The Thread of Continuity
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Puppies. A warm basket of puppies on the shag rug next to the window. Sunlight splashing all around. Soft yipping. Droopy eyed cuties.
Joe loved puppies. After a day of lens grinding he'd come home, shower, and relax by stroking their soft fur as he sat in his laz-e-boy recliner chair. Every now and then a warm smile would play over his features.
Sanity was receding from him like the relentless tide going from high to low under gravity's pull. Any outside observer could see it. Too bad there never seem to be any around when things could be helped. Too bad nobody cared. All those he dealt with in his daily life were far to absorbed in their own problems to notice the slide. He was always odd. They kept recalibrating his oddness as the pendulum swung.
Oh what evils can be kept from this world if compassion is lavished upon a fragile, confused mind while it is still pliable. While the heart is still breakable. While tears can still flow from tight closed eyes.
How cruel a mind can become to itself once it has said goodbye to humanity. Given up on the struggle. Gone over to martyrdom.
Joe knew he was on a one way trajectory at some level. Every day he went out hoping for an interruption to his descent but not really thinking it was likely. He could see a line approaching that once crossed would seal his doom. Yet was unwilling to compromise the principles that goaded him forward on his joyless path. Nay not joyless, for a fanatic feels a kind of euphoria while on his way it is true, but... cold... lonely... dehumanizing. The world was breaking apart in front of his eyes. Dividing. Polarizing. It was simpler to classify everything into good and evil. Most of it evil. Most of it needing to be destroyed. So that it all could be made smooth again
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We interrupt this thread for a public service announcement... Delany et al have posted a record time.
DELANEY'S DONKEY
(William Hargreaves)
Val Doonican - 1967
Now Delaney had a donkey that everyone admired,
Tempo'rily lazy and permanently tired
A leg at ev'ry corner balancing his head,
And a tail to let you know which end he wanted to be fed
Riley slyly said "We've underrated it, why not train it?"
Then he took a rag
They rubbed it, scrubbed it,
They oiled and embrocated it,
Got it to the post
And when the starter dropped his flag
There was Riley pushing it, shoving it, shushing it
Hogan, Logan and ev'ryone in town lined up
Attacking it and shoving it and smacking it
They might as well have tried to push the Town Hall down
The donkey was eyeing them,
Openly defying them
Winking, blinking and twisting out of place
Riley reversing it,
Ev'rybody cursing it
The day Delaney's donkey ran the halfmile race.
The muscles of the mighty never known to flinch,
They couldn't budge the donkey a quarter of an inch
Delaney lay exhausted, hanging round its throat
With a grip just like a Scotchman on a five pound note
Starter, Carter, he lined up with the rest of 'em.
When it saw them, it was willing then
It raced up, braced up, ready for the best of 'em.
They started off to cheer it but it changed its mind again
There was Riley pushing it, shoving it and shushing it
Hogan, Logan and Mary Ann Macgraw,
She started poking it, grabbing it and choking it
It kicked her in the bustle and it laughed "Hee Haw!"
The whigs, the conservatives,
Radical superlatives
Libr'rals and tories,
They hurried to the place
Stood there in unity,
Helping the community
The day Delaney's donkey ran the halfmile race.
The crowd began to cheer it. Then Rafferty, the judge
He came to assist them, but still it wouldn't budge
The jockey who was riding, little John MacGee,
Was so thoroughly disgusted that he went to have his tea
Hagan, Fagan was students of psychology,
Swore they'd shift it with some dynamite
They bought it, brought it, then without apology
The donkey gave a sneeze and blew the darn stuff out of sight
There was Riley pushing it, shoving it and shushing it
Hogan, Logan and all the bally crew,
P'lice, and auxil'ary,
The Garrison Artillery
The Second Enniskillen's and the Life Guards too
They seized it and harried it,
They picked it up and carried it
Cheered it, steered it to the winning place
Then the Bookies drew aside,
They all commited suicide
Well, the day Delaney's donkey won the halfmile race.
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Joe walked the 12 mile walk home in the sleety rain of west Smolensk. Yes he was part of the notorious guest worker program of the late 90s that brought many bright young lens grinders to the steppes and beyond. Somewhere in California a tall blonde was grinding the lenses in his stock. His counterpart in the exchange program.
It made him grind his teeth in the dark Smolensk nights to think of his Betsy, a blue concave bit with sexy lines, that he doted over for years. Each year removing a micron here or there to give her form a cute dimple. He made her focal length march down Fibonacci sequences. How could he have been so rash as to trade those pleasant quiet evenings grinding her in quiet joy for this? For this life?
The lenses he ground here were of a different sort. None had her form. None had her color. They were all beautiful, clean stock. But too clean. Too pure. They didn't have Betsy's unique character. He felt alone in a foreign land. He sighed often as shavings drizzled down his grinding apron.
Oh he was a superstar here. The women couldn't resist the men who ground the glass. And they would grind him. All through the night. The long sleety cold west Smolensk nights.
His animal urges were sated. But his heart longed for home. His work became more escapist. He experimented with forbidden topologies. He ground a Mobius lens for a college professor's microscope and had to endure the shouting of this philistine who did not appreciate art frozen in glass.
In the old days he would have been harshly punished for his deviant behavior. But he was foreigner and a legend. So his excesses were tolerated. This did nothing to check the downward spiral.
It didn't help that he was exposed to the infamous Russian Winter poetry. His depressed mood was intensified as he associated with scowling, bleak tragic poets in unheated street cafes. These defiant scarecrows were too proud to shiver as the wind blew off the steppes and rattled poor Joe's bones. Character. Character could be earned here. But alas, Joe was on a different road.
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In east Smolensk was another evil. The diamond facet cutters. These bastards would introduce sharp discontinuities into an already sub-optimally smooth "stone". The gods mocked man and played games with cleavage planes. Weakening bonds in some preferential direction. Making the lattice structure of matter all too clear.
How many hands had Joe at first held and then pulled away in undisguised revulsion as his fingers made contact with facets? Facets! Polishing and cutting to play games with light. But at what cost? Mankind in its foolishness elevated such aberrations to the status of precious, pulling into their most beloved rituals and institutions.
Madness! Not even the first derivative stood there... there on the edge of one cruel plane jutting into another. It cut. This ugly edge. Hardness matched with ugliness. Base, obvious, disgusting ugliness. Joe would vomit at the mere sight of diamond tailings upon the Dnieper banks come summer melt.
