We Apologize For the Interruption in Your Service...

I planned to have another story up here yesterday, but I was really unhappy with it.  Hopefully I'll be more pleased with the final product due Tuesday.

DNA Warfare

My Nemesis appears to have been correct.  A third party lurks in the shadows, taking loyal Fangers and disillusioned Tuskers and performing Mad Science on them.  A warning - The image below is a  grotesque mockery of Denistry.  Behold:

The Tusker is trying to communicate with it through a series of grunts and obscene hand gestures in the hopes that one day it will learn to speak again.  Perhaps the grizzly truthes that it will unveil will lead us to this Monster Maker 3000.

Laugher Strike

As of yet not turned in, so no chance for professional suggestions, haha.  I just thought it was funny.

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            “Ringmaster, we uh, have a problem…” The man in the dirty tuxedo fidgeted with the brim of his top hat as he stood in front of the Ringmaster’s oak desk.  He was sweating profusely.

            “What is it now?” The Ringmaster didn’t even look up from the stack of paperwork sitting in front of him. “Trapeze artist fall again?  Tent collapse?  Lion kill another tamer?”

            Top Hat tugged at his collar.  “No sir, it’s a bit… more dire.”

            The Ringmaster finally looked up, tapping his pen against the desk.  “What can it possibly be, Stenson?”

            “Um, Winston, sir.”

            “Whatever.  What’s happening?”

            Winston wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his wrist.  “It’s the clowns, sir.”

            “…The clowns.  What about the clowns?  Who cares about the damned clowns?”

            “Sir, they’re… well, they say they’re on strike, but-“

            “Great!  Finally a way around that stupid performer’s union.  I’ve been trying to get rid of the fucking clowns for years.  Where’s the problem, Winlow?”

            “W-Winston, sir.  It’s uh, well, they aren’t striking right.  Uh, y’know?”  He gave up waiting on an invitation to sit and took a seat anyway before his shaking knees gave out.

            The Ringmaster just stared.  “What do you mean ‘not striking right’?”

            Winston gulped.  “They… won’t stop performing, sir…”

            There was a pause.

            “Won’t… stop… You said they were striking, Longstein.  That’s not striking.”  The Ringmaster’s voice was calmly terrifying.

            Winston switched arms to wipe his brow with, his right sleeve soaked through.  “They… they know you want them gone, sir.  It’s, uh, still Winston, by the way.  But they said they’re going to keep performing until you uh… you uh…”  He fidgeted for a good, disarming word.

            “Until I what, Newston?”

            Another gulp.  “Until you… err, give in to their demands, sir.”

            The Ringmaster’s fist slammed down on the table, causing papers to tumble over.  “CLOWNS are making DEMANDS?!”  He stood to his feet, his rolling chair flying out behind him and crashing against the wall.  “What do they even WANT?  We just got done with them fighting for equal show time!”  The Ringmaster pulled out a small, unlabelled bottle of brown liquid from his desk and began pouring it into a glass.

            Winston fumbled for a folded piece of multicolored paper in his inner tux pocket.  Clearing his throat, he spoke, “T-They gave me this.  For you, sir.  They wanted you to, uh, to know their… demands.  Here…” He handed the paper to the Ringmaster, who started reading it.

            “…What is this?  ‘Equal Pies for All Clownes’?  ‘More Compact Clowne Cars’?  ‘More Honky Noses for Clowne Brothers’?  Is this a joke?  And they want an elephant?”

            “Uh, read the footnote, sir… they uh, they’ll accept a giraffe, if the elephant is uh…” He gestured unhelpfully. “Is uh, too much?”

            The Ringmaster just stared for a full five seconds.  “No.  I don’t bargain with clowns.”  He ripped up the colorful paper into confetti.  “They want to play hard, we’ll play hard.  There’s a reason I keep those mime freaks employed.  Round them up for me, Stanislaw.  They’re going to break this strike.”

            Winston started stammering.  “Sir, but… the mimes… they’re as bad as the clowns, sir.  Without the clowns to keep them in check… sir, they’ll… they’ll try to take over!”

