|| -------- -- -----  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 068--11/10/95 <-------  ||  OsoaWeek  ||  Issues  ||  Book 6  ||  -------> (Cup OWis068, Created v1 (4/27/99), Copyright 1999) = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = [[BEGIN068OW]] [[01068CV]] * * * O S O A W E E K 0 6 8 * * * November 10, 1995 "The weekly ezine of Obliviana Super Occult Amusement!" by Frank Edward Nora CONTENTS 01 068 CV--Cover 02 068 LA--Lord of Obliviana 03 068 SU--Superior 04 068 SR--Severe Repair INFORMATION: OsoaWeek068, November 10, 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. Check out Obliviana on the WWW at: http://www.obliviana.com/~osoa Character count: 27006 / Line count: 709 / Days late: 17 *OW* [[02068LA]] Lord of Obliviana 11/22/95 9:12 AM Just finished OsoaWeek068, 19 days late. So much for being back on schedule. Last issue was a milestone for OsoaWeek, cuz in it I ended the practice of spelling fuck as f*ck and shit as sh*t. No more! Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, shit fuck shit. There you go. What prompted this change was my abandonment of America Online, and my new focus on the World Wide Web, where there's a lot more freedom, at least for now. Man, it's almost 1996, THE year. Y'know? It's the year where the Digital Superworld really starts to take off, with 3-D online services and other cool stuff. I gotta be ready to catch the wave. Where am I now? 11/24/95 Well, Kerri broke up with me for good today. She's gonna move out most of her stuff tomorrow. Now I'm free as a bird. And just think, if Obliviana takes off, and I'm a big success, I could date some excellent women. At this point, as a dorky loser, I can't expect to date excellent women. 11/27/95 8:11 AM At this point, I'm about ready to kill someone. Let me work backwards to give you a glimpse of how I got to this point. Right now, I'm sitting in the waiting room of the Princeton Junction train station. I got to the ticket window as the train was approaching. The righthand window, with a fat woman behind it, had a sign that said "closed". But this girl cut in front of me anyway--and she kibitzed and asked about train times and finally bought a ticket--as my chance of making the train waned. Finally the left window was open, and I got my weekly. "Bet I'll just miss it." I commented to the guy. Then I turned to run, and smashed right into this fucker who was just standing there. I made a quick apology and ran out to, indeed, watch as the doors closed. Five second earlier, and I would have made it. I woke up this morning to a semi-barren apartment and muscle pain. I had no motivation to get up on time or hurry up. So I wound up stalling, sitting on the toilet reading an interview with Jennifer Jason Leigh, etc. I had some excellent dreams--most notably, a very intense time travel dream. The other notable dream was one where I got fired. Jeez, in my current financial situation, that would be the coup de grace. Huh. Lucky dreams don't usually come true. Dreams you have while you're asleep, that is, not visions and aspirations. In the time travel dream I had this special mug--two of them, in fact--which were the secret to my time travel ability. They were large, clear glass mugs, with handles, and at their base was a little enclosed space--you see such sometimes at novelty stores--with golf tees, seashells, etc. inside. Anyway, with these, I had to write down information about my destination on a little piece of paper--date, time, and maybe location, and put it in the base. Then root beer was involved in some way--maybe pouring some into the base with the paper? Nah--but root beer was involved. Then, I would fill the mug up with water, and start drinking it. The coolest scene of the dream was when I went back in time--not too far--to visit my ex-girlfriend, Kerri. I guess it didn't go well, and she was after me, and I was drinking from the mug as I backed away, wondering whether it would work. But it did--I started to lose awareness of the surrounding, like I was drifting into unconsciousness, but not quite like that. Pretty cool, huh? The actual FEELING of time travel. It seemed like one had to lose awareness of one time before entering another. Cool. Later, there were agents from the government after me, trying to get a hold of my mugs and of the secret of time travel. Also, I remember noting that it was a good method of time travel, since I hadn't experienced that always-perturbing time travel hazard of meeting yourself. Oh well. So yesterday, I got home from the hike and started some absolutely needed laundry before setting up my guitar and trying it out. Once the laundry was done, I went to bed exhausted from the hike. On the drive home from the hike, which was a haul, I stopped at Border's near my parents and got a guitar instruction book. Let me skip to that morning--I got up, and left for the guitar store in Scotch Plains about 10:45 AM. I got the guitar without much ado, and left for the pre-hike rendezvous site in Bedminster at 11:25--and they were leaving at 11:45. I sped down Rt. 22, and as I approached the on-ramp for 287 North, I decided to take it, but just a second too late--I couldn't get over. So, I swerved into a construction area and waited for the traffic to thin, which took well over a minute. Then I executed a 90 degree turn right, followed by a frantic 90 turn left, where my back wheels skidded in the gravel, as a car was coming for the exit. I made it, and amazingly, I got to the rendezvous. The hike site was way the hell in the sticks. It was a singles hiking thing that Peter Litkey went on every Sunday. It was 7 miles of rocky, hilly terrain. Absolutely exhausting. I was talking to one of the few attractive women there--a Linda I believe--so I didn't wind up feeling like a total loser. Okay. That was yesterday. Now let's go back to Friday. I awake at my parents' house, go to the guitar store for the first time, then go to Bowcraft for some video game entertainment, where I called Kerri and made a date with her for that evening. Then I got to Miele Plaza, across from my old apartment, just to discover that "I Can't Believe it's Yogurt" (reviewed in OsoaWeek039), a store I used to get coffee at all the time was gone. At the deli, they told me that Judy, the owner, had left 3 weeks, maybe a month earlier. I got home, intent on cleaning up, but slept all afternoon. I was a half-hour late for my 7 o'clock date with Kerri. We went to Chi-Chi's, and she told me she was gonna start moving her stuff out the next day, and also that she stopped being attracted to me, stopped thinking of me as a lover, way back in August. She definitely has problems. She used to have epilepsy until she had brain surgery. She still takes medication. I'm just mentioning this to convey something of the true situation. Yes, she did leave me, but it wasn't really my fault, I don't think, in the final analysis. Her and her father and brother were due there the next day at 11 AM. I went home and started cleaning up a little, so they wouldn't all think of me as a total fuck-up. She claimed that she was breaking u with me cuz I was so messy. Funny then that she revealed the losing-interest-in-me-in-August thing. The next morning, I cleaned the place up a little more and then high-tailed it outta there. I decided to take refuge at Video Game Connections (reviewed in OsoaWeek001) with my friend Mike. I brought my PlayStation--I had decided to sell it to help in justifying spending $300 for guitar and amp. So I went, hung out, got 414.7 on Enduro, sold the PlayStation and 4 games for $215, and headed for Outlaw Guitars. On Rt. 9, I stopped at a McDonald's for piss and phone, but the phone had no handset. So I went up to supermarket, where there were a few, one constantly ringing (but stopped ringing just as I was about to answer it). I called Outlaw Guitars and found out they closed in 20 minutes. Being that I was in Freehold or somewhere near there, I was screwed. "Oh, no." I said and regretted saying it. Then I went into a health food store to aimlessly browse for legal stimulants, and this hyper lady who worked there asked "Were you here earlier?" and she went on to describe how some old geezer backed up full speed into the building, and how she saved the day by staring at his license plate, supposedly making his realize that he couldn't just hit and run. She was manic man, running a mile a minute, but nice. I used my conversational skills to make it into an acceptable discussion. What the hell am I talking about? Okay--then I called my answering machine and got about four messages from my brother--where he suggested I meet him and Dave Kopperman after they saw Toy Story. So I went to the Bridgewater Commons and hung out by the theater exit for 45 minutes. Later, I found out my brother went out the back exit, figuring I wouldn't show up! I stay overnight at my parents' house after hanging out with John and Dave (and giving Dave his first cigar experience). The next day was the Sunday (yesterday) described earlier. Okay, so let me go back to Wednesday. There was this whole thing going on, at least in my mind, with these girls in New York. I wrote a piece describing the whole mess, but I don't feel like publishing it now--maybe sometime later. Let it suffice thus--I thought this one girl was trying to set me up with her friend, and I was all giddy and hopeful, and then on Wednesday I called her in the late afternoon from work, and got a whole nother story. But--hey, I already wrote about the whole thing, so you'll just have to wait for it, if I ever decide to publish it. If you're in the far future, search for the string "definitely points toward chemistry" to help you find it. Okay. Wednesday night. I'm all depressed and phased out. I spend the entire train ride home writing about the situation. Guess I just went home after that--no clear memory that evening. Probably just went to sleep. Huh--no clear memory of a time 5 days ago. Huh. What the fuck--now I remember, and it's important to the story, as well. I went to Video Game Connections, and bought Destruction Derby for PlayStation. Mike's father tried to convince me to help them out at a flea market early the next morning, but Mike said it wasn't necessary. I went home with the possibility of going the next morning to this Columbus flea market, but didn't. So I went to my parents' for Thanksgiving, the highlight of which must have been my father's first cousin Mary's boyfriend describing his rare eye ailment in detail. Yeah. I booted up my brother's computer and wrote for about an hour straight, writing this issues Severe Repair chapter, "The Clown Centaur Architect", in its entirety. We watched Goldeneye and Toy Story on bootleg. I hate staying over at my parents' house. The next day was Friday, which I already described. So that's it--the 4-day weekend. Oh yeah--when I got back yesterday, a lot of Kerri's stuff was gone, making for a quite disorienting experience. So--I feel kind of "free as a bird" to quote the title of a new Beatles song. But I also feel messed up. I'm physically and emotionally drained. Mentally though, I'm okay. Now I have to look into getting a new apartment. Sweet. I'm late for work as usual. 9:13 already, shoulda been there at 8. The past four days mark a real transition for me, a major change. Oh yeah--after waiting for my brother at the mall, I got a deck of Jack Daniels playing cards, and made it into a Storm Codex by throwing out all but 30 cards. I uses the SC during the hike, 11/11--2/19. I left it on all night--maybe helped spur the cool dreams? Anyway, what I'm saying is that now my situation is different. I'm moving forward with my life. The way is clear into 1996. The challenge is also clear--establish Obliviana in 1996. Shakeup. Drano the hair clog. Release, catharsis. Electroshock therapy. This is an opportunity, I have to take advantage of it. Get all Obliviana!!! *OW* [[03068SU]] Superior SUPERIOR 381 Bopsindrid the Detergent. Savior elsewhere. SUPERIOR 382 It is not my business to manage a junkyard. It is not my business to maintain a warehouse or complex shipping operation. It is none of my concern to tend to the needs of an office building. I do not choose to deal in matter, for I am the businessman of the digital time. That which I sell is immaterial. But in service to the immaterial is a great material infrastructure, which is kind of a bummer, considering the dream of the digital world. SUPERIOR 383 To me, to me, to me. Is there any way to avoid being self-centered? For even the greatest effort to be selfless revolves around how cool it is to be selfless and how awesome you are for being so. And for all your consciousness, you are with you. What is left. Not at all afraid. Spur of the moment. Carpe diem. Trouble ahead. The romance of trouble. Life is just constantly trying to keep yourself entertained. SUPERIOR 384 This morning, awakened by alarm clock, I pissed but went back to bed. I slept for 45 minutes, then woke up again. My apartment was cold. I took a shower. And I knew, it was too late to get a $2 parking spot, so in a few decadent seconds I decided to turn The Weather Channel on and get back under the covers, still wet from the shower. And these were ten minutes which seemed like an hour. Such comfort, such indulgence. I am now on the train, late for work, but there's no way I'd trade that ten minutes just to be on time. SUPERIOR 385 You can have the capacity, stars are ripe adorable partners. Evil is long ago, my child, so for those walking backwards, collision is likely. I look like a slacker, not a worker. But I make more than most of them. SUPERIOR 386 Was I to be pure, experience raunchiness, to the pine tree area. Can there BE a jumpiness more altruistic--but I apologize--that may not mean anything. Checkerboards are a whole kind of occult life, I mean that. You are in a human body, and you like to huff and puff and blow the world apart sometimes. Do you want to return to the Primal Realm? Consider the smell of rice cooking. Why that? SUPERIOR 387 If these are all words. Dear translator, you're fucked, love Frank Edward Nora. I wanna come to describe something in my life, I have had some jobs, deer have walked through my yard, I am new to this, under you. And the fall foliage, altogether, humming with dry magic, we are swept into a major metropolitan astral plane. Haha, jajajo, umimum, tempermine. Temp ermine. SUPERIOR 388 Donkey Kong, you have been with the three girls I lust after, for many hours, they all play you. Mario is always facing right or left, obeying Cynthia, Diana, and Molly's anonymous commands. But you, Kong, you face them, every time they play. If only I could reach you. But I guess, in the long run, it'd be easier to reach one of them than a fictional character like you. *OW* [[04068SR]] Severe Repair SEVERE REPAIR 55: "The Clown Centaur Architect" Free of the girls for now, Finjear Morno eyed his home in disgust. It was either the war or his love life that would eventually kill him, he thought. Dailan Fogordy was there. He hated Dailan. "Yeah, Finjear." the fat, messy Dailan said. "Yeah." These days, if you had a house, you had to decide between tolerating fools from your past or casting them out to an almost certain doom. He'd cast Dailan out many times before, but somehow the fucker always managed to avoid certain doom and wound up back here. Finjear had horns, and this was what gave him surer footing in his war-torn country. The horned always managed to hang onto the top of the hill, despite a general distrust among the non-horned populace. Dailan had two little bumps above his forehead--he shaved his hair up there to show them off--but they weren't real horns. Genetic mix-ups like him were rare, but not unknown. He always asserted that he was horned, albeit with very short horns. Scientists regarded such as him victims of an abnormality which has nothing to do with real hornedness. "So you're back, huh?" Finjear said. He was a large guy with a limp and a cane. His hair was prematurely white, and his eyes were narrow, a condition many of the horned suffered from as they aged. He wore a green suit with copper chains. He must have been about 40. "Back..." Dailan said distantly. "Look pal, why don't you get your ass down and join the army like you should have done a long time ago." Dailan regarded him with mock shock. "Could it be that this war has made enemies out of brothers?" Finjear sat down on a chair next to the couch Dailan was sprawled on. "Look friend--I know I'll never dissuade you from your belief that you have horns--but horns or not, you're no brother of mine. Just look at yourself. It makes me sick--all those wonderful, healthy young men, being destroyed in the most hideous ways, every day. I sit and think about the contributions they could have made to this world over the course of their lifetimes. All just swept away. Then I look at you. It... it takes all your talent to come up with the complex excuses you dupe yourself with to explain why you can't make it by yourself." Dailan scowled at Finjear as he continued. "You have no skills. But you're 'an architect'. Yeah? An architect. You design buildings... not A ONE OF WHICH HAS EVER BEEN BUILT!" "That's false." Dailan said softly. "How?" "The Jayn Sisters... I helped them build their relief center..." "THAT WAS A TENT! A TENT IS NOT A BUILDING!" "It's a structure! You... Finjear... you're such a pussy for popular notions, aren't you? Hah! I could rattle off a dozen innovations I built into those tents... but you wouldn't..." "Look--a man has a trade! Look at the fighters out there--everything they need has to be fashioned by the hands of men and the machines they build and work. Every food ration, every cartridge, every shirt--all have to be