He didn't know he would be coming to Smolensk when he signed up for the exchange program. He didn't know that the gods had him on strings. That the Fates grinned as they contemplated his meteoric destruction. He did his best. He rented a house on the far west of town. He sludged through the deep, muddy, sleety banks for 12 miles to work, to grind, each day... using that march as any soldier would to maintain his discipline.
But in the dark of his home. He tossed and turned as he tried to find sleep. His torrid dreams full of broken tools... tools destroyed by his efforts to grind diamond into something else. He knew it couldn't be done. You can't transmute matter with grinding tools. You can't overcome the realities of crystal lattices, of bonds, of cleave planes, of ... Physics.
He took to wearing a mask as he walked outside. Just in case any of the horrid diamond dust from the cutting mills would carry against the wind into west Smolensk. His subconscious groped for a solution. Stole from his conscious mind. Stole from his emotional control mechanisms. Stole from his very aura. To the eyes of the enlightened, his plight was obvious. He was faded perceptibly from this existence as his feverish sub-mind worked the workable, worked to wreck the design of the gods.
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Infinitely differentiable.
Long luxurious curves.
A flow over smoothed river rock with no particle passing another.
Colors blending seamlessly into each other.
The line maintained. The football never fumbled.
Proceeding by increments to the ends of the universe and finding it wrapped back upon itself.
Maybe, possibly, perhaps.
There's an opportunity, a chance.
Might be, could be, we'll see./images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Maybe, possibly, perhaps.
There's an opportunity, a chance.
Might be, could be, we'll see.
Indecision was no longer possible with Joe. He was now a full fledged fanatic.
First things first. He violated his exchange worker contract and snuck back to the States.
He found the tall blonde that had gotten way too comfortable in his laboratory and locked her in a cage. After all, there would be a lot of testing to do.
He found Wanda and locked her in a cage too. Chuckling as he did so. This was to show his strength. He would gelatinize all his former favs. Even Betsy.
That made him pause. Betsy? Sweet beautiful Betsy? He swayed and staggered a bit. A little confused. But then the dark shadow swept over his features again and he thought "Yes. Of course Betsy. And her little dog too" And then he positively cackled with glee!
World Watch One wouldn't be bathed in red lights for some time yet. Joe had plenty of time to plan, and build, and cackle.
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dudley_do_ride
2/25/17, 12:40pm
| Post #21
He peeled off her flimsy nighty, lifted it off her heaving body. Her eyes seared him as he did, branded his retinas with their azure passion.
He had picked her carefully. Over the years. No woman had a more perfect figure. Her slopes were ideal. Her skin smooth and that ideal blend of color that is so rare.
He noted with satisfaction as her stroked her, as he teased her, that her skin did not get those disturbing blotches, or blushes, even as she climaxed she was perfectly homogeneous. Only some swelling here. Streaks of moisture there. All emphasizing her unusual continuity, her tight compact ideal curves.
Her nipples had no sharp edges. They blended smoothly into the surrounding skin. They were young and firm, her breasts, maintaining the symmetry and line that he sought.
No freckle. No mole. It was as if she were from some factory. He had made her pledge never to get a tattoo anywhere.
Yes Joe had found a mate. For a time he would be happy. The sex for both was unlike any they had ever experienced. More than that she understood him. As much as any isolated human island gets another.
It is a sad truth about us all that we cannot keep living in our golden days. If Joe had focused entirely upon love, family, and happiness he would likely have lived long and well. But though he had managed to beat the odds and find what many fail to find... he would inevitably fritter it away. To chase what he foolishly thought his higher purpose was. To feed his gods of duty, obedience, and perfection. He would look too deeply at his mate and notice not the things that pleased him so well, so long, but her component, constituent parts, he would be unable to bear that her smooth silky skin was only so at the macroscopic level. It was not the countless mites crawling around nor the minute imperfections in any of us that appear under powerful magnification, but smaller, deeper, more fundamental.
For now, leave the couple to enjoy their too fleeting golden age. Let Joe taste some of Life's joy before we sail to where we must eventually journey...
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
He had picked her carefully. Over the years. No woman had a more perfect figure. Her slopes were ideal. Her skin smooth and that ideal blend of color that is so rare.
He noted with satisfaction as her stroked her, as he teased her, that her skin did not get those disturbing blotches, or blushes, even as she climaxed she was perfectly homogeneous. Only some swelling here. Streaks of moisture there. All emphasizing her unusual continuity, her tight compact ideal curves.
Her nipples had no sharp edges. They blended smoothly into the surrounding skin. They were young and firm, her breasts, maintaining the symmetry and line that he sought.
No freckle. No mole. It was as if she were from some factory. He had made her pledge never to get a tattoo anywhere.
Yes Joe had found a mate. For a time he would be happy. The sex for both was unlike any they had ever experienced. More than that she understood him. As much as any isolated human island gets another.
It is a sad truth about us all that we cannot keep living in our golden days. If Joe had focused entirely upon love, family, and happiness he would likely have lived long and well. But though he had managed to beat the odds and find what many fail to find... he would inevitably fritter it away. To chase what he foolishly thought his higher purpose was. To feed his gods of duty, obedience, and perfection. He would look too deeply at his mate and notice not the things that pleased him so well, so long, but her component, constituent parts, he would be unable to bear that her smooth silky skin was only so at the macroscopic level. It was not the countless mites crawling around nor the minute imperfections in any of us that appear under powerful magnification, but smaller, deeper, more fundamental.
For now, leave the couple to enjoy their too fleeting golden age. Let Joe taste some of Life's joy before we sail to where we must eventually journey...
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
2/26/17, 1:23pm
| Post #22
Just as we owe one death to the gods, so do we owe ourselves a clear, as clear as we can hope to make it, view of reality. To achieve our ultimate in this endeavor requires discipline and strength. It requires sacrifice. Truth is a hard master. It informs us brutally of our limitations. Is merciless in showing us our temporary natures. Catches us in our frailties again and again with no regard to our past achievements.
No wonder that so many try to soften it. Try to avoid it. Try to erect constructs to tower above it.
Some have even tried to fold in other things to redefine it, for example beauty and morality. But these are different things. Our desire to delay the discovery of some truths, or subvert them to higher ideals, can drive us to give up truth as something of value in its own right.