            The Ringmaster smiled a sinister smile.  “I’ve dealt with the clowns before.  They’ll call in their backup.  The clown mafia – the Hahfia.  Dr. Bonzo riding in on his unicycle, troops loaded with water balloons and squirt flowers… But the mimes will be armed with invisible lassoes and weaponry.  It’ll be a massacre of cartoonish proportions, and whoever survives will be easily kept under thumb.  Now, get those mimes ready, Winburgh.”  

            As Winston stepped out of the office, muttering under his breath, the Ringmaster turned to the window behind him and stared, untouched drink in hand, already imagining the Looney Tunes level of carnage that would soon take place.

            He took a sip of the brown liquid, a home-brewed root beer, and a genuine smile touched his face.  "God I love the circus."

On Luck.

Rachel - 13 minutes!

Matt - You pointed out the unlucky number!

Rachel - lol thats my favorite number
because i believe we make our own luck
or, rather, i do
=)=)

Matt - I believe we make each other's luck. Like, your luck is made by a Guatemalan kid who lives in a hut deep in South America. My luck is made by the alternate reality Donald Trump. All movie stars have their luck made by Brian Dennehy.

Rachel - hey, i like that one too
anything other than it being random

Matt - Well, I know that the kid just rolls dice. Alternate Reality Donald Trump just hits people until they spout a number. And Brian Dennehy bases it on the number of cheesecakes that room service will deliver to his room in any given day.

Airships, Urchins, and Dashing Captains, oh my!

Here's another assignment for my creative writing class.

Edit: I don't know why the font is so wonky.  I hope you can deal with it alright.
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            Maigel rounded the corner and fell against the wall, breathing ragged and heart pounding.  His latest haul of stolen fruit slowly slipped out of his grip as he gave himself over to recovering from the chase.  He had lost the bazaar soldiers, but he had also lost contact with the other orphans during their raid.  He momentarily prayed for their safety, but then closed his eyes as his mind emptied of everything except his next breath.

            A dull roar from high above interrupted his reverie.  Looking up between the multistory, plaster-and-wood apartments was the sky, little glimmers of blue visible between the criss-crossed laundry lines and nationalist propaganda banners announcing the glory of the Imperial Parade (“See Your Armed Forces, the Pride of Pellaria, and the Spoils of Righteous Victory!”).  He needed a better vantage point.

            Breath still ragged, he ran through crowded street after crowded street, pushing, shoving, and dodging his way through the mid afternoon crowd, heading first to the roofs and then to the Docklands.  He knew what the sound above meant – airships.  Ten years ago, the last time the Fleet passed through, he had been too young to witness the conquest of Oren.  While the war raged on, even though the front became more and more distant, the “newly conquered” territories were still banned from forming militia or using airships.    News arrived six months ago that Narsket, the last holdout of resistance, had finally fallen.  The Emperor’s “honored heroes” were to return with a token escort after the area was fully under control, and many trading magnates immediately began construction on ships to accompany the military escort while major cities constructed “harbors” for the new trade routes.

            The Docklands was Oren’s harbor – A tall spire jutting out of the waterfront docks.  Piers, supported by suspension cables and buttresses, jutted out in all directions.  A constant groan of the clockwork operating the lifts, pullies, and secret machine inside the technological wonder permeated the port district.  Steam billowed from the top as if it was the smokestack for the entire city.

            Clamped onto the piers were three ships of the Imperial Armada, and docking around them were the tagalong traders, the first in what would become staples plying the skies of Oren.

            The full catalogue of Imperial technology and, some whispered, hidden magics had begun arriving along with the end of the war.

            During the construction, Maigel had often snuck into the Docklands, eager to catch a glimpse of the sheer foreignness of this monument to technology.  Knowing that security would multiply when ships started arriving, he had convinced the orphans to help him make sure there would be a few secret entrances – A weakened wall here, a tunnel there.  The preparation paid off, allowing Maigel to quickly dismantle a small section of wall, climb inside, and reseal it behind him.  Making his way through the steamworks housed in the basement of the Docklands, he arrived into the tower proper.

