TIMEQUACK

[Following is my entry in the January, 2007 installment of Blogging for Books, Jay Allen’s venerable competition at The Zero Boss. This month, B4B changes over to a new format, one which more properly might be called Blogging for Bucks. Regardless, I haven’t participated in quite some time...and since this month’s topic is Time, I couldn’t resist.]

The Time Traveller began his story, sitting back in his chair at first, and speaking wearily. Afterwards he got more animated. In writing it down I feel with only too much keenness the inadequacy of pen and ink - and, above all, my own inadequacy - to express its quality. You read, I will suppose, attentively enough; but you cannot see the speaker’s white, sincere face in the bright circle of the little lamp, nor hear the intonation of his voice. You cannot know how his expression followed the turns of his story! At first we glanced now and again at each other. After a time we ceased to do that, and looked only at the Time Traveller’s face.

“I told some of you last Thursday of the principles of the Time Machine, and showed you the actual thing itself, incomplete in the workshop. There it is now, a little travel-worn; one of the ivory bars is cracked and a rail bent, but it’s sound enough.

“It was at ten o’ cluck today that the first of all Time Machines began its career. I gave it a last tap, put a dab of goose grease on the quartz rod, and sat in the saddle. I suppose someone facing a hunter’s shotgun feels much the same fear and wonder about what is to happen next as I felt then. I pressed the starting lever and almost immediately the stopping lever; I felt a sensation of flying; and, looking round, I saw the laboratory almost exactly as before. Had anything happened? Then I noticed the cluck. A moment before, it had stood at a minute past ten; now it was nearly half past three!

“I drew a breath, grasped the starting lever, and went off with a thud. The laboratory got hazy and went dark. Huey and Dewey came in and waddled, apparently without seeing me, towards the pond. I suppose it must have taken them a minute or so to traverse the room, but to me they seemed to shoot across like an eagle in flight.

“As I gained speed, night followed day like the flapping of a wing. The dim walls of the laboratory fell away; I suppose the house must have been destroyed. The sun leaped across the sky every few seconds, each passage marking a day; eventually, as I gained pace, it became a band of fire that swayed from solstice to solstice, marking the passage of the years.

“The landscape grew misty and vague, the surface of the earth melting and flowing before my eyes. Eventually my thoughts came round to the idea of stopping. I pulled the stop lever over - a little too fast, it turns out, and found myself next to an overturned machine in the year 802,701.

“Almost immediately, I was surrounded by a crowd of what I took at first to be ducklings. They were small and delicate in appearance and spoke in a soft, liquid tongue, quacking gently as they probed me and my machine with inquisitive feathers. After extended bouts of pantomime (for which my education at the Colorado School of Mimes more than adequately prepared me!), we were able to make ourselves mutually understood.

“They called themselves the Muscoveloi, and their diminutive size was, as I discovered, natural to their species. As I spent more and more time with them, I saw that they lived lives of careless indolence, their every need provided for by some mysterious agency. Crusts of bread appeared on the surface of the pond as they swam, insects and fish were plentiful. None of them appeared to be starving; in fact, I observed that, among them, none appeared to be elderly. I also saw no evidence of sickness or disease - no avian influenza - during the entire time I spent among them.

“As I spent more time exploring this world of the far future, I became aware of the presence of strange shafts - mineshafts? I wondered - that led to some sort of subterranean structure. These I resolved to explore.

“It was at the bottom of one of these shafts that I made a grim discovery. The Muscoveloi were not alone in this world; beneath them lived another race of waterfowl, a race that had become thoroughly adapted to life in a nearly sunless environment. Their feathers were a pallid white, their eyes huge and pink, no doubt extremely sensitive to the low levels of light in their underground home. I could not understand their language; however, later, one of the Muscoveloi explained that these creatures were known as Mallardlocks.

“The Muscoveloi, I saw, were alternately disgusted and horrified by the Mallardlocks. To attempt to talk of them was akin to telling a filthy joke to a refined lady. This attitude mystified me, especially as I had deduced that the Mallardlocks were the providers of the Muscoveloi’s bounty. Not only did they ensure that there was plenty of bread and insects to eat, they also maintained the ponds and swimming areas, keeping them swept clean of Duck Dookie. Why, then, were these Underground Brethren so reviled?

“It did not take me long to find out. On one of my subterranean expeditions, I could not help but notice the remains of a carnivorous meal. Upon closer examination, the nature of what I was seeing struck me with horror: These were duck bones!

“Cannibals! The Mallardlocks were cannibals!

“I tried to understand what had divided Duckdom in twain. Surely, the Muscoveloi were the descendants of the moneyed leisure classes, thousands of generations removed from their Ludwig von Drake-like ancestors. The Mallardlocks must have originally been their servants, the working-class ducks. As their habitats grew more and more apart from one another, they became socially estranged, eventually becoming two separate species. As I see it, the Upper-world duck had drifted towards his feeble prettiness, and the Under-world to mere mechanical industry. Then, at some point, the feeding of the Under-world became disjointed. The Mallardlocks being in contact with machinery, which, however perfect, still needs some brains to keep in operating condition, had probably retained rather more initiative, if less of every other ducklike character, than the Upper. And when other sustenance failed them, they turned to what old habit had hitherto forbidden. Poultry!

“And so I came back. For a long time I must have lain insensible upon the machine. The hands spun backward upon the dials; the landscape ebbed and flowed; the familiar buildings of Duckburg grew back. The laboratory sprang up around me. Presently I pressed the stopping lever and brought the Time Machine to a halt. I came in, and now I am telling you this story.

“I know that all this will be absolutely incredible to you. I cannot expect you to believe it. Take it as a dream - or a prophecy. A tall tale. And, taking it as a tall tale, what do you think of it?”

At first, nobody spoke. Then Filby cleared his throat.

“To tell ye the truth, George, I think it’s a wee bit Daffy.”

