but you probably didn't get that the first time around from how i pronounced it. no one does. just be like everyone else and call me David, or DaVID with the stress on the second syllable if you want to be erudite. i come from Spain, from a little village called San Puebla.

Lesli: it's a sin to be like everyone else. ah, yes. but why is everyone from a small village? all the good stories come from the small obscure villages which are now lost to time. you mean to tell me New York doesn't have its tales of woe?

Duvid: please, have a seat, my dogs are barking. (he got her first again!) in my town, we are all so poor...you knew i would say that...we are all so poor everyone in the village has the one dog as their house pet, we share him, bless his puppy heart.

Lesli: a village dog isn't that strange.

Duvid: i'm Jewish. it's a sin in our village to root for anyone but Raphael Nadal.

Lesli: (eyes light up) ah, i got you now, old man. tennis is my wheelhouse. i'm a diehard Federer fan from way back. well, it was Sampras first for me, but the transition to Fed was so seamless.

Duvid: aye. of course you'd be a Fed fan when i'm Nadal, this is the fate of the world. i love both players, but the online fans of each player have ruined tennis permanently.

Lesli: agreed. the problem was Fed was too good. if he were just Berdych, the fans wouldn't become trolls. but because Fed has the most Grand Slams ever, he is always in the conversation of being the GOAT, the Greatest of All Time, and because that is such a hazy subject which spans all of the tennis players who have ever played in the history of the world, it's ripe for trolls to come out of their basements to make their cases and curse those who disagree.

Duvid: very insightful, my androgynous friend. that is exactly right. and to top it all off, you have Nadal who has been Federer's greatest nemesis in their careers. Nadal has treated Fed like a ragdoll at times, beating him soundly. so then the argument goes: how can Fed be the greatest of all time when there's Nadal here who so routinely is able to defeat Fed like he were another Berdych? does not compute. how can the GOAT have a glaring weakness like that, a huge thorn in his tennis elbow?

Lesli: you hurt me with this information, but i know intellectually it is true. the Fed fans try to gloss over these facts by casting Nadal in a negative light: maybe Nadal's a steroid cheat, he picks at his butt when he's playing, picks at his shorts annoyingly, his hard-nosed grindstone style of spins is a horror to watch, nothing like the fluid grace of the ballet Fed puts on when he glides over the grass with ease. but facts are facts. and the fact is Nadal is close to surpassing Fed's all-time record.

Duvid: this brings me to the heart of the matter, the real thing which must be faced. life. life itself, especially those who dream big and carry with them a life's goal. when you are born, you can take two roads, the easy or the hard. the easy lets go of dreams very early because they cannot be achieved, at least not with a strenuous amount of work. i was a good student. i did well in Kindergarten and First Grade. before i knew it, my madre wanted me to ace Second Grade. i hadn't planned on that, i didn't make any plans at all, but i also had to go to school for 23 hours a day, so i figured i might as well make the most. i was the top student in my class, always, always the one with the 4.0 first, 3rd through 8th Grades and into high school. now the stakes were higher, it wasn't just me gliding like Federer along the path of life getting the occasional B+ mixed in with the A. no, i was always to get straight As, that was my thing now, that was my identity. i had strung together many years of life, not a freak science test pass here or a stray A on a pop quiz there, this was my very work, my life's mission, my career, i had become a lifelong student who always studied instead of partied and did well on standardized tests. this string of my successes had added up to something more. the whole was greater than the parts: if i continued on this glorious path, i could attend college free and continue grinding out those As. this was my journey, a journey i didn't choose but was chosen for me by my early performance. what was the endgame, though? what was the final result of me working hard my entire life, year after year after year after year? if i didn't get the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, what were all the As for? could i cash in those As at a local ATM? did i get the girl at the end of the double rainbow? did i marry Miss Puebla?

Lesli: .........................

Duvid: no, to make a long story short, i did not. i smoked weed for the first time the night before my first college chemistry lab and went into another kind of chemistry. Ds followed, douchebags followed, Fs followed, frats followed, and i became another university statistic. no girl, not even the dogs. that is the terror.

Lesli: ...........................terror? oh, btw, do you drink coffee straight-up black without cream nor sugar like a virile man?

Duvid: yes, but i am not a man. i'm trying to tell you that i'm a human, a scared human like everyone else. if everything had just gone down the way it was destined, then EVERYTHING, my ENTIRE LIFE would have added up to something, i would have gotten something tangible from my life's work, someone i could taste: a wife, a job that didn't end in suicide, fame. when you work and end up with nothing, what was the point? your life is a waste, all the papers and quizzes and tests are floating down in the bottom of the ocean.

Lesli: how's your slice serve? that was the last thing i learned, that was the most difficult for me.

Duvid: thus it is with Fed and Nadal. Fed worked fucking hard to get all of his Slams, a lifetime, a career hitting that stupid fuzzy ball across the net to achieve immortality. but it's only immortal if no one ever surpasses his mark. be honest, you sweat bullets every time Nadal steps on court at a new Grand Slam when he's healthy, when his knees are able to hold his weight, because you know here's another chance for Nadal to cut into Fed's lead. Fed will never win any more Slams, his mark is set in stone, he's hoping no one else gets to his height because he himself is now unable to lift himself higher. Fed prays now, relying on angels to do his work for him, for he cannot anymore. Nadal still has self-powering juice in him, and i'm not talking about drugs. can you believe Nadal didn't cash in the Australian Open Slam this year playing first-time finalist Wawrinka? talk about silver platter.

Lesli: i know, biggest upset of all time. i was sure Nadal would have creeped closer to my husband Fed. i admit it, i do get scared all the time.

