caveat emptor

Tough Day

I was a little surprised to see an octopus sitting at the bar, to be honest with you, but I acted cool about it. I try to be open minded, you know? I just took my normal seat - two stools over from the large cephalopod - and ordered my usual, Glenfiddich, neat. I sat there quietly, looking at my phone a little and humming along to the music.

"Tough day?" the octopus said after a minute.

I glanced over to see if it was talking to me, realizing quickly that I was too unfamiliar with octopus anatomy to tell for sure. "What's that?" I asked casually.

"Tough day?" it asked again.

"Not really," I lied. "Why do you ask?"

"I was just noticing your coloration. You're showing a kind of down color." It turned to face me a little, I think.

"My coloration?"

"Yeah. Coloration."

"I'm always this color," I said, pretty sure I was right.

"Really?" It sounded surprised. It turned slightly blue.

"Yeah," I said.

"Oh, well, my mistake then." It turned a little bit green and moved back into a position facing away from me, I think.

We sat there for a few minutes in silence. I sipped my drink. It picked up its beer with a tentacle and pulled it into some hole and drank it, I can only assume. "Truth is, it has been a bit of a tough day." I said after a minute. I waited for a response, but It didn't reply or turn toward me. It just turned slightly orange and reached for another beer.

Hello, friends. Tough day?

Later. Love.

Cloud Animaler

I dreamed an old dream I've not dreamt for some time that I was the one responsible for shaping the clouds so that they looked like animals to children staring up from below. It's an important job, and difficult, though incredibly rewarding. I wish I could do that job in waking life, but I don't know how to apply. It's my dream job.

Hello, friends. I trust you're well enough.

Later. Love.

Ming the Adorable Thing

In the land of adorable things
An adorable thing who's named Ming
Had the job to sing songs for the king
But there was always one line in each song that didn't rhyme or keep the tempo

Though the rest of the song was sublime
This flaw caused him a terrible time
For the king was enamored of rhyme
So he sentenced Ming to five years of hard labor in the royal prison

And Ming's days in the prison were hard
Breaking rocks with a pick in the yard
In the watchful eye of a cruel guard
But while he worked he practiced writing songs that the king would enjoy, though he didn't seem to get much better, so he decided to try something different

At the end of those five toilsome years
When Ming stood at the throne full of fears
The king waited with skeptical ears
And Ming sang, "Noses can't wear braziers."

The king furrowed his brow, most confused
"If you're joking I am not amused."
Ming replied, "But I can't be accused
Of not rhyming. Two pigs melt, become fused."

The king asked, "What's that bit about swine?
It's just gibberish, no place in that line."
Ming exclaimed, "That's just it, king of mine,
I'm an abstract song writer. Duck wine."

So now Ming makes up words in abstraction
And they rhyme for the king's satisfaction
And they've garnered fair critical reaction
Though in his spare time Ming still likes to work unfettered from such structures and strictures and explore formless forms more suited to his natural aesthetics.

The end.

Hello, friends. I trust you're well.

Later. Love.

Doomp the Oompus

Doomp was an Oompus. Oompuses were adorable creatures by nature, natives of Goompus. (The similarity of the name of the group and the land from which they came is common among the cuter people groups.) Doomp wasn't a typical Oompus, however. Doomp was, in the opinion of most who met him, entirely unadorable. He was neither cute nor entertaining. His countenance was pensive and his carriage was a sort of slouching shamble. Even if he tried, which he never did, he could not evoke mirth or adoration. Most people just felt sort of sorry for him as they gave him wide berth, lest he converse with them about all the wearisome, serious things about which he was constantly preoccupied. His lack of whimsy and charm was so complete, in fact, that it rose to the level of a crime according to the code of law of the Oompuses (a code containing only one law which, to summarize, said you had to be adorable). And so the other Oompuses captured Doomp and, most adorably, cast him roughly out of the land of Goompus into exile, never to return on pain of cute death. So Doomp went into the city and got a job as a mid-level bureaucrat in local government. His favorite part of the job was reporting monthly performance metrics. He found it deeply satisfying, in a most unadorable way. No one enjoyed working for him, which suited him just fine. The end.

