Search Results for 'al'
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Search Results
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In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Obviously, when Ann had taken those Wows of Continuity within the hoity-toity (so said the writer) Sisterhood of Continuous Universal Meditation, it had been one of those flimsy whims which were probably only a clever (so she thought) way of putting her friend’s continual fretting at ease.
But more secretely, she’d joined the Sisterhood as a way to be closer to the closeted founder… Walter Crumble.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
The writer wanted to write, full stop. The problem was that the writer’s desire to write was continually interrupted with things in brackets assuming monstrous and all comsuming proportions. Endless chains of things in brackets that always seemed to have priority.
“You could always write about the things in brackets, Ann,” remarked her new friend Lavender. “Might be fun. A thrilling blast, even.”
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Privately, Lavender was thrilled to find she knew Ann! She couldn’t remember when she had met her of course, however that was nothing unusual these days. Everybody seemed to know each other! It was really quite a thrill. Maybe she would go and have coffee with her new friends Becky and Tina, after she had been to the hairdressers of course.
hmmm, it can’t be a thrill, thought Lavender, The “writer” has already used “thrilled”.
The writer wondered, huffily, how to strike out text. The writer wanted to write “It was really quite a blast”
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
“I never knew anyone have so many haircuts!,” Becky said huffily to Tina. “I suppose your latest one is okay though, it has that sort of casual, sexy … I just got out of bed and can’t even be bothered combing my hair look.”
Tina smiled kindly at Becky. Poor old Becky, her hair never really grew back properly after all the stress of the wedding fiasco.
“Well, we will both need new haircuts if we are going to Paris in June for the Be Free, Be Me! conference”, she said cheerfully.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
“Oh well, the problem is Harvey, I can’t actually swim”, Lavender confessed. “So I didn’t see the dolphins blowing rings. But thank you so much for the movie. I think it was probably lying around in the rain pretending to be a mermaid which got me this cold. Last time I am doing one of Moosy’s daft classes”.
Lavender rolled her beautiful eyes and sneezed again.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Ann sighed. She suddenly realized that she’d spent the summer time travelling, back to the Summer Before the Great Shift Trauma. She’d completely forgotten that the Worserversity was Post Shift. Oh well, she would write a historical account of The Times Before The Great Trauma Started.
“What Great Trauma?” asked Monica, who had been reading her mind again. “There was no Great trauma in MY shift experience.”
“Really?” Ann was momentarily puzzled. “There wasn’t in mine either.”
“If you’re going to write about trauma, you’ll have to make it all up.” Monica replied.
“Why would I want to do that?” Ann was still puzzled.
“For the fun of it?” Monica suggested.
“Oh yes, of course…for the fun of it…”
Ann was still puzzled.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
The summer Holidays were nearly over, or the Hollow Days, as they were known to some. The last days of summer had been a bit hollow for Ann at any rate, rattling around inside her own head, not really knowing whether it was full or empty. Ann had spent most of the summer sleeping, and with virtually no dream recall, it seemed as if half of the summer was missing. Probably just as well, what with it being such an odd summer. She wondered if she would simply sleep through the shift, like Ned Young slept through the mutiny. Didn’t seem like such a bad idea.
“Normally” the Worserversity students started rolling back towards Poubelleville round about now, but the word “normally” was becoming obsolete. What was normal, what could be expected? Ann didn’t know. She packed her coloured pencils, her detachable hand and her wooden men, and fished out her homework assigments for the holidays that she had only just remembered.
Alliteration. Bugger bollocks and blast, blimey but what a bother, too bloody hot and bored.
That’s a bit bloody depressing, she muttered to herself, try another letter.
Sweltering summer of sweat and sand, sleeping and sleeping, sublime surruptitious snooze, sail away in the sunset swell, sunrise surrender, ships ahoy!
Fan the flames, far sighted fellows! There’s a flash in the funnel for fast falling fishermen. Far flung, fun fueled, oh fast fleeting fantasies, follow the folks with the flags! Flounder not, fresh fishies, for fun feels fantastic!
Ah, wallow in wisps of wordless wonderings, weather the winds of wandering whispers, while weighty wells of wishes work winsome wonders, woven with worn wool and worrisome white weathered windows. Whether we will, whether we won’t, who will win, what will work, will we watch it water the weeds….
In reply to: Scrying the Word Cloud
Cleaning gave lack circle reality
Under sudden strings essence saying morning soft
Liked himself baby aspidistra case fine whole dark shaIn reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
For her new course, Pr. Moose was a dolphin.
