THAT VERY SMALL PATH

* * *

Happiness is, perhaps, similar

To poetry:

It is born suddenly, even from nothing.
In my hard life
I have passed through so many wide roads,
But the happiness I have endlessly sought
I found today
Beside this very small path,
Where your hands
Suddenly with such warm devotion
Descended upon my shoulders. . .

-Paruir MIKAELIAN (b. 1924)

translated by Mischa Kudian, 1974

::: ::: :::

[Picture: That very small path by reading_is_dangerous (2000?)]

THAT STRANGE PERSPECTIVE

when I was six or seven years old, one of my two teachers asked me to
illustrate a story she had written. It was about a red hair boy whose dad was always
drunk. I did not know anything about drunks. “Just
draw a lot of bottles everywhere” said my teacher. She had chosen me because
a) I was good at everything and
b) it always seemed like I had nothing to do. That is what she told my parents anyway

the project involved about twenty drawings, so that took me weeks to complete. I
went crazy over the details, examining our house, and attempting to reproduce
as many things as well as I could. For some unknown reason, unknown even to me, I
drew many scenes as if seen “from above”
according to a strange perspective I had “invented”. You
could see the floor and two walls. The furniture was always flat, but
that was probably because I was unable to draw things in 3D. There
was an advantage to that: the characters had a lot of free room

the hero had a t-shirt with a picture of a cool car on it. Nobody had a neck. Instead
of empty bottles everywhere, there were many electrical sockets

::: ::: :::

[Picture: That strange perspective by reading_is_dangerous]

I could not draw one of those interesting neckless figures in the above picture because I cannot remember how I was drawing a nose when I was seven years old.

The book was never published. My mom fought over it, wanting to keep it, and she got it in the end. Unless I lost it, it must be somewhere at my parents's home in Canada, in the basement with the spiders.

MEN ARE GHOSTS

I might as well start making
sketches for a movie-----
-----
SHE is walking around in style, going to work
SHE is a warehouse specialist

“streets for rivers
buildings as mountains, this one a cliff
cars as fast running bulls” she thinks to herself

this one car here, this one is a shaman. A car/bull shaman
it speaks to HER
its name is SPECIAL K

“men are ghosts” says SPECIAL K. “Hello Maggie.
-Hello my friend. Am I a ghost too?
-Oh! you know you are not
-Oh! Thank you my friend. I have a question for you
-Ask
-What is the quickest possible ordinary event?
-Thinking. Nothing moves faster than the mind
-But is that ordinary?
-Maybe
-But what about light?
-Light is fast. The mind is a sort of living light show”

…

“Seriously, says Maggie. Consider gamma rays
­-Gamma rays are light
-I know. They have the shortest known wavelength: 10 e-14 meter
-That’s lonely short
-Lonely short indeed. Now how long does it take for a gamma ray photon to
move across it’s own diameter?
-Photons don’t have a size
-Okay, but what about the wavelength? How much time does it take for that
wave to move across that length?
-Well, the
speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second so
10 e-14 divided by that speed (if your photon is moving in a vacuum) gives you
the answer
-Okay, so that’s pretty fast, right? Can there be anything faster than that?
-Hardly, except for shorter wavelengths
-Then what’s the shortest possible wavelength?
-Asks Zarah. Also, ask her if she believes that the universe is synchronized
-What do you mean?
-I mean: When one photon moves, they all move
-I don’t get it
-She’ll understand. Also, ask her if she believes that time is continuous or
discontinuous. No steps, or little steps. One copy of the whole universe on each
step
-I don’t get that either
-It’s okay. Just ask Zarah”

-----so that’s dialog number one
who wants to play in the movie?

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Maggie looking for Special K by reading_is_dangerous]

THE DEADLY PIER

I draw. On the computer I draw with the little button thing that is in the
middle of the keyboard on my Tecra 8100

five minutes ago, I created a sort of seagull on a pier. The
bird was looking at the sea--that blue
deep blue
blurry line of blue under a light blue sky. I
was happy with it, with the drawing, the painting, the digiart

the bird was a little strange, but I liked that. It was okay, that bird. An okay bird

birds don’t know bombs. Don’t know what freedom is. They
don’t know anything that they don’t need to know. They
don’t know anything that they don’t need to
know to be a seagull

for instance, everything they need to know about birds fits on this list:

