Perfecting My Flying Saucer… j/k?

Daily writing prompt

Describe the most ambitious DIY project you’ve ever taken on.

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Tho this all falls under the category (stated in Sagan-speak) of “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence”, this matter, quite simply, is so sensitive and secretive that it’d be best not to reveal too much. In fact, in simply saying this, matters may have already crossed over that line, as it were. Thankfully my security is airtight. Soooooo, let’s soldier on…

Tho I did play and continue to play a major role, I cannot take full credit for the DIY project in question. No, this nearly miraculous undertaking was set into motion in the waning weeks of 1963 (in the wake of the Kennedy assassination) by my mastermind dad, a disciple of a multitude of disciplines; an amalgamation of Astrophysics, Biology and Chemistry (you know the literal ABC’s); as well as higher than high mathematics. Factoring in his being a political science visionary, too, accounts for the timing element.

Suffice to say… my family patriarch had been able to foresee that assassination blowback; the consequent dumbing down of the vulnerable members of our society / electorate (all discourtesy of wretched Big Gov, Big Biz and Big Bro) and wanted absolutely NO part of this mucked up mess. Hence, my pop’s plan for securing a path out; and I do mean way, Way, WAY OUT; way beyond this likely irreparable, terrestrial turmoil; hostile, totalitarian takeover.

Tho dear ol’ dad is no longer of this Earth (bought the farm way back in ’88), seeing how he did teach me everything he knew, I did turn out sufficiently knowledgeable to keep his / our vision alive; so much so that as of late, at long last, I’ve been able to complete our interstellar spacecraft (powered by the ten times faster than light, Dubrovnik Drive). Not to brag, BUT, I’ve already taken several brief spins around the solar system; have now completed the requisite shakedown flights. Bottom line, earth shattering, tech probs have yet to arise.

Ergo, all things are go… so, until we know if Gentleman Joe will be second terming it at the White House; will wind up with healthy Democratic legislative majorities, I must keep my Flying Saucer’s maiden voyage penciled in for mid-November… j/k?

Um… in actuality… to keep this real… and I do mean REALLY REAL a more apt expression would brand my extraordinary claims as… alas… long sigh… little more than my flight of fancy.

Do forgive me for all this fictional embellishment… I just didn’t believe my factual “most ambitious” DIY” (my mid Eighties Era interior prepping and painting of every room of the ol’ family homestead) would turn out sufficiently entertaining to my known readers; to say nothing of the potentially vast Internet masses.

However, in my defense… I ask, is not the whole point of the Daily Writing Prompt to wind up honing our creative writing skills?

So, as most can probably see / likely agree, my droning, ad nauseam, about drywall cleaning / spackling, paint brush and roller selecting, etc. would’ve proven unworthy of writing home about. Ditto that re blogging along similar lines.

Anyway, my now saying so is rooted deeply within the apt idiom (words to the effect)… it’d have been…

“About as interesting as watching paint dry.”

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Be humans Vaxxed OR Unvaxxed, We
can still shed and spread the batcrap
crazy contagious coronavirus which,
in turn, spawns new variants; which,
in turn, could, eventually, render the
available vaccines worthless; which,
in turn, will drag out the pandemic’s
needless suffering, illness and death!

HENCE… this easy as pie, cover your
nose and pie-hole/hole-up heads-up:

Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!

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Nobody’s Home

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On this same old, same old day, let’s kick things off by discussing a well-known author’s work of spooky fiction.

On an overbooked, American Pride Airlines, non-stop, LA to Boston, red-eye flight, ten snoozing travelers have a rude awakening; namely, 100+ passengers, along with the flight attendants, have all vanished into thin air. Amongst the remaining are the young blind girl, public school teacher, stoner chick, violinist prodigy, mystery novelist, blue collar worker, narcoleptic businessman, high-strung high financier, sinister mercenary, and (fortuitously) a deadheading it homeward American Pride pilot.

Upon muscling open the cockpit door, to everyone’s horror, they discover the entire flight crew has also disappeared. Things go from bad to worse when their substitute pilot’s repeated, increasingly heated, radioed Mayday declarations fail to get any air traffic controller response, at all. Upon diverting for a landing at the less traveled, Bangor International Airport, the plot thickens further; due to the terminal being little more than a nobody’s home, ghost town.

Those two paragraphs, above, synopsize one of Stephen King’s most fertile, flights of fancy; be his literary masterpiece printed out on the pages of his collection of novellas, titled Four Past Midnight, or played out in the made for TV, three-hour film, The Langoliers.