It is an honorable thing to face Life as it really is. It is a commendable thing to rule in an open way over your fellow man. Risking your own destruction for the sake of truth. Risking the loss of your power as your vulnerabilities come to light. Trusting your subjects to forgive your weaknesses because they value your strengths, your judgement, your wisdom.
The man who deliberately manipulates it shows a scorn for it. The effect of such a life, the philosopher might lump it into "an unexamined life", is what it is. The man who is incapable of it, who deludes himself into some alternate reality, is on a freight train to a tragedy.
Joe started on the right path. Even his career selected partially to put him on this trail. But there was something deadly to all things wonderful in his life when instead of heroically accepting his role in the universe he sought to force the universe into the narrow framework of his likes. He didn't need to go so far as to incite a distant alien species to bring this fate down upon himself. Though more subtle, his fate would have been quite similar even though lost among the confusing tapestry of human lives.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
No wonder that so many try to soften it. Try to avoid it. Try to erect constructs to tower above it.
Some have even tried to fold in other things to redefine it, for example beauty and morality. But these are different things. Our desire to delay the discovery of some truths, or subvert them to higher ideals, can drive us to give up truth as something of value in its own right.
It is an honorable thing to face Life as it really is. It is a commendable thing to rule in an open way over your fellow man. Risking your own destruction for the sake of truth. Risking the loss of your power as your vulnerabilities come to light. Trusting your subjects to forgive your weaknesses because they value your strengths, your judgement, your wisdom.
The man who deliberately manipulates it shows a scorn for it. The effect of such a life, the philosopher might lump it into "an unexamined life", is what it is. The man who is incapable of it, who deludes himself into some alternate reality, is on a freight train to a tragedy.
Joe started on the right path. Even his career selected partially to put him on this trail. But there was something deadly to all things wonderful in his life when instead of heroically accepting his role in the universe he sought to force the universe into the narrow framework of his likes. He didn't need to go so far as to incite a distant alien species to bring this fate down upon himself. Though more subtle, his fate would have been quite similar even though lost among the confusing tapestry of human lives.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/6/17, 12:26am
| Post #23
Puppies. A warm basket of puppies on the shag rug next to the window. Sunlight splashing all around. Soft yipping. Droopy eyed cuties.
Joe loved puppies. After a day of lens grinding he'd come home, shower, and relax by stroking their soft fur as he sat in his laz-e-boy recliner chair. Every now and then a warm smile would play over his features.
Sanity was receding from him like the relentless tide going from high to low under gravity's pull. Any outside observer could see it. Too bad there never seem to be any around when things could be helped. Too bad nobody cared. All those he dealt with in his daily life were far to absorbed in their own problems to notice the slide. He was always odd. They kept recalibrating his oddness as the pendulum swung.
Oh what evils can be kept from this world if compassion is lavished upon a fragile, confused mind while it is still pliable. While the heart is still breakable. While tears can still flow from tight closed eyes.
How cruel a mind can become to itself once it has said goodbye to humanity. Given up on the struggle. Gone over to martyrdom.
Joe knew he was on a one way trajectory at some level. Every day he went out hoping for an interruption to his descent but not really thinking it was likely. He could see a line approaching that once crossed would seal his doom. Yet was unwilling to compromise the principles that goaded him forward on his joyless path. Nay not joyless, for a fanatic feels a kind of euphoria while on his way it is true, but... cold... lonely... dehumanizing. The world was breaking apart in front of his eyes. Dividing. Polarizing. It was simpler to classify everything into good and evil. Most of it evil. Most of it needing to be destroyed. So that it all could be made smooth again
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/11/17, 5:47pm
| Post #24
It started like this:
Wanda: Joe... you remember that we are throwing that get together Thursday, right?
Joe: Yes dear. Are Fred and Ethel coming?
Wanda: Yes. And guess what, you remember Velma right? She is coming!
Joe: No way! Wow that takes me back. Fred. Daphne. The Mystery Machine.
Wanda: Yeah it has been years. Decades.
Joe: Oh no, she is not bringing that other one is she? You know...
Wanda: The one who always hangs out with the dog?
Joe: Yes right? Everywhere. Always talking to it. Giving it those giant sandwiches.
Wanda: Ruuh Row.
Joe: He's not coming in here. Uh uhnnnn. No way!
Wanda: C'mon Joe they are old friends. You hafta give a little...
Joe: They always freak out and then do the door gag. Blasting their hippy crap on their boombox.
Wanda: Wood Joey do it for a Scooby snack?
Joe: I am not fucking messing around Wanda!
Wanda: Two Scooby snacks?
We'll leave this scene now. Before it gets so ugly. Before the breakage. The wreckage. The twisting of the mortal coil one turn.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Wanda: Joe... you remember that we are throwing that get together Thursday, right?
Joe: Yes dear. Are Fred and Ethel coming?
Wanda: Yes. And guess what, you remember Velma right? She is coming!
Joe: No way! Wow that takes me back. Fred. Daphne. The Mystery Machine.
Wanda: Yeah it has been years. Decades.
Joe: Oh no, she is not bringing that other one is she? You know...
Wanda: The one who always hangs out with the dog?
Joe: Yes right? Everywhere. Always talking to it. Giving it those giant sandwiches.
Wanda: Ruuh Row.
Joe: He's not coming in here. Uh uhnnnn. No way!
Wanda: C'mon Joe they are old friends. You hafta give a little...
Joe: They always freak out and then do the door gag. Blasting their hippy crap on their boombox.
Wanda: Wood Joey do it for a Scooby snack?
Joe: I am not fucking messing around Wanda!
Wanda: Two Scooby snacks?
We'll leave this scene now. Before it gets so ugly. Before the breakage. The wreckage. The twisting of the mortal coil one turn.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/13/17, 1:12am
| Post #25
The lights of World Watch 1 had been turned low for atmosphere. One sector of space was outlined in the crosshairs of the main screen. Dull blue, low green, and deep red lights wavered and flashed. The shadows of Team Banzai danced with the lights. But the team was motionless. The team was silent. All eyes focused on the display. Usually jocular, usually fecund in smart-assery... now focused, serious, intent.
Buckaroo was there. The Irregulars waited outside. Perfect Tommy, Rawhide, Rio and other key members of the Institute's Inner Circle.
