Lysine Rich

What happened to the drabbles?

2011-09-18T23:47:00.001-07:00

So, you may have noticed that I have totally fallen off the wagon. There are a couple reasons for this. One is that I've started reading compulsively, all the Arthurian legend I can find. Right now I'm sitting next to a pile of books that is at least a foot and a half high, and it is staring at me with big doe eyes and saying "Why aren't you reeeeeading meeee?"

The idea was that I was going to use Arthurian legend in a story I was writing, and for that reason I should really know more about King Arthur than can be conveyed in the musicals "Camelot" and "Spamalot". But I appear to have gone overboard (me? Go overboard? Never!) on the research. When (if) I get out from under the pile, and actually write something, it'll be up here. I promise. And it'll be longer than 100 words.

In the meantime, I'm also making a corset! And teaching myself embroidery! It will be fantastic, or maybe awful, but it will be a corset! You can read about the first day of work here!

In other news, I think maybe I need to scale back on the grandiose plans. Maybe? Or would that be no fun at all?

Drabble: Inculcate

2011-09-08T18:15:00.000-07:00

I liked the "repetition" part of the definition most. This sort of works, I think.

Abby didn't really like the poem her teacher had chosen for her, a complicated tangle of words that she could barely pronounce, much less understand. But she liked the way her teacher had smiled upon handing her the script, whispering “I saved the best one for you.” And so Abby dutifully forced her mouth into awkward positions that would yield the knots of language until the clots tripped off the end of her tongue lightly.

Years later, whenever she heard the poem, she would smile with proprietary pride, her nostalgia making up for the obvious and plentiful textual shortcomings.

Drabble: Aplomb

2011-09-07T21:50:00.001-07:00

You can tell I'm tired because this is almost entirely based on a pun. Better tomorrow?

“Oh no, I'm sure I can handle it,”was his continual reprise. First, when the drain was clogged. Then,when the caustic chemicals he was using began bubbling back uptowards the kitchen. Again when the floor was covered in lime, eatingthrough the mop he was trying to use to clean it up. You couldn'tfault his confidence, or his collected nature, simply the results ofhis actions.

“Stop it,” you would say. “We should call aprofessional.”

“Oh, no, we don't need to pay aplumber for this. I'm sure I can handle it.”

Drabble: Gammon

2011-09-07T01:12:00.000-07:00

Oh no! I'm super late, because work today was a nightmare and a half, and then Ceili lasted until they kicked us out of the Gelato shop. The latter totally made up for the former, of course.

But! Here is a drabble about lies and ham, because Gammon means a lie, but it sounds like ham.

The ham gleamed in the center of thetable, succulent and golden. Christopher's mouth watered. This washis favorite part of Christmas: the ham. And better, his cousins werevisiting their other grandparents.

Christopher only had to share with hisparents and his father's friend, who had nowhere else to go.

“You don't keep kosher, do you?”Christopher's father asked. “Chris loves ham. Insists on it.”This was too good to be true!

And then the reply: “It's fine. Itlooks delicious.”

Christopher's heart fell, but not far.One old man was still better than four cousins.

I know, I know, no four people could eat a whole ham in one sitting, especially if one of them is Jewish and another a small child. But this is America, land of excess, so they'd certainly try.

Drabble: Paralipsis

2011-09-05T20:26:00.001-07:00

Percy checked again to make certainthat all his things were properly packed. If something was amiss, itwas an excuse to repack. He hated disorder. And every moment packingwas another moment not fighting monsters. It was safer here.

The message from the king had been veryclear on one thing: all able-bodied young men were to go the northernborder. It hadn't mentioned what they would be fighting.

The rumors were not particularlycomforting. “Apart from the usual dangers,” a soldier had said atthe inn last night, “I hear there's another dragon to contendwith.”

Drabble: Braird

2011-09-04T12:51:00.000-07:00

Rightly, this should be about zombies climbing out of graves or something. That'd be even better. Maybe I'll write that one later. But zombies don't really /sprout/, they grow, so I had to include a plant in the first one.

“That's not what bell peppers looklike.” He meant it as a warning, but I heard an attack.

“My peppers are lovely,” I bit.

“Your peppers are black. Are theyrotten?”

“Rotten! They're delicious.” Helooked at the plant dubiously. “Taste it,” I insisted, picking aparticularly dark pepper. “It's safe.”

Hesitantly, he took a bite. Hissuspicion melted away, but nothing replaced it. “Oh,” he said.“Can I have another?”

He'd be back to criticism all too soon.But in the meantime...

“Water,” I said.

He picked up the hose.

Craft blog: blue jean bustle

2011-09-03T14:40:00.000-07:00

So, a while back Paula (who is awesome) and I decided to start a blog full of the things we make. And I finally wrote up a post, from the pictures I took while making a bustle inspired by one of hers. (A shameless ploy to get her to post? Maaayyyybe...)

Anyway, you should check it out!

My blue-jean bustle!

Drabble: Nebulize

2011-09-03T13:53:00.000-07:00

Hey, an early one. And one that I rather like. I've finally told enough of a story that I feel like it has a beginning, middle, and end. So that's something. It still feels like the beginning of something longer, and there's still more things open at the end than resolved, but it's a drabble so I feel like there are allowances made.

