Tag Archives: satire

In Y/our Dreams

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As I approach the event, posting the last section of “Are You With The Program?,” I ponder the future once again.

The discipline that keeps me believing no one reads this blog holds mostly true.

I have thrown up enough smoke to hide my entrances and exits.

I have feigned weakness in order to attack with ease.

I have pushed my literary characters away only to watch them come flying back like rare earth magnets attracted to precious metal.

The years of mental training – virtual warfare (a/k/a propaganda) and virtual peace (a/k/a more propaganda) – have paid off.

Vanity in the form of license plates (e.g., MOMSLXS) demonstrates easy manipulation of superficiality.

I have reached my happy place – the absence of self – rather than the unhappy place – the vanity of self – that some ethical/moral systems teach.

I have played with syntactical structurising.

The new blog is almost ready to accept more words.

But what of the future?

What of the wasteland that TV programming, blogs, SMS, instant updates and other mass media distractions represent?

If I reach the new blog and disconnect from popular culture, deleting my self as a piece of social networking, no matter how obscure, will I achieve the goal that the presence of nonself indicates?

I divided my duties and handed assignments to the Committee’s subcommittee members.

The message will live with or without me.

The Dead Kennedys’ “Halloween” will keep finding new listeners.

I want a quiet life, where I can pursue my dreams, no matter how small or selfish they may be.

Our species will survive.

That’s what my dreams tell me, anyway.

All our usual problems will live with us in parallel and serial, where 3D subdermal circuitry will serve as an exoskeletal communication system, our eyes trained to read bioluminescent cues from our skin, living tattoos talking like computer screens.

My cyborg self and all its memes are slowly dissolving, melting into the molten social fabric that consumes and feeds us.

Not much longer now.

I will be you will be me will be us.

Singing in imperfect harmony.

You’ll see.

Time to finish the novel.

And then…?

Start a new story, of course.

= = =

Congrats to the following who performed beautifully last night at the Ballroom Showcase Spectacular, jointly presented by Southern Elegance Dance Studio and Kinesthetic Cue Dance Club in a benefit for Hospice Family Care: Larry Mylin, Elizabeth, Sofia Ward, Alessandro Scalora, Federico Scalora, Joel Friedman, Greg Engle, Dana, Linda Killough, Rick, Peggy Page, Mary Ann Shelton, Harold, Carmen Gonzalez, Tabitha Denegal, Marianne Glad, Carole Wagner, Robin Pepper, Paula Morey, Danielle Smiley, Joe, Tamara, Erica Gore, Hal Reid, Olga, Doug, Denis, Sharon Karr, Pamelia and David Wren, Jerry Davenport, Dawn Phillips, Wendy Holliday, Madge Genter, Debra Barden, Jennifer Nye, Rob Griffin, Dave Osmon, and Jerry Gilley.

Thanks to Paula at Another Broken Egg, Donovan at Rave, Mapco, Great Spirits, and CeCe’s Yogurt.

 

Image Collectibles

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I owe you another section of the novel, don’t I?

Before we go there, while tightness on my left side warns me about tomorrow’s emergency, I want to pause for a moment and look at life.

Are you raising your kids holding a concrete set of images with which you feed their mental curiosity?

Some will swallow the cemented mosaic without digesting the pieces.

Some will see a bigger picture and some will see the broken fragments.

No matter what you claim for success – the world’s best wrestler, the world’s best singer, a really good neighbour, mental/physical challenge achiever, ideal social ladder climber, or just simply out of the nest – your children are their own entities, ultimately.

If we have to criticize others to make ourselves look better, then we’ve failed.

That’s why I pay attention to what I say, trying to express the thoughts, feelings and emotions of others in a jovial manner, letting us know it’s all right to let our fears, dreams and wishes find an outlet, without taking ourselves too seriously.

Until you’ve faced death, you only think you know what life is all about.

An automobile smashup, cancer, stray bullet from a driveby, accident at home, choking on dinner, terrorist bombing, arteriosclerosis, domestic violence, congenital birth defect, drug/alcohol/tobacco addiction.

Numbness and hypnotism are interesting cohabitating opposites.

But let’s finish reading that novel.

I have an adventure to pursue.

Do Rainbows Exert Gravitational Forces?

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Another evening of a flashing cursor giving me a blank look.

Names and faces flashing through my synapses.