I’m rehashing this plot, for, no matter how many times I experience it, “anew”, this never fails to inculcate creepy feelings, right down to the very core of my being; REGRETTABLY, NOT UNLIKE how I feel each and every time I mask-up and force myself to re-enter my homeland’s creepy society; the very one dominated by the triple threat posed by impending climate collapse, relentlessly mutating coronavirus variants and sycophantic MAGA maniac insurrectionists.

Factoring in how few Democrats have the “stones” to (figuratively) peg any problem solving stones at any of these life threatening issues… well… I hafta say…

In spite of a populace of 7.9 billion, globally, and 330 million, Stateside, I cannot help but feel like I’ve been holing up within a godforsaken, gawd awful worldwide / nationwide ghost town; where, obviously, nobody’s home.

Granted, there are still plenty of us well-intentioned people, but, seeing how we’re not making any significant headway, anyway… well… nobody’s home still applies.

And tho my closing Q will only resonate with folks familiar with the above literary work, I’ve gotta ask this anyway…

Where the hell are King’s ferocious, growling, flying all over Creation, swooping down, razor sharp toothed Langoliers when we really need ‘em for a much needed, long overdue clean up of our mucked up society?

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Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!

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Six Sax Players Sans Sox

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How strange for Six Sex starved Sax players
to be spurned; denied strip joint ingress; just
because their fashion statement is sans Sox!
That Sux since each onstage lass wears less.

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Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!

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One Act Daft Wordplay Play

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The vigilant, diligent gent, Brent, lent a cent
to brilliant, militant, tenement tenant, Trent;
who spent it to rent a tent for his pet, pent-up
serpent; hellbent to dissent; via sibilant vent.

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The End

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Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!

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New Alice’s New Wonderland

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Reflect on the Looking Glass; espy each Ancient Faced Clock
Where counterclockwise sweep hands, go tick-tock-tick-tock
Is this glass barrier unbreachable; doth it forevermore block?
Or have humans, yet, to discover; the occult key to that lock?

Each temporal mechanic, bedecked in crisp, tailored lab frock
Knows their beliefs can’t be berated; be belittled like schlock
Volunteer, aptly named Alice; her heroes Armstrong ’n’ Spock
Checks checklist; nears full-length mirror; she’s ready to rock!

Intrepid woman steps thru, infiltrates with one knuckled knock
Father Time waves her way, warily; in state of palpable shock
He quizzes, “Why are you here? To Revere Me? Jeer?? Mock???
Once she dispels his suspicions; towards each other both flock

She asks, “Can you halt aging, in here; set back our Bio clock?”
“Fade away wrinkles / crows feet; acne scars / the marks pock?”
“From our seen-better-days bods; can our years you lop; dock?”
“Alas Alice,” Pop sighs, “Your postulate’s PURE POPPYCOCK!!!”

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Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!

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Sigh… Sci-Fi?

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Even had this past Wednesday’s numerology not involved all multiples of 7, I still would’ve thanked my lucky stars on 07/14/21: the very day I got my second chance to finally, fully and freely enjoy a far more meaningful, satisfying life.

That’s when the fortuitous, favorable conditions had allowed my 44-year absent, spacefaring friends to pull off a timely, unscheduled return pass thru our inner solar system; to briefly touch down on Earth (on my behalf); to pay me back for my long ago, last minute, mission salvaging sacrifice (on their behalf); to, in essence, repatriate me.

To better understand my now limitless elation, let’s begin where / when it all began; the summer of ’67; during a sweltering, steamy, Michigan heatwave; a couple hours past sundown…

At that pivotal moment, with the June Beetles repeatedly pinging against our patio door’s screen, this newly minted teenager was sitting across the dining room table from my well-versed in astrophysics father; savoring a fizzing, ice cold cola while rehashing the glum current events.

Eventually, my utter exasperation / revulsion re societal injustice, racism, sexism, classism, no-win endless wars, environmental ruin, etc. had culminated with my raw rant’s slew of Qs…

“I wonder what would happen were we to construct a spaceship to get the hell outta here? How tough would it be to get our journey to the stars off the ground? Would governmental mental misfits deny us a secure launch corridor thru American airspace? Or, attempt to appropriate our intellectual and actual property? Even bark out their ‘Blast ‘em out of the sky!’ command to the military?”

Next, in a sudden burst of inspiration, I began thumbnail theorizing; regarding the spacecraft tech capable of materializing wormholes; which in turn, would allow our crew to circumvent the Einsteinian posted speed limit of 299,792 km per second; to, ultimately, circumnavigate the universe.

