Our Story So Far

Nocturnal storytelling: Clattery map

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 09 May 2008 13:58:00 GMT

Last night I saw this room-sized map that transformed to show different collections of data about the area -- flora & fauna, industrial production, demographic distributions, stuff like that. It worked like the timetables in European train stations, where little tabs flip-flip-flip-flip-flip until they get to the right ones. The person using the map could ask for a particular data set, and the map would clatter away until that's what was displayed. Kind of cool.

The whole thing also involved a lot of angry-sad interactions with the wife, but I don't clearly recall how the map was related to that.

Cow Planet: March

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 03:37:00 GMT

Fantasy crashes to earth & stuff

booker@dreamtimers.net — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 03:29:00 GMT

The last drive-in theater in Denver closed for the season last fall. Looks like it's going to be a long off-season, as I saw during my drive to work this morning that the screen is on the ground, and earth movers are busily moving earth.

It's been threatened forever, and a couple falls ago the marquee showed a sad final goodbye message, followed in the spring by a perky 'We're back!' message. This is looking pretty final, though. I never saw a movie at this theater, but I watched many, many awful movies through buggy windshields at others out where I lived as a kid and a teenager, all long, long gone.

Crunch.

Nocturnal Storytelling: Aquarium

booker@dreamtimers.net — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 00:35:00 GMT

This place I was staying was a big open room. Maybe the size of a basketball gym, but probably narrower, at least. I was there longer than a motel room, I think, but definitely temporary. Nevertheless, I had decided to acquire and set up an aquarium. It was huge -- footprint the size of a twin bed, only about 8 inches deep and down at bed height, so you could look down on the fish and plants and whatnot. No top. It was really cool, and I was enjoying watching the fish move around. . . .

Reverse Orlando

booker@dreamtimers.net — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 00:02:00 GMT

So I'm sitting at the bar, hearing the music in the distance. I got there just before 10, and the back near the band was packed. WTF? Place never starts to fill up until after 11, and I'm gone soon after. Don't like the crowds. But I usually get two sets of music before the annoyance gets the best of me. That was the last show of this fairly popular band with their girl singer, who is leaving for reasons who the fuck knows.

So this time I had to find a stool in the middle of the bar, far from the action. It can be kind of fun to watch the guys flying around filling orders. They make something of a show of it. But I wasn't liking it that much, because I was more by myself in the middle of things. I'm OK by myself down at the end of the bar, because I can turn and focus on the band, and that's why I'm there anyhow. The middle is supposed to be all social & stuff, and I'm there alone. I can chat a little with some people, but these are mostly 30 year olds and we just don't seem to have a lot to say to one another. And the women seem worried that I'll come on to them and they'll have to go to the trouble of smacking me down. Or maybe I'm projecting that onto them. But it's not a comfortable spot for me.

But from where I was,I could see the basketball game on the tv at the other end of the bar, a small benefit. And sitting next to me in that direction was this late 20s woman, black dye job, heavy black plastic glasses, zaftig in a horizontal black and white striped shirt. Think Janeane Garofalo with an extra 20 or 25 pounds. I am careful to demonstrate that I'm looking not at her but past her at the tv, because when my eyes stray her direction, she fidgets and picks at her purse in front of her. That's how I first noticed her there.

So life goes on, I'm watching the show behind the bar and looking around the room. Then I look back at the tv, and the Knicks are barely holding off a charge from Portland. But something is different. That young woman is now wearing a black T-shirt. No she's not. She's become a man. That stool space had transmogrified itself to contain a young man, late 20s, with black sorta spikey hair, heavy black glasses, and probably 20 extra pounds. In other words, he was the boy version of the fidgety girl.

She had disappeared, but she showed up later hanging around this guy. They were friends or dating or something. But at least she hadn't been all wiped out of existence to make room for him. That was a relief.

I spent a good part of the rest of my time there struggling to recall the name of the Virginia Woolf story. I left after the first set, well and the set break. Right as the band was quitting, one of the guys filled my glass for free, so I had to drink some of it to be polite. And outside I saw something I'd never seen before. There was a line of ardent youth outside the door waiting to get into Herb's. Weird.

Happy February!

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 23:21:00 GMT

Scary doctor stories

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 02:57:00 GMT

I mentioned the friend who ditched out on the music outing I was trying to arrange by callously getting sick. I also mentioned that the nature of the illness was intestinal and that she had thoughtfully withheld details. Well, she's finally up & around again, able to drink wine but not eat anything that anyone sensible would call food. You win some and lose some, I guess. But that thoughtful reticence about the details of the personal plumbing is gone gone gone. Hooboy is it gone. . . .

Nocturnal Storytelling: Hawaii

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 02:25:00 GMT

I was at a camping event that was winding down. Friends & campmates were milling around getting ready to start thinking about preparations to strike camp & return home -- maybe 7 or 8 people. The event was held in Hawaii --

Reasons for the blues

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 01:45:00 GMT

Meanwhile, I was morbidly fascinated by this woman who hobbled into the place. The bar is a very divey biker-type joint, pleasantly rough around the edges, with friendly people, many clearly known to one another as regulars. She was well-known by the others around the pool table --

Rock & roll for sale

booker@dreamtimers.net — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 01:41:00 GMT

So I get this letter in the mail inviting me to a musical instrument sale. It's run by a music store, or rather by a foundation established by the family that's run the store for decades. It's supposed to be selling instruments donated to the local university music program by the store, and part of the proceeds benefit the foundation and whatnot. Kind of confusing, but at the end part of the sales price qualifies as a tax-deductible contribution so that's all good.