Duvid: so now, child, imagine the worst, imagine the day Nadal does eventually surpass Fed's lifetime mark. how will you feel? how will Fed feel? Fed will no longer be the greatest player of all time, he'll be just another player. we'll look upon him fondly like we do Sampras, but he'll be one paragraph in the book with Nadal on the cover. Fed will disappear into the ether, his very existence questioned 100 years of solitude from now. are you crying?

Lesli: no, i can't fake things, but i will cry when that day comes, certainly. i get you, David, and i understand your Goliath. lifetime achievements breathe meaning into a person's life, his entire existence rests on a certain number he is able to achieve through a lifetime of work, a number no one else has achieved, it puts him high on a pedestal with the other ant humans looking up. when the pedestal crumbles, what is this man now? is he even a man anymore? is he a woman? i try to be neither gender.

Duvid: no, he is naught, a zero, a cypher, he never lived, erased from the history books. think of Pangaea. what was life like then? those humans (or whatevers) are long gone, taking their secrets with them to their graves buried under millions (billions) of years of silt. the modern humans pretend those early humans never existed, they don't follow anything the apes tried to do to live, it's all stupid now, we modern eggheads know more science than the cavemen could ever know, so what's the point? the early ancestors never existed, all that matters is right now, now, NOW. everything is like this. sex is like this. back in the '80s, i had to make my sex tapes using

VHS, CLICK HERE, RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK.

Lesli: are you sure all of this isn't you regretting getting old, mister?

Lesli closed her eyes to process as she often did. she was androgynous, she looked like Tilda Swinton, she wanted Tilda Swinton to play her in the movie, she dressed sharply, but she'd be damned if she were another Ellen or Bowie, she was her own creation, and she was no fool. the old man made sense, he taught her something, which was impossible. where was the glitch? where was the programming error? she had to find it.

she also started to imagine her parents having sex. it had to happen at some point, for she is born. she wondered if her mom liked anal. if Daddy was rough. to get these thoughts out of her mind, she downed some black coffee.

Duvid noticed Lesli's glass look and proceeded to hug her, he gave her a big bear hug but not before whacking her on her dyed-blonde head first.

Lesli: what the fuck?

Duvid: sorry, my cane got in the way of the hug.

Lesli: that was a little bit harder than an accidental swing there, that seemed to have some unconscious juice behind it.

Duvid just stood there smirking, looking drunk thought he wasn't. his juicy lips made the shape of sticking out one's tongue though his tongue wasn't sticking out.

this wasn't like last time. Lesli wasn't the director of the play this time, controlling the lights and the airport power. this Santa Claus wannabe had gotten under her skin, where everything had been heretofore pristine and clean. it was dirty now, she was dirty inside like all of the best NIN tracks. it was uncomfortable, exhilarating, no just uncomfortable. this wise sage was fucking her.

Duvid (leaving but not before reading her mind): i don't want to fuck. i'm not fucking, just steering, guiding. that hug was for later, save it, savor it, you'll need it for later. i have a feeling it will hit you, hit you hard some day, maybe tomorrow here at this airport, maybe later. the whole life-achievement disappearing without a trace. it's a mindfuck. that's the real fuck. save my hug, it's hot comfort when you really really really think about things, think about your life, think about life, the past, the deep past, Pangaea...the forgotten, those that are forgotten.

Lesli: ..............

Duvid: where's the bathroom?

Lesli: go in this plant.

fuck, this was serious, the tables had been turned somehow, Lesli didn't ask for this, the morn started out so bright with the cookies. want a cookie? want a cookie for surviving life like everyone else does? for not killing yourself...yet?

Lesli realized something very disturbing. self-analysis was coming, and it would not be pretty. the future was dark, even the blinding airport lights couldn't shine it under the shag carpet. this was not some magical Tony Robbins Deepak Chopra self-help shit-peddling anymore, this was real.

this is....................................fucking real.


PART 3 IS DELAYED BY INCOMPETENCE BUT WILL HIT THE RUNWAY NEXT WEEK. YOUR ANIMAL CRACKER CRUMBS ARE COMPLIMENTARY. SORRY WE GOT CAUGHT IN THE DELAY. LESLI, YOUR BLACK TUX TIE IS COMPLEMENTARY OF YOUR WHITE TUX SHIRT.


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TMIT: MY ODD END (BODY PART) ENDED ODDLY (BLACK HOLE)

1. how addicted are you? would you get your energy high using a caffeine toothbrush (PIC 2) those times when you're too much in a rush to down coffee properly? hellz yeah, that seems like something a stoner would invent...or the CEO of Starbucks. one problem: i don't brush my teeth. i wanted to become a dentist, instead i became an artist. two problems: there isn't a Dunkin' Donuts near my place, like at all within a ten-mile radius. it's frustrating. i always hear from the hipsters who live on my street how awesome that place is, but i have yet to partake.

2. you have this list of sex stuff you want to do but haven't yet stuffed in your pocket. the stuff is stuffed. but then your boss finds the magic list strewn on the floor. you're just an absent-minded person, plus your top priority was really to make sure the boss didn't see you looking at porn on the company computers. now you're on the shit list. oh, but flip the script, the boss is offering to help you check a few items off the list! do you do it? sure, but only if she's cute.

3. have you ever been bent over a kitchen counter and fucked in the asshole? vice-versa? yes. it was painful, but i liked it. the only thing was it made my already-bad knees worse. oh, i was speaking metaphorically, this happened at that same office from #2, at the office kitchen with the busted microwave and year-old breakfast burritos. for pleasure? no, but i wish. someday...at our new home with the lawn gnomes looking on for good luck.

