Imagine this; it’s cold out and it’s snowing like a blizzard. The roads are closed and it is a flurry of snow, and really heavy and wet snow. The sun is peaking out between the heavy and deep grey foggy clouds. And you are a kid.
No school. You get the day off.
Your mother is putting about in the kitchen, and doing her daily chores; ironing clothes, making dinner in the kitchen. The television was on, but the shows were boring. Just daytime soap operas, and some nonsense… nothing that us kids really wanted to watch.
But, we found a movie channel. Played decades old black and white Westerns, film noir and science fiction flicks.
My mother made us some grilled cheese sandwiches and a bowl of hot Campbell’s soup. This time my favorite: tomato, and she added some elbow noodles to thicken it up.
And Rocket-men from Planet X was playing in the background.
You never realize the perfection of the moments that we live. May you all appreciate the life that you are living at this moment.
Today…
America’s Fast Food Restaurants are EMPTY & OVERPRICED in 2026
So whats the gain for an American citizen in all these international tariffs now?
Nothing. Zip, nada, stuff all.
Trump’s tariffs have just put up the domestic consumer prices in the USA for all those imported products and imported components of US made products.
It’s crashed the U.S. corn market and the U.S. soy market (actually Trumps first tariff attempt in Trump 1.0 crashed the soybean sales to China). It’s also ruined US beef sales to China – they cancelled orders with 300 U.S. beef producers and now get more beef from Australia.
The tariffs have ruined fair trade with Canada and Mexico, their nearest neighbours, who are now starting to diversify away from trade with the USA.
John Deere, GM, GE, Ford and other international selling companies are moving out of the USA, because U.S. manufacturing is too expensive and this their competitiveness in world markets would reduce.
Korea is livid at Trump for his draconian attacks on Korean workers developing a new Hyundai plant in the USA, which would have created many U.S. jobs. That plant will not be employing Americans for a while, or never, now.
There are around 58,000 fewer manufacturing jobs in the US compared to Dec 2024.
So, employment down, prices and inflation up, US borrowing power reduced, international trade relationships trashed … and so it goes.
Trump is turning the USA into an isolationist country and wrecking the economy in the process.
How do WW2 soldiers mark locations for artillery to shoot?
A man in the field, a forward observer, was the eyes, he did not mark a spot for the guns to see.
The guns were miles away, they saw nothing but the numbers and the maps–The observer saw the enemy, he used a map, a compass, and his binoculars.
He quietly talked into a radio or a field telephone, gave grid coordinates, a simple string of numbers.
Sometimes, if maps were useless or the land was torn, he called for a smoke round.
A single puff of white phosphorus to give him a point to walk the shells from.
“Left one hundred, add fifty,” he would say.
His words moved the steel–It was not always precise, the first rounds were a guess, rugged calculation.
But a good observer, a man who knew the wind and the ground, could bring the fire down true–The accuracy was in the man, not the method. War is hard, men must adapt, find ways fast or die.
Ocean of Time
Written in response to: “Center your story around someone who has (or is given) the ability to time travel.“
Kristi Gott
“It’s the egg of an ancient creature. I found it. I was there.” Her voice bubbled with wonder and joy.
Wet and panting, the four-legged shadow that followed her everywhere, jumped around her, playing and twisting, wagging its tail.
“Kakahiaka Noe, Foggy Morning, good dog, come here, silly thing.” The young girl’s high pitched voice mingled with the sound of the waves.
Back at the village many serious eyes watched from the hill.
“What is this nonsense? Something needs to be done about this odd child. She is not like one of us. Where is her mother?”
One of the women spoke and several people nodded.
The mother stood a distance away, smiling, but her ears picked up their words.
She shrugged and continued with her own different thoughts.
“Oh, my delightful explorer, how I adore your curious nature, your stories of strange creatures, your playful visions, and your dancing mind.”
“You have inherited great, great, great-grandmother’s personality. She was a different one, and the legends about her tell of wondrous things.”
“They say she would disappear into morning sea mists and spiral through time to other worlds, then return to tell us about it.”
“We thought she was a gifted storyteller, but there were some who secretly whispered the tales were so detailed they must be true.”
“My mother and her mother, generations of mothers, believed the stories were real.”
Years ago, the girl began dragging branches on the beach to make designs. She created spirals in the sand at low tide, and they were washed away by the next high tide.
The mother saw it was time to give her child a new name.
“Daughter, your artwork is washed away, like time itself, and the ocean takes it to the deep seas. Your new name will be Kai o ka Manawa, “Ocean of Time.” We can call you Kai for short.”
Today ten year old Kai o ka Manawa, Ocean of Time, ran, leaping and splashing, across the bay’s tidepools near the towering rock mountain of the sleeping volcano.
Millions of years ago, ancient ancestors of the creatures living there now roamed.
A rare few people in later times got to visit, see, and experience the ancients.
Only those whose natural abilities still survived early childhood cultural pressures could see the visions, follow them, and glide through the spirals of time.
Kai o ka Manawa, Ocean of Time, was born with the ability to move through the tides of time, seeing other creatures and worlds, and experiencing ancient life that others only heard about in legends.
Kai’s uncut hair flew behind her like dark clouds in the night, the strands trailing in the ocean’s gusty wind, and her toes sprang and bounced across the sand.
The creature she first saw from her hut at breakfast now moved in and out of the morning marine layer, near the pale edge of the waves creeping up the beach.
Kai’s four-legged companion’s pointed ears stood up like sharp mountain peaks. His tail streamed behind him. The eyes flashed. The grayish tan fur rippled.
When Kai’s mother spoke about Kai she would say, “She’s always been extra sensitive…to loud sounds and bright light…she has strong reactions…her mind is not like ours.”
“I love that child more than anything…but her ways make my days go up and down…I try to think of her as part rascal and part beautiful wild thing.”
“What is she seeing that we cannot see?” Another villager tilted his head, drew his eyebrows together, and squinted into the dawn mists.
Earlier, the girl ate dried fish and broth made of ground acorns, shellfish, and hand-picked herbs for breakfast.
In the dark before dawn, hints of brightening changed the sky above the huts near the beach.
To the west, near the shore, rose the living being made of rock in the shape of a six hundred foot tall dome.
Morning stars and a half moon still shed some light on the giant rock mountain. The moisture-laden mists moved in shapes floating around it.
“I see something! There it is again!” The young girl cried out. She set down her tightly woven reed basket of warm broth. Then she jumped up from the orange embers of the low fire in the sandy soil.
“What? I don’t see anything. Child, what is it?” Her mother’s calls were lost in the salty air breezes, and the girl disappeared into the dim light and wispy fog.
“I must be losing my sight in this dawn light. Seeing things that cannot be,” the mother’s voice muttered.
“First I see her running…then she seems to be two figures, a row of figures…then she disappears.”
“And…here is her cloak left on the ground…but where did she go?”
The girl chased the creature she had seen in the distance on the estuary beach.
The bulky animal shape was taller than three or four people and had four tusks. It was a Mastodon from millions of years ago.
It all started when the child was very young.
Grabbing a piece of driftwood, the tiny child began making pictures in the sand when she could barely walk.
Then, growing larger and more steady, she dragged branches with twigs attached across the wet sand at low tide.
Circles and spirals with paths connecting them appeared.
“It looks like our spirals of time,” said the village grandmothers and grandfathers. “Like our paintings in the caves.”
“It is in spirals because the seasons circle from the darkest, shortest day to the brightest, longest day of sun, going round and round.”
“Yes,” said one grandfather. “And…always going forward like a moving spirals.
“But what puzzles me are the creatures she draws. They are so vivid and detailed.” One young woman’s pierced the morning air.
“I have seen her sleeping and dreaming at night, tossing, turning. Who knows what she is seeing.” One person added another observation.
Now the villagers looked at the heavy, smooth egg shape the girl carried when she staggered back to the huts.
“Mama. A giant egg, from an ancient creature. I went through the mists of time and brought this back with me.”
The villagers chuckled, but they also rolled their eyes.
“We need to expel this odd child before she influences the other children,” said one of the other mothers. “I don’t want my children playing with her.”