And in a corner, in a place where the display was blocked by a bunker support pillar, a brim of a familiar battered hat could just be seen protruding from shadow. The flashing lights never exposing more. Sharp ears could just make out the sound of a light snore. Well worn leather boots rested on a metal crate, broken stirrups affixed. Discarded copier paper covered with ink, equations and diagrams lay all over the floor around the crate. One sheet of said paper was tacked next to the main display in this command center. This one just as messily covered in ink but much more cared for.
Truth takes great effort to discover. Once obtained it takes more to spread it to the places of power. Once in place it glues nations together, guides the tip of the arrow, blunts the attacks of the nefarious. The personages assembled in this room, the tradition they maintained... well... simply formidable.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Buckaroo was there. The Irregulars waited outside. Perfect Tommy, Rawhide, Rio and other key members of the Institute's Inner Circle.
And in a corner, in a place where the display was blocked by a bunker support pillar, a brim of a familiar battered hat could just be seen protruding from shadow. The flashing lights never exposing more. Sharp ears could just make out the sound of a light snore. Well worn leather boots rested on a metal crate, broken stirrups affixed. Discarded copier paper covered with ink, equations and diagrams lay all over the floor around the crate. One sheet of said paper was tacked next to the main display in this command center. This one just as messily covered in ink but much more cared for.
Truth takes great effort to discover. Once obtained it takes more to spread it to the places of power. Once in place it glues nations together, guides the tip of the arrow, blunts the attacks of the nefarious. The personages assembled in this room, the tradition they maintained... well... simply formidable.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/14/17, 12:59am
| Post #26
Richelieu grinned gleefully and twisted his mustache... his eyes darting craftily from side to side.
Here in New Bastille... in Lord knows where... in Lord knows when... History was repeating itself. No... not exactly repeating... say rather.. getting a second wind.
No Fronds. No nobles. Plenty of sieges. No shortage of irons, jailers, intrigue. It was... the best of times... for all the worst of reasons.
His prisoner sagged in his irons. "Take that Romans" thought the unusually flighty Cardinal. Not that Richelieu was flighty. Not normally. He was usually the epitome of cool, grave reserve. And that made this time all the more unusual. He felt a giddiness that he hadn't felt since puberty. He had to suppress some giggling. To resist breaking out into song.
"Do you not wish to confide in your Eminence the names of all the plotters? Don't you wish to sleep tonight in your cell comfortably on any side you choose? Without the smell of your own burnt flesh cloying your nostrils?"
He had always been a little jealous of the Tower truth be told. The Bastille was formidable but sadly lacking in pike appeal... far too low in Ravens. Those accursed Jacobins had brought some needed reforms all right he thought and had to suppress more giggles. The shadow of a very sharp, nicely clean from use blade, cast its shadow in a calculated way across the stone floor.
Now his Eminence was completely cut free from Gloree to do his master works.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Here in New Bastille... in Lord knows where... in Lord knows when... History was repeating itself. No... not exactly repeating... say rather.. getting a second wind.
No Fronds. No nobles. Plenty of sieges. No shortage of irons, jailers, intrigue. It was... the best of times... for all the worst of reasons.
His prisoner sagged in his irons. "Take that Romans" thought the unusually flighty Cardinal. Not that Richelieu was flighty. Not normally. He was usually the epitome of cool, grave reserve. And that made this time all the more unusual. He felt a giddiness that he hadn't felt since puberty. He had to suppress some giggling. To resist breaking out into song.
"Do you not wish to confide in your Eminence the names of all the plotters? Don't you wish to sleep tonight in your cell comfortably on any side you choose? Without the smell of your own burnt flesh cloying your nostrils?"
He had always been a little jealous of the Tower truth be told. The Bastille was formidable but sadly lacking in pike appeal... far too low in Ravens. Those accursed Jacobins had brought some needed reforms all right he thought and had to suppress more giggles. The shadow of a very sharp, nicely clean from use blade, cast its shadow in a calculated way across the stone floor.
Now his Eminence was completely cut free from Gloree to do his master works.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/17/17, 9:37pm
| Post #27
The gods cried... for it was beautiful. The flugelhorn... the strings... the band's power. It was flawless. Even as long melody reached up and danced the tightrope of what could work. They could play it many ways, a plethora of variations, and it worked so well. Nobody else could pull it off. Many tried.
Simple. Pure. But never heard quite that way before. Everyone who heard it, wherever they heard it, whenever, would stop and turn toward it. It made them happy. It made them sad. For in the beauty was the clear idea that it was a passing thing. As transient as any flower. One group's career. Doomed to fade with age.
People who heard it in their youth would never hear it again and have to look for it again in dusty libraries of recordings. Never to experience it ever again in the sunshine of some afternoon as the wind lightly mussed a loved one's hair. No after-life would recreate it. No son would continue the sound of the father. It could not be passed.
Oh sure other beautiful things will bloom. If that contents you then enjoy those flowers. But for some only one will ever be that special defining one. There is a kind of iron, dust and steel in this realization. A splintering of ship's timbers. And for the first time the tragic forms appeal. A kinship is felt with disaster and catastrophic loss. Ch1ldhood is cut adrift, duty beckons, Death begins to sidle up with a grin.
It is my hope that this tale does not speak yet to your heart. That you are still untouched by the cursed blade. That you laugh off the drama as a thing not affecting you and your immortal spirit. For the duty to spin the death knell, the doom drum, comes from the dark spirit world. The deals cut in the cold mists come due and a net is cast for those whose eyes have shards of the fell ice already embedded.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Simple. Pure. But never heard quite that way before. Everyone who heard it, wherever they heard it, whenever, would stop and turn toward it. It made them happy. It made them sad. For in the beauty was the clear idea that it was a passing thing. As transient as any flower. One group's career. Doomed to fade with age.
People who heard it in their youth would never hear it again and have to look for it again in dusty libraries of recordings. Never to experience it ever again in the sunshine of some afternoon as the wind lightly mussed a loved one's hair. No after-life would recreate it. No son would continue the sound of the father. It could not be passed.
Oh sure other beautiful things will bloom. If that contents you then enjoy those flowers. But for some only one will ever be that special defining one. There is a kind of iron, dust and steel in this realization. A splintering of ship's timbers. And for the first time the tragic forms appeal. A kinship is felt with disaster and catastrophic loss. Ch1ldhood is cut adrift, duty beckons, Death begins to sidle up with a grin.