Hello, friends. I trust you're well.

Later. Love.

Tea with the Folks

If I could have tea with anyone in the universe, I think I would have tea with one of the primitive living organisms that was among the original eukaryotes, the common ancestor of both animals and plants. I’m not sure what we would talk about, or even what mechanism we would use to communicate. What a strange creature it would be, not animal, not plant, not visible to the naked eye (I assume). I guess we’d have very little in common, just a few genes. Talk about your generation gap. I wonder if you’d even be able to see the family resemblance? “I’m your descendant,” I would try to say. “You have so many, many descendants, all very different, and I’m one of them.” I wonder if he/she would be proud of me. I mean, I know I’m no giant redwood or cheetah, nothing cool like a baobab tree or a whale shark, but I’m okay. I come from a species that’s interesting in its own way.  “I didn’t come have tea with you because I need your approval or anything. I mean, no offense, but I’m orders of magnitude more advanced than you are.” I hope I wouldn’t start crying. “Can’t you just say you love me? Can’t you just say something?” On second thought, it’s probably not a good idea. I’m just feeling too needy right now for new relationships.

Hello, friends. I don’t need your approval.

Later. Love.

Kill That Noise

You cannot just stack words up in interesting shapes. People will say, "What is this bullshit? Is this supposed to be cool or deep? It makes no sense!" You have to put your words together in ways that work, ways that express ideas. Ain't no damned Picasso in writing, noses up on foreheads and square eyed cheek mouths. Writing has to work! You don't just look at it. Get over yourself. Keep your creativity in check. One day you might feel inclined to write, "brick bat train baby tiger monkeys, wet hype top on bottom fire," or somesuch, but let that junk go, brother man, sister friend. That's not writing, it's just wording. Say it out loud and it’s just noise, so much crazy sound. Nobody understands "clap dog comet lobsters" or "sky bed chocolate ennui." It's like nothing. You might as well save your time, store up your words until you have something real to say. Go for a walk. Fly a kite. Pet the dog. Paint life falling kiss lady ocean butterfly.

Hello, friends. I trust you're doing all you can, and everyone appreciates your efforts.

Later. Love.

All Downhill From Here

Somewhere in this hulky, bulky body with all its dangly, gangly parts is a soul that is neither man nor woman, old nor young, thin nor fat, native nor foreign, beautiful nor ugly. Maybe not literally, for you materialist debaters, but certainly and really. Sometimes the metaphor is all there is, the words we use to describe an idea are the fullness of its noumenon. I want to explain that to these young, energetic, beautiful people laughing and smiling all around me as the wind howls by more loudly than you can imagine. "We're not that different, really. Not on the inside." They'd never hear me in all this noise, though. "I'm not just an aging, overweight computer programmer. There's more to me."  But I'm self-aware enough to imagine how it would seem. It sounds pathetic in my head. And suddenly the opportunity is gone as they all disappear, shooting inexplicably upward into the sky, defying all reasonable explanation. My startle passes when I realize that it's me, not them. I'm still plummeting toward the ground and they've all pulled their chutes. I should probably pull mine. I wonder if they conspired to pull their chutes without me, trying to ditch the old dude. Man, the ground is coming up quickly. Where is that ripcord? I wasn't really listening when the young lady was explaining. I was too busy wondering if she was wondering what I was doing there, imagining that she was judging me. Was she? I mean, it seemed like she made eye contact with everyone else more than with me. Why did I even sign up for this thing? I'm so obviously out of place. And now they're all way up there and here I am, dropping like an old, dorky stone. Is this the cord? I'm pulling it but nothing is happening. Maybe they just gave me a backpack and not a parachute. No, they wouldn't do that. They seem like cool kids. I'm just imagining things again. Insecurity, that's all. What was I doing? Was there something important I was looking for?

Hello, friends. I hope you're well.

Later. Love.