TYPES OF BIRDS
type one: like birds, okay birds. No problem
type two: other birds. Try to chase them away
type three: that bird to mate with. Now where is that one again? Where did it go?
type four: that evil bird that’s up there in the sky evil evil evil evil

oh! so
the bird knows evil. Well, maybe a real seagull doesn’t know evil but
the bird I painted, it knew. That one bird knew

but I deleted it. I wasn’t satisfied with the pier. It
wasn’t wood. It wasn’t concrete. It wasn't
steel. I just don’t know what it was, but that turned out more
deadly for my poor bird than that evil bird my bird was so afraid of

by the way, I don’t believe in evil. However, there are bad birds

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Tell me about your dream house by reading_is_dangerous]

Those three are crows, I believe. I should have made plenty.

THE BIG WURM

nestled in his brain, they found a big wurm. “So
what? said the creature
-Well he was our vice-prozidan, they said
-I am the vice-prozidan! hissed the angry worm (it was starting to feel cold)
-Not anymore” they said, killing it with a pair of pliers

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Wurm in nest by reading_is_dangerous]

THE ANTI-QUEEN

for every particle there is an anti-particle. For every thought, an
anti-thought. For each of me, an anti-me

and for every word, an anti-word. That list goes on. There is even an
anti-list. An anti-thing for every thing. An anti-nothing that embraces nothing

so my next move, you see? My next move will destroy that annoying symmetry

::: ::: :::

[Picture: The Anti-Queen by reading_is_dangerous]

The first book I read on chess was My System by Aron Nimzowitsch. A Jew born in Riga, he lived in Germany for twenty years and published his book in 1925, the same year as tome I of Mein Kampf. Nimzowitsch is considered one of the most influential players and writers in chess history. He did not like symmetrical positions. His system is great and crazy.

Modern Ideas In Chess by Richard Reti is very short, very strong, and very interesting. Published in 1922!

To learn how to play, I recommend: Concise Chess: The Compact Guide for Beginners by British chess grandmaster John Emms. Everything you need to know, and a little bit more (2003).

OLD CAR HAIKU

the old car asleep
on its dream road remembers
spring flowers yellow

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Today on Pushkin Street by reading_is_dangerous]

PORN FOR THE BLIND

yesterday I caught a cold. I couldn’t sleep

“I’m stuck in that
desert I invented for myself” I thought. “Or I am not
stuck. I could use the meatabone knife. It can cut anything that’s neither bone nor meat. I
could use to cut the distance from here to where I am going to, but
that’s it: I do not know where I am going to”

anyway. Another demon came around. I’ve been wanting to avoid bumping
into one every other day, but that one, that demon had
an interesting question: “What is
light? it asked me
-Light is a wave. An electromagnetic wave, I said
-What is a wave? asked the demon
-A wave is a transfer of energy” I answered. I knew that much

next I thought it would ask me what is energy? Instead it wanted to know: “What
is a transfer?” I
laughed. A transfer. Movement. Time. Oh! once again

“Why does your hat look blue? asked me the demon
-It’s made of material that absorbs light in all wavelengths except in the range of
blue. Cherry blue
-Yes, said the demon. PEOPLE ARE LIKE THAT” it shouted, then
it left

Everything I cannot absorb or accept I tend to write about. That’s my
“color”. Fascism, for instance. Processed thoughts. Processed food. Poisons. Etc. Those
combined topics make up my specific “color” just as much as a young lady who
has not yet absorbed the physicality of romantic love is bound to write about it, and
that would be her color, one of her colors

about fascism. America is turning into a fascist country. Misuse of its flag, its
army boots, and detention camps in the building abroad and within the
country. Fascist movies like '300'. Corporations rule over politics. That’s the core of it. That doesn’t mean it’s impossible to live in America anymore. People can live well under fascism. For a while

...but let’s come back to light, and movement. A
while ago, I wrote about what I called
the ultimoment: the shortest possible length of time that can be measured. That, I
wrote, is the time it takes for the quickest possible thing to happen (so there
is actually something to measure)

I had one idea for what that could be: a shift the spin of an elementary particle. A
shift in shape or form if that particle is one of those putative super strings. Now I have new ideas. New ideas which I haven’t absorbed yet

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Portrait of a demon with a strange signature by reading_is_dangerous]

Has the title of this blog anything to do with its content? Maybe not, but I am trying to mix things up. Provocative salad-think. Is it the cold or the lack of sleep?