“There are… thingsin the fog!” His voice is shrill; almostcrazed.

“Stop crying like a scared child,” you chide. There arealways shapes in the fog, little shadows and depths. Fog is never a uniformwhite blanket. You see it every day.

But you’ve never feltit before. There’s a thickening in the fog around you. Your vision clouds. Youcan still hear him, but muffled as though someone was covering your ears. Youcan feel a tendril of the fog – an individual tendril – as it fills your mouth.

“Don’t ssscream,” it whispers. “Thisss will only hurt alittle.”

And it's early enough; maybe I'll have time for another one today. Or a post about something else. That'd be crazy.

Drabble: Darkle

2011-09-02T18:38:00.000-07:00

Let me first say that really, there shouldn't be a word that means "darken" and rhymes with "sparkle". But there is. Because life is just that wonderful. And, secondly, another drabble that sounds like the introduction to a story rather than something that stands on its own. I'm working on it. I feel like I could have pared the beginning down even more, but that it would lose any voice it had, and that wouldn't be as good. This is at least better, because it gets to the punchline, kinda. Maybe.

The pool shone darkly in the moonlight. Caitlynn dipped atoe in experimentally, half expecting it to be solid as glass, or thick asmolasses. It wasn’t. The ripples shivered away from her foot, blotting out theimage of the moon, and then they were subsumed as she waded in. She leaned backand closed her eyes, floating. Peaceful. She didn’t notice clouds washing in,until the stars were gone and the moon was a faint light patch. The pool hadturned velvety-black. It clung to her skin.

She dried herself with a towel, but the shadow wouldn’t comeoff.

(EDIT: I totally thought that setting the "Published on" time for sometime, like, six hours from now would hold this for six hours. No such luck. Either I'll figure out a way to do that or I'll just know in my heart that I'm one ahead on drabbles for the month.)

Drabble: Substrate

2011-09-01T21:01:00.000-07:00

For some reason this took me back to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, with "An audience! Perfect! A lucky thing we came along."

Weird, huh? You'd think I would be all Michaelis-Menten with this one, but no, I chose Stoppard. Let this be a lesson to you: I will always, always choose Stoppard. Of course, now that it's written, I'm not sure I got across what I wanted to.

The cart trundled sadly into town; itsuneven wheels making up for the cement roads and giving it a suitablylopsided, lurching appearance. The banner was barely legible:“Carnival Veronica.” I remembered it being painted in crisp,bright colors, trailing flags that glittered in the sunlight, but nowit just all seemed brown and gray and decrepit. Crumbling. Sad.

“Daddy! Daddy! A circus!” criedBethany, and she tugged on my hand. “Let's go see the circus, canwe, daddy? Can we go?”

“Of course,” I answered, seeing mymemory reflected in the glow of her face.

What I was going for was a magical carnival, one where what you see is a reflection of your imagination/innocence/expectations. But it feels a little bit more like "Kids like the silliest stuff, don't they?" which is totally not where I was going. Suggestions?

Drabble: Metaphrastic

2011-09-01T04:39:00.000-07:00

Turns out I used yesterday's word of the day. And although Metaphrastic describes a piece of writing that's been changed from one form to another - and hence I was tempted to find some non-drabble to turn into a drabble - the idea that stuck with me was about gestures that are beyond phrasing, or structure, or language. Or something like that.

The canceled flight should not be a big deal. Any other trip, you would smile and find a seat that isn't horribly uncomfortable. But it's early, or late – you can't tell, you've been traveling for sixteen hours – and you need a shower and a bed.

You can't tell how you look, crumpled against the wall, exhausted. But you're brought out of your misery by a tiny hand on your shoulder. A child anxiously offering a stuffed toy. It takes all of your strength, but you smile gamely, shake your head, and try to find a cup of coffee.

Drabble: Ice Cream

2011-08-28T19:49:00.000-07:00

I had risotto for dinner, and it was glorious. Fabrics + risotto + Doctor Who + a hammock make for a very happy Elizabeth. And the best part is I cleaned my kitchen in the process, so I can go back to mopped floors and only a few dishes.

No, actually, the best part was eating risotto in a hammock as the sun set. The clean kitchen is just a bonus.

Tonight was a night for macaroni and cheese. Something gooey and fattening – food that went straight to your hips, but on the way it felt like a warm blanket. Emily stared at the e-mail from her boss. “Needs to be rewritten. See me.” Attached, her life's work. The few comments were ambiguous except for their negativity: “Wrong,” “Awful,” and “You write like a drunk preschooler.”

Her phone buzzed, Malcolm checking in with some witty remark. Emily smiled for a moment. “Texting on company time, Emily?” her boss asked, behind her.

Maybe ice cream, too.

Return of the Drabbles?

2011-08-28T01:26:00.000-07:00

Don't get your hopes up, but here's one.

Sara watched the sky, silent, while Nathan drove. The stars, once so bright, were fading; drowned out by the aurora of civilization. “Everything seemed so much brighter out there,” Sara said quietly. “Cleaner, or simpler, or something. I don't know.”

Nathan didn't respond.

“I suppose if we lived there, it'd be just as bleak as home.” For a moment, it sounded deep. “It's the routine that destroys it, maybe.”

