Saturday, March 30, 2019

A most delightful...dump.

As you read in the -Read Me First- post, this is a depository of ideas that need a home, or a place to die, or both.

I used to think having 'lots of ideas' was a good thing. I'm realizing now it has a dark side. I get so ATTACHED to my ideas that I can't give them up. I hoard them. I suppose it's the fear of running dry. The fear of one day drawing from the well only to find an empty bucket.

Time to put that fear, that lack of belief in myself, to bed. Maybe you can relate?

The remainder of this post will consist of random words, ideas, titles, dialogue snippets, and other bits taken from a stack of notebooks I've been adding to for years. Have at them. Find a use I never thought of. Pass them on. I ignore them. If I use something I'll remove it. (I just found a children's book idea I forgot about that I like. Keeping that one.) Also, if I find an entire notebook is about conflict or something I'm not going to list that. And given the stack I have, I'm actually hoping I find more of that type of content. Yikes.

Do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

*A letter to Francis Bellamy about the controversy of his Pledge of Alliance and how it was changed. "Dear Mr. Bellamy,

Please forgive the informal tone of this letter. I know we have not been introduced, but I must confess a familiarity with you that while not quite on the level of a friend, it is well above that of a stranger. This may be startling, especially again since you don't know me, but take it with the highest degree of honesty you may grant me when I tell you your 'oath', put down so succinctly, within the pages of Youth Companion magazine has made a profound mark upon the country of your birth.

An oath or pledge is not a matter taken lightly. You knew this (by all accounts) and measured your words accordingly. Would it then surprise you to learn of the discord and debate you birthed? Please don't think I am placing the blame upon your shoulders. Much has changed in the world since you were called home. Your words have been changed, Mr. Bellamy. Several times in fact."

that's where I left it.

* A children's book about a teen superhero with ADD. The book is narrated by the hero's robotic sidekick Sir Kit.

* George Washington writing a letter to the editor about the inflated cost of diamonds and double standards in general.
"False prophet? False testimony? False witness? All bad. False teeth? Not the same and just fine in my book!

* Necking with statues

* Story about a failed gold theft. Everything goes wrong. The ring leader is thwarted at every turn by accidents and the foibles of his own crew. The story ends after he tries shooting himself but the gun jams.

* Band name: Terrance and His Good Inches.

* "Nothing brings a smile to my face like taking bacon from a hungry kid's mouth."

* "I'm going home, putting a beer in this hand, putting my dick in the other, and seeing which one I finish first."

* Story idea: History Kid. A history book for kids showing normal kid behavior throughout time at various historical locations. Kids throwing rocks over the Wall of Jericho, wiping away cave paintings, spitting off the Eiffel Tower.

* Murder mystery story about missing children. One young child (the first on and off her bus) drew a map of her route to and from school so she knew how close she was to home or school. One day the bus takes a different route home. She draws the route in her notebook. That's how the police are able to eventually find her body.

* The Dangling Web Theater Company (Spider motif logo)

* Daisy Chain: a linking series of Daisy Duke pics

* How come you never see a "hero" at a shelter for abused women or men?

* A vigilante who carries no equipment. He or She specializes in improvisation.

* Razor blade smile

* A child tells her father that their is a monster in her closet. The father turns the lights on, checks the closet, looks under the bed, then tells her all is well. Suddenly the lights go off and the closet door closes. The father sends her out to the hallway. He's pulled back into the room. Door slams shut. The little girl hears growls and things smashing. All hell breaks loose. She's very scared. The door slowly opens. Her father steps out, bruised but smiling. He turns back toward the dark room. "Apologize" A monster voice from inside the room. "I'm am very sorry, sir. It will never happen again." The father says, "And?" The monster, "I, ah, will now go very far away and never come back. May I go now?" Father nods. Daughter hugs him. "Thanks, Daddy!" "That's what Daddy's are for." (Note: I am obvious a father and obviously want to protect my kids. no great mystery where this ditty came from.)

* historical fact: In Athens once a year a vote was held to see who should be banished from the city for a duration of several years. If someone got 6000 votes cast with a broken shell or piece of pottery called a "ostrakon" then bye-bye! This is the likely origin of the term 'ostracized'.

* The only reason a guy wears socks is to clean spills on the floor

* a visual of a stained glass window where the feathers of a bird actually make a sword

* juggling in a cemetery

* A cemetery where stones lower into the ground for mowing

* goldfish have a 9 second memory

* Spider-Man's powers have nothing to do with spiders, if you think about it. If Peter didn't make web shooters and studied martial arts, he'd make a better fighter character.

* visual of clouds turning upwards and forming a circle

* person is smoking in a park. A man approaches them to say smoking is very unhealthy. The person replied that so is talking to strangers.

* Herds of Sasquatch behind electric barricades being kept for...food

* "The worried look of the old."

