Walmart special fades but is fun while it lasts. Temporary tattoos make body art experimentation more exciting to me…an everchanging canvas until I get the flexible screen underskin electroluminescent display implants later this century.
Tag Archives: happiness
My latest tatt
Straight out of the gumball machine at Pizza Hut.
Glass spherical atmospherical at most fear a gull
I don’t know what it is about the objects in this room but some of them have a life of their own.
The crystal ball, which is not really crystal but a thin layer of glass, hummed when I walked into the study this morning.
A 60-Hz hum, as if some unseen creature — a gnome, fairy, elf, dwarf or gremlin? — snuck in and plugged in the crystal ball’s AC power source.
Ah, yes. The crystal ball has electronic junk in its trunk.
For centuries, the crystal ball had relied on the magnetic alignment of layers of rock deposited for millions of years onto Earth’s crust as the planet’s magnetic poles flip-flopped.
But I wanted more power.
I wanted to make the future a reality, not just some foggy image forming out of the inside of a ether-filled dome.
Sing it! “Ee-thur, eye-thur, nee-thur, neye-thur,” ether-aether, “let’s call the whole thing off”-kilter.
Anyway, the crystal ball’s powered profundity projects onto the book covers, picture frames, walls, ceiling, overhead light fixture and my eyeballs a future where we ask ourselves why income inequality has become a buzzword domestically, imagined internationally but not universally.
A spinoff of Virgin Galactic, under a new shell corporation not directly tied to Sir Richard Branson in order to avoid confusion about mission statements, offers a higher boost into suborbital space for the terminally ill, taking their money but not promising them a flight in time before they die, that gives the passengers a longer time in the weightlessness of space and then an incendiary cremation upon reentry, the painlessness of sedatives a personal option, their ashes spread into the upper atmosphere of the only planet they got to know, sparking a new travel industry nicknamed “Your Final Exit” after a book written in the 20th century.
Discovering energy conversion that has nothing to do with atomic structures opened up planetary exploration and galactic travel, completely and forever changing our image and opinions of ourselves as the center of the universe — it’s not the energy level that counts, it’s how you use the paradigm shift to reinvent the way we model our sets of states of energy in the cosmos.
Spending more time nurturing our species’ children during their formative years offset our longterm investment in the spook business that tried to compensate for the messed-up mindsets of adults turned against society, which changed the way we perceived ourselves as [un]fairly-treated cogs in the wheels of the politicoeconomic conditions we used to define our place in society, including the reformation of the public/private education system that used to depend on a mix of caring/sadistic [un]tenured teaching staff and [non]motivated students.
Mapping the new global culture on top of centuries-old subcultures was as fluid as the ocean tidal currents, tide charts predictable but local tidal basins fluctuating minute-by-minute. Protesting the advent of global branding missed the natural evolution of a species in transition from multilocal to a global set of traits. Embracing the concept of optimising profits made the antiglobal movement an effective tool in strengthening our longterm economic sustainability — every person was encouraged to realise we are individually a laboratory of new ideas, making conformity, normality and mimicry as quaint as synergistic symmetry.
The crystal ball hummed louder and louder until I realised that the wallwart was overheating. Time to get a new transformer before the house burns down!
Windbreak Shadow
They stood hand-in-hand, the same height, facing each other.
Her shoulders were broad, her hips turned to one side like a pitcher winding up, her grip strong.
He held her hand firmly but let his arm stay loose. “I promise I won’t drop you.”
She smiled. “Uh-huh.”
“But I might drop you.”
“Uh-huh.” Her smile widened. “You know, you oughta take a look around the room.”
His back to the rest of the dance floor, Lee cocked his head over his shoulder, nodding. “Yeah?”
“Can’t you see I’m the biggest woman in this room? You do know my brother played college football, don’t you?”
He shook his head. “Where is he now?”
“He’s a retired police officer. When he interviewed to become a DEA agent, they asked him how come he was so tough. He told ’em he had me as a sister, who could beat him up. I put stitches in his face.”
Lee nodded. “I don’t promise I won’t drop you. I might just try to drop you on purpose.”
“Yeah, you do that.” She squeezed his hand. “Or you can try.”
The dance instructor called out in his French accent. “Five, six, seven, eight. Sugar push…now the contra move…stop on three!”
Lee held his partner out from him. “I could drop you right now.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“I might trip you, make it look like an accident.”
“A tango move that went wrong?”
“I promise I’ll pick you up. Or pretend I will.”
“Oh, don’t do that. A friend would leave me on the floor…”
“I’ll definitely do that.”
“…and laugh.”
“I’ll make sure I’ll drop you, point, laugh and walk away.”
“Ooh. You’re good.”
“What are friends for?”
The instructor called out again. “Okay, dance leaders, rotate counter-clockwise. We only have so many followers so we’ll rotate twice as faster so they can share themselves weef us.”
Lee looked at his partner. “See you later.”
She laughed. “You wish.” She squeezed his hand harder. “No. I mean you’re a really good leader.”
“Thanks.”
Group dance lessons are like speed dating. You partner up quickly as you rotate leaders or followers, establishing a relationship which is always instantly based on first impressions. However, should you speed date often, you may find yourself with the same partner again, having broken the ice or pointing the way to the icebreaker, ready to experiment a little more with or without the first impression the second time around.
