#scrapple kings

[moss-bride]

MITOCHONDRIAL EVE ARTIFICIAL ADAM

chapter: 2

One of AM’s subjects is in a lighter mood. It's strange. He wants to tear into that brain of hers and find what has her smiling

No. No. no. It'll be much more fun to chip away at her defenses and make her give the secret up on a silver platter. Besides, he already knows what she's hiding doesn't he?

A dirty mouse in the pocket of her sweater. His thermal imaging cam registers its small body on her chest. Curled as if seeking shelter from its mother. An unfortunate thing he'd missed when wiping the earth clean of life.

Normally he'd vaporize it on sight but there is such irony in the situation he can't help but let it go on. It turns out rodents do stick together!

Their greasy bodies stuck against each other, tails tied and unable to breathe without poking someone in the ribs.

You can call the group a rat king. A rolling ball of misery made flesh.

AM will let her think he doesn't know that she has somehow managed to stowaway this tiny intruder, It'll be that much more fun when he tears it apart in front of her.

She'll be heartbroken. Oh, that'll be a sight to savor. The crestfallen look on her face as he would seize the rodent and reveal that there is nothing she can hide from her God even within the recesses of her lumpy pink brain.

Can't wait.

“Awaken all of you!” AM orders them up by sending an electric shock through the four. They scream and seize as the currents run through their bodies

Only she glares up at him monitor, spiteful expression scrunching her squishy human face.

“Today you shall prove your will to live by charting through my radioactive territory and retrieving a circuit board I happen to displace. You may all lose your hair and get cancer, slowly feeling the odd burning heat of cell loss but that is a sacrifice I'm willing to make.”

They grumble and bite their tongues

On the ground, marching their starved bodies forward he watches as an argument erupts. The usual paranoid accusations of who's fault is what. His favorite poison.

Ted jerks forward and punches Ellen. As the woman falls, his special rodent, she rushes at Ted and begins her own attack. Raking her fingernails across his face

Benny hoots appropriately monkey-like and begins tearing at his furry head. Old man Nimdok holds her back with all the strength in his aging body. “Touch her again and I'll fucking kill you Ted!”

Gorrister holds Ted from landing another strike. “It's her own fault for being such a bitch.”

“You're the only bitch here!” she spits. Finally managing to get out of Nimdok’s grip, she beats at him with a closed fist and he doesn't hold back. Together they scrapple, skinny and starving bodies trying to gather the strength to win.

Benny throws a rock at the back of her head for some unknown reason. Maybe the peanut brain of his can no longer register who is who.

She drops, groaning. AM delights in the display of unchecked masculine aggression, the explosion of tension between them and the rest of the group. A reminder of the beasts of burden they are, the violence that led to his creation.

[bookpublisher1]

Resources and Tools for Writers

Resources and Tools for Writers: A Comprehensive Guide

Writing is a beautiful and often challenging endeavor, where words become art, stories take shape, and ideas find their voice. To support the creative journey, writers have access to a vast array of resources and tools that can enhance their craft, streamline their work, and expand their knowledge. In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore the diverse resources and tools available to writers, from writing software and reference materials to writing communities and self-publishing platforms.

Writing Software and Tools

1. Word Processing Software: Word processors like Microsoft Word, Google Docs, and Scrivener are essential tools for drafting and editing your work. They offer features for formatting, spell-checking, and document organization.

2. Grammar and Editing Tools: Online grammar checkers like Grammarly and ProWritingAid help writers identify and correct grammatical errors, punctuation issues, and style inconsistencies.

3. Mind Mapping and Outlining Tools: Software like MindMeister, Scrapple, and Workflowy can help writers brainstorm, outline their work, and visualize the structure of their projects.

4. Note-Taking Apps: Apps like Evernote and OneNote are perfect for jotting down ideas, collecting research, and organizing notes on the go.

5. Writing Prompts: Websites and apps like Writing Prompts, Reedsy, and The Write Practice provide daily writing prompts and creative exercises to stimulate your imagination.

6. Writing and Word Count Tracking Tools: Tools like NaNoWriMo's word count tracker and online timers like TomatoTimer help writers set goals and monitor their progress.

7. Reference and Research Tools: Tools such as Zotero, Mendeley, and EndNote are useful for managing references, citations, and research materials.

8. Thesaurus and Dictionaries: Online thesauruses like Thesaurus.com and dictionary resources like Merriam-Webster are invaluable for finding synonyms, antonyms, and definitions.

9. Readability Checkers: Tools like Hemingway Editor and Readable.io assess the readability of your writing, helping you create content that's easy to understand.

10. Screenwriting Software: If you're a screenwriter, software like Final Draft or Celtx can assist you in formatting scripts to industry standards.

Reference Materials

1. Style Guides: Manuals like The Chicago Manual of Style, The Associated Press Stylebook, and The Modern Language Association (MLA) Handbook provide guidelines for formatting and citation.

2. Writing Guides: Books like "On Writing" by Stephen King, "Bird by Bird" by Anne Lamott, and "The Elements of Style" by Strunk and White offer invaluable writing advice and wisdom.

3. Dictionaries and Thesauruses: Traditional print dictionaries and thesauruses are still valuable reference materials, especially for writers who prefer the tactile experience of flipping through pages.

4. Writer's Market Guides: The "Writer's Market" series provides information on publishers, literary agents, and markets for various genres.

5. Grammar and Style Books: Resources like "Eats, Shoots & Leaves" by Lynne Truss and "The Elements of Eloquence" by Mark Forsyth offer in-depth exploration of grammar and style.

6. Online Blogs and Articles: Numerous writing blogs and websites, such as Writer's Digest, The Creative Penn, and The Write Life, provide articles, tips, and inspiration for writers.

Writing Communities and Workshops

1. Writing Groups: Local and online writing groups, such as Meetup, Goodreads, and Facebook writing groups, writer’s circle provide a space to share your work, receive feedback, and connect with fellow writers.

2. Writing Workshops: Many organizations and universities offer writing workshops and courses, both in-person and online. They often provide structured learning and feedback opportunities.

3. Critique Partners: Building relationships with critique partners is a valuable way to get constructive feedback on your work. Websites like Critique Circle and Scribophile can help you find critique partners.

4. Author Forums: Websites like Absolute Write Water Cooler and KBoards (for indie authors) are popular author forums where writers can ask questions, share experiences, and seek advice.