More to read: It’s Still About The Oil: Secret Condi Meeting On Oil Before The Invasion and Eternalism

BOM BOM BOM

evolution gave us the eye. That’s
a very useful gift

now what if evolution had also given us another kind of
eye, like
one that can foresee the future or
one able to read other people’s mind

maybe it’s not quite ready yet, that eye
maybe it only works a little bit for the time being, until
the great survival game makes it almost perfect

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Bom Bom Bom by reading_is_dangerous]

PEGASUS

every night he tries to find the right
words to write them in the right way to
tell the right people the right thing at
the right moment, but that’s too
much, well too much
for him anyway
so
he
ends up writing something wrong, insufficient or
ugly, something like this: “My dear Pegasus, now
that’s I’ve cut off your wings and sewn them on
your head, let’s see how well you can fly”

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Pegasus by reading_is_dangerous]

JUMP

a hare jumping over a bell. What could that mean? I asked
myself. The hare, that wild animal, it sleeps by day and
gambol by night
under the moon which is a symbol and a mean for cycles. Thus I
think of reproduction, fertility, life

as for the bell, well, it makes a sound. It is a signal, a call. Maybe Praise
be to God! or Hear the sound of the Buddhist law! The bell is an artifact, the
product of the human mind such as all and any of our explanations for life
and the stuff it is made of. Atoms and the rest, stars

so what does a hare mean when it playfully jumps over a bell? That
could be: there needs to be an Explanation in order for Me to take a leap
over It. Life smiles at the explanations for life. The Universe smiles at
its own explanation, that which it provided for itself through the
efforts of the human brain, the human mind

in Christ, the Algonquians saw a personification of Menebuch, the
Great Rabbit who gave us the world. So here is another interpretation: a god, a
savior, a prophet
jumping over their own creation, their own church, their own teachings

movement over dogma, death, immobility

::: ::: :::

[Sculpture: Hare on bell by Barry Flanagan (bronze, black and brown patina, 1983) | picture by reading_is_dangerous (March 16th, 2007)]

GOLDEN APPLE

one day she picked the four youngest leaves from the very heart of a fresh
lettuce and gave them to him, a sweet
present

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Golden apple by reading_is_dangerous]

ANOTHER KNIFE

another demon came around. It was wearing a golden crown. It
had wings like angels do, but very light. It was dressed in black. It
had mustaches and funny ears like those of a bull

from behind it, a million eyes were watching me
or maybe they were knots in some sort of matrix

the demon had horns, great horns of glass. I was not scared. I asked it: “Did
you come out of me?
-Maybe, said the demon. Do you know my name?”

of course I didn’t know. I asked him. Well, I think it was a ‘him’ because
of the mustaches. “They call me Masam, said the demon. I came here
to remind you of something. An
event that happened to you when you were a child. Will you hear me?
-Yes, I told him. Listening to demons is risky, although not much so, not
in a desert anyway, but that’s another story
-Do you remember your visit to the zoo?” asked Masam

that’s when the most incredible thing happened to me. I never
wrote about it. I fell in the gorillas’ area. That
made the news, and I was on TV for the first time. I was eight years old. That
I didn’t get hurt was lucky, but what was considered very strange was that
I was yelling: “THE SUN IS SINGING” when I got rescued. “Do
you remember why? asked the demon
-Why what? I wasn’t sure what he meant
-Why you fell into the gorillas’ area
-I had a crush on a girl, and she was there, and she dared me “climb on that
fence” and I did, and when I got up there she went “get on the other side if you
dare” and I didn’t but I lost balance and I fell to the other side with the apes
-That's not why, that’s how, said the demon
-Because of the girl, I said. That’s why
-No way, said the demon. But that’s another story. Two
gorillas approached your fragile little stupid self. What
do you remember happened?
-those guys were big. Big like big. The bigger one had a branch, a club, it
was hitting the ground with it. “Okay, you are the king” I thought to
myself or maybe not. I was only eight.
There was a lot of screaming
I

thought:
“What is going to happen next?” that
I remember well. Then all of a sudden I realized I was…
-What? asked the demon
-I couldn’t hear anything. No more screaming. That silence lasted a few
seconds, which seemed like a long long time. Then I heard it
-What? asked the demon
-The song. It was a beautiful song. The voice was…
-What? asked the demon
-…coming down from the sky. I looked up. Through the clouds, I could see it, the
sun. The sun was singing, it was…
-What was the sun singing about?” asked the demon