[Apologies to H. G. Wells. Some material used herein has been excerpted rather freely from The Time Machine, which novelette is now in the public domain in the United States.]

CLIMBING THE WALLS

[Following is my entry in the 14th Blogging for Books competition. This month, for the first time, B4B leaves its nest at The Zero Boss and alights on Joshilyn Jackson’s blog, Faster Than Kudzu. The theme is Superheroes, and I have a post ready-made for it...]

He’s a big deal now, and he doesn’t have a lot of time for his old friends, but that’s usually the way the world works. I don’t resent him for it.

We grew up together, Ken and me. Grade school, middle school, Hebrew school, then high school. We saw less of each other after we went our separate ways – he to one of the SUNY campuses in upstate New York, me to an Ivy League school in New Jersey.

[You’re probably thinking, what kind of Ivy League guy says “Ken and me”? Fuck you, Mr. Grammar Pedant.]

The best times might have been during those late-afternoon Hebrew School classes. The class cutups used to sit in the back, out of the immediate steely gaze of Mr. Feld. Me, Bobby Spiegelman, Heshy Weitz, Jerry Kaufman, and Ken. Ken Spiderman.

When Mr. Feld wasn’t looking, Ken would climb up the back wall of the classroom and hang himself from a little web in the corner of the ceiling. It used to drive Feld nuts. “Where’s Ken?” he would ask, growing more frustrated and teed-off every time it happened…but not even once did he think to look up. And meanwhile, the rest of us would be busting blood vessels trying not to crack up.

Ken wasn’t a jock or anything in high school, although he did go out for some of the more offbeat teams. Cross country, lacrosse, tennis…never anything like football or baseball that might have earned him some respect. You always got the feeling he was holding back, that he could excel at anything physical but wanted to keep a low profile.

Jeez, was he ever deadly at handball, though, ’cause he could climb up the wall to get almost any shot. And four-wall? Forget about it. After a while, nobody would play with him – you just couldn’t score points against him. I mean, we all liked him, but it just wasn’t fun to get the crap beaten out of you every single time.

We used to shoot pictures for the school paper, and he was big-time into the yearbook. That’s where he met MJ, working on layout. They were hot and heavy for a while after that, and I guess that’s when I started seeing less of Ken.

But he was always a cool guy. Not like they say in the books. A nerd, he wasn’t. Fun to hang out with, he was, and he’d always be playing practical jokes with those web-shooters of his. I can’t tell you how often I almost pissed myself laughing at some of the stunts he’d pull.

That whole “Peter Parker” backstory, that was all bullshit. Aunt May? Uncle Ben? Complete bullshit. But I guess someone thought he needed a more interesting bio. “With great power comes great responsibility,” and all that crap. What, being a Long Island kid wasn’t “sexy” enough?

But I’ll tell you one thing, and it’s not something you’ll hear from Ken. Not these days, anyway.

I’m the one who told him to start using the hyphen.

EVERYBODY MUST GET STONED

[Following is my entry in Blogging for Books #12, hosted by The Zero Boss. The theme choices for this month’s contest are: (1) a memorable trip or “mini-vacation” (with “memorable” covering everything from “best time of my life” to “unmitigated disaster”); (2) a time you did something spontaneously, in order to shake up your life; or (3) a time you metaphorically took "the road less traveled", and made an unpopular or uncommon decision. I’m going with Option One.]

As part of my responsibilities at The Great Corporate Salt Mine, I have traveled a lot over the years. It’s usually not too exciting.

Much of this travel has been the routine, boring, grindingly dull sort, the kind that is associated with covering a sales territory. Monday, go here. Tuesday, go there. Fly some days, drive others. After a few years, the fancy restaurants and expense account meals get to be a drag, and you find yourself looking forward to the nights when you can just pick up some random sustenance from the local Food Emporium and consume it in the hotel room.

There have been times that I would fly to New York for lunch, then fly home that same day.

I’ll admit, not all of it has been draggy and routine. Some of my positions have involved international travel, with just enough frequency to be interesting without bringing the dreaded Boredom Factor into play. I’ve been to places as diverse as Belgium, Japan, and Indonesia, and found things to enjoy and appreciate almost everywhere I’ve gone.

Boredom Factor or not, if you travel enough, you begin to appreciate the value of Routine. Airline travel disruptions, last-minute itinerary changes – these all must be dealt with from time to time, and all of them involve extra work and irritation. Keeping a cool demeanor is not always easy, but it’s essential. After all, you never know what sort of surprises you may have to deal with on the road...

Let’s wind the clock back to the last week of January 2003. I’m working on a project that requires an enormous amount of advance preparation and training for our Intrepid Sales Force, and as part of said project, I am visiting our various sales offices and conducting day-long training sessions. Not the easiest job: keeping sales reps alert and interested in any one topic for a full day is a little like herding cats. This week’s Exercise in Cat-Herding is to be held in Farmington Hills, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.

I arrive in Detroit on a snowy evening and wait for two colleagues to arrive on their flight from Houston. Once they show up, we throw all the luggage into the rental car and head for the (Farmington) Hills, about a 45-minute drive. Routine.

We arrive at the hotel and check in. Routine.

Next morning, I get up and go through my usual Morning Ablutions. Take a crap. Brush teeth. Floss teeth. Routine.

Take shower. Hmmm, no hot water. Shit! Not Routine! Freezing! Gaaaahhh!

Must...wash...self...in...icy...Michigan...winter...cold...water!

Now thoroughly awake...and slightly thoroughly pissed off, I dress, pack up, and head to the lobby. My colleagues are wearing the same happy expression I am, which means I am not the only one who has taken a cold shower that morning.

We drive over to the sales office and get set up. Projector, on. Computer, on. Routine...again.

The presentations for the day will be in several segments. Ms. Senior Project Executive will take the first 45-minute segment, then I will take over for most of the day. We start...

And after a few minutes, I notice that I just cannot get comfortable. There’s a dull ache in my lower back that will not go away. In fact, it becomes more noticeable and persistent with every passing minute.