It is my hope that this tale does not speak yet to your heart. That you are still untouched by the cursed blade. That you laugh off the drama as a thing not affecting you and your immortal spirit. For the duty to spin the death knell, the doom drum, comes from the dark spirit world. The deals cut in the cold mists come due and a net is cast for those whose eyes have shards of the fell ice already embedded.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/23/17, 3:03am
| Post #28
# begin model
enter main loop...
push 1 Stark onto the stack
*kerchunk kerchunk kerchunk*
affix straps (leather) *fwip fwip*
distract with shiny object *whrrrrrrrr whrrrrr*
vorpal blade release toot sweet *kaaaaaaaaa chink slice*
Stark bulbous neck appendage successfully trimmed
Appendage entering bucket *bump bump whiff*
cycle 448 complete
pop the stack
return pointers for next iteration
Thank you for using the Lannister 8000
If you've got a Stark jam you need our industrial strength, continual flow solution./images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
enter main loop...
push 1 Stark onto the stack
*kerchunk kerchunk kerchunk*
affix straps (leather) *fwip fwip*
distract with shiny object *whrrrrrrrr whrrrrr*
vorpal blade release toot sweet *kaaaaaaaaa chink slice*
Stark bulbous neck appendage successfully trimmed
Appendage entering bucket *bump bump whiff*
cycle 448 complete
pop the stack
return pointers for next iteration
Thank you for using the Lannister 8000
If you've got a Stark jam you need our industrial strength, continual flow solution./images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/23/17, 10:54pm
| Post #29
We interrupt this thread for a public service announcement... Delany et al have posted a record time.
DELANEY'S DONKEY
(William Hargreaves)
Val Doonican - 1967
Now Delaney had a donkey that everyone admired,
Tempo'rily lazy and permanently tired
A leg at ev'ry corner balancing his head,
And a tail to let you know which end he wanted to be fed
Riley slyly said "We've underrated it, why not train it?"
Then he took a rag
They rubbed it, scrubbed it,
They oiled and embrocated it,
Got it to the post
And when the starter dropped his flag
There was Riley pushing it, shoving it, shushing it
Hogan, Logan and ev'ryone in town lined up
Attacking it and shoving it and smacking it
They might as well have tried to push the Town Hall down
The donkey was eyeing them,
Openly defying them
Winking, blinking and twisting out of place
Riley reversing it,
Ev'rybody cursing it
The day Delaney's donkey ran the halfmile race.
The muscles of the mighty never known to flinch,
They couldn't budge the donkey a quarter of an inch
Delaney lay exhausted, hanging round its throat
With a grip just like a Scotchman on a five pound note
Starter, Carter, he lined up with the rest of 'em.
When it saw them, it was willing then
It raced up, braced up, ready for the best of 'em.
They started off to cheer it but it changed its mind again
There was Riley pushing it, shoving it and shushing it
Hogan, Logan and Mary Ann Macgraw,
She started poking it, grabbing it and choking it
It kicked her in the bustle and it laughed "Hee Haw!"
The whigs, the conservatives,
Radical superlatives
Libr'rals and tories,
They hurried to the place
Stood there in unity,
Helping the community
The day Delaney's donkey ran the halfmile race.
The crowd began to cheer it. Then Rafferty, the judge
He came to assist them, but still it wouldn't budge
The jockey who was riding, little John MacGee,
Was so thoroughly disgusted that he went to have his tea
Hagan, Fagan was students of psychology,
Swore they'd shift it with some dynamite
They bought it, brought it, then without apology
The donkey gave a sneeze and blew the darn stuff out of sight
There was Riley pushing it, shoving it and shushing it
Hogan, Logan and all the bally crew,
P'lice, and auxil'ary,
The Garrison Artillery
The Second Enniskillen's and the Life Guards too
They seized it and harried it,
They picked it up and carried it
Cheered it, steered it to the winning place
Then the Bookies drew aside,
They all commited suicide
Well, the day Delaney's donkey won the halfmile race.
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dudley_do_ride
3/25/17, 12:02am
| Post #30
Joe walked the 12 mile walk home in the sleety rain of west Smolensk. Yes he was part of the notorious guest worker program of the late 90s that brought many bright young lens grinders to the steppes and beyond. Somewhere in California a tall blonde was grinding the lenses in his stock. His counterpart in the exchange program.
It made him grind his teeth in the dark Smolensk nights to think of his Betsy, a blue concave bit with sexy lines, that he doted over for years. Each year removing a micron here or there to give her form a cute dimple. He made her focal length march down Fibonacci sequences. How could he have been so rash as to trade those pleasant quiet evenings grinding her in quiet joy for this? For this life?
The lenses he ground here were of a different sort. None had her form. None had her color. They were all beautiful, clean stock. But too clean. Too pure. They didn't have Betsy's unique character. He felt alone in a foreign land. He sighed often as shavings drizzled down his grinding apron.
Oh he was a superstar here. The women couldn't resist the men who ground the glass. And they would grind him. All through the night. The long sleety cold west Smolensk nights.
His animal urges were sated. But his heart longed for home. His work became more escapist. He experimented with forbidden topologies. He ground a Mobius lens for a college professor's microscope and had to endure the shouting of this philistine who did not appreciate art frozen in glass.
In the old days he would have been harshly punished for his deviant behavior. But he was foreigner and a legend. So his excesses were tolerated. This did nothing to check the downward spiral.
It didn't help that he was exposed to the infamous Russian Winter poetry. His depressed mood was intensified as he associated with scowling, bleak tragic poets in unheated street cafes. These defiant scarecrows were too proud to shiver as the wind blew off the steppes and rattled poor Joe's bones. Character. Character could be earned here. But alas, Joe was on a different road.
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dudley_do_ride
3/26/17, 2:41pm
| Post #31
It was Spring. The mood of the residents was noticeably brighter. Our lens grinder was invited by friends on an outing.
They went to a park on the banks of the Dnieper. Threw a blanket on a snow drift that was in sun light. And proceeded to gather river ice of particular beauty. The women blushed when their men presented bouquets of ice to show their affection. The women's parkas and snow pants were sexy and light as was the season.
Even the grinder's heart warmed a bit to see the frolicking. Here they were also safe from the hassling of those ever menacing east Smolenskers.
Ch1ldren skated on the frozen pools and skirts of the great river. The wolves, fat and lazy from their Spring dining, were too content to howl. But simply grinned with bright interested eyes as they took in the merriment.