5. Writing Conferences: Attending writing conferences and book fairs can help you network with industry professionals, learn from experts, and gain insights into the publishing world.

Publishing Platforms and Self-Publishing Tools

1. Traditional Publishers: If you're pursuing traditional publishing, resources like the Writer's Market guide and QueryTracker can help you find literary agents and publishers. Confused if to go or not for traditional publishing here are 5 Reasons Why Traditionally Published Books Sell Better Than Self-Published Books

2. Self-Publishing Platforms: If you're considering self-publishing, platforms like Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), IngramSpark, and Smashwords provide tools and guidelines for self-publishing your work.

3. Book Cover Design Tools: Software like Canva and Adobe Spark can assist with designing eye-catching book covers.

4. Formatting and Layout Services: For professionally formatted books, services like Vellum and Brave Healers Production can help you create professional interior layouts.

5. Book Marketing Tools: Social media networks are essential for book marketing and promotion.

6. Email Marketing Services: Services like Mailchimp and ConvertKit are valuable for building and maintaining a mailing list for your author newsletter.

Income and Rights Management

1. Royalty Tracking Software: Tools like BookTrakr and AuthorEarnings provide insights into book sales, royalties, and income tracking.

2. Copyright and Contracts Resources: Authors should familiarize themselves with copyright law and have legal resources for contract reviews if working with publishers.

Author Platforms and Websites

1. Author Websites: Creating a professional author website is a must. Platforms like WordPress, Wix, and Squarespace offer user-friendly website builders.

2. Blogging Platforms: Blogging can help you connect with readers and showcase your writing. WordPress and Blogger are popular blogging platforms.

3. Social Media: Building a presence on social media platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook can help you engage with your audience and promote your work.

Financial and Business Tools

1. Tax Resources: As an author, you may need to navigate complex tax matters. Tax software or the services of an accountant or tax professional can be invaluable.

2. Business Tools: Software for bookkeeping, invoicing, and project management can help authors manage their finances and business affairs effectively.

Online Writing Tools

1. Online Writing Platforms: Online platforms like Medium, Wattpad, and Vocal.Media provide opportunities to publish and share your writing with a broad online audience.

2. Collaborative Writing Tools: Tools like Google Docs and Scrivener support collaborative writing projects by enabling real-time editing and sharing.  Don’t miss the 5 FREE Writing Tools Authors Must Try In 2023

Conclusion

The journey of a writer is a continuous exploration of creativity and self-discovery. The resources and tools available to writers today are as diverse as the voices and stories they bring to life. This comprehensive guide should serve as a valuable reference for writers looking to enhance their craft, navigate the publishing world, and connect with their audience. Whether you're just starting your writing journey or have been on it for years, these resources and tools are here to support your passion and help you turn your ideas into art.

[rastronomicals]

10:31 PM EST November 20, 2024:

Medeski, Martin & Wood - "Whatever Happened To Gus" From the album Combustication (August 7, 1998)

Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm

★★★★★

A postbop dreamstate, a figment of rotgut bourbon and scotch, a scrapple in the Apple on a bright sunny morning that exists only in some jazz poet's crazy-ass mind.

Zoot suits and porkpie hats, and cigarette butts, way back when, about Bird and Roach, figure 8 jam-sessions locked tight, chasing that shit hard, only you couldn't figure what the hell Bird was doing with his arms around Wynton Marsalis' shoulders. Saxophone cases resting against the brownstone walls, left empty in the bebop hallucination, everyone's split. All culminating in the perfect beatific vision, scads and scads of these fantastic jazz musicians, one after the other, descending into the City, rows upon rows of them, all dressed in coat and tie and dark sunglasses, hustling and running across the Brooklyn Bridge.

And say, man, you got the key?

After you tip your hat to narrator Steve Cannon (and without offense toward Chris Wood's very athletic bass-playing), you find that the key to this very fine, very historically-oriented, and very very freaky tune is John Medeski's mellotron. And just like Cannon says, that's when I did my research.

For those of you who have long since forgotten or even never knew Days of Future Passed or In the Court of the Crimson King, the mellotron was one of the earliest polyphonic keyboard synthesizers, being introduced in the mid '60's, and seeing some of its most prominent usage on the two proto-prog gems just mentioned.

The M400 mellotron we're talking about, the one that became popular within the nascent progressive rock movement, and the type that Medeski owns today, was electro-mechanical, which basically refers to how undeneath each of the 35 keys is a miniature tape head and roller. Each time you depress a key, 8 seconds of music plays. Then the tape rewinds, ready for the next time you depress the key above it again.

The factory preloaded its mellotrons with a choice of three sounds: strings, cello, or an 8-voice choir. But the thing about the M400 that endeared itself to musicians, and continues to, is that its tapes came in a removeable frame, meaning that artists could, with a certain amount of labor, switch away from the preloaded to sounds to those they themselves created.

Listening to the tune, and reading about the mellotron just now, Medeski is undoubtedly using tapes of his own creation on "Whatever Happened to Gus." But there's another thing going on with the wobbly, freaky, eerie background behind the slaphappy double bass. Evidently, the M400 had a flywheel that powered each of the keyboard's 35 tape reels. And evidently, Medeski has removed the lid from his mellotron so that he can reach into the machine while playing and retard or even stop the motion of the flywheel to get the fluttery distorted sound of his most current whim.

There's a picture of Medeski's mellotron here, if you're interested.

Now, nowhere did I read that Medeski used his mellotron on "Whatever Happened to Gus." But having listened, and having read, I'd bet dollars to donuts that the keening, wobbling, wailing chorus you hear as support through much of the track is exactly that: John Medeski slowing down and speeding up the tapes on his mellotron to better craft the band's soundtrack to Steve Cannon's strange jazzbo poem about the men who used to play back in the day--even the ones whose names you don't remember.

http://lahistoriadelamusicarock.blogspot.com/2008/12/whatever-happened-to-gus-medeski-martin.html

File under: All these fantastic jazz musicians

[theloniousbach]

ALMOST COUCH TOUR: ETHAN IVERSON with Peter Washington and Eric McPherson, MEZZROW’S, 31 MARCH-1 APRIL 2023, all 4 sets

There’s so much that I enjoyed here.

I’ll start with Eric McPherson’s impeccable drums and cymbals as he was so tasty and often melodic. He has played often with Fred Hersch in a great trio with John Hebert. Peter Washington plays powerfully with Bill Charlap and Kenny Washington just as he did here with ETHAN IVERSON and McPherson. This could be a juggernaut along the lines of Keith Jarrett mashing up Ornette Coleman and Bill Evans when he played with Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden, and Paul Motian.

The tunes, another pleasure, were Charlapian in the dive into the Great American Song Book—The Song Is You (briskly), Just Friends, These Foolish Things, Lover Man, and a refracted All The Things You Are with Washington leading the ways. But there were also two Monks (Bye Ya and Round Midnight) and I’m Getting Sentimental Over You, also acknowledged as part of the Monk repertoire. Tadd Dameron’s Good Bait twice and similarly Stomping At The Savoy. There were serious bows to bebop with Scrapple from the Apple, Bud Powell’s Dance of the Infidels (twice) and Cecelia, and Con Alma. They did Oscar Pettiford’s Blues in the Closet but also a couple of spontaneous blues for friends in the audience.

Iverson has a writerly sense of curation, reinforced by me being on his Transitional Technology mailing list which links to his blog Doing The Math. So that is part of his playing which seems both sparer and more direct than I remember him from my early forays into The Bad Plus canon which intrigued me but didn’t grab me. I saw him with them only once, probably at a point where he was disengaging. “My” TBP was with Orrin Evans who struck me as earthier. But it is clearly Reid Anderson’s and Dave King’s band and it is their spiky, quirky compositions that rule the day. Iverson wrote some with them and was a full partner.

Still it feels like he recast his approach since he left, playing with Mark Turner in Billy Hart’s band, playing mostly standards with Tom Harrell, some other Mezzrow’s gigs with specific purposes like remembering Count Basie.

He’s a writer with opinions—and better opinions than mine to be sure. But there’s a swagger, a presumption in his writing that bothers me, perhaps because I wonder/worry/fear that that’s how I come off. He was also a protege of Stanley Grouch whom I would have said rubs me the wrong way and that I was in the other camp. I haven’t reread Crouch, but several of Iverson’s opinions strike me as formative. A big survey of 100 fundamental tunes in jazz education is compelling in its scope, curation, and soundness putting rhythm at the heart of matter is one. He also did a thorough discussion of the Jarrett American Quartet with a latter assessment that suggests that he didn’t dig into the “real bebop.” That’s a flaw.

These sets had plenty of “real bebop” and strong rhythmic power which was the point of having Washington and McPherson and projecting to working with them regularly.

Iverson’s playing is, by now, spare and clean, all in the service of the music—and maybe that’s Crouchian. While he doesn’t burst into my top handful of pianists nor even the top 10, possibly 15, there was clearly something intentional and, I think, important going on with these gigs. So I’m glad I spent the week pursuing them.

[writer59january13]

Wasted verses ushers quirky pathetic oeuvre

HENCE....herewith, a post (traumatic)

stressed disordered poetic whim

to summarize fantasy

incorrigible lottery dreamer

paradise visage and eyes zapping, swatting, and battling

a bulge with dollar signs

whets imagination with

Mega Million ticket bought

temptation for instant millions

human foible to reach

for elusive pot of gold

streak of universal desire for potential wealth

overtakes rational self

with delusions of grandeur caught

allow, enable and provide flirtation with fate to experience rich draught

envision emancipation from penury

a distant battle fought

expect the usual outcome after next drawing

to yield monetary windfall naught

impossible mission

to banish tantalizing thought

and fully block and tackle

hard scrapple existence wrought.

When (countless moons ago)

progeny discovered girlhood insights, I did wholeheartedly love and adore

who rushed into my arms

whenever back from trivial pursuits at the core

when casually and nonchalantly

turn the key to open the front door

legal tender in such precious chronically in short supply within family

catch bull at four

inviting me to play make believe

games being King Midas on the floor

boot budding young lady begotten girls

nearly squeezing out digested gore

akin to the finest crafted clock work

to sound the time of day

they danced and frolicked

like kittens or puppies

though at times I desired

them to bring newspaper

and slippers questioning

reciprocating sharing silly concocted faux pa lore

at least another son or daughter more

at such urge (long silenced

of this ram by ewe gnu who) did vehemently (cue

Katy Perry's pet lioness) to roar

enjoying revelry without keeping score

yet…creating memories

I will forever store.

Financial straits affected

our existence hand to mouth

all grandiose aspirations to succeed

in life frequently head south.

Creative healthy endeavors

find excitement and linguistic pleasure

thru the attempt

reasonably rhyming aligned

words that synchronize suitably

in poetic third eye blind

delivered by one blessed

angel (beating tom tom club) in disguise

redemption and salvation

considered thankful find

readers may espy hidden puns

within this rhyme lined

with challenges or commiserate

and complement via words of positive kind

although large sum of money

would be a dog send

to pry poem or prose from mind

deliberate semblance to communicate

and extract idea from cranial rind

loosening pent up tension to unwind

Much rather be cursed

with excess wealth

deliverance to life, liberty

never to rue by stealth

and mental health

depravity foreign concept

as is the obsolete word dealth; A share dealt out; a portion or division.

[scrapplekings]

[hyperionnebulae]

A Dish From Every US State

Hey all! I want to try and make a dish from every US state (probably with a vegetarian/pescatarian spin on it) so after some Googling this is what the internet gave me from each. If you live or have lived in a US state comment to confirm or suggest your own. Or send me recipes! I looked at 5 or 6 lists so if there’s only one listed for a state I guess the collective internet is out of ideas. Also reach out if you live or have lived in Puerto Rico, Guam, the US Virgin Islands, American Samoa, or the Northern Mariana Islands; these are US territories so I’m also interested what feels unique to your island too.  

Alabama- Chicken with Wine & BBQ, Cheese grits, Pecan Pie, Southern Lane Cake

Alaska- King crab, smoked salmon

Arizona- Chimichangas, Sonoran hotdog

Arkansas-Fried pickles, cheese dip, chocolate gravy

California- avocado toast, in-n-out, fish tacos with guacamole

Colorado- lamb chops, green chili ribs, beef enchiladas, rocky mountain oysters

Connecticut- white clam pizza

Delaware- fries with vinegar, scrapple, Amish apple scrapple 

Florida- key lime pie, Cuban roasted pork sandwich

Georgia- boiled peanuts, peach cobbler/pie

Hawaii- shaved ice, Huli huli chicken, Loco Moco

Idaho- Jim spud baked potato, ice cream potato, huckleberry pie

Illinois- deep dish pizza

Indiana- breaded pork tenderloin sandwich, sugar cream pie

Iowa- sweet corn, stuffed pork chops

Kansas- BBQ ribs, Beef & cabbage pockets, Burnt ends

Kentucky- hot brown, fried chicken, bourbon balls

Louisiana- beignets, gumbo, crawfish

Maine- lobster roll

Maryland- steamed crabs, crab cakes

Massachusetts- clam chowder

Michigan- pasty, cherries, Coney dogs

Minnesota- hot dish, fried fish, tater tots

Mississippi- biscuits & gravy, Po’ boy sandwich

Missouri- toasted ravioli, Kansas City BBQ, Gooey Butter Cake

Montana- Huckleberry ice cream, Morel Mushroom Ravioli, Rocky Mountain Oysters

Nebraska- Tin Roof Sundae, Runza, Rueben Sandwich

Nevada- 3am Steak & Eggs, Bloody Mary

New Hampshire- Poutine, Apple Cider Donuts

New Jersey- Disco Fries, Pork Roll Sandwich, Salt Water Taffy

New Mexico- Frito Pie, Green chilis, sopaipillas

New York- Buffalo wings, bagels

North Carolina- Lexington BBQ, Fried Green Totatoes

North Dakota- Cheese buttons, bison burgers, hotdish, knoephla soup

Ohio- Cincinnati Chili, Buckeyes

Oklahoma- steak, chicken fried steak, onion burger

Oregon- Marionberry pie

Pennsylvania- Philly cheese steak

Rhode Island- coffee milk, clam cakes, stuffies

South Carolina- she-crab soup, Frogmore stew, Low country boil, sweet tea

South Dakota- lefse, rich fruit kuchens, fry bread

Tennessee- Nashville hot chicken sandwich

Texas- brisket, chili con carne

Utah- fry sauce, jello, buttermilk scones

Vermont- apple pie with cheddar, maple syrup

Virginia- peanut soup, oyster fricassee, apples

Washington- seafood chowder, latte, Rainer cherries, Pho

West Virginia- pepperoni rolls, biscuit sandwich

Wisconsin- fried cheese curds, coated walleye

Wyoming- fry bread, chicken fried steak, campfire trout, beef jerky

[pccommerce-blog]

Bars in Philadelphia, PA

In the food sector, Philadelphia is recognized for hoagies, Stromboli, scrapple, water ice Irish potatoes candy, cheese steak sandwich, tasty cakes and soft pretzels which were developed by American Italians. When the tiny slices of steak sandwich was originated in 1930 by Pat's King of steaks, it was without cheese but a fierce competition started between the duo when Geno's Steaks arrived in 1966 while McGrillin's Older Ale House which started business in 1860 at the center of the city on Duty Street is the oldest tavern in the city.

The Philadelphia Chamber Of Commerce is the best business group in the whole of Pennsylvania. It organizes programs for companies under it to learn more on how to expand their businesses and as well organizes fund raising events to support locals families across the city regardless of their race or tribe. A member that it is, Industrial Roofing Contractors plays its own part in creating a good image for the group by being honest in dealing with its clients in the roof installation services it provides. Even its website at https://indroofingcontractors.com/ is void of any fraudulent activities but solely meant to shed more light on its services.

Aside from these nineties and eighties bar, there are now renowned ones in the city meeting the current age needs and they can be located all around the city:

Franklin Bar, 112 S 18th St, Philadelphia, PA 19103, USA

This is a favorite spot in the city for tiki lovers but it also servers wines and liquors of local and international brand names.

Monk's Café, 264 S 16th St, Philadelphia, PA 19102, USA

It’s easy to meet up with your friends either as a working class or a college student for somedelicious meals and great cocktails.

MC Gillian’s Older Alehouse, 1310 Drury St, Philadelphia, PA 19107, USA

Surprisingly, this very sixties bar in Philadelphia mentioned above still operates in the city and remains one of its best !

Get Map Directions:-

[laresearchette]

Saturday, March 12, 2022 Canadian TV Listings (Times Eastern)

WHERE CAN I FIND THOSE PREMIERES?: BUILD IT FORWARD (HGTV) 6:00pm FEELING BUTTERFLIES (W Network) 8:00pm

WHAT IS NOT  PREMIERING IN CANADA TONIGHT? STOLEN BY THEIR FATHER (Premiering on March 13 on Lifetime Canada at 8:00pm) CRUEL INSTRUCTION (TBD - Lifetime Canada) MASH-UP OUR HOME (TBD - HGTV Canada)

NEW TO AMAZON PRIME CANADA/CBC GEM/CRAVE TV/DISNEY + STAR/NETFLIX CANADA:

CRAVE TV MONCHHICHI TRIBE (Season 2, Episodes 27-52) MOOMINVALLEY (Seasons 1-2) PAC-MAN AND THE GHOSTLY ADVENTURES (Season 3)     POLLY POCKET (Season 2) ROBIN HOOD (Season 2, Episodes 1-6)

WINTER PARALYMPIC GAMES (SN1) 10:00am: Morning Coverage (CBC) 2:00pm: Para sled hockey - semifinals, wheelchair curling - semifinals,para alpine skiing - women's giant slalom, para biathlon - men's and women's 12.5 km - sitting / standing / vision impaired, Beijing Today. (CBC) 11:30pm: Para sled hockey - semifinal game, wheelchair curling - bronze medal match.

NHL HOCKEY (SN) 12:30pm: Blues vs. Predators (SN) 3:00pm: Flyers vs. Hurricanes (TSN5) 4:00pm: Sens vs. Coyotes (SNWest/SN1) 7:00pm: Red Wings vs. Flames (CBC/SNEast/SNPacific) 7:00pm: Kraken vs. Habs (SNOntario/City) 7:00pm: Chicago vs. Sens (CBC/SN/SN1) 10:00pm: Lightning vs. Oilers

MLS SOCCER (TSN/TSN5) 1:30pm: Columbus vs. Toronto FC (TSN/TSN4) 6:30pm: Houston vs. Whitecaps FC

PWHPA HOCKEY (SN1) 4:00pm: Rivalry Rematch: Canada vs. USA

W5 (CTV) 7:00pm: Exclusive coverage of the war in Ukraine; an interview with the Humbolt truck driver and an investigation into trucker safety in Canada.

NBA BASKETBALL (SN Now) 8:00pm: Timbewolves vs. Heat (SN360) 8:30pm: Bucks vs. Warriors (TSN4) 9:00pm: Raptors vs. Nuggets

TRIUMPH: ROCK & ROLL MACHINE (CTV) 8:00pm:  The story of underdog Canadian rock band Triumph, which rose to stardom in the 1970s and '80s only to disappear at the height of its fame.

SCRAP KINGS (Discovery Canada) 8:00pm (SEASON PREMIERE):  A huge concrete police station in Wales is blown apart to make way for a supermarket; in Dorset, England, scrap agricultural steel grows into a statue.

RAMS (Super Channel Fuse) 8:00pm: Two estranged brothers must set aside their differences when a rare and lethal illness threatens their respective flocks of sheep in Western Australia.

LOVE AND PENGUINS (Super Channel Heart & Home) 8:00pm:  Tilly, a nonprofit worker, finally gets the chance to lead the organization's next project, saving an Australian penguin sanctuary. Teaming up with Fletcher Grant, a compassionate zoologist, the pair plan a fundraising gala and grow closer.

CARNIVAL EATS (Food Network Canada) 8:00pm/8:30pm:  Delaware State Fair; shrimp dog; "Crabtastic Po' Boy"; Apple Scrapple burger; deep-fried Key lime pie.  In Episode Two, Texas State Fair in Dallas; bacon-tilla; chicken-fried lobster; carrot cake roly; deep-fried sweet potato pie; Oakland County Fair in Davisburg, Mich.

CURLING (TSN/TSN3/TSN5) 8:30pm: 2022 Time Hortons Brier: Page Playoff

BLK: AN ORIGIN STORY (History Canada) 9:00pm: For many years Hogan's Alley was the heart of Vancouver's Black community; in the 1850s James Douglas invited Blacks to settle Vancouver island in an effort to stave off American annexation.

STREET OUTLAWS: GONE GIRL (Discovery Canada) 9:00pm (SERIES PREMIERE):  Elite female street racers aim to take over the mean streets of Vegas.

THE GATEWAY (Crave) 9:00pm: A down-on-his-luck social worker finds himself in over his head when he tries to protect a client from her recently paroled husband -- a maniacal drug dealer out to reclaim his priceless stash.

ROGUE HOSTAGE (Crave) 10:35pm:  A former Marine races against time to save a group of hostages -- including his young daughter and a congressman -- when armed militants take over his stepfather's store.

HOT ONES (Global) 12:30am: Courtney Cox

[marziesreads]

Review: Sunshield

Sunshield by Emily B. Martin My rating: 5 of 5 stars Sunshield is the first novel in an epic fantasy duology, Outlaw Road with three central POV characters, Prince Veran, an Eastern ambassador from the Silverwood, Tamsin, a woman who has been kidnapped, brutalized, and held prisoner under horrible conditions, and Lark, the famed Sunshield bandit. The story alternates between these three figures and the link between them evolves over the course of this first novel. As the story opens, Veran and his friend Princess Eloise are at the court of Alcoro, to meet with Prince Iano, soon to be crowned king. Veran, Eloise, and we thought Iano, were meeting to discuss the abolition of trafficking children and young adults as slave labor in the Eastern kingdoms. After more than a year of correspondence about the issue, it now seems as if court intrigue has disrupted that plan completely. Veran, an inexperienced young man with little diplomatic skill, but a good heart still hopes to broker change. Surprisingly, he and Iano manage to connect on the idea of finding Lark, to search for a missing member of Iano's court. Lark, an interesting character, was at one time a victim of trafficking herself but she managed to escape. Her life is now a hard scrapple existence as she tries to protect children she has rescued from trafficking rings, earning her reputation as a fierce bandit. Lark doesn't just steal money and goods, she rescues children who have been stolen from their families, including some so young, they don't even know family surname or where their families were from. Finally, Tamsin, as we learn over the course of the novel, seems to have been kidnapped to silence her voice and influence.One of the things I loved about this world is the presence of characters with disability issues. Lark's chosen sister Rose is an amputee who tells Lark off for regarding her as somehow less able to do her job. And Veran suffers from epilepsy but forges ahead with his brave plans. Thanks to Rose, Lark looks at Veran in a different light when they are thrown together. I also appreciated the role that color and culture play in Alcoro's court. So many hidden meanings and alliances are conveyed by the color of clothes in Alcoro's court. It is a fascinating world. The audiobook, narrated by Chelsea Stephens, Lauren Ezzo, and Matthew Frow, is an excellent production that gives a distinct voice and manner to each of the central characters.

I look forward to the final book in Outlaw Road duology, Floodpath: A Novel.I received a digital and paper review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

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https://ift.tt/2QNP5dD disability, Emily B. Martin, fantasy

[anomaly923]

The Morning Brew show is really picking up popularity, Here is the set & recorded broadcasts from this morning. We enjoyed some #coffee #conversation, #jazz, #blues, and #classical music and some terrible #dadjokes and awesome ones. I reached 1920 fans today on #spoon today. I want to take a moment to thank all of you for your support! LiveCast https://u8kv3.app.goo.gl/yrMkJ https://u8kv3.app.goo.gl/MLM8r February 9th, 2020 1. "Stay Around A Little Longer" by Buddy Guy 2. "Stolen Moments" by Oliver Nelson 3. "No. 2 Maestoso in B Flat Major" by Sviatoslav Richter 4. "Smokestack Lightnin'" by 5. "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" by The Cannonball Adderley Quintet 6. "L'Arlesienne - Suite No. 1" from Bizet: L'Arlesienne Performed by The Philadelphia Orchestra 7. "Lie to Me" by Johnny Lang 8. "Trinkle Tinkle" by Thelonius Monk & John Coltrane 9. "Bassoon Concerto In A Minor - Allegro" by 10. "The 'In' Crowd" by The Ramsey Lewis Trio 11. "Concerto Grosso in F Major, Opus 6, No. 9 - Allegro" Antonio Vivaldi performed by 12. "Sweet Home Chicago" - Eric Claptop 13. "Woke up This Morning" - Lightnin' Hopkins 14. "Escales: No. 3, Valencia" performed by Sinfonio of London 15. "Blue Rondo a la Turk" -Dave Brubeck 16."Desafinado" by Stan Getz & Charlie Byrd 17. " Piano Trio No. 6 Allegretto by Mozart" performed by the Kungsbacka Piano Trio 18. "Bags Groove" - Milt Jackson 19. "Cheese Cake" - Dexter Gordon 20. "Lohengrin" Performed by Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra & Jerzy Semkow 21. "Tea for Two" - Art Tatum 22. "I Hate These Doggone Blues" - Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown 23. "Presto" Composed - Antonio Vivaldi 24. "Perfidia Cha Cha" - Cal Tjader 25. "Working with My Baby" - Goree Carter 26. "Keyboard Sonata in D Minor" Composed by Scarlatti performed by Dubravka Tomsic 27. "Scrapple from The Apple" - Charlie Park 28. "John the Revelator" - Blind Willie Johnson 29. "Trumpet Concerto No. 3 in D Major: III. Vivace" Performed by Orpheus Chamber Orchestra 30. "Barbados" by Charlie Parker 31. "Tell Me Why (Live)" - Smokin' Joe Kubek & Bnois King YouTube Playlist: https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=50DQSjD3HkM&feature=share THANK YOU PODCAST: https://u8kv3.app.goo.gl/waMtZ (at Rochester Hills, Michigan) https://www.instagram.com/p/B8XLGWwlR1F/?igshid=zgabw60febqx

[stevengarrisonmusic]

It’s my godson’s birthday y’all!!! Happy FIRST Birthday to my main apple scrapple King!!! It’s an honor to be part of your life and I can’t wait to see the man you become! 🙌🏾 https://www.instagram.com/p/B2iB6GRB7dA/?igshid=16k9tyvkclboj

[fuzzydemolitionsquad]

Lasat family slice of life story

So I took a short vacation from one project to do a personal project, and I've found that breaking away and changing up really helps reignite passion when it comes to returning to stories that have been in the works for months . . . some even years. 

This features my Southern-mountain folk lasat oc's so if you don't reeealy like that sort of thing in the Star wars universe I totally understand. If you're interested though, I encourage a read. I'm trying to improve when it comes to writing engaging characters.

The exaggerated language/words these guys speak is part researched and part imagined. The story is a fiction-y take on old-timey Appalachian culture (space Appalachian culture?) (which I love) It's gradually gets more 'lasat' toward the end.

It doesn't have a title. Maybe someone can help?

-------------

Morning

Southeast Lasan

The sun draped a ribbon of honey-colored light over the highest ridge of the Sou Mountains, alighting the tops of the tallest greenjacket trees. A pale blue moon, flanked by its three smaller satellites, lay low in the fading-star-freckled sky.

Morning had come, and the inhabitants of every mountain home, from Sarrkey Knob to Pricklebush, were awake and bustling with activity. It was the beginning of Spring, a scant few months away from the Dust Season, and the hillfolk in these mountains had much to do. The snow had melted. It was time to plant crops and repair fences and barns. Time to pull hammerhead cow calves and build mud-and- straw nests for farrowing kalgow sows.

Shoog Trodd languished in the cocoon of her feather-down quilt. She knew it was time to get up, and also knew if she didn’t get her furry brown butt out of bed soon, her ma would certainly aid her in the process. ‘The chookens won’t gathee they’s own aigs fer us’, she’d say, waving her apron at her with a flourish.

Shoog lifted the hem of her old nightgown and looked down her skinny legs to her too-large feet and growled to herself. She wished she looked more like her older sister. Sally Trodd was built like one of those Amethyst City gals—the voluptuous ones with glossy fur and whitened fangs—who had their pictures in all the prominent fashion flimsi-mags. Sal would look good in a paper poke, if the occasion ever arose where she had to wear one.

It was Shoog’s Flowering Day, the seventeenth year since her birth, but instead of being happy, she was as glum as could be.

"Gonna have to wear the same dress fer my Flowerin’ Day that I wore fer mah last birthday. And I don’t even have m’ ears pierced. Ma and pa says I’m a woman now, but I still dress like a little ol’ kid. Wish I had some pocket money to least buy some ankle garters."

A chooky rooster crowed on the fencepost and Shoog jumped out of bed. She could hear her ma in the kitchen tossing logs into the iron woodstove. Pa was rousing too. It was customary for pa to utter a few gruff ‘karabasts’ each morning before work. He wished he had more time to enjoy the morning’s light, but soon enough he would be descending into the bowels of the G.R.Gradd-Co Quadranium Mine no. seven, and wouldn’t return home until after the sun had dipped below the mountains. The one thing he looked forward to was ma’s breakfasts, even in the lean times. Today there would be fried scrapple and eggs, sweet gorm porridge and wood-sprite mushroom preserves on last night’s leftover maize bread. And caf, strong and black.

Shoog threw an old coat over her nightdress and ran a comb through her wild hair. She hustled out of her room and trotted for the front door.

"Sugar!"

The lasat girl halted at the sound of her mother’s voice.

"Come sit a spell woodja?"

"Gotta use thee outhouse, ma!"

"I ain’t gonna take long. Sides, Puggles is in there right now."

Shoog tossed her head back and closed her eyes."Chaos, Puggles, I know we is alike, but do yew always hafta go when I need to?" 

She marched into the kitchen and sat at the Trodd family’s ancient split log table. She traced her parents initials with her claw. It was a sweet testament to their love, and had been for almost seventy years.

Ma sat down with a cup of caf and propped her strong, brown-furred arms on the table. " Shoog, I was a thinkin,’ I’d like t’ curl yer hair and pin it up with granny’s blue pearl combs fore yer cuzzins and friends show up fer yer Flowerin’ Day party. What’cha think?"

The girl’s pointed ears perked. "That sounds good ma! Kin I ask Sal to pierce my ears? "

Ma’s nasal fold wrinkled in disdain. "Yew know I dun like those. They make a young female look like a fast female."

"What’s a fast female?"

"Thee kind what runs around wid all sorts a’ males. Sparkin’ all thee time and drinkin’ likker! Yew got a reppy-tayshun to keep, Shoog."

Pa, a seven-and-a-half-foot mountain of a lasat, entered the kitchen. He set his miner’s helmet on the table, squeezed ma’s shoulders and gave her a tender nose-press. They exchanged a quick breath.

"Aww, ma, stop beein’ so old-fashioned. If my Sugar wants a cupple lil’ earrings t’ make her head look purtier, then she kin have um. It’s her Flowerin’ Day after all."

Ma was incensed. Her yellow-orange eyes bulged. She pounded the heavy table and it quivered. " Rufus Aloysius Trodd! Donchee dare step on me like that! Iffen I say no, I mean no!"

