Writing - Ruins

Ruins. Even before I decide if I am right, or wrong, I look inside. I have a junk shop in my mind, a recycling yard, derelict museum. All of the contents are second-hand and used, none of it is original. Everything is cobbled together. Am I angry over my collectables? Disturbed over my ephemera? Am I isolating over tattered refinements? Alone in the ruins.

Writing - Ozymandias Coming or Going to Poor Phil's

At a certain point of his life, devoid of real purpose or thought, he walked at night in Oak Park.

Ah, Oak Park -- home of Hemingway, and Frank Lloyd Wright! There was the time of the year when lights glittered on the houses and fences. With the gracious homes lit and bunted with holly, silver bells, jingles, reindeer, gold balls, festive and whimsy trinkets and whatnot, some people would sit framed by their living room windows, or panoramic dining room windows -- un-shuttered, un-curtained. They imagined they were displaying gala parties and stimulating dinners -- or he imagined they imagined they were imagining gala parties and stimulating dinners.

He stared at their widening smiles, the joviality, the familial bliss. The "I have prospered, because I am humble in the eyes of the Lord, see he has blessed me." Or, "I am Ozymandias, look on my works and despair". He'd heard both statements, or thought he did in what he was seeing.

But he was mostly drunk, carrying a torn paper bag, and walking in the dark like a ghost. Coming, or going to Poor Phil's, the only pub in town.



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Oak Park IL
December 2010

Writing -- Quiz: The State of Archie McPhee

QUIZ:

Barbara: I'm worried I have not started my Christmas shopping yet. Where should I go in Seattle?

Christo: You don't have to do anything. You live in the state of Archie McPhee. Just go by there and talk to them and they'll give you a trunk load of stuff for free. It is in the agreement, for your area.


TRUE OR FALSE?






A:

True

Writing - Would You Remember

He never had an imaginary friend, but sometimes he would talk to the ceiling at night, in his sleep. He'd also point to where they "got in, through the ceiling". This was upsetting for other people, and they would wake him up and ask him what this was all about. But if you were asleep, and you said you knew things -- like where buried treasure was, or the secret for the elixir of eternal life, and someone woke you up and asked you were it was, would you remember?

In his case, he did remember. He was dreaming of marionettes wielded by unseen persons.

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Quail Stove Hot
Irbles, CA

Writing - The Meaning of Irvine

What is the meaning of 'Irvine'? It comes from Latin, meaning "Ice-Pick". Alternately, it has been translated as "Shiv", the moniker of an ad-hoc stabbing implement fabricated when incarcerated. Some academics have presumed to infer 'Irvine' comes from the Ancient Norse, 'Irarväe', which means "to pillage by starlight". Or, more literally, "to murder greatly by starlight".

Not to be didactic, but 'Irarväe' really could be translated as "great murdering starlight" or "he who is motivated by starlight to kill". In any case, quote me as a source in your thesis.


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Quail Motors
Irvine, CA

Writing - The Creepiest Thing

The creepiest thing that was ever said to him, was nothing at all.


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Hot Stove Meadows
Irvine

Writing - You Have to Be Alert

"You have to be alert, Linda!" he says striding down the sidewalk alertly. He's a big guy. Linda might be his teenage daughter, trailing behind him...she looks cold. She'll probably be trailing behind him her whole life, and Linda needs to get used to it. I listened to him, and farted.


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Laguna Beach
Night

Writing - Pirate Retirement Home

The dream of pirates -- a Pirate Retirement Home. Sunny. Plenty of rum. Peace and quiet. Not in the Caribbean. Anywhere, not to remember those deceptively blue tranquil waters. All for the tepid silence and cold, say, of the outskirts of Cleveland.


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HMS Hot Stove
Quail Meadow

Writing - I Dream of Bamboo

I dream of bamboo, grove after grove of it -- it is a renewable resource, you knew that, right? But in my dreams, bamboo is made out of pure gold.


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Bamboo Groves Quail Meadow
Dec 2014

Writing - Fight with the 'New Team'

We brought the "New Team" in for a global solution -- they were very go-to -- meeting with our customers all over the world. Things were looking up, and then someone left the coffee pot on -- the main office burned down. The "New Team" had our only copy of the customer database, and they absconded to Hungaria, or Argentina. Sorry, Hungary. They'll be back! They have to come back to either San Francisco, or Seattle, for Christmas. Then -- fight!


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Quail Meadow

Writing - Writing About Guatemala

I have had some visitors from Guatemala, and I know very little about this country. But I will write a few nice things about the country of Guatemala: I imagine the wool from Guatemala is of superior quality, and that the weather in Guatemala is temperate. I'm sure people look out for each other in Guatemala. Probably much more than around here. The more that I speculate about the positive things about Guatemala -- a place I know nothing about -- the more I think I want to go live there. People reading this, who exist in Guatemala, you have no idea how lucky you are.


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Quail Hot Stove Meadow
Irvine

Writing - Shit bag w/ Options

The ____________ was going great, it was almost done in record time, when he questioned why it could ever be done right with the concept of it being done in "record time". False, untrue, fuckup -- Zen corpse, shit bag. So he stopped writing and turned the heater on, because he was tired of being thrifty and not running the heater. Shit bag.

a) Poetry book
b) Travelogue
c) Memoir
d) Bodice Ripper


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Hot Stove
Irvine

Writing - Sometimes All We Want is Two Hellos

The phone rings two times, I answer it.

"Hello!" Silence, so I say, "Hello?"

The person hangs up.

Sometimes all we want is two hellos.


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Quail Meadow

Writing - Everyone Knows Thier Birthday

Alex: So what day is your birthday?
Chris: (Absent mindedly) I don't know.
Alex: Yes -- you know!
Chris: Oh yeah, July 11. Silly me. Everyone knows their birthday.


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Quail Meadow
Dec 2013