I looked at him. There he was, a real monster with a crown on its
head, and horns, and a million worms with eyes behind him. “What
do you want to know that you don’t know already? I asked him
-Nothing” he said. “Forget it!”

then he showed me an interesting blade that resembled the meatabone
knife. “What is that for? I wanted to know
-That is to cut words, he told me. I want you to bring it to the famous Maga who
lives in this desert. Will you do that for me?
-Yes, I told him. As long as I don’t cut myself with it…”

before I was finished talking the demon was gone. You’d think it’s
hard to disappear in a desert, but those demons have a way

…so the knife. It was on the ground. I looked at it without touching for a long
time. On its blade a question was engraved: WHAT IS A WORD? I pondered how
to answer that question

when morning came I took the knife and left

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Masam the demon by reading_is_dangerous]

ANTENNA BIRD

I found a message:

…thoughts run like strings

-K

oh! like invisible strings in the sky. Magnetic fields. At
the poles of planet Minda, we discover primordial
instincts. Eros. Thanatos. Love and death: the electricity of the living

if there is a bird flying across that extraordinary sky then what is
it? A bird of Beauty, I believe. That
includes little beauty and great ugliness. How else? Ugly
demons come out of me. Charming? :)

_

before the phone existed, before
the Internet, it was almost impossible to experience this amazing
connection: ten thousand miles apart, you and I
think of the same thing at the same moment. In the mirror of our
imagination, we caught a reflection of the same bird

imagination works as an antenna (a mirror, a telescope, a
blue horse)

::: ::: :::

[Picture: La pensée du ciel by reading_is_dangerous]

NOSE

…another demon came by. The second or the third, I don’t
know. “So many of you!” I said. I wasn’t really speaking to it, to
that thing, but those words came out. It
answered: “You
brought us here. We come out of you
-How do you come out of me?
-Every time you commit sacrilege, we come out. We
come out. We come out. We come out. We
come out. We…

-What is your name, demon?
-I have no name, but they call me Slaughto
-Who are they?
-The victims
-What victims?
-I don’t want to say
-Then say my name. Do you know what is my name?
-Yes
-Say it. Say my name
-Your name is Solipold Feliwin. I came to tell you that if
you will look at the sky for a long long time your eyes will
bleed for a long long time
-Oh, I said, but I never look at the sky. Not anymore
-Your…
-Yes, Slaughto?
-Your nose is bleeding”

it was

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Slaughto the demon by reading_is_dangerous]

EVEN A FEW SECONDS MEAN A LOT OF TIME

that desert around me, I created it. Why?

everything that wasn’t what I was searching for, I pushed it away
now I am left with very little
which means
that I must be getting closer to what I wanted all along
unless I’m wrong

I could be wrong

if I am wrong, too bad. It’s not a big problem. There still is much time
left

even a few seconds mean a lot of time
if you know what you are doing

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Reversal fish by reading_is_dangerous]

HOW TO PLAY NARDI

each player starts with 15 checkers. Those are placed to the right, at
the top of board, as shown in the above picture. Here, Black would sit at the
top, White at the bottom of the picture

to win, move all your checkers around the board, going
counterclockwise, and bear them all off before your opponent does. In my picture, Black
bears off at the upper-left. White bears off at the lower-right

both players first roll one die. The highest number plays first, rolling
the dice to see how many points you can move your checkers

rule #1
a checker cannot move to a point occupied by an opposing checker

rule #2
the numbers on each dice are separate moves. If you roll 2 and
6, you may move one checker two spaces, and
another checker six spaces OR you may move one checker for a
total of eight spaces, but ONLY if the intermediate point (either two
or six from the starting point) is also free of any opposing checker

rule #3
doubles are played twice. For example, a roll of 1-1 means you have
four ones to use

rule #4
you must use both numbers of a roll if possible, or
all four numbers if you got doubles. If you can play only one number but
not both, you must play the higher one

rule #5 / moving off the head
your starting point (all those checkers on your right) is called your “head”. You
may move only one checker off of your head each turn, except on your first
roll, and your first roll only, if you play doubles of 3-3, 4-4, or 6-6, and only those (on a roll of 1-1, 2-2, and 5-5 you may move one checker only)

rule #6
you may not close your opponent’s advance with six consecutive blocks unless
there is at least one opposing checker in front of your blockade

once you’ve moved your fifteen checkers into your finishing table, you may start
bearing off. You bear off a checker by rolling a number that corresponds to the point on which it resides, then removing the checker from the board, as in Backgammon

if you don’t have a checker on the points indicated by the roll, you must make a legal
move using a checker on a higher-numbered point. If there are none, you must remove
a checker from the highest point that has a checker

the first player to bear off all his or her checkers wins the game and
scores one point. If the winner bears off all his checkers before the loser
has borne off any, he gets two points

the game is usually played until one of the two players reaches five points. After the
first game, the winner of the previous game goes first

