Why not mauve?

One day Sam found a face on the ground...

'I knew it was strange' she'd tell me later 'for one I wasn't even looking for a face, I was pre-occupied with pondering whether the sky wants to turn teal but feels pressure to remain blue to satisfy everyone's expectations, and if so why teal? Why not mauve, or coffee teeth yellow? Plus what color even IS teal? Isn't that just a different shade of blue? What have we DONE to the sky so that even in its wildest fantasies of change it can still only contemplate a subtle alteration? And shouldn't we be ashamed of that? I'm ashamed of many things, stuffing my bra in high school, stuffing full envelopes into mailboxes that were already full, stuffing up my first go at tennis by being not naturally gifted at it, not wearing a bra to tennis and distracting a postman who crashed his bike into a telephone booth and broke his pelvis, stuffing up my weekdays for three weeks to do his job for him, using the word 'stuff' too often, and loads more stuff, but I'm not ashamed of the sky feeling trapped to stay the same? That's shameful. Also I'm hardly ever looking to find a face. I feel like if that was a goal you'd be disappointed a lot, and disappointment can really stuff with your brain.' 

'So how did you feel when you saw the face?' I asked, wanting to know more, and feeling I had the skills to acquire this information using the beautiful art of question asking. 

'Well nothing at first, I'm a cute girl so I often see faces pointing at me, but then after I saw this face I thought about it for a while and realized something that I hadn't previously realized that I'd one day realize, when I realized that "lawns don't normally have faces", but then I thought "WHY don't they? What have we done to lawns to make them feel ashamed to not grow faces if they want to?" I've done a lot of things I feel shame for, stuffing Jenny at school into a locker, and then stuffing a rat in there, then saying "I bet you stuff your bra" and then crying "me toooo" and then going to hug her and getting bitten on the vagina by a rat, and then having to have a doctor look at it, but when he said he had to look saying "stuff you, stuff your job, and stuff my whole stuffing life", but I'm not ashamed of not letting lawns feel shameless about growing faces, and then I thought "why did it grow a Caucasian face?" And then I thought "why does it matter what race face it has, I don't care if anyone is black, white or green" and then I thought "oh THAT's why people say that, the third category is lawns" and then I felt ashamed for not knowing that earlier'.

More information was flowing, my delicate balance of using my voice to get her to use her voice to tell me more through the delicate skill of asking questions was working, I now just had to summon up every ounce of my question asking expertise to pose the PERFECT next question to keep this rolling, and I nailed it, 'and then what happened?' I asked.

'Then I called my mom, and I said "mom, have lawns always grown faces?" And she said "you know what, I don't know, I don't think I've ever looked at a lawn, I'm always staring at the sky and wondering if it's ever considered turning teal, but won't because it doesn't want to scare people" then I called her an idiot, I mean the sky shoots lightening at people's heads, even if they are wearing protective metal hats, it is NOT scared of scaring people. Then I thought "Oooh danger, that's sexy". Then I thought "I wonder if lawns are good kissers", you know because I've never kissed   a lawn, and I've kissed a lot of people and things, so I'd probably be a good judge, so I began kissing it, and the answer is YES, lawns kiss VERY well, perhaps it's tongue was a bit grassy, but I smoked a cigarette once so who am I to complain. Soon enough the kissing got hot and heavy, and we were rolling around just going for it, and that's when I realized...'

I knew this next period of time in our conversation would be crucial in my attempt to gather more information and so I engaged the timelessly beautiful technique of question asking, and I nailed the PERFECT next question, 'what?' 

'That the face was on top of me, I was on the bottom, and the rest of the lawn was still under me'.

I needed to continue mining my rich vein of great information collecting, and the beautiful dance that is flawlessly engendered question formulating helped me again, 'so?' I asked. 

'So the face wasn't attached to the lawn. The lawn hadn't grown a face at all! So I pulled it away from me. And then I saw the sky through its mouth and I thought "I wonder if the sky would like to turn teal but doesn't because it's afraid that it'll have to get new ID because it won't look like the picture of itself on its license" and then I thought "focus on the face please" and then I wondered why I had said "please" to myself, I'm not normally that polite, like I've stuffed up many job interviews by saying "just give me the stuffing job", when saying "just give me the stuffing job, please" would gave GOT me the stuffing job. So I'm like I should be as polite to strangers as I am to myself, and then I thought "stuff that, I dont even stuff my bra anymore and boys STILL want to touch, I'm awesome, stuff being polite". And then I went back to making out with the lawn. And then I remembered realizing that the face was not attached to the lawn. Then I was like "eww, this isn't the lawn's face, this is just a face some grub had on his head but mustn't of liked so just dumped it, and then I was like "eww, I just kissed the face of a dude who doesn't even like his own face, eww" and then I vowed to kiss it for three minutes more TOPS!' 

