tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31524792478775143262024-03-06T11:07:54.652+05:30A Hodgepodge of Hodges and Podges...Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.comBlogger144125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-88766431465023203402022-02-01T04:20:00.000+05:302022-02-01T04:20:06.412+05:30The Memory Of A Companion<p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Movement lies in the cycles of every day, and in that movement is life. My life. </span></span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-d2d65673-7fff-7c4c-d505-9495ff202e77"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">The sun’s cycle is one, no less important for its ordinariness. I never seek it out, but I’m asleep when the sun is furthest away, tucked into my comfortable bed. I’m called to wake when the rays sweep beyond the heavy, white curtain that preserves my night, and glimmer against the glass door. There are other cycles, just as present. I’m called to eat, and I do. I’m urged into play, and I do. When the irrepressible energy of the day strikes me, I run and run and run, until I slump, panting. As the sounds of traffic pick up, I find my spot on the divan in the balcony, and I settle down to watch vehicles trundle to and fro. Back and forth. Everyday.</span></span></p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">I’m urged too into love. You might think a beautiful thing like love would never be greyed into routine. But the cycles aren’t bad in themselves, because life, and pleasure, is woven into them. When they, my misshapen family touch me, stroke me, it ripples through my fur. When they take into their arms, raise me to heights my legs cannot take me, I am not afraid, because I trust, and trust is love. Their warm, familiar embrace wraps me like a cocoon. They make soothing gibberish sounds. I respond, I say I love you too. On another day, I might climb into their laps as they sit down. Or wrap myself around an overlarge leg, and sleep, breathing in their scent and warmth. It manifests in everchanging ways, but it’s in the cycles that love resides.</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;"> </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">Sometimes, just sometimes, something genuinely new happens. There’s someone new. Great, big, tall, clumsy, smelly, but someone new and love-filled. His newness fills my space. Where I sometimes sat, and watched the birds fly along impossible paths, he sits, and makes nonsense sounds. But paradoxically, the more he occupies, the more my love grows. He’s a stranger! I should be afraid but I am not. I should shout and warn, but I gibber and cuddle. Perhaps it’s love so great, love so full, I can’t help give back.</span></span></p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">The cycles of routine creep, and their loving caress transmutes the novel. When I hear his body shuffle, hanging on to dregs of sleep, I run full tilt to where he lies, and I jump and shout until he’s there where he’s not. When I hear his feet pad along to the kitchen, I feel the morning energy call to me, and where I ran, I now go to him, and ask him if he wants to play with me instead. He’s slow, and he lumbers, but he joins me. I weave in and out, from one side to the other, dodging him. When he’s slumped for hours in the chair, and when the day’s at its lowest ebb, I seek him out, nudge him and say hello. He says something, but his posture is stiffer, his face crinkled, and I know he’s happy. What’s a new cycle but a cycle?</span></span></p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">Then one day, it’s broken. I climb into my new favourite spot, where the sun has warmed the cushions just enough, and where he likes to sit, but he isn’t there. When the bed no longer creaks in promise of his waking, I go there anyway. My legs aren’t strong enough for me to jump, but I feel his presence, he must still be there right? I jump and shout, but he doesn’t appear. His scent lingers in the air, and I follow it into unfamiliar spots. I clamber over uncomfortably high boxes into strange rooms, cautious, alert, hopeful. The scent weaves in the air, tantalising, but never forming into him. The others are there. They’re clumsy, noisy and smelly too, and I love them, each in their own way. But they’re here, and he’s not. I’m busy searching, and they hold me up, lift me impossibly high. The warm, familiar embrace is still there, but the hugs are too long, and I wiggle, uncomfortable. Their words are softer, more soothing. I insist that I love them, but I have to go. They shush me, saying reassuring things I don’t understand. I brush it off as human fickleness. I run and run, and find another trail. This one is faint, and withered, suggestive of older, rarer patterns, but with my focus turned to it, sharpens into a path. I run to the sofa by the boxes where they - and he - keep the shoes they put on. I don’t come here often. Vague anxieties assail me here, and I think of cycles without my family. Now though, the scent of new love was here. It is no more alive than any other, but I’m tired, and it’s a welcoming place, and I curl up to rest. When I open my eyes, I see them watch me, and there are tears in their eyes.</span></span></p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">The trails of promise fade, and the new, new routine becomes just a routine. I sleep by the boxes, and where the sun burns sharp, until I no longer do. An unformed thought hovers on the edge of my consciousness. This love, a love so great and surprising that took over my cycles for a period, it isn’t what I believed it to be. Deep in the deepest of my memories, so ravaged by the cycles of time that it bears only the crudest similarity to the now, he was there. It wasn’t an inexplicable connection with a stranger, but a rekindled one with a loved one from a memory. I can almost remember being held in his different, yet same, arms, ensconced in the same, yet different warmth. I can almost remember, but not quite.</span></span></p><span style="font-family: helvetica;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: helvetica;">I no longer look, and even the dead trails disappear, not just dead but forgotten. Until all that remains is a look in the eye, a quirky habit, and a promise. A promise of a future that will make the unfamiliar familiar again.</span></span></p></span>Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-35127647282980409482021-10-20T02:24:00.006+05:302021-10-20T02:27:05.947+05:30Sharp, Bright<p><span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fluttering thoughts
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Are sweeping whirlwinds</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-d57a6571-7fff-632f-6835-9c0bc29044b1"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mundane scenes become
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Leech-dark memories</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The laugh of another
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Can but be ridicule</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Every hurt stings
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Scorching injury</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sharp, bright feelings cut</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">but</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But a common wildflower
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sings like precious rose</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The gentle touch of other
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Caresses endless courage</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A palmful of love clasps
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">An eternity of together-joy</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sharp, bright feelings cut</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">but</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In between spacious atoms
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Colour becomes ultraviolet
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">A blessed world awakens
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sharp, bright, gilded grandeur
</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sharp, bright, intimate pain</span></p></span></span>Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-80100851789735291172021-10-11T02:39:00.008+05:302021-10-11T02:40:53.105+05:30The Path<p> </p><span id="docs-internal-guid-45913c04-7fff-57bc-8f00-191a4ed4e759"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I soar above seeking a path
Fingers gripping meshing cords</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The infinite made finite</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Far below, another’s pain burns</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I tug a rope, and offer salve</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The fire soothed, higher I soar</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When new hurt calls, I respond</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Again, and again, not to rise</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But that the path is clear, and the sky is bright</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fickle luck brooks no calm</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Electric arcs cut a strange, dark sky</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The fire is lance-sharp, the pain now mine</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Far above, another soars free</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Their white, bright sky is a cocoon</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My grey presses, presses heavy</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The other sees, eyes hard and true</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And turns away towards pleasure</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The storm passes, and I continue</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Only the wind steers mindless ropes</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The path is plain but it is mine</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mine and mine alone</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The call of another hurt grows</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But each refusal softens the next</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My path and mine alone</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My heart soon begins to grow cold</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Colder than the mindless wind and mesh</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Squeezes tight until there is only darkness</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The path is plain but I cannot see.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I reach out for a different rope</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pulling at new possibility</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The call of another is a sum</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Hero or villain, friend or foe</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I heed only those whom I owe</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Like the one now slumped in grey</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A common grey face that adds up</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The fire soothed, higher I soar</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Not quite to heaven, not quite so high</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But the heart is still for now.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nervous time brooks no calm</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Unheard pain adds to unwanted sums</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The heart is gnawed and weary</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I tug the forgotten first</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Into the murk I sink, the salvebringer</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But my heart is full and I soar again.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Crests and troughs bring clarity</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That a steady path never showed</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Truth lies in jarring motion</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">To seek the path is the path.</span></p></span>Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-977499887547913482020-07-15T22:43:00.001+05:302020-07-16T01:00:33.762+05:30I Am Me<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSvU-MeihN2VzCww0m2oRqgAnqviTAnVhNoPkJWCC-v_zjSrdUvgVITSOaHz8bPN0Zf8r1Cmbh-HkjnjlkiuW01ZWx9WWT5zN6zJmDPw9eToQMiPbx5as-DHpihHXx0WW0GMZ-jd0Qz9FA/s1600/1594833190975828-0.png" width="400">
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<img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKzsZcf1GBQ1pH3ZxcQe_rl6_15eObO0wx2xdeCw_oElQ8bHrArbrKBzaKJEUOpm4t2ePU-f2yIl7s8BN1bPyNLWjG2QOMJpqyjyFzalT2ir1WJccR7CwmIBPiEs3-BhmVJcRuXK-2vmdS/s1600/1594841419609574-2.png" width="400">
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</div><br></div>Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-38364708815526626592020-04-16T02:29:00.001+05:302020-04-16T02:29:46.259+05:30Silence<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjdGHylQ0s5qQDHH1Uu-59f8VTJQNXSb1ophjfFa_741fZOeXHmEKoBLGjPF81oxrPiRpXyUPzsi5eA2vOxxK4G5Ma0y_EVjZJjYA4cWc0633UrGlhyphenhyphenzPXMxx1oQDZjUSL5mi98Ed4Abix/s1600/1586984378909993-0.png" width="400">
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</div>Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-6385848649142025312020-04-16T02:26:00.001+05:302020-04-16T02:26:39.382+05:30You and I<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</div>Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-65630239785210062332020-01-11T02:43:00.002+05:302020-01-11T02:44:08.785+05:30Failure<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Does it hurt because of the fall?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Does it hurt not knowing to stand?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Does it hurt because I'm too proud?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Does it hurt because I'm not proud enough?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Does it hurt that my best wasn't enough?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Does it hurt because it might never be?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Does it hurt because I have no answers?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Does it hurt because I might not want them?</span></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-44989859348971172872020-01-10T00:33:00.001+05:302020-01-10T00:33:51.028+05:30Picture This Caption #1: The Beard<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
New hobby: dream up pictures for captions.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi25I2UC_ncHmOOuDRp0ljGAKn_HtSrRoDWCZkT-vz5JgTZHTgzBaAqn8hpZ2qQfCAq428RJwFHOnIFv-b4MdjTFLFJNOQGpN0iH_4f4jYYOcjKfTg0jr89KQ1wGZxG0eowTdg2Q3IYfSug/s1600/PictureThisCaption1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi25I2UC_ncHmOOuDRp0ljGAKn_HtSrRoDWCZkT-vz5JgTZHTgzBaAqn8hpZ2qQfCAq428RJwFHOnIFv-b4MdjTFLFJNOQGpN0iH_4f4jYYOcjKfTg0jr89KQ1wGZxG0eowTdg2Q3IYfSug/s640/PictureThisCaption1.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-39378374115676132892020-01-08T04:02:00.001+05:302020-01-08T04:02:50.142+05:30Webs<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">By a trick of golden light shines</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A fine pattern of webs in still air</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Million threads locked in soft embrace</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A fragile snapshot of surreal truth.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Another trick folds into grey gloom</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Musty cobwebs of now dark threads</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Until the world is as it was</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Still and black and unchanging dull.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But a strand of gossamer vein</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Slips and floats to a gentle death</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Glowing fire-bright with each moment</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Blazing star-like closer to the end.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">(The new old silence bodes heavy</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Sad butterfly wisps sway in tune</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">To the fickle call of not there breeze.)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Webs like fingerprints catch the light</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Webs too frayed, webs remade by will</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But webs that gleam, webs that glitter</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Webs that make the pattern of life -</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">No tricks can blacken their skin.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Too varied to be, too fine to survive</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The cost of beauty trumps its worth?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The dark hurt yet remains where</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A golden thread faded to vapour.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Now a gentle whisper signals hope</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A new thread spins into life</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Delicate tips probe and seek</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And touch and make new and old</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Until the hurt heals and all is whole.</span></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-68702095351408396732020-01-05T00:59:00.000+05:302020-01-05T00:59:46.179+05:30Dream<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcDN85uTIBAE2zQWIwXNBGWGKdFGnm7Sq8KODmjBca9NM95SjJ49x1O_x3cbiDh2wlVXCyL1TgJSODJgf9OEMkAvEhSPUrFdRpgx1lA9zLr70ZLVZOoG8HM1ArU-AY-8seD5qbyybhYCO4/s1600/20200104_202339.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcDN85uTIBAE2zQWIwXNBGWGKdFGnm7Sq8KODmjBca9NM95SjJ49x1O_x3cbiDh2wlVXCyL1TgJSODJgf9OEMkAvEhSPUrFdRpgx1lA9zLr70ZLVZOoG8HM1ArU-AY-8seD5qbyybhYCO4/s320/20200104_202339.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I slip into a dream and feel alive</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Rushing torrents of things that could be.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Wakeful reality wipes the edge away</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Off memory poisoned into child's fantasy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I wish to hold on a little bit longer</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Make cold fact of dregs of dream.