After half an hour, I am in considerable discomfort. Not agonizing pain, mind you, but the kind of discomfort that is the body’s way of saying, “Hey, Bub! Yeah, you! Something ain’t right!” And I notice that my forehead is bedewed by droplets of sweat.

Hmmm. Not Routine. Very much Not Routine.

Now it’s time for a break, and that’s when I need to make the Fateful Decision: do I try to soldier on through the whole day like this, or do I call a halt to the proceedings? Is this gonna get worse, or will it just go away? Screw it, I say to myself. I choose Door Number Two and announce that something is wrong and I need medical attention.

In seconds, I’m lying down on the reception area’s couch, with everyone acting all concerned. In minutes, the paramedics arrive. They hook me up to an EKG and quickly figure out that whatever is going on, at least it’s not a heart attack.

And by this time, I’ve already figured out what is going on, and the paramedics agree. It’s a kidney stone.

Yeef.

We send the paramedics on their merry way, and I have Colleague Number Two, Mr. Young Marketing Padawan, drive me to the nearest hospital while Ms. Senior Project Executive runs through my presentation materials, avoiding the need to scrub the training session. It’s not a long ride, but it’s a painful one: by now, the discomfort is getting fairly intense.

At the hospital, I cool my heels in the emergency room for an unexplainably long time. The place is empty, but I’m waiting...and waiting. Finally, after what seems like hours but is in reality closer to 30 minutes, they admit me. I put on the Ass ’n’ Back-Revealing Gown and lie down on the gurney, which thankfully is provided with nice, warm sheets, fresh out of the hospital laundry. Ahhhh.

After another seemingly interminable wait, they (finally!) do something about the pain, shooting me up with a nice, big bolus of Dilaudid. Aaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Then it’s off to get an MRI.

And, yes, Virginia, there is a kidney stone.

The resident geniuses give me a prescription for pain medication and a screen. Piss though the screen, they tell me, until you pass the stone. OK, fine.

Back to the office, now. There are still a few hours of presentation to go through, but by now I am feeling no pain...and very little else, thanks to the Dilaudid. So I do my Stand-Up Routine and finish out the day. Mr. Tough-Guy, that’s me.

After all the shouting’s over, I have Mr. Young Marketing Padawan pilot us back to the airport in my rental car. I’m happy to get on an earlier flight, and I’ve arranged to have the thoroughly freaked-out She Who Must Be Obeyed pick me up, since I am still stoned out of my mind on Dilaudid and Vicodin and in no condition to make the 45-minute drive home from the airport.

Whatta trip.

[Postscript: Next day, I’m getting checked out by my urologist, who is horrified that the hospital in Michigan allowed me to fly home. She (yes, she) has no intention of waiting for the stone to pass of its own accord. Instead, she will go in and get it. Which, the very next day, she does. I will spare you the description, except to tell you that I was mercifully rendered completely unaware of the proceedings.]

Yes, I have traveled a lot over the years. It’s usually not too exciting. And I guess I’m happy to keep it that way.

GUYS AND BLOGS

[Following is my entry in the Blogging for Books contest #9, hosted by The Zero Boss. This month, entrants must write a blog post about any incident in their lives in the style of their favorite author. The author can specialize in either fiction or nonfiction, and can even be another blogger. See if you can figure out whose style I used...]

It is 8 o’clock of a Sunday evening and I am sitting in Mindy’s restaurant on Broadway partaking of some cheese blintzes, which is a very fine dish indeed, when in walks a fellow with a white fedora. Of course I know this fellow to be none other than Elisson, because of all the citizens who are likely to be in Mindy’s restaurant at any given time, he is the only one who is likely to be sporting a white fedora, never mind that it is the middle of March.

And this Elisson with the fedora comes right up to me and gives me a big hello, and I give him a big hello right back, as Elisson is always ready with the jokes and is even ready to stand a citizen to a platter of blintzes when said citizen has lost all of his potatoes on some proposition or another. That is not the case with me this fine evening, but it never hurts to be prepared, as them Boy Scout types would say.

Well, Elisson sits down and orders a dish of gefillte fish with horseradish, a dish for which Mindy’s is well-known and even famous, and we talk about how things on Broadway are not the same as they were in the old days. I notice that the older a citizen gets, the more likely he is to talk about how things are not the same as in the old days, and Elisson is no exception, seeing as how he is getting a bit long in the tooth.

“You notice how nobody on Broadway seems to care about the old stuff anymore?” says Elisson. “Nobody goes to the races anymore, and I am thinking that this is because the OTB came in and took all the fun out of it. And nobody seems to care about shooting some craps anymore, because you can run down to Atlantic City or up to Foxwoods and shoot dice, completely on the up-and-up. Even poker has lost its mystery – they show it on the television, and every Tom, Dick, and Harry is now studying Texas Hold ’Em like a doll studies a guy’s wallet. I am thinking that this has become a boring existence any more.”

“You have a good point,” says I. “Why, it seems that it is a good long stretch since I see most of the old gang. Nathan Detroit, Sky Masterson, Brandy Bottle Bates, Sorrowful Jones…come to think of it, these guys all must be playing the duck.”

And my fedora-wearing friend cannot help but agree with me, because it is as plain as the beezer on Durante’s kisser that lately many of these fine citizens are thin on the ground.

“I will lay you plenty of five-to-seven,” says Elisson, “that this blogging business has very much and not some little to do with it, too.

“Why, it seems to me that there is a whole new gang of citizens on Broadway, and they spend all of their time wearing pajamas and writing stuff that would be in the daily bladder, except that these guys do not care to write for the daily bladder as the dress code for reporter types, last I have heard, does not include pajamas.”

Elisson is right as rain about this, and as we are chowing down on our platters of blintzes and gefillte fish and talking about old times, I remember that some of these blogging citizens are not only writing such things as would be printed in the daily bladders, but they are also coming up with interesting propositions.

