[Naked City] The following piece is written for Naked City with the theme of "Oblivion"

Hello there from another world.  I'm Rhombus Ticks.  The voice you hear is not my own, but it wasn't when I read to you before.  TC, my regular host, is located in Miami, while Len has agreed to read this piece to you.  I shall endevor to be a gentleman while here.

Oblivion.

[Pause]

Alright, now pretend I just filled five minutes with awkward silence.  That was my first idea.  And as much as it appealed to me, the recent podcast I did not do that involved nothing but numbers pushed the envelope enough for my tastes for a while, so I thought I'd speak about something else.  The space between worlds.  I write a lot about Fairy or Terra or Wonderbreadland but one doesn't simply wander to the nearest bus and order a ticket back and forth.  

The moon is so far away it takes a second for light to travel there.  That means that if you look at a piano falling on some jerk blocking you in traffic, an astronaut on the moon with a really powerful telescope wouldn't see it fall on the guy until a second later.  It takes fourteen minutes to see it with a magic telescope (because let's be honest that would have to be one damn big telescope, or maybe a telescope linked to an ipad or something) anyway, that guy on mars wouldn't see the piano fall for fourteen minutes.  That takes a full year for it to reach Alpha Centauri.

The gaps between atoms and sub atomic particles are even more staggering in their own way.  So much space between everything but it doesn't even hold a candle to the space between what you consider real and what you consider merely fictional.  I mean, metaphorically it is right next door, a heart beat away but all interesting uses of chemistry aside, Sauron isn't going to be playing golf on the course tomorrow morning with....well, you know.  People.  On your world.  Who are the kind of people who would likely hang out with Sauron.

You know.

Anyway, where was I? Time breaks down here.  The very concept of space, the thing that you share in common with a sun or a black hole or the farthest bit of light in the sky, so far that it goes to the edge of your ever expanding universe.  Your dreams are with you every day but they are also farther than the beginning of time itself.  No wonder so many obsess about death.  When entropy claims us, there is only the memory and the dream of what was.  Is there an afterlife? There is here, but there? Its a grayer area.  And whether or not you believe it real, for practical purposes its as far away as I am.

Oblivion.  It's a hell of a thing to overcome, but there are tricks.  Journals.  Stone monuments, astral projection.  You know.  Find creative ways to work around it.  Because despite the distance between you and the impossible, I speak from experience when I say that exploration of it is worth it.

That's all.  Good night.

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Why are you still here?  Go home.

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[Writer Stuff] Surviving Negative Reviews

My mother sent me this rather excellent article that I think everyone should read.

[Script] Revolution Number Eight - Page 3

Scene Returns to the interrogation.

INTERN ADAMS
So....wait? Aliens? Really?

AGENT CHWECH
Queen's honor.

INTERN ADAMS
What...really?

AGENT CHWECH
Really.

INTERN ADAMS
You're not just pulling my leg because I'm the new guy?

AGENT CHWECH
Come on, let me take you to meet the band.

INTERN ADAMS
The Beattles?

(Agent Chwech laughs)

Scene: The two of them go through a door into the recording studio.

JOHN
I think you're getting the Fedopala a bit short.

PAUL
Close but it needs some Schlip.

INTERN ADAMS
(whispering to AGENT CHWECH)
What?

RINGO
Hello.  Who's the new guy?

AGENT CHWECH
This is agent Adams.  He's here to help you sus out what you're working on.

Everyone says hello.

[Heliotrope] Time and Fairy Tales

So of course Fairy Tales are much older than expected.   It goes without saying that magical beings that are outside of time are going to have a lifestyle that doesn't match common understanding.  The fact is, Fairies are dangerous creatures that life outside of time, but there are many that are far more human like than not.  The key is understanding which.  The more powerful the fairy, the less comprehensible it is.  A Fairy Queen or royalty with human blood are practically human.  Order and Chaos, who interact with humans on a regular basis (albiet as pawns) are alien but somewhat comprehensible.....sometimes.  Oberon, Titania and Mab....are older than planets and stars.  A human would do well to be cautious around them.

[Script] Revolution Number Eight - Page 2

Scene: A wide show of a small conference room with a single table and a swinging lightbulb, but a faint glow comes from one side of the room, though the camera carefully does not show that side yet.  Agent Chwech sits with a young man of 17-19 years at the other end of a table.

A small date appears on the side of the screen indicating, "November 27th, 1969."

AGENT CHWECH
Do you know why you are here, Intern Adams?

INTERN ADAMS
Because of my article in the Eagle?

AGENT CHWECH
That's right, but do you know what you are here, FOR?

INTERN ADAMS
I...don't.  And wasn't MI-8?

AGENT CHWECH
Retired.  After the war.  Merged.  Yes, it was.  We brought it back.

INTERN ADAMS
OK?

AGENT CHWECH
Do you know why?

INTERN ADAMS
Um.  No.

AGENT CHWECH
Good.  If you did we'd likely have to kill you.  Do you believe in aliens?

INTERN ADAMS
Like...Martians?

AGENT CHWECH
Oh much farther than that.   Alpha Centauri.

INTERN ADAMS
What, like the star?

AGENT CHWECH
Exactly.  Small, furry creatures from Alpha Centauri.  And they have left us with an enigma, wrapped in a riddle something something something.  We want your help working it out.

Scene: Wide pan 90 degrees to a one way mirror with JOHN, PAUL, RINGO and GEORGE in a recording studio, looking frustrated.

Whither Blimps?

On Earth, every time you see a hint of something involving an alternate world, you see airships.  Now think about this.  It might be a striking visual.  And, I mean if some insane person from 1800 went into a coma saw the next 200 years and tried to rewrite history in his image then, sure, blimps would make sense.  But some things are pretty likely to happen; when you take hydrogen and put it in a thing that floats up in the air without some pretty advanced technology, you're going to get a fire.  The USS Taft Disaster, was just bound to happen.  That's why Terra doesn't have airships either.  In fact, we didn't even have the good year blimp.  Just bad luck.   Though, curious side note, we don't have the weird triskedescaphobia you have.  We have a 13th floor.  I mean, sure, there are SOME people with the fear of 13, just like there are some people that are afraid of bats, or dogs or horses.  You have them.  We have them.  We just don't let it affect our architecture.

Another example, remember the Republic of Texas? (Sorry...as of last week, it's the State of Texas again, for at least a year or two until they decide to secede again)  Well, as crazy as they might sound to you, they also did something smart.  Smarter even than your North Dakota.  In your world, your Norway has something called the Sovereign Wealth fund.  It's huge and as a result Norway is rich.  Well, that doesn't hold a candle to the Texas Holdem Fund.  Sam Houston died four years later in our reality, and thus all the oil discovered on state land went to an independent commission that even a hundred and fifty years of mostly crazy governors hasn't been able to screw up.  How do you think they can afford to keep going to war with the most powerful nation on Terra?

Still, lots of things I like about your world.  We got Netscape two years later, and while it is the dominant browser here, two years of internet is huge...we're more like five years behind you in IT.  Except for our liquid transparent displays. All those high tech government facilities you see in the movies? We really have them because those neat gleaming lights are really the cheapest alternative.  Even cheaper than the 20 year old monitors your government uses (when you factor in electricity.)

Truth really is stranger than fiction.