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“Aha!” Ann exclaimed, “So that’s it”. Ann had been pondering the symbology of the ‘out of order’ entry — well, truth be told, she had forgotten all about it until she reviewed the latest pages, and then it suddenly hit her: In the Rembrandt book she’d been reading, the dead artist had remarked that the conversations that had taken place in the latter part of the 20th century had actually occurred one day while he was still alive, daydreaming or slipping off to sleep while in his studio in Amsterdam.

“I suppose I should type out the relevant parts of the book to include in this entry” Ann thought, but she had an urge to go for a quick nap instead. Suddenly she could hardly keep her eyes open.

The fact of the matter was that Ann had been intending to write about Cordella’s twin sister Flagella, but had been hopelessly side tracked when Godfrey had thrown that curve ball. Flagella had been wanting to slap herself rather badly and Ann was more than willing to oblige her by entering a scenario into the Play. The way things had panned out highlighted some interesting parallels with Yoland’s current state of affairs too. Obviously Flagella had chosen not to slap herself after all, although she appeared to have chosen to effect that in a somewhat convoluted manner. It was the unknown factors that were baffling Ann, the missing links in the convoluted manners; she felt painfully aware that she simply wasn’t seeing the whole picture.

Unsure of her footing, that’s what it was, at least that’s what Yoland had noticed. With the puppy always climbing over her feet or somewhere underfoot, she hadn’t been able to take a normal step in a fortnight. It was making her tense and tired, and jittery. Every step she took was halted, mid step, which made her feel permanently off balance.

Flagella had wanted to slap herself for being irritated, which was becoming immensely irritating in itself. Being irritated wasn’t fun at all, it was irritating! The most irritating thing of all was that she didn’t know why she’d started getting irritated in the first place.

Ann wanted to butt in and tell Flagella a thing or two about how dense she was being, but didn’t think there was much point. It wasn’t as if Flagella hadn’t already heard whatever Ann might have to tell her a thousand times or more, so it was doubtful that more words would be any help.

She doesn’t need any help, full stop, Ann reminded herself, and neither does Yoland.

Funnily enough, Ann was saying to Godfrey, the random daily quote mentions the word trice a few times, although I hadn’t read it before mentioning the word trice in relation to the Hoots. It also mentions poppy tea, which coincidentally, Vuni mentioned on the Mothership yesterday, to which I replied.

Harvey cursed when he dropped the bed, which hit the floor with a loud crack.

Hopefully nobody had heard him! although it was rather unlikely. He particularly didn’t wish to alert the two ladies, his new employers Miss Sharon and Miss Gloria, to his interest in weightlifting. Harvey was working undercover for the World Association Requiring Prompt Eradication of Dreaming ( Dream Order: Newbie), otherwise known as W.A.R.P.E.D. The New Dream Order had spent considerable time and expense training robots to infiltrate bedrooms everywhere on the planet in a concerted effort to wipe out superfluous and unnecessary sleep, which had been the scourge of the planet for generations. The planet had reached crisis point with the abundance of sleep, mainly in the hysteria and confusion that had resulted when a fictional account of The Magical Nightmare, which had been published in the old Reality Times newpaper. It had caused widespread panic as the populace began trying to nap on everything in sight in a frantic attempt to control The Nightmare.

Harvey had been employed by the two ladies ostensibly as a butler. Conveniently for Harvey, the pair of old slappers had not had the luxury of staff in their hitherto adventurous, albeit common lives, and were blissfully unaware of Harvey’s many improprieties and errors. Whenever Harvey behaved oddly, the two ladies would remark “One simply can’t get the staff these days, my dear”, followed by a bit of thigh slapping and raucous laughter

In a trice the Hoots had donned their Snotsuits and Mucodisolver backpacks and were ready for action. Fearlessly they dived into the vile pit.

Gustav cursed when he dropped the watermelon, which hit the potting shed floor with a loud crack.