Propositions have been around at least as long as Broadway and these Johnny-come-lately bloggers are not the only ones who have the good ideas. I recall the time when Sky Masterson makes himself a few potatoes off of a fellow citizen in this manner. At the Polo Grounds, he buys himself a bag of peanuts from Schultzy the Gimp and dumps them in his pocket, and after the game is over, he says like this to the citizens walking with him toward the parking lot:

“What price I cannot throw one of these peanuts past second base from behind home plate?”

Well, everybody with two brain cells to rub together knows that a peanut is too light to throw much of anywhere, so Nebbish Nelson, who never met a proposition that he did not like, says, “You can have three-to-one from me, buddy.”

“Done – two Ben Franklins against six,” says Sky, and he proceeds to stand behind home plate, takes a peanut out of his pocket and whips it practically to the warning track. This is a most astonishing throw indeed, and it is a good thing for Sky that he is nowhere in the vicinity of Nebbish when it comes out that the peanut Sky throws is not a typical Schultzy the Gimp offering, but instead has been filled with lead.

But these blogging citizens have other propositions that are interesting in their own ways. Some of them have doped out a way to get a free iPod, whatever that is, and that must be a good thing because these iPods are costing not a little amount of moolouw over at the Apple store, whatever that is.

And there is another one that operates a contest every month and the citizen who writes the best “blog-post” wins a book. I myself have worked this proposition a few times but have zilch to show for it, but someone must think it is a good idea because a whole raft of guy bloggers and doll bloggers are writing like one-legged jockeys on nose candy in order to get hold of this book.

Well, of a sudden, Elisson jumps out of his chair and runs over to the front door of Mindy’s, where he hauls off and pastes a citizen right in the beezer and proceeds to give said citizen the old heave-o right out Mindy’s front door.

Mindy is, of course, none too pleased at this turn of events and so he says to Elisson, “What for did you put the blast on that citizen who, for all you know, could have been one of my regular customers? I can not afford to have my patrons afraid to come in here for a plate of sauerkraut and ribs lest some guy in a white fedora smack them upside the snoot. Please explain this to me, or I will have Cooksie give you the old heave-o.”

And Elisson explains things like this:

“A couple of months ago, this guy Cap, who seems to be on the square, comes out with a proposition. You write the best fifty-word movie review, and Cap sends you a couple books.

“And I am thinking that this is a good proposition, because I can write fifty words twice as fast as I can write one hundred words, and also, I am very interested to read the books that Cap is sending to the winner of this proposition.

“So I write the fifty words and there is nobody else that even bothers to write the fifty words, and I am thinking that there is not a single citizen who will say ‘Boo’ to me if I declare myself to be the winner of the proposition. But there is not a word from Cap on this matter.

“And then one day I send a note to Cap and he says that he is a ‘smacked ass’ or some such for forgetting about the proposition, and that I have won the proposition and he will send me the books. He even writes about this on his blog.

“But another month goes by, and there are no books, and I am a disappointed citizen.

“I send a second note and Cap sends back the same sort of answer, and I am beginning to think that I will never see those books unless maybe I am sending Gravel-Voice Larry to collect them, and I do not wish to do this because getting Gravel-Voice Larry involved usually means someone will get his feelings and other appendages hurt. So I am just a little bit frustrated, when of a sudden I see none other than Cap himself coming in the front door just now, and I am compelled to put the blast on him.”

And at this, Mindy says, “You have done me a favor, then, because I don’t serve Welsh Rabbit in my restaurant, if you know what I mean. Lunch is on me, boys.”

And then it occurs to me that Mindy is not referring to any melted cheese, or for that matter to anyone from Portmeirion or one of them places with two L’s next to each other, but to Cap, whose real handle is Capo di Nil, which translates to “Zero Boss” any day of the week, except my friend Elisson says it really means “Zero Books.”

LETTING GO THE TREE

[Following is my entry in the Blogging for Books contest #8, hosted by The Zero Boss. This month, entrants must write a blog entry about a time when they took a risk in their lives. Was it a resounding success or a crashing failure...or something in between?]

You sit in the optometrist’s chair for your annual eye exam, head clamped to that Optical Monster Machine. You look at the chart projected on the wall, trying to decipher those tiny letters while the good doctor flips and rotates lenses...

“This way...or that way?

“A...or B?

“First one...or second one?

“One...or two?”

And on, and on.

But no matter how many lenses you look through, no matter how clear those tiny letters appear, you can’t see the future. And that’s what I need right now. I need the glasses that will let me see the future.

The phone sits in front of me, dark green handset on a warm cherry table. On the other end of that phone is a man with a job for me, a job that may be the first step in a lucrative new career.

I’ve been toiling away in the Great Corporate Salt Mine for, what is it, fourteen years now? I have had several assignments, starting in technology, moving through international operations management, most recently in field sales. Sales – who would have imagined? I, whose previous experience in selling had been peddling ice cream to neighborhood kids as one sweltering summer’s Good Humor man, am now selling 165 million pounds of plastic resin a year to industrial customers. Trainloads!

Those several assignments have come with a price. We’re now on our fourth house, and the prospect of moving back to Houston – Sweat City – fills us with dread. But that’s the inevitable, inexorable next step. A job in marketing, then some sort of management assignment, then…who knows? But all with a certain grim predictability...if I hold fast to the tree.

I look at the phone. How many days has it been since I spoke to the man? How long has it been since we sat in that restaurant and talked about business plans, of salary, of bonuses, of health plans? Just how much do I want this new job as an international chemicals trader? Trading is risky. You make ten deals, maybe seven of them are good ones - if you’re good. Disaster always lurks behind every twitch in the global market, every news bulletin. You buy a boatload of plastic pellets. If prices drop, you hemorrhage green money – for every thousand metric tons, a penny lower means you’re out $22 thousand. A dime, $220 thousand. You don’t get many chances to screw the pooch before you get the Bum’s Rush, but you can really stick it to the investors if you do. Those are the risks the shareholders take.

