tulip mutilation hits backyard

like devil worshipers, aliens have been known to mutilate cows and pigs. i remember that the aliens regularly lopped heads and udders and such from cows before they found the more peaceful farm activity of leaving designs in corn fields.

but the corn circle hobby must have gotten boring. they're back to mutilation, and they've chosen my backyard to begin.

they are severing the heads off of perfectly harmless tulips right at their prettiest. the plants are neatly nipped right below the flower, and the flowers are moved five to fifteen feet away.

the tulips stood proud amongst the mud and wild onions that early spring bring to the drizzly yard. now half are beheaded. their crime? being beautiful. aliens hate beauty. and cows. reward offered for the capture and mutilation of backyard aliens.

wind sensitivity

it hasn't made the news. no one is talking about global winding. well, i am. long story short: it has been very windy here for the last couple months, and i don't like it.

if i recall correctly from my class on meteorological psychology, long periods of heat make people kill, and long periods of wind make people want to kill themselves. casper, wyoming, a very windy place, has an alarmingly high suicide rate (though, as anyone in casper can tell you, there may be other factors as well).

adding to the problem, the wind increase has coincided with the switch to digital tv. yes, i am an antenna guy. under the old system, when the weather was bad, we got fuzzy pictures and sometimes static. i could watch it. with the upgrade, the wind turns every show into max headroom stutters and frozen frames of cubist art.

the wind intensifies on mondays and thursdays, the two nights i watch tv (big bang on tuesday, hell's kitchen on thursday). i sit beside the tv on those nights, arm ready to adjust and re-adjust the antenna, sometimes holding my body in awkward positions (seems to help), trying to outsmart the wind which works hard to destroy my shows while somehow preserving the commercials.

posted no trespassing

sometimes the weather is enough. it is hot, sunny, buggy, but perfect. the outdoors begs for a two-day backyard binge, so we will give in to its wishes.

frogs barking at each other, mounting and slapping one another, birds gathering straw and hair, and we--enough yard work for the day, we sit and drink and wait for visitors and red noses.

i hope the guest list will be long. come on over.

paper in my pipes

Two activities I enjoy engaging in are writing notes on random objects and taking on sporadic cleaning/organizing chores. I write things and forget about them. Later, on a cleaning whim, I discover lost thoughts. This method is more enjoyable than always knowing what I think.

Today I began cleaning the drawer next to my bed. Amongst the hundred or so notes on paper scraps, 3 x 5s, envelopes, and bar coasters, I found a friend's voice.

My friend John died last year, but he left bits of himself on pieces of paper, many of which I am happy to have, like little breadcrumbs leading back to his smirk.

Here's what I found: an article he printed off for me on 8 January 2008, entitled "Prehistoric Mold Found in Denver Sewer." The article describes a giant mold which likes to live in pipes (reminding it of what 250 million years ago I can only guess). I remember him showing me the article, excitedly speculating on the life of giant molds. Below the article in his handwriting is what he thought the mold should be called: "Brian the Bryozoan."

Thanks, John.

new issue, new look

i've been working on the new uglycousin rather than on the blog. the new issue is up now. check it out. leave comments. tomorrow: tangle theory.

don't bring me down

i haven't been blogging much lately simply because i've been a little busier and perhaps less creative than what passes for normal. then i noticed today that my last two blogs made people worry, and that isn't something i normally like to do. no tales of random acts of drinking at the wounded minnow, no revelations about the sham wow (buy something called sham and complain you've been ripped off?), no observations about the debates of the world stage played out in small town middle america. what instead? a story about an pancreas and a "poem" about early death.

sorry about that. the entry that preceeded my long absence was about my pancreas gaining consciousness. it was just a story born from a conversation had over a trash can with my wife. we were thinking that stomach noises might be attempts at communication. i chose pancreas because i like the way it sounds. people wondered if i was alright. they thought i was talking about my actual pancreas. i'm fine, and i really do appreciate the concern. i am very fortunate that my fiction didn't manifest in real life and strike me down with a bad case of gut rot. i believe in the hex. i haven't had the flu in years, i might say, and then be striken the next day.

spring does give me a little more sadness than usual, though, so it comes out in my attempts at poetry. what i said in the poem is simply what i was thinking about while looking in the backyard that morning before writing. it has been nearly three years since i lost my son, and it isn't something i generally bring up in conversation, but it will come out from time to time (usually indirectly) in my writing.

though today with that crazy grand-girl trying to type over my shoulder as i write this, i think the world is pretty good. next entry i'll make fun of something again.

the cruelest month

out past the just-green grass
turned white this groaning morning,
a lone daffodil droops.

bent by wet april snow
its yellow promise nudges
the cold dirt. no sun can
unbend it now. it's over.

the daffodil's april
like waking from a coma
to catch the flu--or die.

my beautiful boy born in spring,
died in spring. warm day, filled
with promise, sunward smile.