Here in the brisk outdoors the pressures of the city were forgotten. Crazy thoughts gave way to wholesome thoughts. The grinder's plan to completely shave his body and practice with the luge team was temporarily forgotten. He didn't mind that the ch1ldren's skates bumped over rough ice. He didn't yet miss the beauty of the river ice for its lack of smoothness.
Joe had not yet left the species. He still had a heart. He still felt.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
They went to a park on the banks of the Dnieper. Threw a blanket on a snow drift that was in sun light. And proceeded to gather river ice of particular beauty. The women blushed when their men presented bouquets of ice to show their affection. The women's parkas and snow pants were sexy and light as was the season.
Even the grinder's heart warmed a bit to see the frolicking. Here they were also safe from the hassling of those ever menacing east Smolenskers.
Ch1ldren skated on the frozen pools and skirts of the great river. The wolves, fat and lazy from their Spring dining, were too content to howl. But simply grinned with bright interested eyes as they took in the merriment.
Here in the brisk outdoors the pressures of the city were forgotten. Crazy thoughts gave way to wholesome thoughts. The grinder's plan to completely shave his body and practice with the luge team was temporarily forgotten. He didn't mind that the ch1ldren's skates bumped over rough ice. He didn't yet miss the beauty of the river ice for its lack of smoothness.
Joe had not yet left the species. He still had a heart. He still felt.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
3/31/17, 9:37am
| Post #32
In east Smolensk was another evil. The diamond facet cutters. These bastards would introduce sharp discontinuities into an already sub-optimally smooth "stone". The gods mocked man and played games with cleavage planes. Weakening bonds in some preferential direction. Making the lattice structure of matter all too clear.
How many hands had Joe at first held and then pulled away in undisguised revulsion as his fingers made contact with facets? Facets! Polishing and cutting to play games with light. But at what cost? Mankind in its foolishness elevated such aberrations to the status of precious, pulling into their most beloved rituals and institutions.
Madness! Not even the first derivative stood there... there on the edge of one cruel plane jutting into another. It cut. This ugly edge. Hardness matched with ugliness. Base, obvious, disgusting ugliness. Joe would vomit at the mere sight of diamond tailings upon the Dnieper banks come summer melt.
He didn't know he would be coming to Smolensk when he signed up for the exchange program. He didn't know that the gods had him on strings. That the Fates grinned as they contemplated his meteoric destruction. He did his best. He rented a house on the far west of town. He sludged through the deep, muddy, sleety banks for 12 miles to work, to grind, each day... using that march as any soldier would to maintain his discipline.
But in the dark of his home. He tossed and turned as he tried to find sleep. His torrid dreams full of broken tools... tools destroyed by his efforts to grind diamond into something else. He knew it couldn't be done. You can't transmute matter with grinding tools. You can't overcome the realities of crystal lattices, of bonds, of cleave planes, of ... Physics.
He took to wearing a mask as he walked outside. Just in case any of the horrid diamond dust from the cutting mills would carry against the wind into west Smolensk. His subconscious groped for a solution. Stole from his conscious mind. Stole from his emotional control mechanisms. Stole from his very aura. To the eyes of the enlightened, his plight was obvious. He was faded perceptibly from this existence as his feverish sub-mind worked the workable, worked to wreck the design of the gods.
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dudley_do_ride
4/2/17, 9:01pm
| Post #33
So Joe doesn't like diamonds. What substance did Joe like? What would Joe transmute all of existence into if he could?
Every ch1ld knows the answer of course. JELLO. Even though it would throw him out of work, as it did not require grinding. JELLO was clearly the most ideal substance on earth. A tear rolled down his gritty face. Irritated eyes watered. Some respite from the damned glass shavings and diamond dust that was everywhere in this pit of agony called Smolensk.
His weary mind recalled happy ch1ldhood days playing with his JELLO that mama gave him every morning before school. He insisted that it was pure... no fruit or any nonsense like that added. He would roll it around his mouth and savor the smoothness. Perfect. No lumps. No impurities. Yes. All matter should be a lot more like JELLO. Then this universe would finally start to live up to its promise.
To a practical, bright mind knowing the objective was most of the battle. He didn't need to do anything more novel that gelatinize on a grand scale. No fundamental changes to Natural Law. No mucking with the forces.
He quit the worker exchange program. No more would the sleety streets of Smolensk see him struggling to work against the perpetual wind from off the steppes. No more would loving women from the area get to touch his smooth pale skin in the heat of the night. No more would he care about Betsy. No more river ice outings for him. His masterwork was firmly in mind. His life's purpose found.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Every ch1ld knows the answer of course. JELLO. Even though it would throw him out of work, as it did not require grinding. JELLO was clearly the most ideal substance on earth. A tear rolled down his gritty face. Irritated eyes watered. Some respite from the damned glass shavings and diamond dust that was everywhere in this pit of agony called Smolensk.
His weary mind recalled happy ch1ldhood days playing with his JELLO that mama gave him every morning before school. He insisted that it was pure... no fruit or any nonsense like that added. He would roll it around his mouth and savor the smoothness. Perfect. No lumps. No impurities. Yes. All matter should be a lot more like JELLO. Then this universe would finally start to live up to its promise.
To a practical, bright mind knowing the objective was most of the battle. He didn't need to do anything more novel that gelatinize on a grand scale. No fundamental changes to Natural Law. No mucking with the forces.
He quit the worker exchange program. No more would the sleety streets of Smolensk see him struggling to work against the perpetual wind from off the steppes. No more would loving women from the area get to touch his smooth pale skin in the heat of the night. No more would he care about Betsy. No more river ice outings for him. His masterwork was firmly in mind. His life's purpose found.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
Brooke Logan
4/5/17, 9:14pm
| Post #34
PERFORMER
Infinitely differentiable.
Long luxurious curves.
A flow over smoothed river rock with no particle passing another.
Colors blending seamlessly into each other.
The line maintained. The football never fumbled.
Proceeding by increments to the ends of the universe and finding it wrapped back upon itself.
Maybe, possibly, perhaps.
There's an opportunity, a chance.
Might be, could be, we'll see./images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
4/9/17, 11:26am
| Post #35
Maybe, possibly, perhaps.
There's an opportunity, a chance.
Might be, could be, we'll see.
Indecision was no longer possible with Joe. He was now a full fledged fanatic.
First things first. He violated his exchange worker contract and snuck back to the States.
He found the tall blonde that had gotten way too comfortable in his laboratory and locked her in a cage. After all, there would be a lot of testing to do.