“Maybe,” Nathan agreed. Tomorrow there would be coffee, and work, and the gray normalcy of life. But tonight there were still stars left. Sara watched them.

Drabble

2011-06-16T23:11:00.000-07:00

What's this, a drabble? Came to me on the train. Initially I wanted to do this with 100 characters, and not 100 words, but then I wasn't sure if spaces counted and so I just did the lazy thing and wrote it as a drabble instead.

When you left, I planted a tree. I would sit under it every day, and cry. My tears watered it. I thought of Cinderella, and the spirit of her mother. Maybe the spirit of our love would come back to me some day, if I tended faithfully to its remains. I promised I would never forget, never listen to the friends who told me to just get over it.
But trees need a lot of water, and a girl can only cry so much.
I met him before it had grown stout. And it withered, and died. I’m not sorry.

And the 100-characters (counting spaces and punctuation) version:

I planted a tree when you left. My tears watered it. But it was thirsty, and I can only cry so much.

The other idea I had on the train, this one does work with 100 characters, counting spaces:

His most serene highness, the emperor Ferdinand Archibald Van Hooferschteinen III, slept peacefully.

Belated Circus Video

2011-06-14T17:21:00.000-07:00

What my mother has been waiting for:

Of course, when I look at it now all I see is the fumbles I make, the time I spend thinking "Wait, what now?" and so on. Advantages over the previous act: I have a character. Disadvantages: the song isn't as good for an act, and the moves don't go as well to the song.

I think those parts are a function of how I choreographed, which is to say that I chose the song (and in certain ways the character) because I was performing in two weeks and hadn't yet found anything better. I had a few sequences I wanted to fit in, and I cut stuff out to fit the music. It worked, and the act is okay, but it could be way better. And although I like the fact that the character came semi-first, and the music came later, I think that it probably works best to spend enough time playing around with the music that they really flow. So next time, before I start stringing tricks together, I'll find some music.

Gardening

2011-06-07T13:02:00.000-07:00

My mother, I am certain, wants to see circus videos (last week was notable for two end-of-session showcases). But instead I will bother her with something no one but me cares about: pictures from my garden.

This is the garden that Amy and I planted. It is badly in need of weeding, but otherwise looks good. I think we should start eating some of the leafy greens, otherwise they will be altogether too much. Or something like that.
Especially the arugula. It's taking over the raised bed as if there's nothing else growing there, which shortly there won't be because it will all be arugula.

Which, honestly, won't be all that bad. There are a lot of worse things than arugula. I love it's spicy, bitter bite. None of this is news. What is news is that I finally tried some of the arugula growing in my garden. And let me tell you - it was like store bought arugula only about a hundred times more potent. I don't know what they do to remove all the flavor from the stuff I get in the produce section, but I was shocked, and impressed.

And I only have one more thing to say:

I'm looking forward to the tomatoes.

Ask a Geneticist, again!

2011-05-18T16:23:00.000-07:00

I have another "Ask a Geneticist" answer posted. This one was very interesting to write. Hopefully I did an okay job.

http://www.thetech.org/genetics/ask.php?id=410

I want to do something in this space, but I've been distracted from drabbles. Maybe I'll go back to them but on a less demanding schedule. Maybe I'll write longer stories less frequently. Maybe I'll start trying my hand at some science writing. Maybe some combination of those. If you have opinions, share them.

Anneal

2011-04-26T18:34:00.000-07:00

Not happy with this one. But I didn't have any better ideas. I just automatically go for jargon when I see that word, and I had to fight against it - awkwardly, at best.

They met in late August, at the height of a scorching heat wave tearing through the Midwest; bumped into each other between pool parties and barbecues. Each regarded the other with a mixture of respect and distance. A rival.

By September their similarities could not go unnoticed, and they happened upon an awkward friendship. The leaves turned, and pool parties were exchanged for movie nights, and they seemed to merge. Maybe the changed happened on Halloween, and maybe Thanksgiving, but before the first snow, they were best friends. But they always insisted it was temporary: “Just wait until the summer.”

Marginalia

2011-04-25T16:50:00.000-07:00

The[O1] derivation of[O3] the formula[O4] being simple, it is left as an exercise[O9] for the student[O11] .

[O1]The derivation of your mom is simple[O2].[O10]

[O2]And left as an exercise for the student.[O10]

[O3]Calculus sucks!

[O4]Mary Jacobson <3 Trent Adams [O5]

[O5]Garrison Hopkins[O6]

[O6]James McDaniel [O7]

[O7]Noah Czernowitz [O8]

[O8]Every boy in school

[O9]I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of this, which this margin is too narrow to contain.[O10]

[O10]Thinks he’s cleverer than the rest of us, but probably can’t figure out the three line proof. Joke’s on him.

[O11]Actually, it’s in appendix three.

[O12]Who checks appendix three? [O12]

[O13]Who writes in a library book?[O13]

Homunculus

2011-04-22T16:21:00.001-07:00

Technically, a voodoo doll isn't a homunculus, I don't think. Especially one that doesn't work. Oh well.