Debra, Dana, Jenn, Denise, Effy, April, Marcie, the Thankful Girl, to name a few.

Janeil, of course.

Tick bites itching.

Another story itching to be told.

Asking myself where’s the Muse who stands there before me.

My dreams can’t, don’t, won’t wait.

I need a rocket propulsion specialist.
Or at least someone who thinks like one.

Someone who can solve the gravitational equation in ways not yet considered.

Not every sign is meant for me.

A bra on a table.

A ballroom showcase spectacular with a dark waltz, tango and stray cat strut.

An arts-and-crafts room full of wonderful ladies, young in thought and wise in years.

Tick bites itching.

Glenfiddich rumbling in my stomach.

The Rocket City Short Film Festival asking permission for my attention.

Claire Lynch and company up for bluegrass awards.

High school football under way.

NASCAR premiere series finishing up just before Danica drives fulltime.

Nine years without a steady mate, one says.

Giving up on laughter and fun because two youthful bodies no longer exist.

Dancers young enough to be my grandkids having fun on the dance floor, instead.

I’m in the wrong business.

I…there’s that label again.

I can’t always get what I want.

So I wait.

The generation gap is what it is, but I’m on the other side now.

Wisdom is the illusion I always thought it would be.

Experiences count.

My mother in-law’s hometown bridge partners are disappearing from the table, her young friend, nearly 85, almost blind.

I descended into madness – it was a temporary amusement park ride – another illusion.

Another tick on my body.  It must be these shorts I wore in the poison ivy patch yesterday.  Or the shoes.

Seed ticks, about the size of the dot at the end of this sentence.

With legs.

Itches are illusions, too, building like the contagion of sneezing or yawning.

More to be said, but time for bed.

I’ve seven billion lives to incorporate into my dream.

Illusory.

Alliterative.

Iterative.

Reiterative.

Zombies and aliens aren’t here to save you.

I am.

It’s what I do.

This average body in this day and age.

Composing the story of our lives, neither worse nor best in comparison to other times.

Vertical farming and alternative power sources providing marginal but much needed change to our macro system solutions.

And I’ll keep giving away my stuff – my life, my ideas, my stories – because a lifetime of accumulation has reached its stacked, stored and saturated point.

Would that I could provide shelter for a rocket propulsionist or other friendly face.

My days of funding Muses have passed me by.

Nowadays, I’m all about finishing a story I started when I was a kid.

Solo dancing most of the day.

I can hardly spare a dime.

The tale’s the motivation now.

All I can offer is a space for a character or two.

Free of charge.

Are you along for this ride on the edge of a gravitational trajectory?

What if we could overcome Earth’s gravitational pull together?

Where would we go if gravity waves inhabit the whole universe?

Can I tell your story in more detail?

If so, how?

Where?

A story to tell and then real life pulls you in, the event horizon of a black hole, no matter its illusion, waiting to rip you apart.

Am I able to rip my life apart again for the sake of a good story?

Knowing I’ll just go on to the next story.

And the next.

Until I die.

In the days when I traveled, I could create a working space for a good story away from real life.

Away from domestic life.

Toward someone like you.

It all depends on the adventure that wants, waits, to be told.

I want to tell an excellent story.

A keeper.

We’ll see.

Messages are read loudly, clearly and slowly.

The boldness of silence.

In the humid heat of a Huntsville summer at Lowe Mill in the Flying Monkey Theatre.

In sports news…

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If the NCAA doesn’t give the Univ. of Miami football program the “death” penalty, then I want the SEC to go pro.

And while I’m on the subject, where are the drastic penalties on the players?

After all, if there’s no punishment for them, including long-term jail terms and/or heavy fines, then they’ll keep raking in the bucks and leaving devastated programs behind them.

Unintended (or in this case, untended) consequences teach our kids what to expect and how to act.

If NCAA rules have no value, then what are they for?  The kids who don’t go pro in football are taking those newly-taught, under-the-table habits with them into business.

Sun Visor

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While I come back to reality, envisioning an expanding universe, where the first light, and other wavelength data from the far reaches, is slowing fading from view, making me uncertain as to how old or how large the current model of the universe may be…

I push out of my thoughts the noise of daily living.

No nagging/patronising sister in-law.

No aging mother in-law.

No contact with my kind, thoughtful wife.