Hopefully nobody had heard him. He particularly didn’t wish to alert the two ladies, his new employers Miss Sharon and Miss Gloria, to his interest in agriculture. Gustav Burgeon was working undercover for the World Association To Eradicate Redundant Material (Escarole Leaf Order: Newbie), otherwise known as W.A.T.E.R.M.E.L.O.N. The New Leaf Order had spent considerable time and expense training robots to infiltrate agricultural enterprises, cottage gardens, and allotments in a concerted effort to wipe out superfluous and unnecesary edible plant items, which had been the scourge of the planet for generations. The planet had reached crisis point with the abundance of foodstuff, mainly in the hysteria and confusion that had resulted when a fictional account of The Mythical Nutrients had been published in the old Reality Times newspaper. It had caused widespread panic as the populace began eating everything in sight in a frantic attempt to control The Nutrients.

Gustav had been employed by the two ladies ostensibly as a butler. Conveniently for Gustav, the pair of old slappers had not had the luxury of staff in their hitherto adventurous, albeit common lives, and were blissfully unaware of Gustav’s many improprieties and errors. Whenever Gustav behaved oddly, the two ladies would remark “One simply can’t get the staff these days, my dear”, followed by a bit of thigh slapping and raucous laughter.

When Ann read about “that place lost between the pine trees” in The Play she started coughing again. She was beginning to wonder about her cough, after reading in the New Reality Herald last night about the man with a fir tree growing in his lung.

In tandem with her coughing, the ground started to tremble beneath Amarilla, The Forgotten Eggleton, and flecks of sun melted chocolate spattered the gravestones and pine trees.

It’s a lungquake, run for your lives! she shouted, but there was nobody there. The ground heaved and cracked beneath Amarilla and she lost her grip and plunged headlong into an abyss of vile sticky mucus.

Yann was excited, he just had a mail from the cattery “The Laughing Cats” telling him they would send him pictures of the new litter. The little kittens had just opened their eyes and apparently they were very cute.

When they went to that cat exhibition with Ewrick in March, Yann thought it was just to meet a friend of his who was a cat breeder himself, and they actually met him. His cat was gorgeous and seemed so comfortable that you could have thought he had been drugged. Yann’s friend told them he was always like a big stuffed toy.

They chatted a bit and Ewrick and Yann wandered about to have a look at the other cats, and that’s when Yann saw the Abyssinian cats of the Carnelian cattery. The cats were solar and majestic, their cinnamon coat were stealing Yann’s heart. He knew he would get one… soon.

After a few weeks looking on the Internet at the different catteries, the different websites about this particular race, Yann decided to take his phone and make a call. He’d selected a few numbers and decided to just have another look on the net and found the Laughing Cat cattery, they got new kittens since a few days only and there was one of them whose coat was cinnamon. It seemed it was the perfect one, so Yann called that cattery first and the guy told him there were no call for this one color yet though he had many calls from Russian or other European breeders for the others…

Yann asked if they already had pictures but apparently the kittens had still their eyes closed and he was waiting a bit to take pictures… “they looks like rats you know”… no matter, he’d wait.

And they had opened their eyes now, he’d get pictures very soon now.

He was silently waiting, standing on a branch of a big bingahloo tree on the edge of the village of Duur Mistar. He was one of the Scouts of Dhja and his duty was to travel through the realm of Amstar (pronounced [Am ⁱ shtar’]) and report back to the Queen any event usual or unusual. The Scouts were gifted with a special talent and they were trained since childhood to develop it and use it for the good of Dhja. They could read energy and notice the slightest change in any manifestation before it became physically manifest. Because of that, they were revered and feared by many.

In the realm of Amstar, the People of Dhja was feline and the different tribes were presenting as many differences as the races of our own felines. From the tribe of the Solar Bear was Dhurga, his fur was medium-length and cinnamon, similar to that of Abyssinian cats. He was slender and his movements graceful, one would barely notice his presence at that moment, as Scouts were able to manipulate their energy and adjust it according to their purpose, and he was here to observe and not to interfere.

He had felt a call for a few weeks. It was barely noticeable first and there were many possibilities to translate this. It could have been because of the small amount of energy, or it could have been because it was quite far from were he was at that moment. The later was more accurate and he had to travel many days before he could pinpoint a more precise direction and point in space and time.