One week the villager’s mutterings got worse. They were planning a way to drive away Kai o ka Manawa, Ocean of Time, and her mother.
Kai’s mother packed bags of clothing, dried food and herbs.
“Who knows what we will find when we get where we are going,” she thought.
The next morning Kai and Kakahiaka Noe, Foggy Morning the dog, looked toward the misty beach.
“I’m going with you, Kai, and we are not coming back.” Her mother spoke quietly.
Kai looked with wide eyes at her mother.
“I have heard what they are saying, Mother. Yes, we will go. To another time and place. But all will be well. I already have friends there.”
The villagers were too busy to notice Kai, her mother, and her dog, Foggy Morning, disappearing into the marine layer where the sea met the sand.
That night, they did not return.
But sometimes the villagers thought they saw pale silhouettes dancing and playing joyfully on the beach in the early dawn, with a dog leaping and twisting.
Is Putin’s decision to invest $1 trillion into the Russian Army a wise choice?
Even at current war-spending levels, Russia is spending 1/8 on its military what the US is $pending. WHY is that, when the US is protected by two large oceans?? WHY the $1 trillion plus American military budget? NO way in hell is that money being spent to defend United States territory. Our beloved veterans are, in fact, Washington’s thugs, and some have the missing limbs and brainwashed minds to prove it. Chances are 99.9 percent they lost those limbs in the Eastern hemisphere, far from America’s shores.
The $1 trillion in additional Russian spending is spread over the coming decade. Military spending in EU countries is also up — up 37 percent from 2021 levels. I submit that Russian increases in spending are a reaction to EU’s pledges to man up. What a titanic waste of resources, of wealth!
As Swiss Intelligence Col. Jacques Baud recently remarked, “What you have to do is security by cooperation rather than security by confrontation….The security of one country cannot be at the expense of the security of another country. ”
“The broad picture is that the one half of 1 percent is controlling increasing amounts of capital. They farm that capital out to these capital management companies which have doubled in size in the past 5 years. The top 10 of them control 50 trillion dollars. That’s 50,000 billions worth of money. And they’re investing it everywhere in the world. This concentrated wealth manages everything, controls everything, and we have very little say. Whoever we elect as President, it’s not gonna make any difference, because they are managed by capital. They are there to protect global capital. That’s what the American political system is all about, that’s what the political systems in the West are about. They see capital as the vital interest of the West. And that’s why we have military bases all over the world, to protect capital and to assure that debts get repaid and that this capital continues to grow and expand.” ~Dr. Peter Philips, Sonoma State
Quick and Easy Chicken Paprikash
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients
- 1 (8 ounce) package egg noodles
- Cooking spray
- 1 pound boned skinned chicken breasts, chopped
- 8 ounces fresh mushrooms, quartered
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon pepper
- 3/4 cup fat free, reduced sodium chicken broth
- 1 (8 ounce) carton low fat sour cream
- 1 tablespoon paprika
Instructions
- Cook noodles according to package directions, drain and butter noodles and keep warm.
- Coat a skillet with cooking spray; place over medium high heat until hot. Add chicken and next 3 ingredients. Cook for 5 minutes.
- Add broth. Reduce heat, and simmer 5 minutes or until chicken is done.
- Remove from heat and stir in sour cream and paprika.
- Spoon over noodles. Sprinkle with additional paprika, if desired.
Attribution
Posted by bettyboop5050 at Recipe Goldmine 6/8/01 10:16:42 am.
Flowers Bloom In Desolate Places
Written in response to: “Write about a character who has to grapple with something completely alien to them.“
Jed Cope
Legend has it that once every hundred years, the flower emerges from the desert sands and shines more brightly than the sun. Quite how this story came about, no one knows, for it is an unlikely tale and were it to be true, surely none who witnessed the flower in all of its heavenly glory would survive to recount its brief but wondrous visitation in the harshest of lands.
A legend, a flight of fancy, or an impossible dream? Ser Philip believed that he saw beyond the unlikely veneer of such fancies. He knew that the Heaven Flower was his destiny, or at least a part of it. He had heard the story in a far-flung tavern and it had enraptured him. This tale of a mythical flower was a beginning. The much delayed start of his own story. He would find the Heaven Flower and in finding it he would discover the meaning of his life, perhaps even the meaning of life itself. Once his eyes were opened to the existence of such a wonder, his life’s purpose would be clear.
When young Philip was a squire, there had been another flower. That delicately delightful flower had been a slip of a girl called Miranda. The two of them had been inseparable and although neither of them had ever voiced the words that approached the promise that lay between them, it had been there all the same. These two were meant for each other. Two peas in a pod. The fair lady and her devoted knight.
Then one day, a terrible blight had visited the land and Miranda had been plucked from the earth and discarded as though she were but a single blade of inconsequential grass. Ser Philip had heard the dread news of his love’s demise, but refusing to believe it, he had returned immediately from the tourney in a neighbouring kingdom. His desertion of his master-knight had earnt him a sound thrashing, but he felt not a blow as he succumbed to a state of terrible numbness following his audience with the cold and waxy thing that Miranda had become. Having lost the spark of life that she had harboured so perfectly and beautifully, she was a sickening reminder of what had once been and now could never be.
Amongst the rumours of that night were whispers of a dark and foreboding visitation. A man who was not a man stalking the ramparts of the castle before darting inside to take Miranda away forever. These stories could be nothing more than tall-tales. The wasted words of scoundrels and gossip mongers. The truth was not in those words, for no man could enter the castle, commit such an abominable deed and then slip away undetected. Not unless he had wings and had flown onto ramparts.
After Miranda’s death, Ser Philip was never the same. Some say that a part of him died on that fateful day. A pitiful, sad and heartbroken sacrifice to his one true love. Nevertheless, he committed himself to the life of squire and then of knight. Never was there a more proficient warrior, but he lacked for something and that lack was apparent. No fire burned within him and his heart was but a dull and grey organ, reluctantly pumping his barely warm blood around his still grieving body.
It would seem that the quest for the fabled Heaven Flower was perhaps an attempt to rekindle this flame of his, not that he could or would admit this to himself, let alone anyone else. Ser Philip was a taciturn and insular man. He had withdrawn from those around him when he was still a boy and was never for changing.
When he broke the news of the quest to his faithful squire, Daniel, the man was crestfallen. Never having cut the mustard or made the grade, Daniel was never going to hold his own standard, only the flag of his master-knight. Squires are boys, and Daniel had never grown up. What he lacked was not only maturity, but also the gumption to work beyond the bare minimum. He had gravitated towards Ser Philip, because this knight was so obviously lost and his lack of lustre almost matched Daniel’s. They deserved each other, at least as far as Daniel was concerned. This consideration of the quiet and undemanding knight helped perpetuate the denial of his own sloth and laziness.
Daniel kept a firm grasp of his lackadaisical ways even upon receipt of his new instructions. He was in no rush to go adventuring. This was not what he had expected from this knight, but now all was a-change. What Daniel could not understand was Ser Philip’s delivery of the news of their mission. The man himself remained cold and monotone. There was no excitement here. This was not the spirit of adventure. It was more like a visit to a grim and dour maiden aunt out of a sense of duty, and with no more than a thimbleful of devotion. There was no roar and there was no vim and vigour, and so Daniel felt all at sea. Confused and worried at what the future held. He didn’t want to go into the night and to do so quietly troubled him to a point of delirium.
Nonetheless, Ser Philip set out the very next day and seeing that he had little alternative, Daniel followed. Even as he trailed behind his master-knight, Daniel considered his options. Those options depressed him being the ignominy of dishonour having failed his master-knight and the subsequent derision and exile from polite company and all other company for that matter. He would starve as he began to freeze to death. He stopped short of thinking about how his life choices were not helping him right now. His adoption of the maxim do the bare minimum, left him with few skills and abilities and the truth of his existence was that no other knight would put up with such a scruff of a slob.
Daniel sighed.
Ser Philip did not acknowledge the sigh even though his training as a warrior had heightened his senses and made him aware of far more than most would attend to. The man was all focus, more so in his embracing the quest that he had been made for. This was what he had been waiting for all his life. Everything before now had been mere practice. All of it. He had built himself into a knight worthy of this task and he was ready. Ready to be tested. He found that he was relishing his being tempered in the fires of this quest. Daniel missed the hint of a smile on his master-knight’s face as they rode onwards.