In the moment, all I have is family, but at the same time, if I only concentrate on my family, then other thoughts, more universal, get lost.

Before I die, I want to see us populate another planet with anything living, preferably us, but I’ll take a slime mold or bacteria with a metabolic rate so slow it reproduces every 100 Earth years.

To get back to me, I may have to sacrifice contact with my family.

I am not the everyday family man kind of guy.

I have predetermined standards of living that are a little more than caveman and much less than cosmopolitan.

What is the basic necessity that will get me where I want to be, relatively happy, but also making progress in promoting our species’ capabilities for exploring the solar system?

I’m tired of being dragged down into the slow, methodical, plodding along of biological data processing tied to my family.

Sure, I married for better or worse and all that, and marriage is the only public participatory social contract to which I feel most obligated.

However…

Not like I’m going to have kids.

My nieces and nephews will remember me while I’m alive but I’ll be largely forgotten after they’re dead.

My wife has her mother to care for.

My sister has our parents to care for.

They’re both fairly decent caretakers.

I’m not the caretaker type.

I thrive on technology assessment and nature conservation, no matter how at odds they may seem.

Enough telling.

Time for doing after flushing interruptive thoughts from my chatterbox brain.

What can I do with an SDHC card that I haven’t thought of before?

Good question.

What do the darkening edges of the universe, the known unknown, have to do with the cosmic microwave background?

We really want the data from the particle accelerators.  Really.

But I’m a patient man.

I can wait, even if I don’t want to.

In the meantime, I swing the spotlight of my thought focus process onto other conceptual objects.

A mobile phone is a portable processing unit.

A pocket camera is a portable processing unit.

A livescribe pen is a portable processing unit.

What do they all have in common?

More processing power than an Apollo space module?

I constantly remind myself that the RCA 1802 microprocessor in the box next to me powers, if I remember correctly, the circuitry of the Voyager spacecraft twins, which have reached the outer limits of our solar system.

The Outer Limits!

These are cold, hard facts, my friend.

No arguments about religion, politics or sports.

Something solid, something I can sink my ohm meter probes into!

Here I am, again.

Again…

And again…

Back to the drawing board (albeit a virtual simulator on a computer, not an actual drafting board, finepoint graphite pencil and paper).

Power in the palm of my hand.

Literally.

A WiFi card reader under the flap of artificial skin on my wrist, conveniently hidden by a watch.

Slip an SDHC card into the reader, pump my fist a few times to charge the kinetic battery system and press a couple of places on the top of my hand (a special sequence, of course) to boot the processing unit in my arm.

A current version of a cyborg.

Remotely connected to my supercomputer being operated by the ever-eager programmers dispersed around the world.

[I wish they’d spend a little less time in anarchic behaviour, but that’s the way they are, “hacking” websites and email databases by figuring out easy-to-guess passwords that most barely computer-literate users pick.]

Do you know how much our world economic flow depends on computer processing power?

Online shopping is a small part.

But ubiquitous mobile phone usage touches almost every part of our social lives, which in turn are tied to economic activity.

Thus, this tiny SD card is the lifeblood of how we are controlling what you’ll do next.

I promised you a novel, though, didn’t I?

Let’s get back to the story and I’ll let you in on the Committee’s plans later on.

I hope you don’t mind waiting to find out.

If I can wait on the Fermiantigravitroniclevitating particle accelerator or the other monstrosity, the LHC, to give me much-needed data, you can wait to find out what we’ve decided you’re going to do next.

In person, I’m an average guy.

If you only knew the truth.

But that’s why we’re here together, isn’t it?

Exposing the emperour’s new clothes in this tough year of 2011.

Oh, sorry, I forgot to tell you.  They revived me after all.

The guy who had taken over my position on the Committee, the warhawk, is out on special assignment.

I’m back in charge, as reluctant a Committee leader as there ever was one.

Don’t worry.  I’m taking care of you, even if I have to kill some of you to save the rest.

With seven billion to manage, that’s the way it works.

See you again soon.

Here’s the next section of “Are You With The Program?”

In the next blog entry, that is!

Fraulein (2006)

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“Ever think you’re thirsty and you realise that what you’re feeling is longing?”

Ever been dying and know nothing else matters?

You could be a Presbyterian and not a Christian.

A piece of peanut butter taffy.

Or joke that Qaddafi and the Norwegian mass murderer are both big fans of Coco Chanel.