            Slipping into the hustle and bustle of the Docklands was easy, and he began making his way up the lifts and stairs to the piers.  He spied foreign merchants dressed in all manner of exotic clothes and smelling of aromatic spices and foodstuffs.  Laborers moved crates and milled about, looking half as likely to cut as carry.  Cargo cranes swung with precision that bordered on recklessness as they convoyed cargo down and supplies up.  Maigel watched with wide, glassy eyes.  He changed lifts three times before reaching the first pier, the people at the bottom of the tower now simply dots in the haze that permeated the structure.  As he stepped out from the inside of the tower, he blinked before the light glinting off the metal of the military airship.

            Trade ships were primarily wooden, and many had only basic steamworks in which to keep them afloat, relying mainly on the cheaper and easy to repair system of propellers for movement.  This ship, very obviously military, was encased in metal, wings a mixture of steam and wind power.  The cannon doors were closed, but the outline allowed Maigel to easily imagine the similarity between this metal beauty and a porcupine.  The other big difference between the trade ships and the military ships was easily observed as well – Soldiers were guarding the gangplank to the Imperial airship.

            He sat on a nearby crate, eyes devouring every inch of the wonder.  So awestruck was he that he did not notice the man in the casually undone uniform sit next to him.

            “A true beaut, isn’t she?”

            Shocked out of his daydreams, Maigel fell off the crate, scrambled to his feet, and stared at the now laughing soldier.

            “Now, I can’t imagine why a kid like you would be here.  Although, you walk with the confidence of someone who belongs, I don’t think you do.”  The soldier’s grin got wider as Maigel’s jaw set in silence.  “Well, how about I show you around this ship?  A tour from Pellaria’s ‘greatest hero’ should give you a story to tell to the other kids, yeah?”  He stood and walked toward the ship, Maigel hesitating for only a second before following.

            He watched the soldier as they walked along the pier.  Unkempt uniform, shaggy red hair under an uncentered hat, and a swagger that told of too much time spent in the sky.  “…Who are you?” he half-whispered as they approached the gangplank.

            The grinning man spun around in front of the guards watching the plank.  “If these gentlemen have done their jobs right, you and everyone else in this city will have that answer before the day’s over!” He turned back to the guards.  “Gentlemen?”  The two guards nodded, unsuccessfully trying to hide smirks of their own.  “Excellent!  Well, boy, shall we begin your tour during the preparations for departure?”

            Uncertain of the soldier’s meaning, Maigel nodded and followed as he was given a full walkthrough of the ship.  The deck, almost empty, hid the bustle of the blowdecks.  The machine room was undergoing a full repair and the cargo hold was brimming with supplies and men checking off lists.  The crew quarters were almost empty, with the crew hustling around the ship, but the cannonry was almost too full to pass through, with cannons being cleaned, supplies being checked, and drills being run.  When the tour brought them to the captain’s quarters, three men bent over a table hushed, eyeing Maigel distrustfully until the soldier laughed and told them to continue.  The men started talking, but in forced tones that told of false conversation.

            As the tour progressed, Maigel noticed that the people still boarding the ship were merchants and laborers dropping off cargo and then disappearing further into the ship.  The few soldiers on board were keeping a watch outside the ship on the deck or the gangplank, not inside.  And as the tour wound to a close back at the end of the gangplank, the eccentric soldier received a whispered message from one of the guards.  Nodding, he turned back to Maigel.

            “I fear this concludes our tour, as this ship will be departing in mere seconds.  It was a pleasure meeting you, young thief,” he grabbed Maigel’s arm and shook a small pilot’s handbook and navigational chart out of the loose, baggy sleeve, “I hope your dreams are fulfilled as much as mine are about to be.  Remember this: nothing will happen if you don’t make it happen.” He left Maigel standing on the pier and stepped back aboard the ship.  “I’m sure we’ll be making a name for ourselves, so keep up with the rumors!” He was now shouting over the roar of the engines starting and the whirring of propellers.  “Maybe you can use our bad example to learn some tips about what not to do when you get your own ship!”  Laughing, he took off the military jacket, swung it over his head, and threw it toward the pier before turning and disappearing into the ship as it disengaged itself from the pier and, dipping only slightly, turned and set off.

