Tag: life

Moonflower and Hornworms

I’m gonna try writing. It’s what I do. Even though I feel like crap.

I volunteered for a gardening event at Shelby Park today. I didn’t feel like doing it at all. I didn’t feel like doing anything at all, but as it goes with these things, you warm up to them, and then you’re glad that you did do them. Sometimes you just have to get in the groove. It was actually great that I had this to do today.

The crew was a surprisingly large and cheerful one. There was a naturalist woman named Emily that I have remembered, as she was about to start the TN naturalist program, and I talked to her about that, which she said was amazing. She had the true nature-lover and naturalist spirit, and she was interested in all of the things in the garden and the bugs.

Our host Hazel was a naturalist and knew everything in the garden and knew about all of the bugs, too. She was awesome.

There was another woman who was something of a comedian. She was awesome, and she knew about the things in the garden too. She was especially fond of passionflower and was really wanting to raise some. At one point, she was lovingly touching a strand of passionflower and speaking to it, telling it that it was so beautiful. She was cracking me up.

She told us that passionflower is colloquially known as “Maypop”. She ventured to say that it could be because it blooms in May, or has something to do with the flowers making a popping sound when they open (and unless it blooms multiple times a year, which I know plants do, they were just blooming now, so not sure if May blooms as well)… she said that she didn’t really know the lore, and that we would have to find a “real person” to ask. That became something of a running joke, as I immediately used it to riff off of, saying, “Yes, hello, I’m looking for a real person, yes, does anybody know someone who’s real, I really need to know the lore of the Maypop flowers!”

The garden at Shelby isn’t a big one, but it has some interesting stuff in it, and today I saw that it actually had way more going on than I even thought. But the one thing in that garden that I’ve seen and wanted to know about, today was my chance to ask about it, and I took my opportunity. There was a large, sprawling, low-to-the-ground bush, that is a subtle shade of blue, and although it doesn’t have visually striking flowers, and the flowers don’t even really look like flowers at all, the pollinators go crazy for it. As in, I’ve seen like 500 bugs on this bush at a time. They are literally swarming this baby. I’ve been wanting to know what this thing is for weeks now, and so I asked our host, Hazel, what it was, and she told me— Mountain Mint. A Tennessee native. Mountain Mint, how awesome.

She then said that it grows like crazy, and that she would give me some if I wanted it. And she did. She cut off a section, as all you really have to do with these kinds of plants is dig up a chunk, and she put it in a bucket and gave it to me. She gave some to another young guy too, who was very excited to have something to plant. This guy was entertaining me, because he had a real bro energy, and you could tell he was pretty much a novice, but he was really curious and enthusiastic. You love to see it. And him and I scored, majorly, with that Mountain Mint.

I was talking with the comedian lady about how I was learning that all you had to do was ask gardeners about their plants, and they would just give it to you. That they liked to give things to each other. I told her the story of when I was at Bates nursery just the other day, and had asked about the passionflower (maypop) and the worker had gone and grabbed me some seed pods and gave them to me. The comedian lady said, “Yeah, gardeners are real people.” And she said that there’s something in the soil, there’s a chemical in the soil that’s released when you’re gardening that just makes you cool. I thought that was funny.

It’s a very wholesome activity. It almost feels wrong how wholesome it is.

I felt that way with the master gardeners. They were two of the most wholesome people doing the most wholesome things that I had ever seen. I was really overwhelmed by the wholesomeness. Today, I felt like I was too dirty and unworthy, almost. Or that something is wrong with me, to be seeking out and participating in such wholesomeness.

The polar opposite of debauchery.

I took on the role of weeding, now being familiar with what is crabgrass and other grasses that we don’t need in our garden. Being able to identify what’s what is a skill. I could have gone with the strongmen to do mulch work, but as the one guy said, he wanted to do mulch work because he was afraid of pulling anything good out of the garden. And, I’ve done enough digging in my yard. I was not interested in lugging around giant wheelbarrows of mulch.

Pulling away at the grass, down in the ground, it was about twenty minutes, we had been working around this unique plant that Hazel told us was called Moonflower, when I suddenly spied an enormous green caterpillar. Enormous as in, like seven inches long. And fat. I commented on this to whoever was nearby, and they were very excited, it might have been Hazel. Well, there several more of these fatties, striking fat green caterpillars, and she said that she thought they were Hornworms. They had a spike on their butts, so that would make sense. They were going to town on the Moonflower, if that’s what it was.

I looked it up because it was such a cool plant, but I can’t tell if what I looked up as Moonflower was that plant or not. Hazel knew what she was talking about so I’m inclined to say it was. But anyway, as you can imagine, the hornworms were wildly popular. As you would expect for some marked, fat green caterpillars. I was proud that I had spotted them, I wonder if anyone would have. It took me twenty minutes of working around down in that area before I even saw them, and they had been right in front of my face that whole time. It just goes to show you the power of camouflage. They were the exact same dark green as the Moonflower they were on, and they were adhered to the stalks, so they didn’t stick out in any way. You had to look directly at them, not just a passing, sweeping glance with your eyes. I saw one that way, just taking a good hard look at the Moonflower, because it was cool.

Hornworm

You can see immediately that these guys are awesome.

The curious bro said, “But aren’t they bad? Aren’t they like pests or something?”

Hazel said, “They do what caterpillars do. If you’re attached to your plants, then yeah, they’re bad.”

They were chowing down on that Moonflower, but she didn’t mind.

There was a pretty girl here at the gardening event, I have to tell you. And she seemed to be interested in me.

She caught my eye immediately, and she was at my side as I walked around the room, examining the displays and curiosities. I had been looking for the snake in the snake tank, and I couldn’t find it. She was still next to me, and I said, “Where’s the snake?” And she said, “Right there,” and pointed it out. It was a cute and small snake, hiding under the rock water bowl. I said it was cute, and she agreed.

Then when we out in the garden, Hazel was giving us the rundown for what we were supposed to be doing, and I had hung back, the rest of the group funneling into the vegetable patch. This was now my chance to give this girl a good look, because I wanted to see if she really was pretty, and I saw her face clearly, and she was— and then she immediately noticed me and look back at me. I was caught, and I glanced away, but she didn’t seem to mind that. After Hazel was done speaking, she came over to join me in weeding the main garden bed.

It was me and her down there, ripping out that grass, and I wanted to talk to her, so I struck up a conversation. I asked her about gardening, about what we were doing… We talked for a little bit. She smiled me, and I saw again that she had a pretty smile. I couldn’t get much more out of her though, and then I after ten minutes of vigorous tearing, I started to get bored with that particular patch, and there was action going on around the garden (people making discoveries, CD Paddock showed up, I had to ask about the mountain mint…).

I had come back to my post, then meandered more, made jokes and etc., and this girl did laugh at some of the things I said. She didn’t really engage with anybody else there, that I saw. She was quiet. And I didn’t try to talk to her much more, although I did make some comments, such as that we had moved on to the tougher to pull grass, and I said, “Now this is harder work,” as I had commented before on how easy it was to pull out the grass in the mulch. She laughed, but no reply.

So, I was talking with the comedian woman, we were the last ones left, having gotten our mountain mint, Hazel was still in the garden doing work, and we walked up the steps and back through the nature center, and I saw that this girl was still in the center, the only one left, buying something. I walked through, said goodbye to the lady at the desk, the comedian woman had stayed behind, and I was walking back to the parking lot, when the pretty girl called out to me from behind, “What are you taking home?”

I thought it was interesting that she was still hanging around, and I thought it was now very interesting that she was talking to me. I had a feeling that she would.

I told her, mountain mint. And I said that I had been curious about it, and asked about it and Hazel had just given it to me. The girl did not have much to say about it, I don’t know if I ever heard her response. It would have just been, “Oh,” or “That’s cool,” I guess. And then, I was just thinking, what does this girl want from me? Are we having a moment here? And I was thinking what to say next, and I was about to say, “What are your plans for the rest of the day?” When she said, “Well, have a good day.” And I said, “You too.”

I have to tell you, I’ve been thinking this one over. I’m not an egomaniac and am not assuming that every girl is interested in me, but there were cues. And especially at the end, she could have just let me walk away. I just couldn’t really get anything out of this girl. I didn’t know what to do with her! And then, as it goes, she’s gone. I’m sure I’ll never see her again.

I was thinking about it, because especially after her talking to me at the end, and then rather abruptly walking off, I was wondering about her. Was she just a quiet type? Was she nervous?

Mysterious.

What I was thinking about, during the gardening and as I write this, is the depth of subtlety of human connection. The subtle forces at play between people when they communicate, when they interact. Especially romantically. There all of these cues, currents and mechanics that are going on under the surface, with eyes and smells, body language, voice. So few words even spoken to one another, yet so much is communicated.

I also thought about how they say the way to make friends, and probably lovers too, is to see people repeatedly. These things take time. It can take awhile before you really know what someone is about, such as with this girl. What’s her story? I would like to know.

She was interested in planting natives in her garden.

That’s a good thing.

Mountain Mint (an unassuming pollinator powerhouse)

Wearing A Suit

What is the power of wearing a suit?

What is the power in looking extraordinarily dapper?

Why do the chieftans put feathers in their headdress? The most magnificent feathers?