Seeing how my questions had only been rhetorical; my notions theoretical, about all that was left to do, that night, was rise, yawn, stretch, shrug and wish my Dad pleasant dreams; and then head off to my own dreamland.

Well, by dawn’s early light, I found my father all smiles at the breakfast table as he said…

“Son, I’ve taken to heart virtually everything you spoke of, last night; so much so, I’ve already phoned my network of visionaries to schedule an impromptu meeting. And, seeing how you’ve amply demonstrated your own think-outta-the-box creds, I want you to skip school, today, so you, too, can meet with us.”

Well, my ability to view science in the abstract wound up “wowing” my dad’s associates; so much so, I soon became known as our team’s Abstract Artist (aptly nicknamed “Double A”). Of course, canvas and oils had nothing to do with the type of pictures I was “painting” for them. To cite an apt 21st century aside, I was more attuned to Jean-Luc Picard than Pablo Picasso.

My primary work assignments involved conceptualizing space-worthy hardware and ancillary devices; presenting these notions to my co-workers, who, in turn, would leap ‘em off their drawing boards; fast track ‘em into production; so much so, that it took less than a decade for our fully functional, starship, The Saucer to ace all its preflight tests; to be secreted within its under heavy guard, underground launch bay.

And, such nomenclature was quite fitting, too, considering this vehicle’s uncanny conformity to descriptions found within Sci-Fi literature, TV and films. Indeed, our extraordinary tech, namely, the Wormhole Wave Generator and The Shroud (akin to the Trekian Romulan Cloaking Device.) could’ve been easily, mistakenly deemed to be of “extraterrestrial origin”.

Quite the tale of two vastly disparate space programs, huh? On one hand, NASA was merely setting their Sixties era sites on lunar landings; on the other, our would-be astronauts were boldly training our crosshairs on deep space and whatever else we may encounter.

Naturally, to ensure that our mission would not die of old age and old ideas, our carefully considered crew manifest did boast a diverse, cross section of humanity; namely, the mens sana in corpore sano, intellectually curious, humane, superbly scrupulous young women and men; all committed to hand down, from generation to generation, our principles and scientific / technological expertise.

Our actual launch date was slated for 07/07/77 at 07:07 UTC. However, unbeknownst to us, we had a quisling within our ranks; one whose top priority was to muck up everything by sabotaging The Shroud, which would either totally scrub the launch or force our, in full view, departure from Earth. In other words, to leave us completely vulnerable to military attack.

My father had outed this traitor who, via a landline, was a mere syllable away from outing our launch bay’s actual latitude and longitude to government muckety-mucks. Even tho dad had severed the phone’s wire in the nick of time, that call, if traced, still could’ve afforded them our general vicinity, ergo, we deemed it imperative to deploy a decoy to lead any in hot pursuit entities in the totally opposite direction.

In a heartbeat, I had volunteered to take ‘em all on the proverbial wild goose chase; soon thereafter, spotting the flashing lights of multiple military vehicles and civilian cop cars; all emerging from the dust cloud seen in my rearview mirror. And, while my mission to mislead ‘em had allowed The Saucer to launch precisely on schedule (in full view) I, too, found myself (as expected) in the figurative rearview mirror (of our starship). By the by, our enemies did manage to haphazardly fire off several missiles, but to no avail. Ultimately, our tech had amply proven our brains over brawn superiority.

Over the course of the past forty plus years, I’ve never lost hope that our crew (now a blend of originals and descendants), would return for me; my belief remaining so passionate that I continued to unleash talents worthy of my “Double A” nickname; so much so, that my latest drawing-board-to-reality tech involves the RTC (Real Time Communicator).

The fact that these words are now posted @WordPress is proof that the RTC is now online aboard The Saucer. Ergo, unlike in the past, we’ll manage to regularly stay in touch with our recently assembled, top secret, skeletal, global network; our ground crew, who in turn, will stay connected to you, the worldwide reader.

Oh, how good it feels to say good riddance to the husks of humanity Trumpers who still flat out refuse to mask up / vaccinate during a deadly pandemic; who remain hellbent on overthrowing America / fighting AGAINST freedom; who are DYING to empower fascistic freaks who, in The End, WILL suck the life blood from the masses they oppress.

To wrap this up, I’ve now swapped out our dismal, decaying, devolving society for the glowing, growing alternative reality where I’m at liberty to explore the vast multiverse. Might there exist a deep space / otherworldly solution to our worldy ills? Perhaps even an improptu meeting to mind meld with our omniscient Creator?