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Open eyes limit you to a grey prison</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And weak limbs refuse to soar</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Heart that shrivels, and mind that cowers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I seek the switch that makes reality fog</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And beautiful dream magical truth.</span></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-88636263847602536452019-12-16T04:53:00.000+05:302019-12-16T15:16:50.680+05:30Statistical Hypocrisy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">When I went to my best friend’s house to drag him outside for a bit of fresh air, ice cream and gossip about pretty girls, little did I know that I was moments away from having my life turned upside down. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">There was no answer when I hammered on the door with a subtle fist, but I was used to that. I walked in through the unlocked entrance, calling out my friend’s name and shouting juicy promises as I made my way to his bedroom.</span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-0908d6f8-7fff-ffe3-4d22-af87b6237df2" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Come on out. You know who is doing you know what, and you have to see because you would be absolutely shook!”</span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The house was deathly silent. I shut up when I saw the glow of a computer screen reflected in my friend’s face eerily, as he sat statue still, engrossed in reading what looked like comments on Facebook.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I sighed loudly knowing that if my hollering at the top of my voice had no effect, my sighing wouldn’t. It was more for me than for him, because I knew what was happening here.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Are you arguing with people on Facebook again?” I reached the statue in two long strides and smacked it on its back, and out burst a human being that turned to look at me. His eyes were aflame with naked passion.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Do you see? Do you see?” He whispered urgently, waving a confused hand in the direction of his computer screen.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“What new crusade are you on, my friend? Whatever it is, I don’t care. I just wanted to drag you out to get ice cream and talk about girls. Because that’s what normal people do.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My friend completely ignored most of what I said, but not everything.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Crusade is exactly right, “ he said with terrifying enthusiasm. “Go on. See.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Am I supposed to be looking at a comment thread on a New York Times article about a pancake recipe?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Yes.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“And…?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“Take a look at that comment. John Smith. The same people…”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I saw it. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>The same people who complained that New York Times only does salads and other dreadful tasting non-food recipes are now complaining that pancakes are unhealthy and should not be promoted. </i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My friend’s eyes glinted menacingly. “You see it, don’t you? I see this argument everywhere. Literally EVERYWHERE! And it’s broken. How does John Smith - pff John Smith - know that the very same people who complained about salads are now complaining about pancakes? He doesn’t!”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“He’s wrong. WRONG. WRONG!” He screamed at the flickering screen, and it seemed to flicker more rapidly for a second as if in terror.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I responded with a wordy, “Er…”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">My friend, the crusader, turned, gripped my shoulders painfully hard, and stared unblinking into my eyes for so long that I began to squirm, and melt.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“You see, “ he said. “I call this The Statistical Hypocrisy Fallacy. Just because some group of people somewhere on the Internet said they don’t like X does not mean that when some other group of people say they like X, that there is some kind of hypocrisy at play.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I nodded because that seemed to be what was expected. He released his death grip, and beckoned me over to see another window on his screen.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>The same people who complained that it was fat shaming to use fat people in exercise bike ads are now complaining that using a thin woman is not targeting the right audience.</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>The same players who complained that the tennis season was too long are now playing a million exhibitions.</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“But how do they know that it’s the same..” I started off, before I stopped myself. The conversion was already happening, it was too late. My friend smiled at me, validated.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“I tried reasoning with one of them, you know, “ pointing at a four screens long Twitter thread. “I asked, in the most polite way I could, if this man had actually gone door to door, to people’s homes, with printed screenshots of their utterings on the Internet - time and date affixed of course - and verified that yes, these very people had changed their tunes now? But he didn't engage. Clearly, this man was a buffoon and a simpleton.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I saw the final response from the buffoon. “TROLL!! GO AWAY!!!!111” with miscellaneous colourful phraseology inserted that I am skipping without loss of semantic content.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>The same people who said DC was too dark are now complaining that Marvel has too many quips.</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Something in me snapped. That made no sense at all! How does he know it’s the same people? It was such a vacuous statement that was all the more dangerous because it had a vague ring of truth to it. But it was wrong. WRONG! Comment threads and colours whizzed by as I opened window after window - it was the same everywhere, as my friend had said. From travel to relationships to music to economics to porn, there was a John Smith in every comment thread.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A heavy weight settled in the pit of my stomach as the scale of the problem we were faced with struck me with stark clarity. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">“We need more people, “ I muttered under my breath. But my friend had gone back to fixing the world one comment thread at a time. He typed: </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>The Internet, despite appearances, is not made of just one person.</i></span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Truth! I pulled a chair for myself, pulled up the comic book thread, and sat down to do God’s work.</span></span></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-33182933617415144952019-12-11T21:47:00.000+05:302019-12-11T21:48:16.273+05:30Obsession: Part #2<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>(<a href="https://thelightofcanopus.blogspot.com/2019/10/obsession-part-1.html">Read part #1 here!</a>)</b></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Strangely enough, the consequences for his meltdown were not as dire as he had feared. He was banned for a month by the Player Council, but it was soon forgotten. Perhaps if it had been Girona that had reacted that way, it would have been more of a scandal, but it was roguish, temperamental, handsome Scolo. Tennis needed personalities, right?</span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-258f2a1b-7fff-a7a3-9de3-8efaa0a20e1f" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even the journalist who had asked the question was not immune to his wiles. He remembered her face distintinctly. Shock, initially, at the unexpected violence, but then there was glee. Yes, glee. He distinctly recalled the hint of a smile breaking out at the corner of her lips, out of place in the confusion and anger and fear on the frozen mask of her face. Scolo knew that most journalists craved the chance to truly eviscerate someone, to impale someone with acid barbs and no fear of rebuke. This was her chance, and not only could she do it without worrying about payback, but this would probably even shoot her into tennis journalism’s stratosphere. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So, Scolo did what Scolo did best and pre-empted her by offering to do an exclusive scoop. When she agreed, and when they met and he saw the cold, tight outlines of her face, her folded arms and distant expression, he knew he would have to turn up the charm to change the narrative. But this was just another game he knew he could win. The journalist was tough, but she was no Girona. Scolo mixed genuine humility and contrition, with flashes of humour and rakish charm. When his eyes weren’t downcast with shame, they stared directly into her eyes as if in naked confession, until he watched the journalist’s defences melt away. A couple of weeks later, there was an article in Tennis Week: ‘I forgive you’, and a lengthy defence of Scolo’s behaviour, arguing that heartfelt attempts to better oneself must be appreciated, not mocked.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">His tennis life fell into a familiar routine that somehow felt less satisfying than it used to. Forehand drills, wins over lesser opponents, trophies, backhand drills, everything seemed to meld into a single monochrome image. The only thing that sharpened his focus and infused his life with colour was the thought that he was the only one who knew about Girona’s cheating, and he would be the one to bring him down. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And yet, he managed to keep his obsession with Girona in check, or so he thought until something happened that would reignite the flame. The day before it happened, Scolo was talking to Coach about Girona’s chances against Patel. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Styles make fights, “ Coach said. “And Patel’s style is hard for Girona. Which is why he has a two match winning streak against him.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Scolo did not even look up as he said, “This time though, Girona is going to win in straight sets. Bet on it?” </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The next day, as he warmed up in the locker room for his own match, he saw Girona for the first time since the meltdown. Before he could even make sense of his own emotions, Girona had smiled and waved at him politely. Scolo fumed. It was like he had never even been called a cheater. How could someone be this equanimous? Perhaps it was the drugs, it had to be. Girona probably felt eyes on him, because he paused in the middle of rummaging through his kit bag to nod at him.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Scolo, perhaps to distract himself from his black mood, looked at Girona with fresh eyes. He was tallish, but below average for a tennis player. He had good posture, but it wasn’t impeccable. There was the hint of a slouch, imperceptible for anyone but Girona who had an eye for this kind of thing. A thick head of hair was conservatively parted to one side, but liberally gelled to survive the rigours of a tennis match. He was handsome in a conventional, athletic way - with lean, angular, well defined features, but Scolo felt that there was an openness, an amiability to his face that made him less attractive than a surlier aspect would.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then Scolo did something unusual: he finished his warm up and sat down in the lounge to watch Girona’s match. Was this the action on which his destiny hinged? Perhaps it is natural for human beings to seek, especially in the wake of an inexplicable catastrophe, a sharply defined moment in time that, even if not quite an explanation, at least separates the before from the after. The truth is rarely that simple. Anyway, as Scolo watched Girona quickly turn the tide against Patel, winning four games in a row to take the first set, his mind drifted away, jumping from thought to thought, as he distractedly scrolled through his social media feed.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In an instant, he was alert, because he noticed soft light spilling from a nearby doorway. It was Girona’s private locker room, and he had forgotten to lock it behind him. Almost before he could think, he was up on his feet and inside the room. Rifling through open bags, and unlocked cabinets, he looked for anything that could prove that Girona was cheating. Working himself into a mad frenzy, he was halfway through a particularly large drawer, when it occurred to him that there might be cameras. It was too late to worry about that now. The most he could do was rearrange everything so that they would have no reason to look at the camera footage. He continued searching, methodically replacing everything he moved, not pausing to think about what he was really looking for, afraid that his nerve wouldn’t hold.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Suddenly, he could hear footsteps outside the room, and he had only a second to put away the bag he had open, before Girona swept in, flushed, breathing heavily, and happy. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I knew I could.. “ He paused, confronted with an unexpected sight. “Scolo..?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“May I help you?” Scolo scanned his face for hostility, or suspicion, but he couldn’t see anything. What could he possibly say? It was hopeless.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I… dropped a ball I was warming up with and it… rolled into.. er.. your locker room.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Did you find it then?” Girona asked, without the slightest trace of sarcasm. Scolo nodded and shuffled out of the room, wondering if his excuse was better than he realized, when he saw Girona’s coach standing beside the doorway. Naked hostility was plain to see on his face. He knew Scolo had been up to no good, and his lips moved as if he was about to say something, but he held his tongue. Girona had moved on, there was no point making a scene.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Back in the safety of his locker room, Scolo let out the breath he had been holding for a long time, and unclenched his fists. He probed his mind for fear, or second thoughts, but there was only a burning determination. He had not felt this alive in a long time. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Scolo began to be polite to Girona. He struck up conversations every time they passed each other, and Girona started to open up to him more and more. No one else but Girona would even entertain the idea of considering a professional rival a friend, but he laughed again at his naivete. (So the drugs didn’t make him immune to his charm.) Even when they played, and Scolo inevitably lost, he managed to do the hardest thing: smile gracefully and congratulate his opponent. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There were dinners and parties. At one dinner, Scolo was with Cara and Girona with his girlfriend, whose name he couldn’t remember. As Girona narrated one anecdote after another, he could see Cara begin to warm to him. After all, everything she knew about Girona was through Scolo’s eyes. The fake amiability, the drugs, the cheating, the drugs, the smarmy oily falseness that she expected just was not there. All she saw was the most successful tennis player in the world sitting in front of her, without a trace of pride, treating her like an absolute equal, narrating embarrassing stories from his childhood. Scolo stayed silent for a long time, as he could feel Cara’s eyes on him. Perhaps she didn’t believe him anymore. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Scolo stopped taking Cara along to parties. He told himself that it was because he was only using the parties as an excuse to find out Girona’s secret. But why did he not tell Cara what he was doing? He saw the unasked question in Cara’s eyes all the time. The truth was on the tip of his tongue, but he could not bring himself to say it out loud. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I’m sorry, Cara,” he muttered like a chant in his mind as he hovered from one glittery person to another at one such party, making his way to Girona’s bedroom. This was the first time he was at a party at Girona’s place, and he was not going to let an opportunity like this pass. He spotted a few kit bags by the window, and started to make his way to them, when he heard a voice call out to him.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Scolo, lost again, looking for the bathroom?” It was Girona. Resisting the urge to turn sharply, he looked back to see a friendly smile. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Yes, yes, of course! How silly of me, must be all the wine I have been drinking.”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Remarkably, every time he snuck into Girona’s rooms and found nothing, his resolve only strengthened. As everything else in his life began to fall apart, this mission - and he had begun to see it as one - clarified into an almost holy one. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">His form suffered. It wasn’t just Girona he began to lose to. At this peak, he had a presence that repelled conversation as he strutted through the locker rooms. He spoke to no player, and no player spoke to him. That fort he had built around himself began to crumble, as whispers of veiled concern impinged on his conscious mind. They thought he was crazy? He would show them they were all wrong - WRONG - when he found incontrovertible proof of Girona’s shame, and they would bow down in front of him. He redoubled his efforts. Sometimes, he walked into Girona’s private locker room without invitation, and while his back was turned, pocket shower gels, vitamin pill boxes and the like. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One day, he received an email from Coach that he was quitting. It was as amicable as it possibly could be. They had a great run, but he had taught him all he could, and now he needed something different. A brief white hot flame of fury rippled through his body, but then it was gone. All this meant that he would have to finish his mission sooner. He began to nudge Girona into hosting parties at his place more frequently. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But Coach leaving was nothing compared to what happened next. When he got home after another tame training session, Cara was waiting to speak to him. She firmly rejected his protestations of tiredness, and said it would only take a minute.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Are you cheating on me?” She asked without evident anger, gently, too gently, as if dealing with a mentally ill person.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">All his frustrations, all the pent up anger, all his failures converged for a moment into an act of madness. Scolo screamed at Cara, and before she could react, shoved her to the floor.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“SHUT UP!”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In an instant, his anger was extinguished, and there was shame and guilt. Painful, stomach churning amounts of them that he knew would take a long time to dissolve. That was before he saw that Cara was bleeding from a cut on her temple where she had struck her head. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Cara left the next day.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There was a brief moment of introspection. His behaviour had been suspicious: not talking to Cara anymore, going to all those parties, returning late at night, and not saying a word about what he did. It clearly must have looked like he was reverting to Playboy type. All he had to say was anything at all - the truth - and Cara would have supported him. But he hadn’t. And now he had another party to go to. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There was one cabinet he hadn’t searched yet. That had to be it. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">At the party, out of the smoky darkness, a gold bedaubed vision from heaven appeared in front of him. For the first time in a long time, he really took in the sight of another woman. He admired her supple, athletic form. The dress hugged parts of her body, revealing and hiding at the same time, hinting at unexpected curves. She was speaking to him. He responded, she laughed a practised laugh, and in a heartbeat they were kissing. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Girona was there. He was saying something.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“... you want to do this? Are you sure you want to do this, Scolo?” Concern filled his face.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Scolo didn’t say a word. He pushed away the woman sitting in his lap, picked up the lamp by the side of the sofa, and swung hard, as hard as he could at Girona. The woman was screaming, he was screaming, the nature of the noise all around them changed. But he missed. Girona, agile as a cat, skipped out of the way, shock and betrayal on his face.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And that was it. Scolo’s long and brilliant career was over that instant. After a lengthy ban, he returned to playing tennis again, but he barely won a match. Someone pressed charges, but he lawyered up and got away without jail time. Cara did not report his attack, but he never heard from her again. Occasionally, he would see her perfect face on advertising hoardings, and he would smile for her.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br />__________________________________________</span></b><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He was nervous, but not for the reason he expected. There was no doubt in his mind that Girona would have forgiven him for the way their friendship ended, none at all. Instead, he wondered what he would think when he saw the broken husk of a man Scolo had become. He tried to puff out his chest, and walk straighter, but that messed up his gait, and he looked clumsy. Sighing, he untied and tied his shoelaces one last time, and walked into the locker room.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Girona was practically unchanged. Of course he must have been, given that he had not stopped playing, but the sight still took his breath away. The tennis player is the perfect athlete, and the athlete is the human being pushed to physical perfection. There were more lines on his face, and he wasn’t as lean anymore, but the contrast to his own withered form was as clear as night and day. Intense nostalgia flooded through him and roared in his ears like thunder. He could see concern briefly flit across Girona’s face, but it was wiped away, and he smiled and said something, but Scolo could not hear a thing. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A hand on his shoulder snapped him out of his reverie. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Before we play, “ said Girona, “I want you to have something.” Then he pressed something into the palm of Scolo’s hand. It was a bright, blue pill.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“What is it?” Scolo asked robotically. There was a strange expression on Girona’s face.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“It is an implant that resets your memories. I have used it all of my career to forget the sensation of losing.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Scolo did not say anything in response.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“My problem was always mental. If only I could forget the sensation of losing, I would be the perfect player, I thought. And then I discovered this. It works by… “</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“... you were right all along Scolo. I’m sorry, I really am but I suppose it doesn’t matter now anymore.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Then why tell me now?” Scolo asked dully.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Because I want you to find peace.”</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And Scolo knew right away that he did find peace. It was like a physical weight was lifted off his shoulders. He knew, and probably Girona did too, that he would not report this to the authorities. All he wanted was to be right, and he was. It had cost him everything, but he was right, and he knew he could finally move on with the pieces of his life. He smiled at Girona, genuinely for the first time in his life, and walked out alongside him to play the last tennis match of his life.</span></span></div>
</div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-91057483857466375252019-12-06T21:43:00.002+05:302019-12-06T21:43:32.464+05:30Seeing Red<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Nothing ever really changed on Cerise. </span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-2254e725-7fff-0bcb-ebc8-6e9287c99e7b" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The sky was a fiery orange in every direction. A uniform red sea of rock stretched from horizon to horizon, almost uninterrupted, except for free standing stone hills that erupted from the surface on occasion. These hills, sometimes hundreds of metres tall, did not look like anything produced by blind geological forces. Thousands of granite steps folded and locked together to form one intricately patterned hill. Anywhere but on Cerise, one would think them abstract monuments to a forgotten race of giants. But here, their geometric precision was natural, and did nothing to detract from the timeless permanence of the world around them.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Nothing quite changed on Cerise, except for the monsters.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The exterminator was looking at one right now. Lying flat on his stomach, he peered through the telescopic lens briefly again. Yes, it was definitely a yuni. It was roughly the size of a horse, but that was where the similarities ended. Every inch rippled with powerful muscle, where it was not covered by a near impenetrable scaly armour. Between fissures in the plates, two metre spikes would be propelled like bullets, if the creature felt threatened. And this was all what he could see of the back of the beast, because if he was looking at the front of it, he would be dead in a second.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The digital watch on his wrist beeped numbers at him. (The exterminator insisted on calling it a watch even though checking the time was what he did the least with it.) Eighty two metres it said. The yuni’s mace like tail swished once, as it scanned for prey. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He could take it out with a bazooka from this distance if he wished, but then he wouldn’t have it to protect himself from something bigger and deadlier than yunis. And yes, such things existed. He continued to crawl forward.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Sixty metres. Beep. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Fifty metres. Beep. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Forty four metres. The watch beeped something different, a lower frequency tone - an alarm. He was too close.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Alright, alright,” he told himself. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He had heard of exterminators being ripped to shreds before they could aim an already loaded gun and let a shot off. The statue like creature in front of him was deceptively quick. Taking a deep breath, he fell into an almost deathly stillness. His forefinger tensed, ready to pull the trigger.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And then suddenly, he felt, rather than saw a movement off to his right. The exterminator had no time to see what it was because, in a blur of motion, the yuni had swivelled around and was looking at him directly. He resisted the urge to shield his head from the inevitable barrage of spikes. It would make no difference. Instead, he ignored the whizzing and clanging of the flying missiles all around him, and slapped a button on his skin suit to switch to the bazooka. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The yuni charged. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Where one would have expected a face, there was something, but it was hard to call it a face. A lipless, gaping hole where the mouth should have been, was full to bursting with teeth. Where the nose should have been, there sprouted an immense horn. If there were eyes, they weren’t like any he had seen on Earth. But its face was not the most terrifying thing about the yuni.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It was its speed. The yuni had a pair of wings, because of course it did, but it could not really fly. Instead, it combined the lift generated by the wings with the power from its four strong limbs to accelerate to incredible velocities. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Clawed hooves screeched, and wings like blades swished, louder and louder, until his whole world was nothing but sound. The bazooka clicked into existence by his side. He had no time to aim, but hopefully he didn’t need to. He punched the side of the cylindrical surface of the weapon, and there was an explosion of fire. And then, there was silence.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The exterminator became aware of the thundering of his own heart. It felt like he was about to burst. He watched the yuni disintegrate into chunks of flesh that sprayed in all directions. The watch beeped an upbeat tone. One down, three to go. There was blood, a lot of it, but now, only a second later, he could not see it at all. He knew it was there, but it was so well hidden away in the red gravel and the red rocks, that it might have never existed. The display on his watch told him that he had no bazookas left, and advised that he request an extraction as soon as possible. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He was safe for now, but he stood there for a long time and stared at the fist sized chunks of flesh that lay all around, as the sky howled at him. There was no wind on Cerise, there would be no drifts of sand that would pile up and bury them away. But nonetheless, when his heart no longer hammered a painful beat in his chest, a long time later, he could no longer see anything but rocks.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">___________________________________________________</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The exterminator had done this many times before, but something was different this time around. He could feel the beginning of a strange new emotion gnawing at the edge of his consciousness. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“It’s just like a hangover,” he told himself aloud. You don’t stop going to parties just because you have hangovers the next day. That was all it was - the aftereffects of a nightmarish experience. The yuni would have cut him open in an instant. It was do or die, right? Besides, he was doing this for the greater good, because the future of humanity was at stake. Even in the comfort of his own mind, the grand pronouncement rang hollow. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He was nearly back at the shelter when he recalled that something had spooked the yuni. It had to have been a lizzo that had unwittingly stumbled into his hunt. Just as the thought occurred to him, he spotted one foraging in the distance. He made a snap decision; he would destroy the nest. While lizzos were usually no more than inconvenient pests, they were hive animals and they had been known to take down exterminators in packs. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Better safe than sorry, “ he mumbled.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Unscrewing a tiny pouch attached to his utility belt, he picked up a marble sized something and tossed it in the direction of the lizzo. The creature paused to watch it arc towards the ground, and then continued to forage like nothing had happened. Momentarily, his watch beeped that the lizzo had swallowed the bait. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He didn’t really need to follow the lizzo, because the nugget that it had swallowed was a smart explosive that would go off once it detected that the lizzo was back in its nest, but the experience with the yuni must have dulled his senses. Scrambling up smooth granite steps, he climbed the hill higher and higher, until his legs began to wobble at the thought of a fatal fall. Presently, a cave opened into the heart of the hill. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Chittering surrounded him all around as lizzos of all sizes snoozed in warm recesses. A part of his brain half heartedly noted that he was in grave danger. But he only had a moment to observe that the lizzo he had followed dropped its collection of rocks on the cave floor, and that other lizzos - identical in every way, except they were much much smaller, no bigger than chameleons - were crawling towards the stash, when the cave lit up in a flash of light. The exterminator turned and left before the bomb went off. The howling sky masked the unearthly screeching from the cave. Nearly.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">___________________________________________________</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He was back at the shelter. It was a spartan room, and there was barely any space apart from a bed, a bathroom, a small fridge, and a workstation. The yellow and black logo of Terraforming Corp was slapped on everything from the computer wallpaper to the faceplate of his skin suit. Considering they were the ones arranging his trips to Cerise, it wasn’t that odd. A caption accompanied the logo: “Planet of Monsters”.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The exterminator was still a wealthy man, by any measure. He had made his money by being one of the first to start a grey market interplanetary shuttle service, and he had made a lot of it. One trip to Cerise was a dream for your average Earth billionaire; this was his sixth. He had made a lot of money, but most of it was gone. Suppressed rage simmered under the surface. He sipped a beer as he contemplated his situation.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If he culled two more yunis, Terraforming Corp would reimburse his travel fare. The monstrous face of a yuni appeared unbidden in his mind’s eye, and he shivered. The adrenaline of the hunt seemed like a distant memory. He could try and tag a dino instead, but he put that thought out of his head. He had never heard of anyone even seeing one, let alone tagging one, so that was a pipedream. While a part of his brain coldly worked through the numbers, another part wondered how he had ended up in a situation like this. He had so much money! He had thought he would keep coming to Cerise forever. He had even entertained a vague notion that when the terraforming project was complete, and the first human settlement had sprung up, he would stay and volunteer as a glorified security guard. But that was before today; that was before he had almost died trying to conserve ammo. Was it the sense that he was moments from death that bothered him though, or was it.. was it that a friend’s betrayal had brought him to that edge?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">______________________________________</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It was a new day, but the term was arbitrary. Cerise always had the same amount of light, a pleasant cloudy tropical illumination that never varied. The sky continued to howl its perpetual lament. He had heard that massive planet wise storms raged in the upper atmosphere hundreds of kilometres from the surface, and the only sign of all that violence was the howling that seemed to come from all directions at once. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The exterminator checked his watch. He never booked the same map each time, so he could not go off on memory. Green lines lit up indicating the sectors he had already covered. A tiny ticker on the right blinked that he had 42 hours until extraction. He turned left towards an unlit sector.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The rhythmic clomping of his boots on the gravel lulled him into a stupor. Despite his best efforts, his thoughts drifted in a now familiar direction. He chuckled at the irony that the only business partner he had ever truly trusted, even gone as far as calling a friend, the only one he had rescued from crippling debt, the only one he had cared about, had been the one to betray him. He had stolen all of his business, and most of his wealth away from him. Perhaps it was a fitting lesson. In his line of work, the murky semi-legal world of human transport, there were no true friendships, only alliances of convenience. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Every good deed is its own punishment.” He chuckled at his own wit.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And yet, he knew deep down that he did not truly believe that. In fact, he had only got into this business as a way of helping a friend who had found herself on the wrong side of the law. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“What now?” He frowned at the watch. All it ever did was beep and boop, but the exterminator felt like it understood him, and he understood it. Now, it was telling him that he was very close to the edge of the map, and that he had to turn away. He sighed, but complied. Another sector done, and no yunis spotted. How many more trips to Cerise could he afford?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Something glinted in the distance, and nothing should ever glint on this planet. The exterminator instantly fell to his stomach and clicked a button on his skinsuit for his rifle. Scanning back and forth with the zoom lens, he quickly spotted the source. There were only two ways he could ever spot another human being on Cerise, and both were so unlikely that he never planned for it. But it was undeniably a human being that shambled slowly into the crosshairs. It was a pirate.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Annoyance flashed across the exterminator’s face. He had heard about pirates who had somehow missed extraction and been stuck on Cerise for longer than they intended. They survived by stealing from other exterminators. If the pirate spotted him, he would kill or maim him for sure. Yes, he could not see what kind of weapons he was carrying, even through his zoom lens, but.. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He watched the pirate shuffle and stumble aimlessly. His finger hovered over the trigger. It would be so easy. Pirates were no longer tracked by Terraforming Corp and he was perfectly entitled to kill anything that moved in his map. Besides, if the pirate hung around in his sector, he might mess up his hunts. And he might have weapons and ammo he could use. He snorted and pressed the button to launch a flare instead. The pirate flinched at the light and sound and ran. The exterminator watched him through the lens until he was sure he had crossed over into a different map, and disappeared behind a rock hill.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Just perfect.” He shouted at his rifle, as if it was the rifle’s fault he didn’t shoot. When it didn’t answer back, he smacked it with his palm and it collapsed back into his skinsuit. All his previous trips had passed without the slightest hitch - there was not even a stray lizzo attack - but this one, the one that he needed most to be issue free, the one after the betrayal that had left him with next to nothing, was just one disaster after another. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Ah well, it can’t get any worse, can it?” The sky continued to keen, and he took it for assent. But he was wrong. It would get worse. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It was the last sector in the map, and he was almost done with it. There was nothing there, no yunis, just a solitary granite stepped hill. He stopped to press a button to confirm extraction. Four hours, the watch beeped back. He was only a few hundred metres away from the shelter, when he spotted a lizzo dashing away in a mad sprint. But the strange thing was, it was not running towards the hill, where presumably its nest must be. It was running away from it. That was when he saw the hill move. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The world shook. Rumbling that jarred him to the bone threatened to knock him off his feet, but somehow he managed to stay upright as he sprinted towards the shelter. The exterminator swore to himself that if he survived this, he would never again come to Cerise. He was done. He was done. With each planet shattering step, the rumbling got louder, and the dino closer. With each planet shattering step, everything in his eyeline danced a mad dance, rocks rose in the air, stayed suspended for too long, before they fell to the ground. And then they jumped again, higher this time. Distant hills throbbed in sync with the inexorable drumbeat.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And then he was inside the shelter. He curled into a foetal ball until the rumbling and shaking went away, after what felt like hours. A flashing light on his work station told him that there was still three hours until extraction. Calmer now, his brain observed professionally that he had just spotted a dino. All he had to do was report the coordinates, and his trip costs would be waived away.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“I know. I know.” He told his trembling fingers. Instead of doing anything, he opened the hatch to the surface, and sat on his haunches. His watch blinked red warnings, but he ignored it. A lizzo scuttled into view. The exterminator pulled out his pistol, the smallest in his weapons cache, and pointed it at the creature. The lizzo froze.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“So you know what this does, eh?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A strange feeling gnawed at the edges. He put the pistol away. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“It’s your lucky day. One of your kind saved my life today. Maybe it was you?” He squinted and peered closer at the beast, that was peacefully scooping up Cerise rock, only a few metres away. It was about the size of a dog, but scaly like a reptile. A frill of tough skin surrounded the monstrosity that was its head. He ignored the teeth, and the claws, and focused on the frill. It was folded away into a saggy pouch at the moment, but he knew that it could flare into a hood twice the size of its head when the creature felt threatened. He knew that already, but what he found interesting was that it was covered with an intricate orange pattern. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“You are one ugly bastard, you know that.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“And you could take my leg with one bite, so I have to take you down. But next time. Off you go!” He finished, the last sentence a touch louder. The lizzo paused at the sound for a moment, but then scuttled out of sight leisurely. The exterminator finished his beer, and left the planet.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">________________________________</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Three months later, he was back, and to the same map. He told himself that it was because of the dino. He hadn’t reported its coordinates, and he wanted to hunt it himself. Bringing down a dino would mean free Cerise trips forever. Terraforming Corp would probably even send him a nice hand written letter thanking him for his services to humanity. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It would not really be that hard. You did not have to be an expert tracker to follow a building sized creature on a planet that did not even erase footprints, even if said creature could camouflage itself as a hill. And he was a good tracker. On the other hand, if he didn’t take down the dino, he would not only never return to Cerise, but he would likely be in a lot of money trouble. From the richest man in the world - or close enough - to swimming in debt, a tale as old as time.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It would not really be that hard. So why rush? He grabbed a couple of bottles of beer and refilled them with a touch. Snapping open a small foldable stool, he sat down under the flaming sky and sipped beer. Was it really an unchanging world? The atmosphere in Cerise was hundreds of kilometres thick, but the giant red star it was locked to was immensely bright, and close. Surely, if he only tried hard enough, he could spot it? Were the clouds really uniformly thick and opaque? The star was so close to Cerise that it would take up half the sky. He stared, unblinking at a patch of sky, until he was convinced he could see the faintest arc of starshine.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He closed his eyes for a second.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Chunks of flesh rained all around him. Wind - wind? - whipped them into a demonic maelstrom, as rivers of blood rushed in torrents and disappeared into black volcanic rock. The howling sky melted into screeching, and the cave, and burning lizzo children, and his eyes snapped open.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">There was a lizzo standing in front of him, less than two metres away. Had he really fallen asleep on the surface of a planet of monsters? The lizzo was so close, he could count the fangs in the gaping maw that passed as its mouth. The frill around its head pulsed, as if in anticipation, but did not flare out. The intricate orange pattern around it was beautiful. Why had he never noticed that? A part of his brain wondered if this was the same lizzo that had run away from the dino and saved his life, and the same lizzo that had come to see him later. The rational part of his brain scoffed, assuring him that such an occurrence was exceedingly unlikely. Besides, lizzos did not go to ‘see’ anybody. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He sat as still as he could. “So you are here to get me before I can get you, eh?” he whispered softly. There was no way he could draw a weapon before the lizzo reached him, and strangely the thought comforted him. Perhaps it was not quite comfort, but a lack of tension. He did not have to be on edge anymore, it was out of his hands. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The lizzo scuttled away, with the chaotic, yet perfectly balanced, gait of a chameleon. The exterminator tried to let out a sigh of relief, but he had not been holding his breath. He wondered about the yunis. Were they pack animals too? He knew their only food source was the lizzos, and the dinos preyed on the yunis, but he wondered what the yunis did otherwise. Did they have elaborate mating dances? Did they even have sexes? Did they even reproduce? The image of the charging yuni was branded in his mind. The whirring blade like wings, perfectly adapted to the planet, cut through the thick air like butter, the cloven hooves that gripped the gravelly surface for maximum speed. Swish. Crash. Crash. Swish. Crash. Crash. A mad symphony, with the howling sky an enthusiastic participant.</span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Even the hills did not seem as eternal as they used to. Subtle changes in light caused the granite steps to gleam dully. He wondered for the first time how they came to be. Why was he here on Cerise? His head throbbed and his skin burned with a fever. The exterminator shut the hatch and lay in bed, but his racing thoughts would not slow.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The planet of monsters had an austere beauty. All he needed was to track the dino, shoot a couple of bazookas at it, and he would never have to return again. Even if he could. The planet of monsters was not an unchanging vision of hell. It would only take a couple of hours to track down the dino. It was an absurd video game world of exterminators versus pirates, yunis versus exterminators, dinos versus lizzos, humanity versus monsters, monsters versus monsters, it was all a synthetic lie. Humanity’s saviour - remaking an ugly, cruel world into a golden haven. Revulsion flooded through him, and his stomach clenched into a painful knot. His trustee watch beeped that only an hour remained until his scheduled rest. There was no point heading out now. He drifted into a tortured sleep.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">____________________________________</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The next day, the exterminator walked directly to the nearest edge of his map, and crossed over. His watch blared warnings, so he ripped it off his wrist and tossed it away. It had been his only companion, but his decision was made. He continued walking in spurts, pausing to scan the surroundings with his most powerful lens, until finally, he spotted the other exterminator. He looked ridiculous in his orange camouflage skinsuit, as he lay flat on the ground, clearly tracking something. Was it his dino? He jiggled the lens until it focused on a yuni in the distance. The yuni hadn’t seen either exterminator yet, and continued to serenely, methodically scan for prey. It was a difficult shot at this distance but he could take down the yuni, and then the other exterminator would have a couple of options. He could shoot him dead, no questions asked, because he was trespassing after all. Or he could agree to negotiate some form of resource sharing with him. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The exterminator pointed his weapon at the yuni, and pressed the flare button. The yuni was probably too far away to spot him, but he did not care. The yuni started and charged in the direction of the flare, and within moments was out of range of the other exterminator’s weapon. The other exterminator turned his gun towards the direction of the flare, and sprayed bullets wildly, but there was no one there. </span></span></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-79875753125796293162019-11-20T07:25:00.000+05:302019-11-20T07:25:09.492+05:30Behold... The Arctopus<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is a story/free verse poem written almost entirely using names of metalcore, hardcore and deathcore bands. If you're curious what those band names are - and you just might discover some cool new music - check out the epilogue, or just read along and enjoy the ride.</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I am society's finest; but to crown the empire - </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here: articles of faith fit for a king -</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A day to remember, burnt by the sun;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nights like these, side by side, beneath the sky;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'd burn 100 demons beyond the walls of Jericho</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Because arsonists get all the girls.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Drop dead gorgeous Alesana, skip the foreplay;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Beloved Miss, may I see you next Tuesday?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Close your eyes, embrace today, forevermore.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But you stick to your guns, refused to cave in;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You loathe me, deny me as a limp wristed adolescent;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You saw no redeeming social value in my eyes,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That you could in big boys, misfits and FUs.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Repulsion like scarlet stigmata from her eyes</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Throwsdown the word alive to the wind.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Alesana, you tear out the heart;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Your cruel hand rupture deez nuts;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All that remains is the agony scene.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is hell, but the warriors born from pain</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rise to remain on broken wings</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Blessed by a broken heart, I wage war,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Strike anywhere, terror while she sleeps</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Attack attack! I killed the prom queen!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Green arrows and ice pick to a glass casket,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Upon this dawning, blood has been shed.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The void still remains in my kingdom of sorrow</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The hope conspiracy converges in suicide silence</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Falling in reverse from a second story window</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">From autumn to ashes, as I lay dying</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Shadows fall, senses fail, but I prevail.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">EPILOGUE</span></h3>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is the full list of band names in the poem, in order. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_(American_band)">I AM</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society%27s_Finest">Society's Finest</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_the_Empire">Crown The Empire</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Articles_of_Faith_(band)">Articles of Faith</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fit_for_a_King_(band)">Fit For a King</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Day_to_Remember">A Day To Remember</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnt_by_the_Sun_(band)">Burnt By the Sun</a>,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nights_Like_These"> Nights Like These</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Side_by_Side_(band)">Side By Side</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beneath_the_Sky">Beneath the Sky</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burn_(band)">Burn</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Demons">100 Demons</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beyond_(band)">Beyond</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walls_of_Jericho_(band)">Walls of Jericho</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsonists_Get_All_the_Girls">Arsonists Get All the Girls</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drop_Dead,_Gorgeous">Drop Dead Gorgeous</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alesana">Alesana</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skip_the_Foreplay">Skip the Foreplay</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beloved_(band)">Beloved</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miss_May_I">Miss May I</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/See_You_Next_Tuesday_(band)">See You Next Tuesday</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_Your_Eyes_(band)">Close Your Eyes</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace_Today">Embrace Today</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forevermore_(band)">Forevermore</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stick_to_Your_Guns_(band)">Stick to Your Guns</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refused">Refused</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_In">Cave In</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loathe_(band)">Loathe</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deny_(band)">Deny</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limp_Wrist">Limp Wrist</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolescents_(band)">Adolescents</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Redeeming_Social_Value">No Redeeming Social Value</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_My_Eyes_(band)">In My Eyes</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Boys">Big Boys</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misfits_(band)">Misfits</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_F.U.%27s">The FUs</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repulsion_(band)">Repulsion</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarlet_(American_band)">Scarlet</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stigmata_(band)">Stigmata</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Her_Eyes">From Her Eyes</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Throwdown_(band)">Throwdown</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Word_Alive">The Word Alive</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_the_Wind">To the Wind</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alesana">Alesana</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tear_Out_the_Heart">Tear Out the Heart</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruel_Hand">Cruel Hand</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupture_(band)">Rupture</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deez_Nuts_(band)">Deez Nuts</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_That_Remains_(band)">All That Remains</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Agony_Scene">The Agony Scene</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Is_Hell_(band)">This is Hell</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Warriors_(band)">The Warriors</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Born_from_Pain">Born From Pain</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rise_to_Remain">Rise To Remain</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Broken_Wings">On Broken Wings</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blessed_by_a_Broken_Heart">Blessed By a Broken Heart</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_War">Wage War</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_Anywhere">Strike Anywhere</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_(band)">Terror</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/While_She_Sleeps">While She Sleeps</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_Attack!_(American_band)">Attack Attack</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Killed_the_Prom_Queen">I Killed the Prom Queen</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Arrows">Green Arrows</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icepick_(band)">Icepick</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_Casket">Glass Casket</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upon_This_Dawning">Upon This Dawning</a>,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Has_Been_Shed"> Blood Has Been Shed</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Void_(band)">Void</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Still_Remains">Still Remains</a>,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Sorrow"> Kingdom of Sorrow</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hope_Conspiracy">The Hope Conspiracy</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Converge_(band)">Converge</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_Silence">Suicide Silence</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falling_in_Reverse">Falling in Reverse</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_a_Second_Story_Window">From a Second Story Window</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Autumn_to_Ashes">From Autumn To Ashes</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/As_I_Lay_Dying_(band)">As I Lay Dying</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadows_Fall">Shadows Fall</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senses_Fail">Senses Fail</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Prevail">I Prevail</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The original list had over 800 band names, taken from the metalcore, deathcore and hardcore pages on Wikipedia. And I'm sure you're too lazy to count, so I'll tell you the answer to the question on your lips: there are 80 band names in this little poem.</span><br />
<br /></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-55211608494119785092019-11-18T22:49:00.000+05:302019-11-18T22:51:02.389+05:30The Forgivable Sin<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">So there I found myself, standing all alone in front of a group of people with hate in their eyes, and twitching fingers eager to condemn me to eternal damnation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">How did I get here? It was hard to construct a story, butterfly effect style, that began at the beginning when I was two months old and follow its twists and turns to the now. No, it was impossible. Because, no matter how I tried to spin it, I had been a good person until moments before I did the unthinkable. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I had been a loving father, a loving husband, a careful employee who knew when to work hard and when to pretend really hard, a dutiful citizen who paid as little tax as he could get away with, and a moderately annoying neighbour.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Harsh raps from the judge’s gavel snapped me out my what-ifs. He was saying something, but it was hard to focus. I could see the hint of a curly wig, but everything else was blurry, like reality itself was fading into memory. Instead, I turned my attention to the jury, whose burning eyes were turned towards the judge.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">That young woman in the hoodie, with the restlessly tapping left leg, she would be the first to drop the guillotine. Not because she hated me personally, but because she really didn’t want to be there in the courtroom with all the senile old fools. One of the several men in business suits turned to look at me, and smirked. I sensed there was a hint of curiosity behind that slappable smirk, but who cared. I hated them all, my to-be executioners.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Presently, the judge stopped speaking. I didn’t really notice, but the burning eyes of the jury were back on me, boring holes, so it was clear I had to do something. I cleared my throat laboriously.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“We don’t have all day,” the judge droned. “And considering you refused the right to counsel, it’s clear you don’t really care. Even so, this is your last chance to mount a defence before the jury makes its decision.” The judge tried to work the leather on his face into a kindly smile, but it didn’t work. I looked down at my ten year old torn Converse shoes. I looked around to try and spot my wife, but she wasn’t here.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I exhaled noisily, as I considered my options. Maybe I had done it because I had a secret drug habit, and drug addiction was a disease, not a crime, and this particular drug caused fits of uncontrollable rage. Maybe I had done it, because I had just found out about my wife’s five year long affair. I’d hate to throw her under the bus like this, but she would understand. Maybe, I had found out about my cancer diagnosis. Maybe…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Someone in the jury coughed pointedly. I looked up to see a middle aged woman scowling furiously in my approximate direction. Clearly short sighted, but too vain for spectacles, and also equally clearly, a god fearing executor of medieval justice. She only needed access to a javelin and immunity from prosecution. I giggled internally at the doubly meaningful use of ‘short sighted’. Somewhere, a butterfly flapped its wings furiously to fight off a cyclone.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The sore throated woman’s distraction was more than just that. I knew then that nothing but the truth would do. Were I in the place of one of the suits on the bench, would I forgive myself? Bear in mind that I was someone who had absolutely no issues with cognitive dissonance. I lived and breathed ‘do as I say, not as I do’. And yet, I knew that I would condemn me in a heartbeat. So, the truth then.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“So, this is why I killed that man.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Gasps from the jury accompanied that pronouncement like thunder to lightning. Come on, there were like thirty five witnesses to the act, and probably a few others who hadn’t been there but would back up the story for giggles. </span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“It started from the moment he joined the company. I had never before met such a self absorbed human being, and coming from me, that’s saying something. This man strutted around like we were all privileged just to breathe the same air as him, but this isn’t about that at all. I’ve met a few pompous pricks in my time, it’s not worth killing over.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I paused for breath, but dared not look at the jury for fear my heartfelt confession would derail in its tracks.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“No, the reason I did it was because this man - this abhorrent creature - deemed it his life’s purpose to tell everyone he met that their jokes weren’t funny.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A wave of hushed whispers rippled through the crowd. I still continued looking at my battered shoes, but a tremulous voice piped up.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“But but, was this.. man... funny.. himself?”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The judge smacked his desk with as much force as he could muster. It was one of those cases of the effort being far more impressive than the result. Nonetheless, the voices stilled.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“This is most improper, young lady, interrupting a defence while on the panel.” A moment later, he added: “However, I’d like to know the answer to this too, so I’ll let this pass. Don’t speak out of turn again!”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I turned to see that it was the young woman in the hoodie who had asked the question. It wasn’t quite hate in her eyes now, but something… Different. Not daring to scan the woman’s neighbours for their expressions, I forged on.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“No, NO, NO, NO. NO!” I thundered like a trapped god. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“This man couldn’t make a joke to save his newborn infant’s life. All he did, all he ever did, was strut around, and tell people that their jokes weren’t funny.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“One day, everything came to a head. I was by the watercooler chatting with colleagues, and we were all laughing at something someone said. It must have been some joke, because if we had even sensed this guy’s presence, we would have walked right away, without the smallest nod to social etiquette.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“There he was, looking us in our collective eye, and he said with complete and unshakeable self belief: ‘That joke was not funny’.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“I went into autopilot. Like some kind of miniature Hercules, I picked up the huge flatscreen TV by the coffee machine, picked it right over my head and smashed it… smashed it into…”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">My voice choked up with emotion, and I could say no more. When my sobbing stopped, I was surprised to hear a strange sound coming from the direction of the jury. My eyes immediately snapped up to see the medieval executioner lady crying. She was crying! The expression that took over my face then could best be described as confusion.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">You may now disagree with my assessment of this story’s climax, but I’m sticking to it and calling it a happy ending.</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The judge had his answer within moments of the end of my performance.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“I have worked this job for a long time, and very little I see everyday surprises me but today’s events definitely qualify.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“If there can ever be something called a forgivable sin, this is it.”</span></div>
<div class="p2">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“The jury would like to especially thank you for ridding this world of one of the most loathsome pests I have ever seen, a humourless dunce who unironically appointed himself as joke critic, and nibbled away at countless souls with uninvited, fun-killing barbs.”</span></div>
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-76136429887395717272019-11-10T06:06:00.002+05:302019-11-10T06:06:58.664+05:30Forgiveness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-91777482920632560152019-10-16T01:07:00.000+05:302019-10-16T01:07:28.967+05:30Obsession: Part #1<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In the dimly lit bookshop, an old man shuffled wearily from shelf to shelf, dusting the tops of books ineffectively. His eyes, if there was someone around to see them, were glazed as if focussed on something inward. Midway through his chore, he seemed to give up and slump into the solitary chair in the shop. A stray beam of sunshine lit up his face, and brought with it a surprise: the old man was thirty five years old at best. The rounded shoulders, the tired demeanour, and the unnaturally haggard droop to his cheeks conspired to fool the casual observer, but Scolo was definitely a young man. His eyes were still glazed over, and in his mind, he was doing what he did every day of every year since the time his other life ended. </span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-73e9e4c2-7fff-6d80-3ec5-6dd70253bed2" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">This was a memory so polished from repeated replay that it almost glinted at the edges like a shiny HD video. It was the memory of a tennis match; no, two tennis matches actually, with a point from each playing side by side, frame by frame in his mind’s eye. The opponent in both matches was his great rival Girona, his downfall and nemesis, but on the left side, he wore a fearful grimace on his face, while on the right side, an angry scowl. Yes, this wizened old-young man had been one of the best tennis players in the world. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Scolo served. Left Girona and right Girona played a rally ball back. Both halves were so in lockstep, it was like they were the same match. Except for Girona’s face, of course, which seemed to resolve into hyperreal clarity. The rally went on back and forth for a few more shots, until Scolo sensed a tipping point - a tingling in his racket fingers that suggested that something was about to give. Scolo just knew in that moment what he had to do. Taking the pace off his shot, he massaged it straight back at Girona. Left Girona grimaced and shanked an easy forehand way out of the court, but right Girona - his nemesis and downfall - stepped in to smash it away for a winner. Confusion overwhelmed his thoughts - it should have worked! It had worked before! - confusion from the match bleached into the present like no time had passed at all, and he held his head as if willing it to go away.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It was always the same. If not this rally, if not this match, it was something else. But Girona, the man who everyone thought was a saint... the vicious spiral of his thoughts was interrupted by the tinkle of a bell. A visitor?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Old man Scolo shuffled to the door. It was the postman. Muttering to himself about unwanted advertising, he opened the unmarked envelope to see this letter.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>“Dear Scolo,</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>I’d like to play an exhibition doubles match with you before I retire. For old times sake. And to bury the hatchet. Don’t turn me down.</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Girona</i></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>“</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Viscous rage flowed into his veins, rough from a lack of use, but familiar like a close friend that had drifted away. The nerve of that man! But he knew, even in that moment, that he was going to say yes. He hadn’t struck a ball in years, but he was going to say yes.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In retrospect, it had all started falling apart at <i>that</i> press conference. It was after a third consecutive loss to Girona. He had just lost his number one ranking, and every question in the press conference stung harder than ever before. He still didn’t know why he did what he did next, but he hung around in a small, darkened room by the main press area after his conference was done, to watch Girona’s press conference. None of the journalists knew he was still there - oh what a scandal it would be, he thought impishly - but made sure to leave the door slightly ajar.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“What did you make of your performance?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He watched Girona shade his eyes, a tic he knew all too well, using that moment to reset his thoughts and reply with the bland stock filler answers tennis players give.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“I am happy. There are little things that maybe I can improve, but this opponent.. I have full respect.. One of my toughest opponents… Very happy.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Stock question after stock question followed, and pat came the inoffensive, cliched responses, and Scolo began to switch off. He wondered what Cara was up to. She was probably much more busy than he was. She definitely was, considering he was lurking in a dark room daydreaming. But presently, his eyes snapped back to the press room, as if alerted by some supernatural instinct.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Girona, in the early part of your career, despite being widely acknowledged as possibly the more expansive talent, you lost nearly every match you played to Scolo. And now you’re on a winning streak. What’s changed? What’s the secret? I’m sure Scolo would like to know.” Amused chuckles filled the room.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Scolo hasn’t tailed off, not really. His record against almost every other player is still as good as it ever was. It’s you. What’s the secret?*</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">To Scolo’s utter surprise, Girona did not immediately respond with a press friendly cliche. (“Oh, I’ve been lucky a couple of times, I’m sure Scolo will fight back”, “At the highest level, tennis matches hinge on a handful of decisive moments that are hard to pinpoint.”) A very awkward pause filled the room as Girona stared straight back at the journalist. Eventually,</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Could you repeat your question?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And when the journalist did, Girona still seemed frozen. Wondering murmurs spread among the throng, but still Girona said nothing. The press coordinator leaned in to whisper in Girona’s ear, nodded at his response, and proceeded to announce to the journalists that Girona was suddenly taken ill with a dizzy spell and would have to cut the press conference short. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The buzzing drone of stifled conversation slowly dissipated as all the journalists filtered out, but Scolo stood there in the dark for a long time. He was shaking and his eyes were aflame with sudden revelation, because he knew, he knew with absolute certainty that Girona was cheating.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">To understand Scolo’s conviction, you had to understand the kind of tennis player Scolo was. Yes, he was very talented, fairly hard working, in decent shape, but so was everyone else in the top twenty in the world. Where he stood out, and what allowed him to be the number one player in the world for two years, was an almost divine sense of intuition that guided his game. It wasn’t just that he knew each player’s weakness and could target them, again, probably every player in the top twenty could.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It was that he knew to millisecond precision what shot each player was going to play in each given situation. Again, this was nothing as naive as saying that this and this player played more forehands down the line than cross court, but much more sophisticated than that; he would know with certainty that at a given point in a rally, at a given point in a match, given the way his opponent had played thus far, given the way his opponent was feeling mentally, given how tired - or not - his opponent was, he would know with certainty that he would next play a down the line forehand.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Scolo couldn’t explain the formula to you if he tried. Instead, he embraced his gift and trusted it and rode its power to the top of the world. Girona was, in the beginning, one of the easiest kills for his spider sense. He was only six months younger than Scolo, and everybody - even Scolo himself - freely admitted that Girona was probably the most talented player the sport had ever seen. But faced with Scolo’s unerring anticipation, his beautiful shots fell apart to almost amateurish proportions. Occasionally, Girona would cling to his game long enough to steal the shorter matches, but the head to head was embarrassingly one sided. Scolo 12 Girona 2.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And then Girona had begun to cheat. It had to be that!</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">A faint, faraway whine resolved itself into the voice of Coach. A very annoyed voice that made it very clear that it was repeating itself for the four hundredth time.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Running forehand drills?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As he smacked ball after ball back at the brightly lit moving laser targets on the opposite court, Scolo’s mind drifted to the Girona question again. It had to be drugs. How often was Girona tested? Players didn’t know one another’s testing schedules, but he was fairly sure there was a lot of out of competition, random testing. Yet, clearly, Girona was somehow beating the system. He was - </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Ouch!”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Coach had just smacked a vicious forehand drive straight into his midriff.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“What are you playing at, Coach?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“No, what are you playing at? Where’s your mind at? You’ve never been the most industrious pupil but this is ridiculous.”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Have you even noticed that the targets have been moved up to the net for you to practice your passing shots?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Scolo looked up in mild consternation. Yes, they had been moved, and yes, he hadn’t noticed. And Coach, a normally mild mannered man who had to be pushed to say a word, was furious.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Sorry, Coach. So, here’s the thing.”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“I think Girona’s cheating.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Scolo paused for the full import of that statement to sink in, but Coach didn’t even blink.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“It is possible, and I won’t even ask why you think what you think, and I don’t care. It’s forehand drill day, and that has nothing to do with Girona or cheating. Let’s get on with it.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Scolo was jolted out of his thoughts. He didn’t know what he was expecting Coach to say, but it wasn’t this. He was instantly grumpy but finished his drill before it got too dark. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He seemed to get over his dark mood in the coming days. Racking up win after win, and not playing Girona definitely helped, but it was probably more Cara. Cara always helped. She was gentle and sympathetic, but always impartial and slow to judgment. She had always helped. After a whirlwind lifestyle as a young professional, with numerous flings with actresses and supermodels, page three scandals, and money and endorsements and more money, Cara came into his life. She was a supermodel too, so it wasn’t like that movie where the dashing hero romanced stunning woman after stunning woman before finding out that the homely neighbour was where his heart lay all along. No, Cara was a stunning woman herself. He was a handsome, young tennis player with a charisma that enveloped everyone in his presence and lifted them into a higher plane of existence, a heady, exalted plane that made them feel special. Cara was not immune to his wiles, and he added her to his list of conquests. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Or so he thought, because to his everlasting surprise, he actually fell in love. Cara became a homebody supermodel, and he, the almost comically quintessential Casanova figure with the roving eye almost never flirted again. Yes, Cara, lovely Cara, had been sympathetic to his suspicions about Girona, but merely warned him to keep a hold of his emotions and not say something in public he would come to regret.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Famous last words.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Both Girona and Scolo reached the final of the Madrid Open. Scolo knew this might happen the moment he saw the draw, but the rapid rate at which his hard won good feeling fell away, to be replaced by a black, knotted rage surprised even him. Hours before the final, he skulked his private locker room area and muffled screams slipped from his lips from time to time, despite himself. He punched a wall so hard he wondered if he’d broken a finger. He had never done that before. It didn’t help. Despite losing the first set, Girona came back to take the next two and win the match.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">He could barely look Girona in the eye during the post match handshake. Girona probably didn’t notice that he was trembling, that man was so amiable that he was practically blind. He knew he should take a breather for five minutes before the press conference, but he walked straight in.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Somehow, he survived the first round of banalities. But then the red mist descended in an instant when a journalist asked him about his losing streak against Girona.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“Do you think Girona now has a mental edge against you, and that is why he is winning against consistently?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“He’s winning because.. He’s a CHEATER. HE’S A FUCKING CHEATER!” His voice rose to a scream. A shocked silence fell over the room. The journalist who asked the original question recovered and began to speak again.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“What do - “</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">“SHUT UP! JUST SHUT UP!” Scolo picked up the water bottle in front of him and hurled it at the journalist. Without looking to see what happened next, he stood up and stomped out of the room.</span></span></div>
</div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-2071910715717058282019-10-11T01:57:00.001+05:302019-10-11T01:58:31.456+05:30The Key To Everlasting Happiness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">This is best illustrated with an example. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">You have a house. Your house is dustier than the streets of Delhi. You are super annoyed about it, but just can’t bring yourself to get around to fix it. For reasons; and since I’m chock full of empathy, I’m not going to attack you personally by insinuating that you’re lazy. Instead, I’m going to offer a solution that doesn’t involve giving up on your most cherished ideals.</span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-1d5971d8-7fff-095f-1b38-8ba753ea9c77" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">What if you hunted through your fridge instead for the smelliest carton of milk, took it out, and carefully and liberally spilt it all over the floor? Making sure, of course, that you picked spots that were likely to leave behind the hardest to remove stains, until you eventually found the energy to get up to clean them off. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">What’s this got to do with the dusty house, you wonder? Therein lies the rub. While you were busy worrying about how on Earth you would get rid of that big splotch of milk in the middle of your drawing room, <i>you forgot all about the dusty house.</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Even better, the sweet kick of endorphins after you solved the spilt milk problem made the dusty house a little more tolerable, chipping away at your frustration one floor stain at a time, until some day, you won’t care about dusty houses any more. Problem solved.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">This is a variation of the <a href="http://thelightofcanopus.blogspot.com/2019/08/a-treatise-on-pain.html">Acupuncture Principle</a></span></span><b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><a href="http://thelightofcanopus.blogspot.com/2019/08/a-treatise-on-pain.html">™</a></b><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">, of course, and can be paraphrased as:</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">To solve a problem, make yourself a bigger problem.</span></span></blockquote>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">In fact, the more I think about it, the more I feel like I’ve discovered the key to happiness itself. And like all great sages of yesteryear, I’m willing to share my wisdom for no charge at all. (Here’s my Patreon.)</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">To start things off, here’s a list of what I have cleverly named The Acupunctuals: a list of fallback solutions that will help you get over any problem in life. Just pick one and off you go.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">1.Shoot a neighbour.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">2. Set your house on fire.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">3. Contract Ebola.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">4. Go to work naked.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Unemployed and anxious about it? Go shoot a neighbour! You’ll no longer have to worry about being unemployed and anxious. And so on.</span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Sometimes though, you might not need car-sized hammers like these for your tiny nails. Fret not, my vast expertise transcends generalities.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you find yourself anxious about those unfolded post-laundry clothes lying in a terrifying heap on your sofa, start chucking soiled clothes on the floor, one at a time, every day. Before you know it you’ll find yourself no longer fretting. About the unfolded post laundry clothes.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If the idea of writing daily status reports at work is boring you to tears - and if it isn’t, please feel free to check in your homo sapiens card when you leave the building, there’s a long waiting list - go ahead, and break that super important, super critical client facing system. No more status reports, and your manager will thank you in secret. Or openly, if post-work beers are your thing.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you’re tired, get yourself a cold. </span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you have a cold, get yourself a full blown upper respiratory tract infection.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you have an upper respiratory tract infection already, break a leg. </span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you have a broken leg, break another leg.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you have two broken legs - have you considered buying lottery tickets? - cut off a limb. </span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you’re there already, sorry I’m out of ideas. May I point you to the list of Acupunctuals?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you’re happy, and you’re a masochist, treat yourself to a day of hedonistic decadence involving copious amounts of alcohol. You’ll be happier, and you’ll forget the little joys that caused you such pain the day before.</span><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Sometimes though, the key to successful application of the Acupuncture Principle is tangentiality, not degree. The uninformed might call it procrastination, but I say: tomatoes, tomatoes.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Do you have a homework assignment to do? Pretend to think about beginning work on that novel that’s going to make you rich and famous. </span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">When you’re ready to actually write down the first line of your novel, you’ll always have the homework assignment to do. </span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">There. Thank me later for only just dropping the key to everlasting happiness in your lap.</span></span></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-47843210428079253972019-10-04T02:03:00.001+05:302019-10-04T02:03:06.413+05:30Deception, appearances, and all that<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBwBr7T3O6TCfvJ0b82Z4H9aAx0POjoCFMsQ3u42t5RZpxpxJUKkJznSfYUBN2MHml5CHJ_67A95y0M3Wwj2WqTEWybh_7MHMsPKxE6tW8xPfLdC_WL1pMxlm-YreJQIWvLFPH-3Sj8GzP/s1600/Friendly.tif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBwBr7T3O6TCfvJ0b82Z4H9aAx0POjoCFMsQ3u42t5RZpxpxJUKkJznSfYUBN2MHml5CHJ_67A95y0M3Wwj2WqTEWybh_7MHMsPKxE6tW8xPfLdC_WL1pMxlm-YreJQIWvLFPH-3Sj8GzP/s640/Friendly.tif" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">(</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">As always blogspot doesn't like large images much, so if you're on the desktop and can't read the text, right click -> open image in new tab and then magnify. On mobile, just tap the image and pinch zoom.)</span></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-56373245332462025022019-09-17T04:24:00.003+05:302019-09-17T04:25:12.869+05:30Glass Half Full<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">(Have you ever felt that you live in a world built for cynical people, and it is oh so exhausting? Normally, I'd laugh you out the door, but I'm in that sort of mood where I look at a quarter full glass and shout from the rooftops that I have a glass that's half full. Sharing is caring, right?</span></i></div>
<div class="p1">
<i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br />
Well, in that spirit, I've decided to pluck some of the gnarliest proverbs I could find, and smoothe them into messages of hope and upliftment. Who needs all that negativity?)</span></i></div>
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<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>When you're down in the dumps, and all hope seems gone, your friends will all.. be there for you and support you, because that's what friends do.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>A chain is only as strong as #teamlinks because #oneteam, #noblamegame, #together.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Actions speak louder than words (when you're at a metal concert, otherwise words do fine. Actions are fine too - I love Die Hard just like you - whatever floats your boat).</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>A fool and his money are soon parted. Sure, but a thief and his money are soon parted as well. If not, that's OK, because he has mouths to feed, right?</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>A leopard won't change its spots because it's spotty and proud as it should be.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>All good things come to an end, because great things are around the corner.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>An empty vessel makes much noise. That’s alright because you’re like a drummer playing the drums, and everybody loves drummers.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Appearances can be deceptive, but they usually aren't. Yellow taxis are yellow taxis most of the time.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Bite off more than you can chew, because how else would you know how much you can chew? </span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Blow your own trumpet, because it’s better than a vuvuzela!</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Give them an inch, and they’ll take a mile. Yes, but if that’s your partner planning your surprise birthday party, more power to them, right?</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Cry away over that spilt milk, because let it all out, detox, and milk’s as good a thing to rue as any.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Keep your mouth shut and your eyes open, your mom says? Well, mama don't know all when it comes to kissing well.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Go ahead. Run before you walk because in a world full of escalators, walking is overrated.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>Man proposes, and man implements, and man is happy, because who does that sky deity think He is, disposing of other people’s stuff?</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>You take your horse to the river, and she drinks through a straw, because they're still around.</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>My old dog just learnt that she can run from one end of the room to the other with her eyes shut. That’s a pretty darn neat trick eh?</span></li>
<li class="li1"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="s1"></span>What's wrong with me, you wonder? Nothing, because whatever you are, you are golden.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></li>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-34669249249778682572019-08-25T03:00:00.002+05:302019-08-25T14:40:10.049+05:30The Dream Matcher<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Little had I known then but my life was about to turn upside down when a frazzled looking colleague ambled into our office break room one pointless Monday morning. I mean, I was not fully there myself, but it wasn’t anything some caffeine couldn’t fix. I soon saw that this crumpled up man in front of me with his bloodshot eyes would severely derail my own waking up process unless I did something. So I said:</span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-6f7d49f3-7fff-9dbb-4fe1-9fc341dda538" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Slept poorly last night?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Momentarily frozen as if shocked to be spoken to by another human being, the man mumbled out.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Yes, er.. Yes. Bad dreams.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I looked at my nearly ready coffee and looked back at the tortured soul in front of me. I sighed. The coffee only worked its charm if I imbibed it at a particular pace alone. Alone.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“You know what? I’m actually pretty good at interpreting dreams,” I fibbed glibly, “I might be able to solve your problem”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The man squinted at me for a second.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“How did you know that I’ve been having the same dream over and over again?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I didn’t, but I clucked mysteriously. Then he launched into a story that stopped, started, stopped and started over again more times than the TV series Supernatural, but could be summarized in one line. A giant thirty foot wide foot (ha!) came out of nowhere to squash him like a bug.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Did you notice anything.. I mean.. Was there anything about the shoe that struck you?” </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Actually, yes. Weirdly, it was the exact make of brown suede that our boss uses.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I looked at the coffee mug fondly. Almost there, my darling. I then put a consoling arm around his shoulder and uttered the following words:</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“You’re clearly unhappy with our boss trampling all over you to get work done at the expense of your health and sanity.”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“You’re a grown adult, a fairly smart, a decently qualified adult, and you should stand up for yourself and ask your boss to either back off, or pay you twice what he pays until HE STOPS!”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A thoughtful glint slithered into the man’s eyes as he truly focussed on me for the first time. I knew he’d be alright. What I didn’t know was that everything was to change for me.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Thank you!” he said, and walked away, a little less crumpled than before.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So one thing had led to another, and I found myself quitting my comfortable white collar job and becoming a full time ‘dream matcher’ as I called it. Clearly, that very obvious interpretation of the giant shoe shouldn’t have been enough to quit my day job, but you should have seen that guy! He had looked like he thought I was the Messiah or something.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It had turned out to be a decent career choice however. Apparently I had this talent for unravelling the most ridiculous dreams into sensible life prescriptions. Once I got the ambiance sorted, the sleep deprived wackos started flowing in like a contagious disease. The tent was the first step, of course, but then I went all in. I bought dream interpretation books written by various quacks over the centuries and ceremoniously half-burnt them into a carefully placed pile in one corner. Then I got rid of electricity and lighting and all that and stuffed the tent with more aromatic pillows than any single man in history. I dropped my shirt and jeans uniform for an airy robe of some sort. Second hand antique shops all over the city were raided for trinkets of every kind until I could hardly walk around without fake diamonds shattering under my feet.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That was in the past. Now I was faced with the greatest puzzle of my fledgling dream matcher career and I feared that this was my Kryptonite, my nemesis, the problem that ended me for good. It wasn’t that I hadn’t encountered challenging dreams before. For instance, there was that time when this woman had walked in and said:</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I dream of dinosaurs.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The bloody ambiance sold this whole dream matcher idea to the gullibles but I could hardly see a thing, and it was annoying. I popped on my IR-augmented glasses to see an average woman in average clothes with an average posture and an average expression on her face. Green, of course.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I am an accountant, you see. I don’t even think of dinosaurs. In fact it’d be fair to say that the last time I thought of dinosaurs during my waking hours was probably about twenty years ago. When I was ten and had watched Jurassic Park for the first time. And then my brother said he’d liked it too, and I had to hate it from that point on, of course. So, basically, I thought of dinosaurs for all of a single day.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">She paused to wag a finger in what she thought was my direction but was actually at the human sized pile of half-burnt quack-lore in the corner. Ironic. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“So don’t feed me some simplistic interpretation about a hidden love for paleontology.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I hemmed from the diaphragm like a death metal vocalist warming up, startling the wagging finger.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Tell me, “ I murmured, “what do these dinosaurs do in your dream?”’</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“They.. er.. Are flying. Flying with smiles on their faces over the lush green forest below.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“The dinosaurs.. Are flying?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Yes.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“With a smile on their face?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Yes.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“What do you think of the Conservative Party?” I burst out, while straightening my body at the same time. I knew that in the dimness the effect would be of pressing urgency almost like a physical entity enveloping you. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The woman paused. “I…”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I think that they’re exactly what this country needs. What with the out of control crime, them taking all our jobs, and having so many babies and changing our language, we need… discipline.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Discipline?” I rumbled gently.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Yes, discipline.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Her green jaw tightened into defiance. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Clearly,” I put on my poshest Oracle voice, “the dinosaurs represent your longing for a time long past. A golden age, a utopia, an idyllic time when everything was perfect. The flying? It symbolizes freedom. Freedom to be what you want to be in a perfect world. A world that the Conservative Party can bring back.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Go and vote!” I added.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">To this day, I was proud of that dinosaur connection. Yes, there had been other great matches as well. Like the man who dreamt he was in a coffin all the time because his mattress was too small, and the girl who dreamt she was an unappreciated wooden door and would wake up in pools of tears because her neighbours worked night shifts and had the bad habit of slamming doors from time to time. There was even this one guy who had this elaborate mythology constructed piecemeal over hundreds of dream nights about this sub-species of humans that broke off from the mainline and lived in harsh volcanic deserts until they evolved into gilled amphibious green creatures that no longer needed any water.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It turned out he often went to bed thirsty. I felt a bit bad for ruining his budding career as a fantasy writer, but at least he wouldn’t die of dehydration.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But my nemesis’s case was different. It was different because it seemed easy on the surface. Through the IR goggles, I had spied an inconspicuous looking man. Glasses, stubble, unruly hair, slouchy, I’d already filed him into a cabinet in my super-judgy shelf when he had spoken up.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I dream the same pattern every night but the details are different.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I am a bird of some sort, but my plumage, the colours, the size, the feathers, everything is different each time.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“You.. are a bird. Do go on. What do you do as a bird in your dream?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“I.. er.. Perform these elaborate mating rituals. And then mate. And mate some more, until the cock crows at dawn.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I was intrigued. Clearly, this man was involuntarily single - to put it nicely, and I try sometimes - and he wasn’t what you’d call conventionally attractive - nice one last time - so clearly it was a case of the coitus desperadus. Except, it wasn’t. You - clueless reader - might think so, but I, the world’s foremost expert on dreams, knew that the human brain didn’t work that way. It was almost as if it compensated for the mind numbing tedium of everyday life, the rules and order and mundane structures that stifled creativity, by going crazy wild at night. It was still subject to the limbic desires of the animal subconscious, but it was free to ride that imagination train to wherever it wanted as long as it was in the general direction of those primal desires.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This man’s dreams weren’t about sex. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I said my usual verbose time consuming nonsense mumblings until I had nothing more to say, but the pattern didn’t strike me, and I gave up and said:</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Have you tried Tinder?”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I had taken his money and bought myself expensive Ethiopian coffee, but the look of disappointment on his ghostly green IR face still haunted me. I hadn’t failed before and didn't want to this time. There was something else at play in this enigmatic man’s life.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I creeped on the Internet until I found his profile, and then his address and began to skulk around his neighbourhood. I watched him enigmatically throw out his cat litter everyday, and shuffle back and forth from work (8:30 - 5:30). I even watched his silhouette collapsed in a shadowy heap on what must be a sofa watching what must be Netflix for two hours before I called it a day and went back to my tent. One of those fake diamond pendants I stepped on yet again cut me this time, and it bled. It was a sign.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So I showed up at his workplace, confident he wouldn’t recognize me. He worked in IT. Of course. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He looked up from his eighth coffee and spotted me camouflaged by the printer. I could see the gears turning in his head. Shit. A frown creased his forehead. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Aren’t you that hippie conman from the tent?”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Hippie?”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Conman?”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Tent?!”</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“You must have me mistaken for some other handsome devil because I am here to er.. Inspect the printer.”</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">After some more silver tongued falsehoods, I slipped away back to my tent with my nemesis none the wiser. I decided not to go back to that soul sapping office. Just in case.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So I continued skulking around the man’s house for four more days, until my brain was mush and I was ready to give up. The cut stung, and the ‘temporarily closed’ sign outside my tent stung even more, but what could I do? Either I’d be the world’s greatest dream matcher, or I’d do mediocre IT. At least the coffee was alright. One more day, and then that was that.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Cat litter thrown out. Check.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Garbage out. Check. </span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Post box checked. Check. Empty. Check.</span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Walk to office. Check. Sigh.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That was that. I had walked a third of the way back to my tent when it occurred to me that it was a Saturday. IT doesn’t do Saturdays. I ran like a madman back to that accursed office and snuck into the good old printer room, and peeped out the blinds for a glimpse of my eternal foe. There he was! But what was he doing?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He was kneeling on the ground, hunched over something protectively. Was it drugs? No, it was… Lego. He was building something with Lego bricks, and presumably the office had a set. Also presumably, he was too scared of public shaming to do this during work hours.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I stepped on a stray brick on my way out, and it hurt like the twelve realms of Hell, but I didn’t care. I’d been right, my mojo was still on, and most importantly, the Dream Matcher was still undefeated and going strong. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The note on Lego Birdman’s desk read:</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“Go all in doing what you love, and others will love you for it. - </span></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Hippie conman.”</span></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-20860597597666305392019-08-20T02:31:00.000+05:302019-08-20T02:35:06.983+05:30A Treatise on Pain<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>This astonishingly insightful thesis is quite possibly my magnum opus. By that I don’t mean <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnum,_P.I.">the crime drama</a> that our dads used to watch, or the ice cream brand that has a great vegan almond flavour, but my life’s greatest work, my masterpiece, my piece de resistance, chef d’ouvre and midlife swansong. </i></span></span></div>
<i><b id="docs-internal-guid-d8c4bf3a-7fff-1b5b-6122-82abaccff00a" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
</i><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>(As you can tell, my fondest memory of the many childhood hours spent browsing the Oxford English Dictionary is of looking up the meaning of a word, and finding a definition made up of three more words I had to look up. But I digress.)</i></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Have you ever wondered about a particular aspect of the nature of pain? That one kind of pain hides another? </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This idea is best illustrated with a painfully realistic example, pun intended. Let’s say you’ve been hiking for a really, really long time, and your feet have begun to hurt. But you’re stubborn and you forge on, and then after a while you notice that your hip has begun to throb. Your aching feet are all forgotten, but does that mean that your pain has somehow transferred from your feet to your hip, and that you feet are all fine now? NO!</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If you stop and turn the gaze of your mind’s eye upon your feet, you will realize that they have been hurting all along, and that your brain has just shifted attention to the newest, shiniest ache on the block. Let me pause now and name this phenomenon, because naming things is traditionally how one fools oneself into thinking one understands something.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I call it the Acupuncture Principle. It has absolutely nothing to do with chi or meridians, but merely derives from my belief that the only possible way acupuncture could work is if the act of inserting needles into various parts of your body distracts, terrifies and annoys you to the point that you forget all about your chronic back pain. Like with feet and hips. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Now that we’ve nomenclatured our way to enlightenment, the other interesting thing about the Acupuncture Principle is that not being able to multitask isn’t a bad thing right? Imagine being able to feel every kind of pain equally, all at once. The horror. One might even consider striking ‘multi-tasking’ off one’s CV.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">OK, so you’re a masochist and you ignore your throbbing hip and your stabbing feet and decide to soldier on. Now your shoulders are on fire, your back is creaking and muscles you didn’t know you had are crying for you to stop. That is when you will have another epiphany. </span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Pain is actually just like a broken up former empire with too many squabbling city-states, all ruled by despotic warlords. You just want them to change over frequently just so one of them doesn’t rise up and conquer the whole world.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But like with real life squabbling city-states and fallen empires, an Alexander the Great will eventually rise up and take over. What starts off as insignificant skirmish in the netherworld of the realm of the feet, ignored by the mighty twin kings of the deltoids of the North, and the valley of the Spine, spreads upwards and outwards, slowly and inexorably until the whole world is in thrall of the Pedestrian Emperor of agony, and all that remains is a nostalgia for the halcyon days of squabbling city-states and brutal civil wars.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And when the humble backwoods tribe of the Wrist joins the cacophony of torment, it’s akin to a nation of weed smokers rising up in rebellion against The Man - a laughably pointless gesture that you’d get behind as an absolute last resort. You only pause for a moment before conceding that the tyranny of the Pedestrian Emperor qualifies, and you focus the full force of the Acupuncture Principle on the Wrist. And when your hip begins to throb again, you actually feel better because not only is the hegemony of the foot defeated, but because you’re vindicated.</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And so the first chapter of my magnum opus is written.</span></span></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-10576488844010455882019-08-17T16:11:00.000+05:302019-08-17T16:13:10.899+05:30Laws of Hiking<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Once upon a time, Lord Murphy - the one True God - decided to take a break from his insufferable meddling in all of human existence and go on a hike. Surely, an already tortuous activity of repeatedly going up and down piles of rock only attracted a crowd of the masochistic variety, shall we say, that did not really need to hear his Message? He realized soon enough that he was wrong, and that he did have some preaching to do to the choir, so he sat down and formulated these nuggets of existential wisdom.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<h3 style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;">The Law of Relativity I</span></span></h3>