* Rock music doesn't cause devil worship, religion does.

* Of what conflict do we suffer from ourselves

* freewill is like digesting ice cream. You can either handle it or not

* a cautionary glancer is someone at a convention who wants to look at your work without looking at you

* children's book title  "Ant Sneezes and Other Small Things"

* "That's not evil, that's masturbation."

* Comedy short about a martial arts class where the students are sneaking snacks. As the class happens the instructor steps on a cracker, hears a soda can open, smells bacon.

* story where humanity is finally exploring deep space to the point where it catches up with early twentieth century radio signals. These deep space data miners are filling the gaps in our knowledge. one pilot starts to hear updates on WWII and the...German victory. Wait, what?

* OCD pilot in space

* story of Jerk-O the Space Clown, where the next laugh is only a light-year away. He's always getting in trouble. "The Planet of Questionable Motives"

* The wolf who e-Bayed at the moon

* symbolism lists for quick reference

* Undiscovered Country Realty and the Post Mortem Chamber of Commerce

* Scientific Superstitions "Never run that test on a Tuesday."

* White noise generators in bathroom stalls

* Vomit Ave

* Bookmark used like a birthmark

* intertextuality

* "He's a self-styled stallion of the local coffee shop. He thinks he's got a lot of what the others guys have not."

* Something with Marx weeping in a corner while sharpening a dagger for Lenin, cursing his name for spilling blood on his utopia and turning Russia into a graveyard. Can I make Marx a sympathetic figure? Do I want to?

* Truth Tooth. Implanted lie detector as science proves the human ability to talk is the number one method of lying in humans

* Story idea: Digging. A family's life is turned upside down when their house becomes the center point for a decades old murder mystery. As the police peels back the back lawn, the family is peeled back from the stress. Secrets old and new come to the surface.

* Story idea" Scratches: Surfaces exist for a reason. Teen coming of age story where the main character suddenly develops x-ray vision allowing them to see "below the surface".

* Zombie Juice Energy drink. Enough Energy to Wake the Dead. image is a zombie with a tap coming out of its forehead. it's holding a glass under the running tap.





* A girl so pretty there's no where else to go but down

UPDATE! SOME BOOKS HAVE POEMS GOING ON FOR 7 PAGES. NO WAY IN HELL I AM POSTING STUFF LIKE THAT. GOOD LORD. WHAT WAS I THINKING!

* Re-making Aliens as a comedy

* "What would Buddha do? Nothing."

* Mettle Detector

* Drafting a piece about the hierarchy of convention attendees. Devotees to dragged-along to significant others.

* "There's no place like Rome. There's no place like Rome."

* That uncomfortable feeling like using someone else's toilet.

* words batman might say on a really bad day, " Our eyes have been blurred by the grey, spoon fed poisons that weave blinds to hide the monsters at our door. Night birthed me to remind the fiends some still see their faces."

* using tombstones as switches

* If Christ was a carpenter like Joseph, do you think he made comfy chairs? Does someone own one today? hmmm.....

* If You Complete Me, Why Am I Falling Apart?


* Going Down With the RelationShip.

* My Body. My Shame.

* They Don’t Like Me and They’re Right.

* It only hurts when I say I’m sorry.

* I Wish I Hated Me Less and You More.

* Hell called. They need you back.

* You are a beautiful mess.

* Pain Glorious Pain: My Life as a Human.

* I Still Have Blood In Me, No Thanks to You.

* My Nerves Are on The Outside and Your Name is Salt.

* Why Me? A Lesson in Agony.




* “How dare you question my honor! This is an outrage cleansed only by virtuous blood. I challenge you to pistols at dawn. We will settle this like gentlemen in the traditional manner afforded such an affront to my person.”

* “His intelligence is unmotivated.”

* “Hundreds of years ago the universe and all life on earth sprang forth when the Irresistible Cosmic Cream Pie impacted the Unmovable Straight Man. Then things got weird. But that is another story.”

* When he scratches his head it must seem like a vacation to his balls.

* “Pantheon records, in conjunction with Zeus Entertainment presents Narsicis singing your all-time favorite love song: I’m the one that I want.

* “The butterflies are covered in blood”

* Humans are so stupid God made shit stink so we won’t eat it. And even that doesn’t always work.

* Never hire a psychic who has voicemail.

* It had a good ending like Flowers for Algernon had a good ending.

* A cornucopia of arcane knowledge boarding on the encyclopedic served with perfectly aged sprinkles of historical oddities. Yummm.. knowledge is tasty...
 

* Image – "bombs" dropping out of a plane are actually body bags.

* Image – MRI scan of a brain that looks like a face.

* Image - Waking up and heading to the bathroom only to find the words “Throat Cut” written across your neck.