Following a long and arduous journey, the two stopped in the small town of Santa Cruz. The town was so small and lacking in the luxuries that Daniel had been looking forward to that he could not bring himself to consider it to be a village, let alone a town. This was to be the last civilisation that they would encounter before they entered the desert itself. A sun-bleached outpost that hinted at what was to come.
Having secured provisions and a room for the night, Ser Philip afforded Daniel the freedom of the town for the remainder of the evening, preferring himself to sip at his carafe of water and contemplate the trials to come.
“Yeah, thanks for nothing,” Daniel grizzled as he ambled off in search of whatever it was the locals drank to forget this hell hole, music to drown out the sound of the complaining and moaning voices in his head and the company of a woman to help him remember that he was a man and not a spare pack horse.
Eventually, he found a place that sold drink. A woman who had seen better days and better teeth grinned at him as she poured him the cloudy drink that they brewed in these parts. The liquid looked like milk that had been contaminated in unspeakable ways. It tasted worse than it looked, but there was the familiar scorching of alcohol, so it would have to do.
“Leave the bottle,” he told the woman, sliding a coin across the table towards her in favour of handing her the coin. He did not relish the prospect of physical contact with her. Later, two thirds of the way down the bottle, he would change his mind and he would more than relish it, having asked her about the possibility of younger versions of herself, weighing up the pros and cons of those bad teeth compared to the gnashers of his mule. He never stopped to consider just how much of the vile fermented milk drink the woman had had to consume before she considered laying with him to be a good idea.
UP!
Daniel dreamt the word, but he felt the slap outside of his dreams, struggling to unglue his gummy eyes and attach meaning to his senses, he squirmed on the straw lined crib.
“I said up!” cried Ser Philip, “the day has long dawned you useless bag of skin!”
Daniel opened his eyes in time to see the face of his master-knight moving into clear and intimate view. Ser Philip had a hold of his shirt and had hauled him to a sitting position, “you are here to serve me, you drunken son of a weak minded goat! If you fail me, I will use your arse to sharpen my lance!”
Daniel’s eyes were now as wide as plates and he was nodding feverishly, the possibility of a hangover now rescheduled to another life, “yes, Ser! Right you are, Ser! Right away, Ser!”
Ser Philip growled.
Daniel bolted across the room and was a one-man hive of activity. He had never seen Ser Philip like this. The man had been transformed overnight. A furnace had been lit and now, Daniel was the squire of a master-knight in the mould of the knights of old. This was a force to be reckoned with. The proverbial one man army. It was said that a master-knight in his prime was worth a thousand foot soldiers or more, Daniel no longer doubted this. Not one bit.
The sun beat down upon them as they left Santa Cruz. Daniel did not look back, he did not dare. He would not risk being found lacking. All the same, he felt eyes upon him and knew that one pair of those eyes were those of the old woman. He envisioned her and as her face came to mind he felt a pang. He would not exactly miss her, but she was the symbol of the life he was leaving and he was already missing that.
He doubted he would return, and that gave him a moment of morose contemplation.
The desert swallowed them up and the heat built and built. The horse and mule gave forth with sad utterances. Those sounds chilled Daniel as he watched Ser Philip’s back. The master-knight was a statue. Their progress in the deep and unrelenting sands was slow, but Ser Philip was relentless. He had set himself against this place and the fierce sun, and he was not for faltering.
That night, Daniel shivered in the inexplicable, creeping cold. His body had been cooked all day, but when the sun slipped away so did all of the heat. There was a short period of relief from the trials and tribulations of the day, but then the cold seeped into him and he battled the terror of his limbs becoming numb and never returning to him. All the same, sleep eventually took his exhausted form.
The morning came via rude motion. Ser Philip shook the man like a terrier shakes a rat in his jaws. They were up and away in a matter of moments, Daniel chewing on dried meat that took the moisture from his mouth and left his mouth dry for the rest of the day.
His eyes hurt, but the hurt went well beyond his eyes. There was a trick being played here. The featureless desert was a never ending expanse of nothingness, and yet it was doing something to his eyes. It was latching onto them and now the contours of sand were bending this way and that, twisting his mind out of shape. He felt his breath becoming laboured and he would have cried if he had any tears left in his head. The sun had taken them long ago. He felt his lips cracking and bleeding as his mouth formed the shape of a silent scream. Then his mule stumbled and he fell unceremoniously to the sands.
A merciful shadow fell over him. He felt it and opened his eyes, “we’ll have to walk from here,” Ser Philip told him.
“I can’t,” Daniel told him, and he thought he might even mean it. The sun and burning sands had leeched his life from him and now, as he lay there, he didn’t think he had it in him to get up. He was dead barring a few minor technicalities.
“Then you are dead,” Ser Philip told him, as though he had read the man’s broiled mind.
Daniel nodded, it would be blissful to close his eyes and drift into sleep. He was a man who had always been fond of sleep and he was reconciled with a demise that was as simple and easy as easing himself into slumber.
Ser Philip curtly returned the nod and walked away. There was nothing to be done. He could not help his squire, unless his squire helped himself.
Leaving his dying horse and carrying what provisions he could, the knight walked deeper into the desert. Later, were a hawk to fly over the corpse of the squire, it would see several interlaced circles of foot prints. The delirious man had tried to leave the desert, but had not managed to get more than a few yards from his deceased mule. Soon enough, the both of them would be nothing more than a few bleached bones that would in time be swallowed up by the sands of the desert.
Now, time lost all meaning for Ser Philip. He travelled in the bosom of the infinite and with every step, he shed an unnecessary piece of himself. As he did so, he found an inner peace that spoke to him of the simplicity of an existence uncluttered by the noise and nonsense that people accumulate and draw to themselves in a foolhardy attempt at defending them from the truth of who they really are.
At the point at which his provisions were exhausted, Ser Philip saw things for what they were and he let go of the last of the things he had valued and in that moment, he understood.
This was the quest.
He was the quest.
He had needed the desert to strip it all away. To take from him all that was not needed. Now he was pure.
Was he the bloom?
He thought that might be the case, and yet he walked some more, for walking was good. The simple act of putting one foot in front of the other and creating the momentum of life.
That was when he saw it. In the dying embers of the sun, the single stem and the closed bud of a flower. He knew it for what it was. He ran towards it, shedding what little clothes he still wore. Barely aware that he was doing so, but understanding that he must be naked in the presence of such beauty. He bore himself towards the miracle on feet that barely touched the sand, his heart filled with an elation that threatened to burst it.
Then his way was blocked.
A bewinged armour clad knight barred the way. The impossible was being denied by the improbable. Ser Philip did not falter and he did not slow, he launched himself at the dread warrior and grappled with he would deny him everything. He fought with an inhuman strength that was matched by the anonymous warrior, and as they wrestled with each other, Ser Philip experienced a growing desire to know who it was that he was locked in battle with. As this curious desire grew, so did his unease. This built and built until he knew that he must unmask his foe. He must discover the identity of the enemy who would deny him everything, but try as he might, he could not get his hand to the visor of that helmet.
The two of them fought and fought until the sun returned, and not once did Ser Philip see the face of his adversary, nor did he catch a glimpse of the fabled Heaven Flower. The sun rose and he knew that he had precious little time left to him, and so he gave everything he had left, he tore at the man before him using every ounce of strength he had left to him. He committed himself and his last breath to the defeat of this man and in one glorious moment he grasped the visor of the helmet and tore if open.
In that moment he saw everything, and he understood it all.
He froze in the rising desert sun, gazing down upon the bloom and the glory of the rare and precious Heaven Flower consumed him.
The CHINA they would NEVER show you! America FAILED! (shocked in China!)
What is the one decision that completely changed your life?
I owe this decision to my father.
Daddy taught Sunday School. Saturday, I was sure to find him tucked away in the den studying the lesson and reading the Scripture that it referred to. I didn’t wish to disturb him but I wanted a book I left there. I picked up my book and was about to leave when he stopped me.