Phoebe huddled over the little clay doll, clenching it in her hands and hoping that he felt the constricting tightness of her grip. She wanted to crush him. To boil his blood and grind his bones to dust and dance on his ashes, naked from head to toe, feet blackened with soot and dirt. Nothing short of that would be suitable punishment. Nothing short of that would assuage her anger.

She squeezed the doll until it cracked and crumbled in her hand, turning to dust. She threw the dust on the fire, and watched it flame out. But nothing happened.

Mumbo-jumbo

2011-04-21T16:12:00.000-07:00

The ship ran on a state-of-the-art technobabble drive. So long as there was a semi-plausible but ultimately meaningless explanation, accepted by the crew on faith, everything was fine. The life support used ultra-dense biomimetic arrays to replenish oxygen. They were propelled either by solar sails or nuclear fusion. Maybe both. No one cared to question it. Everyone knew what happened when someone doubted; they had seen the Perseus fall out of the sky. All it took was one word to punch a hole through the hull faster than you could say “I do believe in fairies.” One traitorous word: “Why?”

Initially, this was going to be a string of technobabble trying to explain something. I like this better.

Abaft

2011-04-20T18:34:00.000-07:00

It means "Behind" but it reminds me of "Abashed" because I'm a terrible person and that's how someone with a lisp would pronounce "Abashed".

She wanted to interrupt, to shout something impetuous but ultimately futile. Or even just the truth. But he had warned her about it, had expressly prohibited it, and he had always looked out for her best interests. “This isn’t about what’s true,” he’d said. “This is about damage control. I’ll take care of it, you just stand behind me and look abashed. It’s what they want; they’ll lap it right up. And then we can go back to not giving a crap about them. Okay?”

So she stood, and stared at her shoes. It would all be over soon enough.

Akimbo

2011-04-19T13:54:00.000-07:00

The poster on the wall showed Superman, chin up, arms akimbo, sun making a halo behind his head in posterized art deco glory. Whenever Jeremy felt overwhelmed, he adopted that pose. Or tried to, at least. His narrow shoulders could never quite match the man of steel’s comically proportioned frame. It was a pose, nonetheless, of determination and power. He brushed his hands together. He couldn’t see the floor, covered in a six-inch deep layer of dirty laundry and schoolwork. And his mom had said: no laser tag until the room was clean.

This was going to take a while.

Corybantic

2011-04-18T18:13:00.000-07:00

This is an awesome word that I didn't know until today. It means frantic or without restraint. It might be one of my new favorites.

“No, no, no!” the director shouted. “It’s flat, sagging, like a corpse on the far side of rigor mortis. It’s even letting off a putrescent stench.” The dancers scowled. None of them appreciated his metaphors, which seemed more likely to turn stomachs than clarify concepts. “You need to breathe life into the choreography. You need to commit, at least. Better to do something decisively wrong than pussyfoot around.” Another conspiratorial glance – there had been too many derisive lectures about footwork to forget.

“In fact, just forget it. Make something up. Improvise. Just don’t run into each other. From the top.”

Absence

2011-04-17T14:50:00.000-07:00

My computer died on Thursday, which is why I haven't been posting (for both of you who noticed).

And since it's been a while, I have a longer story. It's (obviously) the beginning to something longer, which I might or might not write. It feels a bit too much like too many of my other ideas, and I have no idea where the plot would go. At this point, it's just playing around with characters and trying to make them believable.

Wendy loved the rain; the soft percussion of water against her roof, the tense static charge released from the air, and the smell. Especially the smell. She loved sitting out on the balcony and watching the damp streets below, people scurrying by with umbrellas, collars upturned against the damp. There was something exceptionally romantic about rain. Something that Alice, standing just inside the sliding glass door, failed to see entirely. “You’ll catch your death,” she remarked dully. At least Wendy had made it obvious over the years that while she respected her friend and took her counsel on many things, Alice was not going to change Wendy’s love of a good rainstorm. Alice barely even tried anymore. “I was thinking,” she continued, gesturing with her martini so loudly that Wendy could hear it without turning. “I know you’re resolved to live in this hovel, but there’s no reason it shouldn’t at least look like a home. My friend Diane can fix you right up.”

“My apartment is just fine,” Wendy insisted. “And I don’t have the money for an interior decorator, anyway.” Wendy paused for half a moment – any longer and Alice would certainly cut in – before she continued. “And even if I had the money, I would use it for something else. Or even just save it. The last thing I need is an apartment’s worth of decorations and no apartment to put them in.”

Alice’s tone was frustrated and not a little condescending. “Wendy, darling, don’t think of the price. Let me pay. I want to – in fact, I insist. And Diane will be on strict orders to avoid extra expense. This isn’t about buying art for the walls; although you certainly could use something to bring interest to the place. This is about using what you already have to brighten your little corner of the world.”

“What I already have is a bed, two chairs, and a table.”

“Yes, well, in your case it might involve a trip to the flea market.”

Wendy rolled her eyes. “Why are you doing this, Alice?”

“I just hate to –“

“Really.”

“Diane’s down on her luck, and my loft is already gorgeous.”

“You’ll pay?”

“Of course.”

“And she’ll stay out of my hair?”

“You have my word.”

“Fine, have at it.”

“Marvelous. When can we all sit down together to consult?”

“Consult?”

“To plan. You understand.”

