wiring apps

So many writing apps. Pretty neat. I'm probably going to half-ass my way through a handful of them and see what happens. Writing on the cell phone worked out okay for short stories so what if one of these is good for writing longer stuff. We'll see.

I had today off from work for Martin Luther King Jr. Day. I spent it cleaning my house and attempting to organize my life. I can only claim partial success on both counts. 

Yesterday was great though, my great friend Sibbitt was in town from Montana and we had a great time eating Mexican food and trying to solve all the world's problems. 

This is also my reminder to read The Brothers K by David James Duncan. Apparently, the first forty pages are a bit of a slog so Future Guillermo, hang in there. I wonder if it's like the director of Solaris, the original Russian adaptation, where he deliberately made the first act incredibly tedious to scare off any viewer who did not have the mental fortitude to grapple with the lofty concepts the film was purporting to explore. 

(I have seen it, and I prefer the American remake, but I don't know if it was necessary to gatekeep it that way.)

Solaris is basically this:

"Hey man are you having fun trying to figure out that crazy new planet that's impossible to figure out?"

"No. No I am not."

"Aw, man, I'm sorry to hear that. Boy, I sure miss my loved ones."

"Me too."

Fort Vine, Campfires, and Cryptids

"There's light inside your body!" the singer was saying as I walked up to the crescent of people sitting around them and a brazier of crackling fire. 

I was emerging from the darkness into the middle of a musical performance, with a group of mostly strangers, but they were talking science so I jumped right in. "That's right!" I pointed at the fire. "The same thing that's happening in the fire right now is happening inside our bodies!" 

Everyone turned to look at me. I said "Hi, I'm Guillermo! I've been approaching random campfires for the last hour and a half so I hope I've found the right one." Most of the people laughed. 

I was joking, of course. Wendy had invited me to this performance, a folk duo called Fort Vine, who were holding a neighborhood concert. I was just very late, because I had been trying to trick myself into being social. I completed my exercise routine, took a shower, then instead of just running around in my underwear afterwards, I put on pants, and shoes, and a shirt. Being dressed made me feel like getting undressed was a bigger hassle than driving a half-hour away for some reason, so I went. 

I'm glad I did. It was a lovely night. 

I met a girl named Catherine who is a literal rocket scientist, and I witnessed the moment she was given a pair of shorts that said "CRYPTID" across the butt. Apparently this was the culmination of several weeks of an escalating inside joke. She was delighted and donned them immediately. 

We talked about cryptids, and someone asked if the Loch Ness Monster was a cryptid, and I said yes it most certainly is. Catherine said she used to have a West Highland Terrier named Nessie, and I had said that's funny because I had also known a West Highland Terrier named Nessie, but this was years ago, and on the other side of town. 

Maybe Nessie The Westie is also a cryptid, existing in multiple households simultaneously in a kind of quantum canine superposition. 

The house hosting the neighborhood concert had a husky named Trillian, after The Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy. I petted her for quite a bit. 

Then on the drive home, I saw The Mothman flying over the interchange of the 202 to the I-10. 

Which I didn't consider a good sign or a bad sign. 

Almost certainly a coincidence. I doubt they're interested in me, as I am more of a  hermit-monk-smart-ass caricature than an actual person right now. 

Mothman ain't got no time for that mess. 

Imaginary Hotels

In the middle of the desert is a hotel where it's always raining inside. Not real rain, of course. Simulated streets, each room its own little house in the "suburbs" section, where it's always a cloudy, overcast day, although the artificial sun does peek out now and then. There's also the "city" section, with scaled-down brownstone buildings, alleyways, and even fake traffic. That's where I usually stay. I like to walk through the rain and wonder what could have been. 

There's even a pool. Swimming in the rain is one of my favorite things, but of course, it's dangerous to do so in an actual thunderstorm. In this hotel, the flashes of lightning and rumbles of thunder are impressive, but harmless. 

The hotel is called "Felis Et Canes."

I will advise you to make use of the Sunrise Room before you leave. It looks like a little park, with benches and grass and trees. The fake rain will slowly stop, and the fake clouds will slowly part, and the fake sun will come out, and it will be less of a shock when you step back out into the desert sun. 

We should go sometime. I think you'd really like it. 

hidden factories

There are buildings with no roads that lead up to them. Generally made of red brick, with high, narrow windows. We have one on the outskirts of our small town. I don't know how anyone applies to work there. I heard you get a letter, with a contract to work for 2, 3, or 5 years. 

It's not a 9 to 5 job, whatever it is. The people walk out there, go inside, and they stay. They don't seem to ever come out the whole time. After their years are up, they walk back in to town. Most of them leave town and never come back. Those who stay keep to themselves, and don't seem unhappy, but none of them ever seem to work anywhere else again. 

stowaway

Stowing away had seemed like a good idea. Hide out in the hold for a little while, let the ship sail far away from my enemies, and then sneak out at one of the many island paradises along the trade route. Now, after two weeks of the dark, the damp, and horrible seasickness, Prell was lamenting that he was slowly dying, lying there in the mildewed belly of this ship, when he could have died quickly, on his feet, fighting in the sunlight of the city streets. He liked to fight. He might even have won. 

Instead he had run, and hid, and now he was alone, with his writhing innards, his regrets, and the taste of bile on his cracked lips. 

"Perhaps it's not to late to be a man," Prell croaked, his voice sending the gathering rats scurrying away. He began to crawl over to entrance of the hold, where he would try give himself up. He doubted he had the strength to climb the ladder, but he still had the cavalry whistle his father had given him. The shrill blast had signaled many men to charge into battle, sometimes their last. 

Maybe he'd even be able to get in one more good fight. 

New Year's Resolutions. A noble tradition, in which I do not participate. I'm sure I did, once. Like blowing out birthday candles and making a wish. 

In that moment, I imagined cake. Then I wondered why you couldn't wish for more wishes. Of course you can have more wishes; everyone has wishes, but the wording is important.  The power is in the granting. 

Genies (genii? Djinn; much better, sounds like it's singular and plural) are magical creatures, bound to servitude. Sentient, certainly. Human? No, I suppose not. If you unbound them, would their wrath at being bound extend to all humans? If a wasp stung you, would you not destroy the nest? My moral code, such as it is, would compell me to free any unjustly captured person or person-like thing. If I thought it would destroy me if I did, I probably would not. 

But I might. Out of spite. Someone has to try to fix things. The reasoning around self-preservation will often drown out ideals. 

A djinn... would probably cause more problems than it solves. 

I'll rest then, and return to work tomorrow. Still, I'll remain alert. There is much to do, and every opportunity that presents itself must be examined carefully, the magical and the mundane. 

Goodnight.