I needed to know even more, and I just knew that the blemishless poetry of the question could be my aid, and I formulated the best question I can imagine posed for many a sun drenched millennia, 'what did you do then?' I requested. 

'What do you think you idiot, there was a fucking loose face in my hands, I handed it into lost and found, I'm not a complete jerk'.

She now stormed out. And that was it. I was devastated. There was so much more I wanted to know:

- How big was the faces nose?

- Was it a round face?

- Which lost and found?

- Was this yesterday?

- Was it REALLY a good kisser or was it a really good kisser but just not real?

- What other art forms can I make a question metaphor or simile with? 

- You saw sky though it's mouth, oh right cause you're looking up, and it's just a face, not a whole head.

- If the nose was big then so what, why the hell are you judging a randomly found face's nose?

- Does that make you feel good about yourself? 

I'm not nosey normally. And although it may seem like I'm a talented and renown journalist that's not true at all,  or why I was asking her to tell me more. 

You see, I'd accidentally dropped my face on a lawn the day before, and I was hoping to find out if this one could possibly be mine. But I just didn't ask the right questions I guess. Regardless of my delicate and intricate fingering of the strings attached to the cello that is the beautiful concept - the question.  

I guess I really stuffed that up. Sam's right, being a stuff up super sucks. This is the worst thing to happen to me since 2007 when for some reason my postman randomly over stuffed my mailbox. And take it from a faceless man, have your bills wrinkled is totally STUFFED! 

I mean, some people!

'I'm the kind of guy who often likes to jump through hoops' I said.

'If there is a hoop I'm jumping through it.

Even if it's on fire.

Now I'm not saying I want it to be on fire.

Why would I?

I'm a rational human being. 

Why on earth would I WANT a hoop I'm jumping through to be on fire?' I asked.

'Ok, sure maybe there is water on the other side of the hoop.

Maybe it's a cold day.

Perhaps I'm not wearing a wetsuit.

As I often am not.

At least three days a week I go completely wetsuit free.

Or naked as I call it.

It can get me in trouble...

"Oh I was naked by the playground last night?" May be something I say.

To a cop.

If he asks me why I'm in a park alone at night.

"I'm trying to relive fond memories'". I'll add.

But he doesn't know that when I am naked I mean I am fully dressed.

And therefore not in a wetsuit.

As those can be uncomfortable and cumbersome. 

Plus if he could give me an effin' break for a moment.

I could explain to him that when I say playground I mean my underground wolf pit.

Which is where I fight wolves to the death.

Something I normally only do in a wetsuit.

Because if I flood the pit an hour or two before the fight the wolves are WAY easier to defeat.

So of COURSE I'm going to go to a park at night and sit and fondly remember my first naked victory' I answered.

'Also, obviously, at a park I'm going to get a way better chance to big-note in front of other woodland creatures, bushland creatures, forrestland creatures and even domesticated animals on the lamb, than say staying in my recently fumigate house.

Now aren't I? 

And of course I fumigate everyday. 

Who wants fucking spiders eating all your bowls of flies? 

NO ONE!' I added. 

'So yeah, in this scenario I can see how I may want the hoop to be on fire.

So that I'm nice and toasty when I land in the water on the other side. 

But when I say I like to jump through hoops I'm not necessarily saying that I want to do it during a water park themed circus act. 

That's just not a leap you should automatically make.

Although I understand where you are coming from and why you're coming from there.

It a good place.

A fun place.

I bet there are Dolphins there.

But I have to tell you, and I hope this doesn't hurt your feelings, but I don't do a water park circus act.

At least not anymore.

I gave it up after the legendary napkin incident.

When I slid on some soap, hurtled into the audience, head butted an old man, and when I looked up at the Jumbatron and saw that my face was covered in mostly old man blood (you could tell it was his because it was almost translucent with lack of life), I then casually turned to the old man's young granddaughter and said, "excuse me miss, may I please borrow a napkin" I blew the house down' I boasted.

'I mean people were BLOWN AWAY by my calmness and wit, in what was an otherwise slightly tense moment.

Obviously because I'd messed up my trick when I slipped in soap.

And instead I'd turned it into a triumph.

Laughter rained, cheers exploded, sirens sang!

Of course they were mostly ambulances for the old man, who by this stage seemed certain to die, but in the moment they felt more likely to be for my grand moment.

If I had not stood and asked to be literally blown back to the stage from overwhelming applause then the ambulance may have even reached the old man in time.

So I don't do water park based circus acts anymore.

I already reached he peak of that field' I gloated. 

'Nope I'm a hoop jumper now. 

But not hoop earrings. 

Because they remind me of ears.

Which remind me of ear canals.

Which remind me of the canals of Venice, Italy.

Which remind me of the canals of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Which remind of the people of the never lands.

Which is my fun little nickname for people who live in Venice, California. 

Because they hardly ever become property barons. 

Which reminds me of the legendary moonshine barons of the South African apartheid era copiers of the legendary moonshine barons of prohibition. 