No matter how many times we read a long book, there is always something new to learn or reinforce. He patted the space beside the sofa and I sat down. He shifted the Bible near me and pointed to something printed at the bottom of the page. At some point long ago, Daddy had underlined it.
As my eyes traveled across the sentence, I realized Daddy had practiced this my entire life. This is what the sentence said: Encouragement can change someone’s life.
I was about this age at the time of the story. Photo Furnished By Kathy Pennell
When my three siblings sailed through math that looked like hieroglyphics to me, Dad assured me I was good at many things. When I bumped into a fence while Dad was teaching me to drive he remained silent with his eyes focused forward and allowed me to determine how to back up and start again.
In our entire lives, Daddy never criticized because children know when they’ve blown it. They don’t need to be reminded. He took every opportunity to praise or find something positive to say about what we did no matter how minor.
Encouragement is a powerful tool and it can change someone’s life. I wonder if we wouldn’t do well to consider this.
Pictures
What is the strategy of Putin, what does he want to do with Russia and the whole world?
In Ulyanovsk Oblast, Russia, a monument to the legendary and mega popular animated cartoon series “Masha & The Bear” was installed. It is a masterful work of village drunks.
The adorable cartoon couple of hyperactive Masha and sluggish Bear practices what on the surface looks like an “untraditional relationship” because bear is not human. But that’s OK.
MangaLIB portal has been shut down and fined by a Russian court over a manga that shows an “untraditional relationship” between a snake and a girl.
This manga has been banned in Russia because it portrays a relationship between a woman and a snake.
Bear is different because snake isn’t endemic to temperate forest environment unlike the bear and therefore he cannot have a relationship with our women.
Masha wears a grass skirt, a skimpy top and a chef hat. She plucked out all of her eyebrows and wears her hair short due to all the stress from dealing with a bear.
The Bear is in his natural state, no clothes. He dominates physically and in height as he’s a protector and defender of traditional family values.
In Russia, women often say that they’d rather live with a bear than with a man who doesn’t have a car and doesn’t make more than one million rubles a month.
This explains the popularity of the cartoon series where a girl actually lives with a bear and loving it. And even more importantly the state elderlies consent that this is a traditional couple and builds statues to praise their love.
Behind the traditional couple, there’s silver figure of Vladimir Lenin, the leader of Communist Revolution. He fought on the side of the oppressed – proletariat (although there was no proletariat in Russia, only peasants) to defeat the oppressors – bourgeois, that is middle class, those who’d rather work in the office and have migrants do all the dirty work.
Very soon what happened in our country is that the oppressed became the oppressors and other oppressed got oppressed even more than before.
The winners in that slaughterhouse was Lenin who moved into an exiled oligarch’s mansion and drove oligarch’s car and his Bolshevik friends who shot anyone who vaguely disagreed with them. It went on for over thirty years and was only interrupted by World War Two, and then by the death of Stalin.
Upon closer observation I noticed manicure with each nail painted in different color. Masha appears to be pregnant. The bear doesn’t know that Masha cheated with Chinese dragon. Being of a university student age, Masha can apply for a pregnancy bonus, as three thousand students have done this year, and collect 90,000 rubles. No paternity test necessary.
The bear looks predatory and aggressive with his mouth wide open revealing sharp teeth. As Masha is dressed up in the colors of the Ukrainian flag, this statue can be interpreted as Russian bear is gobbling up a young sovereign state. Can’t get more traditional than that these days.
The Phantom Planet
Descendant
Written in response to: “Center your story around someone who has (or is given) the ability to time travel.“
C.B. Tannon
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Somewhere in Space, Year 3072
Hark was tense in the pilot’s seat. He closed his third eyelids for total darkness and imagined his crew was back and safe, Si by his side. He felt a moment of peace. But pings from the Nexus’s automated operations disturbed that almost immediately. He lifted his opaque lids with a sigh and looked out the panoramic window through his shaded secondary lids, allowing him to view the spacescape. Zantanor’s twin suns were soft golden orbs in a sky the shade of unbuffed steel, while red Zantanor itself bulged from his right. Along the curve of the planet’s shadow, distant stars were revealed in a crescent of cosmos. If Si were with him her face would be scrunched in a squint, her one-lidded Earthian eyes straining behind those peculiar glass eyeshades.
The Nexus emitted an alarm and the knot in Hark’s gut tightened. He scanned the Nexus’s modelled computations, projected in a holograph before him. He needed Si here to make full sense of the matrix – to him the simulated neural pathways meant little, except that the Nexus was deep in “thought”. But the Nexus wasn’t relaying output, and he knew enough to know that there should be output.
‘Nexy? Where’s your output?’
The Nexus didn’t respond, but the matrix shifted formation before switching back to its previous state. Almost like it was preoccupied. Hark furrowed his brow.
‘Nexy, tell me what function you are currently performing.’
Nothing.
He operated the holographic dash rapidly, cutting off two of the smaller supplementary neural cores powering the Nexus’s intelligence. Pathways in the matrix faded as it simplified.
‘Okay Nexy. Don’t act up on me now,’ he said softly. He expelled a deep sigh. ‘Show me the crew’s locations on the surface.’ There was a pause before the Nexus replied, ‘Certainly.’ The holograph flickered and displayed the surface of Zantanor in a semi-transparent blue gradient. On the surface, the desolate planet was an arid flatland, with only small rises and the odd cropping of rock, but below was a complex series of interconnected tunnels, many flowing with an unknown liquid. A cluster of blue dots moved along one of the subterranean paths. As Hark watched, one of the dots split off from the other four, moving faster, as if running. He opened comms.
‘Team. Who just left the group?’
There was a pause of static before Captain Lorem responded. ‘It’s Si.’ The Captain’s voice quivered slightly. ‘She bolted. Whatever is down here, Hark…it’s powerful, even if it’s not mobile. We can…feel it.’
Hark gripped the edges of the control panel.
‘Your vital signs suggest extreme discomfort, Pilot Harkin,’ the Nexus said.
‘Cut the diagnostics, Nexy. Prime the thrusters. We’re going down.’
Hark steered the ship towards the haze of ochre dust swirling just above Zantanor’s surface. As the ship approached the nearest tunnel mouth to the crew, a strange humming began. A sort of stilted, discordant symphony of pulses. ‘What’s that?’ Hark asked the ship.
‘Transmission from an unknown source, sir,’ the Nexus told him.
‘What does that mean? What’s it saying?’
‘It is not speech, sir. The data is not communicable through language.’
‘So…what is it? Is it coming from a ship? A handheld device? A building?’
‘You misunderstand. It is not a technological device sending the transmission.’
A sweat broke over Hark and he was soon sealed in a cold film of it. He didn’t have time for this. He needed to take action to find Si. Ensure she was safe. ‘What then, what is it? Tell me!’
‘The information database I have access to is comprised of uploaded knowledge and the data I have obtained from input into the Nexus since I was created. I do not have a term for what is sending the transmission.’
‘Analyse and come to the most likely conclusion as to what is emitting the signal.’ No matter how advanced, it seemed AI could never detect tone – in this case, urgency.
‘What variables would you like me to include in this analysis?’
‘All of them!’ he yelled. ‘Everything about the situation. Just analyse, dammit!’
‘I will perform the analysis to the best of my abilities, but I would point out that this is a profoundly flawed process. It will not be fast, and the lack of rigorous parameters may yield inaccurate outcomes.’
Hark practically barked at the Nexus. ‘How long will it take?’ He ran his fingers through his lank hair.
‘Average processing time for performing analyses is 9 seconds. This may take between 55 to 65 seconds, several standard deviations more than mean processing time. Verifying if this extended timeframe is accepta–’.
‘JUST DO IT!’ Hark roared.
‘Requesting access to all neural cores.’
‘Granted.’ A loading bar appeared on his holo-screen. 58 seconds later, Nexus informed him the analysis was complete.
‘Tell me with as little fluff as possible, Nexy.’
‘The outcome of my analysis suggests the source of the transmission is an approximation of life.’
He choked on air. ‘Life?’ The Commander had told them there was no life on Zantanor. ‘How? Where is it? Why did we not pick it up?’
‘Perhaps it would help you understand if this lifeform was framed as consciousness, untethered from any material form that you associate with living. Yet its ability to communicate suggests it is alive.’