4. how do you really feel about sexting? meh/have to be begged/it's foreplay for me/naughty notes and steamy pics are my forte/what's your number? i have a daily sexting list. wanna sign up? hi. what's your number? i have a daily sexting list. wanna sign up? or just email me, i'm lonely...

5. what do you love to sniff? why? HELL DUST, CLICK HERE, RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK RIGHT NOW. why? because it's an awesome story. and Hell Dust, i love that. also: cocaine.

bonus: what is PIC 7? how would you use it? it's a pack of 5 mini-steering-wheels for Rockso The Clown's clown car. you know the steering wheel has to be that small in order to fit all of those clowns into that car. or maybe it's something for my dong.

i'm typing to you from a black hole. i fell into one last night while watching Cosmos. unfortunately, i didn't land in an alternate reality where lead instead of carbon is the major building block of the universe or anything cool like that. instead, it's EXACTLY the same as normal reality except i exist in a plane one second later than all of you. sorry for the late post. i'm sighing here externally and internally. i so wanted to get carbon poisoning.

CLICK HERE FOR TMI TUESDAY

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NAME THIS FETISH

CLICK HERE, RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK.






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BAGGAGE CLAIM

Lesli Cougar had worked on her look so much it was effortless now when she woke out of bed with bedhead, which is what she was going for. androgynous, he-she, freak, labels were limiting, that's what she always said, after hearing that on tv. she preferred to think of herself not as a she or a he, but a person, a human being. she figured it was the only way she could think, for she had a human brain.

Lesli loved her work, or rather it was the other way around. her work had found her, because she was penniless and needed to do something. she lucked out as it turns out because she was meant to be a profiler. she could study people and instantly tell who they were, their likes and dislikes, but more importantly, their middle-of-the-roads. the FBI wanted her. the CIA wanted her. but she associated those two three-letter agencies with another letter-jumble: CNN. and war. she wanted no part of war and horrific senseless conflict, Lesli was peaceful through and through. she didn't want to think about the enemy, she wanted to think about the friend.

instead, she did freelance work. off-off-off-Broadway freelance work. so out of the mainstream the indie hipsters gasped. so out of the loop her bosses never knew where she was, she never reported back, her office was still spotless from two years ago when they first hired her.

in her Sunday best on a Wednesday, Lesli entered the airport ready to work. her tiny frame in that long black tux slipped her easily into the bustling angry crowd gathered at the baggage-claim carousel, so striking was her presence that her every saunter was gasped at by hipsters and non-hipsters alike. her essence oozed essence, like she knew the answers before she asked the questions. that is the sign of a good profiler. that is the sign of an impossible character.

the grey planked steel carousel conveyer belt whirled and twirled and turned turned turned. it was hypnotic. Lesli crouched into a ball and stared at it. turn turn turn, she closed her eyes. she opened them again up only slightly to let in a bit of light and a bit of the turn, then closed them again.

"am i still me?" she whispered out loud. "yes, i guess so, i didn't turn into anyone else by closing my eyes. it wasn't all a dream. that settles it. i can't ever change."

the drumbeat of the din of folks scrambling to get their lost bags and scurry on the next taxi to the next parking lot full of taxis was palpable, but it wasn't danceable. Lesli had to close her eyes again to add a coherent rhythm to it all:

CLICK HERE, RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK.

"that's the ticket," she thought to herself loudly. "Tickets!" intoned someone. she hadn't noticed that she wasn't meditating in the lotus position on the dirty airport floor, she had been sitting on the conveyer belt of the carousel this whole time, going round and round and round. that's why those turns seemed particularly lifelike. that's really why the hipsters were oohing and aahing.

she sauntered over to the airport coffee shop for some state-of-the-art inexpensive coffee. she asked the harried pimply nerd without glasses and pimples to pour her a cup of his finest. he thought she didn't mean coffee, but she did.

"black, straight-up black, no cream, no sugar this time, i'm a man," Lesli explained.

"okay," the poor boy responded meekly, "but you look like Ellen."

"i'll take that, i like her dancing. but please, no more, i'm my own person. i really am a man, can't you tell by my face? i look like a man. i mean, i am a man...too."

Lesli took one sip of the black coffee and realized it wasn't for her. "you drink this stuff straight to prove your manhood, but why does it taste so disgusting?" she relented and tore and scooped and spilled in as much sugar packets and salt packets and real cream and artificial cream pellets as she could into her cold drink. "FLAVOR!" she sighed orgasmically after swigging down the last of it.

across from the hustle of the conveyer belts were the relative calm of the padded waiting benches and husband chairs. there today at this moment sat Tonia Johnson, a heavyset woman with a gleam in her eye and a quick step to her fingers. she was constanly typing on her laptop, furiously. her furrowed brow was never not furrowed, her gaze glued to her tiny screen. whenever she sent something, she didn't just push the send button, she crashed down on that send button with glee and determination. it was a miracle that key didn't break. perhaps that was the miracle. perhaps that was the key, Lesli thought, staring at her next mark for change.

Lesli: you must change. everyone has to change.

Tonia: excuse me? busy here, i'm in the middle of crucifying this brony a new one! ha! ha! and fucking SEND! yes, pwned, got you, pore over that detailed paragraph i sent you, idiot! mull that over in your basement. you can't deny me now, that was thought-out, that wasn't a troll. i made sense, it's incontrovertible. i win! i win! i am noticed as the winner!

Lesli (sighing): incontrovertible. if only you used your gift for good, not evil.

Tonia: what? wait, i got a reply back.

Lesli: of course you do, but what if you decided not to reply back?

Tonia: i never thought of that before. it's just a natural reaction. i've been doing this for ten years. whenever i fuck someone up online, i hit send and glue my eyes to the screen waiting for the reply which always comes within a second or two, always. i then reply back, i have to or i lose. i can never let them have the last word.