Which remind me of rivers of spilt booze. 

Which remind me of the canals of Venice, California. 

Which is where I first lost an ear in a water fight with a wolf.

Also I struggle to fit through most hoop earrings' I explained.

'And trust me, the girls wearing them prefer if you get through WITHOUT a violent struggle.

I think that's why most girls prefer date fit guys than morbidly obese sperm whales. 

Poor sperm whales. 

Can't even get a gig at the water park.

Plus they have that awful word in their name

"Perm" which reminds people of greasy guys in the 80s who were always jerking off.

Which reminds people of sperm' I concluded.

 

'So NO, I do NOT want to substitute my fries for onion rings! Do I look like I fucking brought my wetsuit and a pack of rabid wolves?' I answered! 

I mean, some people, am I right? 

So there was that - a love poem

It was a pretty boring night the night I first saw her. 

Just a nothing night.

The kind of night that when someone calls you and asks 'what are you up to?' 

You merely reply 'nothing'.

And when they say 'you must be doing something?' 

You go to their house and light their car on fire screaming 'WELL NOW I AM MOTHERFUCKER!' 

But I didn't have any phone calls that night.

My phone was out of battery and of course there's no magical solution to that. 

So I was doing nothing.

Nothing was happening.

I wasn't doing nothing.

And I couldn't even see anything. 

Well...there WAS a satellite visible that night.

I'll admit that. 

Which isn't that remarkable really.

Satellites are almost ALWAYS visible. 

At least on a clear night this far from the city. 

But I still don't normally notice them.

Yet this night I did. 

So there was that.

Maybe it was because this particular satellite had crashed to earth.

And was now imbedded in a giant's head. 

And, now that I think about, that was a tad unusual.

Because giants have really tough skulls.

So imbedding satellites in them is hard.

Also the giant itself also stood out as being a tad less than the norm.

At least for somewhere this far out of the city.

Because normally giants are more likely to be seen in town.

And they've NEVER been seen in town.

So I guess you'd say this was rare sighting around these parts.

And these parts aren't known for rare sightings.

In fact, just some advice for the future, if you're ever round these parts, and you sight someone sighting a rare sighting, then RUN! 

They're probably just trying to sell you something made up, like insurance, all-terrain shoes, or the respect of your peers. 

Yep, there are no real rare sightings in these parts. 

Plus the giant was wearing pants made out of a matter previously unknown to scientists.

And it glowed an aqua-tinged purple.

And threatened to solve the entire world's energy needs.

Which isn't THAT unusual. 

I mean these pants didn't even hold themselves up! 

Pretty crappy pants. 

The pants had to be held up by the second coming of Jesus holding hands with lucifer and together with their newly repaired friendship a orchestra of universal and bi-dimensional harmony was being heard.

I mean obviously there was some strapping too.

Two guys holding hands make pretty poor suspenders.

Believe me.

I'm a dress up party enthusiast.

I've tried just about EVERYTHING you can IMAGINE as suspenders.

Hats.

Tennis shoes.

Suspenders. 

Memories of a childhood playground accident where three kids lost limbs.

Lost limbs saved from childhood.

A CD by the band 'savior'.

Rope.

Ripe gnats.

A Red hazmat suit.

A suit of arms. 

An armless suit I stole off one of those kids now grown up.

That kid's tears.

A glass filled with the air made from the noise made from him crying 'that's literally my only possession, I sold everything to buy this suit hoping it could help me finally get a job'.

The words 'tell your sob story to someone who cares' tattooed on his forehead, then ripped off like a super sticky bandaid.

Love, respect and empathy for my fellow man.

Suspenders.

I've TRIED them all, and NONE of them work without some strapping.

Oh plus there was a guy giving out free soft-serve ice-cream. 

The quality custard based stuff. 

So there was that. 

And there was a big pile of leaves that ANYONE was allowed to play in.

And they were the perfect mix of fresh and crunchy.

So there was that.

And the pay-phones weirdly were giving out free phone calls to anyone with a dead mobile battery, and they knew all your phone numbers too.

So there was that. 

So I guess it wasn't a COMPLETELY boring night.  

But it was still boring.

Almost nothing was happening.

And I didn't even have a genuine excuse to burn someone's car to distract me.

But then I saw her.

And she was totally decent looking.

Just my type. 

And my whole world changed. 

And she smiled at me when I smiled at her. 

And my world changed again.

But not like back to where it had been before the first change. 

Like more total change in a direction AWAY from the original position.

But then I realized it.

She'd only given me a half-smile back.

That's so ambiguous. 

So yeah, 

Pretty shitty night all up. 

Also then the next time I saw her she was wearing a pair of pants I didn't care for, so it looks like it wouldn't have worked out anyway.

So pretty good result in the end if you ask me.

Oh and it turned out all that other good stuff could only last in the company of new true love. 