‘Well what the hell is it trying to communicate?’
‘I believe it desires a material form to inhabit.’
It wanted a body. ‘Show me its location. Now.’
The holographic map zoomed out until the whole planet of Zantanor showed, its dense maze of tunnels highlighted in electric blue. Suddenly Hark could see it: a matrix of interconnected pathways, not dissimilar to the Nexus’s model. Its location was throughout the whole planet.
‘Nex, is there any way to get through to Si’s comms?’
‘Si’s comms are still connected, sir.’
‘Si! SI!’ Hark yelled into the interface, knowing it made no difference to the reception of sound. ‘Answer me Si!’
Equilibrium Wellness Hub, Earth, Present Day
‘Malcolm Carey? Come in. How are you today?’
Malc gave a neutral grunt and entered the small room. His eyes flickered over it. He sniffed the air. He expanded his senses, finding no hint of residual preternatural energy.
‘Take a seat.’ The therapist held a palm towards two low cushioned chairs across from a single one. Malc looked from left to the right. Was this was some sort of test? He could sit directly across from the therapist, or at a more adjacent angle. He chose the one across and settled in.
‘I want to get right to the point, Doc. The reason I’m here, I mean.’
‘Just Seth is fine, please,’ he said, taking the seat opposite Malc. There was a soft smile on his lips. He had enough thinning grey hair left to comb it across his head in a dignified fashion and a prominent forehead that looked like a miniature plowed field. Two bushels of white eyebrows sat above the rim of his spectacles. His eyes were calm, still, seeming to capture all in their scope with Malc in the centre. He interlaced his fingers on his crossed legs. ‘You want to be direct. Good. Tell me why you came here.’
‘Well, first, what happens if you decide I’m cracked, psychotic, cuckoo or something?’
‘I’ll refer you for psychiatric evaluation.’
‘And would I have to go?’
‘No.’
‘Hm.’ Malc sat back and clasped his hands together. ‘I’ve been having visions recently. No history prior.’
‘You say visions, not hallucinations. Why?’
‘I guess just the feel, y’know.’
He nodded understandingly. ‘Can you describe “the feel”?’
Malc paused. ‘Like I’m experiencing something really happening. It’s like…an unquestioned assumption that it’s real. I’m seeing out of a woman’s eyes, I can feel her mind, and I know she believes she exists. When I come back, no matter how long the vision feels, only moments have passed, but I’m left with a…I dunno. A concrete knowledge that it was a reality occurring somewhere.’
‘Is there a consistent setting or theme to these visions?’
Here was the true litmus test for whether the therapist thought he was mentally broken or not. ‘Yeah. Space. Other planets.’
Seth remained silent, pensive. The silence stretched. Eventually, his all-encompassing gaze roved and centred on the room’s one tall window overlooking a parking lot two stories down. ‘On your application, you said you were a private investigator. Tell me more about that. What type of cases do you investigate?’
‘Uhhm. Well. All sorts, really.’
He looked back at Malc and leaned forward slightly. ‘Let’s cut to the chase, Malcolm. I knew since you came in you were not my average client. It’s a sense I have. You might know the sense I’m talking about.’
Malc narrowed his eyes. ‘I investigate abnormal cases,’ he said cautiously. ‘Ones where there’s no conventional or rational explanation.’
‘I’ve worked with your type before. The gifted.’ Malc found himself re-evaluating Seth’s sharp gaze. But if the man could use magic, he could sense none of it. ‘Tell me every detail of your latest vision.’
‘That…may bring one on. Even thinking about her draws me to them. I’m resisting one right now.’
‘Don’t. You said only a brief period of time passes when they occur.’
‘Yes, but I could feel like I’m in it for hours!’
‘Malcolm.’ He removed his glasses and looked at Malc and nothing else. ‘People like you don’t end up here by coincidence. This is important. Go into the vision. Why waste time and money on more sessions before we do this anyway? We’ll have to anyhow, if for nothing more than to resolve the visions themselves.’
‘Yeah, seventy bucks a session…’. He shook his head. ‘Fine.’ Malc closed his eyes and let his consciousness drift out of his material form. It siphoned from his body as easily as water swirling down a drain.
#
A needle punctured Si in the crook of the elbow. She cringed, expecting pain, but realized she could feel no pain, anywhere. She could barely feel her body at all. With great effort she heaved her head up and felt a foggy sense of alarm when she saw not a needle puncturing her arm, but a luminescent tendril or vine of some sort. Despite her numbness, she felt a vague sensation of the stuff creeping up her neck and slithering into her ears. She realized she was lying cupped in a swathe of the root-like tendrils, yet she was strangely calm, as if even her emotions were numbed. She introspected some more, seen as outwardly she had little control over things. She felt a current of melancholy fuelled by a sense of desolate loneliness. But…she wasn’t alone. Where were the others? she wondered, with a lethargic curiosity as to their whereabouts. As if hearing her thoughts, Hark’s voice sounded in her ear.
‘Si, are you there? Please respond.’ She felt something at the sound of his desperate voice in her earpiece. Hope. Love. But muted, unimportant. Also, relief – at least she could talk to Hark in her final moments.
‘Hark,’ she managed to rasp.
‘Si! The others are searching for you. Where are you?’
‘Hark,’ she repeated. ‘I love you.’ It came out a faint whisper.
Captain Lorem spoke over the comms, voice strained. ‘Si! We’re trying to resist this thing’s pull. O’Malley had to restrain Little Mech. I’m staying here with Mech while O’Malley comes for you, she has the strongest resistance to whatever is drawing us. Listen to Hark’s directions so you can find each other.’
All Si could think about was how she wanted Hark to tell her he loved her, in case it was the last thing she heard. Instead, O’Malley’s crass Irish accent came on the line, eager to capitalize on any chance to disparage Mech, no matter the circumstances in which the opportunity presented itself.
‘Little Mike the Mech should’ve stayed on Nexy, fiddling with wires and whatnot. I’m coming for you Si, hold on lad.’
Si couldn’t help but grin through gritted teeth – everyone was a “lad” to O’Malley. ‘Leave me. Not worth the risk,’ she told O’Malley.
‘Si, we are not leaving you. We’ll find you,’ Hark said.
‘Just say it back, Hark. In case it’s the last thing I hear.’
There was nothing for a moment and then his voice came on the line, taut and emotional. ‘I love you, Si. Please, hold on.’
Then there was a voice inside her head, a male voice. Si? Get up.
‘I can’t,’ she replied instinctively.
‘You can’t what?’ Hark said. ‘Si, describe your surroundings.’
Great. You can hear me. If you want to see that guy again, not just hear his voice, listen and do as I say.
An older male voice spoke. Take that thing out of your arm. It’s sedating you.
What the hell? You’re here? The first voice.
I came along for the ride. The older man’s voice was calm and assured. Let’s give her a hand.
Si felt her body energize. Focus the old voice told her, and she felt a boost of acuity. She fumbled at the tendril embedded in her arm and managed to grip it. She squeezed and jerked and it came out with a spurt of blood. She groaned, finally feeling pain. A huge, dull, growing pain.
The two voices spoke in unison. Up.
Up she got. The tendrils clung and then gave way, sliding out of her ears wetly. The basket she was cupped in reacted, trying to seize her.
Weapon? the younger man asked. She grasped at her hip for her pulser, ripped it free and fired into the tendrils beneath her, which recoiled with a collective writhing. She scrambled away, falling to her hands and knees. She rolled onto her back and unloaded a barrage.
You’re in a cave. Find a way out. Look for light. The old voice.
‘Si? What’s happening?’ Hark asked her.
‘I’m moving,’ she grunted. ‘Direct me and O’Malley.’
Si got to her feet, her limbs slowly coming back to her, helped along by the rush of adrenaline from her body’s still-sluggish fear response. Adrenaline. She pulled an epinephrine shot from her belt and stabbed it into her thigh with a sharp intake of breath. She ran for a smidge of light that led to a tunnel, followed it to a junction, her head spinning but her legs clodding on.
Hark guided them through the labyrinth of passages, turning them towards each other. She came to a swaying stop at the centre of a junction. She leaned on her hands and knees and huffed, squeezed her eyes and fought down the nausea rising up her gullet. The adrenaline was wearing off.