He found Wanda and locked her in a cage too. Chuckling as he did so. This was to show his strength. He would gelatinize all his former favs. Even Betsy.
That made him pause. Betsy? Sweet beautiful Betsy? He swayed and staggered a bit. A little confused. But then the dark shadow swept over his features again and he thought "Yes. Of course Betsy. And her little dog too" And then he positively cackled with glee!
World Watch One wouldn't be bathed in red lights for some time yet. Joe had plenty of time to plan, and build, and cackle.
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dudley_do_ride
4/9/17, 9:50pm
| Post #36
It was May 6th 1992... On stage was the Great Flydini.
The audience gasped with Carson as the magician pulled thing after thing out of his fly. Effortlessly.
He was a performer with charisma. Women in the crowd swooned as he pulled out a lit cigarette and took a few distinguished puffs.
A phone rang out loudly and he pulled it out of his fly to answer it. Never missing a beat. A dozen eggs. A long string of handkerchiefs.
A pretty woman strutted onto the stage and he wooed her with things he pulled out of there. Flowers. Chocolates.
Ride too watched in the crowd. Alert even as he laughed along with the other people.
The woman answered a phone call from the magician's fly and walked out of his life. The devastated magician was shocked still for a moment but then a weeping clown came from out of his fly and performed a tragic aria. The crowd was his. Laughing and weeping tossing confetti onto the stage. When the magician came back to take an ovation, bubbles were wafting out of his fly. This brought down the house.
We mention this famous showbiz event... the last time for a long time the world was so easy and free... because it was this night... this memorable happy night... that the San Pedro police discovered the gelatinized remains of Wanda near an abandoned pier.
How did the police know it was a woman and not some disgusting new flavor of JELLO? It was not because of the horrible fleshy color. It was not because of the horrible odor. It was not because there were ropy reddish things in it that had to be transmuted veins. It was because all of this stuff was in a sundress that also contained rings and other personal effects of the missing woman.
Every policeman who saw it vomited out whatever was in his stomach within 10 seconds. In time they would become used to these sights. But they were all rookies for the moment during the rise of earth's new super-villain.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
The audience gasped with Carson as the magician pulled thing after thing out of his fly. Effortlessly.
He was a performer with charisma. Women in the crowd swooned as he pulled out a lit cigarette and took a few distinguished puffs.
A phone rang out loudly and he pulled it out of his fly to answer it. Never missing a beat. A dozen eggs. A long string of handkerchiefs.
A pretty woman strutted onto the stage and he wooed her with things he pulled out of there. Flowers. Chocolates.
Ride too watched in the crowd. Alert even as he laughed along with the other people.
The woman answered a phone call from the magician's fly and walked out of his life. The devastated magician was shocked still for a moment but then a weeping clown came from out of his fly and performed a tragic aria. The crowd was his. Laughing and weeping tossing confetti onto the stage. When the magician came back to take an ovation, bubbles were wafting out of his fly. This brought down the house.
We mention this famous showbiz event... the last time for a long time the world was so easy and free... because it was this night... this memorable happy night... that the San Pedro police discovered the gelatinized remains of Wanda near an abandoned pier.
How did the police know it was a woman and not some disgusting new flavor of JELLO? It was not because of the horrible fleshy color. It was not because of the horrible odor. It was not because there were ropy reddish things in it that had to be transmuted veins. It was because all of this stuff was in a sundress that also contained rings and other personal effects of the missing woman.
Every policeman who saw it vomited out whatever was in his stomach within 10 seconds. In time they would become used to these sights. But they were all rookies for the moment during the rise of earth's new super-villain.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
4/12/17, 2:21am
| Post #37
dudley_do_ride
4/16/17, 12:03pm
| Post #38
It was a happy happy Easter in Casa d' Gelantno. Joe was dancin' around with bare chested, gold-chained east coast style. He wiggled his hips at his now gelatinous dog. He slurped his kiwi smoothie and gave a toast to his gelatinous frog. He did the splits and side stepped over to his gelatinous neighbor, Teddy, now forever occupying that hard to fill space in the corner of the living room.
It was working better than expected... his Gelanto ray. He found bugs in the software and debugged them. He found imperfections in its lens and he ground them out. He found more and more power. Today was a holiday. A day of rest. A chance to relax. A chance to dream.
He was able to transmute creatures... one at a time for now. He was able to transmute people... one by one it was true. This was relatively easy to do. His real test was set for the morrow. To an outside observer it was trivial compared to all this. He would transmute a hand sized rock. But Joe knew better. He had done his homework over a lifetime you see. That rock was much more densely packed with matter than watery silicon based life forms. If he could do one rock, he could do the world baby. If he could do the world... well... say hello to a slippery, slushy new universe.
That the organisms gave up the ghost in going jello didn't bother him one whit. He figured it made things a whole lot less chaotic. Life was anything but smooth baby. He didn't want some grasshopper clutch exploding out with hopping, happy hoppers at some crucial moment of his work. Inanimate things couldn't muck with the fabric of the design. They couldn't carve out hard, edged, eye irritating facets from some immutable stone.
Gonna be smooth. Gonna slide. Gonna lose those cleave planes. Gonna lose some protons and go to a longer stringed compound. Gonna be nicer than tapioca. Gonna go easier than a banana. That dog ain't gonna bark no more. That neighbor ain't gonna play the B52s at 3 am anymore baby.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
It was working better than expected... his Gelanto ray. He found bugs in the software and debugged them. He found imperfections in its lens and he ground them out. He found more and more power. Today was a holiday. A day of rest. A chance to relax. A chance to dream.
He was able to transmute creatures... one at a time for now. He was able to transmute people... one by one it was true. This was relatively easy to do. His real test was set for the morrow. To an outside observer it was trivial compared to all this. He would transmute a hand sized rock. But Joe knew better. He had done his homework over a lifetime you see. That rock was much more densely packed with matter than watery silicon based life forms. If he could do one rock, he could do the world baby. If he could do the world... well... say hello to a slippery, slushy new universe.
That the organisms gave up the ghost in going jello didn't bother him one whit. He figured it made things a whole lot less chaotic. Life was anything but smooth baby. He didn't want some grasshopper clutch exploding out with hopping, happy hoppers at some crucial moment of his work. Inanimate things couldn't muck with the fabric of the design. They couldn't carve out hard, edged, eye irritating facets from some immutable stone.