Lesli: yes, but this can't continue forever. everyone needs to eat, sleep, and use the ladies/men's/or other room. i use the other room. i mean, who exactly has the last word? how is that determined? no one really has the very last final last totally last-typed word until one or the other of you dies.

Tonia: you look like David Bowie.

Lesli: thank you! thank you so much for saying that! finally! okay. this is coming from a stranger so it's accurate and verified. you don't know how long...*hehe*...i like Ellen, but, y'know...

Tonia: you oldfag! you newfag! i got you in my clutches. you picked the wrong one to mess with. i'm a bitch? fuck you, you're the bitch. yeah, well, i went to college for a year, do you know how smart i am? i don't choose to use big words like you because i'm not a showoff. what do you mean? i have a life. my life is better than yours. yeah, well, fuck you. were you saying something, lady?

Lesli: lady, huh? i'm trying to be both, or neither. oh well, gotta work on that some more, i want to be the transcendent third gender, the genderless gender. the alpha female. see, everyone has problems, but none of them ever get solved online.

Tonia: this is all i know. i barely speak anymore, i only type, this is how i communicate.

Lesli: this is how you troll. you have a lovely voice, you should use it more often to speak to strangers.

Tonia: i don't have any friends.

Tonia begins to cry, her large tears roll down her large cheeks and onto her fingers which enjoy a much-needed rest, though they look weird motionless like that. Tonia is completely motionless in fact, she is a stoic statue, she's not looking at the screen anymore, she is closing her eyes, but the salty tears still stream through. after several tense moments, she opens them again. apparently she couldn't change who she was, either.

Lesli: i don't have any friends. i've never had any.

and with that, Lesli hugged Tonia. it was tough getting Lesli's slender arms completely around Tonia's giant frame, but she did it, and that hug lasted forever.

Tonia (still with a broken voice): shit, though, some anonymous moron just called me fat on imdb.

Lesli decided to gently close the screen of the laptop as she guided Tonia soothingly. that was the only way this would stop.

Lesli: it's okay, honey, i'm here, this is real, the stuff online isn't, it never will be.

Tonia (opening up the screen again): another one just called me a dyke.

Lesli: well, do you like women?

Tonia thought about this forever.

Tonia: i don't know.

Lesli: insults are like labels. they're lame and tired and worn-out and are a sign of a weak mind. dumb people use names that are already invented, they can't come up with their own. words have power, they have immense power. imagine how the right words can lift someone's day, make them feel good about themselves. a single word can cut someone off, cut them down, fix them to a box. a compliment or word of praise can elevate a bum to become the manager at his local McDonald's finally.

Tonia wipes away her red swollen eyes, her voice gains a bit of tenor.

Tonia: i have some original words i'm thinking about right now.

Lesli: i hope they're good words, healing words. now do come up with a few quips, also. keep them in your backpocket. let's not get sappy here, the world is a rough place.

Lesli smiled. Tonia smiled.

Lesli: let me show you something.

Lesli unplugged the silver wire from the side of Tonia's laptop. she then gave a whimsical look to Tonia's pink eyes and "plugged" the wire back into the air. Tonia began to convulse, she was being electrocuted.

Tonia: bitch, what's happening to me?

Lesli: don't worry, it's just a small static shock, the type you get when you rub your funky-material shoes against the shag carpet and touch someone on the elbow. you never did that in elementary school in the '70s?

Tonia: i'm okay.

Lesli: it's magic, huh? that electricity is but a taste. you have the power with this little computer and screen to connect to the entire world. what you felt right then is the energy of the collective energy of every single fellow human using the same lines you do to connect with a computer. why waste all of this beautiful potential energy with stupid trolling? connect fruitfully, add your immense energy to the immense energy out there until you become a neverending ball of shining light and heat and electricity and lightning and activity and activism.

Tonia: i understand, but i have a feeling this is gonna take some time.

Lesli: it will. it will take a lifetime. you can't change people in a day. you have to accept them for who they are. you can't change yourself in a day. it won't happen until after your death.

Tonia finally works up a grin.

Tonia: kiss?

Lesli: no.

Lesli and Tonia spend the rest of the afternoon in a hard embrace. their hug swallows up the energy of the dying embers of the sun. it uses so much potential energy and activated energy that it drains the entire power grid of the airport, leaving the airport darkened at night.






PART 2 ARRIVES ON SCHEDULE, NOT DELAYED, NEXT WEEK. WON'T YOU JOIN ME?






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TMIT: STAYCATIONS SUCK

1. what mode of transportation do you prefer for vacation? car/bus/train/cruise ship/airplane/other: other. i'm working on something in my garage. don't want to give too much away until i get the patent.

2. what baggage strategy do you use when flying? carry-on only/gate check excess bags/check baggage/ship bags ahead/other: two words: baggage claim. that is such a loaded term. it's fun to wait at the baggage carousel and watch it turn turn turn turn turn. better than my morning meditation. and then you stare at it for so long you start to think every item that passes you by is your luggage. but it's not. it's not. they lost your luggage again. get yourself a large plastic cup of orange juice and a newspaper. orange juice tastes like coffee. newpapers don't exist anymore.

3. what is your accommodation strategy? luxury hotel/bed and breakfast/cheap hotel/motel/stay with family/friends/camping or RV/other: i always play the middleman between my fighting sisters. oh, you mean...let's run these down: i work at a luxury hotel, so i can't stay there. they won't let me have breakfast in bed, so that's out. a cheap hotel is a motel. a cheap motel is the street. because i'm cheap i have no family, friends, or framily. isn't RV the thing with the remote-controlled drones? goths don't camp. well, they can't camp.