Another Day is Done

Day is drawing to a sleepy close here at the coffee shop where I sit at this computer and work for hours every day, morning till night. My top and bottom eyelids are trying to snuggle and spoon, but I’m resisting them because they block my looky holes when they do that, and my other senses aren’t sharp enough to see the screen. I’m punctuating sentences and making a few last minute edits on a software specification document, the same one I’ve been working on for weeks. It’s a beast. I’m saving files and shutting windows. I’m packing up this morning’s goals carefully because, as it turns out, they’re still going to be tomorrow’s goals, so I cannot be too rough with them. I still need them. I’ve been using them for many days and they’re getting a little ragged around the edges, a little torn at the creases, a little soiled with coffee stains, grease and barbecue sauce. In a minute I’ll start disconnecting cords, shutting down peripherals and packing everything into the sixty pound bag of junk I carry around on my sore shoulder. One shoulder, my fingers, my eyes, my ears and my ass, these are the parts I use every day. Sometimes I use my talk hole, but I’ve been doing a lot of remote solitary work lately. When I go back to the office it’s going to take me a few days to remember how to look at people and listen to the word sounds they make. This is what I do lately. It’s work, you know. It pays the bills. (Actually, Susan pays the bills, but the job is where we get the money.) One day I’m going to change into a butterfly. People will come to my office and they’ll see a giant, empty cocoon and they’ll ask, “Where is Scott? I need him to sign this expense report,” but I’ll be gone. Not sure how I’ll get out of the building, though. I’ll have to wait for someone else to call the elevator and open the front door, I guess. Will anyone do it? I mean, a giant butterfly with a sixty pound laptop bag will probably scare them, right? I’ll just have to try and be cool and nonchalant. Most of them never look up from their smart phones anyway. That reminds me of how annoyed I was that SNL stole my idea about a car that sends you a text message when you’re about to crash into something. I wish those guys would leave me alone and quit stealing all my ideas. Have you noticed that they do that to me? I have. Aaaaaanypoop, I guess I’m going to pack up and go home. My iPod Shuffle, Señor Tinybop, is fully charged. I always charge him when I think about going back to the gym to get in shape. Who’s ever heard of a fat butterfly, after all?

Hello, friends. I hope you’re well.

Later. Love.

The Sun and Me

After sunset, when the sun gets off work, sometimes we meet for a cup of coffee or maybe a cocktail, depending on how the sun is feeling that evening. The sun always wears an overcoat and some shades, to avoid being recognized. If people see the sun in the evening it makes them nervous. Occasionally someone will stop, furrow their brow and say, “Hey, aren’t you the sun?”

“I get that all the time,” the sun will reply dismissively. Eventually the person will move on. It must be tough, being such a star, not being able to show your face. Still, the sun takes it in stride and is surprisingly humble about it all. Many famous people act as though the world revolves around them, but not the sun. The sun, once the workday is done, just wants to hang out with friends, keep a low profile, chill.

“It’s winter solstice,” the sun said last evening, a little depressed. “My workdays just get longer from here.”

“Cheer up, sunshine,” I said. “Enjoy the shortest workday of the year while its here. Lament the long days when they arrive.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” the sun sighed, sipping a martini. “Just feeling a little under the weather.” The sun is always down in the evening, but always up again by morning.

“You’re just not a night person,” I said. “Things will look brighter in the morning.”

Eventually I have to go home to sleep and the sun, who never sleeps, will usually wander the streets or sit in the park and wait for dawn. Sure, it doesn’t make any sense and science will tell you it couldn’t happen. Nevertheless, there the sun sits on a bench looking out across the river snaking darkly by in the murmuring nighttime silence, trying to avoid recognition, brilliant source of all our light and warmth.

I’m not really sure what the sun sees in me, to be honest, but we’re pretty good friends. Sometimes we play Scrabble.

Hello, friends. I trust you’re well.

Later. Love.

The Big Day Approaches

Ghosts are getting excited for the big day, only days away now. Witches and goblins are dieting and grooming, wanting to look their best. Bog creatures are updating their curricula vitae. Zombies are trying to pull themselves together. Vampires are flossing. Mummies are wrapping up a few loose ends. It won't be long now. The thing under your bed, the slavering thing that has been building up the courage for years now to grab your foot and eat it when it hits the ground in the middle of the night, thinks this Halloween might finally be the day. Are you excited? I am.