Will we / can we, somehow, succeed? Stay tuned for my next update.

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I’ve Got Good & Bad (FAKE) News

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The FAKE Good News: Ten years ago, the Hans Nopkins University medical research team, headed by D. Lou Shunz, MD, pioneered an entirely new classification of therapeutics to totally eliminate the human aging process, hyper-evolve the immune system and bat shit crazy augment both organ and tissue regeneration. (Aside: Say bye-bye to toenail fungus!)

“Back in 2011, we began seeding the clouds, globally, with these super-meds, and, ever since, the rain and snowfall has done the rest. Make no mistake about it, by now, this process has totally enhanced all water supplies; hell, not even the most remote farms’ wells could’ve possibly escaped treatment. Every paradigm we’ve ever projected indicates the same. gradually accumulating super powers. Within six months, the first reports of our accomplishment shall begin to surface! The projected results are nothing short of astounding. I mean, only a Sci-Fi vaporizing ray gun blast could ever obliterate any human being.”

D. Lou Shunz, MD ~ 03/07/21

Shunz went on to reveal the name of the most prominent patient he has ever bio-engineered in the lab; namely, ruthless dictator wannabe Vladimir Limpdick.

The FAKE Bad News: Comrade Limpdick possesses the one and only arsenal of hand held ray guns / rifles. Additionally, having already ruthlessly and successfully hacked into our world’s top ten nuclear launch facilities, he now commands sufficient WMD to hold all 7.8 Billion of us humans hostage. Before the year is over, he intends to and will conquer the whole freakin’ human race.

FAKE Op-Ed: Hmm, how ironic that billions of immortal human beings will soon be condemned to eternity in a Fascist State.

BTW, a friendly reminder, you know, just in case you may have missed repeated usage of the word, FAKE, and this post’s headline:

THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO TRUTH TO ANYTHING YOU HAVE READ ABOVE.

Well, at least, to the best of our knowledge…

Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!

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Ashes for the Asholes!

 

Once upon a time… there lived a pathetic, churlish child; a bona fide, boneheaded bully, who, somehow, managed to masquerade / market himself as a grown-up.

Oh, how he loved to egg on bedlam and brutality on his playground; doing so by forcing his odious, oppressive self on whoever he singled out. Typically, that nasty bastard would, first, pit one faction against the other, next, incite riotous blood splattered brawls and, in the end, go online (ya know) just to get off while recounting and reliving the emotional misery, physical pain and inevitable carnage he had inflicted. Ofttimes, he’d end each of his thick with sadism Tweets ROFLMAO!

Sometimes he’d even bogusly boast that he was the Super Hero, who, just in the nick of time, with cape all aflutter, had swooped down to save the day!

Seeing how he had never, actually, done one lick of work in the real world, and coupling that issue with his state of arrested development, it shocked nobody when that freak would frequently wish aloud…

“I wanna be either a truck driver or a fireman when I grow up!”

Well, then came the day where fantasy, kinda sorta, met up with reality. Indeed, the little hellion even got to park his yuge keister behind the wheel of big, badass rig. Hell, he even got to TOOT-TOOT the horn!

Later that very night, with visions of vicious violence dancing and prancing within his twisted, warped little noggin, he actually dreamt in phantasmagoric magnitude, virtual reality. He was now the driver of a firetruck; not loaded with H²O, but instead with the highest octane gasoline ever refined. With each passing highway marker, he was nearing his destination: Blue City.

Upon arrival, he instantly spotted two diametrically opposed, infuriated factions. It was The Goods vs. The Goons; their bitter battle already in progress (uh, if progress is even the operative word, in play).

Coming to a screeching halt at the epicenter of that war zone, he leapt out of his firetruck, took aim and hosed down that entire metropolis. Just then, an ill-timed bolt of dry lightning (supercharged by climate change) crackled down from the sky. Whilst The Goons fled from the scene of their crime (ya know) in order to totally flout justice, nary one Good person survived and Blue City burnt to the ground.

For four fortnight, into early November, the ferocious conflagration spread all across that once great nation; only burning itself out when nary one combustible twig remained.

To the malevolent “victors”, The Goons, went the spoils of war; namely, Ashes for the Asholes!

The End

 

Stay Safe at Home! Stay Publicly Masked! Stay Healthy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Diarrhea of a Dictator

 

Once upon a time, within a homeland… hopefully, not like your own… there existed an amorphous 150kg / 330lb blob of ferociously fetid, fecal matter.