But what risk am I taking? I’ve got my track well mapped out at the Great Corporate Salt Mine. I have a good idea of where I’ll be ten, fifteen years from now. I have a good idea of how much I’ll be making.

And I’m bored.

Hugging the tree, ah, it has its comforts and rewards. It’s security, that tree. I feel safe under its branches, its sheltering leaves. The cold wind does not touch me and I do not hear the wolf’s howl.

But I’m thirty-five years old, almost thirty-six – and I am bored.

And maybe just a little scared.

Because I don’t have those glasses that will let me see the future.

“This way...or that way?” – Do we stay here or do we buy yet another house? How are the kids going to deal with yet another move?

“A...or B?” – Will this new company survive?

“First one...or second one?” – Will I succeed?

“One...or two?” – Will the investors hang tough, or bail if a few deals go south?

I can’t see without those glasses. But I know that I’m not yet forty, and if I don’t let go the tree today, I never will. I’m young enough to grab another tree if I have to, but in five or ten years, it’ll be hell to hook my fingers to strange bark.

The phone sits in front of me, dark green handset on a warm cherry table. I pick up the handset and punch the number. The number of the man.

THE VANISHING SIDE-BAR

[Following is my entry in the Blogging for Books contest #7, hosted by The Zero Boss. This month, entrants are to choose which genre of fiction best represents their lives - mystery, romance, horror, SF, fantasy, whatever - and write a fictionalized account of a life incident using that genre.]

Of all the escapades in which it has been my fortune to take part with my friend Sherlock Holmes, few illustrated the quick wit and extreme perceptiveness for which he was famous, as did the mystery that confronted us early in January of aught-five.

It was a wintry Thursday morning when I woke to find Sherlock Holmes standing beside my bed, fully dressed, with his pipe in hand – thankfully, as yet, unlit.

“Sorry to knock you up at this hour, Watson, but I am expecting a visitor presently, and I should like to know your impressions of him once we have spoken. Would you be so kind as to join me in the drawing room in half an hour?”

“On one condition only.” My voice was, I fear, a bit harsh, owing to my just having awakened, but Sherlock Holmes took no offence.

“Name it: it shall be seen to.”

“I should like to have a cup of Earl Grey awaiting me when I arrive downstairs.”

Holmes was agreeable, and thus it was that I arrived in the drawing room twenty-nine minutes later, my face speckled with a band of plasters as a result of my haste with the straight razor. But the sting of my many small wounds was soon eased by the steam from my hot cup of tea. I was surprised to see a familiar face sitting in the room.

“Why, Elisson! A pleasure to see you once again!”

“Ah, the good Doctor Watson. It is, as well, a pleasure for me to see you, but my reason for being here is no pleasure – no pleasure at all!”

At this our visitor sank down into an armchair and covered his face with both hands, shuddering. After this momentary paroxysm had passed, he sat upright, images of the Klees and Dalis that adorned the walls reflected in his spectacles. Then he began to speak in a low voice.

“All is lost, and I fear I shall never find it again.”

Holmes responded instantaneously. “Why, Elisson, surely a Blog-Poster such as yourself knows that That Which Is Lost May Always Be Cached.”

At this our visitor started and his eyes flew open wide.

“You are familiar with the relatively recent technological phenomenae of the Inter-Net and the Blogo-Sphere?” asked Elisson. “How... how did you... how did you know I am a member of the Society of Blog-Posters?”

“Why, my dear Elisson, that required the most minimal of deductive skills to uncover. You hold your hand in the attitude of one who is on the verge of suffering from Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, and your fingertips are flattened approximately 0.25 millimetres from their normal shape. Both of these conditions may be explained by repeated contact of the fingertips with a Keyboard Mechanism. But there were two additional clues that were even more telling.”

“And those were...?”

“First, I overheard a brief snatch of your conversation with the housekeeper as she admitted you to our lodgings just now. Surely, no-one but a Blog-Poster would use a word such as ‘Crap-Tacular.’

“And second, you are in my drawing room here at 221B Baker Street dressed in your pyjamas. What more need I say?”

“Mr. Holmes, you amaze me,” said Elisson. “Perhaps you can indeed be of service.

“My present situation has presented me with a genuine conundrum. I operate a Blog-Post Repository, into which I deposit Blog-Posts regularly. You are familiar with these?”

“Yes,” replied Holmes. “Go on.”

“It is but a simple Blog-Post Repository, consisting of a Main Body, and a Side-Bar, the latter being the place where are located the basic Navigational Tools, Useful Hyper-Links, and Stupid, Useless Flash. Yesterday evening, upon starting my Computational Device, I saw that, while the Main Body and Header of my Blog-Post Repository were intact, the Side-Bar was gone! Fie upon those villains at Blogger, with their wretched software!”

“That is serious, indeed,” said Holmes, who spent the next several minutes in a brown study. The study looked much more somber since it had been painted brown; its former teal and mauve colors had been brighter, but had had a deleterious effect on Holmes’s digestion.

Holmes’s next question was unexpected. “You say the Side-Bar is missing. But is it gone completely? Or does it appear in any way? Think carefully, man!”

Brows furrowed, Elisson considered this question for several moments, then answered as follows: “The Side-Bar appears momentarily, when I first navigate to my Index-Page. But, moments before the page finishes loading completely, pouf! It is gone, as though through a conjurer’s trick!

“But that is not all! If I should navigate to an individual Blog-Post, rather than the Index-Page, why, the Side-Bar is there in all its glory!”

At this, Sherlock Holmes leaped up and paced the room excitedly. Fixing me directly in his piercing gaze, he expostulated: “Watson! Have you heard all this? This is a new phenomenon! Not at all like the Case of the Missing Pre-Haloscan Comments... you recall how I discovered a means of resurrecting those old comments that a previous Blog-Poster client had feared were lost in the ether. But I am quite sure that the instant difficulty will be resolved as well.