It just works. That’s it.

There is a power in being grungy and dingy. There is a power in not giving a damn. And conversely, there is a power in being immaculate and clean. A different kind of power, in being prim and proper.

It’s really an amazing thing.

We can’t shed these expectations. We can’t shed the affects of our dress. We cannot extract ourselves from our society, from our company. There’s simply no way, unless you live completely alone.

Even in the company of one single other person, your personal appearance will lead to perceptions and inferences on their part, however slightly.

Cats groom themselves. So, you may say that it is unique what we do, but it isn’t. Birds preen. Monkeys groom. It is a natural instinct.

Prior to me busting out the suit for a job interview, I hadn’t touched it for over a year. I remember the last time I put it on, I felt great then, too. And yesterday, wearing my suit downtown, going about business, I felt great again. I felt like the man, although I was sweating and uncomfortable at times, I could handle it. Nothing I couldn’t, a small price to pay for the power of the suit.

My suit is bespoke, 日本製. Made in Japan. I had one custom made only because I did not want to buy a suit made with any synthetic fibers. I also wanted to buy something that was not Made In China. These conditions ultimately led to me having a suit tailor-made, at the mall in Kumamoto City. I still remember the whole ordeal.

It was awesome.

The suit cost about $1000, USD. This suit is not cheap. I thought quite a lot about it. And occasionally, when my bank account has fallen low enough, I’ve thought — I really wish I had a thousand dollars instead of this damned suit that I never wear. How ironic that I have one of the finest suits in the world, and I am this poor! If anyone knew that about me, they would surely think that I was an enormous fool. My only salvation on that front is that I really didn’t buy the suit to impress anybody. I ended up spending this much money on a suit for ethics.

I could have thrifted, sure. I think I tried. If I had gone on this suit quest now, I may try harder to find something thriftable, and then have it tailored to fit me. I don’t know why I didn’t go that route before, except that I know I had landed on the Kikuchi Takeo store, after many investigations into how I could acquire a non-synthetic, non-Chinese suit, and someone suggested I try Kikuchi Takeo. It was on the fourth floor of the mall.

I know I’m a little all over the place here. I’m now halfway between talking about suits and the power of dressing nicely, and telling you the story of how I came to acquire this wonderful suit. I’m rambling. I’m sorry. I am sleep deprived, and overly caffeinated, to tell you the truth. And I’m wearing a suit.

I had the suit made by Kikuchi Takeo, as I’ve now said a few times, and the process was just as awesome as having the actual suit. I didn’t know exactly what I was in for — I didn’t know at all, to be honest. I simply stumbled upon this wonderful thing, custom suit-building. But I remember, when they told me I could build a suit from scratch, and it cost about the same as buying any of the suits they already had. The man showed me the many fabrics that I could choose from — 100% wool, 99% wool and 1% spandex or whatever (probably not spandex), whatever else… And that %1 spandex did make the suit $100 cheaper, I remember. I think so. I was committed to no synthetics, I had to go all the way.

He showed me all the fabrics, the different colors, textures. I was able to feel all of them. They were stupendous. He showed me the various linings, that I could use for the inside of the suit. Again, varied and incredible. Many patterns, some ostentatious, some simple. I chose something simple but with a little pizzaz, I’m looking at it now. Slate gray, with tiny diamond flower-like emblems forming a pattern. For the color, I went with a dark charcoal gray. It was either that or navy. I wanted something really versatile, that could work in all situations, and I already had a baby-blue suit (very synthetic)… I think that’s why I chose gray, as opposed to navy. It was just something different.

I got to choose the buttons. How many, the material, what color. I got to choose everything, people. I’m telling you I had no idea what I was in for. It gave me a great appreciation for suits, now. There are many details. I also chose the lapel-style, I was able to have my name embroidered on the inside of the jacket, and I chose to have a small mark added on the front left of my lapel, for style. I chose the embroidering color and style for that mark, and the final button hole on my sleeves. I think I chose how many buttons were on the sleeves, as well. There are four. Three that are embroidered with the same color as the suit, the dark charcoal grey, and then the final that has the light grey embroidering, that gives it some pop.

I remember that I was quite overwhelmed at the time, as I had not prepared or thought about at all all of these choices that I would have to make, about something that was going to cost me $1000 dollars, and that I would be wearing for the rest of my life (hopefully). There was a lot on the line, in that moment. I ended up having to just totally trust my judgment and hope it was right. In this case, the Takeo Kikuchi guy helping me, and I finally remembered him, my brain had been trying to ressurect his memory this entire time — he was a dapper young man. He had impeccable taste and swag, and he was in his early to mid-twenties. I remember that, because I remember that I trusted his judgment because of this. And I remember that he was very helpful in helping me make this many aesthetic decisions.

I wanted the suit to have formality, but just enough flair. That was the balance we were trying to strike. For that reason, I did choose to have the mark on the front lapel, which was eye-catching, and I also chose to have lapels that flared up at the top. Kind of like Dracula, my brain is saying to me for some reason. I think that this was something I deliberated over enormously, because it was a big decision. This was a mold-breaker, to have lapels like this. I know that. I think after the fact I was reading about suit lapels and they were saying, do not choose the upturned lapels for your suit, they’re over the top, not suited for formality, whatever. Well, I have no regrets.

They took my measurements, I chose out a pair of matching socks, and a dress shirt. White, with some very subtle stripe pattern running vertically. Totally non-synthetic.

I waited a few weeks to get the suit, I went to pick it up, make sure it fit right, and it fit perfectly. And what I have to tell you all is that, in my investigations I had tried on many suits. Many, many suits. In my life, I have worn a few suits. And this suit that I put on, my bespoke, 100% wool suit, I have never worn a suit like that in my life, nothing even close.

Even right now, I wear it, and it feels the same. It feels like I’m wearing a track suit. It’s like wearing pajamas.

That was the #1 thing about all of this suit business that really stood out to me, and still does. I had always thought a suit was just going to be somewhat uncomfortable. I thought that’s how they were. Until this suit, I thought that’s how it had to be. But this suit I wear now, it really is like wearing pajamas. Perfectly fitting pajamas.

How awesome is that? You look great, and you feel comfortable. That’s worth a lot of money right there.

I had wanted the suit in the first place because it was now winter, and all the other senseis at school were wearing suits, and looking professional. I was an ALT, I had my own rules, and I wasn’t required to wear a suit — none of the senseis really were except the top dogs, it seemed. And I had my baby-blue suit, but that was a standout in a school full of black and brown. I wanted something that was on par with the other senseis. I don’t think I ended up getting it, though. By going with this fabulous, bespoke, $1000 suit, that was obviously really nice, I think I ended up going over the top. It was a little too much for a high school teacher, but I paid for it, and dammit, I was going to wear it.

I knew it was going to be a big deal the first time I wore it to school. It was always a big deal when I dressed up. Sometimes I would put on the blue suit for fun, but generally I had stopped wearing it, and opted for muter dress. Well, I wore that suit to school, and it was all any of the classes wanted to talk about. They were shocked and awed. They had never seen Steven-sensei looking so nice and fancy before. And it confirmed that I had probably gone over the top.

The other senseis were amazed by it too. I was very proud to tell everyone that it was 日本製、nihonsei, made in Japan. I’m still very proud of that.

Digging up the old Japanese suit, yesterday, and wearing it for that interview made me remember the power of the suit. I kept it on when I went to the coffee shop afterwards, to do some work. I was feeling like getting work done, as being in a suit lends you to feel, and I had work to do, so I kept it on. But I did feel a little silly, ordering my coffee, wearing full formal dress, suit and tie, and then sitting down and typing away on my laptop. I felt overly dressed. But, who cares?

Today, I decided to wear the suit again. I have business to do. I have a great suit. Why not? But I opted for a black t-shirt instead of the shirt and tie. A little dressed down, like a tech CEO. That’s better.

I’m also wearing Doc Martins because I don’t actually have any formal dress shoes. I thought I had a pair, I know I had a pair. What happened to them? This was giving me a good laugh, when I realized that I would have to wear my Martins to the interview, and that I had gone the whole nine yards, suit and tie, and couldn’t finish the look. But I’m sure that they didn’t even notice. And the boots actually work great with the suit.

Well… that’s what I wanted to say about that…

The psychological power of the suit. Of clothes. It’s a real thing.

I think that for me, a big part of wearing the suit is the element of power that comes with it.

A nice suit is an embodiment of some kind of power. It suggests wealth and status. Con men know that – they’ll wear a nice suit even if they don’t have a dollar in the bank. Grifters know that. The image is important.

It’s interesting that I feel changed when I’m in the suit. That it has that effect on my personal psychology, too. I think that I am very aware of impressions and perceptions, and so part of the putting on of the suit is that I know it is going to impact people’s perceptions and impressions of me. People are going to change how they treat me, for better or for worse. And I think that I almost feel… false, in the suit. I feel like it is almost manipulative. Is that true? No…

What is it, then? You know what it could be?

It’s perhaps that I feel people are expecting something of me, when I’m in the suit.

People are expecting me to be well put together. They are expecting me to have decorum, and confidence. They are expecting me to be smooth and successful. To be professional. Don’t you think?