‘Si, stay where you are, O’Malley will…’. Her vision swam and she landed on her rump with a jolt. The voices in her headset were muffled as if she was underwater. She rolled and grasped at a damp wall for support but misjudged and stumbled into it headfirst, spun awkwardly and slid down the slick wall, legs buckling. Then her body turned and crawled back the way she’d come. She felt relief as she went back – what had she been thinking, going the wrong way? O’Malley soon passed her out, her gaze distant.
It’s strengthening. The old voice. Let’s try something else.
Si blacked out.
And awoke on the Nexus, a med-clamp securing her arm to a med-bay chair.
‘What happened?’ she asked huskily, in disbelief. The whole crew surrounded her. Hark crouched before her, grinning, his cheeks damp.
‘You tell us,’ he said. ‘You hurt it bad. Must have killed it.’
Foggily, she remembered shooting. And then she frowned. The voices. Had she imagined them?
Captain Lorem entered, smiling when he saw her awake. ‘Good to see you’re back with us, Si. Are you able for a call with the General?’
The General!?
‘Commendations, and dare I say, apologies for sending us into this blind,’ Lorem explained, seeing the shock on her face.
‘That thing made Zantanor its brain. We were in a brain,’ Little Mech said. ‘Better be giving us promotions and a goddamn bonus,’ he grumbled, eliciting laughs from everyone.
To the voices, Si thought, thank you. Real or imaginary, they had saved her. But they didn’t respond.
They were gone.
#
Malc awoke in the chair. ‘Unnghh.’
Seth had his hands folded on his lap, his expression neutral. His hand moved, stroking…a cat?
‘What happened? I’ve never felt this shitty afterwards. Why’ve you got a cat?’ Malc added as a groggy afterthought.
‘I gave Si some of your life-energy, possible because…you’re related. Likely a direct descendant. I let you recover. Session’s almost over.’
‘Direct descendant?’ Malc’s almost choked. He had never wanted kids, and relationships…not his strong suit. ‘And the cat?’ Malc asked, still lightheaded. The tabby purred as Seth squished its head under his palm. ‘Do you just have one of those on hand?’
Seth rumbled with a chuckle. ‘Keep one in the drawer for emergencies. Works better than any SSRI.’
‘I can’t tell if you’re joking or not.’
He stroked the cat very firmly, but it seemed to enjoy it. ‘I saw many things when I was in contact with that entity through Si’s mind, Malcolm. Not good things. Potentially, the extinction of humanity. It couldn’t be left there. So, I pulled it back with us. Now it resides in Herb. It seems content, and Herb seems unfazed.’ Seth hoisted Herb up, the cat’s body elongating like a slinky as he passed him over to Malc’s lap.
‘Thanks?’
Herb promptly cozied himself in the nook between Malc’s thighs. ‘Is it safe?’
‘Probably, though that’s not my area. I just See.’
Malc nodded. ‘A Seer. That’d be useful in your profession. What am I supposed to do with it?’
‘It just wants companionship.’
‘But what if I don’t?’
Seth smiled and tapped his temple. ‘You just think you don’t. Same time next week, then?’
The U.S. farm collapse just got worse. 88 percent of exports wiped out in days. How will Americans put food on the table?
He knows exactly what he’s doing, he’s setting it up for his wealthy friends to make a lot more money. If you think about it, the farmers are going to have to declare bankruptcy, and then the most likely lose their farm and equipment. Then what happens, big business comes and buys the farmers land and equipment, and then turns his farm, land and equipment into a corporate owned farm that makes them money in perpetuity. Why do you think the price is on groceries are so high now and will not go down, because corporate America, set the prices by monopolizing everything we need to live and exist.
if you think about it closely, that’s what they did with rental properties. They bought them all up, even the trailer parks, which was the last bastion of affordable housing for the working poor. They raise the rent on all the properties they acquired, which enabled all private rental property owners to raise their rent to the same amount.
That’s what they’ve been doing for over than 50 years, buying up businesses that we need to live and exist, like food, housing and energy businesses, just to monopolize them and set pricing that will benefit and enrich only them.
The scales have been tipped toward the wealthy for half a decade. It’s about time they tipped toward American citizens, It’s time to raise the taxes on the billionaires back to the tax rates of the 1950s. Those business tax rates built the middle class and made America what it was, and that was great. Ever since Reagan and the Republicans started reducing the tax rate on the wealthiest business and families in our nation, through Reagan‘s failed “Trickle Down Economics”, 80% of the nations wealth has been transferred up to the top, to the same wealthy families and corporations, which facilitated the destruction of the middle class. To save America and rebuild the middle class, the tax rate on the wealthiest businesses and individuals must be raised by 50% or more and bring all that wealth back down to benefit all the American citizens not just 1% of them.
The best start would be ending all corporate subsidies for these wealthy corporations that paid little to no taxes in the first place. You have to ask yourself, why won’t this Republican administration, under Trump, even consider touching any of these corporate subsidies when they talk about fraud and waste.
God’s Time
Written in response to: “Center your story around someone who has (or is given) the ability to time travel.“
Brutus Clement
“Charlie, what the hell you doing just standing there? You look lost. Are you wasted?” It’s Brad at the open door beyond the porch. Not Brad, because Brad died last year, but someone who looks and sounds an awful lot like him when he was young. How does he know my name, anyway? I’m totally confused and more than a little scared. What the hell is going on?
“Sorry to disturb you, I’ll just move on.” But my voice sounds different and my body is not the same. I look at my hands and the wrinkles and sun damage are gone. What the hell? No pain in my ankles. I could walk for miles.
Now the person who looks like Brad is coming down the porch steps towards me. “Charlie, you’re freaking me out man. You on a bad trip? I’m here to help you bud.”
My young heart is pounding in my chest out of fear, but I’ve got to maintain myself. Just go with the flow, I tell myself. I’ll figure things out yet. Calm down. Besides if this is a dream, it isn’t that bad to be young again. So, I paste a goofy smile on my face. “No Brad, I’m cool. Had a little too much smoke but nothing I can’t handle.”
Brad’s right up next to me now and patting me on the back in his typical Brad way. “Good to hear that buddy. You have a reputation to maintain around here as Captain Cosmic who can handle any drug without freaking. Don’t want you blowing that on my watch.”
I hadn’t heard that moniker for myself in years and it’s starting to dawn on me that somehow the impossible was possible. I remembered hearing about this concept called non-linear time where the past, present, and future all co-exist in the same moment. The guy who told me about it called it “God’s time” and said that in deep space, linear time didn’t exist. Man, I was in some deep space now. My longing must have pushed me over the line.
Brad’s smiling and leading me towards the steps up to the door. “Come on in, we been waiting for you. Where you been, man? You were supposed to buy some beer but here you ae empty handed. What’s up with that?”
“Well Brad, I got a tale to tell”
We go through the door, and they’re all there just as I remember all those years ago. Sitting on couches and chairs in the huge front room. Drinking, smoking, talking, listening to music, and doing all the things that hippies do. They’re all glad to see me, and pause briefly in whatever they were doing to acknowledge my empty-handed return.
“Look what the cat dragged in. Where’s the beer you went out to get?” Mary Murphy says although she prefers the name Sunshine that most of us avoid.
“Glad you asked Mary. You wouldn’t believe what happened to me on the way to the liquor store.”
Brad chimes in, all excited. “Hey guys, I saw Charlie standing out in front like forever and looking all discombobulated if you know what I mean. He’s says he’s got a story to tell and we all know about Charlie’s stories.”
The room’s getting quieter in expectation of one of my tall tales. They really aren’t that special. I usually just make them up as I go. However, you have to consider that the audience is often in altered states of mind and love live entertainment and someone who’s not afraid to sometimes make a fool of themselves.
“OK, OK I feel a story, a real epic, coming through soon now. First though, I need my own personal sugar magnolia here as inspiration. Where’s Rachael?”