___

ref.: http://www.bkgm.com/variants/Narde.html

::: ::: :::

[Picture: The starting setup for playing nardi by reading_is_dangerous]

In Armenia, nardi or narde is played on a big wooden game, 30 cm by 60, about 12 inches by 24. Tiny dice are preferable. The sounds of dice throwing and checker moving can be heard all over the country, all the time. Everybody has their own special techniques: how to roll the dice, how to build the best blockade, how to prepare for bearing off the checkers, etc.

If you have a question or would like a few tips, please leave a comment. I'll come back, and edit this page accordingly.

DEMON CHARBON

walking is great. The rhythm of my steps created music in my mind, a
concerto, and I am at the piano. When my fingers run on the instrument the
other guys keep quiet. That is anti-democratic music at its best, ha! ha! ha!

when you go to the desert, bring onions. They feed you. They
quench your thirst too. They are also light in weight. Rosemarine gave me a
bagful

there was a rock in the distance. “Good place for onion eating” in my
opinion, but it was two hours away, so my concerto just grew longer

on that rock was a crack (an etching?). It made a weird shape, and there was a sort of a
hand made drawing in the middle. “Is that blood?” was my first question. “What
does it mean?” was another one. It reminded me of somebody: LE DEMON
CHARBON, the Coal Demon

sleep took over me. There came a dream. “Time is three dimensional” told me
the demon. “Dimension one is {yesterday, now, tomorrow}
dimension two is a{yesterday, now, tomorrow} where a means ‘alternative’
dimension three is e{yesterday, now, tomorrow} where e means ‘eternity’
…so in the third dimension, everything and everywhen sits on zero.
-What are you doing here?” I asked. There was no answer

then there was a voice asking me for the rules of a game known as nardi. “I
promise to write them down” I heard myself say

that was a few hours ago. The desert is great. Walking is great. “When
you don’t know where you are going to, you better hurry” said one
truly famous Professor Shadoko

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Demon Charbon by reading_is_dangerous]

LIFE AND THE SOKOL

life and death
what you know, and what you don’t

tears and sweets. Old stories. New stories. Things
I’ve said. Things I should repeat, in the hope
I’d say it better

questions I never answered: Who is Boe an Fop’h? Who made his
self-portrait? Was that really scotch tape or
did I create the whole thing in Photo
shop? What about the
TRANSMUTATION picture? Last
week, I took a shot of a few dried golden raisins. Yesterday
I mixed it with another picture I made two
weeks ago: buckwheat

why did I mix them? Why did I do that? Now why do I
write about it here? Why do I do what I do? What did
I do last year, and
what will I be doing next year? According
to my own theory, NOW is only YESTERDAY
written on top of TOMORROW… but isn’t that what everybody believes?

…yesterday, I played NARDI. It’s a variation of
backgammon, a better game in my opinion. One
day I shall write down the rules, and post
them here. I won five games in a row. My luckfield was UP

…yesterday, I went swimming. ARM-ARM-ARM, BREATHE, that’s
crawl. Because I ate before the pool, I couldn’t breathe
well, so I swallowed some chlorinated water

I wish I lived in the desert, in an oasis. Maybe one day I’ll
walk until I find one, then live there for a while, and swim in fresh water

when I came home, the cat sniffed my nose for at least a
minute long. “Oh, it’s that once-a-week funny smell he
has” she must be thinking

on January 18th, I saw sparrows in a tree. “I wonder
what it’s like to think like a sparrow” I thought to
myself. Branches all around. You-brother birds. You-sister
birds. “It’s us! it’s us! We’re here! we’re here!”