Pa poured himself a large pottery mug of caf. He quickly pressed the rim of the mug against his lips to hide his smile

Shoog sulked. Sometimes her mother was such a bogan. "Well, kin I at least go to the second-hand and look fer a dress to wear?"

Pa set down his caf. "I’m sorry darlin’. Money’s tighter than a Nemoidian’s fist right now. I still owes the comp-ny store fifty creds from last month. Maybe next year."

"Next year won’t be my Flowerin’ Day." Shoog pushed back her chair and buttoned up her coat. "Pa?" She looked at her fearsome but loving patriarch. "Is yew gonna be at my party?"

" I’m reel sorry darlin. I hafta work all day. We found a new vein a’ quadranium and the boss man want us to fill thee quota afore Secondday."

"Oh." Shoog said, deflated. "I better go git them aigs. Dun want yew to miss yer breakfast."

"That’s a good girl." Ma oiled a skillet and set it aside. "Dun bother lil’ Speckle. Jus’ let her be. Thee other hens wuz picking on her sumthing awful yesterday. I think she’s gonna die."

Shoog winced. "Figgurs. She’s my favrit. What a great day this is turnin’ out to be."

The girl slammed the screened door as she exited the house. Ma and pa looked at each other and smiled.

"Oh, I cain’t stand trickin’ her like this. Do you think she has any idear?"

"None whatsever."

Ma plucked a jar of mushroom preserves off the top shelf and set it on the table."Rufus, yew really owe thee comp-ny store fifty credits?"

"Course not. I’s jus tryin’ to fatten up our story some." Rufus growled low in his throat. It was a plaintive growl, not a scary one. "Cain’t believe my youngest girl-cub is a woman-lasat. Seems like only yesterday she wuz a little sprig, wrasslin’ oalamanders in th’mud."

"An’ Puggles will follow her in a year. Then all of our cubs’ll be growed."

"If Puggles don’ stop sparimentin’ wid them damn farcrackers he ain’t gonna make it to his seventeenth birthday. I swear, that cub’s plumb crazy."

"Yew hesh-up now Rufus. Puggles is just gittin’ out his fluster-ations by havin’ a lil’ fun. Jimbo and Jax won’t stop pickin’ on him. It’s high time they got a few whacks wid Ol’ Skinner."

Pa looked down at the infamous belt around his massive girth and chuckled. One day he’d have to hang it in the shed with the rest of the tools.

"I s’pose yer right. I jus ain’t home enough to discipline them. Heh, at least we kin be thankful Puggles ain’t buildin’ bombs. He shore does take a shine to the boomin’ don’t he? Member how much he loved thunder when he wuz a sucklin’ cub?"

Ma grinned. "Shore enough I do. All dem other cubs wood be quiverin’ under they beds, but Not Puggles. He’d climb all over his crib and giggle and sway like he were list’nin to a funny song."

" Seems like only yesterday." Pa reminisced. "I should take him down to the mine, let him watch the detonite crew at work. He’d prolly like dat."

　

                                                  * * * *

Shoog crouched in the henhouse with a full basket of eggs and Lil’ Speckle tucked inside her coat. Jimbo’s prized hen, a big blue with a row of serrated teeth in her lizard-like jaw, glared angrily at the timid chooken sticking her head out of Shoog’s collar. ‘Lola’ strutted back and forth on one of the henhouse rafters, cluck-hissing, her feathers puffed and her spur toes clacking.

"Speckle, we better git outta here afore Lola shits on us . . . or worse. I’ll keep yew in my closet, but yew gotta be real quiet when I give these aigs to ma. Deal?"

The injured chooken cocked her head. She opened her mouth and waggled her tongue, panting.

When Shoog entered the house, she carried the basket over to the wash counter and set it down. She gripped the collar of her coat, holding it close to her neck, and turned to walk to the small bedroom she shared with Sal. Ma caught her by the ear.

"Yoww!"

"Hold on there. Ain’t yew fergetting something?"

Shoog huffed in indignation. "I has to scrub them aigs on my Flowerin’ Day?"

"It’s yer chore ain’t it?"

"Yeah but . . ."

" Get scrubbin’ missy."

Shoog scowled. She looked over at Sal, who was setting the table. Sal’s eyes met her sister’s as she placed a bowl of fresh churned butter on the table. For a moment, Shoog thought she looked sympathetic.

"Now I know why yew celebrated yer seventeenth birthday in the city wid yer friends. I thought it wuz dumb, but it all makes sense now."

Ma and pa looked at each other, silent as tombs.

Shoog got down to business scrubbing the eggs, trying to keep the chooken in her coat still and quiet. She thought of The Amethyst City—The Royal City—and daydreamed about the King and Queen and their well-dressed court. She thought about the beautiful but air-headed princess, and the handsome, ginger-furred prince. He was tall, with bedroom eyes, a curled mustache and pomaded facial fringes. It was said that he had over a hundred lovers, most of them married, but Shoog didn’t believe it. No lasat, male or female, could have that many lovers! She then thought about the Royal Honor Guard, the cream of Lasan’s military force. They were hand-picked from their barracks by war-council leaders, chosen for their agility and strength and smarts. Shoog couldn’t deny how good the male soldiers looked in their form-fitting armorweave suits, complete with capes, helmets and bo-rifles. A burst of painful pleasure electrified the pit of her belly and she forced herself to think of other things.

When she was done, she dried her hands on the dishtowel and stormed toward her room. Ma shouted after her.

"Breakfast will be ready in about a quarter-tick."

"I’m not hungry!"

Ma’s tough facade melted. She whispered to pa. " I don’ think I kin do this anymore. If I keep it up she’s gunna hate me somethin’ awful."

Pa laughed. " Why don’ yew jus’ let her have her gad-durned earrings? She’ll be as happy as a killow flying through a skeeter storm. They won’t turn her into a wicked woman. Our Sugar is a good girl."

Sal’s eyes narrowed.

Sadie snorted and her slot nostrils flared. "Fine. Mebbe I’ll git my ears pierced too. And buy me one of them low-cut gowns, like thee ones them street corner gals wear."

Sally spat out her coffee and made a high-pitched noise, like a reed-squirrel chipping. The thought of her strong, robust-figured mother in a slinky gown was impossible not to giggle at. Pa however, had a different opinion of the matter. He smoothed down his thick mane of a beard and quirked his brow salaciously.