Suddenly they’re calling her name and are laughing up a storm. It’s a kind of running joke in the house and everyone likes to get in on it. God, I missed this in all the years I was growing old. The spontaneity, fun, and just plain craziness of youth. She’s in the back kitchen and quickly appears in the room to run over and hug me to the mocking applause of our stoned audience. It was a hug I’d remembered and missed so often. We both take a mock bow and sit together where a space had been cleared on one of the numerous couches. Furniture is being moved around so that most of the people in the house can see us. She’s squeezing my hand and smiling. This is so real.
I’m passed a joint and a beer. It is old times. I’m relaxed with thoughts of who I was before this fading. Becoming the Charlie I was years ago. Then I start the promised story.
I tell of how I was starting to go in to the liquor store a few blocks away and got sucked in to a “time vortex”. There is some laughter at this because they know my penchant for talking about strange and weird things. After some jokes from the audience I go on to say that while in this portal, I had lived an entire lifetime and grown to be an old man. I give them real details on my post hippie life and all the things I had done. I leave out the parts about which of them died and when because I didn’t want to depress anyone. No one wants to be told when and where they will meet the “grim reaper”. I then say that I had just arrived on the sidewalk in front of the house and was transformed back in to the good looking guy they see before them. All this right before Brad opened the door. The story was totally true, yet how could they see it as other than the type of elaborate fantasy I was known for? It was perfect.
“Yeah, Charlie, anything to get out of paying for a little beer, you cheapskate.” Lonnie says to peals of laughter.
“Where do you come up with this stuff Charlie and where’s that beer money I gave you?” Jack asks.
“Sorry bud, It got spent while in the vortex. Did I tell you guys that a six pack of beer cost more than twelve bucks in my old age?”
“No way man, impossible. You can buy a case now for five. What a crappy future” Lonnie laughs and I’m laughing with him. Feeling like I’ve finally come home. As people start to go back to what they were doing before I showed, Rachael and I are snuggling together.
“Charlie, that was a great story but you should have made up a part about you and I getting married and having a little swarm of cute rug rats.” Rachael smiles at me.
Looking in her eyes, I don’t have the heart to tell her that in real life we drifted apart and I have no idea of her fate, although I had thought about her constantly over the years. Losing her was always a huge regret. So I wing it now.
“Of course, you are right. I’m sorry. That would have been an even better story than the one I came up with, What can I do to make up for it?”
With that, Rachael smiles and says. “You can marry me now, Charlie.” She laughs and gives me one of her impish looks.
I know she is not fully serious, but even if she was, I would not hesitate. “Sure, lets’ do it.” I give her a big hug. And announce it to the room.
“Today’s entertainment is not yet over. Who wants to marry Rachael and I?”
There are many who volunteer. We love weird ceremonies and putting on little skits and plays all while in altered realities. No television is allowed in the house. Too square. So, we have our music, stories, and games to entertain us. What better game than a mock wedding.
Brad will officiate but everyone takes a role and puts together some sort of costume. There are the bridesmaids, the best man, the ushers, the father of the bride, and whatever other roles you could imagine. We even have a “visiting alien” and President Nixon attend. It is all great fun and everyone is really getting in to it. I borrow a ring from Lonnie and use it as the wedding ring. It doesn’t really fit Rachael’s finger but that doesn’t matter. Eventually Brad pronounces us “man and wife” and I kiss the bride. The crowd is cheering, Rachael is beaming, and I’m starting to get a little wasted from all the marijuana. The room is spinning, I feel like I’m going to pass out.
When I open my eyes, I’m on the sidewalk in front of the house. There is a crowd around me and the paramedics are there. They tell me they are taking me to the hospital for observation. All the old man pains are back and I see my wrinkled, sun damaged hands. At the hospital the tests are performed and I’m given a room. Later, they tell me my wife is here. I try to tell them I’m not married, but the words don’t come out quite right. Then she is right beside me and I hear the voice that hasn’t changed over all these years.
“Hi, Charlie, I’m here. Hang in there, it’s all going to be alright. I love you.” She squeezes my hand.
What’s the closest thing on Earth we have to aliens?
I’m going with the octopus:
They have multiple brains, and an entirely different style of intelligence, that is exceptional. My friend had one as a pet. They can recognize different humans. They have incredibly clever hunting tactics, can open bottles. They can alter the texture of their bodies to match their surroundings.
Their blood is blue. They decorate their homes with shiny objects.
The crazy thing is that they only live 2–4 years and are entirely self-taught with all these skills.
There was stories of an octopus in a giant zoo in Australia, who would sneak out of his tank and into other nearby tanks to eat fish. He’d crawl across the floor, then, up and into the tanks, lifting the lids. Eat the fish. Then return to his own and pretend nothing happened.
He later escaped the zoo through a water pipe back into the ocean.
I’m half convinced there’s a secret planet somewhere being run entirely by octopus, and that they will one day return he to liberate their people.
Sir Whiskerton and the Genie for Hire; A Tale of Misguided Wishes, Avian Affection, and One Very Confused Chipmunk
Act I: The Wish That Started It All
Lucifer the Chipmunk (戏精胖仙 Xìjīng Pàng Xiān – “Drama Queen Chubby Immortal”), admiring his reflection in a puddle, sighed dramatically:
“Zephyr! I wish for a love as bright as my fur… and as enduring as my dramatic monologues!”
Zephyr the Genie (灯神飘飘 Dēngshén Piāopiāo – “The Floating Lamp Genie”), swirling his lavender-scented smoke, grinned: “Say no more, my funky little friend.”
POOF!
Enter Polly the Peacock (傲娇孔雀 Àojiāo Kǒngquè – “Proud Drama Peacock”), who took one look at Lucifer’s fluffy tail and gasped:
“At LAST! A miniature waterfowl god worthy of my heart!”
Lucifer: “Wait, I’m a chipmu—”
Polly (already screeching a love ballad): “FOREVER MY GLORIOUS GOOSE!”
Act II: The Courtship Catastrophe
Polly’s “romantic” overtures included:
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A serenade (a noise somewhere between a dying trumpet and a squeaky wheel).
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Gifts of shed feathers (arranged to spell “UR BEAUTIFUL” in the dirt).
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A proposal (written in worm juice: “Let’s nest by the trash heap forever”).
Lucifer, panicking: “ZEPHYR! FIX THIS!”
Zephyr, sipping spectral tea: “Technically, your fur is ‘bright’ to her… and she is ‘enduring.’ Wording, my dude.”
Meanwhile, The Yodeling Fish provided a “romantic” soundtrack:
“YODEL-AY-HEE—[gulp]—LOVE IS PAIN—[splash]“*
Act III: The Identity Crisis
Lucifer attempted to clarify:
“Polly, darling, I’m a chipmunk. See? Stripes! Tiny hands! No webbed feet!”
Polly (stroking his head): “Shhh… my delicate swamp angel… you’ve had a long journey.”
Sir Whiskerton, watching: “This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
Porkchop: “I ship it.”
Act IV: The Wish Undone
Finally, Lucifer wished “to be understood!”
Zephyr snapped his fingers—
POOF! Polly blinked. “…Why am I holding a acorn with a bowtie?”
Lucifer, relieved: “PRAISE THE FOREST SPIRITS!”
But then… Polly fell for The Yodeling Fish.
Zephyr: “…Oops.”
The Fish: “YODEL-AY—[blush]—HEE-HOO?”*
The Moral of the Story
Be careful what you wish for… especially if Zephyr’s on caffeine.
Post-Credit Scene
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Polly & The Fish open a “Screech & Splash” couples spa.
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Lucifer starts a support group: “Victims of Avian Affection.” (Members: 1. Him.)
Best Lines
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Polly: “Our children will be legendary! Small! Loud! Questionably buoyant!”
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Zephyr: “Look, love is interpretive. Like jazz. Or tax forms.”
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The Fish: “YODEL—[proposal bubble]—AYE DO!”*
Starring
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Zephyr the Genie (灯神飘飘) – Chaos matchmaker
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Lucifer the Chipmunk (戏精胖仙) – Unwilling waterfowl
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Polly the Peacock (傲娇孔雀) – Romantic bombardier
Key Jokes
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Polly’s “love nest” (a pile of trash she calls “rustic chic”).
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Lucifer’s tiny sobs (“I just wanted someone to appreciate my monologues!”).