Owing to this dung heap’s proximity to a deregulation dilapidated, radiation spewing, nuclear waste dump and the multiple lightening strikes from an amped up by climate change, freakish thunderstorm, that oddly, orange hued lump soon was able to manifest its newfound superpowers, lickety-split, to take on, more or less, human attributes.

In essence, IT had become a shapeshifter and IT had become a HE and henceforth, HE became Dungy Dump. Alas, any other reports of any other resemblance to humankind would be greatly exaggerated, for he did not possess a humane disposition. In fact, ol’ Dump did not give a shit about anything… uh… anyone… other than himself. And so… it was what it was.

For one fortnight… to avoid the sunlight’s purifying rays… Dungy lumbered thru the inky darkness of night until he stumbled upon the shoreline of a nearby swamp… where he giddily slogged through the knee-deep muck and mire and even took mud baths.

It was shortly thereafter, when churlish Chad, the chairman of the Archconservative Political Party (whilst on a mission to bury subpoenaed, incriminating evidence), spotted a frenzied swarm of blue bottle flies heading southward.

As all buzzed on by, he bellowed out, “Hark yonder flies, where go thee?” The leader went into a circuitous holding pattern, just long enough to query back, in his gruff gangster growl, “Hey, yooze fuckin’ nose blind, ya jerk? Just take a whiff!”

Indeed, “Dr. Fly” (not his real name) could’ve been an ENT specialist and a shrink, too. Consider his instantaneous, spot-on diagnosis and intuitiveness… i.e., knowing he had met up with a totally impervious to corruption’s stench, shitty politician.

However, upon fine tuning and refocusing his olfactory talents, Chad finally caught wind of the situation. He muttered, “P.U., how the hell did I ever miss THAT?” He also exclaimed, “Oh shit! This should be fun!”

On foot, it took about an hour for him to finally wind up swapside. However, Chad and Dungy had no sooner introduced themselves when Chad sensed it’d been worth the trip. And, once they got to shootin’ the shit… as it were… they both knew it was love at first sight! The air about Dungy had so overwhelmed / enraptured Chad that he swooned and nearly passed out… especially whenever his newfound BFF spewed forth his verbal diarrhea… a veritable shitload of icky autocratic, sociopathic, misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic rhetoric.

Soon, arm-in-arm, they sauntered back into town, which just happened to be their nation’s Capital. Within one scant year, Dungy Dump’s gross, grotesque disposition and malodorous verbal diarrhea / dogma had so bowled over the masses, they too, had became noseblind… so much so that 51% of them first emboldened, next empowered him.

From that day onward… no questions ever allowed or ever asked… they’d eat up whatever shit Dungy Dump fed them… and asked for second heaping helpings, too.

The End

 

 

Stay Safe at Home! Stay Publicly Masked! Stay Healthy!

 

 

 

 

Breaking News! Raw Footage!

The Republican National Convention is slated to run from Monday, August 24 thru Thursday, August 27, 2020 in Charlotte, North Carolina (day 1) and at various other locations remotely (days 2–4).

While this blogger cannot disclose sources, I have obtained raw footage… REALLY raw footage… of presumptive nominees Donald J. Trump and Michael R. Pence practicing their upcoming convention acceptance speeches (during a sound check).

The in the field journalist and crew… this REALLY in the field team of professionals… should have appropriate medals pinned to their uniforms for braving inordinately odious / adverse conditions while snagging this Breaking News Exclusive!

Considering the magnitude of this stomach turning, turn of events (wink / wink –> ) I must now turn this matter over to the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the U.S. Department of Labor.

According to the latter federal agency, stringent rules and regs (re compensation), as set forth by Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), do expressly stipulate:

“Hazard pay means additional pay for performing hazardous duty or work involving physical hardship. Work duty that causes extreme physical discomfort and distress which is not adequately alleviated by protective devices is deemed to impose a physical hardship.”

Considering the disgusting, reeking manure, which our intrepid news gathering team had encountered, most assuredly, they’ve meet those FLSA standards, and as such, have all earned every, last damned penny of their hazard pay!

Gratitude and Kudos for an extraordinary job superbly done!

By the by, from the “Ahem” Department: This blog’s fake news is loosely based on a political joke, circa 1967, where (then) President Lyndon B. Johnson and (then) Vice President Hubert Humphrey were purportedly walking thru a Texas barnyard when, all the sudden, the latter, not really looking where he was going, first, encountered a cow pie and, next, quipped, “Look boss! I just stepped onto a Republican Platform!”

 

Stay Safe at Home! Stay Publicly Masked! Stay Healthy!