* Image - a Billiard Ball Golem

* Scientists accidentally create a black hole with exotic materials in a particle accelerator. The earth is destroyed. Only, it's not. After the terror and seeming death of everything, humanity wakes, as if from dream, in the same place they were in before the The End. After shaking off the jitters, humanity discovers everything appears normal. Same sun, same laws of physics, everything. Several weeks pass. Humanity is drawn together by the shared experience until the Hubble discovers an IDENTICAL earth on the far side of the sun. Close observation reveals it is earth in the bloody thirsty 14th century. Humanity must decide if they should interfere with this other earth, and possible their past. Who will side with whom? Will old rivalries erupt? What happens when "enlightened" man decides to play God?


* Among the social insects, the need for prompt corpse management is considered so pressing that there are dedicated undertakers, workers that within a few minutes of a death will pick up the body and hoist or fly it outside, to a safe distance from hive or nest, the better to protect against possible contagious disease. Honeybees are such compulsive housekeepers that if a mouse or other large creature, drawn by the warmth or promise of honey, happens to make its way into the hive and die inside, the bees, unable to bodily remove it, will embalm it in resin collected from trees. “You can find mummified mice inside beehives that are completely preserved right down to their whiskers,” said Gene E. Robinson, professor of entomology at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign.

* Local awareness, Intimate knowledge of the immediate surroundings. Knowing what was moved last. Where fingerprints are. Who was in the room last. How items are best placed. The history. Hidden space. Layers of paint. Old smells, images, what pictures used to hang on the wall. Omniscience in a 5 foot radius.

* Junque. A new cologne by the minds of Strongarm Labs. “When a woman smells me, she smells Junque.” Junque is the bold next step in olfactory honesty from the makers of Truth Tooth, the world’s first implantable lie detector and Wolf-Away, the world’s première werewolf repellent. Coming soon, Smelderly, the intoxicating scent of old age for the young person who wants the world to take them seriously.

* She is a mean, evil, bitch. When you call a character who she is, you are giving credit to the author. To the man who started with those same words or a vague image and transformed them into poetry, into a patient symphony of vile actions spread down before the reader so that no other conclusion can be made. An author worth his ink dips the reader into the black sludge of a soul and lifts them out again. The soul is not real so no lasting damage to the reader is done, but the craft is so good the impression of a wound lingers to teach, to ponder, and to lift the reader’s soul by the beautiful rendering of the ugly. 

*“A watched pot”

--story of well meaning, over-protective parents who keeps their children’s lives from boiling

* “Fighting the Clock”
--An old man on his death bed fights and defeats Death to prove a point before accepting it is his time. 

* “ The Long Haul”
-- Main Character - Female/early twenties/ Racial differences almost non-existent by this point, except for a few small cloistered socially experimental communities/Social class is middle like most of the world due to generational accumulation of wealth/

World – Betting on the day and time of death common practice. Prognosticating arts a cultural norm. Genetic blocking techniques lead to perfect birth control. Suicide has become a performance art. Cloning human parts common, but the cloning of people has gone “out of fashion”. Cold fission power. Atlantis found. Boredom, according to a leading radical psychologist, has become the major motivation in most people’s lives. The impulse to live has been replaced to the impulse to be entertained. Underground sex shops. Why wait for the perfect lover when you can grow them to customer orders and dispose of the bodies afterwards. Long spans have been brought about by chemicals added to the public water and air supplies. Huge plants exist which pump air into the atmosphere, while others clean the sea.

* “The Married Man’s Kama Sutra”
-- A comedy about the perils of marriage romance told as a parody of the Kama Sutra.

“* Village of the Darned”
--A reverse Village of the Damned where a very orderly and insect-like world is visited by human children. Chaos runs rampant as the human/insect cross breeds start acting like normal, curious, unpredictable kids in this paradigm of order. They start playing with things, asking a lot of annoying questions, not doing what they’re told, crying, etc, etc. All to the dismay of their parents and bafflement of their peers, of course. Now, the question is, does this society grow from this alien experience, or does it put an end to the threat once and for all?

* Unnamed future zombie tale
-- Future zombie tale. Space colony humans left the earth alone.Instead of eco-disaster, it was a zombie apocalypse.

They travel back to see the conditions and if the zombies have dies off. For some reasons, the zombies decay incredibly slowly. It takes a century for a zombie to decay to non-threat.  The humans don’t really need the earth. They are willing to let nature take its course, rather than carrying the plague into space. They check in every so often. This time, they see a message. A welcome home sign. One zombie was arisen to lead the others. She is intelligent. She wishes to establish trade and communication with her fellow humans. Her descendants. She invented a collar to communicate with. This allows a mask over the face so the space humans don’t feel threatened. It is an act of submission, to collar, to disarm oneself. Is it a trick? What motivation does the space humans have for keeping contact. They have developed amazing weapons and defenses against the undead. Can the undead out think the other humans? What do they want? What tale in history can this mirror?