Along with the ability to read energy was a constant conscious connection with any other Scout. They had no secret among their kin and neither was it necessary nor would it have been possible easily. He had checked with the other Scouts if they had felt the call also, but apparently very few of them were feeling it and fewer were interpreting it as a call. He’d been the first one to arrive at Duur Mistar, apparently the originating place of the call and he’d been waiting for the others since. They were not far away and there hadn’t been any change in the quality or in the intensity of the vibration, but there were signs that it could soon occur.

Back in January, her friend Ronda had asked her if she wanted to come with her to a seminar in Madrid, one of these loonatics seminar. She wasn’t interested herself in that kind of gathering of freaky people and she wouldn’t have accepted if Ronda hadn’t offered to pay for her expenses.

That was the perfect occasion and the perfect time, with the crisis her little enterprise was sinking rapidly and money had never been so scarce. Those would be the perfect holidays, even if she would have to spend some time among some loonatics.

So in March here they went in Madrid. The hotel was simply gorgeous and as they told the biggest in Europe.

It was perfect again.

Not that the rooms were big, though they were quite expensive, but there were so many sculptures and paintings, so many trinkets in the lobby and in the lounge… and there was a pool!!! She could see herself flirting with one of those rich loonatics, always ready to spend money on glass pyramids that had properly been tachyonised

That’s where her life changed and that she realized she needed STRUCTURE in her life.

It happened during one of these meditations by a certain T’Eggy, a still active porn star, the favorite of Marvin Scrozzezi… and she was also doing seminars!!!
When she saw her, Patricia thought her face was familiar, and that’s when she saw the groupies in the first row, all of them wearing the leopard superstrings that had been made mass spread by her performance in the latest Marvin Scrozzezi. Patricia had one of them, but the superstring hadn’t resist her generous forms or she would have bring it to the party… well that’s another story.

T’Eggy was stressing the need of structure that they all needed in their lives and she made her points listened and watched with a few scenes of her recent and not so recent movies. Everybody was charmed and she made them laugh with her story about when she played the millionaire waiting for Bill the milkman…

Ronda was not really interested by T’Eggy and a bit shameful of her adoration of T’Eggy, Patricia had to sneak out during the break and she bought a few books, amidst which “The Pelvic Respiration” or “Release your Stress in a Gang Bang”. She also bought a few vials of the special Dr. B. Cream which said “Rejuvenate your Vagina”… apparently made with some blue spiders silk and venom. She went quickly in her room and hid her purchases in her suitcase before returning for the Channeled Music of the Chinese Swamps Monastery and the Channeling of the Big ErectoMagnetic Stick called Fryzon.

Patricia didn’t listen to all of that, she was already imagining all the ways she could structure her new life with the pelvic meditation.

“Let’s play Follow My Thread in the park” Becky had said a little over a year ago. Little did she know at the time that the ‘Follow My Thread In The Park” game would lead her to Walter Mellon.

Yoland was inordinately pleased with her purchases, trifling though they were. She smiled at the little bottle of cherry red nail varnish, imagining how it would look on sun browned and callous free toes. Painted toe nails was one of life’s simple pleasure, she reckoned. Nothing fancy or expensive or uncomfortable, like her new brassiere, which had never the less given her spirits a bit of a lift, as well as her breasts, with its bright blue moulded foam shape. She wondered if she could suspend the brassiere and its contents from something other than her shoulders for once, but couldn’t see how it could be arranged and still allow a modicum of freedom of movement. Perhaps some of the new scientific discoveries that she was eagerly awaiting would include some kind of gravity and weight defying device, possibly helium filled foam support. Perhaps even in the future, anyone with a high squeaky voice would be described as a bra sucker. Or perhaps one day breasts worn on the waist would be fashionable. This thought made Yoland a bit uncomfortable, as she hadn’t really believed she was following fashion, but maybe she was after all.

Yoland wondered if she was verging on the ridiculous again, and decided that it didn’t matter if she was. There was something rather splendid, she was beginning to discover, about the mundane and the silly. Something serenely pleasurable about ~ well about everything she’d been taking for granted for so many years. The things she hadn’t really noticed much, while her mind was busy thinking and pondering, replaying old conversations, and imagining new ones, sometimes with others, but often with herself, inside the vast jumble of words that was her mind.