            Maigel picked up the jacket and watched dumbfounded, not entirely certain of what just happened.  The ship made it’s intentions clear a few seconds later when it unleashed a volley of cannon fire into the Imperial ship on the next pier up.  As it disappeared into the smoke still billowing from the Docklands, Maigel heard the sound of whistles and shouts from further down the pier, alerting Maigel to the immediacy of his need to not be here when they arrived.  Shimmying down the side of the pier, he crawled along the support beams that criss-crossed the underside like laundry lines, slowly making his way down the pier and to his own, less glorious, escape.

Back to the original purpose...

While in no way forfeiting this war, I refuse to allow it to fully disrupt the noble origins of this blog.  In order to accomplish this, I'm posting a creative writing assignment I turned in today.

The assignment had two parts.  The first was to describe a place that had some kind of significance to you.  Not to tell a story, just describe it.  The second part was to actually tell the story in this now fleshed out area.  While the options for places that are important to me are countless, this is what I picked.


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Part One

I grew up in a cabin in Chattanooga, Tennessee.  My parents lived there, tucked away about a mile off East Brainerd Road, until they got divorced when I was six.  My mom decided to move to a townhouse in a neighborhood a few miles closer to the actual hub of civilization.  Whereas before we had one family that lived nearby (About five minutes of hiking through woods), we were now surrounded by other families.

The neighborhood was a short drive from Hamilton Place Mall, an area that was just entering a phase of what continues to be a constantly expanding part of town, and a slightly longer drive to downtown Chattanooga.  Across the street was a church with a terrifying (to a little kid) depiction of Jesus hanging from the cross.  Next door was a Subway, and the ultimate responsibility to the adventurous 9 year old was to ride a bike all the way down there, buy subs for my mom, sister and myself, and make it back without tipping over.

My mom chose the neighborhood because it had a lot of kids for my sister and I to play with.  This was true, but it was also a “stopping point” type of neighborhood.  People rented for a year or two and moved on.  We didn’t.  We lived there for around six years, and by the time we left, it was almost devoid of playmates.

When we moved in, next door was a forest.  The road continued, and on the left side were apartments, but the right was all forest.  It was later cut down to build more cheap homes, but for a few years, it was the place where kids shoes were muddied and imagined adventures played out.  Deep within was a lake.  A swamp, really, but we called it a lake.  In the winter it would freeze over just enough to give the impression that it was solid enough to slide across.  It wasn’t, although my mom’s mood to my frozen pants and chattering teeth was fiery enough to make up for my fall.

There was a cat that roamed the neighborhood.  An outdoor, grey striped warrior named Boo-boo due to the constant marks of battle on him.  He was there before we arrived as a sort of neighborhood cat.  There were about five families that kept food, water, and a bed out for him.  My mom, a lover of cats, joined the cause.  When we left, we were the only family still feeding him, so we formally adopted him and took him with us.  Probably the toughest, most capable, most loving cat I’ve ever seen, I always imagined him as a noble warrior or samurai: intelligent, composed, confident, and fully able to take care of himself in any situation.  The entire neighborhood was his domain and he knew it.

 

Part Two

This neighborhood, unnamed but residing on Stratton Place, drastically changed during our stay there.  The place changed, the people changed, and the atmosphere changed.  The changes, be they for better or worse, it taught a lesson to me about treasuring memories.

I already mentioned the forest next to my mom’s townhouse.  It wasn’t a terribly attractive forest filled with tall trees, pine needles carpeting the soil, and a soft, green light permeating.  It was a scraggly, dense cluster of thin, wispy trees, bushes, weeds, and ivy.  Demolishing it, as the neighborhood owner eventually did, was removing an eyesore and a great business move.  As kids, we hated them for it.

The denseness of the forest made it a fortress.  The trees and bushes worked together to build walls surrounding it.  There was an easy path in, but even for seven to ten year old kids, we had to hunch over to get through.  A winding path led us to a clearing in the center, where there was, inexplicably, a decaying old tool bench.  The sky opened up above letting in light, and we kids would gather around the table and plan things we would build in the forest with our rusty screwdriver and brittle hammer.  While the actual construction never got further than me ruining a steak knife from my mom’s kitchen while trying to cut a limb out of a tree, the idea and knowledge that when we got older we’d have an awesome tree fort filled us with excitement.  This was our base; our war room.

And then, one day, a sneak attack destroyed our base.  It seemed to happen overnight.  One day we were playing in our forest and the next day over half of it was being loaded into a truck to be sent for scrap lumber.  I remember very clearly watching as some of the larger trees, the foundations of legitimacy for this forest, were sawed down.  Flocks of birds fled, squirrels were displaced, and I sympathized with them.  I had lost half of my home, too.  My mom tells me I cried, but I refuse to admit it.

Construction started within a week.  Initially it was nothing special, mostly just bulldozing and digging for a while.  But this was also the origins of our guerrilla movement.  We took to organized resistance, waiting until after they got off work to abscond with the little marker flags, write angry notes in cement, and carve curses on the wood.  We thought we were really getting to them, although there was no evidence to support that.

Construction finished months later.  The neighborhood of townhouses and apartments now had full fledged houses, although they didn’t fit with the rest of the neighborhood.  Cookie cutter design, no trees in (very small) yards, and a sense of permanence that the rest of the neighborhood lacked characterized them.  People moved into those homes to settle down, and that divided them from the rest of us.  I remember this period as the time when the other kids started moving away, and I never met any kids, if there were any, from the new houses.

I don’t know what ever happened to the decaying old tool bench.  It disappeared in the first day or two of construction, probably just dumped off at a landfill.  I really hope that the marker notes, a splash of color on the dilapidated old wood, caused someone to think about what that place meant to us.  The loss of our headquarters heralded the destruction of the club of neighborhood kids.

An Update

I returned to my apartment and noticed a few scratches on my door.  My investigation team has determined they resemble tusks.  Inside, on the table, was a half-eaten sandwich.  I didn't make this sandwich, but some tusked creature entered, fixed a sandwich, and took a bite, leaving me with the cost of wasted materials and a mess to clean up.  Also, the note wasn't very nice, either.

This shit is on now.  Shit just got real.

Deceiving the Deceivers

Our enemy, gutteral tusked nitwits that they are, plan to use my poor eyesight as a weakness.  It is a strength, I say.  Even those he, himself, is bespectacled, he only sees mine as a weakness.  This sort of oversight is exactly why the Tusker is a threat in brute force only and not in higher mental prowess. 

He plans to use "ultraviolet dogs", which are really just regular dogs, but he immediately assumes that my glasses issue means colorblindness.  As we all know, colorblind people can't see dogs or people from Laos.  I wonder, then... Has this beast forgotten his true nemesis?  Has he instead turned his lazy eye toward our good friend Jo, who has yet to join either camp?  Or does he just hate Laosians?

He has issued a decree.  An ultimatum, if you will.  He declares that there is no middle ground; no Swiss.  Is he trying to force the undecided into his camp in fear?  Worry not, neutrality nuts.  The Fangs offer sanctuary.

And remember, there's nothing worse than a Tusker.  Ok, Nazis are worse.  And Communists.  But there are only two things worse than a Tusker, and those are both super bad.

A Comparison

Last night, I had the dubious honor of attempting to engage my nemesis in dialog. Photographic evidence of the two styles of Pretzeling have since surfaced.


Please note the narrow, beady eyes and the perpetual scowl of the Tusker.

Opposing the Tusker, we have the dignity and class of the Fangs. Enlightened, friendly, and, above all, in possession of a hookah, the ultimate symbol of class.

However, attempts were made at compromise. I am not unreasonable, and if it will end the bloodshed of the Dental Pretzel Wars, I could see lowering myself to work with a lowly Tusker. However, our attempts at compromise failed, resulting in a hideous creation literally exploding with teeth. Warning: This is not for the faint of heart.














JESUS RUN--

Treachery Abounds!