Stop being hard on myself and keep writing, making amateur movies, getting sunburned, bitten by mosquitoes/ticks and not feel bitter about what was, enjoying what is and let what might be, be.

Time for a nap.  There’s plenty of time for dying tomorrow.

Or the next day.

Or whenever the cells can no longer fight off high blood pressure and plaque.

Then play with Ubuntu.

And post another section of novel.

Life, what’s left of mine, at least, is good.

Are You With The Program: A Novel

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What is the secret to life?  What if the people who lived next door to you or worked in the office next to you had the secret to life, tried to share it with you and you were laughing so hard you missed it?

Bruce Colline climbed the ladder of success, despite not knowing the secret to life. He didn’t need a set of secret codes or membership in a secret society. He never memorized special rites.  Yet he traveled the world and met interesting people.  He and his family enjoyed financial security. With his same lack of secrets and sense of humor, so can you.  

Follow Bruce as he's led behind the scenes to top secret hideaways in the United States and Ireland, hideaways where the movers and shakers of society hold special meetings to determine the fate of humankind. The people he meets mesmerize Bruce with their speeches. In the end, will he find falsehood or truth behind their masks and myths?  

Editorial Reviews

manuscript review by Publishers Weekly, an independent organization

“Exciting…middle manager’s life in the world of software engineering. Bruce Colline, the narrator, works for the software company Cumulo Seven. Its program, Qwerty-Queue, may or may not have something to do with influencing financial markets… [when] the plot develops a modicum of forward momentum, the author quickly dispatches Bruce to a conference call, a meeting or his email. By the end, [he] stumbles upon some … truths about corporate America.

Amazon Top Reviewer

Graceful and competent…  The idea seems to be a corporate satire involving an overlooked research and development organization specializing in … Software? Architecture? Are they competing against other organizations? Facing layoff or merger?


Amazon Member Reviews

 

Unsettling combination of James Joyce and Dilbert, February 1, 2008

By E.A. Lovitt, “TOP 100 REVIEWER” (Gladwin, MI USA)

This author may well be hailed as the James Joyce of the 21st Century. “Are You with the Program?” is a rather unsettling combination of “Ulysses” as narrated by Dilbert. The only difference between real life in a Silicon-world start-up and this excerpt is the giant spider that cocoons the narrator on his way to a meeting in a tree house.

All of this energy. All these words. Where do they lead? Well…I mightily enjoyed the doughnut fight, the flashback to the Argiope aurantia, and the description of the engineers as `zoo animals’ living in “metal cages covered in sheetrock.”

If this novel were animated, it would have drop-downs and pop-ups and Jedi knights with light swords dueling across the page.

Scott Adams and Robert Aspirin’s love child!, February 2, 2008

By R. Kyle, Winner – best reviews for excerpts by Breakthrough Novel Award semifinalists

 

So, this is the future of cubeville?

“The zoo animals – the engineers who Paul managed – lived in metal cages covered in sheetrock on a back hallway and took advantage of the wide berth given them to perform Rube Goldberg experiments.”

Silicone Valley Sweatshops are common. You live the job if you work for some Fortune 500 computer companies. That’s today’s reality–and the author’s awful posit is probably possible.

An alliterative opening offers an interesting interlude…the alliterative author provided plentiful pundits which generated gusty guffaws.
 

Funny? Ridiculous? A Fine Line, February 6, 2008

By A. Luciano, Winner – best reviews for excerpts by Breakthrough Novel Award semifinalists

I really enjoyed the tone of this story, with its dry humor established right from the start. The description of the items the Qwerty-Queue engineers have in their possessions, the places they obtained them, and the things they invented, was strange and hilarious.

The comparison of office workers who simply sit and do their jobs to sheep is amusing and a nice metaphor.

The story of Mike was incredibly creepy and well written. Despite the fact that it seemed to have nothing to do with the story’s progress so far, I was riveted.