So that's pretty cool, it turns out that new true love is real and powerful!

So that's good news for those who may have access to it one day. 

But good things never happen to me.

Fucking life. 

At least I have my sunny disposition.

Oh and a few jars of giant brain.

I've been trying to sell them round these parts.

But for some reason people keep saying 'wait, did you sight those, cause that's a rare sighting' and then they RUN.

Some people are so strange. 

Soft like a cloud on your babies bottom

Sometimes in life you have to face some harsh realities, harsh realities such as:

- The death of your favorite TV character 

- The death of your favorite TV show 

- The death of the guy who showed you your first dead body

- A body of water so polluted you can no longer swim in it without fearing death

- Swimming up-stream in a storm in a tea-cup 

- A stream of insignificance in a wheat field of silence 

- A scream of silence in a world of the famously obsolete

- Writing Simon And Garfunkel quality imagery but being unable to harmonize as well as them

- The death of the pop song with artistic merit

- Misplacing the Boy Scout Merit Badge you received for turning the guy who showed you the dead body into the police, where a confession was beaten out of him, even though while he did kill him, he did not, I repeat did NOT, put the lipstick on him! 

Yep harsh reality SUCKS. That's why here instead I'd like to deal with some soft fabrications, soft fabrications such as:

- If you eat a bucket of butter standing upside-down, in an upside-down helicopter, in a topsy-turvey world, on a day the globe flipped upside-down, the same week the solar-system turned inside-out, the same month the Big Bang went into reverse, after your favorite politician flip-flopped on their renewable energy stance to somewhat disastrous results, at least according to the opposing party, then you won't gain butter weight! 

- If you live in a house made entirely of pillows, pillow bed, pillow walls, pillow oven, pillow toilet, pillow hat-rack, pillow carpet, pillow arm-chair, pillow humidifier, pillow hot-tub, and pillow trunk in the pillow attic filled with your dead pillow grandmother's pillow clothes with her pillow ashes in a pillow urn kept on the pillow effigy you keep where the pillow fireplace used to be that you removed because you didn't like having something synonymous with burning in your living room, then people will understand why you're always talking about pillows and it won't bother them at all! 

- If you remove every internal organ in your body and replace them with cotton-buds, then you will never have to clean an orifice with a cue-tip again! 

Yep those sure we're all soft, although of course they were also unfortunately fabrications, and therefore it's time to face some harsh realities - so clean your damn ears out butter-ball and listen up, we are all sick and tired of hearing about your friggin' pillows all the fucking time, okay! Shut the hell up. Plus buy some new clothes, pillow underpants do not cover you as well as you think! Dick. 

Monumental miscreants

Dayton was now officially a 'Forget Not'. It had been his dream for many years to join their ranks, and now that he'd been ordained he was fighting the urge to smile, for that could do nothing but sully the moment.

'Wow, the forget nots' he thought to himself 'the international band of miscreants hell bent on long term infamy through a highly and intensely calculated program and dedication to becoming so epically and mind numbingly uninteresting that people who make their aquantence can not help but be punched in the solar-plexes with a strongly wielded sense of "holy crap that person was uninteresting", therefore guaranteeing entrance into their sub-conscious, possibly even motivating conversations beginning with sentences such as "I met this person last night, holy crap that person was uninteresting" now starting a spreading of the sub-conscious penetration, which once amplified by people sharing similar experiences with similar encounters with other members of the group will ultimately make the entire organization unforgettable!' 

Yep, the urge to smile was strong, but Dayton resisted. It was against organization rules after all. There was only one thing Dayton was willing or allowed to do right now, pretty much nothing. And as an official member he'd be doing pretty much nothing for the rest of his life. 

Still, on the monumental occasion of this monumental event he did allow himself one monumental last indulgence, and it took its form in this brief, yet intense thought, a moment of joy, something that was utterly frowned upon, and he'd never feel again, so he had to enjoy this one, so with the mask of a frown on his face he let it hit his mind...

'Suck on that Dad, I TOLD you it didn't matter that I flunked algebra' 

One in each

If you ask me, and you should, anytime you see a guy holding a wrench in one hand and a screwdriver in the other, marching steadfast and angrily towards a factory being overwhelmed by a grease fire, you can probably make at least three of these ten conclusions, possibly even four:

1. He was actually checking the tool box for a plunger, but he's not a guy who gives up a job just cause it's about to get dirty.

2. He's in the middle of an epic fight with an inside-out robot, and he's just got the upper hand! 

3. He's about to eat steak, and he's not concerned whether or not it's still in the cow. 

4. Beth in accounting has definitely been taking advantage of her petty cash privileges, but that petty cash box lock is about to get slightly tighter! 

5. Maybe this whole time we've had it wrong, and fire actually rules the world, and if that's true, as water drinkers, water floaters on, and water based internal and possibly external parts, humans are mere foot-soldiers of the rulers archenemy, and maybe, if the word 'maybe' appears this many times in one sentence then maybe that's awesome. 

6. Crime rates in New York City may have diminished in the past dozen years, but doesn't that just mean perhaps the criminals moved to Idaho, and that if you live there shouldn't you stop wearing your gold bars as sandals? 

8. If a man was lying in the middle of the road and said 'trust me, I like it here' and then you pick him up and carry him over to the sidewalk, and he says 'I will never trust you again' isn't he really the one with trust issues, and possibly 'choosing places to lie down' issues, and perhaps even dirty clothes issues? 

9. He's about to beat that fire black and blue. 

10. He wasn't paying attention at ALL on 'what to do in case of a grease fire' day at factory school. 

Which of the three, possibly even four conclusions you could make? I have no god damn idea. I sure as hell didn't say you should ask me that. 

So farm

I'd like one day for some one to say... 

'Dave, man that guys FARM, like he's not a farmer, I'm not saying that at all, I mean just look at him, his face is barely worn out and leathery, he's got  the build of someone who's never done a day of physical work in his life and even if he did he wouldn't ever look good, and I know he hates mornings like toucans hate beak rot, which is not like a death sentence for them, but does require lots of trips to their equivalent to a dentist, and normally that's some jungle monkey, and they're so unreliable, I saw the turn out at piranha dissection day, barely 78%, and you know some of those monkeys still passed, so I'm not saying that guys a farmer, I'm saying that guys FARM, he's valuable like a big patch of dirt, if people stood on him they'd totally wear hats, and like I could see tractor being on him one day, which would be badass, I mean it would be painful, but tractors have got to be one of the best one tonne or heavier vehicle or other mode of transportation devices, EVER to have on you, way better than say a naval destroyer, because then you'd have a whole pile of sailers saying things like 'you alright man', 'whoops', and possibly even 'woah, dang, that looks like it'd have hurt' and you don't want that, NO ONE would ever want that, who wants a tonne of attention right at the time you've just had a tonne or more of transportation device on you, with a tractor no one even notices you were under there because of the noise, plus you'd get to see what your arm would look like sticking out of a hay bale, you could even shake your OWN hand, I mean it would be an awkward hand shake, especially if  the hand that was removed was on the right arm, and now you no longer have a right hand to shake it, so you'd have to do one of those backwards left handed shakes, which no one likes, just don't shake, why do people feel they need to shake all the time, then again you'd get to tell people in the future that you lost your arm to a piranha attack at that a monkey puked when he found a finger in its belly at dissection class, and that's a badass story!' 

Yep, one day I want someone to say 'that guys FARM, having goals in life... yep just ace. 

If you ask me he'll achieve it too

Harry had always wanted to deregulate the beautician industry. 

He wasn't sure why.

But he was sure why he wasn't sure why, because:

- he wasn't a beautician 

- he didn't work in the beautician industry 

- he didn't know any beauticians 

- he wasn't interested in meeting any beauticians 

- he wasn't interested in learning about what beauticians do

- he thought the word 'beautician' sounded harsh and unpleasant

- like clinical and possibly even medical

- if it was medical he didn't want to get what ever disease you'd have to get to require getting beauticianed

- and how would they even inform you that you needed it?

- 'we've looked at your test results, do you have a will?'

- that just sounds horrible

- and he found horrible sounding things unpleasant 

- and feeling unpleasant fed into his bitter distaste of the apple picking 'for fun' movement.

- because it often involved whistling, humming, and other mouth noises occasionally associated with enjoyment

- which reminded him of the fact that as a small boy his father was whistling when he chopped down the tree that he had once coveted building a tree house in

- and in that tree house he was planning on one day cutting open the dead baby hawk that he had found behind the school playground 

- and was keeping fresh in the home freezer in a tuppaware labeled 'moms casserole'

- something no one wanted to eat

- because mom had run off with the paperboy seventeen years earlier 

- so this would have to be REALLY old casserole 

- plus it wasn't in there for the first sixteen years she was gone 

- so it might even be a tad moldy 

- plus the paper boy still delivered the paper with a daily wad of spit on the main headline 

- he was the one who stole a married women, why was he pissed off?

- and so now because of these fucking beauticians Harry didn't acquire tree house building skills, doesn't know what the inside of a baby hawk looks like, and associates even the happiest of news headlines with phlegm

- which is another word he finds harsh and unpleasant

- because it was a throat full of phlegm that kept him from picking apples for fun that one time

- meaning he had to get paid for it instead 

- a job he's now held for twelve years and finds mildly unpleasant in stormy weather 

- because when there's thunder he can't hear himself whistle 

- and also he didn't know what 'deregulation' means 

But 'at least I have a goal' he'd think. 

And isn't that really what life is all about?

Ghosts, ghosts, GHOSTS

It's Halloween today, depending on where you are or when you're reading this, so it may possibly have been Halloween yesterday, or possibly even three months and six days ago, and that's exciting because Halloween is ace, and Halloween means lots of things, but of course one thing more than any other thing:

And that thing is this:

That if you find yourself camping anytime in the next year or twenty, you're going to tell some ghost stories. 

Now I've never really told a ghost story, and I don't think I've ever really had one told to me, although one time when camping as a Boy Scout, true story: 

I got horrible diarrhea, then someone accidentally flung some water on me that was in a pot on a fire getting ready to boil, it wasn't hot yet, but I pretended it was so that I could claim my burns hurt so much that I couldn't get involved in scout activities, and I could instead spend all my time spraying the rats at the bottom of the pit that was our toilet. So I know TRUE horror. That's why it's time to give this halloween's definitive list of things to include in your next ghost story: 

1. Awesome settings: forget your cliches like isolated motels, broken down cars, shacks in the woods, mountains by the sea, dark alleys, well lit alleys, sandwich shops with alleys behind them, alleys that lead to dark places, places that aren't scary right now but could be if the budget in your story can afford to shoot at night, keeping in mind not just lighting costs, but also overtime pay for any union workers, scurvy tents, rats nests, giant bird cages that still contain giant birds yet no giant cats, a laundromat that doesn't sell detergent and you always forget to bring some from home, inside the mind of a bowl of soup, alleys that have dark senses of humor or any of the other tired old settings: 

Instead go with somewhere unique, here's a twist, try somewhere sweet, innocent, and pure so they'll never see it coming: like a flower shop, a baby clothes store, or inside your mothers vagina.

2. Include at least one hilarious joke: here's one I prepared earlier:

'I've got a cold, I don't know where I got the germs, I wash my hands religiously, at Christmas AND Easter!'

Here's a twist, if your listeners don't laugh yell 'zing' after it so they know it was a joke:

 If they still don't laugh yell 'zing attack' then jump on them and squeeze a marshmallow into their eye socket: 

If they STILL don't laugh, tie them to a tree near a pit of fire ants, strip them naked, then pour honey all over them:

If they STILL just don't laugh they just don't have a sense of humor so de-friend them:

If they are currently more than your friends, lovers even, demote them to mere friend to punish them. Make sure you tell your current friends you consider being your friend a punishment. 

3. A bad guy.

There you have it, these are the three key elements. Now just have all those elements come together in a satisfactory way for your audience. Boom. 

If your ghost story fails, don't worry, you can always grab a boiling pot from the fire and chuck it on your fellow campers:

Or just give them diarrhea, I have a hunch those rats need a good spraying. 

Today's blog was brought to you by:

- Colons, punctuation's version of the cute double butt mole. Colons, often overused and misused, but not in this blog.

- The word 'twist', a perfect replacement for 'tip' anytime. Who doesn't love getting drunk and going cow twisting.

Now THATS' a zing. You better laugh, cause I buy BIG marshmallows. 

0h wait:

4. GHOSTS!! 

Sad Halloween

This Halloween I'd like to ask you all a favor. While you're out having fun, eating candy, bobbing for apples, eating witches hair spaghetti, drinking punch from the witches cauldron, making love to the witches broomstick, burning the weird girl down the road alive at a stake, eating steak cooked by Superman (ha ha, cute), and all the other classic fun Halloween games we all adore every year (well let's face it sometimes the steak is cooked by Batgirl, Halloween is no time for sexism or assumed binary gender roles, save that for world leprechaun day thank you), I'd like you to have just as much fun as normal.

Having said that, as the night goes on, perhaps before the stake is burned to the nub, and before the splinters are being tweezed out, just spare a thought for a moment or five, for all those sexy ghost pirate robots from space, with Jokers smiles, mermaid bottom halves, jungle cat tails, and Smurf coloring, and who are REAL. 

Normally they are the absolute center of attention, but then one day a year  strangely, inexplicably, they start having lots of people suddenly say to them 'nah, you tried WAY too hard' when ALL they did was put on some bunny ears. 

So sad. 

Intrudabley Repudably - A Poem

'That guy Kevin, he's shady' they said. 

They said this because Kevin had a reputation for being shady.

This was because everywhere Kevin went he carried a knife.

Although Kevin was adamant that the reason people called him shady was because he'd often say things like 'need shade? I got a knife I'll cut a tree down, build you a fire, make you some shade'.

It would have been a better ruse if he knew how shade worked.

Or how fire worked.

Or how knives worked.

Or how offers to strangers in need of shade worked. 

Or if he didn't say it in an old-timey New Yorker criminal voice like from the old-timey pictures set places like Chicago. 

Or if he didn't carry around a mink coat with a court ordered sign on it saying 'obtained through mugging at knife point'. 

Or if the Reputiblesofrights, the people in charge of assigning and administrating reputations, could get off their fucking high horses, and give out a god damn reputation or two that aren't steeped in unnecessary metaphor. 

Why not just say 'he's got a reputation as a guy who a carries a knife'.

You know what, next time someone gets stabbed just because they felt like they had gotten too much sun and would like a break, or relief, perhaps in the form of shade, let's blame them! 

Fuck the Reputiblesofrights!

Anyway that's my rant for today.

I've been Dave. 

A man with a reputation for 'occasionally unwittingly pissing off the WRONG people my friend, and often being too dumb to realize, how's that for no metaphor dick'.

Wait, I do NOT have that reputation.

What do you mean it's 'just been officially assigned?'

No.

Please no. 

Please, please, nooo! 

What he hell did I do? 

Fleeting forever is Fleeting Forever

It's just come to my attention today that if you google Fleeting Forever you do not in fact easily find Fleeting Forever, by which I mean THIS Fleeting Forever, that you're reading right now, this website called Fleeting Forever that is.

I discovered this when standing in the lobby of a hotel holding my bag, which has 'FLEETING FOREVER' painted on the side of it, and I noticed a girl walk past, see it, mouth the words 'fleeting forever' with her mouth (which is my personally preferred method of mouthing words, I tried doing it with my spleen for a while with only limited success, and I once met a woman who used a taxidermy skunk she'd had grafted to her back to cover up the scars from where she'd had a cluster of moles removed, but again with only limited success) she then pulled out her phone and seemingly typed 'fleeting forever' into google, and I thought 'woopee, my brilliant advertising campaign is working, I'm finally going to build readers, make fans, get love, start to matter, get some attention, not feel so alone, scare the dark clouds away, I can stop feeling worthless, I can stop drinking a bottle of cough medicine a day, I can stop purposely wearing a slightly too heavy coat and feeling slightly too hot and thinking that even though this cosiness is nice at times, I deserve the times that it doesn't feel that way, and be me!!' You know, the average thoughts of a real writer has upon getting a new reader. 

Then of course I thought 'woopee' Seriously Dave? No REAL writer would ever think that word, you're a nothing, a pathetic loser, a complete waste of biology and atoms and then I thought 'well real writers do think thoughts like THAT all day? Why is this so confusing?'

Then I decided to google Fleeting Forever to see what comes up when you google it. Which of my hundreds of blogs would be the highlight? How many links to the many things I've attempted to achieve would be found? Why don't I have any cold drinks near me? Warm soda is gross but I'm still drinking it. I'm hot for some reason damn it. Fleeting Forever, my baby, it's been years since I googled it, and since then I've written several million words of it! It must dominate that corner of Google now. 

So I googled it. What comes up? Fucking nothing!!!!!!!!! Well at least nothing to do with me.

- A defunct band. 

- Some Napoleon quote.

- Articles that have used both those words but not concurrently.

- But no me. 

This is bullshit. 

It's occurred to me that perhaps I need to use the words Fleeting Forever more often in this to sparkle up those search engines, so I have used Fleeting Forever several times in this blog already, and I may even write Fleeting Forever a few MORE times. And by write Fleeting Forever, I mean type Fleeting Forever, and by type Fleeting Forever, I mean into my phone, where I write most of Fleeting Forever's blogs. 

Now while Fleeting Forever is a beautiful poetic term I coined myself, who can forget all the wonderful times it's subsequently been used by others in this world. Let's list some:

- We all gasped when watching Pulp Fiction yet again, but for the first time noticed that in the scene in the coffee shop at the end when the briefcase is opened we can see in the reflection of a knife in the background that the golden glow is in fact sourced by golden yellow neon lights spelling FLEETING FOREVER.

- We all sighed beautiful sighs of beauty when we finally got speakers loud enough to hear what Bill Murray says to Scarlett Johansen at the end of 'Lost In Translation' and discovered he'd said 'I wish it was you instead of the redhead, well maybe not, then you'd be a cheater, I don't think the audience wanted that, anyway have a nice life, don't eat the peanuts on your flight, someone told me once they're now this artificial synthetic replacement thing so as not to kill people with peanut allergies, oh you've got spinach on your teeth. When did you eat spinach? Anyways I best be off, the director just said to whisper something, I'll cya at the wrap party, peace, fleeting forever'.

- We burped when we saw the actor who played Tim's neighbor in Home Improvement in subsequent acting performances and discovered instead of a chin he had an elephant tusk with Fleeting Forever engraved in it. 

- We gurgled you we ran World War Two era decoding machines over 'one small step for man, one giant step for man kind' and found it broke down to 'Yay, Fleeting Forever, check it out, it's Ace'

- We all exhaled wind from our ears by holding our nose and blowing, when's watching the original 'Planet Of The Apes' when Charlton Heston spots the Statue of Liberty sticking out of the sand, but when watched through the eyes of an official set used ape mask you instead saw a billboard sticking out of the sand saying 'Fleeting Forever' and he screamed 'you maniac' knowing he was in fact on earth. 

- We pussed from our scabs when Ringo Star performed one of his most famous and epic drum solos with the Beatles on Ed Sullivan and morse coded out the words 'Come Together right now? I pitched Fleeting Forever, big cow, but I guess I don't matter, my opinions don't count, pricks, well one day I'll get my revenge, I'm going to voice a cartoon/ claymation train! John or Paul could NEVER pull that off!

- We all sweated out a fibula bone when no name tweeter @gluedome tweeted 'Fleeting Forever, pretty good' to his seventeen followers. 

Ok that last ones a bit far fetched and I'll admit I made it up, but the others are all real. 

So yeah, that should do it. Wait. Hang on. Fleeting Forever, FLEETINGforever, FLEETINGFOREVER, fleetingFORVER. Fleeting Fleeting Forever Forever 

Fleeting Forever Forever

FleetingFleeting Forever

Fleeting

Forever

Ok that should do it. Hopefully this will make me googlable. If that doesn't work I can always move on to my next big idea, mouthing words using a puddle of Gatorade I pull around behind me on a tarp, it might not be memorable, but I could get some sponsorship money! 

Poor Mountain Love

Hello everyone, I'm sure you all saw the latest survey results, the whole world has been talking about them, but for those of you that don't pay attention to the news I'll fill you in - this past Tuesday, for the first time since Tuesday the 17th of February 43BC (the day when it was first pointed out that while volcanos do indeed make badass science project entries, in reality they're 'interesting at best' to live next to) mountains have failed to finished number one on Price Waterhouse and Young Ernst's weekly 'People's Favorite Big Thing, You Know, Mountains, Pyramids, Volcanoes, Shit Like That' Survey. 

The new number one.... 'Dwellings, but not like houses, big dwellings, like buildings and stuff'. 

Obviously this is devastating news for mountain fans and mountain well wishers everywhere. And I've managed to get an exclusive interview with someone right at the forefront of this pain, someone truly suffering, and I now have the opportunity to capture this pain in print, please welcome to this blog Geographer Greg Gurber! 

Dave: Welcome Greg, thanks so much for being here, you obviously are a big mountain respecter, reminiscer and even ramshackle style lover, and you look devastated, truly broken, it's lovely to get to see you like this right in the heart of the pain cycle.

Greg: Thanks Dave, I'm just a humble geographer, simply a prophet speaking the language of the flawless wonder of nature, and yep I'm truly destroyed, you have certain things you hold dear in the world, your rocks, the things you can rely on, and to have one of them yanked away is utterly crushing, so it's lovely to be here. 

Dave: Can you tell me how you your feeling about dwellings right now? 

Greg: Sure thing, well look, I'm just a simple geographer, basically gods travel agent, and it makes me sick in a real guttural intestine fizzing way, I mean dwellings? Seriously! Only a medium percentage of them even are big, and even so, how long have they been around a few thousand years? So that's how we pick our favorite big things now, just the hot new thing? Mountains have been around ages, and unlike dwellings they'll STILL be around in future ages! 

Dave: You don't think dwellings will stay around?

Greg: No way, look I'm only a geographer, basically a conductor of splendor, and as such I am utterly crushed like a toe under an anvil after someone said 'take that out, there is literally nothing good not throwing that out will provide', so I'm no expert of dwellings, but they feels like just a fad to me. 

Dave: So what is your speciality? 

Greg: Geography. 

Dave: So like maps and things. Shouldn't I really be talking to a geologist? 

Greg: What do they do? 

Dave: Rocks I think? But aren't mountains made from rocks? Maybe that's more likely to result in extreme mountain love than geography?

Greg: Hey you invented me, you just conjured me from your brain, there's no part of me that's real, so I'll be whatever you want.

Dave: Well you didn't have to tell everyone that, people like the illusion, but yeah, I think I want you to specialize in geology.

Greg: Sweet, I'll make the necessary adjustments. Oh wait, can I still do that self-aggrandizing stuff? That was fun.

Dave: Sure. 

Greg: Hey I'm just a simple geologist, link between mankind and millennia of awesome, and I'm horrified like a witch getting startled by a REAL witch threatening to both expose her as a charlatan AND add more demand for essence of gnat at the local 7/11 potentially driving up the price, and you know what, fuck dwellings, big or small, mountains are here to stay! You know, except the bits I drill out and take to the lab to experiment on. And you'd be surprised how many bits we take! Sometimes entire mountains. There used to be a mountain bigger than Everest that now only exist samples in my storage unit. 

So there you have it folks, a real life, genuine professional geologist says 'fuck dwellings'.

And I for one will not just sit and wait for dwellings to stop existing without a solid plan as to where I'll live next. 

I think maybe I'll go for some form of Iron Man type suit that's completely self contained and livable in. Fortunately I know an expert in Iron Man style suits, or he may just work at a fancy dress store, meh, I invented him, he can be anyone I want!