Alas, it is with a heavy heart that I tell of the betrayal of my trusted second-in-command. Fuyuko, whom I once believed to be an advocate for all that is fluffy and cute in this world, has sided with the enemy. In other news, I've weakened the enemy and taken away his spirit animal:

[15:04] TheAuburnDragon: How are you a pretzel walrus, again?
[15:04] M4573rF4c70r3r: Shit.
[15:04] M4573rF4c70r3r: Good point.
[15:04] TheAuburnDragon: It just occured to me. Walrus tusks go down
[15:04] TheAuburnDragon: Like vampires
[15:04] M4573rF4c70r3r: Yeah...
[15:04] M4573rF4c70r3r: But.
[15:04] M4573rF4c70r3r: I did have tusks!
[15:05] TheAuburnDragon: Like uh... like a boar?
[15:05] M4573rF4c70r3r: Sure.
[15:05] M4573rF4c70r3r: Did I call myself a walrus?
[15:05] TheAuburnDragon: Yeah, last night
[15:05] M4573rF4c70r3r: Last night.
[15:05] M4573rF4c70r3r: But
[15:05] M4573rF4c70r3r: Not today.
[15:06] M4573rF4c70r3r: I'm... I don't know. What else has up tusks?
[15:07] TheAuburnDragon: Do your own research! I'm slandering you.
[15:07] M4573rF4c70r3r: Fine.
[15:07] M4573rF4c70r3r: But I'll find a really awesome animal to be.
[15:07] M4573rF4c70r3r: So there.

A New Challenger Approaches

I've just received word that a hated rival of mine, my arch-nemesis, if you will, is considering the production of his own blog (Henceforth: His blag) in order to compete with me once again. His view, the view of heathens and heretics, is that pretzel teeth go up, like a walrus. I feel that the Dracula inside all of us knows better than to fall for such chicanery, so the only recourse is to fight back against this tide of Wrong.

I will keep you updated.


Edit: The walrus lover has already started his blag. Take this opportunity to slander him! Tell dirty jokes about his pets, and talk about his coarse whiskers!

Connecticut and Me

This summer I took a trip. Now, I'm from Tennessee and had never really been up "Nawth", so I was pretty pumped. And it was a great trip! I spent some time in Boston, New York, and Detroit and had a great time. The trip up from Tennessee wasn't that bad. However, the trip from New York to Boston and back? ....

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So, being an ignorant goon from the South, I had this fairytale idea of Connecticut as this kind of sleepy neighbor to New York. Lots of forests, mountains, coast, and friendly village folk. As it turns out, I was lied to.

On my way to Boston, I hit the road right as dark clouds snuck over the horizon. Within five minutes I couldn't see out of my car, almost hydroplaned into a semi-truck (Ironically carrying Ford sedans (I drive a Ford Taurus, for the two people who read this that don't know me)), and had an average speed of fifteen miles and hour and still felt like I was flipping off Death. The only reason I knew I wasn't was because he was in the car next to me, shaking his hourglass in rage because he, too, was late for an appointment.

The rain stopped almost as suddenly as it started and left the sky a murky white, and while I was still recovering from this sudden shift, the traffic around me -stopped-. It took me two and a half hours to go 30 miles, no joke. I timed this, checked my distances, all this. Trust me, I had -time-. And I saw more dick driving moves in those two and a half hours than in the rest of my life.

An example: People were speeding down the shoulder to jump ahead in traffic, so a semi truck started driving in it next to another one in the right lane, just to keep them from doing that. High five, I've seen that done back home. What I hadn't seen were the daring ne'er-do-wells that tried to four wheel up the hill, through the sparse forest, and around the vehicular barricade. A guy almost flipped his jeep (His wide-eyed screaming expression was enough to forgive his total dickishness). Other maneuvers included the "Merge while I pretend you aren't there" and the "Skip the two mile toll booth line", which was followed by the "Merge while I pretend you aren't there". A winning combo, Steve.

Truly inspired coaching, Bill.

Speaking of two mile toll booth lines, I gotta ask... What the hell is with the two mile toll booth lines? There were like, 10 lanes, four of them were the fast card speedy things for the everyday commuters, but of the other six, three were open. Call in the cavalry for that shit, Connecticut.

The one good part of the toll line, though, was the other drivers. I had my window down playing some System of a Down, and I ended up next to this other guy who also had his window down playing a -different- System of a Down song. So we started having a System of a Down off. I'm sure the family of eight behind us and the Asian couple with the two kids ahead of us loved all the swearing.