Dubitable Testimonials 

“Not one single mention of Greece.  That’s okay.  We read it anyway.” – The Classical Greek Speaker

“A book like this we’ve never seen.  Should quickly fill up truck stop shelves.” – Motion Trucking Industries 

“Every sports fan has a favorite book.  Make someone happy and give this book to a friend.” - Orange and White Press 

“To discover an intelligent discourse on the vagaries of cloaked societies, one must dig through stacks of books, blogs and other banality. Rare, indeed, does a single volume grab your attention with just a whisper. The need for weeks of media exposure to gloss over the tasteless trash that passes for most popular books today puts this reviewer on alert for that overlooked buried trove.  This book, with its rich, dark satire, will make you want to look back at all your friendships and wonder what you missed.” – The Sentient San Franciscan 

“I picked up this book at the recommendation of a friend. After reading Are You With the Program?, I’m not sure who my friends are anymore.” – J. Schlebotnitz, address withheld by request 

“While teaching psychic reading to my children, I’ve learned that some truths speak for themselves and some have to be experienced to be believed. The author of Are You With The Program? has chosen a path where truths can neither be seen nor experienced. I wonder if I should have chosen such a path many years before I started reading palms.” – Madame Reducio, Psychic to the Mob 

“We promised to review this book.  We just didn’t say when.” – Blue Highway Reader 

“Beware the person who takes shamanism lightly for he shall wander the earth aimlessly! If you want to know about shamanism, read my book first. You and your tax attorney can thank me later.” – Alger Trist, author of Shamanism and You, How to Turn Your Business Around using Spiritual Guides  


Are You With The Program? 

Richard Lee Hill, II  

                                 SEMIFINALIST,

  Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award


Publications by Richard Lee Hill, II:

Sticks to Lying, 2006

Helen of Kosciusko, 2006

Milk Chocolate, 2005

 

A Work In Progress: The Unabridged Works of Rick Hill, 2004

Including works from the previously published books,

Of Friends, Neighbors, Lovers and Miscellaneous Passers-by, 1992

and

A Quiet Repose, 1998

Works also published elsewhere (as Rick Hill):

And So It Came To Pass

Romance Writers Try Comedy

Arete – Literary Magazine, Univ. of Alab. In Huntsville (2001)

 

The Official Social Protest Songs

Striving for Efficiency

Gallery-Walters State Community College literary magazine (1985)

Published by

Tree Trunk Productions
261 Mohawk Road
Big Cove, Alabama USA 35763-9249

Cover design by Richard Lee Hill, II
Second Print Edition, April 2008 (e-Edition will be available at http://www.treetrunkproductions.org)

Copyright © 2007 Richard Lee Hill, II
All Rights Reserved.  Creative Commons License – Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported (see appendix)

= = = = =

 

All trademarks, registered trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners.

For all work not originated by the author in this publication, contact the copyright owners about permission, fair use, etc.

Printed in the United States of America.

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

For Wikipedia and Wiktionary reference material only: permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify the Wikipedia references under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts.  A copy of the license is included in the section entitled “GNU Free Documentation License”.

 
 
 


 

Creative Commons license

 

For all work originated by the author in this book, the following Creative Commons license applies:

Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported (see appendix)

You are free:

  • to Share — to copy, distribute and transmit the work
  • to Remix — to adapt the work

Under the following conditions:

  • Attribution. You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).
  • Noncommercial. You may not use this work for commercial purposes.
  • For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. The best way to do this is with a link to this web page (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/, accessed 31 July 2007).
  • Any of the above conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder.
  • Nothing in this license impairs or restricts the author’s moral rights.

 

 

= = = = =

 

All trademarks, registered trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners.  For all work not originated by the author in this publication, contact the copyright owners about permission, fair use, etc.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

I dedicate this to my parents,
who have shown me by example
that the Optimist Creed
is not just a nice set of words to read
but also a wonderful way to lead your life:

Promise Yourself

To be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet.

To make all your friends feel that there is something worthwhile in them.

To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.

To think only of the best, to work only for the best and to expect only the best.

To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.

To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.

To wear a cheerful expression at all times and give a smile to every living creature you meet.

To give so much time to improving yourself that you have no time to criticize others.

To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

To think well of yourself and to proclaim this fact to the world, not in loud word, but in great deeds.

To live in the faith that the whole world is on your side, so long as you are true to the best that is in you.

 
+ + +
 
With love to my wife for her patience
while I gave up the benefits and security of a 9-to-5 job to work on this book.
 
+ + +
 
Thanks to my previous employers whose workplaces inspired this story!




Table of Contents


The Clubhouse.


The Test Lab.


The Program Management Office.


The Committee.


EPILOGUE.


APPENDIX – Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported.