Diario finale: Incagliato in Pretare

“120 trillion kilometres from home.
Atmosphere is thin, yet suffocating. Burn injuries: Are these from the disastrous atmospheric entry or the planet’s natural radiation? Blood and sweat mix, trickling down my scalp.
Environmental suit is charred and has lost resilience. Thoracic respirator seems to be functioning. Communicator is useless.”
[...]
“Am in pain. Inability to keep quiet seems to attract local humanoids. They communicate verbally, but hearing them is difficult in the thin air. They have a device that produces a very bright flash. Does not seem to be a weapon. They bring a four-legged beast that tries to attack. Can repel it. Gravity is light here.
Hiding behind a wall where it is dark...”
[...]
“Shock is wearing off but the pain grows. Find refuge in higher terrain away from local population. Manage to find some small animals for sustenance. Don’t know if local fauna are toxic, but have little choice at this point...”
[...]
“Burns are getting worse, as is dehydration. Found shelter under tree-like vegetation. Odds of survival are nil. Cannot say if mission was successful, as computer survey results of Planet Esotöb3magA-III were lost in descent. Data transmission reception unconfirmed. Skin sloughing off and life force is diminishing. May those on behalf I have ventured, for the record, know that I have done my best, to my ability, all circumstances notwithstanding.
Final entry out.”

Service, Commitment, Sacrifice: The SetUp™

The concept of the SetUp™ arises out of a global perspective, interfacing people and situational activities within a positive context. It can show you what you can become, while showing you what needs to be accomplished. The SetUp™ can show you how to fit into the whole; it can help you integrate all aspects of consumption intake, and it can help you facilitate a trans-consentive awareness based upon emotive applications of image toning, synergetic flow-control purgatives, and dynamic enhancement.
With the SetUp™, you can maximize your consumption intake through a rotating benefits exchange system. By using co-orientation and augmentation of internal resources, your cognitive domain will be market-attuned. You will freely enjoy commercially expressive activities, as a normative reactivity to dynamic incentives enhances your scope of self-referentiality.

--- --- ---

And now a few words from SetUp™ Facilitator Eljack McGhee:

So you’ve been wondering...
What exactly is the SetUp™?

A: I’m glad you asked. The SetUp™ is America’s premier lifestyle product, designed to identify and disseminate excitement patterns throughout its 1500+ offices nationwide, interfacing people and situational activities within a positive context. And you can see how that’s going to help you, right?

Q: Yes, I can. But what makes the SetUp™ different from the rest?

A: In a word, sacrifice. The SetUp’s comprehensive Relinquishment Program maximizes consumption intake through a rotating benefits exchange system: your wages, your car, your house -- even your children. How’s that for a broad church?

Q: It’s very broad. But what if I’m of the opinion, ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it?’ Know what I mean?

A: We know exactly what you mean. Think of it this way -- you wouldn’t want another man, possibly a foreigner, sleeping with your wife, right?

Q: Certainly not.

A: Okay then, let’s get you set up.

Q: That seems like the most reasonable thing to do. I hope it isn’t difficult to switch over from my existing product.

A: That’s the great thing -- it’s no hassle to get you switched over. It’s already set up!

Q: That gives me peace of mind. But what if I don’t like it once I join?

A: I assure you -- that simply cannot happen.

Q: But what if I don’t like it?

A: We’ll slowly poison you with sweet fragrances. In the meantime, let’s get you set up!

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The author would like to thank Eljack McGhee of The Orville Corporation and Peter Glavodevedhzhe for helping him to get “set up.”

Life of Reillys: Seafóid Kibble Argóint

 

Through the streets of Sheffield again drifts the hoarse hollering of Mrs. Reilly. Her snotty kids sulk about, littering the neighbourhood with gum wrappers. Mr. Reilly can also be heard shouting under his braying wife. Out on the kerb, rubbish has spilt from the bin to the pavement. An empty tin of Flighty Dog pet food glistens in the midafternoon haze.

Karma Fundoo: Tamas guna getcha

The Adage as Crutch

“If it walks like a duck...” At one time or another in conversation we all rely on proffering little truisms that supposedly illustrate a situation at hand. Such verbiage as “Don’t bite the hand that feeds,” and “Don’t count your chickens...” can often elucidate an unspoken Big Picture. But all too often we hear the urgent appeals to empty platitudes, most of which are strident injunctions meant to serve the speaker’s ulterior motives. Basically: The Pig Parent’s impious harangue tailored to convince the listener to adhere to the agenda of his banal Life Script. As most people with a clue already know, the scarcity of righteousness is artificial, and resorting to pleas with hack, fortune-cookie clichés only spells out too clearly the feeble fundament you lean upon. No Brain, No Gain!

Schlaf verrostet nie

Where the barber meets the prince
between brick and cirrocumulus
stands oxidized metal heralding
some quaint neuer Weg
to starch our shorts

UAP: Wakili Kuku

Jimbōchō Dimensional Conduit

Quiet, dusty bookstore in a small corner of the megalopolis.
 Between the tomes glide alien tones of Hammond and Leslie, sonic statues striding in a minor key.
 Attack, decay, sustain, release.
 The dry smell of disintegrating pulp and the twilight of vibrato -- dusky notes of simmering violet, sage green and translucent oxblood... a constellation of miniature gongs resonate through the aisles that would bring to Toshinori-san a kind session of many smiles.

Escape from Asylum Le Rixe

At first a stately refuge with hedonistic accommodations:
A home studio with “coat cheque” to fuel the all-night sessions.
A deluxe jacuzzi (with ‘therapeutic’ pretenses) where ‘Bobbing for Satan’ was a joked-about pastime.
The meditative chamber of Bad Greiferfuß, in all its purple murk.

And then slowly, like the paint peeling from the walls, ghosts emerge from the past and present:
Dogs barking at empty transoms. The baying of wolves from beyond the fence. Spectres said to drift down the main hall. A seat at the piano in the empty, darkened parlour that brings forth an invisible presence to stand at one’s back.
All this and the contagious madness that spreads to the living:
LeVira, the shut-in with a litany of dodgy excuses for every neurosis.
Behold, a nutritionally inventive new pizza topping: nail clippings. That should suitably supplement an otherwise dreary diet of white wine and menthols.
A proclivity for phony artsy friends is embarrassing enough, but when self-destructive tendencies come to the point of inviting sociopaths over for tea, one could say a line has been crossed.
Witness the vile yob known as The Hackler. Choking the dog in a spun-out bevvied stupor? That would be he. Chicken bones on the doorstep? His brand of voudou. A cinder block smouldering inside the shattered remains of a 24-inch television screen? Well, let’s just thank Mr Greenberg’s photographic prowess for capturing the posterity of that scene on an 8x11 glossy. As it drove even him from the asylum.
In the event, it drove everyone of sound mind.
Yes, the line is well beyond crossed.
Stealth evac to the true asylum: The Men’s Lodge.