4. what world-famous places have you visited on vacation? Disney World? the Louvre? Gettysburg? Yellowstone? Yosemite? Other? the two cities on my bucket list are Tokyo because anime and London because i want to eat at the same McDonald's that the Olympic athletes ate at...

5. where do you really really want to go someday? before the Big Bang, Everything was the size of a marble. i want to go back a second before the Big Bang and be outside of that marble...

6. where would you like to go back to see again? i want to visit my childhood home again. that's where all of my good memories formed, magic '80s childhood and such. it's now a Starbucks.

bonus: have you ever had sex with someone you just met while on vacation? spill: sure, countless times, that sex doesn't count, right? nowadays, i'm trying to cut back on my anonymous sex like Archer from Archer...

bonus bonus: while vacationing, have you ever had sex in a moving car/bus/train/airplane? do tell: train sex is the most elegant of these. Tom Cruise is my hero 'cause he managed to become successful while being 100% crazy. thus, cue that Risky Business scene...

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MY KIND OF WHIP

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KREATURES III: EYES OF A MASTER

he sees all, knows all, is all. he looks at you and instantly you know things, the secret tomes, the forgotten truths, and you spend the rest of eternity justifying that look at you from him that pierces through your soul into the next one.

it's still raining. in fact, it's pouring now, coming down hard. i remain on the ground, soaking but so soaked that i don't feel it any more, the waterlog is the new normal, outside by the recycling bins. i'm still terrified, but less so, time has a beautiful calming influence the more it accumulates, even the terror of a gummi gecko will dissipate in *time*

in fact, this is exactly where i want to be, where i should be, why shun fate? it's always a losing battle, especially for a lowly human like me. when in doubt, go with the flow, it's all a human can do in these times. this extended wet holiday has afforded me time to think, time to meditate, time to relax. under the thick blanket of droplets pounding my flesh, i'm able to....sleep. precious sleep, that's all i want, all i need.

"it's just a myth," my cat Triton teaches me the next morning as he scratches the worn post of my sofa to complete his morning ritual. the post is no longer a post, it's a collection of strings of fabric in an explosion pattern, "i mean, sure, there are black cats around, in fact there's one on our back lawn right now, but it's not a Master."

i never noticed. i turn my head and instantly an invisible force forces my gaze to lock onto his...there he is and he hasn't missed a beat, his white demon eyes are lasering on my own, this black cat stands tall in the middle of the back lawn, his black silhouette against the light green of the grass is striking indeed, nature stops to recognize his presence and stare against its will. the black cat doesn't make a move, his paws and tail are quiet, his face is stoic, he doesn't even breathe, he is here but not of this world, he is of something more, and his only purpose in life is to stare at me. it's only me and the black cat, there is no other world outside of this silent exchange of looks.

the way my mornings go are usually the way the rest of my days go. this morning, the ants got into a most unpleasant crevice of my life, as is their wont. i was swirling blue mouthwash all around my puffy cheeks and my tongue, have to to get that tingling feeling on my teeth when i spit out. afterwards, as i move to put the ridged cap back on the mouthwash bottle, i peek inside the cap and see two dead ants lodged squarely into the inner ridge of the cap. i try to excise them from the cap using a tissue, but no luck, they're really stuck in there. great. this is payment for something i did, i know. those two buggers will remain there under my cap forever, two dead reminders, reminding me of something, something about my nature. i just hope they won't eventually spill off into the surface of the remaining mouthwash liquid in the middle of the night. i'm gonna have another bad morning when i wake up to find the two dead reminders floating in my mouthwash. this message must be drilled into my mushy mind. messages are created in the middle of the night as i sleep unawares, something forming about the nature of me.

"why are you cuddled up underneath my covers this morning, Triton? not that i don't love it when you feign love."

Triton tried to look cool, but it was clear even the great worldly confident Triton was scared. "it's not about the black cat outside. it's, that, um, you know, you're not a bad master, i like being beside you."

"better than the Master outside, the one with the capital M, huh?" i queried lackadaisically. boy, would the mood shift in a hurry before the day was through.

"i told you, it's just an ordinary black cat. legends are legends for a reason. i mean, sure, he's the very cat of the devil himself, but did you know that one legend has him scratching the eyes out of the devil and essentially taking over the underworld? i mean, how silly. he's just an animal, he couldn't possibly be more powerful than a supreme entity."

"whoa, comrade," i intoned shocked, "don't let the other animal comrades hear you talk that way. i thought animals were kings and the humans were duped into thinking they were the kings. i thought your god was the real god. so is your Satan the real Satan?"

"that's not funny, man," Triton peeked his head out from the blanket fort to say, "these are not stories anymore, not idle chatter, this is the real thing. you haven't looked into the eyes of him: that is true evil, that is centuries of evil, a force that washes away my cherished lifespan and your puny lifespan with a single glance, a glance of eternity."

"i have actually, i saw him, and he saw me," i said.

with that, Tritin fell unusually silent and pensive.

"Triton," i tried to change the subject, "do you love me?" that'll get him out of his funk i thought, mushy talk from the ol' master with a lowercase m, he couldn't resist but to respond to my inane blather.

"not now, man," was Triton's reply, his standard reply, but then he thought about it, licked his paws, chased his tail for a bit before realizing how futile that was, then calmly perked up his long pointy ears and touched his tabby striped fur like it was dusty or something. through his long whiskers, my cute little tiger spoke: "all in all, you're not bad. for a human, you listen, which is the most important thing. that's the problem with the other humans, they never listen to us, to the small hidden sounds all around them, they don't hear us, they don't hear nature telling them what to do and where to go, so eventually nature takes all humans to where they are to go. you at least are willing to learn, you're teachable, which is all i can ask of you i suppose."

i was in the mood for a bottom line. "so you're saying that you love me, too?" i asked.