* “Scratches”
-- Premise:
An average high school boy manifests x-ray vision after falling off his roof. He is poised to enjoy a fantasy dreamed of by millions of boys and men. The first time he uses the ability at school he picks the object of his lust only to discover this “perfect girl” hides the bruises and scars of abuse. He believes her “overprotective asshole” boyfriend is the abuser. The boyfriend believes the girl’s father is the abuser. The father is unaware of the abuse but he knows something is wrong with his daughter. She won’t tell him what. He thinks it is the boyfriend. The abuser is the girl’s jealous mother. The boy’s perspective grows during this journey. All faces are a scratch of the surface of a person. Some are shallow. Some are lies. Some are as advertised. We all have a hidden story. Often it’s hidden from ourselves.

The story examines the stereotypes and preconceptions we carry, including most importantly those we have about ourselves.


* Mr. Fixit.
Premise

An unflappable furnace repairman meets his match when an emergency repair call puts him face-to-face a piece of reverse engineered alien technology.

The owner’s husband worked for the government. He brought the “junk” home years ago and it worked fine until yesterday. She prattles one about her husband and the junk. The repairman wants her to shut up (never tells her) so he can concentrate on the job and stop thinking about his own problems and the strange furnace before him.

The story ends when the repair man fixes the machine the same moment the woman answers his own personal problem. He never gets to try it out, however. He fixed it too well. The house disappears in a flash of light.


* Knightengale or Knight –n- Gale
Sword and sorcery story for younger readers. Main character is female.
Witch and wizard are the same person. Duality. Cloud Giants. Fire Ants (literal) Snow Ants (they melt in your hand), visual- reaching into the ground, pulling up a root, snapping open, drinking like from a hose while the water lasts. Lady in the Lake. A spirit of Life and Reproduction (They are men. I don’t understand. You will). Spirit of a King. THE spirit of all True Kings. Whispering Willows. Death spirit (Why am I here? All pass through me, little daughter. Am I dead? From the moment of your birth) when she falls ill. Graveyard scene.

* The Erie Canal
Universal themes and myths played out by travelers on the Erie Canal. Take from many cultures and times.

 * Legendary Pest Control.
The name is literal. They control the legendary monsters. They always have! Fifties style book. Understating the situation. Prim and proper house wife at her wits end calls when ‘something’ isn’t right =huge orc in the closet. She acts upset like it’s a roach when the guys show her the signs (hug pile “Droppings”) (But I have guests coming tonight!) Then humane solution (The little guy won’t feel a thing. Creature shakes the whole house in its death agony)

* Big Space
Astronauts and alien collide in space (car accident idea). They laugh at the vast expanse of space only to collide in. The share gestures of huge. Sudden bright light. Both clueless. The large craft open revealing a huge, terrible thing…that puts on a little hat. It hands them each a little piece of paper, then leaves again. Lights flashing as it does. The alien saying something obviously not happy. Human – “ could not agree more.

* Batman
-He has 15 minutes to solve a crime at Wayne Manor
-A healer is killing people in awful ways.

* Little Girl with magical PJ’s. The PJ’s go out for adventures every night.

* Little human child and Alien child accidentally switch places for a day. Explore and enjoy each other’s world.

* A Small Worship.

* Man owes local Baron lots of money. Forces wife to sleep with him to make an heir. She turns and sleeps with a demon. Hilarity ensues.

*Zombie flavors

1     Comic geek
       Low pants > crawling zombies with nothing wrong with their legs
       Redneck
       The elderly > no teeth, poor eyesight, brittle bones
       Wall street > packs of zombies in suits
       What about zombies who eat themselves if they go long enough without fresh meat?
       Zombie nuns
      People who were dressed like zombies before they were bitten and turned into real zombies
      Cosplay zombies
      One legged zombies with really good balance.

      Zombies trapped inside ambulances and police cars and jail

      "Hanks Last Day"  -A story about the person who mails Lee Harvey Oswald his rifle.
Hank’s Last Day


    Length: 8-12 pages

     Setting: Early 1963 Chicago.

    Summary: Outside of some historians and conspiracy buffs, very few people know Lee Harvey Oswald purchased the gun he became infamous with through the mail. When I read this odd piece of knowledge my first thought was ‘Who was it that shipped Oswald his gun?’. I imagined some shipping room clerk or supervisor hearing the news on that late November day and wondering to themselves, “Oswald? Why does that name sound familiar?”
            This story is dedicated to that faceless employee whose outstanding job performance helped one customer change the course of American history. I have named him Hank, and this story is about his sudden decision to quit and the last gun he ever shipped. It will provide the reader information on a little-known side of the Kennedy assassination, demonstrate the interconnectiveness of human history, and steal a peek into a mind and culture struggling to grow.