I think so. And that means that that’s what I have to be.

But then, isn’t this a matter of rising to the occasion?

Or, I don’t have to be that at all. Really, I should be myself, and I should be the same, whatever I’m wearing.

That’s the key.

I wonder how much of this is truth, and how much are my own thoughts and feelings about wearing the suit. What I did want to tell you is that yesterday, trying to find my target parking lot amongst fifteen different parking lots in downtown Nashville, I ended up in the wrong one. I couldn’t get out of the lot without having to pay, even though I didn’t park there, and I pushed the Call For Help button many times, to no avail, and I was pissed off, etc. etc. I went in and talked to the hotel staff about it, asking if they could please let me out, and not have me pay $11. Well, this saga ended up being rather convoluted, and I could not leave the lot, as they were having issues with the machine, and I was then going to be late… I ended up having to resolve it later.

As I approached the counter to handle this issue, I had the thought “They are more inclined to treat me kindly and take me seriously because I am wearing a nice suit.” And it was true that they did both of those things. They were nice people, and I would bet that they would have treated me the same, whatever I was wearing. But, isn’t it interesting that I had that thought?

There is quite a lot of psychology going on here.

I look at myself in the mirror wearing this suit, and I see a totally different guy.

Who is that guy?

People see that too. Parker said this morning, seeing me walk out of my room wearing the suit, “Woah. What’s going on?”

And my man at the coffee shop, the grunge-lover said, “You’re looking good today!!”

This is another element to the suit-wearing. When you’re this dressed up, you stand out. And when you stand out, you inevitably invite and draw attention, like it or not. As these comments show, people will notice, and they might even say something.

This attention-drawing element is another interesting one, for me. I generally like to fly under the radar. It even makes me uncomfortable, to have eyes on me. God forbid anybody thinks I’m cocky or smug! God forbid anybody thinks I’m a jerk!

Well, why shouldn’t I strut my stuff every once in awhile? Why shouldn’t I stand out, sometimes?

I wonder if this is something extraordinarily beautiful people have to deal with. Famous people, too.

Well, enough about that.

Now I have to write more Bob Schmingus.

Bob Schmingus and The King of the Rats: Part 1

(Readers, please recall that Bob Schmingus is a top cat agent who has recently saved America from a humilating loss at the hands of the Chinese King Liu Wei, who wished to purchase MacDonalds and rename it MacWangs.)

Bob Schmingus had just returned from his recent successful adventure, convincing the King of China, who had recently desired the purchase and renaming of the iconic American restaurant chain MacDonald’s to MacWangs, and was enjoying his reward of 20 boxes of Fancy Feast. He was lounging on a beach in the Carribean, at this moment, shades on, feet up, and licking his paws clean, when his phone rang.

It wasn’t his usual ringtone, Ain’t Talkin’ Bout Love by Van Halen. No, it wasn’t that, but it was a familiar ring: The Star Spangled Banner. And that could only mean one thing.

The President Of The United States was calling.

Bob Schmingus sighed. This wasn’t exactly what he wanted right now — he wanted waves and sun. That’s why he came to the Carribean, duh. But when the Prez calls…

He took the call.

“Talk to me, Jim Bob,” said Bob.

“Schmingus, I told you not to call me that. My names Carl. At least call me Carl, if you won’t follow the proper formalities.”

Schmingus chuckled. He couldn’t help himself. He loved messing with the President.

“Alright, Carl Bob. What do you need? Surely can’t be more trouble with the King of China? After we just had such a pleasant time together?”

“Ugh…” Groaned the President.

“It is.”

“Come on. What a guy! Isn’t he ever satisfied?”

“He’s a wily one. We can’t keep heads of tails of him. And we’re in for a long time with this guy… I hate to think about it.”

“So what’s the deal? I’m not exactly his babysitter here. That’s for the Chinese ambassador.”

“I know, Schmingus… I know. But… you know how to work him.”

Schmingus smiled. It was true.

“He respects you,” continued the President.

“Yeah, yeah. I know. Birds of feather. So what’s his deal now? What geopolitical problem are we solving today? Wait, don’t tell me. He wants to buy Burger King and rename it to Burger Kang?”

“You know Schmingus, I understand why you two get along. You must have the same brain. That’s exactly what he’s trying to do.”

“You’re kidding me.”

The President sighed.

“I wish I was, Schmingus… I wish I was.”

Bob stared out at the lolling waves through his black Raybans, but he hardly saw them anymore. His mind was on the mission.

His mind was on China.

“He’s offered 100 trillion dollars for it. They’re thinking of selling. We could block them, but, the legalities, the politics… We need it done quick. You know what’s at stake—the geopolitical blowback, we could lose the culture war—”

“I get it, Pres. It would be a national tragedy, the loss of an American gem, yada yada. What’s the pay?”

“Same as usual.”

“I want Friskies, sardine and anchovy this time.”

“You keep Burger King American and you’ll have whatever flavor of Friskies your little paws could possibly desire.”

“I want Greenies too. Ten boxes.”

“Dammit Schmingus, you glutton! Don’t you ever tired of your hedonic binges? Don’t you ever want something more fulfilling? For a mind so brilliant, you live like a heathen!”

“I like this lifestyle. It suits me.”

The President was silent for a moment.

“There’s something else, Schmingus.”

“Uh oh. I don’t like that.”

“We’re teaming you up for this one.”

Schmingus bolted up, knocking the half-eaten tin of Friskies off of his lap and into the sand.

“Teaming? There is no teaming. I don’t do teams. You know that.”

“This time you do. The situation is getting dicey in the East. You need backup.”

“Like Hell I do!!”

“Dammit Schmingus, I’m not your damned butler! I give you the orders, and you aren’t going alone, dammit, and that’s that!”

Schmingus took a deep breath. The President was really testing him on this one.

“Just tell me who it is, Pres. And it better not be a woman. I’m not looking for any romance—”

“It’s your old pal, Schmingus. It’s your old Navy buddy.”

“No.”

“No one can fly a chopper like him Schmingus. He’s just what we need for the job—”

“NO!”

Schmingus was enraged, and without thinking he slammed his phone shut and hung up.

Immediately, he had regrets. He just hung up on the President of the United States. Not exactly recommended procedure. But…

The President was out of his mind. To suggest that he, Bob Schmingus, international ace, detective, dealmaker, assassin and schmoozer? Go to China with his greatest nemesis and archrival?

Schmingus had kicked his fallen can of Friskies and had thrown himself back on his chair, stewing with rage, when his phone buzzed.

“Pickup point Gorganzola. 11pm.”

— Carl Bob

Bob Schmingus wasn’t sure if he would go. But in the end, he wasn’t one to walk away from a trip to see the King. No he wasn’t. China was one of his favorite countries to work with. Something about the Orient that appealed to him. And he wasn’t going to give it up just because of that damned bastard Boldchungus… the grin that must be on his face right now.

Boldchungus probably hated the assignment as much as Schmingus did. He didn’t play with partners either. How did the President get him on board? Must have offered him a lot of Friskies. Greenies, Churu treats too…

They had that in common, at least. They were both greedy, thrill-seeking bastards.

Schmingus packed his essential gear, a lockpick and his trusty Barret .50 cal, and headed to the pickup point.

Someone was there to meet him.

Standing by the chopper, a model 450x SteathKite, with quad-lazer rotors and a radio-drive cloaking device (a top of the line stealth chopper, undetectable by all modern equipment known to man—or at least, America), and looking as smug as a bug in a rug, was Charlie Boldchungus.

That smug asshole.

“Well, well, well… Little Kitty’s gonna get his paws wet again, huh?”

“Save it, jackoff,” growled Schmingus, throwing his Barrett in the SteathKite’s storage hold. “I’ll rip that loose tongue right out of your mouth. What the hell does that even mean, anyway?”

“It means whatever I want it to mean,” Boldchungus retorted. “Tell me, how did the old man get you on board? What flavor of Friskies was it this time? Sauteed Salmon? Pink Antarctic Krill?”

Schmingus rounded on him in a flash, claws unsheathing.

“At least I don’t work for some god damned Fancy Feast. Pathetic.” Bob spit on the ground.

“You can’t buy taste.”

Boldchungus looked on with his iconic, smarmy grin spread across his face.

“Oh, and you’ve got it, do you?”

Charlie’s eyes screamed disdain. He hated being with Schmingus as much as Schmingus did being with him.

“Listen to me,” said Boldchungus, glaring at his arch-rival. “We don’t have to do play this stupid game. You get me in, you get me out. We both get paid. We don’t have to say as much as kum-ba-yah to each other.”

Boldchungus laughed, and climbed up into the cockpit. “Whatever you say, captain. Me, I’ve decided. I’m going to enjoy this.”

“I’ll enjoy it when I’ve got my Friskies,” muttered Bob, hopping up in the co-pilot seat. “And not a minute before then.”

Bob and Charlie went way back, if you can’t tell.

They were two of the hottest hotshots known to catkind. Two of the top feline agents in the entire world.

Six billion cats on Earth, and only a handful could do what these two could do. Part of an elite ring of feline actors, they were employed by governments and private businesses and wealthy individuals worldwide to carry out their respective desires. If the price was high enough, chances are you could find a cat to do it. Some stayed loyal to their countries — others only called a place where they could hoard their Friskies or Fancy Feast home.