“You said she would stay out of my hair. Diane can do whatever she wants, so long as I don’t have to see her. You have a spare key.”

Alice sighed one of her trademarked sighs. This one said ‘You are being unbelievably difficult and I do not know why I put up with you.’ Alice had perfected the art of the sigh at a very young age. “I will never understand you, Wendy, dear,” she said.

Wendy shrugged. “You’re the baffling one,” she insisted.

They fell into a comfortable silence, the sound of the rain overtaking their conversation. Comfortable, at least, for Wendy, who was content to sit and listen to the rattling in the copper gutters. Alice fidgeted inside, playing with the venetian blinds and rearranging the bedspread.

“Are you going to sit there all night?” Alice asked.

“Of course not,” Wendy lied. She would stay out as long as it was raining, she thought. “I have work tomorrow.”

Alice chuckled, another one of her perfect expressions. This one somehow expressed her mixture of equal parts respect and disdain for Wendy’s job. “How are the little monsters?”

Alice never referred to Wendy’s students as children. It was as if, in Alice’s mind, children were mythical creatures, like unicorns or mermaids. The small, unruly people Wendy spent most of her day with were just runted adults, and rather disgusting examples of messiness and need. Little monsters, designed specifically to ruin a good designer pant suit.

“You don’t want to know,” Wendy answered.

“It’s still polite to ask,” Alice insisted.

“If you say so.”

“You’re wasting your talents. You could be so much more than a third grade teacher.”

“I’m good with kids. I like them more than adults, usually, anyway.”

“But you could change the world.”

“Who says I won’t?”

“I just hate to see you squandering your life.”

“And I don’t see it that way.” There was another pause; this one tense enough that Wendy couldn’t drown it in the sound of the rain. This was another sticking point. Wendy didn’t know what Alice expected her to do. Alice herself was a hedge-fund manager at a local branch of a banking conglomerate. Wendy didn’t know exactly what she did all day, unless it was shuttling money between accounts and collecting a disgustingly large paycheck.

“I should be going.”

“Okay.”

“You know how Clarence gets if I leave him to his own devices for too long.”

“He might start rearranging the furniture.”

“Oh! Don’t even joke about that! It isn’t funny.”

“See you next week?”

“Of course, darling. You know I love our talks. I’ll see myself out.”

Wendy heard the sound of Alice latching the door behind her, and nestled further into her chair. She was alone now; just her and the rain. She breathed in the smell of mist and mud, and breathed out. She finished her beer, and closed her eyes, and might have fallen asleep in her chair. She dreamed that a raven, feathers in disarray and with a clipped wing, flew up to her balcony. She felt like she should have been afraid, but she wasn’t. The bird just looked pitiful, like it had just been in a fight with a cat and had come out the worse for wear. It blinked its jet black eyes at her, and cawed. She thought she heard a plea in the caw, and she reached out to the bird, but it hopped away and flew, wobbling and dipping but never quite falling, into the night and the rain and the city.

She woke up in the middle of the night. The rain had stopped. She stood up, stretching her shoulders and yawning as she picked up her empty bottle. She took one last glance at the rain-drenched street, and saw him: collapsed under a streetlamp, drenched and in a pool of what she hoped was rain. She hurried inside to call an ambulance, and when she knew they were on their way she stepped into her galoshes and made her way down the stairs.

Up close, the pool wasn’t water. He had been badly beaten. She stayed two steps back, in case he was some kind of crazy person, and said, tentatively, “Mister?”

She thought he groaned.

“I called an ambulance. They’ll be here soon. What happened?”

He mumbled something that she couldn’t understand. Crazy, then, most likely. “Whoever it was beat you up real good,” she said. “I’ll stay with you until the EMTs get here.” In the distance, she heard sirens, and the cawing of crows.

And since I have a computer again, I'll resume posting drabbles tomorrow.

Praxis

2011-04-13T13:57:00.000-07:00

Very quick, for better or worse. But it seemed appropriate.

“You want to build what kind of building on our campus?”

“Engineering.”

Dean Jordan sighed and ran his hands through the two strands of hair he had left. “Have you toured the University?”

“Yes, and there is no engineering building.” Jordan’s bespectacled interlocutor seemed undaunted, perhaps even oblivious.

“You’ve talked to the students?”

“Why would I do something like that? I can get the numbers from U.S. News and World Report. You’re ranked top ten in the country, even without an engineering building. The students are certainly smart enough.”

“Are they interested?”

“Why wouldn’t smart kids be interested in engineering?”

Oppugn

2011-04-12T20:28:00.000-07:00

“The esteemed senator from Colorado is mistaken,” intoned the speaker with a smug smile to the colleague to his right. As if to imply that their opponent from Colorado was a small child worthy only of condescension.

Something inside her snapped, and although she knew she would probably be kicked out of the proceedings for disorderly conduct, she interrupted. “Stop it,” she demanded. “Your façade of respect is as sickening as it is false. We don’t esteem each other, and I’m not mistaken. You’re lying, about everything. You haven’t said a true word since you’ve been elected, if not longer.”

Another late night in lab, made better by the fact that this afternoon I had some time midair. Everyday is better with a little bit of circus. And possibly with a lot of science.