Hello, friends. I trust you're well.

Later. Love.

Regarding Music and the Ubiquity Thereof. Also the Big Jam.

Music is everywhere now. It's in your car (satellite, AM/FM, CD audio, MP3 CD, MP3 through the AUX jack). You can carry it in with you (MP3 player, phone). It's readily accessible when you're at your computer or tablet (local music player, streaming audio). You can buy it right from your phone, computer or tablet and have it almost instantly. Some people are convinced that the awesomeness of modern convenience is going to destroy civilization, and I cannot argue with them, but I'm really enjoying it in the meantime. Even now Beck (Beautiful Way) has shuffled up in my headphones and I'm loving the way things have turned out so far. You can also play your own music, of course. Some of us are getting together. In the middle of the desert there is a grand piano and bench. You can sit down and play Bach or Bacharach. You can play jazz, ragtime or classical, country, blues or rock and roll. Bring a mandolin or a bongo drum with you. Someone might bring a sax or a Jew's harp. Bobby McFerrin doesn't need any instruments. Eddie Van Halen will be there with a custom Strat with a humbucker at the bridge and his old Marshall amp. I'm dragging a tuba through the desert right now, heading for the piano spot. I'm following the footprints and tire tracks of all the tour busses. I'm pretty thirsty and sunburnt, and this tuba is hotter than hell, but I have a fourth of a bottle of water left and I think I'm going to make it. I cannot wait to jam with you guys. John Popper just passed by in an old brown, bigfoot-style Suburban with no doors. He pointed at me, laughed, took a swig of something and gunned it, throwing sand in my face. This is going to be some kind of groove, you guys. I'm stoked and also a little light-headed. See you soon.

Hello, friends. I hope you're ready to jam.

Later. Love.

Judgment Day Anxieties

They pick a panel of people to judge you when you die, to decide your fate in the afterlife. If I'm lucky, mine will be Paul Simon, Steven Wright, Maria Bamford and Wes Anderson. I have no idea what judgment they will pass on me, but it's sure to be absurd and subtly amusing, and I think I could live with that. If they throw some wildcard in there, like Raven-Symoné, Wolf Blitzer Oprah Winfrey, then I might be doomed. I hope there's a chair and a glass of water. I hope you don't just have to stand there with a dry mouth as they interview you and then deliberate. Maybe there's a waiting room with crossword puzzle books or magazines. I hate most magazines, but you can always look at the pictures. Maybe the floor will be tiled with intricate patterns that you can stare into and imagine shapes and faces of people you knew before you died. Don't judge me too harshly, you guys. I was mostly bewildered and restless. I tried my best as often as I remembered to, I swear I did.

Hello, friends. I trust you're well.

Later. Love.

Commercial Wilderness

Young ducks move like cadets, so martial and structured. I am standing where the smokers break outside the other of our two office buildings, near one end of the perpetually shaded, arboreal canyon formed by the edifices of the two buildings. I'd like to have an office that faces this lovelier scenery, but I look out over the parking lot. I am on the sidewalk between the two strange, green ashtray receptacles that look like suction bulbs. First I hear and then I spot a hairy woodpecker jackhammering against the high trunk of a tall cypress standing nearby. From the pond I can hear the mating songs of the fire turtles, loud and haunting as it echoes off the office windows all around. Somewhere overhead an eight-winged octopus falcon casts its odd shadow skimming across the grass. The dark silhouettes of brick apes lumber around on top of the buildings clicking indecipherable messages to one another from rooftop to rooftop. A nine foot acorn cobra rifles under the oaks for treasure, whistling through its pressure slits. I am enjoying this break from all the human commotion inside, so contrived and hectic. I am just another animal here in the office park. Just then a sky buffalo comes rocketing down from the clear blue and crashes into the middle of the pond with a terrified screech. The brick apes raise a clicking, howling ruckus that might be laughter and the fire turtles stop their mournful, lustful serenade. This is what I love about reality, all the simple mundane activity of a normal Texas summer afternoon.