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<span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If you feel like it’s been an hour, it’s been twenty minutes.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Law of Relativity II</b></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If you’re absolutely certain deep within your bones that it’s been one hour, it’s been forty five minutes at best.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Dunning-Kruger Syndrome As Applied To Applied Mathematics </b></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If, based on your current rate of progress you compute that it’ll take three hours to reach your destination, it will take at least four. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Law Of Mosquitoes, Rightful Inheritors of the Earth</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Insect repellents don’t work.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Theory of Pharmacology of Natural Drugs</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The sound of rushing water is an addictive drug that fools you into believing you’re having fun. That gentle breeze pleasantly wafting into your face is a close second. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">These natural drugs often also have hallucinogenic effects because when you really stop and look, you'll find that there isn't a water source nearby, and the air is stiller than in an underground crypt.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Law of Mountain Meterology</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">After you spend ages carefully pitching your tunnel tent in the direction of the prevailing wind, it changes.</span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Observation On The Wellspring Of Creativity</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If you've deluded yourself into constructing this fantasy that the long hours of solitude that go with hiking will strike at the wellspring of all creativity, and that you'll compose that perfect poem that'll rock the very soul of a generation, rid yourself of your childishness. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">All that you will think about every waking second of every long day of tortured trudging is that painful next step, a step that is inevitable as it is meaningless, for it seems to get you no closer to your destination that is far, far beyond the horizon. If you're feeling expansive - perhaps triggered by an imaginary gust of cool air - you might even think about your next meal, or sitting down and taking a swig of crystal clear mountain water, or a soft bed, a soft, white, inviting bed. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Law Of Associativity</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If you take your favourite food along with you, it becomes your least favourite food by the end.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Corollary to The Law of Associativity</b></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">This also applies to shoes, clothes, books, lipstick, water bottles, toilet paper and quite possibly your own face. Avoid mirrors.</span></span></div>
<b><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /><br />Murphy's Kindness</span></b><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As he chuckled to himself in admiration at his own depraved genius, Murphy paused and reflected. In a moment of weakness, he realized that it wasn't all bad. Perhaps there was a silver lining, and it was that hiking could teach you the most important life lesson there is to learn.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">That, yes, it is possible to grow tired of perfect beauty. For, you know, when you begin to consider if you should actually marry an Israeli supermodel for endless happiness.</span></div>
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Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-68994124015369490122019-05-29T03:22:00.003+05:302019-05-29T03:22:43.694+05:30Mindfulness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There can be too much of a good thing.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2v-GZNNuprk0xlOJRTM6aQTSBXyu68fWbdyrhyw0a_KR8c0oJXhEjaOVmI9bptudhTpr7Lry8wXoOJfTs5fg5Q31hCK5di_OZgiQ_dyZUGWey26Nqg0Z9hvp8JRGQ-tH3AWLlPYheGwWs/s1600/Mindlessness.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2v-GZNNuprk0xlOJRTM6aQTSBXyu68fWbdyrhyw0a_KR8c0oJXhEjaOVmI9bptudhTpr7Lry8wXoOJfTs5fg5Q31hCK5di_OZgiQ_dyZUGWey26Nqg0Z9hvp8JRGQ-tH3AWLlPYheGwWs/s640/Mindlessness.png" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Needless to say - as is often said before something is said that very much needed to be said - if you're unfortunate enough to not make the transition from C -> D, all I have to say is: there's a reason there's an axis labelled 'Bottomless despair'. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(<span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px;">As always blogspot doesn't like large images much, so if you're on the desktop and can't read the text, right click -> open image in new tab and then magnify. On mobile, just tap the image and pinch zoom.)</span></span></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3152479247877514326.post-79355464763016633742019-02-22T02:02:00.001+05:302019-02-22T19:58:50.026+05:30The Interview<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"F*@#!"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Despite Employee 322's best efforts to smother that outburst, clearly somebody had heard him, because right away he heard a chair creak in his direction. He waited.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Employee 343's face appeared around the corner in slow motion. He had to be careful, of course, so he tried his best to appear lost in thought, while accidentally happening to just spot him whilst doing so. To Employee 322, he just looked constipated. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Employee 322 looked at Employee 343 without really looking at him. The latter raised an eyebrow the teeniest millimetre. In response, one corner of Employee 322's lips turned upwards the teeniest millimetre. With that exchange, the two of them were practically hugging. Employee 343 was putting everything on the line with that overwhelming show of emotion. And it was all because they were best friends in a workplace where friends were frowned upon, let alone best anything. Employee 343 was risking his job sympathizing with Employee 322; he could lose it to a program any time. Employee 322 smiled an internal smile of gratitude and walked off before he could get his friend into further trouble.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"All work is charity." The unwanted voice of his Hitlerian father banged on his mind's door. Indeed, papa, indeed. Sighing, he trudged at the slowest possible pace he could without setting off slacker alarms, to the basement where the room lay. Why oh why did it have to be his turn today? He sighed again, and entered the room.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It was pitch dark. Fumbling around for a switch, he stubbed his toe against a raised cable and cursed loudly. An idea cut through the pain: what if he complained to the top brass about the room being biased against able bodied people? Short of being a bat-human hybrid, there was no way groping for a light in a dark room was safe. But he knew that keeping the lights always on would have the environmental ethics guys swarming all over the office in no time. The fines would be steep, perhaps impossible to pay. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He chuckled. Let them squirm trying to choose between the rock and the hard place. Personally though, he preferred hard places. A rock was a rock was a rock. But a hard place could be anything. Perhaps it could even be something nice. Naturally, his mind drifted to sexual innuendo. The predictability of his thoughts alarmed him; maybe he was due to be roboted out after all.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Click.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Warm yellow light flooded the room. It was bare except for what looked like a towering vending machine to one side. The Questioner, Employee 322 called it. He fancied the name had a vaguely menacing air to it that fit perfectly. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Apparently, the buttons on the machine had text on them once. Employee 13, that know-it-all SOB had deigned to confide in him. Voice lowered to a whisper, but head still tilted towards the ceiling to make no doubt of his superior status, he had told him:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Clearly, knowing what each button does would bias you in some way. You'd pick whatever test sounded nice to you in that moment in time. I mean, I would achieve the closest thing to randomness that the human brain possibly can, but you, " a waggling eyebrow had dismissed Employee 322's worth for all eternity, ".. you would probably pick the biggest sounding word."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"No offence, " he added offensively.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Also, and you wouldn't have caught this, I'm sure, just writing something like 'click this' on each button wouldn't work either. That would bias the interviewer for or against the language of the button text."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When Employee 322 had not responded with a suitable degree of awe and admiration, Employee 13 had stopped talking to him. All's well that begins well. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">All the buttons looked the same, grey - that'd change to a lighter grey when the LED was snapped on, except for the green button that started the interview. Employee 322 let out the most heartfelt of sighs and hit the green button. The Questioned hummed and purred into life.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Meanwhile, on the other side of the adjoining wall, was a man. Candidate 5872. He was surrounded by a circular wall of smooth, featureless white. He had absolutely no reason to be nervous, but apparently his trembling fingers hadn't received the memo. He shoved them into one of his sweatshirt's numerous pockets.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Sweatshirts. His grandmother had caught a glimpse of him getting ready to attend the interview, and she'd asked him:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Are you prepared?"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He'd laughed heartily at that question. Would you prepare for winning the lottery? Then she'd turned a critical eye over his interview costume. A grey sweatshirt covered with possible food stains, a hoodie and a decade old jeans didn't make the best impression. But she had turned away without a word because even she knew how it worked.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When interview standardization had first become a fad, beauty - and attractiveness and presentability if you will - had been the first to go. It was a well known confounding variable; candidates who were more beautiful, or presented themselves more attractively were much more likely to be hired, all other things being equal. The solution: the interviewer would never see the interviewee, and vice versa. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Employee 322 watched a 3D hologram of his first high school crush shimmer into existence. It was awkward because he hadn't seen her since high school, so the 3D hologram was of a fifteen year school girl in uniform. He told the schoolgirl:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Alright, Candidate 5872. Before we start with standardized testing, you have one minute so summarize your skills and experience."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The schoolgirl figure nodded and waved. Employee 322 snorted in disgust. They'd still not got it right. Yes, the interviewer shouldn't be able to see the interviewee, but speaking to a wall didn't make for the best interviews. Humans needed visual feedback - they'd need a human figure for the interviewer to address, but this human figure would have to be completely neutral in the interviewer's eyes. If seeing the figure made any part of an EEG light up, it wasn't right. Neural tech hadn't however progressed to the point that somebody could just plug in a chip into a brain and spit out a neutral hologram. So, the brass did the next best thing: surveys.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Just for giggles, Employee 322 had described his high school crush in his neutral hologram survey. A decision he now ranked among the three best of his life because it made things so much more entertaining. Some days he hated the girl, and some days he loved her, but she was always entertaining.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A sound suddenly enveloped Candidate 5872. It was a voice; a voice neither male nor female, a voice neither cruel nor compassionate, a voice neither loud nor soft, a voice neither friendly nor cold, a voice without direction. Obviously, it was designed to be completely unprejudiced - it would neither soothe a candidate's nerves, nor boost a candidate's confidence, it would do nothing but convey the meaning of the words it spoke.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"You. Have. One. Minute. To. Speak. About. Your. Skills. And. Experience."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Taking a deep breath, the candidate marched into a vigorous self-eulogy. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"I have worked for years and years in C# and have mastered it to the point that I can design a better language with all its strengths but none of its weaknesses."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"I work with the leading titans in the field to deliver cutting edge top of the line frameworks that are future proof, robust and self un-attenuating."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This wasn't what Employee 322 heard at all. The Questioner was designed to compensate for articulatory privilege. What if the poor sap being interviewed was great at his job but poor at speaking about it? Totally unfair right? That's what the brass had felt at least, and now the Questioner compensated for it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The schoolgirl only said: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"C#... Skill... Networking..." </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then she giggled and fell silent, an action eerily reminiscent of the whir of an old desktop computer that was just going into hibernation.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Employee 322 ticked a box and turned to the grid of grey buttons in front of him. Which one should he press today?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Meanwhile, Candidate 5872's mind was racing. What would his test be like? It would be completely random of course, and possibly something never asked before, but speculation was fun. Would he have to take off his clothes and put them on again, like this neighbour's nephew's son he knew? Or would have to make four and a half circuits of the interview chamber without pause?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Suddenly he recalled the tragic story of a man who'd tried to game the Questioner. Everybody knew that the Questioner compensated for known handicaps. So this man had deliberately broken his foot and slipped a disc before the interview, hoping that this would narrow down the kinds of tests he could be asked to perform.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Wrong, he was so wrong.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A neither male nor female voice had asked him to sit down on the ground. It had then coolly and crisply instructed him as to the right way of doing so without further injuring himself. And then it had asked him to count the blinking lights behind his back without turning around or getting up. Since he could hardly do either of those things, he had failed the test. Some people believed the Questioner was a demonic instrument with supernatural powers. Candidate 5872 wasn't among those people, but he shuddered.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The omnipresent Voice spoke again. (Was it ever silent?)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Take. Your. Shoes. Off. Chuck. Them. Across. The Room. Pick. Them. Up. Wear Them. Then. Repeat. Process. 14. Times."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Candidate 5872 smiled; he had heard weirder. But something was wrong. He was caught up in a moment of regret. As a child, he'd often taken his slippers off and tossed them through the window into his cranky neighbour's balcony. The neighbour's dog would hear the slap of rubber on concrete and would come yapping to see. Every time, without fail, to his everlasting hilarity. He'd become something of an expert at taking footwear off and chucking aforementioned footwear, all in one motion and at rapid velocity. When had he stopped doing this? Why had he stopped doing this? Man, oh, man, oh man. It had been years! His footwear chucking skills would have become rusty.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He took a deep breath and forcefully recalled the holy tenet of standardized interviewing: Practice Makes Imperfect. If it's a skill that has been improved with practice by a significant fraction of candidates, then it's a skill that cannot be tested on. Everything would be fine. He knelt to take off his shoes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Employee 322 watched the schoolgirl sway her hips from side to side. He noted the amplitude and frequency of the swing into a tablet computer. Another sigh, a particularly vicious one, escaped his lips. It was always the same. He was not to know exactly what the interviewee was being tested on, because that would break the other holy tenet of standardized interviewing: The Double Blind Principle, so he would see a normalized version of the interviewee's performance. The schoolgirl's hips swayed hypnotically. He wondered what hologram Employee 343 saw.</span></div>
Internet Personhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14588777047269678211noreply@blogger.com0