“…they always come back to that tree” told me the friend who
lives there. “From those branches, they can keep a watch on both
the sky and the ground.
-An eye open for the cats. Yes. But why the sky?
-Because of the SOKOL” said my friend. The sparrow hawk

I didn’t know there were sparrow hawks in the city

…birds: their talk must be sort of a low resolution picture
of their surroundings. “Safe, safe, safe place here, here, here
oh! food? food? yes-food, food, hungry, hunger, hunger…
…co
cold
cold
cold. Here. Here. Here. Us. Us. Us.” I remember reading about a
man who studied parrot-talk for over twenty years, and his
conclusion was this: THEY TALK A LOT, AND MOSTLY THEY TALK ABOUT
GOD, AND LIFE AND DEATH

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Bloggers by reading_is_dangerous]

TRANSMUTATION

…I had walked a few miles into the Electric desert when I saw a woman. “What
do you like? she asked me.
-Hello, I replied. Don’t you say hello?
-Hello, she snarled. What do you like?
-This desert I like. What about you? What do you like?
-Gold more than anything else” she answered

…she took her heart out to show me. “See, it’s made of lead” she said. Before
she could put it back in her breast, I
quickly cut it in two with the meatabone
knife. Inside the heart of lead was a gold nugget. “Here
is your precious metal” I told her, but she was gone

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Transmutation by reading_is_dangerous]

FAREWELL, BOE AN FOP'H

“...what’s this?” I asked Boe an Fop’h. “It is a meatabone knife.
-What can it cut?” I wanted to know. “Anything that is not meat or bone”
answered the po-warrior. He sold it to me for one bronze penny

...he kindly gave me a cherry blue bowler hat, then he said goodbye and
left in his paint-room balloon. They say the Electric desert is best travelled on foot

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Meatabone knife #24 by reading_is_dangerous]

BELOW THE SURFACE OF NOW

“…what is your understanding of time?” asked me Boe an Fop’h. I’ve
already answered that question, I told him. “Yes, he said, but
explain yourself again. For the Truth shines from every one of its countless sides, as
opposed to a lie which only looks true from a certain perspective

-Well, as you might remember, I believe that time is instantaneous. Time doesn’t flow, one
second coming after the next, although it feels that way. It
feels like time carries me away

…the way I imagine it, all moments of time have already happened. What we call the
future has happened, and it’s also happening. Likewise the past continues to be

…the way I imagine it, any moment is like a square on a chess board. You can not take a
square away. Any square, any moment is eternal

-Yes, said Boe, I recall you’ve said that. Now dig a little deeper
-Okay, I said. So let’s consider moment one and moment two. Each is a room without a
door or a window to enter it

-If that is so, how can you move from room one to room two?
-You can’t. That’s what I’m saying: Time doesn't flow. We do not move in time. We do not
go from room one to room two. Instead, we already are in both rooms, as well as in
countless other rooms

-If that is so, how come I remember at moment two what happened at moment one? In
other words, how does the ‘version of me’ in room two knows what happened in room one?
-Well, that’s exactly the question I’ve been asking myself for a while. I think I found the answer



-Tell me
-There is a picture of room one in room two, that’s how. In room three, there is a picture of
room two with its picture of room one. Etc.

-But how does the picture gets there?
-It doesn’t get there. It’s just there without having to get there. In other words, there
is an infinite number of rooms, or moments. Any room that has a picture of another room feels like it’s the next room, or the next moment. There can be many next moments for any given
moment, or many rooms two with a picture of room one in it. What happens in each of
those rooms two is seen in the picture found in a series of rooms three. Etc.

-Very well. But what happens in each room?
-A picture appears, a picture of another room

-That’s it?
-That’s it. It appears. It has already appeared, once and for all. Our subjective experience of
time, our life, it’s that virtual thread of pictures that exists across one room to the next. Any
moment that you call ‘now’ is a picture hanging in one of those countless rooms

-You are not talking about the way memory works
-Not the human memory, no. I’m talking about how one particle remembers what it is, where
it is, where it comes from, and what it was, from one moment to the next

-What about the room One with a big O. What does the picture shows in Room One?
-Well, at first I thought that maybe the picture in Room One just shows nothing. Then
I came up with another hypothesis

-Which is?
-There is no Room One. The rooms are not numbered. They all appeared at once, an infinite
number of rooms or moments (let’s not forget that we are talking about time). Time is
instantaneous. What is the past or the future only depends on how far you can look into the picture at any given moment. Right below the surface of now, you can see the past. What
lies much deeper we call the future

-Ouroburos
-Yes. The snake does bites its tail

-Can you see the numbers for the super lotto?
-Yes and no

-Indeed
-There is something else

-What is it?
-If we don’t move in time, it also means…

-…that we don’t move in space. Good. You seem ready to meet with Tsyopa Maga whose
speech is like…
-…like broken glass”

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Boe an Fop’h by Boe an Fop’h]

Instead of letting me take a picture of him, the famous po-warrior gave me that self-portrait. “Rosemarine cut it in two,” he told me, “but that scotch tape is really a great invention. Can you imagine what the world used to be before that existed?”