Hello, friends. I hope you're well.

Later. Love.

In The Beginning (Paraphrased)

In the beginning Bob created the heavens and the hotdog, and the hotdog was good, what with the onions and mustard and sauerkraut. Mmm, the hotdog. And Bob said, "Let there be beer," and there wasn't beer, so Bob had to run down to the liquor store and buy beer, and it was cheap, and not very good, but there was plenty of it, so that was good. And Bob said, "The game starts at five. Be here by four thirty," and all the people rejoiced, except Danny, who could not be there because his truck had a flat tire. And at halftime Bob made nachos, and they were ok. Nothing to write home about. Amen.

Hello, friends. I hope you're well.

Later. Love.

This is What We Are, Like it or Not

You could have been born a rock or a drop of water. You could have been a sea cucumber or a parking meter. Would that have been better, I wonder, to be a cucumber cucumbing along the bottom of the briny sea? It's not a choice that's given you, what you're going to be when you're born. By the time you have a chooser the choice has been made and there you are, a radio antenna in the middle of a corn field in Indiana with nothing but flat plains and corn as far as the eye can see, not that you have eyes, mind you. If you could have chosen, what would you have been? A Galapagos Tortoise? That would be a good choice, I think. A grommet? I don't really even know what that is. Maybe that would be ok. Grommets are probably important for something. It's nice to be important, or so I've heard. I wouldn't want to be a toilet or an orthodontic retainer. I wouldn't want to be a star-nosed mole. I find their noses too creepy, and, although they do have vestigial eyes, they can see no better than a radio tower. How do I feel about having been born me? I don't know. It's ok. It would be been cool to be able to fly, I suppose, but I also enjoy writing. Probably there are no flying species that write. It's ok, then. How about you? Are you content to be you? Would you rather be something else? A dragonfly? A hubcap? Jelly beans?

Hello, friends. I'm glad you're you, for what it's worth.

Later. Love.

The One About Bears

You have to be careful because there might be bears in your house or office. Bears have been known to jump from coffee cups and kill people right in the middle of an important project status update meeting. People often make the mistake of thinking that they are safe from bears because they are sitting on an airplane in Business Class 30,000 feet in the air watching a movie that features Zack Galifianakis, but bears could be anywhere. Your best friend might be a bear who's just pretending to be your friend while waiting for the perfect opportunity to eat your face off. Those earrings you bought might be bears. That cheese Danish? Grizzly. Those new, fancy underwear? Polar bear. Koala. Panda. Sabre-toothed bear. Dragon bear. They're all around you. Flying machine gun bears. You cannot be too careful. BEARS!

Hello friends. Please be careful.

Later. Love.

On Eating Outside

People always want to sit outdoors at restaurants when the weather is nice, to sit out in nature with the animals and plants and eat some of them in front of the rest of them. I do not enjoy this as much as everyone else does. I'd rather sit inside where they don't let the wind and the bugs and the birds in. There are many reasons for this, not least of which is that I, unlike most of you, actually understand bird speech. And it's awful. Birds are all either inane or vulgar and disgusting. If they're not boasting in disturbing detail about their latest sexual escapades then they're arguing about reality television. I don't want to hear, while eating my sandwich or salad, exactly how she moved it when he hit that. I'd rather be free to ponder something more edifying than American Idol or The Voice or the show that has the name I think all reality shows should have, The Biggest Loser. So, next time you invite me to eat somewhere, please don't say, "Oh, it's so beautiful today. Want to sit outside?" If you do, I'll smile and say, "Sure" as my soul slowly dies a little more inside. Or outside, as it were.

Hello, friends. I trust you're well.

Later. Love.