It was always a wonderful change of pace to go away on a trip, with its wealth of new conversations and words, events and symbols to ponder over later at her leisure, the many photographic snapshots providing reminders and clues and remembered laughs, but it was the renewed sense of appreciation for the mundane that was ultimately most refreshing about returning home.

The word home had baffled Yoland for many years. For most of her 51 years, if the truth be told. So many moves, so many houses, so many people ~ where, really, was home? She’d eventually compromised and called herself a citizen of the world, but she still found herself at times silently wailing “I want to go home”, but with the whole world as her home, it didn’t make a great deal of sense why she would still yearn for that elusive place called home.

Of all the words that swam in her head some of them seemed to keep bobbing up to the surface, attracting her attention from time to time. That was the funny thing about words, Yoland mused, not for the first time, You hear them and hear them and you understand what they mean, but only in theory. The suddenly something happens and you shout AHA, and then you can’t find any words to explain it! Repeating the words you’ve already heard a hundred times somehow doesn’t even come close to describing what it actually feels like to understand what those words mean. That kind of feeling always left her wondering if everyone else had known all along, except her.

Yoland was often finding words in unexpected places, and these were often the very words that were the catalysts. (Even the word catalyst had been one of those words that repeatedly bobbed to the surface of her sea of words). Her trip had been in search of words, supposedly, channeled words (although Yoland suspected the trip had been more about connections than words) and yet there had only really been one word that had stood out as significant, and oddly enough, that word had been watermelon.

That had been a lesson in itself, if indeed lesson is the right word. Yoland had been attempting to exercise her psychic powers for six months or more, trying to get Toobidoo, the world famous channeled entity, to say the word watermelon ~ just for fun. She couldn’t even remember how it all started, or why the word watermelon was significant ~ perhaps a connection to a symbol etched on a watermelon rind in Marseilles, which later became a Tile of the City. (Yoland wasn’t altogether sure that she understood the tiles, but she did think it was a very fun game, and that aspect alone was sufficient to hold her interest.) By the end of the last day of the channeling event Toobidoo still hadn’t said the word watermelon which was somewhat of a disappointment, so when Yoland saw Gerry Jumper, Toobidoo’s channel, in the vast hotel foyer, she ran up to him saying “Say watermelon.” The simple direct method worked instantly, where months of attempts the hard way had failed. Yoland felt that she learned alot from this rather silly incident about the nature of everyday magic, and this particular lesson, or we might prefer to call it a communication, was repeated for good measure the following day in the park.

Wailon, the other world famous channeled entity who was the star attraction of the Words Event, had proudly displayed photographic evidence of orbs at the lecture. Like Yoland had tried with the watermelon, he was choosing an esoteric and unfamiliar method of creating orbs, suggesting that the audience meditate and conjure them up to show on photographs, rather than simply creating physical orbs. Yoland and her friends Meldrew and Franklyn had chanced upon a beautiful glass house full of real physical glass orbs in the park, underlining the watermelon message for Yoland: not to discount the spontaneous magic of the physical world in the search for the esoteric.

It had, for example, been rather magical and wonderful to hear Gerry Jumper explain how he had mentioned watermelon to his wife on the previous day in the dining room ~ mundane, yes, but magical too. It would have been marvellous to create Toobidoo channeling the word watermelon for sure, but how much more magical to create an actual slice of physical watermelon in the dining room and have Gerry remark on it, and to have an actual physical conversation with him about it. Who knows, he may even remember the nutcase who spent six months trying to get him to say watermelon whenever he sees one, at least for awhile. It might be quite often too, as his wife is partial to watermelon. Yoland wondered if this was some kind of connecting link, perhaps the connection to Gerry and Cindy started in Marseilles and watermelon was the physical clue, the pointer towards the connection.

Perhaps, Yoland wondered, the orbs were the connecting link to Wailon, although she didn’t feel such a strong connection to him as she did to Toobidoo and Gerry Jumper. She had been collecting coloured gel orbs for several months ~ just for fun. There was often a connecting link to be found in the silly and the fun, the pointless and the bizarre, and even in the mundane and everyday things.