It's also possible that the disconnect between the "normal" Baker lab schedule and my own makes nights that wouldn't be late for any other graduate student seem later. Although I think 10 PM is late for most anyone, and it's looking like two of those in a row.

Balderdash

2011-04-11T14:11:00.000-07:00

Spent the better part of the weekend reading the latest Thursday Next book. It occurred to me that my love for Jasper Fforde pairs nicely with my love for Tom Stoppard, in that half the joy of either of them is in allusion, wit, and postmodernism.

Three of my favorite things!

Anyway, that certainly led to this, although I'm not sure how much I like this one. Feels too much like ripping other people off.

How to Tell You’re an Artificial Construct from Someone Else’s Mind: Ten Easy Rules

1) Your life is full of foreshadowing, not coincidence.

2) Your actions and words all have significance.

3) You forget large swaths of your past until they become useful.

4) You have one, and only one, striking physical characteristic.

5) You know your purpose, or

6) you feel reasonably certain you have one.

7) You forego mundane actions – like eating or bathing –

8) without consequences – like starvation or body odor.

9) You’re easy to ignore, especially when you're right.

10) When you're cut, you bleed ideas.

Simpatico

2011-04-10T22:42:00.000-07:00

Megan almost tore her royalty check out of its envelope, holding it up to the light. She was going to be rich! But then her heart dropped. That was it?

The reviews had been so good. “The next big thing to hit bookshelves!” and “The best new writer of the decade!”

And, most traitorous of all, her agent’s “You’ll live fat off of the royalties!”

Her dismay turned to anger, and she picked up her phone, calling the liar. “The check was too small,” she insisted. “You said I’d be rich!”

“Darling,” her agent consoled. “I say that to everyone.”

Tenterhooks

2011-04-09T17:26:00.000-07:00

“I’m sure you’re all wondering why I brought you here today. It is a matter of utmost importance and seriousness. But bear with me for a moment. It was the habit of my late grandfather to host dinner parties, much like this one, upon the occasion of any significant announcement. As you might have surmised, it is my intention to continue his legacy, and I would like to start with a moment of silence in his honor, on this inaugural celebration.”

Everyone bowed their heads dutifully at first, but the pause dragged on and someone asked, “Well? What is it?”

Futz

2011-04-08T13:35:00.000-07:00

This word would only be better if it was in May.

According to legend, every thousand years, a God appears in the sky and heralds the dawn of a new age. But we weren’t superstitious. We had science, what use had we for legends?

Most people didn’t think anything would happen.

Until It – He? She? – appeared in the sky; a hazy white face in the heavens, cloaked by starlight. Clerics gloated, called it the hour of judgment. When nothing happened, they fell into an awkward silence. Everyone waited for the other shoe to drop.

But our leaders wouldn’t wait. “There’s only one thing to do,” they said. “Let’s shoot it down.”

No, it doesn't make much sense, unless you know the song "Futz Said Julie". And no, it doesn't make sense that someone at some point wouldn't have said "Dudes, chill, it's a comet." But no, I'm not apologizing.

Metier

2011-04-07T17:18:00.000-07:00

“Where do you get your ideas?”

The question was a needle in Jeremy’s ear every time he heard it. How do you answer that question? Everyone gets ideas, or no one gets ideas. Some ideas are good and some are bad, and the only difference between Jeremy and his brother who painted vans was that Jeremy threw out more of his work. Every painting started out mediocre, and most never got better. But that wouldn’t mollify his interviewer, who wanted to portray Jeremy as a genius.

Fortunately, he had a prepared response. “Aliens.”

“Aliens?”

“They beam ideas from outer space.”

Canorous

2011-04-06T12:25:00.000-07:00

At first I only heard the baseline, the drum beat. Even that was impressive, coming from ten feet away and filtered through earbuds solidly entrenched in her ears. Volume went with the inverse square law; just how loud did that mean it had to be at the source? I thought I caught hints of a song I hated, but they faded into the background and I ignored them.

But the familiarity caught me again, and again, and again. The song was on loop. “Umbrella, ella, ella” it went. I tried to laugh. This was going to be a long hour.

This was my personal aggravation last night, on my way home from circus. I almost cried, but that would have been weird, so I laughed bitterly instead.

Irascible

2011-04-05T15:06:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time, there was a very bad-natured lion. She was angry because she was in pain, and she was in pain because there was a thorn stuck in her paw.

A clever mouse, who had read enough fables to know how this one ends, approached the lion cautiously and said “I’ll remove the thorn from your paw, if you agree not to eat me!”

The lion scowled, and snarled, but finally nodded her head, and the mouse made quick work of the splinter.

“Now we should be fast friends,” declared the mouse.

The lion yawned, and ate him.

I thought that 'irascible' had a connotation of stubborn, rather than just easily angered. To contrast with cantankerous -- cantankerous is angry, but irascible has principles. Or something. But according to Dictionary.com, that's not the case; irascible is just as arbitrary as cantankerous.

Dapple

2011-04-04T18:10:00.000-07:00

Cynthia wasn’t a painter; she had never picked up a paint brush unless forced. She was an ombudsperson. Her job, every day, was to listen to complaints and attempt to address them. The calls that ended even remotely amicably were few and far between.