made. You're not a part of that." Dailan struggled like some severely-injured insect to sit up on the couch, wriggling in a pathetic laziness. He glared at Finjear. "Don't kick me out again, huh? I can't take it out there. Do you know what it's like to sleep in wet woods?" Finjear held his hand up. "No, no. I'm not going to boot you out. But it's not compassion on my part. I don't really like you at all. But I DO have a job for you, and your staying here is contingent upon you accepting it?" "How you I hear the same song every day..." Dailan sang, quoting from a popular song. "I know you're intelligent, Finjear, but you have a mental block as far as reality is concerned. Look around us... buildings bombed and blown up in massive fashion. Yeah. You know that this war will end someday. Uh-huh. And there will come a time to rebuild." "Yeah? So what's your point, Fogordy? That time will come, yes. But what does it have to do with the present?" Dailan snickered. "You think that my time would be better served in a factory than in the SERIOUS PURSUIT of architecture?" "Yes, I do. But the job I have for you is not in my factory. It's in a bar that I just acquired." "'Acquired'? As in the bilking of poor war victims?" Josal Fade was no victim. He was a ruthless racketeer, who's never had anything but his own benefit in mind. The war fueled the demise of this pathetic criminal empire. Hah--The Clown Centaur Architect was just about the only thing of value the court could give me. Didn't even take a dent out of what he owed me." "THE CLOWN CENTAUR ARCHITECT? I despise that little shack. Hah! I hope that's not the bar you had in mind." "Of course it is. You think I acquire multiple bars every day? Come on, man. Haha--I thought it would be SO appropriate for a real architect to tend the bar there." Dailan sat up and his feet touched the floor for the first time since Finjear had entered. The fat man's face started turning red. "If you think you're being clever, don't--no--it's not clever. You're just calling me a clown." "Yes Dailan, I am. I'll call you a clown anytime, anywhere, cuz that's WHAT YOU ARE." "Hah! I won't do it! The Ksoco Library is under martial law now, so I can finally get access to the rare books they've hoarded from me all these years! I was just going there tomorrow!" "How were you gonna go there?" "Well..." "How? By borrowing MY bike?" Dailan stared at Finjear and his face cycled through a number of emotions--anger, fear, plea for pity, pride. "Surely you understand the enormity of the Ksoco Library! Those intellectual barbarians have kept knowledge under lock and key for long enough!" "I don't know, uh, Dailan, but isn't that in enemy territory?" "ENEMY TERRITORY? In the realm of intellectual pursuit, there are no territories!" "And you--fat, weak, timid Dailan Fogordy plan to pull off such a hazardous mission by yourself?" "Well..." "Oh, come on! You wanted ME to help you? After all the things you've done to me--stealing, badmouthing, assaulting--you think I'd really even consider it?" "Well, if you want the evil pleasure of debasing me in that bar of yours, you better do it." Finjear shook his head in disbelief and closed his eyes. "Well," he said with a smile, after a pause, eyes still closed, "a mission like that couldn't be worse than my love life." "Who has time for a love life in these times?" Dailan said softly. Finjear opened his eyes. "I do. I don't know what it is--I guess I just love having a woman around. Sex and companionship--can do a lot to keep you sane." "Is your wife still alive?" "Who knows. Once she joined the other side, she was dead to me. So whether she's still breathing matters little to me." "Why? If you once loved her?" "Because--love is a moving target. You have to keep up with it. Things get so fouled-up. Love is a gentle, delicate thing..." "I know something of that." Dailan said, looking down at his lap. "Oh yeah?" Dailan didn't respond. "Well," Finjear said, "the problem as I see it is this. I know this circle of woman friends--and I find all of them attractive, at some level or another. I'd as readily go for one as any of the others. But dealing with them is like walking through a mine field--believe me--at this point I might rather get blown up by a real mine than step back into that labyrinth feminine." "What do you mean?" "I mean--as a man--I think that men can genuinely love more than one woman at once. It's just that the women don't take too kindly to this. They impose this monogamy on us--and I was thinking--isn't this women turning men into woman-like people?" "That's beside the point." "In what way?" Dailan raised his eyebrows to indicate lack of response. "So," Finjear continued. "You just said 'that's beside the point' even though you don't have a point? You just said it for the sake of saying it?" Dailan stuck out his lips in a frown and tilted his head. "You really are a lost soul, Dailan. Anyway, what I was saying, was how the male and female perspective on love... and sex... is so vastly different." "I've heard this argument a thousand times." "What argument?" "The... the argument about men and women being different." "You know--you call yourself an intellectual, but you're nothing but a poser. You can't handle even the simplest debate. We're not going on any book-bundling mission. You're coming with me to the Clown Centaur Architect tomorrow and start your bartending training. A lot of bars have been damaged in the war, and god knows that drinking becomes that much more popular when the world is falling apart around you. And I don't want to miss that profit." "Why me, though?" "You fucking little fool! Can't you stop lying to yourself long enough to identify an act of pure mercy when it comes your way? You act so high and mighty, Mr. Big Architect, but how big are you when you sleep in the woods, and nearly die from the exposure? I'm giving you a chance--a safe and easy job that'll carry through the remainders of this war--maybe you can even make enough to put away some savings--and who knows--in a few years, you might really be in a position to start your own architecture business!" Dailan said nothing. "Look my friend," Finjear continued, "you've built a might structure in your mind to protect your ego--damn, maybe you really ARE a good architect, but just in the construction of damn excuses--see--you have to jump right into the deathly jaws of life, be ready and willing to be chewed up and spat out, within an inch of your life, if you ever hope to get anywhere." "I... I..." "Listen to me. My emotions absolutely worn as thin as they can get. I can be a real bastard if I want. I'll throw you out and have you murdered if I so much as catch a glimpse of you. I have the connections--you know I can do it without any fear of reprisal. And like I said--I don't really like you. I just... the thought of you tending that bar... it pleases me at some level." "You have... no... common decency." "Listen to me Fogordy! This is it! I'm not going to put up with any more bullshit! I'm giving you your last chance. You do exactly as I say--no arguments, no shenanigans. If you feel like stepping out of line, you better fucking well disappear, because I will HAVE YOU KILLED. Understand?" Dailan shook his head uncontrollably as Finjear stood up, with some difficulty, using his cane. "Not another word from you. Go into the guest quarters. And... and if I ever see you again, it means that you accept my offer. If you don't... well, I better... I BETTER NOT FUCKING EVER SEE YOU AGAIN OR YOU'RE FUCKING DEAD!" Dailan began to weep. "So--the plan--you go into the guest quarters--accept my offer, and I'll see you tomorrow morning. Reject me, and you better escape into the woods. If you understand this much, just nod your fat head." Dailan nodded frantically. "And... uh, and Dailan... if you harbor any thoughts about stealing my bike tonight, I'd erase them from your stinking skull. Because, if you do that, I'll use every resource in my possession to track you down and make sure you--and all your architectural documents--and ruined and destroyed in a most uncomfortable fashion, eh? Steal my bike, and you're going to suffer much before you die." Dailan started shivering. "Get out of my sight." Finjear said with an icy finality. Dailan scurried to the guest quarters and gingerly closed the door. Finjear huffed and puffed heavily as he regained his composure. Transferring my anger at the women to such a pathetic little rodent, he thought as he sat down on the couch. But if he's good even as a target for my frustrations, then at least he's good for something. I wonder if he'll try and kill me tonight? Only him and me in the house. Well, if I lock my quarters, there's no way he could get in. A crafty man, a resourceful man, maybe. But a fool like him--what am I worrying about? *OW* [[END068OW]] -------> ------------------- ----------- -------- -- -----