Triton: i...

me: *smiling face*

Triton: well, i...

me: *happy face, waiting face*

Triton: after analyzing all the known data, my conclusion is such that it's, i suppose i do in fact...

me: *anticipating face, my tongue hanging out like a dog*

Triton:...like you.

my face is now sullen. perhaps the dog tongue was too much, threw him off his cat senses. suddenly, i felt very alone, very alone and isolated and lonely and depressed and separated from the world indeed. Triton was all i had, i had no one else, no other human to cuddle with. i wondered if he would ever stick up for me if the occasion arose. i knew i would. i would die for him, and that isn't an exaggeration or silly boast. it was simply true. real. love is strange, you don't always find it where you think you will, and it comes to you in messy forms and unexpected packages, but you must fight for it wherever it lives. beggars can't be choosers, it is what it is, cliches are cliches because they are true. everyone does what they must to survive, if not to thrive.

the black cat was there on his spot in the center of the back lawn the next day, making eye contact with me the second i was within view. his tail formed a larger-than-life shadow. i wish he would just speak, even if it was a guttural prayer to Satan or something. huh, then again, maybe not. silence is golden in this case. the funny thing was, i was too tired to be scared today, so i sauntered over to the edge of the sliding-door glass which protected Triton and me from the outside lawn. i really took a look at "the Master" this time, i wanted to actually see what was there in reality, not what i imagined him to be. those silver eyes of a black cat are so demonic, they are so creepy, not the normal safe green or brown eyes of my Triton, green and brown, the colors of leaves and dirt, the colors of life. his silver eyes were otherworldly, they came from space, from spacedust, they spoke of the heavens above, or the heavens below.

but this morning, the black cat seemed, appeared to me, to be...cute. if you didn't look at the eyes, everything else but the eyes, the cat was just a normal cat. he was small, powerless, just standing there not in a commanding trance but because he was scared to move, maybe he just wanted a saucer of milk from me but was unable to communicate that and froze. yeah, that's it. i mean, honestly, this little kitten might as well have been Triton painted in black, he was the same size and shape, sans the stripes and white underbelly and general overall tabbiness. my imagination turned to play, not horror. i imagined the black cat wearing a cute black pointy witch's hat, like you see the cats-who-are-really-people-or-spirits in anime wear, so disarming. that disarms the supposed frightful witch from whence it came also, i mused.

it was the third night, or the third day, or perhaps just the second night. would i see the black cat for the third time? yes, all neatly in threes. a crow crowed three times. it happened, i read about it. i read a lot of books nowadays, that's all i do, Triton doesn't want me leaving the house anymore. a faint low hum is pervading the house, the hum of activity all around me, the ants under the house, all in my area, forming and creating their gigantic homes, their nests under my home, ready for that one day. the hum becomes just as low. it was time to take out the trash, first time i was ready since the gummi gecko. i think. it was still light out, guess it was the afternoon still. on the black cat spot was instead a dodo that wasn't moving, seemed to be a relic of the past trapped inside a forcefield, an old old very old ancient movie of the past, when dodos still lived wonderfully on this earth, the dodo is so happy moving and playing and surviving and living, the movie starts to blink out. two majestic peregrine falcons with brown wings swoop into the forcefield area and turn off the tv. they gather around the Master's circle and wonder as well why the Master isn't there. three gorgeous bald eagles fly in and shoo the falcons away. time for my human duty, my chores. i take out the trash and gather up the recyclables for the bins outside. i go down those two steps into my man cave, and i open the thin door from there to the outside.

nature is all around me, was always around me when i was born, fills the air in me now and forevermore, the hum remains low and out of earsight. i love you, Triton. i'll pay for this later. this is how i always imagined it. i take out the trash, i'm vigilant but see nothing, there was never anything to see, except for the black night. black cat. i deposit the cans and bottles with no incident, and i return to the man cave and shut the door fiercely. were the lights always turned off? they are now. the outside night has filtered into the night of my man cave. man cave. how silly. human cave. ancient human cave where the first humans saw the first animals, the buffalo, the horse, the domesticated horse, the wolf which turned into a dog, a pet, a cat, the earliest humans paint the first painting of a buffalo on the cave walls, man cave, bison drawing, it's so so so dark in here, as black as midnight, i stumble around for the light switch...find it...turn it on...nothing. where is up and down and left and right in this place? i need to focus my eyes on something so i can predict center again. my eyes lock on...something...please? something?

white eyes, silver eyes, the silver eyes of the black cat, he is inside my man cave, inside me, my sanctuary, how fitting, the Master has penetrated my very castle, my very home, my very heart. my eyes are scared as they laser into his, or rather the reverse, he has all the power of course, and he never has to say a word, there is nothing left to say after all, his presence speaks so many volumes they become the stars in the night sky. his experience caused the Big Bang, when he killed Satan he unleashed the first atomic thrust. that was the ultimate act of proof, that granted domination of animals over humans for eternity, dominion over the gods themselves. that's why their gods are better.

i never heard the fight, never heard my struggle as i scrambled to dodge the scratches and the cuts and the swipes of the Master against my skin, his punctures with his claws through my heart. i am paying and praying for something, for everything, for humanity itself, i am humanity's lowly but designated representative, for i am the standard human. the loud screeches and mews and roars with my yells are all scrambled together and muted, they all mix back into the low overriding hum. i don't remember much after that, except i remember it all. the knock at the man-cave door. it is Triton. he mouths something to me then races to attack the Master. a cloud of white smoke like in cartoons follows between the two feline warriors. i love(d) cartoons. i measured my entire life against cartoons, they were all i had, my only reference, i never talked to anyone. i love you, Triton, my beautiful loyal furry companion.

this is how i imagine it. like in an anime. with the background music and everything. the beat. i am tasting the clouds, the white smoke inside the dark room gives way to clouds, high high clouds, as high as the farthest sun, the invisible star i always knew was there, the meaning i sought was there all along, i knew animals could talk, i taste the clouds. they are not necessarily comforting, but i make them comfortable as i close my eyes to open my eyes, with

AN ENDING THAT IS MARKED WITH AN INTRO, CLICK HERE, RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK.