In the days following her return home ~ or the house that Yoland lived in, shall we say ~ she felt rather sleepy, as if she was in slow motion, but the feeling was welcome, it felt easy and more importantly, acceptable. There was nothing that she felt she should be doing instead, for a change, no fretting about starting projects, or accomplishing chores, rather a slow pleasant drifting along. Yes, there were chores to be done, such as watering plants and feeding animals and other things, but they no longer felt like chores. She found she wasn’t mentally listing all the other chores to be done but was simply enjoying the one she was doing. Even whilst picking up innumerable dog turds outside, she heard the birds singing and saw the blossom on the fruit trees against the blue sky, saw shapes in the white clouds, heard the bees buzzing in the wisteria. The abundance of dog shit was a sign of a houseful of happy healthy well fed dogs, and the warm spring sun dried it and made it easier to pick up.

It was, somewhat unexpectedly, while Yoland was picking up dog shit that she finally realized what some of those bobbing words meant about home, and presence, and connection to source. It seemed amusingly ironic after travelling so far (not just the recent trip, but all the years of searching) to finally find out where home was, where the mysterious and elusive source was. (Truth be told, some printed words she found the previous day had been another catalyst, by Vivian channeled by Wanda, but she couldn’t recall the exact words. Yoland had to admit that words, used as a catalyst, were really rather handy.)

Wherever you go, there you are ~ they were words too, and they were part of the story. Now that Yoland had come to the part where she wanted to express in words where home, and source, was, she found she couldn’t find the right words. In a funny kind of way the word vacant popped into her head, as if the place where the vast jumble of words was usually housed became vacant, allowing her to be present in her real physical world. It really was quite extraordinary how simple it was. Too simple for words.

This afternoon I felt motivated to spend some time here, for the first time in ages. I was in the story section, Circle of Eights Part 2, where there is the nut story line and of course the quote from the infamous Lemone chap.

we’re all nuts anyway; different flavours thereof, but nuts nonetheless, peanuts, peacan or up the wall-nuts

While I was reading a parcel was delivered to the door, which turned out to be a box full of of bags of nuts; cashews, peanuts, pistachios, chocolate almonds … (it was a hospitality industry advertising thing, which was completely unexpected .. cool! and YUM! )

‘“It may have been the sudden change of environment, but Leörmn had great difficulty at staying focused.”

‘Aspidistra Merryweather, suddenly disconcertingly finding herself in a completely different place, with a new name and an unfamiliar body, was marginally relieved to discover that the wonderful synchronicity of the random quote selector hadn’t changed.’

Cordella wondered how many times, and with how many additions, this perfectly timed random quote would thread its way through the volumes. She had been trying to balance her universal celebration lettuce somewhat unsuccessfully, wishing she’d paid more attention to the lecture, when she spotted the orbs.

String Theory

I am an artist, painting a portrait of my reality in vibrations, the physical culmination of tone and hue. Like a spiders web, a single line from a single spider, weaved in and out in a circular fashion, and I expect to connect all things in a linear fashion. But I do not. Yet any portion of my web is the precise area of my intent to snare the intended victim. So I hide in expectation of biting the head off and consuming it. In the dark, alone, like a dirty little secret.
And I think the string itself is a thread of association, much like the thread of a discussion tracked on email mailing lists. And the string can go in many directions, many hues, weaving a web of interaction, a sticky internet, iridescent in the morning dew. I notice the taste of this reality morning, before venturing off into other realms of daydreams. Other realities that are unfamiliar.
The spider inside her calls out in strings of nine, as I know the victim is me and my own ideas of self.

(from Share):paperclip:

Larisa glanced at the cute pig faced clock ticking happily away on the kitchen wall.

Blimmin’ Heck! how could that possibly be the time? …. and what was time anyway?

Well whatever it was, there was certainly none of it to spare for that sort of philosophical carry on! She was well late for her meeting with Jane and Rob to discuss the latest project. Of course she was nearly always late, so she consoled herself with the fact that Jane and Rob already would have explored the probability that the meeting wouldn’t start at seven. They were pretty good with probabilities. Throwing her, it must be said rather bizarre and fantastical, Ewko Lemin novel down, Larisa hurriedly gulped back the last of her blue and red vitamin pills, shouted out a quick farewell to Greve, who was staying with her while he recovered from his latest disastrous rowing escapade, and dashed out the door.