Bob Schmingus and Charlie Boldchungus were both American cats, so to speak, and they had stayed loyal—for the most part. Boldchungus was known to run a mission or two for the French. Schmingus got the occasional call from the Japanese Prime Minister, the King of Danes, and Moldovan High Crown.

And, there is some speculation that he might have worked for the current King of China, King Wei. That might be why he had such close ties with the King. But, currently, it’s only speculation…

As far as Boldchungus goes, he was a top-flier. Boldchungus lacked the charisma, the geopolitical brain, intellect and charm of Bob Schmingus—that’s mainly why he despised him. But, of course, there was Lucina—better not to dig that up, not just yet. But what Charlie Boldchungus lacked in brains, he more than made up for in grit and sheer damn luck.

Charlie could find his way out of a truck in a deep muck, blindfolded. He had saved one the world’s top energy executive from an assassination attempt by shooting the assassin’s bullets out of the air. He had managed to find his way home after being buried alive in a Mongolian bunker twenty-three thousand miles deep (he was the only survivor). And in one of his most legendary feats ever, he was said to have flown his helicopter through another helicopter.

No one even knows how that could be possible, really. But he did it.

Why did Schmingus hate Boldchungus then, aside from the fact that he was an insufferable idiot?

It all goes back to the Iran incident…

But that’s for another time.

The Last Gigachad

Alright y’all. You’re invested. You want to know. Who is the sixth Gigachad? Have they been found?

They have been found.

The Last Gigachad

It’s this b**** (please excuse my language).

Meet Florges. フラージェス. (Furaajyesu).

If you aren’t immediately on board, let me break it down for you. There’s something you need to know.

First of all, she is NOT a Grass-type. It’s a trick. Certainly you would think she must be. I thought she would be. She is not, but she has Grass-type moves. So she can still defeat measly Water-types.

She is only Fairy-type, which is still a great type, and also by not actually being Grass-type, she doesn’t open herself up to weaknesses to Flying, Fire, Bug, Ice… Grass has lots of weaknesses. So that’s good. (Except it doesn’t really matter at all because the game is so easy that I can beat it with my eyes closed at this point.)

Florges is stunning. We see that. And she comes in many colors.

Mine is yellow.

Now, she obviously has charisma and charm. This is a charming Pokemon right here. We can all agree on that. Right?

So stunning.

She has major Queen energy. A diva and a queen. Not too soft or feminine for my team of gangsters. Just the right amount.

I think she adds a certain element of polish and refinement, and a dash of feminine energy. Not that Tinkaton isn’t feminine, but Tinkaton has a little more of a crazed, insane energy. And Soubureizu is a scary, no-nonsense killer. Florges is rounding out the team, even while she blasts you into smithereens with concentrated moonbeams.

Which, yes, she can do.

To be a real Gigachad, you can’t just be swaggin’. You have to be strong.

She’s strong.

Florges can summon the full power of the moon and bomb her foes with it. That is a very satisfying thing to do, I’ll tell you, if you’ve never had the pleasure of doing it yourself. And as if that were not enough, she can also harness the power of the sun, and fire a magnificent destructo-beam of solar energy into her opponent’s face.

She also has insanely high Special Defence. Insanely high.

When thinking about who could be the sixth and final Gigachad, I had a feeling that this Pokemon (Flabébé) might have been the one. And it did turn out to be her.

Baby Gigachad

This is the first version of Florges. And here is the second.

Floette, フラエッテ

Neither Flabébé nor Floette suggest what incredible power and beauty lies in their final form. I wouldn’t have thought this thing even evolved. Who would have imagined that this soft-looking flower child had it in them to become such a regal, majestic queen?

And look at her now!

The story of Flabébé just goes to show you: everyone deserves a chance. Any one of these little darlings can have the greatest glow-up of the century. You can’t write them off right out of the gate.

I mean, remember this guy?

Weakest Pokemon Ever, Dorameshiya

It’s the classic story of the nerdy kid in school who ends up becoming a billionaire, and cool. And perhaps there was one kid who saw their potential and stuck with them in those dark days. Dorameshiya (Dreepy) is that kid.

With the addition of Florges to the roster, the full team of Gigachads has been assembled.

Real Gangsters, 100% Swaglords, Escaped Convicts, Ultimate Gigachads

You can see how THE QUEEN rounds out the team vibes. Every other member of the gangster squad—Gaburias, Doraparuto, Soubureizu, Dekanuchan, Manyuura— all of them look like they could’ve just busted out of Poke-prison. They’re hard.

But Florges? You would be totally surprised to find out she was an ex-convict. What kinds of henious crimes had she committed? You would look at her in awe and wonder to what extraordinary deviousness she had been up to that landed her behind bars.

I imagine she would be running mob rings, leaking information, embezzling monies and generally doing a lot of double-crossing.

So… The Gigachad Army is complete. What now?

This is about the end of the Pokemon arc for me. I’ve almost entirely stopped playing the main game, and have spent all of my recent time scouring the land for the truest, greatest gangsters, most notable and worthy Gigachads. And now that I’ve got them, there is simply no one that can stand in my way.

I’m near the end of the game. The story is picking up—it’s actually pretty good for a Pokemon game. There are many characters (too many), and you should have never given them your phone number because half of them are calling you all the time. The other half magically show up whenever it’s time for the plot to move, and they usually all decide to do this at once, so that for most of the game you have absolutely no story progression and minimal dialogue, and then you unsuspectingly walk into a room and are inundated with 400 lines of complex plot conversations.

From some of these lengthy dialogues, last night, we learned that the delinquent children who created a gang called the Star Gang (スター団) or Star Army, the truant children who are no longer attending the school (of which you are a new student), have all dropped out and formed the gang because they were severly bullied at school. It’s something of a twist, as you are led to believe that they are just ne’er-do-ells and don’t want to go to school.

At the defeat of the fourth gang leader, the previous school’s principal shows up, and he further elaborates on the great tragedy of the bullying, and his failure as a principal, and how he destroyed the records, which was horrifying information for the current school principal, who is accompanying you undercover, trying to get the kids back to school…

I missed exactly why the last school principal did destroy the records. This was on dialogue line 355 and I was starting to get tired of playing at that point.

There is one reason to keep going, and that’s to figure out who the mystery character カシオピア is, Cassiopia. (Which, isn’t that a great name? Cassiopia is an amazing name.)

All game, you have been getting calls from this mystery person, who has recognized your extraordinary potential, as everyone did somehow after you won your first three Pokemon battles, requested your assistance in taking down the Star Gang, and who pays you for it. I remember in the beginning that you are given the option to refuse to help her, which I think I took, but somehow you end up working with her anyway, because she’s part of the plot. Well, we all want to know who this mystery woman is and what she’s up to. She could even be a he, that would be a twist. She could even be the principal! And he had contrived the whole bullying episode to create a scandal and oust the previous principal. Now that would be juicy.

It’s good to have some mystery and intrigue in your story. What’s the deal with Cassiopia? Who was the bully that ruined the lives of so many kids at the school and led to the creation of the notorious and renegade Star Gang?

I haven’t formed many theories and haven’t cared much about the Star Gang. I’ve been Gigachad hunting. But now that I’ve got the squad… we might just have to see how the game ends.

There’s A New Farmer In Town // New Favorite Pokemon

I decided to sit at the long wooden table today, at Ugly Mugs. I haven’t sat there in a long time. Today, I wanted to. I’m feeling social and active. A couple sat down next to me and started chatting. Right from the get-go, she wanted to talk to me. The lady said, “Hi,” catching my eye. I said “hi”. Then she said, “We aren’t disturbing you, are we?” Or, actually, she said, “Should we go somewhere else? Are we bothering you?” I said, “No, not at all!” This was the truth. They were not bothering me of course.

Well, two of their friends showed up, and they were very chatty, and I had the sneaking feeling that more of them would be on the way. They were now taking over the table, mostly they had claimed the table. There was still a little space for me. But then, just a few minutes later, more of the party arrived, and I realized, they needed this table, and the right thing for me to do was to give it over to them. I was not going to deny them what they needed, what was the inevitable course of reality. I said, “I’m going to give you guys the table,” and they laughed, and I said, “I had a feeling there were more of you coming,” and the chatty lady said, “Are you sure, you can stay if you want!” And they said, “But he probably has work to do!” I said, “Oh yes, I have a lot of work to do….!” Hiding my screen from them, which would have shown them copious tabs of Pokemon investigations. Yes, a lot of work to do.

I have resumed my morning routine of waking up at the crack of dawn and going to the coffee shop. It took a few days to get back into it. Last night was a struggle, and I could not fall asleep for the life of me, even though I was tired during the day, at the end of it. I was ready for bed. Why does that happen? You’re ready for bed, you lay down, thinking, alright, time for sleepytime, and then, suddenly you’re seized with incredible energy, thoughts moving a mile a minute, your creative genius is exploding, and you want to do a hundred things at once. Everything except sleep, which is what you came there to do. Well, that was happening again last night, and as I am doing the no artificial light thing still, what could I do? I didn’t want to read.