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TMIT: DAVID WITH BRONZER

for reference, the first pic up atop there, the one of David, is PIC 1. the one directly below it is PIC 2, and so on to PIC 5.

1. have you taken a sexually-themed vacation getaway like Hedonism? why? yes. because i need to get out of the house. it doesn't really matter what i do---sex at Hedonism or searching for rare, out-of-print comic books at a Con---i just need to get out of the house.

2. you have won an erotic-fantasy weekend getaway package custom-fit to your needs. describe the fantasy you desire: i'm a simple man: cum in mouth, that's it. oh, and a lime beer, always wanted to try that.

3. an artist has decided that you are his/her inspiration. they want to capture the essence of your sexiness in a sculpture. what would that sculpture look like? SEE PIC 1. i'm honored...

4. you are being paid 500,000 USD to pose as a live nude model mimicking one of the sculptures in PIC 5. which sculpture will you recreate live? why? make it a cool million and we can talk about tending to that beautiful green grass. i feed my lawn, i feed it the Scot way. i choose 3 because 2 requires too much taxing athleticism on my thin-as-a-rail frame, and 1 is just showing off...

5. which book title fits your current thoughts on love, sex, and romance?:
a) No More Silly Love Songs
b) The Joy of the Quickie
c) Dr. Seth's Love Prescription
d) Why Do Fools Fall In Love?

Dr. Seth Meyers? the only Seth Meyers i know is the husband of Stefon on Saturday Night Live.

bonus: in PIC 4, which one are you? which position do you want to occupy in this sculpture? and write a caption:

i'm the white dude who is upside-down in the pond mooning the world unintentionally and missing all the bronze action to the right of me there. the caption: SOMEONE JUST PUSHED ME INTO THE POND TRYING TO WATCH THE BRONZE THREESOME. SEND HELP.

CLICK HERE FOR TMI TUESDAY

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NCAA BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP GAME, ANYONE CAN PLAY!

hai guyz! are you there? you're probably not there, huh? it's a Saturday night. it's also Spring Break. well, in case you are, UConn and Kentucky are gonna play for a national title this Monday night, college basketball, where they do it right with a playoff tournament. anyway, if you want to play, if ANYONE OUT THERE ON PLANET EARTH OR MARS wants to play this blog game, the rules are simple: predict who will win Monday night, UConn or Kentucky. also predict the final score. the winner of this blog game is the one who correctly predicts the actual winning team and is closest to the actual final score. use my example in the comments as a guide. meet me here Tuesday for the results. good luck, have fun, and...oh yeah, the prize for winning: y'know, a cute waitress at the club has just passed me a packet of some special sugar and i'm feelin'

SMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTH

right about now, so i'm in the mood for anything. oh, Legal just said i can't do that, so i guess it's my usual prize: three of my comments at your blog. i know i've been slacking in providing these prize comments to the winners of these games and i am heartily sorry about that, i've got a lot of stuff going on right now and always. hopefully, one day, i'll actually have some real free time when i can finally fulfill my responsibilities. that's why i say three comments but don't give a specific time frame, so it could technically take 100 years before the three comments are transmitted...hopefully sooner, but y'know...in 100 years, hopefully humans are reading minds instead of using blogspot. bye guyz!

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KREATURES II: GUMMI GECKO

the brown spot by the dish deck, what was it? i washed and dried my dishes by hand because i am poor. i went to touch it, touch it

it was

a speck

of

something.

i turned to the left and saw my Keurig coffee machine. i slipped in a K cup, decided on decaf, i probably needed that right now, and waited for the wondrous machine to heat up and brew me just the right amount of java at just the right temperature and flavor mix. as i poured in the water, i didn't notice the ants at the back of the machine scrawling around. two, three, four, many ants all converging on the coffee machine at once, in that spiral pattern of theirs, taking up space, conquering the machine, claiming it invisibly. an ant gets in the water container without me knowing, it's gonna get brewed, and i'm gonna pay for that later. as the coffee drips and falls into the cup, the ants wait, they aren't dumb, they sense that the liquid is hot, they wait for me to handle the cup and take it to my lips. as i pause a second to blow on the coffee to cool it down, that's when they strike and enter my mouth through my tongue. as i drink my favorite morning brew, i eat these conquering ants. they died for the cause, they are heroes to their people, and i am as always left unawares and human. i'm not sure how the ants regard this: is it more or less of a victory that i don't know they're in me?

i'm so tired i forget that i went to sleep, i just wake up the next morning...or rather, afternoon. i wake up in a very odd position, my back is all twisted, my mouth and tongue hang out and are full of saliva from not brushing my teeth in weeks, i'm almost completely upside down but my head is slightly tilted to where it's the most uncomfortable pivot point for me to be in, my arms and legs don't hang and swing gracefully. i look much like my cat Triton as he slumbers.

i remember now, i was thinking of a pasture, and sheep, lovely sheep, now these are creatures i can hang with, they are gentle, fluffy like clouds, and they all jump over the fence in an orderly line to help me get to sleep. routine and rhythm make human a dull boy, and human falls asleep 'cause he can't take the pattern. that's so nice of them to do that for lowly me, i'm grateful, i really am. as the suicide sheep jump and jump and jump, one of them manages to bite me in the nose, and though this is a dream, it manages to still hurt.