“Mr. Elisson, pray tell me, has this difficulty ever happened before?”

“Why... why... yes! Two times in the past several months! Each time, it about drove me mad, but after a day, the Side-Bar reappeared as though nothing whatsoever had happened!”

“A day? One day, no more, no less?”

“Yes – one day,” answered Elisson with a degree of assurance. “But what bearing could this have on the instant matter?”

Sherlock Holmes smiled and began lighting his pipe. As the vapors from the carefully contrived blend of Turkish Latakia tobacco and Jimson weed swirled about his head, he announced, “Come back in exactly six hours, at which time I shall have resolved this mystery to your satisfaction.”

* * *

It was three o’clock that afternoon when we three reconvened at 221B Baker Street. Elisson handed his topcoat and hat – a peculiar white fedora – to the housekeeper, and immediately sank down in a well-upholstered armchair. Sherlock Holmes, for his part, paced excitedly, to and fro, in front of the glowing fireplace, pausing only occasionally to launch a gobbet of sputum towards the flagstone hearth.

“Your problem is solved. The culprit, it seems, is not the maleficent programmers at Blogger, but rather an insignificant piece of Java-Script provided by TrueFresco-Org. Remove the Java-Script, and your Side-Bar will be safely in place once again.”

Elisson shook Holmes’s hand warmly. “My good friend, if I may be so bold as to enquire, how did you deduce the source of my difficulties?”

“Quite simple,” responded the Sage of Baker Street (for so he was known). “This afternoon, I paid a little visit to my friends at the Blog-Patrol.”

“You mean,” our visitor said, “that organisation of Hit-Counters and Referrer-Trackers?”

“Just so,” said Holmes. “It appears that a recent visitor to your Blog-Post Repository had an extraordinarily long name. To be specific, the name was over seventy characters long, the sort of name that a Ceylon Hindoo would have. Or, more significantly, the sort of name one would have if referred by a Search-Engine, one that was tasked with an especially complex search.

“What happened then was clear. The TrueFresco-Org Java-Script lists referrers to your Blog-Post Repository for the immediate past twenty-four hours. When this long-named referrer came along, it overwhelmed the Java-Script, causing your Side-Bar to vanish – but only at the moment that part of your Side-Bar loaded. Thus it was that you would see the Side-Bar momentarily, only to have it vanish.

“Because the Java-Script does not operate on individual Blog-Posts, you were able to circumvent the difficulty and view your Side-Bar by navigating to them. But this was no cure, only a temporary palliative measure, and one that would not be of use to the casual visitor to your Repository.

“As for the previous instances, it is clear what must have happened. The Java-Script, as I have just described, lists referrers for the immediate past twenty-four hours. At the end of that period, the long name would drop off the list, and the Side-Bar would be restored!”

“So,” said Elisson. “It was the TrueFresco-Org Java-Script at fault all along. I cannot thus blame Blogger for my immediate difficulties, then?”

“No,” replied Sherlock Holmes, as he adjusted his deerstalker cap in the looking-glass. “In fact, to properly assess blame, one must look to both TrueFresco-Org, who provided a Java-Script that could so easily be subverted, and to http://www.askjeeves.com, whose Search-Engine is configured in such a way that its referrer names are so impossibly long. Yes,” he said, “it is that latter organisation that is chiefly the author of your woes.”

“You mean...?” I said in astonishment.

“Yes,” said Sherlock Holmes with a grin. “The butler did it.”

NOTHING DOING

[Following is my entry in the Blogging for Books contest #6 over at The Zero Boss. The challenge: describe in 2,000 words or less why your life would make a perfect sitcom.]

Jerry Seinfeld began his career as a stand-up comic, but his lasting and eternal claim to fame is his television series Seinfeld, purportedly “a show about nothing.” The show revolved around Jerry and three of his friends, following them as they lived their day-to-day lives, celebrating the ridiculousness of the ordinary. It was the show everyone talked about the next day, dropping catchphrases into the American lexicon like...like things that get dropped into other things. “Can you spare a square?” “Master of his domain.” “Shrinkage.” “These pretzels are making me thirsty.”

The show succeeded precisely because it captured that notion of “funny crap happens to everybody” that we all seem to share. Of course, it didn’t hurt that the main characters were memorable, each in his or her own way: cynical Jerry, neurotic and obsessive George, desperate Elaine, and deranged Kramer. Each character was rooted in real life, but given a semi-surreal twist by the actors and the writers. The situations they found themselves in did not drive the comedy - the characters, and their responses to those situations, did.

I can relate to Seinfeld, possibly because I can relate to Seinfeld. Jerry and I share a common ethnicity and geography. We both grew up in Massapequa, on the south shore of Long Island, albeit in opposite ends of town. While we went to different high schools, we attended the same synagogue and celebrated our B’nei Mitzvah under the tutelage of the same rabbi, one year apart. Jerry’s dad was a well-known personage in town, owing to his sign-painting business (“Kal Signfeld Signs”) and constant presence as one of the movers and shakers in our congregation.

The difference is, Jerry made a career out of being funny. I, on the other hand, made a career out of performing Niggling Bullshit for an Extremely Large Corporate Employer.

But when it comes to a “show about nothing,” Jerry Seinfeld has nothing on me.

I have the characters, all appropriately quirky. She Who Must Be Obeyed, who looketh with a jaundiced eye upon all my foolishness, and pronounceth upon it, viz: “You really are a girl.” (So what if I thought the football-shaped hibachi at Omaha Steaks looked like a brown egg?) Elder Daughter, working in a coffee and sandwich emporium (always a potent source of comedy possibilities) and dealing with her Iranian musician-grad student boyfriend (cultural conflict, another rich laff-mine). The Mistress of Sarcasm, an art-school student (more comic possibilities!) with an acid tongued sense of humor.