Right right, anyway, the two and a half hours in traffic thing. Turns out that at the end of those sweet thirty miles, there were five police cars, a Swat van, a police van, and an unmarked van carrying equipment on BOTH SIDES of the freeway, both looking off into a small little dip. Almost creek looking, but no water. Still have no idea what happened.

So that was my trip through Connecticut to Boston. On the way back, I got revisited by what I assume was the same storm, although the traffic I got caught in after was just the average five o'clock traffic that starts at 3:15. I'm curious who built that stretch of interstate, though. There's another interstate joining on on the right, then another that joins on the left, then the right has to merge, followed by the left merging, then the next right lane ending, followed by the next left lane closing. I'll try to graph it:


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I mean, what the hell? That's ASKING for traffic issues.

Anyway, those are ALL of my experiences with Connecticut. No gas stops, no breaks, etc. Just putting up with interstate and weather bullshit. My illusions of sleepy wonderland have been destroyed by poorly created interstates, crappy weather, and major criminal activity.

Content? Shenanigans!

So, just to get something up here, I'm going to post two pieces in a minute. One is a rant from facebook, the other is a story blurb I wrote for a class last week. I'll endeavor to provide new and original content soon. In the meantime, balloons!

Edit: Turns out I lied to you. I forgot that I wrote the story on the school computers and forgot to e-mail it to myself, so I'll copy it down when I get the story back.

Hello, World.

So, yeah. Hi. I'm going to warn you, I've never done this before, and you've never read me before, so we'll learn together.

I've recently been writing more and more. There used to be two non-school related times when I would write. Y'know, the creative juices just start pounding, you get this awesome idea, and then BAM - You spend three hours slamming away at a keyboard and churn out a few pages. Like I said, that used to happen to me during one of two times:

1) It would happen when I was rip-roaringly drunk. Oh man, I wrote the best essay of my sophomore year of college like this entirely by coming back from a party, seeing word open, and pounding out three paragraphs. The next morning, after deciphering things such as "Renfairisznce" as "Renaissance" and eliminating the train of thought elements "And that is why the Boxer Rebellion resulted in oh man I fell out of my chair. I need to remember this for tomorrow. It's so funny...", it turns out I had a really good beginning. I think I've gotten off topic.

B) I'd also get those bursts of creativity during late, almost all-nighters. Just finished a last minute essay on the Crusades (And what better to spark creativity than a hilarious series of war crimes?), Word still open, and ideas of space crusaders or of Bruce Campbell traveling back through time to fend off Saladin just burning through my mind. Who can resist that kind of call? I couldn't, and that's why I have a little known nonexistant book series entitled Morally Conflicted Living, with such entries as Morally Conflicted Living 1, Morally Conflicted Living 2, and Army of Turks. It's also why I'm being sued for slander, copyright infringement, and parodying B-movies.

I guess what I'm saying is that I very rarely wrote fully thought out things. Bursts of creativity that rarely saw my return. I have a folder of stories I've started and never revisited, and it's not from lack of enjoying them. I love the setting or characters or what have you in all of them. I just lost the oomph for writing more.

So what did I do? Well, I've done a few things. I've started trying to get into the habit of writing more. In order to accomplish this, I started posting notes on facebook, I signed up for a creative writing class, I hired two hippies to burn a collection of mind-altering incence in my apartment, I started renting a new apartment after the hippies wouldn't leave, and now I'm here, starting this up. I think I'm just hoping that feeling a slight feeling of responsibility toward writing more will help. It won't be much, because I currently have no readership, and even if I did, I'm also a bastard. But hey, like I said, we'll learn together.

Anyway, if you find this and you know me, thanks for showing some support. If you found this through other means, you're a stalker, but I hope you're the kind of stalker that is a beautiful, wealthy, geeky woman who enjoys sponsoring our trips to the ocean for long walks on the beach followed by marathon Mario Kart 64 sessions. I mean sex. I didn't mean to write Mario Kart (Yes I did).

Edit: Oh, right, I'm going to try and post new stuff soon, but I may just move the facebook notes over, just to get some content on here. Maybe I'll keep you updated. Or maybe I'll surprise you. We'll see.