I listened to records. I listened to most of my Superheaven record, Jar. My favorite thing about Superheaven is the chords they use. They have awesome chords. 90% of my love of Superheaven comes purely from loving the chords, and the guitar tone. It really is that simple. I then put on Holiday by Madonna, a great song, but you realize, not heavy at all. Light and dancy. And then, I knew what I wanted to hear – some Tame Impala. Brand New Person, Same Old Mistakes, or whatever that song is called, that is one of my favorite songs of all time. Whenever I hear that song, and I’ve heard it a thousand times, I still stop and listen. It’s a perfect song. It captures me completely. It hits so hard. It’s a song that comes on at cafes sometimes, always the best song that can possibly come on in a cafe. There is something about that song, probably many things, that just grab hold of your ear and your brain and don’t let go. From the absolute beginning of the song, it catches you. Slow, mysterious, groovy. Unlike most things that are being played on a cafe radio.

I can keep going here, I am extremely caffienated. What now?

I think this is the part where I tell you about my new favorite Pokemon.

If you don’t care about Pokemon at all, stay with me. You are still going to love this. Highly probable.

Pokemon can evolve. You knew that, right? Please tell me you knew that.

This is the first version of a Pokemon I’ve found in Pokemon Violet.

Do you see this thing? It’s called Kanuchan in Japanese, or Tinkatink in English. Yes, Tinkatink.

This is how it looks in the game. It looks miserable. What is it holding? Is that a beer bottle? What is this little thing? I first found this Pokemon and thought it was weird, and thought maybe it could be cool, but it was incredibly weak. I really don’t have a lot of time for weak Pokemon, I never have. They have to have a lot of promise, like they have to seem like they will evolve into an enormous powerful dragon-beast, or shark or something. This little pink twinkletoes was not promising, even though cute and charismatic. I had to pass.

Then, much later, I encountered the second version.

Yes everyone, meet Tinkatuff. She’s tough now. She’s scrappier. Her chunky iron beer bottle has now become some kind of exotic club. That’s good. But she’s still tiny.

She’s still weak. How can she have a place on my team of Gigachads? (Including the likes of such greatness as マニューラ and ガブリアス.)

Gaburias and Manyuura (Garchomp and Weavile), certified Gigachads

I could not imagine having her on my team of real gangsters, even if I wanted her around. For her pink charm and her Fairy typing. Every slot is valuable on a team of serious gangsters. You see that we have a dragonic sandshark and a dark weasel killer. Small pink fairy child with club still does not seem like she will make the cut, cute as she is. So, I still wrote this Pokemon off.

However, something happened.

This is a redemption story. This is the story of the ugly duckling, people.

I was on the mountain with the Psychic gym town, on the plains of the mountain. I found Tinkatuff, in Japanese Nakanuchan, in the ruins at night, with Bronzor the giant floating bell with eyes, and I was at that time running tryouts for my team of Gigachads. I was having another round of tryouts, and I was seeing who were the real beasts, and who I wanted on this team of hitters, absolute slayers, and I thought, let me evolve this Tinkatuff. Let me see what this Tinkatuff is all about. I will give her a chance.

Well, ladies and gentlemen. You will not believe your eyes. It is the greatest glowup of the 21st century. We are still early in the century, but I don’t know if this glowup can be beat.

IT’S TINKATON.

デカヌチャン!!!!!!!

How enormous her hammer is! And look at her hands! Massive paws, to hold that beastly hammer! Who would have thought that measly hump of iron would ever become a thousand-kilo slammer????

I never would have expected it. Tinkaton, she glowed up. And she immediately learned a move called デカハンマー, Dekahanmaa, which I took to mean, Giant Hammer, and I surmised that it might possibly be a move where she slams something with her newly acquired, enormous thousand-kilo hammer.

When I first unleashed my new Dekanuchan’s Gigaton Hammer move on a poor, unsuspecting wild Pokemon, I was extremely hopeful that it was in fact going to be a giant hammer attack. Imagine how pleased and enthused I was to see it was exactly that.

Gigaton Hammer

I’m including the above picture because I want you to see just exactly how ferocious this Tinkaton is. Before she even begins her attack, she first unleashes a massive wave of power and energy — she opens her mouth and screams, before charging forward, leaping into the air, raising the hammer and slamming it down, literally obliterating her enemy. It was everything I wanted to see.

I have to tell you, in my Tinkaton excitement I did some exaggerating. I lied to you. Her hammer is not actually 1000 kilograms; it’s 100 kilograms, that is about 220 pounds, and we know this because the game tells us so. From Dekanuchan’s Pokedex entry:

“The hammer tops 220 pounds, yet it gets swung around easily by Tinkaton as it steals whatever it pleases and carries its plunder back home.”

And now, we learn a very interesting fact about Tinkaton here that I did not know, which further enhances her charm and character, which is already outstanding. She is a THIEF.

So small, yet so powerful. And a conniving thief, raiding and plundering? Dekanuchan earned a top spot on my team of Gigachad gangsters.

Who will be next to take a top spot? We really have three slots left for true gangsters. I have been putting Pokemon through the workouts and trials.

I have a lot of eggs in this guy’s basket.

Dorameshya, AKA Dreepy.

Don’t let me down, buddy.

I titled this “There’s A New Farmer In Town” because I have been gradually becoming more obsessed with planting, farming, and gardening. I couldn’t sleep last night, I had too much physical energy, and you know what I decided to do with it? I went out in the yard and dug up my grass.

I had to do it. I have seeds to get down. Butterfly Milkweed. And it was actually a great time to tear up the lawn, at 11 pm at night, because it was cool. It was nice to able to do some yard work without feeling like I’m dying in the sun. That was awesome.

Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa)

A neighbor across the street was coming home and I happened to see them turning their head 180 degrees around to watch me as I dug in my yard, bathed in the glare of the copious amount of artificial light in the street outside of my house, shovel in the hand. He was certainly wondering what the hell I was up to. I imagine that if you ever see someone digging with a shovel at night, you’re going to have some suspicion about that. Who can be up to any good with a shovel at midnight?

A 29-year old man, laying in bed with thoughts of Dekanuchan and gardening. Alpha male? Probably not.

Quack Hits

I meant to say, Quick Hits.

“But what could it do, if any danger came?” Alice asked.

“It could bark,” said the Rose.

From Through The Looking-Glass, 1871, Lewis Carroll

Quick hits:

We write for joy. We write for fun. That’s why we write, ultimately. It is for joy.

Sometimes to convey information. Sometimes to persuade. But the best writing is that which comes from an act of love. It is play. That’s the best. So says Stephen King.

I have sat down to do this and found that I don’t really want to do this. So it goes.

“So it goes.”

– Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut.

I went on a run today. A wild run. I ended up in the middle of the woods running on deer trails. I stopped one centimeter before running through an enormous spider web, complete with large, scary black spider in the middle, at face height. It was like meeting a tripwire. I stopped just in time. I felt out around the edge, not wanting to just destroy the poor beast’s hard work and livelihood, but having to pass through this way, being in dense woodland forest, and I felt around the edges of the web, the invisible space, to see if there was some way I could pass without entangling myself in threads. I did find a large patch of open space, and I contorted myself through it, hoping very much to not bring the spider down upon me. I then resumed my running.

I could not believe that I had absolutely no ticks on me after this wild run. Through long grass, for a mile or more, I had mud, some scratches, various other debris, but surely, thought I, there must be a tick or twenty on my body. And there were NONE. Moving too fast? Too much sweat? No ticks in that grass? I couldn’t believe it.

It’s good to run hard through the woods. Makes you feel alive. I ran through about twenty deer, ten different pairs of two or three deer, on that run.

Tragedy struck this morning. Or, it struck last night. I discovered the tragedy this morning. My sunflowers had been ravaged. They had been doing so great, too. Well, they were ravaged. Not even a trace of three of them, only craters left in the ground from where they had been savagely ripped from the earth. The second largest, uprooted and mangled, left a carcass on the soil. If sunflowers had blood, there would have been blood everywhere. The largest, my prize bonnet, or whatever people said in the old days, my prize pig, bit clean off from three inches up. Three measly leaves and a smidgen of stem left. Well, at least they gave me that. Can it rise from the ashes?

Mysteriously, the two that have made it out of my second planting were left untouched. Perhaps they are being saved for later? Allowed to fatten before the slaughter?

Who was the culprit? We will never know. I suspect a rogue deer that haunts our neighborhood.

I’ve seen her.

I have had a growing history of reading people things from books, offering personal heartfelt readings, generally when in the comfort of my abode. I have read or attempted to read many a story to my living mates. Two nights ago, at a party, before heading out into the night, we sat around in the living room, eight of us young modern American people, and my roommate Smosh said something that I will never forget. I remembered it just now, I was reflecting on the significance of this event just moments before I started to write this piece, because it was truly extraordinary, and has put him in my good graces forever. He said, in the midst of the revelry, the group now gathered around the couch and table, all conversing, he said to me: “You should read us some poetry.”

I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of it first. Smosh, you wonderful man. I ran the three steps from the living room into my bedroom and grabbed my book of Poems of Fun and Fancy. And I read the poems.

Some of them.

I first chose to go out on a limb and try a new one. That was as an experiment. But it was not a great success. Everyone (my sister) just wanted to hear A Letter To Evelyn Baring.