And then there’s me. Elisson, semi-befuddled dad, funnyman wannabe, professional procrastinator, viewpoint character of Elisson’s World. Wearer of the White Fedora.

Other, more minor, players float in and out. There’s Dora, obsessive neatnik and Shopasaurus Rex, always concerned about the size of her ass despite her Size Zero physique. From her kitchen flows an endless stream of cookies and pies, none of which she ever eats. There’s Rob, dour and phlegmatic newspaper editor, who is reduced to helpless laughter by the sound of fake Swedish. There’s Harry, Talmudic scholar and ex-cop, with a gravelly voice and personality to match, and Herman, who laughs at Elisson’s stupid jokes. And for gravitas, Rabbi Solomon Loomis, a fiery pulpit orator, professional schmoozer, and master of the horrible pun.

Seinfeld had Monk’s Restaurant; Elisson’s World has The Local Bagel Emporium, where the morning breakfasts (reminiscent of the Carnegie Deli scenes in Broadway Danny Rose) are bon mot-fests worthy of the Algonquin Round Table.

Storylines? Hell, just browse the Archives here at Blog D’Elisson and storylines just leap out at you. The enema bag left hanging in a public restroom. Elisson wandering into the wrong restroom at the airport and barely escaping with his life. Trivial conversation over the proper way to consume a pie. A weevil An evil bowl of chili. All of them ripped from the headlines of my daily life.

I’m telling ya, this sumbitch could practically write itself.

And let’s not forget catchy phrases, the bits and pieces that are absorbed into the General Pop Culture over the water cooler:

“You feckin’ eejit.”

“Son of a bitch!”

“Christ on a crutch!”

“I can’t do my work!”

“Wha hoppen?”

Only question is, is this show suitable for prime time? Given the propensity of Yours Truly to cause most conversations, at some point, to devolve to the topic of feces, perhaps HBO or Showtime would be a better venue. The broadcast networks are understandably squeamish about shows whose storylines feature commentary about turds.

But these are trivial concerns. Mr. De Mille, I’m ready for my close-up!

BEFORE... AND AFTER

[Today’s post is my first-ever entry for the Blogging For Books contest at The Zero Boss. This month, for Contest Number Five, we’ve been provided a choice of three “starter sentences” with which to begin a piece of creative nonfiction.]

Before I had kids, I thought... well, to be honest, I didn’t think. About what it would actually be like to be a father. To have real, live humans roaming the planet, humans for whom I was responsible. Real, live humans who would have to be fed, clothed, cleaned, sheltered, educated, and somehow kept alive.

No, such thoughts were dangerous, and so I removed any potential hazard to myself by simply keeping those dangerous thoughts away.

Once you’re married, though, the Avoidance Tactic has a short shelf life. Just as the softest drip-drip-drip of water will eventually wear away mountains of granite, sinister forces are at work eroding the Male Tendency to Procrastinate in Matters Concerning Reproduction almost from the moment the happy bridegroom picks the last kernel of rice out of his hair after the wedding.

First, you have the constant nudzhing of the parents and/or the in-laws providing a sort of white noise in the background. It’s the sound of a gently flowing brook...a gently flowing brook that will carve the Grand Canyon out of your bedrock-hard resolve if you give it enough time to work on you:

“So?”

“Do I have to be dead in the ground already before someone calls me ‘Grandma’?”

“Is everything OK? You’re not having...problems, are you?”

All this can be safely ignored or shunted aside, but other factors soon come into play. Foremost among these are the pernicious Friends Who Have Kids. Friends who already have children are a one-two punch to the glass jaw of your Denial Face. One, the mere existence of such people is proof that having children does not immediately make you dead; and two, the proximity of their children to your Other Half causes her Maternal Instinct to kick in. Once your friends have kids, your childless days are numbered.

And when She Who Must Be Obeyed looks at you with those I-wanna-be-a-mommy eyes, your days of denial are over, bub. Pretty soon you are going to be doing the Daddy Dance.

In our case, the Friends Who Have Kids didn’t so much as accelerate the decision process as take some of the fear of the unknown out of it. And, damn, those kids of theirs were cute. SWMBO and I would spend a day with them and look at each other questioningly. Maybe it’s time...

Then, BANG! - before I could get my bearings, impending fatherhood loomed. At T-minus one week and counting, it was time for a Come-To-Jesus meeting with myself. What the hell had I been thinking? How did I get sucked in? Waaaaaaa!

Get a grip, I told myself. Other people have survived this, and so will you.

And, as it turns out, it wasn’t all that bad. I was the stalwart birthing coach for SWMBO as she struggled through a night-long labor to give birth to Elder Daughter. I was by her side as they gave her a shot of oxytocin to “kick things up a notch.” (Hoo, boy, was that fun.) But I was also there to provide tension-relieving comic relief:

Nurse: “Don’t touch the button on this stand that’s holding up this full bottle of intravenous dextrose infusion, OK?”

Me: “OK.” [I promptly touch the button, only to find out that the bottle is actually quite heavy and that the button releases the catch that holds it up. The bottle drops like a rock, despite my hand beneath it, and crashes to the floor.]

SFX: SMASH!

Me: “Uh-oh.”

[Before I had kids, I used to screw around with things that I shouldn’t mess with. Now, I don’t. As often, anyway.]

I was there to watch as the attending obstetric nurse tried to help my bride through the last stages of labor by using the Toothpaste Maneuver. You know the Toothpaste Maneuver: the one where the nurse mashes the mother’s belly with her forearm in an attempt to extrude the baby as one would squeeze Colgate from a tube. Not for the faint of heart.

But it worked. And I was there to take pictures with the new camera we had purchased only one week before. Pictures of our beautiful newborn baby girl!

Our very first baby girl, complete with eggplant-shaped head (from the stress of delivery), and a head-to-toe coating of blood and vernix. Ecch. Pictures that only a Daddy - or Mommy - could love... or would ever get a chance to, thanks to the inadvertent inclusion of a wayward tuft of pubic hair that would forever cause the photos to be consigned to a dark closet.