Visualized Away

When the lines and waves of the pulsating music visualizer move outward from the center of the screen toward the edges it gives the illusion of forward motion through a science fiction wonderland, traveling deep into more mystical and interesting places in the universe. This is all an illusion. You're sitting in front of a computer screen, staring into a music program visualizer. The interesting parts of the universe is still very, very far away, farther away each second if science is to be trusted. It's okay, though. Your pets still love you in that way that pets love. Your favorite TV shows can still be downloaded from the Internet. Mortality is still your friend, though not your best friend.

Cosmologists and theoretical physicists are now speculating that the oldest black holes in the universe might predate the Big Bang. They might not have been participants in the violent birth of everything we consider our universe. They are leftovers from previous universes. I wonder if those universes were better or worse than ours. I wonder if those black holes miss their universes or if they've come to accept us, our Johnny-Come-Lately cosmos. I guess there's no use worrying too much about it. It might not even be true, like all science. Even the physicists who postulated the notion are only theoretical. Maybe they don't really exist, or maybe they just aren't really physicists. Maybe they're actually drugstore soda jerks. Maybe they'll give us a strawberry malted and a winning smile. Who knows? Science confuses me.

My music program visualizer has now taken me to the edge of the known cosmos and we are about to strike out for an alternative reality. Black holes older than the universe watch unimpressed as we cross the threshold. They've seen things, man. You don't even know. They've seen things you cannot imagine. Sit at the event horizon and ask them questions and you'll never believe what you hear. It will blow your Johnny-Come-Lately mind, friend. Don't look for me, though. I'm riding this visualizer out of here. I'm gone. Where we're going, pets don't even have television. Amen.

Hello, friends. I hope you're well.

Later. Love.

The Sun Comes to Breakfast

The sun came through the window and sat down at the breakfast table, melting all the butter and staining the tablecloth. I tried to ignore him, but the sun cleared his throat and began to redden my sleepy eyelids. “Good morning, sun,” I said finally.

“It is good,” he observed, “and you’re welcome for that.”

By this point the carpet and curtains in the breakfast nook were beginning to singe and sputter into flame. “You’re going to burn the place down,” I said. “You already melted the butter.”

“Do you realize what an honor this is?” the sun asked. “Do you have any idea how many people worship me?”

“What do you want?” The tablecloth burst into flame.

“A story,” the sun said. “I want to hear a story.”

“Can I get back with you?” The curtains ignited and burned quickly upward to blacken the walls and ceiling.

“It doesn’t have to be true,” the sun continued. “But I have to be the main character.”

“Ok. Fine. I’ll get it to you later.”

“What’s it going to be about?”

“I don’t know.” The sun just sat there, whistling and waiting. I jumped up and ran to the kitchen for the fire extinguisher.  “Could you please leave? You’re burning down my house!”

“And the title will be…?”

“The Sun Comes to Breakfast! That’s what I’ll call it. Now, go!” I screamed, spraying the extinguisher wildly around the room.

He floated toward the window to leave. “That’s a terrible title,” he said, and then he was gone.

“Asshole,” I said, ending the story.

Hello, friends. I hope you’re well.

Later. Love.

Bon appétit!

The secret ingredient in my Nightmare Vegetarian Chili is terrorism. I don't tell people because everyone has a great sensitivity about terrorism these days. I don't support terrorism, but I do cook with it. It just has this wicked depth and merciless kick that you cannot get from any other ingredient. Just after I finish browning the veggies and spices I add three heaping teaspoons of imported terrorism and a half-tablespoon of the domestic stuff, which is much worse but has a familiar flavor that people find more palatable for some reason. I don't know why I'm drawn to unpopular and controversial ingredients in my cooking, but I've always been this way. I put religious fundamentalism in my barbecue spice rub. That amazing twist in my salsa? Homophobia and fascism. You'd love the intolerance in my banana milkshake, unless you're sensitive to the lactose. Once I won a state fair ribbon with strawberry preserves that were anti-Semitic. (Well, they had anti-Semitism in them, anyway.) Cooking brings us together. We may not agree about everything, but that doesn't mean we cannot eat our fears if they're prepared in a delicious way. This is what I love most about humanity. Bon appétit!

Hello friends. I trust you're well. I certainly hope you are.

Later. Love.