I haven’t always been so well-adjusted.
For a while, I had a therapist. And he did free association
Well, kinda. He just kept shouting “Buckminster.”
I’d say “Fuller” and he called the cops on me.
I now realize he wasn’t a lousy therapist.
I was just too possessive, and I followed him everywhere.
He’d lost his dog, and was out looking for him.
It’s funny, looking back at these things, and remembering them.
Okay, so I stole his dog, but Buckminster is a really good dog.
Although after every time I say his name, I keep wanting to say “Fuller.”
Category: My stories
Turing test
After computing hardware and programming advanced to the point where we could beat the Turing Test, the next challenge was to create an artificial body to put that intelligence into that would fool a human.
Unlike the intelligence test, the body test was a lot more hands on.
Scientists were asked to fuck a series of robots and humans, and then were asked which ones were human and which were robots.
There were occasional glitches, resulting in broken bones, severe lacerations, and accidental beheadings.
And too many scientists would say “I’m still not sure, can I try that one again?”
Billy the fastballer
Billy was a fastball pitcher.
He threw fastballs.
Really fast. Faster than any other pitcher.
They were really dangerous.
Two hundred, three hundred miles per hour.
So fast, nobody could hit them.
If you tried to hit them, you’d shatter your bat.
Or if the ball was off-target, you’d get your arm or leg or skull shattered.
Nobody could catch them either.
He killed a few catchers that way.
The first one, total accident.
After that, yeah, should have learned their lesson with the first dead catcher.
Billy was banned from baseball.
Became a superhero.
Until somebody shot him dead.
And she got a pony
My girl loved ponies.
Shelves and shelves of stuffed ponies.
You could barely see her bed under them.
My girl liked to draw ponies.
She drew them everywhere.
When she got older, she got a pony tattoo on her arm.
She thought it would cover up the needle tracks.
But it didn’t. We knew. And we tried to stop her.
We couldn’t.
We buried her in pink pony pajamas.
Wrapped in her favorite pony blanket.
Out by the pony farm we used to go to every summer.
Before the drugs took her on the last, long ride of her life.
Fast food for thought
Bob says that he can’t live on his minimum wage fast food job.
So, he protests at rallies calling for a minimum wage of fifteen dollars an hour.
Bob’s bosses say that such a high minimum wage will kill the fast food industry.
Why is this a bad thing?
Nobody should be eating fast food.
Burgers and fries and super-sized sodas are bad for you.
Eat healthy things, instead.
Fuck them both, I say. Fuck all of the poison-peddlers.
Get a job at a collective organic farm.
Sure, it’ll pay minimum wage, but at least it’s not peddling poison, right?
National Novel Writing Breakfast
For this year’s National Novel Writing Month, I stay in front of my computer and stared at the screen.
I didn’t write a word.
Until, at the very last minute, I went into the kitchen and pulled three strips of bacon from the refrigerator.
Then I stuck them to a sheet of paper.
“I’m finished!” I shouted.
I stuck the paper in an envelope and sent it to my publisher.
The publisher returned it with a few edits.
They replaced one of the strips of bacon with turkey bacon.
And added a dribble of mustard in one of the corners.
The Melting Girl
Elizabeth liked to construct wax replicas of herself, mount them in the heated pan, and then transfer her consciousness to the slowly melting figures.
Without sight or sound or thought, just the sensation of the warmth and slowly draining away from herself.
Her softening skin, flowing and dripping into the pan, coalescing into a growing puddle.
Her feet and legs and body descending into the mass, collapsing into the bubbling goo.
After ten minutes, her mind would return to her body, she’d open her eyes, and release a deep sigh.
And she’d pour the hot wax into the mold again.
Club 27
Jimi, Janiss, and Jim.
They all died at the age of twenty-seven.
Kurt Cobain, too. And Amy Winehouse.
So much young talent died at the age of twenty-seven.
They call it Club 27, a macabre hallmark of the price of drugs, hard living, and fame.
Music industry executives were worried that their biggest acts would die before their biggest hits.
Or, even worse, die without leaving a massive library of unreleased tracks to exploit after their deaths.
Like they did with Michael Jackson, Prince, and countless others they had killed.
I mean, countless others they had difficulty negotiating contracts with.
Halloween mob
For Halloween, kids would dress up as ghosts and vampires and other creatures.
Then came the cheap plastic masks and aprons with Marvel superheroes.
I didn’t put up with any of that crap.
So, I rallied the kids in the neighborhood to meet in the apple orchard, and we’d hand out pitchforks and lit torches.
Then, we’d go door to door as an angry mob.
“IS THIS CASTLE FRANKENSTEIN?” I’d yell.
When they said no, I’d unfold a map, and yell “IT MUST BE THE NEXT HOUSE!”
And we’d work the neighborhood, until the cops attacked us with riot gear.
Vampire Jack
Wolfman Jack, the famous deejay, was not a werewolf.
He was, in fact, a vampire.
In order to hide his true nature, he wore a scraggly wig and howled so people would think he was a werewolf.
This ruse worked, until a deranged fan tried to shoot him with a silver bullet.
Werewolves normally die from silver bullets, but vampires are immune to them, so Wolfman Jack staged his own death.
The next day, Mummy Jack showed up at the radio station looking for a job.
But walking around in bandages didn’t have the same appeal as a wolfman’s howl.