Before I had kids, I thought I’d never be able to handle being present at a delivery. But it really wasn’t so terrible. For me, anyway. It was a wee bit tougher on Momma, especially the second time around. That one - three years after the first - was, if anything, even lengthier, after a pregnancy that was complicated by the recurrence of the phlebitis that had developed during her first delivery. The last two weeks before the Mistress of Sarcasm arrived, SWMBO was in the hospital, hooked up to an IV full of anticoagulants. But the delivery itself went swimmingly. No Toothpaste Maneuver required.

It’s a funny thing about the processes of pregnancy and delivery. As arduous as they are, women have an amazingly short memory with respect to just how arduous they are. There is no other way to explain the large number of families with more than one child. Women simply forget.

“What episiotomy?”

And that’s how we ended up, three years later, with two lovely girl-children.

Before I had kids, I couldn’t conceive of a universe in which I would be comfortable around certain, ahhh, substances. The ones we all deal with on a daily basis are no big deal, but when it comes to vomit, I am a confirmed puke-a-phobic. I loathe vomit, to the point where I pride myself on not having blown lunch in over 33 years. My own personal Throw-Up Record.

But when we were vacationing in Washington D.C. and Elder Daughter came down with the stomach flu, I was the one who stayed with her while Momma escorted the young Mistress of Sarcasm to the National Zoo. Thank God for hotel wastebaskets, is all I’m going to say. I was so pleased with myself for not running screaming into the hotel parking lot. Lesson: We have unexpected reserves of inner strength that reveal themselves when we help our children face adversity. Even if it involves puke.

Before I had kids, it never occurred to me in just how many ways parents influence their children. A mother’s tone of voice, a father’s decision on what constitutes a punishable offense, the jokes Mom and Dad laugh at - all of these shape the personalities of our offspring. And I would never have dreamed just how much, and in what ways, my children would take on some of my likes, dislikes, and - dare I say it? - quirks.

She Who Must Be Obeyed, for her part, raised our girls under the philosophy that If My Parents Did It, I Will Do The Exact Opposite. Believe it or not, this was an entirely reasonable approach to take. I am not sure just how SWMBO managed to survive her own childhood and come out as well-adjusted (heh-heh) as she is, but, well, there you are. She was not abused, mind you, but her relationship with her mother was a bit sketchy, back in the day. [I am pleased to report that it is much healthier now. Having an 850-mile spatial separation is a small, but significant, factor.]

My child rearing philosophy, on the other hand, was to expose the children to High Culture at an early age. This meant reading stories to them. Constant, incessant reading, mostly of stories involving Cookie Monster, Oscar the Grouch, Grover, or some assemblage of the above. But as soon as the girls were old enough to appreciate literature that was chewier than the standard Sesame Street Little Golden Books or Dr. Seuss, we moved up to Jonathan Swift and Arthur C. Clarke. I like to believe they enjoyed “A Modest Proposal” as much as I did. It must have worked; they now both read Chuck Palahniuk.

High Culture also meant fine music. What I regarded as “fine,” anyway. Our daughters were the only kids on the block who were intimately familiar with the dub poetry of Linton Kwesi Johnson and the jazz of Miles Davis as early as age three. And then there was Frank Zappa...

Last year, the girls and I went to hear Project Object when they performed in Atlanta. Project Object, in the likely case you have never heard of them, is a band whose repertoire consists entirely of Frank Zappa’s music. But to call P.O. a “tribute group” or “cover band” does not begin to describe them, nor does it do them justice, as these terms imply a semi-skilled band that coasts along by playing (generally poor) versions of other peoples’ music. Not these boys. P.O. has several semi-permanent members who have actually played with FZ at one time or another. At the show we saw, for example, the lineup included Napoleon Murphy Brock, Ike Willis, and Don Preston... real honest-to-God FZ alumni of the first water... and except for the fact that Zappa himself was missing, they did a remarkable job of recreating the sound and feel of his legendary concerts of the 1970’s and 80’s. When Zappa died ten years ago, I had thought that sound was lost forever - yet here I was, listening to it again. The feeling of having been transported back in time literally brought tears to my eyes.

[Before I had kids, I could never have imagined sharing this sort of experience with them - and with them actually enjoying it!]

So my (then) 23- and 20-year-old daughters and I were listening to this amazing-yet-strange music, and all of us were having a grand time of it. During the break, when Elder Daughter decided to go get a beer, a fortyish man standing in line at the bar asked her what a person her age was doing at this concert - thinking, I guess, that nobody that young would have even heard of Zappa. Elder Daughter responded, “Oh, I’ve been listening to this stuff all my life.” At which the man said, in an awestruck voice, “God bless your parents!”

And, yes, we are blessed indeed. What other Dad has kids that can join him in a rousing sing-along of “Florentine Pogen”?

OK, so exposing the kids to Zappa at an early age may have warped them a little. But I’ve damaged their minds even more than that.

Maybe as a result of having read a lot of MAD Magazine as a kid, I had (and still have) a habit of inventing silly lyrics to songs. This would probably be harmless, except for the fact that, growing up, the girls didn’t always know whether ol’ Dad was singing a real song or was making up some silly crap.

[Before I had kids, I didn’t realize that children hear - and remember - every word you ever say in their earshot. This can create problems... for them.]

Here’s Elder Daughter, attending a performance of “Jesus Christ Superstar” in Boston with a group of friends. And they’re all singing along:

Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ -
Who are you, what have you sacrificed?
Jesus Christ, superstar -
Who in the hell do you think you are?

At this point all eyes swivel toward Elder Daughter. “Hey, those aren’t the right lyrics!”

And she responds, “Yes, they are! I learned them from... (growing realization that she has been duped)... my Dad! Aaarrrrgggh!”

Before I had kids, I thought I’d never know how sweet it could be to tell a story like that. Now, I do.