News, Plumbing, and Aristocracy

Hear ye, see ye, read ye! Contrary to what I may have heard through the grapevine below your window, not every white paper is a suitable replacement for the colorful news, weather, and sports delivered in virtual real time by youngsters who have nowhere to go but up, assuming Mars hasn't dropped below the horizon before the final countdown begins.

Reading between the lines below the fold proves that the trials and errors that pass for news are only fumes in the teapot, and should not be taken internally before the gas has been allowed to cool. This is not to say that a similarly tempestuous cooling period contributed to our naked ancestors' demise, before clothing burst into the limelight, and occasionally at the seams. Rather, an appropriate phrase would consist of proper nouns and their improper counterparts, leaving quarter notes to fill the white space left behind by shifting tectonic plates below my pressroom, where stability really counts.

Indeed, less is often more, evidenced by the nomenclature used to signify equality, although sometimes it's the other way around. Odd Thursdays are the exception to the rule, leaving the colonists to settle their differences the old-fashioned way, but not everyone has a duke at his disposal. Like a plumber on overtime, the gloves come off before the light goes on, leaving opposable thumbs to declog, demuck, and demystify the reversible threads that confound royalty and plainclothes workers alike, for these are not your father's pipes. If they were, you would have inhaled by now.

 

Questionable Certainties

Extra Special Ops Having reached the age of habituation, it's easy to take my surroundings for granted. A tree is still a tree, a hydrant is a hydrant, and the clouds are where they've always been, though they seem darker now. To avoid further complacency, I believe the time has come to take my surroundings with a grain of salt, questioning the certainties that frame my worldview, and cleaning the peephole I use to spy on the little terrorist across the hall.

Sure, I'm aware of my surroundings, but are my surroundings aware of me? Of course not. Espionage doesn't work that way.

 

Realizing the Event Horizon

Don't judge a hole by its color. Historically, the sight of a crow heckling a large hawk causes me to avert my eyes. The outcome is predictable, severe, and does little to improve my already cynical worldview. This morning's episode, however, was different in one very important way: I had a realization. This is how I was able to connect the dots.

I saw that the connectivity of dots is hampered by their straightforward appearance, leading to the realization that coaxing them out of their hide-in-plain-sight surroundings and onto a sheet of carbon paper is the best way to observe their habits. This led to the conviction that too many dots spoil the graph, but it didn't matter because I had already arrived at my realization, which isn't the sort of thing that needs to be done twice.

If asked, I would simply indicate that the murder of crows is no longer my responsibility. If asked again, I would simply indicate that, yes, they do grow on trees. The third time, I would simply point to the nearest black hole, which is exactly like a hawk, only without the feathers. Superior encephalization quotient or not, crows should know that by now.

 

Nothing Doing

Don't do nothing. When I act as if nothing has happened, I'm setting the stage for a play on words. In theory, the act of doing nothing is less an act than the stubborn refusal to stand and deliver, but not everyone is good at thinking on their feet. In practice, talk is cheap, which is just one more reason to memorize the script before the fruit flies.

When actions speak louder than words, we immediately understand that something hasn't been properly lubricated. If joints could speak, they would ask for silencing jell, or a ride to the muffler shop. If joints could sing, they wouldn't have to spend their lives gazing into the wishing well of popular culture, where everyone is a star, or will be, or was.

Are we not stardust? Yes, and the fruit fly is stardust, too.

 

360

360 degrees of freedom, plus or minus.

Turtles dawdle when they walk
Shambhala shells along for the ride
But when they go sailing
Their shells are unfurled
A pirouette of possibilities
Horizon's blue axis
Afloat on the waves.

 

Charge

Like a highly amplified tour bus. While discussing current events with one of my charges, the problem of negating false positives during the testing phase rose to the top of the stack, resulting in a noticeable puff of smoke that alarmed the fire department's chief observer, who chided us for leaving the lightning rod unplugged during the height of the storm.

When he had finished plugging in, the familiar strains of an old Hendrix song woke the neighbors, who came over to complain, but changed their tune when they realized that the drummer hadn't removed her breathing apparatus. As midnight came and went, it became obvious that the fire department intended to play until someone apologized for interrupting their sleep. They didn't see the humor in our reckless disregard for fire safety during a thunderstorm; they said we might as well have been on the roof, naked, with a metal pole.

They were right, of course. Like grounding a charging horse, a negative charge on the lightning rod guarantees a few extra winks in the firehouse, where the path of least resistance often leads to a brass pole, even at night.

wonder if horses understand electricity.