Smosh then said, “I thought you would read us a Japanese poem.”

I went and got my Japanese poems.

I read the first poem I came across, which happened to be from The Exile Of Godaigo, about an exiled emperor of Japan in the late 1200’s.

tsui ni kaku

shizumihatsubeki

mukui araba

ue naki mi to wa

nani umarekemu

If it is my fate

To terminate thus my days,

In the depths of ruin,

Why was I ever born

Sovereign supreme of men?

After only one week, possibly ten days of avoiding all artificial light bar fire in the evenings, my circadian rhythm has completely reset. I have woken up at the crack of dawn on nearly all of these days. And now, the sun goes down, and I am sleepy. I am still often having surges of energy and late night mental wanderings, but I resist the urge to indulge them. I think it takes some time to fully adjust. This morning I woke up at 5:30 am, and for the first time, I felt like I was waking up regularly, as in, I did not feel that I wanted to go back to bed.

Parker came into my room last night to show me something on his phone. He had been working on some art for his Spotify. I allowed him to show me, he said, in an attempt to persuade me to evaluate his art, “I’ll show you on the lowest light settings.” Well, to my fully adjusted nighttime eyes, that “lowest” setting was still blinding, and when he flashed that screen in my face, I immediately recoiled, and I felt my eyes rapidly contract in my head. It was like I had just looked into the sun. I felt like I had just been doused with cold water.

I talked to a girl at the barcade, the night of the party. It was towards the end of the night. I had gone over to the machine to play Q-Bert. I got the second highest score, that night. Someday I will claim the first.

There was a girl standing alone at Burgertime. She was pretty. I had the urge to talk to her. I walked over to the machine next to her, and said, “Are you winning?” She said, “Oh, I’m just waiting for my friends, they abandoned me.” I said, “Oh.” (Or something like that.) She said, “I don’t even know what this is,” gesturing to the game in front of her. I looked at the title, saw that it was Burgertime. I said, “It’s Burgertime!”

She said something about how her friends were always going outside to talk to the bouncer or something. I said, “What do you think they’re talking about?”

She thought for a moment.

“Drugs.”

I laughed. She said, something about how they’re always talking about a “plug”, and she put emphasis on that word, somewhat mockingly, lighthearted mocking. I think she rolled her eyes.

She then asked me, “Are you winning? Tonight?”

I said, “Eh. I’m not losing.”

She was really looking at me now.

“Where are you from?” she asked.

I could tell she meant where I was really from.

“Elkhart Indiana… Northern Indiana.”

I don’t remember if she had any real response to that or just acknowledged it.

(Actually, I remember. She asked what brought me to Nashville.)

“How about you?”

She was from Nashville. She said, “right down the street” and she made a gesture suggesting that she really was talking about right down the street.

I said, “You can tell I’m not from Nashville?”

She said, “Mhm.”

“How could you tell?”

“Your stature.”

That was not what I expected to hear. I didn’t really know what that even meant.

“My stature?”

“Yep. And the way you talk.”

I ain’t no southern boy. That’s for sure.

Somehow, then, for whatever reason she told me that she had broken up with her ex that night. I don’t remember why she was telling me that. It was pretty matter-of-fact. She didn’t seem too devastated about it. But I remember that she phrased it as, “My ex and I broke up tonight.”

I said, “You’re already calling him your ex?”

She nodded.

I thought that was interesting. Can you say, “My ex and I broke up?” Not really, right. Because you can’t break up with your ex. You’re not dating them anymore.

I didn’t go into that right then. I said, for some reason, I guess I just had the feeling, “Have you broken up before?”

She nodded.

This was about at the end of the conversation. I’m wondering why I didn’t offer any words of solace or comfort. She might have asked me right after that what brought me to Nashville, but that doesn’t seem like it would have been the follow-up question. I think that came earlier in the conversation. There wasn’t much more said though, before she said, “I’m so sorry, but I really have to go now, my friends are waiting for me. It was nice talking with you, though.”

And she touched my arm.

I said, “Go on!”

Not in a way that suggested I wanted her to go. But it was time for her to go.

Maybe I was supposed to say, “It was nice talking with you too.” I don’t think it mattered too much what I said, then.

I now had permission to go ham on Q-Bert.

I had an epic run. In the very first game, I lost two lives like they were… pieces of candy… that you don’t… want, on Halloween. (I want to come up with an original and unique simile here. I don’t have it.)

I lost my first two lives like they were tadpoles… in a pond. Because frogs have so many babies…. they’re disposable… do you know what I mean?

Oh my god.

I lost those first two lives, and then I was on the ropes. I had one life left. And somehow, on that one life, I ended up going so far. It was all I needed. I was rolling hot on that one life.

I was in the perfect place, mentally, for crushing Q-Bert. I was the right level of invested. I didn’t care too much. I wasn’t too drunk. I was just a little buzzed, a little desirous of doing my best. The alcohol was unlocking some Q-Bert skill in me.

Then, my sister came over. She started talking to me. Something happened. I got riled up, I got distracted. And I made my one, final life Q-Bert jump off the cliff.

What a tragic ending!

I watched as my Q-Bert fell into the abyss. There went my final life. And for the night, that was my attempt at the top score. I did no better than that.

Boys’ Club at Ugly Mugs

More freewriting. I’m giving you more freewriting. I’m giving me more freedom to freewrite.

I woke up today at 6 am. And I don’t feel terrible. That’s pretty good, except I did feel sleepy still, and I sat on the floor and meditated for a while, and then moved to the more comfortable place, the bed, and then I was feeling so peaceful and comfortable, and I just touched the edge of blissful sleep —

I forced myself to get back up again.

Why am I doing this? I ask myself as I get out of bed, throw on clothes, head to the coffee shop, Ugly Mugs. If I’m tired, why not sleep in? Why am I battling my sleep schedule like it owes me money? Why am I not just living my life freely and comfortably and doing whatever I want whenever I want it?

Parker, in his infinite wisdom, said the other night, “Why don’t you just use your energy when you have it and rest when you don’t?” That was the most profound thing I had ever heard in that moment, and I told him so, to which he said, “Isn’t it obvious?” That just made it all the more profound.

The coffee at Ugly Mugs is gas this morning. As in, it’s really good. It’s hitting me like gasoline in a tank. And it tastes great. Really good coffee.

This is the earliest I’ve ever made it here, by far. 7 am I was at the shop. I wanted to get something done, I wanted to get started on whatever it is that I’ll do, and I knew that the chances were much higher if I escaped my freezing cave, and made it out here, out into the world.

I wondered what would be going on here at 7 am, I really did. It’s a local neighborhood coffee shop. The day is full of remote workers, college students, friends meeting for a chit-chat, coworkers or acquaintances talking business. What would be happening at 7 am?

A shocking thing. As I stumbled in, there was a guy, my age, different vibe, shorts and sunglasses, sandals (I’m wearing full black with running shoes, black hoodie in July because my roommate blasts the AC in the house, and it keeps me safe from the mosquitoes anyway, that love to feast on my precious blood), and I knew that we were on track to be reaching the door at the exact same moment.

Sometimes in this situation, when my brain has accurately calculated that I am on a collision course with another human, I will slow down or speed up. But I didn’t feel like doing either of those things, and he didn’t either.

I could tell he knew that we were both going to reach this door at the same time. Well, I reached it just a second before he did, and I opened the door and held it open for him. And he said, “Oh, you go ahead,” and I said, with a grandiose, sweeping gesture, “No, after you,” to which he replied, with a small nod, “Thank you,” and walked through the door.

Now, that wasn’t awkward at all. Just two humans being polite to one another. That was nice.

I did end up then walking right past him to order, as he stopped to look at something on the wall.

That was some foreshadowing. The fact that I was holding the door for a MAN, then. As I took my first sip of coffee I surveyed the scene, scanning the crowd. Who were the 7 am folk on a Wednesday morning at Ugly Mugs? And I was shocked.

All men.

Yes, in a place where the crowd is at least HALF women, I’ve never noticed a ratio skewed one way or the other, this morning, Ugly Mugs was a total boys’ club.

There was (and still is) one group of four lads having a great time at the long slab of wood table. They seem to be discussing some business, wearing smart business casual attire. I just stole a glance at them. Then, you have two more gentleman having a conversation at a table behind them… There’s a bro in sunglasses sitting outside in the sun. There is a refined-looking gentleman with well-maintained hair, glasses, comfortably but tastefully dressed, reading something on his phone. Probably the news. He is giving major dad vibes.

There is a guy behind me doing remote work. He was typing up a storm when I sat down.

There were about four guys in the back of the room, that seemed to all have moved on already. There’s one guy left way back in that corner, who is with high probability working. That’s the workers’ corner.

Since my arrival, somehow it’s already 7:45, several ladyfolk have entered the store, one is walking in right now. But none have stayed.

Who will be the first to break the boys’ club?

Will it be this woman in a blue and white summer dress?

Holy s***. It is!

But wait a minute. She may just be taking a temporary seat as she waits for her coffee.

She’s going to pick it up now.

What happens next?

She’s put a lid on it. It’s in a plastic cup. She could take that thing right out the door.

She’s added some cream. We are all waiting on tenterhooks.