And so, when Cynthia got home each day, she picked up a water balloon heavy with molten color, and flung it as hard as she could against a canvas. The paint sprayed out from the point of impact, covering her arms and face and apartment with a fine mist. And she felt a little bit better.

It's a new quarter, and so a new schedule for aerial fabrics at Stanford. The schedule is more crowded this time; intermediate classes twice a week and two hours of open gym time a week as well. Of course I'm tempted to do it all, but I probably shouldn't. We'll see. And apparently both of the experienced teachers are leaving in the next six months or so, which means they're leaning on me heavily to take on some of the classes. It's a hard choice. I love aerial silks, and I enjoy teaching (and coaching), so it could be fun. But I like the fact that I'm not accountable for anything but my own joy right now. Silks is how I vent, and unwind, and relax; I don't want to ruin that by teaching.

Abstemious

2011-04-03T01:50:00.000-07:00

Can't sleep, might as well get this out of the way early.

They don’t mean to get you drunk. Or, that’s what they always say.

“I really shouldn’t.”

“Oh come on, one drink won’t hurt!”

But one drink is never quite just one drink: it simply smoothes the way for another, and another after that, and on and on until you’re dancing on the table with your tie around your forehead and going home from the bar with a stranger with more acne than personality. And you wake up the next morning, just barely, and immediately regret the previous night.

Next time, you remember, and warn them: “I really shouldn’t.”

They smile.

I have several craft posts to put up, but I'll likely put them in a new blog I'm sharing with Paula (because she is awesome and makes many lovely things). I'll link or cross-post as appropriate. Gardening today, so perhaps pictures of the planted garden?

Also, I'm back to thinking about interchangeable multi-part stories. My best idea so far is the story of a murder, or a suicide, in which a different order will give you a different (but unambiguous) ending. The difficult part is arranging it so that every part is interchangeable, and internally consistent, but that the ordering of some of them alters the plot. Still not quite sure how I'm going to do it.

I guess the other thing to consider is that even in the Borges story, it doesn't always have to make sense. It's possible, and acceptable, if most orientations are askew. So long, I guess, as it's not always, and totally, unintelligible. And as long as there are at least two configurations that give sensible, and most importantly different, results.

It would, after all, be incredibly easy and straightforward to write a series of short stories linked together by a theme for which specific order is secondary to the theme. Or a series of episodic short stories whose very episodic nature means that order is irrelevant. But in those situations no matter what order you use you get the same "result": the same point. There's something cool to me about the idea of writing one story that is really two stories.

Unctuous

2011-04-02T17:56:00.000-07:00

Made me think of Mr. Collins. But also this. Not sure how I feel about the last sentence. It's supposed to tie into the previous paragraph, but it could be better.

The flowers were concerning. Of all the people Mary did not want to receive flowers from, John topped the list. She threw them out in a dramatic gesture meant to demonstrate that such things were not appreciated.

She would have avoided John if she could, but they worked together. She tried to remain professional, cool, and aloof.

She realized she had failed at the company picnic. “Mary,” he oozed, reaching towards her shoulders. “I got too much sunscreen, do you need any?”

It was cold comfort that John spent the rest of his weekends in Sensitivity Training. Slimy, cold comfort.

Gravitas

2011-04-01T12:11:00.000-07:00

Here I go again.

There were people who grew beards out of laziness and a dislike for razor blades. There were people who grew beards in search of the lumberjack look that just wasn’t complete with only the red plaid shirt. There were people who grew beards because within an hour after shaving, they already sported stubble. But Timothy grew his beard for none of those reasons. His beard was a signifier of status, of maturity, and of gravitas. It brought him one step closer to Abe Lincoln, and maybe even Moses.

In short, it made people believe him, no matter what he said.

Day 31: Bivouac

2011-03-31T17:57:00.000-07:00

Because Julie told us this story of camping at Red Rock Canyon after lab meeting today.

A thin pad provided insulation from the ground, and Sheila was snug in her sleeping bag. The stars above her were impossibly bright, a million nightlights to watch over her. After such a long day, her arms and legs were almost numb: she didn’t notice the feeling of insects as they crawled along their way. She only heard the ever-present crickets.

And the explosions. The mining operation two miles away required copious amounts of dynamite. Every blast erupted in her ears and sent the campsite rumbling, jolting her awake in the fear that the ground was falling away under her.

And, miraculously, I'm done. That one is a little too punch-line-y for my tastes. I'm noticing again what I noticed the last time I wrote these: that the easiest way to tell a story in 100 words is to use the form of a joke: a long build-up and then a quick reversal. Or set-up and punch-line. I'd like to try to get away from that, but I'm not entirely sure how in this format. There's just so little space, I feel like you can either have a description (no change) or a joke (change).

I'll probably continue. I'm also thinking of changing, or loosening, the format: adding slightly longer stuff, and maybe some poetry (although poetry is not my comfort zone, so maybe not). But I'll be here tomorrow, so check back!

Day 30: Lucre

2011-03-30T12:08:00.000-07:00

I have this image of a pirate, one hand half falling off, tugging in vain at a chest full of gold as the tide comes in and fills the cave, drowning him. Because if anything reminds me of pirates, the word 'lucre' does.