Many Esfodi have a personal stamp which they use instead of their signature, because their writing system is so complicated. In red, the four sentences read, top: Everything is a symbol; middle: The Universe cannot be cut in two; lower right: Now is an echo of elsewhere; and lower left: They call me Boe an Fop’h. “Why no ear?” I asked Boe. “The answer to that question is the same as to this question: Why did Rosemarine cut my self-portrait in two?”

GIFT VALLEY

...flying in the paint-room balloon, over Gift Valley. “One of these boxes down there is
for you, said Boe an Fop’h.
-Which one? I asked him.
-Nobody knows” answered the famous po-warrior.

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Gift Valley by reading_is_dangerous]

NIGHTMARE MONKEY

I had a nightmare. Something spectacular had happened and the vice-
prozidan became the new prozidan

...the martial law is imposed in the name of national security. For the same
reason, protests are made illegal. Troops are deployed across the country. The
National Guard which used to be under the control of the state governors
now comes under the direct command of the new prozidan

...meanwhile what happened is blamed on a country the former prozidan
had been planning to attack anyway. Soon war breaks out. One
million people die not too far from where I live

...at home, dissidents are told to shut up or face questionning by the secret
services. Many people are arrested. Anyone can be held indefinitely without
charge, tortured and executed in secret

...detention camps previously built for “illegal aliens” are quickly filled
with ordinary citizens who discover too late that the unthinkable has happened once
again: a few evil men have taken over the most powerful country in the world

::: ::: :::

[Picture: Nightmare monkey by reading_is_dangerous]

Inspired by articles 17190 and 17216 on ICH, and this blockbuster.

THE CURSE OF THE BLUE LYCANTHROPE

I found an Armeno-Esfodi magic book. It’s real, it’s fat, and it’s
called THE THREE
THOUSAND AREAS. It teaches some cool stuff like how
to levitate safely without a rope (p.74), how to fly (p. 832), how
to teleport yourself without leaving your fillings behind (p. 1909), and how
to be in two or three different places at the same time (p. 3444)

at first I considered learning how
to fly at night above waters [slow] (p. 960) which seemed
easier than the rest, but the thought of crossing the Atlantic Ocean or the Sea of
Saints alone, under the countless stars, a few feet only above darkish waters… a prey for any creature attracted by magic-that forced me to reconsider. So I tried how
to be in two different places on the 28th of February (p. 4298)

that was yesterday (it feels like
many miles ago). It didn’t work, “because you
already are in two different places at the same time” told me a laughing Boe an Fop’h
after my attempt. Boe is the famous po-warrior with whom I travel in a paint-room
balloon, going to the Electric desert. Said the po-warrior: “Most people don’t realize it, but
they often are in two different places at the same time. People like you don’t need that spell.
-Okay, but why didn’t you tell me? I asked him.
-You wouldn’t have believed me.
-Okay, but you could have tried to convince me?
-There was another reason. We were flying above the dangerous
Forest of Cheux, and the best way to keep us safe was to let you
focus on that harmless magic.
-Okay, but what’s with the dangerous forest?
-It’s home to the dangerous Blue Lycanthrope.
-Okay, but what about him?”

in a few words the po-warrior told me about the Curse of the Blue
Lycanthrope. Strangely enough, I cannot remember it, except for this:

“...sticky light”
“...there isn’t a single non-mysterious thing in the whole Universe”
and “...always pretend you are not alone”

whatever. That inspired me a painting, a rather clumsy one with a wulf who doesn't seem very dangerous. I'll give it to you. You might be able to
imagine something out of it

::: ::: :::

[Picture: In the Forest of Cheux by reading_is_dangerous]

The little girl I danced with earlier this year round the Christmas tree visited me today. She’s two and a half years old. “What do you see?” I asked, showing her the above picture. “Trees” she answered without a blink. “Okay,” I said, “but what else?
-Snow, she said.
-Okay, and what else?
-More snow.
-Okay, but what’s this? I asked her, pointing at the blue dog.
-Oh! she said. That’s a sea shell.”