She’s taking a sip. She seems pleased.

And now?

Another sip.

And… she’s gone to a table in the back!

She’s sitting!!!!!!!!!!!!

Welcome to the club!!!!!!!!!!

(One minute later)

Oh my god. She just left.

She had just been waiting for a sandwich.

The boys’ club continues…

Han Jan

I love my morning coffee.

It’s 8:11 am. I’m still adjusting to my early wakeup times. You would think that my body would not wake itself up before it had had enough sleep. That it would just keep sleeping. There is no reason for me to get up so early if I don’t have to. My brain knows that.

The body responds to its own cues. That’s why I get up at 5:23 am yesterday, even if I wasn’t asleep until midnight. And today, 7:20 am.

I did better falling asleep last night, I think I was out before midnight, but there was a long period of undesired wakefulness. I had turned off the AC at some point, and it turned out that that was a mistake, as I was uncomfortably hot. It was 80 degrees in the house, if our thermostat is to be trusted, which I sometimes doubt. That was my excuse anyway, for being stuck in bed, awake, when I just wanted to enter the sweet dream world of sleep, so that I could get started on the next day.

The morning is a precious time. Special things happen in the morning. Yesterday morning I decided to try a new experiment. This morning I am thinking about a butterfly that I had raised, and a Go Pro, and a past love, and its sad end. (This is all one story.)

On another morning not too long ago, I began a story that I have finished, that I am supposed to be working on right now.

Does anyone else… do you wake up with songs in your head? I do. Almost every morning, I wake up “listening” to a song in my head.

It always seems random. Often the song comes deep out of left field. A song that I haven’t heard since middle school. Yesterday I think it was a Nickleback song, Far Away. Today it was Han Jan, by Peggy Gou.

Why? I haven’t been listening to these songs.

I want to be here for the mornings. If I sleep in too much, especially if I sleep in to a horrific hour like 10 am, I feel like I’ve committed a crime. But, I don’t know if I am exactly a morning person. It’s just that I know the morning is such a precious time, and magical things can happen.

I woke up at the crack of dawn for the first time in what seemed like years, probably a month ago. I couldn’t believe that I was awake. I didn’t know what to do. That’s what happens when you’re used to getting up late, and you wake up at 5 am. You’re early to the party by five hours. What the hell are you supposed to do now? You’ve got so much time on your hands.

That morning, I went outside, and sat in my yard. I was meditating. That was all I really wanted to do, then. About twenty minutes in, I heard some crunching sounds, on our gravel driveway. I didn’t think much of them, but I kept hearing them, getting closer, soft crunching, and I had the feeling that something was moving around on the driveway. I opened my eyes, and there, between my roommate’s black Nissan Altima, and the fence, was a small deer, staring at me.

I was shocked, of course. A deer, in our yard? What? There’s never been a deer in our neighborhood, let alone my yard. This is the city. We’re right off of Gallatin. What are you doing here?

It was the last thing I expected to see that morning, or ever, in our yard.

That morning, I also spied several neighborhood cats, sneaking around, in our yard right under our noses, living their secret cat lives. I felt like I was seeing a whole new world.

I think that the morning, like late night, is a liberating time. That might be the secret of the morning.

It’s time that at least I can feel like, it’s totally mine. I somehow have a free pass to do absolutely anything I want with this time. And so I can enjoy myself and live to the fullest, untethered by responsibilities or expectations. That’s great for the spirit, and for creativity.

These recent nights, I have spent in Harry Potter world, reading by candlelight. At 3 am, I exist in the wizarding world, I read about Snape’s past, I learn the secrets…

Morning is also the best time because you get to have your first cup of coffee for the day.

I was thinking about the butterfly that I had mentioned earlier, this morning, staring out of the window… I’m sure it’s on my mind because yesterday, I noticed that I had a green caterpillar, possibly mid-transformation into a cocoon or chrysalis, on my blue plastic tarp that I use to cover my bike in the yard. It seemed to have adhered itself to the plastic and was sluggish, hardly conscious. And if it does decide to settle down there, it kind of becomes my caterpillar, my cocoon or chrysalis, my project. I will have to watch over it.

I’m going to go check on it now…

And there you have it, folks.

Overnight it has become a chrysalis.

I will watch over you, my child!

500 Word Experiment and No Artificial Light

The 500 Word Experiment

I like the phrase freewrite.

I’ve been using that recently. In thinking about what I will be writing about. Often, most of the time I have something specific in mind, that I want to share. Even right now, there are several things that I am thinking about, that I would like to write about. And yet, I’ve noticed that when I just… freewrite, the writing… well, things come up that I wouldn’t have expected, sometimes, and the way I write about them is natural, as a flow of thought, and that’s often even more interesting than me just writing about a specific topic.

It’s good to just have a topic in mind, and something to write a whole piece around. There doesn’t have to be any specific way that you go about writing things for your blog, anyways. You still can do whatever you want.

I was having a good time trying to meet that 500 word cutoff, for a while. Did I even make it a week with that? It’s not my style. I’m simply too meandering and loquacious. I simply have too much to unload, in most cases, that I sit down at the computer, or with my pen and paper, and start going crazy. 500 words is a sneeze.

However, the 500 word experiment was very interesting. I hacked and slashed some of my pieces to death, to near death. I didn’t allow anything to die, and that’s why I ended up mostly being unable to reach the 500 word cutoff. There’s only so much you can say in 500 words. But, if you can say something in 500 words, but you’re saying the same thing in 700, or 1000, then you should really consider cutting that down, think carefully about those extra 300 or 500 words.

That’s how I felt about the experiment. I did feel that everything I posted benefitted from at least some degree of serious pruning, and often, even ruthless cutting helped the piece. But when pushing it to the limit, you see what is too much, when you’ve overcut and done damage, what can’t be cut away. Where to draw the line.

I really thought about Hemingway when writing like this, and editing in such a manner. I do use a lot of fluff. Even in that sentence, I realized it as I wrote it. I do use a lot of fluff. Now, do you see the fluff there? It immediately stands out. And I’m in the habit of using immediately as a filler word, as I just did again. Immediately can often be cut.

I just like to add words, and in conversation we do add a lot of words and use a lot of filler, and especially in a piece like what I’m writing now, a freewrite, where I’m writing as I’m thinking, that’s fine, even important. For the tone and voice. But there are cases where you don’t want that, and where it would be better not to have it. The point is that you are choosing to be terse, or fluffy, loose with your wordage and writing, intentionally. As Hemingway chose.

The fluff in that sentence was the do. Why do we need do in that sentence? We don’t need it. But if I were speaking, I would probably add the do, and say, “I do use a lot of fluff.”

How many words have we got here?

577, so far.

New Experiment: No (BAD) Artificial Light

The 500 word experiment was fun and useful. This is why we like to do experiments. They show you things. And, they are fun. Usually. I don’t know what experiment I’ve done that wasn’t fun.

I’m currently on a new one, that y’all don’t even know about yet, which is that I’m trying my best to avoid artificial light at night. I am shocked that it took me so long to get around to this one.

I’ve known that blue light was bad for the eyes, and screentime is a problem for the circadian rhythm, tricking your body into thinking it’s still daytime, throwing off your cortisol production. But I wasn’t taking it that seriously. Well, Rachel offhandedly made a comment about artificial light being a problem, the other week, and it stuck with me. It sat in my brain, it hit me at the right time. It was something I had been meaning to research.

I only had to read about three articles full of facts and data, to sufficiently shock and horrify me, and outrage me, and put me on the right and true path. I could share that data with you, possibly in another post. I’m freewriting, not writing an inspirational piece or anything here. You might not need all that data anyways, but data is what gets me to take action. Data, fact, reports, they are all what move me. And they are what convinced me of the bane on our existence that is artificial light.

Now, fire is also artificial light. I had to Google that after my first night by the candle. I spent the night thinking, “Is this artificial light?” Having an internal debate. The answer is yes, but it’s nothing like LED light, or light from screens. I am tempted to look some things up here — I won’t do it. But fire is low on the spectrum, the wavelengths are longer, and carry less energy. (Something like this.) It is not so intense on your eyes. I just read that firelight mimics sunlight, which is telling your brain that it’s time to wind down. So at least if you are burning a candle until 3 am, binging on Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire, your body and mind are basically already primed to go to bed whenever you decide that it’s best if you finally put the book down now, or you become so absolutely exhausted that you’re dropping the book on yourself or rereading the same page seven times in a row.

Candles are fun. We all know that, right? We are all in agreement of this fact. So, having more reasons to use candles is always great. I think that half of me is adhering to my no artificial light policy (I’m excluding candles from inclusion in my artificial light definition, here, because it’s really not a bad one) because it gives me an excuse to use candles.

It’s a good thing to be doing, a no artificial light (after sunset) policy, because it is like a soft ban on lots of bad things. Things that you aren’t supposed to be doing at night, that keep you up late. Phone, computer, gaming, TV. Even just getting up to shennanigans in your room, even reading, it will be easier to stay up later when you bask in your artificial light glow in your room, in your kitchen. However, when that sun goes down, FIRE UP THE CANDLES. It’s creepin’ time. There’s not much you can do then, or you have to really want it. You have to want it so badly that you’ll do it under conditions of severe low light, and possibly risk an injury, and experience frustration.

