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|| -------- -- ----- A E R I E O B L I V I A N A . singular book of text wandertainment by Frank Edward Nora ------------------- ----------- OSOAWEEK--ISSUE 046--6/8/95 <------- || OsoaWeek || Issues || Book 4 || -------> (Cup OWis046, Created v1 (4/27/99), Copyright 1999) = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = [[BEGIN046OW]] [[01046CV]] * * * O S O A W E E K 0 4 6 * * * June 8, 1995 "The weekly ezine of Obliviana Super Occult Amusement!" by Frank Edward Nora INSIDE THIS ISSUE! Just you wait! Don't pass me by--I'm the thing you seek! Check it out... 01 046 CV--Cover !!!!!!!! Quips, contents, and MORE! 02 046 IW--Into E-mber Forge of Wander !!!!!!!! The history of FOW! 03 046 HR--Hemisinister Review !!!!!!!! Movies: "Pocahantas" and "Casper" 04 046 HT--Halfevil Times !!!!!!!! More of those incredible Perceptions & Ponderings! 05 046 ZP--Zope !!!!!!!! COBBLESTONE ZOPE 06 046 CZ--Classic Zope !!!!!!!! "The Comazope Affair" & "Comazope Aftermath" 07 046 TS--Trick Sojourn !!!!!!!! Dreamfrank in Dream New Orleans! 08 046 LA--Lord of Obliviana !!!!!!!! Struggling with the WWW, and more! 09 046 SU--Superior !!!!!!!! "Soothzolt, I know you." 10 046 IS--Into E-mber Severe Repair !!!!!!!! A revolutionary way to get Infostimulation! 11 046 SR--Severe Repair !!!!!!!! "Manny's Attempt of Suicide" YOU MIGHT NOT THINK, BUT THIS IS ALL VERY COOL! INFORMATION: OsoaWeek046, June 8, 1995. Published weekly by Obliviana Super Occult Amusement, obliviana@aol.com, 1-800-OBLIVIANA. All contents copyright 1995 Frank Edward Nora. This release is Predatorware--you are free to make digital copies, so long as they're not altered or sold. All other forms of reproduction require permission. You're Prey unless you get a Predator Deed for this release. Contact us for more on this concept. Character count: 47352 / Line count: 1348 *OW* [[02046IF]] Into E-mber Forge of Wander [:[FOW007]:] FORGE OF WANDER E-mber 007, June 8, 1995 Number 7 already, huh? Man, how time flies. Yeah. So maybe I'll tell you a little about the history of FOW--whattaya think of that? The first FOW was a little 32-page magazine (some might even mistake it for a "zine"), which had a cool colored strip along the spine--it's hard to explain, you'd have to see it. Anyways, it contained a number of early Severe Repair chapters (all revised and reprinted in OsoaWeek), Zope comics, Halfevil Times/ABM style humor, weird essays, and the like--kinda similar to OsoaWeek! I published 4 issues, from August 1992 to January 1993. Later, in May 1993, I developed a new "packet" format for Forge of Wander, and published two of these packets--"Superior" and "Anything But Monday". See, the whole system of packets was called FOW, but each packet had its own individual title, eh? Okay, so then, a year later, in April and May of 1994, I revamped the packet format into the most ambitious publishing design I've ever created. See, there was this durable rubber strip with two holes in it, that matched up with the holes in the little light-blue 4.25" x 5.5" packets. What you did was secure the packets into the rubber thing with screws, washers, and fly bolts. Very cool, and very time-consuming to create. I did three "Get All Obliviana" packets, which were never fully produced (I made only a few "Analog Pinsers", as the rubber strips were known, before procrastination got the better of me). A few months later, I started the ezine OsoaWeek, and FOW was again in limbo. But now, it's come back, in a whole new form--as an E-mber! Who knows where the stalwart FOW will wind up in the future! Whatever, make sure you're there to find out! INFORMATION: Forge of Wander E-mber 007, June 8, 1995. Published weekly by Obliviana Super Occult Amusement, obliviana@aol.com, 1-800-OBLIVIANA. All contents copyright 1995 Frank Edward Nora. This release is Predatorware--you are free to make digital copies, so long as they're not altered or sold. All other forms of reproduction require permission. You're Prey unless you get a Predator Deed for this release. Contact us for more on this concept. You can cancel or subscribe to this E-mber anytime, via E-mail. *OW* [[03046HR]] Hemisinister Review ***MOVIES*** POCAHANTAS Pocahantas is hot! Easily the sexiest Disney animated babe ever. I really liked this movie--it blows Lion King away, and Lion King was pretty good. The animation is quantum leaps beyond LK, too, with unbelievably beautiful and detailed work. The integration of computer-generated 3-D objects is done with great aplomb here. Cinematically, Pocahantas weaves a wonderful web, because at its heart, it's about a wonderful, free spirit--Pocahantas. She leaps off cliffs, canoes down waterfalls, flirts with the white man, talks to trees, is loved by the animals, and all that. The theme of freedom is reinforced at the end--where the warrior she was to wed, Kokuoum (I have no idea how you spell that), is dead, and her other love interest, Englishman John Smith, is wounded and departs on his way home. The Indian princess is given the choice to accompany Smith, but she declines. "I'm needed here." is her excuse. So she ends the film still free, virginal, pure, unshackled. I read about the real story, and this is far from it. She actually wound up marrying some OTHER English dude, and spending a lot of time in Jolly Old England, where she died. Disney has created an erotic, thrilling, strong character in Pocahantas. I really like how Disney is getting more mature in their animated features--first Lion King, and now this. I have a feeling, though, that this is the apex of Disney feature animation. CASPER What a mess. It looks like this movie was rewritten about a thousand times. It's a cinematic wasteland, a Frankenstein's monster, slapped together from spare parts. In short, it sucks. Technically, the ghost animation, by the same folks who did Jurassic Park, is groundbreaking. We're swerving ever closer to a time when human beings can be simulated on film via computer, and Casper is a big step. The girl, Christina Ricci maybe?, is real good. Wasn't she in the Addams Family movies? Seems kinda typecast. Seeing former Python Eric Idle in such a pitiful role is depressing. He must be pretty happy though--Casper is a blockbuster. I guess this really is a kid's movie. It's ashame--cuz the best kid's movies can also be enjoyed by adults. *OW* [[04640HT]] Halfevil Times ***HALFEVIL TIMES PERCEPTIONS & PONDERINGS*** EVER WONDER... ...why people can't turn the friggin' sound off on their PowerBooks on the train? Do they think people actually LIKE listening to annoying beeping noises after a long day at the office? EVER NOTICE... ...how stop signs and traffic lights carry a lot less weight in a mall parking lot? *OW* [[05046ZP]] Zope COBBLESTONE ZOPE ZOPE Hey Joe--what the hell are cobblestones, and why would anyone ever want to make a street out of them? MASTER JOE Uh--I think they're these little yellow pellets, like, uh, made out of a naturally-occurring plastic-like resin, and, uh... ZOPE Ah, you're no help. If I wanna learn about cobblestones, I'll have to go it alone. Robot 90! C'mere! ROBOT 90 Yes master what is thy bidding? ZOPE Yeah, why don't you go prepare my... hold on a second... did I just hear you use the word "thy"? ROBOT 90 Please hold while I check my memory banks... *click*--*click*--*click*... yes my lord, I did use the word "thy". ZOPE And why's that? ROBOT 90 Insufficient data... but it may have something to do with my fixation with the King Arthur legend... ZOPE (hitting ROBOT 90 on the head) Well get over it, and go get my Flyin' Chess Bishop ready! ROBOT 90 Yes sir. Sorry. MASTER JOE Man, you sure are lenient with your robots. If wunna mine gave me that kind of lip, I'd blast it to f*ckin' hell! ZOPE Well Joe, that's the difference between you and me. You're a hothead, who acts before he thinks. Me, I'm rational. When I do something, I do it for a reason. MASTER JOE Yeah, right. ZOPE Shut up you! Just for that you can't come with me in my Flyin' Chess Bishop to go and find out about cobblestones! MASTER JOE I thought you decided to go alone already. ZOPE Out! Out of my house! Out of Zopekeep! Don't piss me off, man! MASTER JOE (turning and leaving) Okay, okay! Jeez! And he calls ME the hothead! ZOPE I heard that! LATER... ZOPE sits at the controls of his Flyin' Chess Bishop. ZOPE Ah yes, this is the good life. Sittin' back, wreaking a little havoc at a couple military bases bombarding them with a rain of mischief-magic ball bearings, coloring all the clouds in the area a deep blood-red, zapping a nest of ten-thousand blue chipmunks with my human-level-intelligence ray, makin' railroads that lead nowhere, developing a hot new trading string game, demolishing The Wall Street Journal and forcing all its writers to become coopers, growing a clone of M. C. Escher to help me with my self-portrait, nuking Norway (hah hah! I never get tired of nuking Norway!), and trying to figure out that damn "Masquerade" book. I want that golden bunny, dammit! FLYIN' CHESS BISHOP COMPUTER WARNING. Approaching cobblestone street area. WARNING. Approaching cobblestone street area. WARNING... ZOPE Okay! Shut the f*ck up already! FLYIN' CHESS BISHOP COMPUTER Unknown word--"f*ck"--please define. ZOPE SHUT UP! I'll flay your circuits, you goddamn piece of sh*t! FLYIN' CHESS BISHOP COMPUTER WARNING. Approaching cobblestone... With a *BASH!*, Zope smashes the console and silences the computer. ZOPE That's better. Now to survey the cobblestone! SOON... ZOPE (kneeling down, examining the street) Hmm... the street seems to be made entirely of smooth stones, held together with some kind of glue-like substance... Hmm... SIMIJAR May I help you? ZOPE Huh? SIMIJAR I am Simijar, Goddess of Cobblestones. I sensed your need to understand. I came. ZOPE Whoah, you're pretty hot! For a goddess of cobblestones, that is. SIMIJAR Why thank you! ZOPE (thinking) Oh boy! Imagine how cool it'd be to have a girlfriend who's a goddess of cobblestones! I'll show that Numizmonia! I'll show her I don't need her--cuz I got SIMIJAR, GODDESS OF COBBLESTONES as my girlfriend! SIMIJAR Are you okay, little friend? ZOPE (getting angry) Little...! (getting calmer) Oh, uh, no, not at all, uh, Simijar. Just thinking how nice it would be if such a lovely goddess as you would accompany me in my Flyin' Chess Bishop for a romantic evening dinner on the River Litherbine. SIMIJAR Oh... what a sweet offer. I wish I could, but... but the King of the Gods, Doirzaine, does not allow goddesses to mingle with mortals. ZOPE Uh, wait here for a minute, okay? SOON... ZOPE is beating the crap out of DOIRZAINE. ZOPE Okay bub--whattaya say? Wanna make an exception to your stupid little rule so's I can go out with Simijar? DOIRZAINE Insolent pup! I'll never... ZOPE bashes DOIRZAINE in the face. DOIRZAINE You... you'll pay for this... ZOPE spends some time beating the crap out of DOIRZAINE. DOIRZAINE Enough! Enough! Stop! I give in! You have permission... no more... no more... ZOPE Thanks, you f*ckin' pussy! SOON... SIMIJAR Oh, jolly good! I did so want to go out with you! It was so kind of Doirzaine to acquiesce! ZOPE That it was, babe. That it was. *OW* [[06046CZ]] Classic Zope "The Comazope Affair" September 1987 At a local "Soybust" restaurant, Zope orders his favorite drink, a "diesel fuel and tonic". (Stirred, not shaken, in a matted-camel-hair cup.) At "Soybust South", they serve a rudimentary soy paste which the chefs, or "Soyboys", shape into busts, or "head and shoulder statues", of famous people, actors, kings, etc. Zope decides on ordering a large "Abraham Lincoln". As he stares out the window at the sunny, turn-of-the-century style street outside, he wishes to eat Abe's nose first. Across the street Zope spots a bright yellow half-cat, half-dog. The waiter brings the drink, but this waiter is a dick, so he mistakenly brings Zope the wrong drink. He brings Zope a cup full of pure cyanide. Zope chugs down the poisonous cocktail as he turn his attention towards the mini-stage. There, he sees an "animadecapitated" (decapitated, yet alive) girl tossing her head around in an alluring dance. She is wearing Snoopy socks. It only takes a few moments for Zope to pass out, as he is almost immediately overcome by the cyanide. Now, whereas Zope drank enough poison to kill all of New Jersey, he is made of tougher stuff, and lives on, albeit, in a deep coma. Fade to black, etc... Dreamily quivering passage. Zope wakes up and finds himself in a home for emotionally disturbed children. He is in a wheelchair eating licorice gritz with chopsticks. One look at the ceiling and he's gone again. Flash, now later. An ugly woman wheels Zope into a group meeting where he can "openly share his feelings". Even though he has no proof, Zope is convinced that his subconscious mind is somewhere in Yugoslavia. Soon, in a dreary daze, Zope recounts "Th' good ol' days, runnin' cattle up Palmer's Canyon, drinkin' at the' saloon, carryin' a gun, killin' people, eatin' beans, etc." COWBOY ZOPE (in vision, shooting off two handguns) Less go! A light bulb blows up and all goes dark. After several emergency crews, the discussion resumes, but Zope returns to semi-consciousness. Later, the only words he can remember are "guilt", "reinforcement", "therapy", and "balls". After one more week, at around 4 pm, Zope wakes up fully refreshed and recovered. The late afternoon sun lazily plays upon his sheets as he breathes a breath of fresh air. Still smiling, Zope savagely rips off his bed post and begins a furious rampage, injuring children, killing nurses, burning medical records, and eating corn, cob and all. Later he goes home under the purple sky. ZOPE (bashing a nurse with his bed post) F*ck you bitch! THE END! "Comazope Aftermath" 12/8/93 Weasel's Flyin' Rock... (a huge rock flying over the countryside with three windows in front) WEASEL Hey Zope, look down there! Isn't that the restaurant where they gave you cyanide once? ZOPE You know what Weasel, I think it is! I was in a coma for weeks! WEASEL Well, you know what they say, let bygones be bygones... ZOPE Like hell! Gimme those controls! Soon... With a *KRUSH!* sound, the restaurant "Soybust South" is ripped out of its foundations by a huge clawlike device protruding from Weasel's Flyin' Rock. ZOPE Everyone in that restaurant will pay for what they did to me 6 years ago! Set course for the South Pole Concentration Camp! Later... ZOPE (holding a pointer of some sort) I suppose you think it was cute to be eating in the same restaurant where I got poisoned. Well, as punishment you will all be forced to eat butterflies and toothpaste 24 hours a day! RESTAURANT PATRON But we're innocent! ZOPE Who said that? No answer? You will all suffer then. Your toothpaste will be laced with POLIO! *OW* [[07046TS]] Trick Sojourn ***DIARY OF A DREAMFRANK*** 6/21/95. Today me and my girlfriend went to apply for a job at this weird company. It mined diamonds, and had four divisions--digging deep into the earth, diamonds, and two others I don't remember. We looked around at some cool diamonds and stuff, and I told my girlfriend maybe I could get a discount in buying her an engagement ring. We went there, and sat in this guy's office. Two other people were applying for the job, a guy and a girl. When the interviewer came in, he started looking at the resumes, and the girl said she wanted to sing a song, so she did. I thought it was awfully stupid to sing a song at an interview like that. Then the guy started complaining and acting like a real assh*le, like talking about the deep earth division, how it was serious business, and all that. Then, as part of our orientation we were driven through various places. First stop--New Orleans. It was a weird small town--we saw a black lake where no light could escape--except maybe at night, it blew up or something? We heard about Mardi Gras and how destructive it was. I saw a little kid playing behind this huge fence made up of sharpened telephone pole sized logs, laid out in a chaotic fashion. "Cool wall." I think I said. Later, we stopped, and I went into a music store with a floor sloping downward to sit down and explain something to the singing girl--I think I was going to tell her why it wasn't appropriate to sing at a job interview. It was a weird store, maybe it sold musical instruments, maybe bootleg tapes. I don't know. Later I was on my balcony and something weird was going on with something on the ground, but I can't remember. That was it for the day, so I went to wake. ***SONG OF THE WEEK*** "Ghost Town" by The Specials (from one of their greatest hits album) [:[END]:] *OW* [[08046LA]] Lord of Obliviana Oh yes! OsoaWeek045 is done! 20 days late! But less late than the issue before that! Now onto this sucker. OsoaWeek046. 6/22/95. 7:23 AM. Amtrak. So I'm definitely going to Las Vegas. Gonna stay at the Luxor. Looks pretty cool. I heard something about Disney announcing their fourth WDW theme park--Wild Animal Kingdom or something. To open in 1998. Sounds like a long time, I know, but it'll be 1998 in two-and-a-half years! Was January 1993 really all that long ago? Also, in four-and-a-half years, we got 2000. The Millennium. Oh yeah! That last sentence reminded me of a Star Wars dream I had last night! Something like a videogame or something, and at the end you meet up with the Millennium Falcon and Han Solo, since they weren't featured in the main part... Also dreamed of a very old David Byrne. Here's a thought--why hasn't David Byrne weighed in with an ultra-hip CD-ROM yet? Mysterious. The world of videogames is in a real slump now. The most exciting thing in the arcades is MK3, I guess, but it's just more of the same--nothing new. Cruisin' USA is great--but it's been around for a long time and doesn't break much new ground. Home systems are even worse. Nothing's coming out anymore for the 16-bit systems--nothing exciting, that is. Saturn is out, but it's a pretty raw deal right now. Maybe Sony's PlayStation will jumpstart the industry. Maybe. But right now it seems a lot like 1984 (great videogame slump?). I'm fallin' asleep here. Youth, Fiction, Wit, Hedonism, Science, Magic, Computers, Angst. What is it I'm seeing here? Whatever. I've been feeling real weird today. That last paragraph was this morning. Now I'm going home. These people talking are bugging me. Gotta move. Okay. No A/C in this car, but worth it not to hear those idiots talking. Nice and quiet, just how I like it. Awfully hot, though... Okay. Where am I? Issue 46. Huh. Y'know, psychologically, the apparent extent of change in these issues is less than in the beginning. That is, going from, say, issue 3 to issue 11 was a big move. Going from 38 to 46 doesn't seem like that much at all, but it's exactly the same. So I'm feeling a little lost. The method I'm currently using to distribute OsoaWeek is totally bare bones. One copy buried on AOL, another buried on The Familiar Spirit BBS. Not much chance for a big readership like that. I just read in Wired about a WWW-based ezine that averages 100,000 hits a day. Jesus Christ. 100,000. That's where I gotta be. I gotta be on the WWW. I can set up all of OsoaWeek on there, cross-referenced like all heck. But not only that--graphics, sound, video, games--even 3-D space via the emerging VRML virtual reality WWW standard. Maybe I'll win big in Vegas and have dough to set up my own Web server. That's where I gotta be. http://www.obliviana.com Maybe someday soon that beatific address will lead somewhere. But for now, I'm still in the wasteland. I want OsoaWeek to be like a place, with locations analogous with the various features. I want a foundation I can rest on and build up from. Right now, I feel like I'm sketching on a tabula rasa, all the time. I need some cyberspace in my life, baby! I had an idea today which expands upon several existing ideas of mine, and comes out as something quite subversive and interesting. The idea is for a Revolver called "The Dark of College". Now, some historical data. Thatterine College in Severe Repair was originally called "The Dark of College". I changed it when I began OsoaWeek, I think. It's mentioned in OsoaWeek015, cuz I forget to change it to "Thatterine". I changed it because I didn't think it was a good name for a college. In retrospect, I may have been too harsh on the name, but I like "Thatterine". It makes sense, since it was established by Evene Thatter. (Note: It was his rival, Pobix Pabor, who founded Shirt University). As you may have read in the pages of OsoaWeek, especially in OsoaWeek021, I myself had some rather intense occult experiences at Drew University, starting in 1986. This experience piqued my interest in the whole subject of occult goings-on on a college campus. So in a broader sense, The Dark of College is a name that covers the whole "genre" of occult college experiences. Now, the new idea I have fore The Dark of College is to create a new Revolver, taking place at a fictitious college that is not part of the SR universe, but rather, is set in the real world we all know. Well, real except for the fact that Obliviana has gotten amazingly popular in this world, and the student characters are all heavily into it. Think of the possibilities. 6/23/95 6:10 PM train Yesterday I think I was overcaffeinated. So today I haven't had any coffee. I DID have a Coke, though. That has caffeine. But not too much. Now I have a caffeine-withdrawal headache. And I don't feel like writing. Guess I'll play some NetHack. 6/26/95 6:55 AM Amtrak I've been in a writer's malaise the whole weekend--hardly got any writing done at all. Looking at +18 for today. I gotta plan this out, though. See, the rule is, every issue much come out under a week after the previous one (even if only by a few minutes). If I put this one out today, Monday, then the next one will be due by next Monday at the latest, and I'll be in Vegas that day. Okay. So this issue HAS to be done by Wednesday. If I do that, then the issue after that will be due NEXT Wednesday, the day after I return from my trip. Or, of course, I could finish this one up today, and spend the rest of the week working on issue 47, for a Friday release. I don't know. It's tough. So I saw Pocahantas and Casper over the weekend. Check out the reviews above. Also, I got Laurie Anderson's "Puppet Motel" CD-ROM. After the hours it took me to get my computer properly configured to play it, I found it somewhat interesting. I guess I have to explore it more, cuz I haven't gotten to hardly any of the good stuff they mention on the box or in articles. Oh well. I just saw a thing on the local news last night that New York is quickly becoming the hub of the Digital Superworld CD-ROM/Internet content production kinda thing. They call it "Silicon Alley". Watching the story, I felt a pang of urgency, that I should have been at that trade show, that I should have been the one on the news report pontificating about the future of digital entertainment. But alas, no. Right now, I'm nowhere. But nowhere is a good place to make preparations to be somewhere. This Amtrak I'm on is cool--it goes straight from Princeton Junction to Newark, and from there, New York. Whizzing past my old stop, Metropark. Streamlining along, across the face of New Jersey. Toward Silicon Alley... Yeah, I have to come up with something soon. Something like a CD-ROM or a WWW site. I mean, the time has come. But--I guess that the time can wait at least a month, till the end of OsoaWeek Book Four, which is also the end of OsoaWeek Year One. This will occur with OsoaWeek052, July 20, 1995--which WILL be out on time! The issue after that will the out EIGHT days later, on Friday, July 28, 1995. See, that's Obliviana Day, the 209th day of the year. So for all of OsoaWeek Year Two, it'll come out on Friday instead of Thursday. See? Man it's cold on this train. LATER Yeah, on my way home now. I'm still in some pretty confusing territory. You'd think that after completing 45 issues, I'd have some sort of clue as to what I'm doing. I don't know. It's just--I guess it has to do with where I'm going. The current distribution system I have set up just isn't working. I was hoping that I'd get an audience of several hundred at least, using this method, but I have no regular readers that I know of. At least, only a handful of people have sent E-mail. So it's kind of depressing. Huh. Just like in the other three Books so far, when I hit about the middle, I start to really hate the new format I've developed. And right now, I tellya, I can't wait for OsoaWeek to change. But I'll carry this format through to issue 52. That the goal I set for myself and that's what I'm gonna do. This is the seventh issue of the Fourth Book, and still I haven't sent out any E-mbers. What am I waiting for? I guess at some level I'm apprehensive about E-mailing material to people that they might find offensive. Yeah, look. Censorship in action? All this talk about censoring the Internet? And BBS operators in jail cuz someone uploaded a photo a someone doing it with a dog? Yeah, I guess this is a factor. But above and beyond all other reasons is procrastination. My laziness knows that if I start mailing E-mbers out, I'll have to do it every week, and it'll just be something else I gotta do. I know I keep denying it, but I need an interactive thing, with movies and sounds and pictures and all that. E-mail just won't cut it. I need CD-ROM or World Wide Web. Just like I said up there somewhere. I mean, even to present the text-based OsoaWeek the way I want, I need a front end. Now let me say, I just got access to WWW and a CD-ROM drive in the past month. Let me tell you--I'm spending a helluva lot more time with the CD-ROM than with the WWW. I think what I hate about the WWW most is the interconnectivity--all those web Sites that are little more than links to other web Sites. I don't know. I never liked the idea of being a "team player". I believe in the power of the individual, and somehow, the WWW goes against that. But this a minor quibble. I have to be realistic. I MUST have a site on the WWW. It is IMPERATIVE. But still, I think my ideas would be better served by a CD-ROM... Heck, why not make both! Great idea! Yeah! I could of course take another route, and create an Obliviana Interface not on CD-ROM, to distribute as Predatorware. 6/27/95 Morning. Yeah, so I checked, and I have to finish this issue before 9:05 AM tomorrow morning. Yup. That's the way it's gotta be. I guess it's writer's block. I haven't felt like writing for about a week now. But... it's not exactly writer's block... I have stuff to write when I sit down and do it--I just don't FEEL like it. I wonder why. Oh well, I guess it's just part of a healthy creative life, going through these blue periods. It sucks, though. So back to the whole "next step" issue. If you go back to OsoaWeek001, you'll see this whole complex system of stuff. THIS is the kind of thing I want to do with the Obliviana Interface. And it all leads to a full-fledged virtual realm, where folks can visit anytime, 24-hour-a-day. But the real value behind all this is not just having a virtual world--it's the IDEAS behind it. I have plenty of ideas--now I have to refine them into a single coherent body. In fact, I have so many ideas, even I can't keep track of them all. I've answered the question "What is Obliviana?" so many times, that the true answer remains distant and vague to me. But it's there... I have some kind of grasp on it... and I will master it... LATER. I saw a thing in Macworld today about a WWW service which, for a $100 setup fee and $30 a month, will register a domain name (such as "obliviana.com", say?) and put up to 10MB of HTML and associated files on the WWW, with a 100MB per month download limit before additional charges kick in. Well? I know I was badmouthing the WWW before, but I think that it's the way to go. For now. 6/28/95 8:20 AM Okay! Sitting in the waiting area at Penn Station--gotta get this baby done within 45 minutes to remain true to my pledge! I'm going to extremes to keep OsoaWeek on the right track! But that's just the kind of guy I am! Hope I make it. Love, Frank Edward Nora P.S. G E T A L L O B L I V I A N A ! *OW* [[09046SU]] Superior SUPERIOR 257 Sing a song of platform, days of thrill-before-deal. Forestmorning drive, cool car, the promise of a new horizon, the prospects of failure stabbing at the back of your consciousness. Dazed and rummaged, gotta get there early to get a parking spot. And I shatter the delay. SUPERIOR 258 Calling to the north mountain. Calling to the virtual reality place, tense hanging around. Conversation across travline, overhear and what's up with my heart? Have you talked to Piper lately? She's moving to Philadelphia in like two weeks. I overheard that. So much pressure inside the Earth, never released, never knowing relief. America has known peace and prosperity my whole life. I look around and wonder why people complain about success. SUPERIOR 259 I might have a reason to party. Nobloe, get logic for him to demicide. Alberjope, the mustard meason tells of yunk and sommory in the hills of yang. My my my, lookee here, si true the yanner and umping. Tore of jurit, let them tend to their smattering. Yo legs hammering the day and yum yum the day. SUPERIOR 260 Fall comfort, not underfall, touring and during, I, light and carefree, jump at you. Cuff, of amzer and dank ontoings I bserve. Elevator overall, smooth eggshell partofastar, yad wasn't polt. The adore place-yandow stimmery was of the and juicinessness. Nearing sleepthemagic was for you thelady. SUPERIOR 261 Soothzolt, I know you. The wicked of jagged signs and symbols, your room in the library is cool. We look at military and saw, What forgot, was stained high. Give me your logical nerves. We can do it better. SUPERIOR 262 The cardinal flies and we rip each other apart. Going to Europe for the Summer. While I work at the mall. Strange how fate goes, how I know we're over. Rich parents make a difference. Europe changes a girl's worldview, so to you. I cry as I think about it--plenty of girls at the mall, gotta get myself a new one. Nothing you say means anything to me anymore. Go to Europe--I'll create my own Europe at the High Bluff Mall. SUPERIOR 263 Rhombus is pure, loving the local brook. Squeeze of a grapefruit, and always more. Time spent in government offices--I'd kill for an island of my own. Gauge progress on a windy deserted hilltop, like me. Pine tree and playground thing, you know the thing I hate about rakes is when you step on them--you know about this?--and it flies up and hits you in the face. You think that only happens in movies? Nuh-uh, not for me. I've done it to myself. Several times. SUPERIOR 264 original To watote wotaj eujes vlosed, I am the man, So come and celevrate the arrucal of Summer, I womderm after all tjese uecats of tupinf, do I atukk nit kniw the keynisrf? Stupid, sully demonstratum nut I fotta keep on micuug. *OW* [[10046IS]] Into E-mber Severe Repair [:[SVR007]:] SEVERE REPAIR E-MBER 007 by Frank Edward Nora Welcome to the SEVENTH Severe Repair E-mber! This time, I present to you a rather frightening chapter called "Manny's Attempt of Suicide". Hope ya like it! See ya next time! INFORMATION: Severe Repair E-mber 007, June 8, 1995. Published weekly by Obliviana Super Occult Amusement, obliviana@aol.com, 1-800-OBLIVIANA. All contents copyright 1995 Frank Edward Nora. This release is Predatorware--you are free to make digital copies, so long as they're not altered or sold. All other forms of reproduction require permission. You're Prey unless you get a Predator Deed for this release. Contact us for more on this concept. You can cancel or subscribe to this E-mber anytime, via E-mail. *OW* [[11046SR]] Severe Repair SEVERE REPAIR 46: "Manny's Attempt of Suicide" The crazy guy came up to me and Jesk at the bus stop. "Hey man! Did you hear about the wedding?" Adrenaline surged through me and I breathed heavy. The guy was disheveled, long unkempt beard and hair, ripped clothes, dirty. "No." was all I could manage to say. "Yeah!" he said, laughing happily. "It's the good one." Me and Jesk stared at the guy in fear. "Ebsekkian, man! He's getting, like, married! You know Ebsekkian!" "Who?" I managed. "Ebsekkian, Evil Master of Weirdness." he said in exaggerated way. We didn't respond, so he continued. "He's taking a bride. You know what her name is? Lightning Elsewhere. She's so hot I could just... I... I could just like eat her up!" I looked over at Jesk and he shrugged. "So you guys going?" he asked us. "Um, I don't know." I said, fiddling around in my pocket for the little pen knife there, as if I could possibly wield it in defense. "You have to kill yourself to go there." he said matter-of-factly. "What?" Jesk blurted out. "Yeah. But I'm invited. They told me to come." "Who?" Jesk asked. "From the world of Evil Weirdness." Jesk shook his head, always the skeptic, and maybe a little too cocky too. "Where do you people come up with this crap?" he said, clearly putting up a front. "Crap?" the nut said. "Crap? It's not crap kid. I get the transmission--every other day, for five minutes." "Yeah?" Jesk said mockingly. "Had to kill twenty people to get it." the weirdo continued. I stiffened and massaged my little knife. Jesk, also, was speechless. The guy came over and sat next to us. "I gotta kill myself soon. The wedding is tomorrow. But..." Shakily, I looked over at him. Jesk, between him and me, was plotting. I could see it in his eyes. "Why kill yourself?" I said. He looked at me, and when our eyes locked, I saw something strange in his eyes--like stars and galaxies moving toward me. "I've been conditioning myself for years so that my spirit will be suitable for passage in the Place of Evil Weirdness. When I die, Ebsekkian will catch my falling soul and bring me to the wedding. I am one of the few." He didn't seem violent or threatening, other than what he was saying. He just seemed, I dunno--calm. Even happy. "How can you be sure of this?" Jesk said, turning to the man. "No one knows what happens after they die." "I do." the guy said with a smile. "I told you I get the transmission. News and important information beamed straight from Evil Weirdness into my head." His eyes drifted off and he smiled a scary smile. "All those I killed in his name--all of them caught by the Man. But consigned to slavery or worse. Not me. A faithful servant like me--we get rewarded." "If you're a murderer why shouldn't we call the police?" Jesk said haltingly. I got the impression he regretted saying it as soon as he did. The man glared at him for a moment, but then smiled. "No, there will be no police. Not once I offer you the gift." "What gift?" Jesk said, breathing heavily. The man smiled, turned away, took a smoking pipe out of his pocket, and crushed it in his hand. "Here it is boys. I killed twenty, and have sworn my life and soul to Ebsekkian." he said. Then, more animated, "The power! You can't imagine! Being able to look inside people, manipulate then. Seeing and commanding elemental forces. Raising chaos and madness! Destroying... And the transmissions... Scenes of such glorious excess and Odditey! Such total SEX and MADNESS!" He turned to us, eyes utterly insane. "YOU'LL BE CUMMING THE WHOLE TIME! YOU CAN'T HOLD BACK WHEN THE TRANSMISSION IS ON!" I stood up and backed away. "Leaving so soon? Before my offer, Poale?" "How... how did you know my name?" "I can see into you. And just like the character you're named after from 'The Aleche Degrasion', you too hold great potential for darkness within you!" "Shut up!" I yelled. "No." the guy said authoritatively, as Jesk also got up. Then he smiled again. "Here it is!" he said, holding his hands up in a showmanlike fashion. "I could kill myself, but it would be a waste, for he who kills me gains all my Evil Weirdness. This is an offer that won't pass your way again, Poale. I offer you vast power, vast pleasure--and ask for nothing in return! An event such as this is rare! If you pass this opportunity by, you'll regret it the rest of your days!" As I looked at him, I started to feel strange. I started getting these visions. Horrible stuff--scenes of such total evil and degradation. I was shocked that such stuff would even cross my mind. But I could tell--I could tell he was putting them there. And he knew--he knew that I liked what I saw, even if I was still lying to myself then." "What's wrong with you man?" Jesk yelled. I grabbed him by his shirt and threw him down to the ground. He was totally surprised. "Wh... what the hell's wrong with you Poale?" he said, getting up and backing away. "I don't know." I said. Then the bus came. Jesk looked at it, then back at me. "Are you coming to see Uncle Manny or not?" "I'll catch the next bus." I said. He shook his head, saying "f*ck you", and got on the bus. A moment later, I wondered why what just happened had happened. We were best friends. Then I looked at the weirdo. "Call me Zigzug Haine." he said. Then he produced a hypodermic needle from his jacket." I looked at it, fascinated, and vaguely aware that he was overpowering my mind. He gave me an innocent look. "Come on, Poale. Ebsekkian said that I had to find someone to replace me if I want to go to the wedding. Be a friend. Don't you know that all the guests at an Evil Weirdness wedding have to have sex with the bride? Do you know how much I want to f*ck Lightning Elsewhere? It's all I can think of! And you--you little freak--out of everyone in Derolbam, you're the one. You're the one with the most potential. I ask you to stick this cyanide inta me. Kill me. Then I'll be on my way and you'll be on yours." A vision of a woman, who must have been Lightning Elsewhere, flashed into my mind, and I wild just grew in me, and a tightness in my pants. "I'm screwing with your head, Poale, that's for sure. But not enough to force you. You have to choose to do it. Choose to kill me." He put the hypo down next to him on the bench. Then he took off his jacket, revealing his bare arms. He threw the jacket onto the ground, faced forward, took a deep breath, and closed his eyes. My mind was a frenzy--at the sight of his bare arm, I was filled with a crazy desire to plunge the hypo deep into his flesh and inject the poison deep into his veins. I shook my head--these weren't my thoughts, these were his... "I'm only magnifying your true spirit." he said, clearly reading my mind. I narrowed my eyes and frantically looked around, searching the area for people. "There's no one around. I made sure of that." As he said these words, an irrational hatred for Zigzug gushed up in me. I despised him, wanted him dead. More than anything, I wanted to kill him. "Do it." he said. "Imagine the feeling of all my power, all my blood, sweat and tears of thirty years--you sucking it all into you. YOU'RE EVIL! YOU KNOW IT! WHY SUFFER AT THE HANDS OF THE INSECTS ALL YOUR LIFE, WHEN YOU CAN BE FULFILL YOUR TRUE EVILNESS AND CONQUER ALL!" I was a pulsating ball of rage. I knew what he was saying about me was true, and I hated him all the more for forcing me to see the real me. A few moments of this frenzy and I was gone. With a terrible roar a lunged forward, primitively gasped the hypo, and stabbed it into that ugly bare arm. With great relish, I pressed the plunger with my thumb and pumped liquid death into Zigzug's veins. And one the plunger was all the way down, I pushed the needle further into his arm with me straining fist. I searched for his eyes, and he obliged by opening them and locking them with mine. And all those stars and