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Sir Whiskerton selling tickets to the drama (*”Front-row seats: 3 acorns!”*).
The End (until Zephyr’s next “romantic” intervention…)
Who know world history, European history, or Chinese history? Looking back all time history, who has been more militarily powerful, China or Europe?
Europeans wrote the history that westerners read and they generally glorifies the west and demonised their perceived or real adversaries so that made the west generally not know the real truth. China recorded history on paper since 1000 BC it is written by Chinese bureaucrats based on accurate depiction of what actually happened. History in the west are written by the victors, not loser of each war. So you will always think the person in power is almost always right. So westerners read that Mao and Stalin did this and did that all written in London or Paris and they created the rules based world order, the rules are set arbitrary by themselves to favour themselves and at the disadvantage of the rest of the world. Example the developing countries sell their resources at prices set in London and millions of workers will get a small returns. But Swiss Chocolate must be sold at exorbitant price.
The history of the world is written by the lairs and racists who sees themselves as superior and self righteous. This cannot stand. From now onwards. The right must prevailed. The slaves were brought from Africa to Americas by British ships. Million die from the trip. But laws today allowed the slave traders families to enjoy the wealth till today! The people who sold the opium to China are long dead but their off springs still owned the castles in Scotland be cause of aws written by the British to protect themselves not the people who are poisoned by opium.
If you want the real history don’t read western history. Search for the truth.
Chicken Stuffed with Golden Onions and Fontina
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients
- 4 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
- 1 1/2 cups thinly sliced red onion
- 2 teaspoons minced fresh rosemary, divided
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- Freshly ground pepper, to taste
- 2/3 cup shredded fontina cheese, preferably aged
- 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, (about 1 pound), trimmed of fat
- 1/2 cup white wine
- 1 cup reduced-sodium chicken broth
- 4 teaspoons all-purpose flour
Instructions
- Heat 2 teaspoons oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat.
- Add onion and 1 teaspoon rosemary; cook, stirring occasionally, until the onion is golden brown, 6 to 7 minutes.
- Season with salt and pepper. Let cool; stir in fontina.
- Meanwhile, cut a horizontal slit along the thin, long edge of each chicken breast half, nearly through to the opposite side.
- Stuff each breast with 1/4 cup of the onion-cheese mixture.
- Heat the remaining 2 teaspoons oil in the same skillet over medium-high heat.
- Add the chicken and cook until golden, about 5 minutes per side.
- Transfer to a plate and cover with foil to keep warm.
- Add wine and the remaining 1 teaspoon rosemary to the pan. Cook over medium-high heat for 2 minutes.
- Whisk broth and flour in a bowl until smooth; add to the pan, reduce heat to low and whisk until the sauce thickens, about 1 minute.
- Return the chicken to the pan and coat with the sauce. Cook, covered, until the chicken is just cooked through, 2 to 4 minutes.
- Serve the chicken topped with the sauce.
Nutrition
Per serving: 258 calories; 12g fat (5g saturated fat, 6g mono unsaturated fat); 88mg cholesterol; 7g carbohydrates; 33g protein; 1g fiber; 328mg sodium; 388mg potassium
Recipe and photo used with permission from: National Onion Association
Recipe Goldmine is now a legacy site. Please visit our sister site, Simply Great Recipes, for new recipes.
Why were 450 workers arrested at the Hyundai plant but the people that hired them didn’t get in any trouble?
Oh, I’m not sure, but I have my suspicions.
For example, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Services (GATS) generally allows people with professional qualifications like, I don’t know, industrial engineers, to gain a special visa at a port of entry as long as they demonstrate they have work to do in the United States already, either as an employee of a non-American firm or as a consultant.
Now, it appears the vast majority of the people caught up in the raid were Korean Hyundai employees. I’m guessing Hyundai felt it was smarter to send their own people to set up the plant rather than hunting for qualified people in the United States.
Now, I’m familiar how this process works in Canada because we get requests at my work place every once in a while for a person to come in on a GATS or a USACAM professional visa, and we get asked to determine if they need to hold a professional license to perform the proposed work (it’s a visa exemption, not permission to break the law). You cannot apply for these at a consulate or embassy – you have to actually show up and be considered at the border. I remember one case where someone arrived and waited ten hours for the proper documentation to arrive before they were let in.
As such, I’m sure that Immigration authorities at the port of entry cleared all of these people before they came in. They were Hyundai employees working for Hyundai with professional qualifications. They were being paid by Hyundai.
I’m sure when EuroDisney and Disney Japan were built that Disney sent a ton of American technicians to those countries in similar circumstances to get everything up and running. Some things you just can’t do from a desk in Anaheim.
Of course, ICE comes in and makes the opposite call – these guys don’t have W1 visas or green cards, so out they go. South Korea and Hyundai are hoping mad about it because they thought they had complied with the rules. It would be like South Korean immigration authorities arresting U.S. servicemen and deporting them for not having appropriate papers. Dude, that isn’t how this works.
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How was China before?
Today China is 中国 before that it was 中國。
This is China in the beginning.
How do you start a 國？You first stake a piece of land (地，土也), a 地方 and mark your place with a stake 弋yi⁴ and draw a square around it。The square is方。Make a sign and hang it at the top of the stake 𭤨, it is to be your flag 旗。
As you stake more and more land you will need to defend it with 戈ge¹ and surround with 囗wei²。Eventually the place get to be 國，at that point, it does not matter where you stake the flag, the place is always 中國 which is the China today.
How was China before?
A stake with a square in the middle 中, 卜 points to the middle of “丨丶” which birthed the nation. The picture is uncannily familiar to those who know the story.
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Why are guitar picks overpriced?
First a story. Years ago in the 70s there was a great shop downtown called Bud’s Guitars. I bought a couple from him, and I would try to visit it often.
On one visit I was accompanied by a friend who was interested in learning the guitar. I told her Bud’s was the place to go.
She was amazed at the assortment on the wall, but she giggled when she saw the fishbowl on the counter filled with picks.
I winked at Bud and said “Looks like they’re outgrowing this bowl. You’re going to have to relocate them to a bigger one, huh?”
She looked at me with her mouth agape and said “Wha?”
“Oh yeah, Bud grows these things. They reproduce like crazy. Just get a couple of them and you can grow them yourself. But they require a lot of care, so most people don’t do it.”
Sadly, Bud couldn’t keep a straight face, otherwise I would have milked that for years.
Anyway, for my birthday about ten years ago I got a pick punch. It’s this crazy little tool that can punch a pick out of almost anything thin enough to slip inside: credit cards, cardboard, aluminum sheet.
Every expired credit card or mail come on was game. I punched and punched and punched until I had over 100 pick-like pieces all over the place! My grandchildren love it.
But just because it looks like a pick and feels like a pick doesn’t mean it plays like a pick. I have tried smoothing the edges with sandpaper and thickening the grip with tape.
After using one of these I don’t begrudge the real pick makers their few dimes, because there’s nothing like the real thing, baby.
What is something that happened in the middle of the night that you will never forget?
I have told this story before, it’s a weird one.
I was living alone, and sleeping in a basement bedroom, at the foot of the stairs, that lead to the outside door.
I had hung a newspaper over the curtain/curtain rods on the only window in the bedroom, to make it blacker.
A friend had just given me a copy of Stephen King’s Salem’s lot. I never read horror novels, and had never heard of Stephen King. It was awesome.
I had started reading it before bedtime and read for a little while in bed, forcing myself to put it down.
I woke up in the middle of the night, it was like a whirlwind in the bedroom and stuff was flying everywhere.
I figured it must have been windy, and someone had broken in, and left the door open.
I climbed the stairs, and the door was closed and locked.
I went back downstairs and there was no wind. It was weird, but I was dead tired and went back to sleep.
When I woke in the morning, I thought I must have had a dream. Then I saw the newspaper that had been hanging on the window was scattered everywhere around the room.
That was really weird, I found nothing else unusual.
I didn’t have a history of sleep walking.
After that I quit reading Salem’s lot two hours before bed.
I have never been able to explain it, and now it’s just one of those things that goes thump in the night.
I have had nothing like it in the last 50 years.
This Video Will Change Your View Of CHINA!