That’s how the reading has been. My candle barely casts enough light to illuminate the pages. It’s probably terrible for my eyes, having to squint so hard, but my eyes are already so terrible that at this point… they can get worse. I mean, if it comes to it, I’ll use a magnifying glass if I have to. We’ll cross that bridge when it comes. But this reading, you would be amazed to see all the various positions that I have come up with, the seatings and arrangements, the tactical candle placements, the ingenious schemes to angle the book so that it receives more light.

It took me three nights to come up with my second best idea, which was to place the candle in a drawer in my desk. I have an old wooden desk, and it sits right next to my bed. Reading from bed is more comfortable, especially at night, although I like to also sit at the desk and read. I have been starting at the desk, and then moving to the bed. Sometimes I’ll switch between them, and actually I have been doing that, to give my body a break from being stuck in a single position for too long. So, sitting at the desk could be tiring, as I have to prop the book up in my hands, on my elbows. That has to be done to ensure enough light hits the page.

The angle of the light is very important, and unfortunately most of my candle light is shooting straight up, and is wasted. So, wherever my book is in relation to the candle, it must be above the candle. I have to get that light. That’s why, after two nights, my genius was not to raise the book up, but to lower the candle, by putting it in an open drawer. That makes it lower than the surface of the desk, putting it on the right level for me and my book. It also allowed me to read from the bed, while sitting propped up against the pillows, because my bed height is slightly lower than the desk height.

I thought that this was a good lesson in how time can reveal solutions and solve your problems. You do not immediately see all the improvements, you do not strike on all the best methods at once. You inevitably get tired of the problem, you get so tired of the problem, and you constantly scheme ways to solve it, until you do.

It took me about five nights before I found the best, most comfortable solution yet. It was also, however, the most fraught with risk, as I found out. By placing the candle at the side of my hip, directly on my bed with me in my bed, I was able to have the light so close, and receive a majority of the beaming photons, wonderfully lighting up the pages of my book. They would shoot right up into the book, that I could hold in a natural position, right on my lap, as I lay there in the bed, and I could see every word, on both pages, clearly, from a perfectly comfortable position. How wonderful!

Yet, the problem as you can imagine, is that I am laying down, sharing my bed with a precariously placed flame, and a basin of hot, liquid wax.

It was some night where I was reading the Order of the Phoenix, deep into the trials and tribulations, and I just wanted it to be over, I wanted to get through it, but the book was defeating me, all 900-something pages of it. This was no Chamber of Secrets, this was no Prisoner of Azkaban. I was pushing it up to my limit, playing with fire, literally (yes I had to write that)…! And I was falling asleep at the wheel, and the third or fourth time I nodded off on the page, I was jolted awake, feeling my side suddenly become wet and hot, and saw that the candle flame was now sideways, and the hot wax was spilling out everywhere. That’ll wake you up.

You know what? I just remembered. I wasn’t falling asleep. I remember that, I was just deeply engrossed, and forgot about the candle, and adjusted myself. I know I wasn’t falling asleep, because I remember what I did afterward: I took off my pajama pants, now covered in hot wax, I changed my undies (had a little hot wax on ’em too), and then I promptly sat down at my desk and kept reading. When I went back to bed, I checked to see if the wax had cooled, and it had. There was a hard, waxy patch now on the side of my comforter and bedsheet.

That patch lasted for about five days, by the way. I just washed the sheets today.

One week of no artificial light: Results

I was just tempted to let that be the last line, but I should tell you about the big reason to avoid bad artificial light, which is quality of sleep. And I have found that since I’ve started doing this no artificial light thing, I have really been getting great sleep, and I have been enjoying these evening, reading-by-candlelight sessions. It’s got me waking up at the crack of dawn again. I find that even if I stay up late, as I have been, because I have been gripped by a sickness of Harry Potter fever, it’s not as punishing to stay up reading by candlelight, than by browsing the internet on the laptop, watching YouTube or whatever it is that I’m doing with that thing.

It also removes all temptation, and pressure. Maybe I’m pressured to take care of some business? Do it tomorrow. Have to message someone? Nope. Check email, bank accounts, Google something that I absolutely need to get to the bottom of, such as “Is fire artificial light?” It can wait. (It took all of my self-control not to look this one up, that first candlelit night.)

It makes it easier to say no to all of these things because of the clear rule. When the goes down, artificial light is BANNED. That’s it. Simple.

I would recommend anyone to try this out.

(Shoutout to Parker for discovering the unscented $1.99 candles hidden on the very bottom rack in the candle aisle at Kroger, that comes with no plastic except the tiny sticker, that looks exactly like a large glass of milk, and makes this foray into candlelight living much more economically bearable.)

Bart

Sometimes, the universe gives you exactly what you ask for, exactly when you ask for it.

(This just happened to me.)

It was noon. I had already done some writing on a story that I’ve been working on. I’m nearing the end of it, and it feels like I’m in the middle of a boss battle. I’m currently writing what seems to be the core emotional center or climax of the piece. It’s a difficult part. I can’t force it. But I can’t leave it alone.

However, after spending the better part of last night as well immersed in writing, I realized I was hitting a limit of time spent in fantasyland. I tried to write outside so that I wasn’t cooped up inside all day but was immediately beset by mosquitoes and angry about it.. I had an unshakeable feeling that I needed to get out into reality and connect with it, right now, during the day. I could come back to writing at night. Now was the time for reality.

With that solified in my mind, I decided to go out and walk, and do a bit of running, which I have wanted to do but am struggling with a calf strain. Just let my feet take me somewhere, and move my body in the sun. I changed clothes, threw on shoes, and out I went.

Immediately, as I turned right to go up the hill and into the depths of my East Nashville neighborhood, I saw a man on the ground in the grass across the street. He was about thirty feet down the way, rolling around near the sidewalk. I didn’t recognize him. I saw that he was old, had snow-white hair. And at first, I thought that he may have been doing yoga or something. I approached him with great curiosity and growing concern. I realized that he was not just doing some noonday stretches, but he trying to get up off the ground, and he was shaking and rocking rhythmically, like he was having a small seizure.

I walked up and studied him. There was no else around. I asked him if he was okay, and what had happened. I now noticed that his forehead was covered in a smear of blood. It was shining and deep red. It was the color of blood. He seemed confused, and I was trying to figure out what had happened to him. Was he having a stroke? Did he have a concussion? How conscious was he? Was he on drugs? He was not coherent at all. He only kept asking me to help him get up.

I could tell that if he did get up, it wouldn’t help him much. He was going to fall right over, and risk hurting himself again. I knew then that I needed to call an ambulance, and I looked around for anybody, but there was no one around. I didn’t have my phone on me and would have to go back and get it. I didn’t want to leave this man, but that was what I had to do. As I walked over to the man I had heard a siren, and I was hoping that maybe they were on the way for him, although there was no one around that I could see that would have called the police. Well, I hung around with this man, who was becoming angry at me, that I was not helping him stand up, which he couldn’t do anyways, and he started yelling at me, when I let go of his hands, “Help me, God Dammit!!” I grabbed his hands again, calming him, and then I saw turning the corner at the end of the street, a fire truck. That was a relief, and I waved to them. They pulled up, and three guys hopped out of the truck.

The lead guy was middle aged, shaved head. The two guys following behind were younger, wearing sunglasses. The shaved head firefighter walked up to the old man, and said to my surprise, in a friendly way, “Hi there Bart! Need some help?” The firefighter knew this guy. That was good. Bart said, not looking up at them, “I don’t want your help. Don’t help me.” He seemed to know them too. He was not happy to see them.

I backed off, and let the professionals take over. They talked to him, grabbed a plastic chair off the nearby porch and sat him down in it. As they picked him up, he collapsed again. The two other firefighters were sitting with him now. The lead firefighter now turned to me and gave me an explanation, in low tones. “He lives just over there,” he said, gesturing to the houses back behind. “He has Lou Gehrig’s disease and does crack, smokes weed.” He talked about it as if it were regrettable but common. All I could really thing to say to this was, “He’s having a tough time, I can tell.” The firefighter now walked over to Bart, and at that time an ambulance and a squad car showed up, everyone getting out of their vehicles. Six personnel were on the scene, and my role here in this small play was finished. I went off on my walk.

I thought briefly about this. I reflected on the plight of this old man, of the casual, matter-of-fact way of speaking about him, in his patheticness, of the firefighter.. This man, a man of my neighborhood, in such abysmal condition, and his story so natural and normal that I don’t even bat an eye at it. It’s not surprising to me at all to have encountered this situation. Especially after New York City, and from my time at the Cummins Station Starbucks, I am not shocked to see these things anymore.

Underneath the normal veil, the standard quietness of this suburban space, today, where I do my writing and my gardening, and things seem so normal, there was a rupture. I learned that my neighbor is doing crack. He is not okay. He is suffering.

Bart punctured the veil.

I am supposed to write something memorable and significant here, in conclusion. I know that. But I don’t really have anything to say.

I left my house seeking reality, and yet I was immediately met with a somewhat fantastical event. I guess it’s just that kind of day. The lines are blurred.

I hope Bart is okay.