It was a fancy-dress course entitled: ‘Act out your characters’.Pedro was naked, and when she asked him in what kind of disguise that could be, he told her “I’m the Universe”. She was, a moment, hypnotized by his so blue eyes that she’d forgotten her question. She gulped, speechless and looked at him more closely, appreciating the physique of his body…
— Is it real? she asked.
— It’s the Universe.
— Well, ok then, go get a seat and let’s begin our course.Following him with her eyes, or more precisely following his butt with her eyes, she also noticed a few other students. Ann was wearing a nine-titsed alien costume and there were two glowing ladies with fishes stuck to their ghostly bodies…
This butt, she thought again, her attention distracted from the other students.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Yann had been working on a transcription all the afternoon, only accompanied by some mysterious musicians using pneumatic drills not so far outside.
Though he had managed to make it flow quite easily most of the time, the attention and the tension required to make it possible were now getting on his nerves… he had one more pass through the audio to do. He was wanting to do it now in order to get it over, but he realized he was pushing his energy…
A weird thought… he would enjoy diving into a pond full of little fishes that would massage his skin.
he chuckled thinking of that, imagining that the fishes were some kind of imagery of his energy field.In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
That unexpected call from the Dean had put the Fisherman in abyss of perplexity.
The fishes weren’t really his prime concern. He only needed to paint a little red nose on one of the cloud fishes to stir the others out of their unerratic routine.
The matter wasn’t really worth his coming back to the Worseversity, but he and the Dean knew better. If the fishes had snapped into that randomless routine, it was most probably a protective reflex to anticipate some trauma.Trauma hadn’t really been seen in ages —in fact, not even once since the Great Shift, which had been an orgiastic experience of trauma of all kinds for people prone to indulge into this emotional drug. The coincidence had not been lost on the two old men. Of all the Worseversity’s, there were very few true artifacts remaining from before the Great Shift; barely a handful of them. Most of the known artifacts were in actuality clever re-creations from older designs, but not the “real” thing. And for good reason actually; most of the laws of physics had changed since, and made almost all of the older designs broken and unusable.
The pool was hiding one of these few artifacts that had mysteriously gone through the Great Shift without decaying. Furthermore, this very artifact was quite old, and signed by the visionary architect Rumbold the Pale boasting in carved letters which had once been golden, now mostly erased by the passing of times: “The real game is only played whence it started”.
That fishy omen seemed so dire that it couldn’t help but put the Fisherman out of his lifelong passion questing for the great Trouts of the Universe.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Sha and Glo were looking at the Aerial Pond of Cloud Fishes in their blobby glowing spectral form.
“A shame we’re dead… That school of fish is sure somethin’”
“You’re thinking what I’m thinking Shar?”
“Well, of course; we’re dead and psychic, bloody hell Glor!”Glor was glad that she was dead sometimes, and this was such a time. She’d found Sharon’s usual rude rebuking was far easier to handle in that state.
“Well, I would love to dive in that pool too, like in that documentary…”
“Exactamundo! Have the school of fishes eat dead skin and give it back its young fresh and peachy glow.”“I think we better find some quick way to get back in Shar…”
“Not to bloody worry Glor, it already looks like our subliminal sex enticements have worked very well; would be a shame no one would get preggers with all that fornication going around!”
“I’m starting to wonder what it would be like if that’s the nine-titted alien going first though… I’m told their pregnancy is quicker than human’s…”In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Home made LSD was a bit tricky. Amaury Flipswitch had tested some in his last potion and now he was having difficulties focusing.
Speaking with Ann, he was seeing her blinking in and out with all the discrepancies in the communications that it could generate.He didn’t know if she had heard his last answers to her questions… but whatever… he couldn’t hear her last question either.
‘Yes’ he answered.In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Gremwick was glad the Fisherman had come to repair the Cloud Fishes of the Inner Aerial Pool of the Worseversity.
It’s been a few days that he’d noticed an unusual lack of randomness in the swimming patterns of the little Cloud Fishes.
As they were usually used for the divination courses, no sooner was the issue identified than the students had to temporarily recourse to the use of pigeons for their assignments —which sadly left a stinking trail of devastation on the usually pristine marble floors that greatly infuriated Charity, the cleaning lady, otherwise known for her great patience and candor, who’d kept cursing like a sailor against the winged demonic creatures the last past weeks.The incident in itself was not of immense consequence in the grand scheme of things, but it felt worrisome for the Dean that these swimming creatures known for their quite reliable and, yes, totally unfloundering randomness had suddenly decided to adopt a monotonous pattern.