Gonna be smooth. Gonna slide. Gonna lose those cleave planes. Gonna lose some protons and go to a longer stringed compound. Gonna be nicer than tapioca. Gonna go easier than a banana. That dog ain't gonna bark no more. That neighbor ain't gonna play the B52s at 3 am anymore baby.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
4/19/17, 8:38am
| Post #39
I wake and am compelled to write. It is in the deepest, darkest part of the night. My soul shrieks in twisted agony. My brain races at an unhealthy tempo. My bl00d boils... my skin crawls... my nostrils... why they flare like a foaming horse's.
The dead writhe in the mists that have seeped into my chamber. They whisper. They groan. All the slain from tyrants. All that were tortured and sent to their deaths screaming. Their ghostly nails try to scr8pe my skin. Their empty eye sockets glare at me.
The tale winds and whorls. The tragedy relentlessly unfolds. Joe's spirit moans and shrieks, driving these dead into my narrow confines. I don't see how it can bring any relief to them. The telling. They've lost their brief lease on life. They are bankrupt in all of life's accounts. They are trapped and powerless though driven by malevolent desires.
But they can make the teller mad. They can cause such words as will destroy the men that read to pour garishly onto the page.
Die you fell spirits. Just die. Trouble man no more. I will resist the urge to gush forth your venom. I will suffer so that my fellow creatures may live.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
The dead writhe in the mists that have seeped into my chamber. They whisper. They groan. All the slain from tyrants. All that were tortured and sent to their deaths screaming. Their ghostly nails try to scr8pe my skin. Their empty eye sockets glare at me.
The tale winds and whorls. The tragedy relentlessly unfolds. Joe's spirit moans and shrieks, driving these dead into my narrow confines. I don't see how it can bring any relief to them. The telling. They've lost their brief lease on life. They are bankrupt in all of life's accounts. They are trapped and powerless though driven by malevolent desires.
But they can make the teller mad. They can cause such words as will destroy the men that read to pour garishly onto the page.
Die you fell spirits. Just die. Trouble man no more. I will resist the urge to gush forth your venom. I will suffer so that my fellow creatures may live.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
dudley_do_ride
4/21/17, 9:29am
| Post #40
There are forces that shape our destiny that are beyond our ken as we live our lives in the midst of events. Yet to students of History the forces are quite clear.
West and east Smolensk... so different... so tragically very different. There was a time when they were one. But coming out of the steppes to the west was a great Bigol khan, Senglis. He was opposed at the end of this era and at this locality by the great Mongol khan Fruklis. These mortal enemies were once allies. They had banded together to destroy the decadent Trigols of the northern marshes. These subpar horsemen had never managed to lose the training wheel attached to the side of the horse. So were easily destroyed by the allies. Their bow shots would go awry when the training wheel hit some pebble as they careened over the steppes.
Now it was ally versus ally. Tribesman versus tribesman. They were both strong. They were both clever. They were both crafty.
Both tried to persuade the walled city to let them in. Whoever was let in could resupply and rest in the city before rushing out at whatever time pleased them to destroy an ill supplied enemy. Neither wanted to storm the walls because the battle would weaken their army before confronting their mortal foe.
The mongol khan threatened the mayor of the city with torture, r8pe and death, using his resume as evidence of his sincerity.
The bigol khan used the carrot instead of the stick. He promised to teach the merchant class the eastern secret of facet cutting should they let them in. His resume did not testify to his sincerity but the mayor had a carrot on one side and an iron f1st on the other. So he let Hope guide his decision.
As a result it was the Bigol Horde that entered the city instead of the mongols. Naturally they divided the city into west and east. Only to the east did they give the secret from the east. The bigols loved dichotomies. To the west they gave the secret of thread straightening, also learned in the course of their eastern conquests.
Wow an unpromised secret you may say, naïve reader. But the bigol khan was devious. He gave out of a sense of mischief. Knowing the conflicting natures of the craft. Knowing it would start a division in the people they ruled that could be exploited.
The bigols recuped, honed weapons and rode out of the city to meet their destiny. The mongols paid the price for the mayor's rejection of their threats. Both clans played their role on Life's stage and have now vanished back from whence they came.
But Smolensk was forever changed. Accident? Fate? Study History my ch1ldren, study it well. You may get a clue, see a thread, that when pulled saves you from some fast approaching disaster.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
West and east Smolensk... so different... so tragically very different. There was a time when they were one. But coming out of the steppes to the west was a great Bigol khan, Senglis. He was opposed at the end of this era and at this locality by the great Mongol khan Fruklis. These mortal enemies were once allies. They had banded together to destroy the decadent Trigols of the northern marshes. These subpar horsemen had never managed to lose the training wheel attached to the side of the horse. So were easily destroyed by the allies. Their bow shots would go awry when the training wheel hit some pebble as they careened over the steppes.
Now it was ally versus ally. Tribesman versus tribesman. They were both strong. They were both clever. They were both crafty.
Both tried to persuade the walled city to let them in. Whoever was let in could resupply and rest in the city before rushing out at whatever time pleased them to destroy an ill supplied enemy. Neither wanted to storm the walls because the battle would weaken their army before confronting their mortal foe.
The mongol khan threatened the mayor of the city with torture, r8pe and death, using his resume as evidence of his sincerity.
The bigol khan used the carrot instead of the stick. He promised to teach the merchant class the eastern secret of facet cutting should they let them in. His resume did not testify to his sincerity but the mayor had a carrot on one side and an iron f1st on the other. So he let Hope guide his decision.
As a result it was the Bigol Horde that entered the city instead of the mongols. Naturally they divided the city into west and east. Only to the east did they give the secret from the east. The bigols loved dichotomies. To the west they gave the secret of thread straightening, also learned in the course of their eastern conquests.
Wow an unpromised secret you may say, naïve reader. But the bigol khan was devious. He gave out of a sense of mischief. Knowing the conflicting natures of the craft. Knowing it would start a division in the people they ruled that could be exploited.
The bigols recuped, honed weapons and rode out of the city to meet their destiny. The mongols paid the price for the mayor's rejection of their threats. Both clans played their role on Life's stage and have now vanished back from whence they came.
But Smolensk was forever changed. Accident? Fate? Study History my ch1ldren, study it well. You may get a clue, see a thread, that when pulled saves you from some fast approaching disaster.
/images/_common/forums/emoticons/' }