AM I AWAKE? CLICK HERE, RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK.

shower time. lovely time. i relish my time cleaning myself, i lick my paws and crunch on my nails like Triton, and i do the human stuff, too, like using soap and a tiny cute little washcloth. shit, the clear plastic shower mat with the suction cups is still stuck to the bottom of my bath/shower, i need to remove it to drain it. as i rip the suction cups away from their suction and air, i notice too late that i've sent a tiny spider flying to somewhere. shit, i'm gonna pay for that later, huh? i shouldn't be in a rush all the time. what am i rushing for? what is there really to do anymore?

and again stuff happens or it doesn't and i'm back in the pure comfort of my bed in my beautiful awkward position sleeping and racing to get to another dream. am i awake or still asleep? is that Triton stalking my bedroom door? i can never tell. see, i leave my door slightly more than ajar, i leave a nice small space of air for Triton to come in at night, i never close my door, always leave that slit of space. at the bottom of my doorframe there's a huge area of the door jamb that's taped up with brown masking tape. at night, or during the day for that matter, it's an optical illusion, if i stare at that spot long enough, i always see my brown-furred cat there, but many times, it's just the tape i'm seeing...although one time it really was Triton sniffing at the door in that area waiting to come in.

"Triton? Triton, is that you?" i say all the time to the tape.

i imagine this is the principle of camouflage critters in the wild use, the green lizards who blend in with the large green leaves of the tropical rainforest to avoid detection, to avoid becoming someone else's meal. the lice which make me scratch my head constantly, they blend into the already-white surface of my skull.

dinner time, and there's nothing in the fridge. do you know what that feels like? i'm starving, but i'm not like those who are actually starving, so i keep my complaints to myself. still, though, the freezer is bare, save for one bottle of jalapeno ketchup and one glass bottle of expired dijon mustard. i' die for a caesar salad kit right now, i shouldn't only buy three a week like usual, i should buy four to have an extra one handy, but that costs money. i'm so hungry it feels i've missed a meal though i haven't, it feels like i can still taste the salad from last night, and my stomach is craving more. feed the need if you please. got no green to buy those leafy greens. a couple of flies enter my eyes.

where i eat is the kitchen. there's a heavy door at the end which leads to two steps of stairs which lead to the man cave. my man cave consists of my dying desktop on a rickety table, no ridiculously large tv or foosball or pool table or Nok Hockey or Carrom board or air-hockey or life-size arcade cabinet of the video game Mortal Kombat. no, instead i look at a screen to get the nostalgia from my '80s magical childhood. to the right of this room is a thin door which leads outside to where the two recycling bins are, one green for trash and the other blue for everything else recyclable. there's also one red at the corner in the back outside for lawn refuse, dead leaves and dead twigs and dead branches.

every night when i take out the trash i follow this same path from the kitchen down the two stairsteps to the cold, foreboding outside night. my path outside is blocked by my neighbor's fence. i'm the creepy neighbor in this life, he isn't. the fence is made of long sturdy burgundy planks, high high high as the attendant foliage and greens and vines grow out from the top of the fence and through its slits. there is a whole ecosystem up top of that fence, who knows what's living there?

i know what's living there, magic scary creatures that don't exist anywhere else on Earth, things you couldn't conceive of by yourself. taking out the trash one day i saw him, something out of Tolkien and Rowling, it was a gecko, but not the cute ones you see advertising on tv, this was a giant one, it must have been 100 pounds, and it was gummi.

the surface of its skin wasn't ordinary and smooth and green, it was see-through, you could see its inside organs, its heart pumping and its dynamic circulatory system, its internal veins and arteries pumping its dark deep purple alive juice all around its body, preparing it to face me. its outer shell, where its skin should be, the outer body itself was like, clear, white, like Wonder Woman's invisible jet, you could see the outline of it, but you couldn't actually see it. this gecko squirmed around and wiggled like it was a gummi candy, but i was in no position to eat it, it was the other way around. i was terrified.

i dropped my trash bag and bottles and cans came spilling out.

"recycle the right way" the gummi told me from its perch on top of the fence, "or behold creatures even more mysterious than i. the wild will eventually adapt to change and force you stupid humans to do so as well. you can destroy our home as much as you wantonly want, but nature wins out in the end. we will create whatever monstrosity, whatever elf, fairy, and dwarf, whatever majesty we need to bring this gorgeous verdant planet back to our side. you humans don't realize the beauty all around you, you're too busy with instagram to care. you don't see the magnificent world beneath your feet, rather you stomp on it. all hail the wonder of nature!"

and with that, this glorious gummi beast sprang from its post and powerfully bit my nose. i screamed a girly scream. i think i fainted, but i didn't, i was just on the wet ground waiting to die. it had been raining by the way.

my poor nose, i thought, why is it always my red nose? i waited, breathed heavily, my forehead caked in sweat, but the gecko was still right there by my side, on top of my face. he dug the nails of his webbed feet and hands, which were indistinguishable as to if they were feet or hands, into me, and he opened his jarring jaw and i was prepared to get sprayed with deadly toxic yellow emissions, but instead, the gecko's yellow dotted eyes rolled back into his head and protruded outward on a vine, then regressed back into his head. blindly, he slaps my cheeks with his whipping tail and he tells me to my face:

"hear this, representative of the humans, i am but the precursor. my master awaits to teach you the final lesson..."




PART 3 NEXT WEEK.



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