In that disposition, they were merely echoing the requester’s requests in a manner of a mirror instead of evoking strange and obscure meanings from the depths of the universe.It had amused the students very much, as it was making their assignments apparently far easier —there was no thing left in need of deciphering, unless the students’ requests were themselves incoherent, which could on occasion happen especially after the Special Crop Circle Lessons. As no incident was without meaning, the Dean had pondered this one, but without any satisfactory answer as of yet.
At least, it had been the occasion to meet the Fisherman, and to ponder on the plainness of a world without unpredictability.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Monica was asking Pedro about Pr. Moss last assignment. Everybody had been very impressed by his story teller talent and she wanted to know more about it. He was quite secretive though, and maybe it was because he was not a native English speaker, but nonetheless she wanted to know about some details.
Before he could say anything, she felt an excruciating pain in her belly and the announcing signs of intestine problems…
— Are you ok, asked Pedro? What was that strange noise?
— Nothing! she eluded quickly. I need to go to the bathroom, excuse me.Another spasm almost made her fall on the ground.
Damn Pr. Flipswitch! she thought, I shouldn’t have accepted to try the herbs he gave me after his herbal course.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
“To be perfectly honest dear, I wouldn’t be very outwardly lovely if I were to be honest.”
“Another of your convoluted ways to say it’s rubbish” Lavender said with a smile “But that’s fine, you know. It’s also meant as a test of honesty… And as I’m not sure you heard it properly anyway, a little honesty wouldn’t have hurt you know.”But it seemed Harvey’s attention had already gone somewhere else. “Are you even listening to me?” Lavender said with a lovely voice practicing the delicate guttural accents of Sloopernoff, snapping back Harvey’s attention to the conversation.
“Oh, you were speaking… I’m sorry, I’m starting to worry that Ann’s narcolepsy is contagious.”
“Always the worrywort…”As they were talking surrounded by the soft dusty specks of the library (which every time annoyed Lavender quite extensively, as she wasn’t so fond of the taste of dust bunnies and didn’t see with the same eye as Ann the archaeological value of burying useful things in dust), Gremwick the mad Dean of the Worseversity passed by with a yellow sticker stuck to the back of his trench coat.
“Looks like mad old Gremwick isn’t doing so good recently hey… Seems like he was droning about taking the students’ courses to check on their quality last time we heard of him…” Lavender looked empathetic.
Harvey was smiling “If you ask me, he might just be wanting to know if the rumor of Prof Gubby’s nine nipples were true or only sheer fantasy”
“I wonder which perverted mind’s fantasy it could be” sighed Lavender unimpressed.In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
“What do you think Harvey? It is my first assignment in the new writing course. I really think I have made progress with my limericks.” Lavender beamed proudly at Harvey. “It is written in Sloopernoff and is full of rich symbolism, indeed, it cleverly elaborates on the symbolism in a coded form inherent in the precise rhyming structure required for the pure art form of the limerick poem. I think Gubby will be impressed. Okay, put down that zebra and listen:
They made a fine statooe of Melon
which pissed off his thirteenth wife Ellen
When a pigeoon stoopped by
She said with a cry
That man was a nasty oold felon!”In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
“Is old Gubby male or female?” whispered Lavender. To be honest, she didn’t really care much, but she did want to maintain the conversation with the gorgeous Dieter.
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Meanwhile, Pr. Gub was preparing her new course in Artistic Making of Interdimensional Bleedthroughs (AMIB for short), which her alien origin made her extremely entitled to teach. The course was more commonly known as “Crop Circle Making” inside the Worseversity, and was quite a hit every year (and one could believe not only because of the mistaken association of ‘Crops’ with Special Crops
), so that only the most motivated and creative students could enlist.Aaeiulie Gub’s new design was done. Among copious sacred and profane geometric, she had chosen for it the overall shape of her favourite animal on this planet, a glaring glamorous owl. Now that the design was almost done (there was always a little leeway for improvisation every time, especially when the farmers wouldn’t like it), they would gather in one of the serene spots of the Worseversity’s park to manifest it in other dimensions…
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Professor Gub smiled kindly at the young student. It was a common trait of the individuals in this dimension that they needed endless repetitions of information before they could assimilate it, and Prof Gub assumed that this was simply another example of the density of the inhabitants. It hadn’t occured to him that his words weren’t clear enough, as in his own dimension, the words were always accompanied by the clarity of the energy of the meaning behind the words.
“The assignment is to explain the symbolic significance of a statue of Walter Melon with pigeons sitting upon it. “ he explained. “Simple and profound, lengthy and convoluted, the choice is yours.”
Turning to Lavender, he asked “Are you understanding?”
“Oh yes, thank you, now I am” replied Lavender politely. The student sitting next to her, the enigmatic and dashingly handsome Dieter had helpfully passed her a note with Prof Gub’s words translated into plain English.