The reflected light from the coins tinged his eyes and skin gold as he grinned in the torchlight. Twelve long years, and finally success. His crew had abandoned him, losing hope one by one. But that only meant more gold for him. His left hand ached with gangrene; but a tiny fraction of the loot would buy him the world’s finest hook. Whoever said piracy wasn’t a lucrative career had obviously never discovered a lost treasure of this magnitude.

He could guess why, as he reached down with his one good hand. The chest – one of perhaps twenty – wouldn’t budge.

Day 29: Bedaub

2011-03-29T17:00:00.000-07:00

“Are you sure? It looks like enough to me.”

“No! More!”

Mary sighed, looking from her two-year-old daughter to the Halloween costume. She wasn’t sure where she could fit more lace on the princess dress. It was nothing but lace ruffles, pink ribbons, and frill. Mary was almost worried that, upon donning the costume, her daughter’s skin and hair, and maybe the rest of her too, would suddenly transform to lace. “Darling,” she began, but her daughter interrupted.

“More lace!” the little girl yelled, with a pout, eyes wide and tears welling at the corners.

“Where?” Mary demanded.

“I dunno.”

Day 28: Afflatus

2011-03-28T11:59:00.000-07:00

Meaning "divine inspiration".

At first, he didn’t know what to do about the episodes. He thought they were seizures; although doctors said nothing was wrong. It seemed more frequent around computers, so he avoided them.

But instead, his hands would erupt in pain, twisting as if to find phantom keys.

So he started to carry around a foldable keyboard to attach to his phone.

Mercifully, most of the episodes were short, five-minute bursts. Few struck at inopportune moments. And so he stopped thinking about them.

Until he looked at what he was writing. And then had it translated.

When had he learned Chinese?

One more week and I will have met my goal. I'm considering doing this again next month; it wasn't trivial, but it wasn't impossible either. The only difficult part was dealing with the convention; hotel wireless was no fun, and so I had to find a friend's house where I could mooch computer time the first day, and write them after I got home the second and third days. Still, 100 words isn't very many.

Day 27: Equivocate

2011-03-27T01:41:00.000-07:00

Not sure how this turned out. But I think this idea is better than my first idea: the fuzziness and confusion of a bad sound system.

Henry was happiest when telling stories about his childhood. Without siblings, living so far from his hometown, there was no one to correct him when he told his children, “My adventures could fill a bookshelf,” or even when he just smiled and refused to answer their questions. His role as historian was his pride and joy. And he crushed doubt with an iron fist: his children would take his word for anything.

They told him so.

It was only hard in the quiet moments; those spring mornings when the blanket of fog would clear and reveal the emptiness behind it.

Day 26: Verisimilitude

2011-03-26T01:03:00.000-07:00

I went to a dance show my first year at Stanford, and the director of the traveling company who was performing talked after the show. One of the things she said was that she didn't care if something wasn't physically possible, she wanted to create the illusion - that the impossibility of it was part of the dance, and part of the spectacle. I think magic shows are always like that, self-knowingly like that. But dance sometimes doesn't realize it. You go to shows to see things that aren't real - basically can't be real - but that seem real at the time.

There's something here as in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead, too, especially the players -- what's the difference between seeming true and being true; what's the difference between theatre and life? (Obviously there's less difference if you're Rosencrantz or Guildenstern, or even Hamlet.)

And there's also the degree to which seeing the real-seeming can attune you to the real. Or something.

Not sure I like the story, though. Or really know where it was going. But I need to post now, since I'll be at the hotel for the convention all day tomorrow, and their internet is dodgy at best.

It wasn’t a simple illusion, like flying. When you pull an actor up by a harness and swing him across a stage, every audience member knows what is going on: flight. They give you the benefit of the doubt, ignore the wires. They don’t leave the theatre saying “the flight was good, but he should have been on fire too.”

None of that applies to faking emotion. But in return for the difficulty, the ambiguity, and the disbelief, the return was phenomenal. Because flight would always mean one thing, but a good actor in a great scene could redefine love.

Day 25: Bumptious

2011-03-25T14:45:00.000-07:00

A costume-themed one, in honor of the steampunk convention this weekend.

"Your costume is wrong," the voice-over intoned. "You may not know how, but it is full of flaws and inaccuracies. Details that may be invisible to you but ruin the effect for those around you. Don't be that person with an 1850s day dress and an 1880s bustle! Fact-check your costume!"

An image flashed of a woman, apparently ostracized for her poorly designed garb and very sad.

"Hipster historical will tell you what's wrong with your outfits. Stop by our offices in San Francisco or Berkeley for a free fact checking. Because however much you know, we know better."

Day 24: Kismet

2011-03-24T15:09:00.000-07:00

Can you tell I really don't like the idea of predetermination?

“Why don’t you just dump him?”

“You don’t understand. He’s my soul mate. I’ve known that I would end up with him since I was five years old. I dreamed about him.”

“You said you didn’t love him anymore.”

Morgan sighed. “Of course I don’t love him. This isn’t about love, or happiness. It’s about fate. If it was just love, I could leave. But this is one of those things, written in the laws of the universe. Or mandated by our past lives, or something. It has to be this way.”

“He makes you miserable.”

“Fate isn’t always happy.”