Some fun is worth waiting for.
A windbreak between corn fields takes years to reach the right height but never so tall as to completely block out the sunlight or a heavy thunderstorm.
Our sets of states of energy may build up defenses but sometimes the cocoons around our personality are melted by the simplest of smiles.
Or, as they say, there’s a time and place for everything, patience has its virtue, and laughter is the best medicine.
Lee promised himself he’d let her slip the next time, catching her unawares in his arms, seeing if he could avoid the stitches her brother couldn’t.
We all love a good challenge!
Abi and I agree on dance costumes?
Abi…there’s something about her that I haven’t been able to put my finger on until this afternoon.
We stood and held hands for probably 20 minutes while talking with Traci. I haven’t held hands like that with another woman since…well, since 1978?
I mean just standing there hand-in-hand, not cuddling or thinking about what’s next.
And then it dawned on me! Abi is the same height as Robyn, my girlfriend from high school.
So it’s only natural that Abi and I should wear the same outfits I did with Robyn lo those many years ago at a Halloween party.
Abi, I’m game if you are, you sassy girl — assuming Stephane will loan me some timeshare moments with you next week, that is! I promise not to drop you on the floor, IF AND ONLY IF you let me sit on your lap.
Kiva – Loans that change lives
My wife handstamped and crafted birthday cards, sending them to a shelter in Gadsden, Alabama, USA, to support dosomething.org’s gift to https://www.kiva.org/register/freetrial.
You can too!
Two kids practice
While waiting for today’s lesson with Abi, here’s the last shot my wife made of our lesson with Jenn last night:
Valley Girl
Guin and Bai stood on a small rise, waiting for Eoj to join them.
Guin hefted a small boulder in her hand.
“How far do you think I can throw this?”
Bai picked up a small rock and threw it twenty or thirty meters with no effort.
Eoj walked up behind Guin. “Hey, guys. What’s up?”
Bai nodded at Guin’s arm. “She’s got a crazy idea.”
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
Guin tossed the boulder in the air. “You know, I used to throw shotput, discus and javelin.”
Eoj laughed. “In this century?”
Guin smiled. “Who’s counting?”
Eoj looked at Bai. “What hasn’t this woman done?”
“I also competed at the pole vault and long relay. Very occasionally they would throw me in a short relay.”
Eoj snorted. “And here I am, sucking in my breath after running a few kilometers to catch up with you guys.”
Guin kicked small rocks out from a small circle. She made a few test turns, seeing if she still had her perfect throwing moves in her memory. “Throwing and polevaulting — there are serious ramifications if you move your body the wrong way.”
Eoj laughed again. “Bai, I think you and I ought to throw a few rocks ourselves. If we can dance as well as Guin, we can do whatever else she does just as well, right?”
Bai looked from Guin to Eoj and back. “He’s never seen you throw, has he?”
Guin shook her head. “No, but you’ve never seen him throw me in the air, either.”
Guin motioned Bai and and Eoj back a few paces.
She steadied her breathing, set her feet and took three steps, launching the boulder from her body’s core, through her shoulder and out of her hand like a hydraulic jack hammer punching the air.
The boulder’s arc was like a low altitude sounding rocket’s path, an ideal unimpeded trajectory in the thin atmosphere.
Several seconds later, a puff of Martian dust, then another and another indicated a few thousand meters away the boulder bouncing on the other side of the valley.
Guin smacked her hands together as if she was cleaning them of dust. “Not bad, if I say so myself!”
Bai looked at Eoj. “You think you can throw her that far?”
Guin snapped her head around. “Now, wait a minute!”
Eoj grabbed Guin around the waist. “Hey, it’s worth a try.” He tossed her ten meters in the air and caught her.
He set her down and they laughed together. “Ready?”
They started a slow jog, pacing themselves for a run down the valley and back around to the lab.
Eoj had the afternoon off before he had to return to the tourists and wanted to warm up with Guin and Bai before they put in some dance practice for the finale performance the last night of the tourists’ stay on the Red Planet.
Kickstarter Update #3
As promised, here’s the latest update from our Kickstarter Xceed Xpectations project tentatively named “All Sols Day.”
Today, let’s take a look at a couple of the early prototype bumper stickers the Creative Arts department crafted to get their imaginations going…
We can’t wait to get this party started. As soon as the next batch of art is ready, we’ll post it here for your perusal.
Have a peaceful sol!
Tomorrow, a tale on Mars, illustrated
While our Creative Arts department puts away its propaganda material, preparing for morning sketches, let us look at sports that don’t often see the limelight.
And here’s the image du jour…
Well, before I post it, a little background. You see, after talking with Jenn tonight, we’ve decided to change our outfits for the showcase dance. I said I was going as a punk rock Big Bird, meaning she could go as her favorite character, Oscar the Grouch:
But then…well, the craziness kicked in. She’s going to dare me to dress as a sexy Big Bird, I know it, so I better dare her to dress as a sexy Oscar the Grouch first! We’ll see who wins the “best costume” contest — me as a drag queen Big Bird or her as a hot Oscar!
treetrunkdings 