galaxy came into me. I slurped and devoured all the Evil Weirdness this psycho had to offer. I took it all into me, ruining my soul forever, I knew. But I didn't care. He was right. Why suffer my whole life when I had the chance to triumph and reign? I took it. I lapped it up like a kitten with milk. The transfer of Evil Weirdness took only a few seconds, and the strain of it was enormous. Both of us collapsed. And I blacked out, know in my last moment of consciousness that I would never be in the light again, never for the rest of my life and beyond. I would forevermore be in darkness. I liked the idea. * * * Butterscotch Hold was a way of life. The buzzword all round was "imperfection". Lemon and Courier Arbhay sat in an alcove facing the vastness of Gnoboslast. The Hold was like an enormous hemisphere at a 45 degree angle--like a theater, Gnoboslast the stage. "This place just feels so HEAVY." Lemon said, sitting on the super-shaggy butterscotch-colored carpet. She sat with her legs folded to the side underneath her--a very innocent-looking pose. "Yeah." Arbhay said, sitting astride a big, dark wood chair, resting his folded arms on its ornate back. They were back in their normal bodies. The transformation back was a painful and vexing one. See, as Granticaine led them here, their real bodies started to break through the old ones. The pressure of their true forms built inside of them, and clumsily began to tear and rip the false bodies from inside. Most of this process occurred during a monthlong trek across Special Black Terrain, a dark, barren nowhere of Gnoboslast. The horns were the first things to start breaking through. Lemon's were easy, but Arbhay's antlers were a bitch. Whatever was happening, it could only happen in Gnoboslast. There were a few weeks when both of them looked terrible and experienced a dull, horrific pain. Fingers bursting out of other fingers, eyes forcing other eyes aside, legs ripping out of the sides of other legs. Gnoboslast was like nowhere else. The whole journey to Butterscotch Hold took two months--but it may as well have been forever. No day or night, no eating, no breathing. A more basic form of just being there. Scary. "I hate how this place... has taken away all my concern, all my energy. I should be trying to get us out of here, but I just don't care anymore. I wish I did, Arbhay." "I know what you mean. And I... I was looking forward to a very lucrative and sensually pleasurable afterlife. It was... almost a lock. But now... I doubt I have any access there any more." Lemon smiled a crooked smile. "Sorry for saving your life, antler brain." "No, it's not--I mean, I didn't want to die. It's just--this is sort of LIKE being dead... and I would have preferred the afterlife I invested so much of myself in..." They looked out at Gnoboslast. Dwaralah Field--bands of states, flowingly changing much slower than clouds. The black one with the colorful pyrotechnics ever above it, the precious metal cubes of the checkerboard one, the one of all the floors and the shadows of the feet that walked them, the feather and fur one, like living mountains, the huge granite one, always with one whiskey bottle somewhere on it. And the foundation--brown and black miasma, with electric blue energy discharges. All of this, all over. Sometimes a sky, sometimes not. All kinds of skies. Sometimes the sky was a beautiful ocean, sometimes like a ripped pair of blue jeans. The was Gnoboslast Winterhome, this part of Gnoboslast they were observing. Butterscotch Hold was an idea auditorium to observe it all. You could spend hundreds of years watching. Indeed, it would take hundreds of years to start to understand it. "We really have to help Daptin." Lemon said, head in hand. "I know. He sounds like a real nice... whatever he is. God." "Yeah, he is. Godhood is sexy in a man." "Mm hmm." She looked up at Arbhay. "How is it he could be so weak? In the world he himself created?" Arbhay shrugged, and Lemon continued. "I mean, it was so obvious--Spanking New Sarah was the queen for him! You know! She was perfect. But no--those two snakes, Booze and Sleap--they did Daptin but good." "Yup." "Slaverceth knows what they were looking for, if this place was just a wrong number!" Arbhay sighed. "I mean, Arbhay my dear, what the heaven? What could they want?" "I don't know." Arbhay said, in thought. "But if Zoipin and Granticaine are right about this Orange Universe place, we SHOULD be able to deal with those two, Red Archer Booze and Sleap Drassy." "I hope so. It's just--we've been here for a year already. And I... I feel I could just loungearound like this for another decade or something before I'd even start to feel antsy." Lemon smiled and continued. "Maybe that's what this place is all about--maybe it's the Anti-Antsiness Land." "Yeah..." "But--I know we always wonder about this, but what could have happened to the others? If Zoipin and Grant were just... just tossed into Gnoboslast for trying to help Daptin, what could have happened to the rest of them? To the rest of my adopted family in Yellowhaus? I... I care a little about it all. And in this place, caring about anything is so... so impossible..." "Yeah." Then the two heard the distant megaphoned voice of Granticaine Chug Perion. "Attention. Attention Courier Arbhay and Lemon. Please return to the Phone Center immediately. We have contact with Orange Universe. Repeat, we have contact." There were a few moments of nasty feedback, then all was quiet again. Arbhay and Lemon looked at each other. "I could kinda care about that." Lemon said. [:[END]:] *OW* [[END046OW]] -------> ------------------- ----------- -------- -- ----- |