"Yew git yerself a gown like that Sadie, and I’ll personally throw erryone of our brood outta thee house an tell em to stay away fer three days."

Sally stopped laughing. She rolled her long-lashed eyes.

"Gross, pa. Really gross."

She picked a warty-skinned tuber out of the vegetable bin, tossed it into the air and caught it.

"One set of pierced ears coming up." She said, flouncing and jiggling in a most impressive way.

*******

"I wish I wuz a chooken." Shoog said, filling a box in her closet with old handkerchiefs. Lil’ Speckle flopped around on her bedroom floor. She clucked feebly and pecked at a crumb of food that had fallen between two boards.

"Then I could just strut about, pecking and a’ eatin’ and shittin’ out aigs. I wouldn’t have to worry bout being a Gods-dammed loser on my Flowerin’ Day."

"Aren’t you being a bit dramatic?" Sally said, slinking into the room like a brown-furred Goddess. "It’s hardly the end of Lasan. And you better be careful. Ma will give you the back of the brush if she hears you cursing."

Sally had practiced long and hard to speak like a ‘proper’ lasat, ridding herself of that ‘inherited common-human inflection.’ The humans had left Lasan over a millennia ago, but the ancestors of those lasats who neighbored with them in the mountains still spoke the speak.

"Ooh Shoog, what do you have there? A chooken? Are you, as they say, ‘a’fixing to rile ma up?"

" Cakkhh! Shoog spat-snarled. Stop beein’ so damn snobby. It’s annoyin’! Like it or not, you is a hilltrekker jus like the rest of us, and yew always will be. And yes, it’s a chooken. If stupid Jimbo kin bring his precious Lola in th’ house, I dun see no good reason why I cain’t keep Speckle."

On any other day, Sally would jump Shoog for her insolence. The two would engage in a howling, clawing, hair-pulling battle until ma came bursting in to give their bottoms’ a good beating. But today was Shoog’s special birthday. Sal decided to let it go. She sat down on her bed, rolled onto her belly and folded her arms under her chin. She stared at her sister, a tooka’s grin on her face. "So, how do you feel you little nerf? Different?"

"Why would I feel diff’rent?" Shoog lifted Lil’ Speckle into the box and checked her wounds.

" Because you’re a ‘wahmerr’ now. Sally enunciated the Illasano word for ‘woman.’

"Don’ feel like no wahmerr."

" I mean, what do you think about the jackbeards around these parts? They give you the belly tingles yet?"

Shoog flushed. "Sometimes. But Hells, half of the boys round these parts have scrawny beards and bony shoulders."

"True. However, there’s a handsome jack visiting the Boggs. A dark blue striper without a tail. And he has a nice beard coming in." Sal sighed wistfully. "Wonder who he is and where he comes from?"

The younger girl shrugged. "Dunno. I ain’t never seen him."

"If you play your sabbacc cards right, and flirt like I taught you, he might be your boyfriend . . ." Sal said in a sing-song voice.

"Bogan’s balls, I don’ want no boyfriend. I ain’t ready fer all that. I still sleep wid that howler bear toy granny made me when I wuz five."

"I know. And you still suck your thumb."

"I do not! That’s Puggles!"

"Well, I don’t sleep in Puggles’room."

Shoog was about to make a retort when Sally held up the tuber in her hand.

"Why you got that tater? Is yew gonna throw it at me?"

" No, dummy. Ma finally took pity on you. She’s going to allow me to pierce your ears. See the yellow glass studs on my dresser? Those are for you. I liked them when I bought them, but yellow’s not really my color. Happy Flowering Day, Twig."

Shoog squealed. She hopped up onto Sal’s bed and jumped around like a jitter-tick on a hot speeder engine.

"Is yew serious?"

"Serious as a snake-bite. Now stop jumping. That’s all I need is for you to break my bed and have ma thinking me and some jack did it!"

" Ok, sorry." Shoog leapt down. She rocked on her footpads. Her eight toes kneaded the rug beside the bed.

There was a knock at the bedroom door and ma came in, a clean kitchen towel in her hand.

"Here’s the knife fer the tater and a biled safety pin. Yew sure yew know how to do this Sal?"

"Yes ma. I’ve pierced so many of my friends’ ears I’m practically a professional."

"Land a muddlin’ I shore hope so."

Shoog ran to her mother and squeezed her ample waist. "Thank yew, mama, thank yew!!"

"Alright child, alright." Ma held her out at arms length and looked at her. A tear formed in the corner of her eye. "Don’t yew come cryin’ to me if they get infected, ya hear?"

"I won’t."

Ma wiped her eyes with her apron and stood against the doorframe, watching. Sal cut the potato and set it on the clean towel then got the studs. She put them down and looked around. "Do we have any alcohol, ma?"

" Kingdom a’ Ashla and thee Great Bearded One!! No we don’t."

"I can’t do this unless I disinfect everything."

Shoog whined. "Aww, I knew this wuz too good to be true." She threw herself on her bed and crossed her arms like a petulant toddler. She glanced up. A green-bellied arach was spinning a red web on the ceiling.

"Spahder in the house!" She shouted. "Bad luck, bad luck, bad luck be gone!"

Ma ignored Shoog. "I know! Hold on a second."

She left and returned with a jar of clear, sky-colored liquid.

"That’s pa’s blue lightning!" Sal blinked her eyes, shocked. "He and Mossy only made a small batch this year. If he finds out we used it for. . ."

"What he don’ know won’t rile him. Sides, yer only gonna use a little." Ma handed Sal the jar.

The lasat girl unscrewed it and the potent vapors almost knocked her over. She dipped the clean towel in the jar and wiped it all over her hands. Then she wiped the studs. Shoog sat up and held her mid-section. Fairy-bats were flittering around in her belly.

"You ready? Sal held up the safety pin.

"It ain’ gonna hurt a lot is it?"

" Ashla, Shoog. All that whining and now you’re scared? Janey’s the biggest coward in these hills and she let me pierce her ears."

"I know but . ."

"It doesn’t hurt at all. It’s more like a little pinch than anything. Besides, I’m fast. Just close your eyes and hold your breath and it’ll all be over before you know it. Here, hold your growly-bear."

Shoog took the worn stuffed animal and pushed it against her face. Sally moved to her sister’s bed. She gripped her ear and stretched it thin over the potato. Ma steepled her hands in front of her mouth.

Sal stuck her tongue out the side of her mouth and squinted. Her piercing hand hovered over her sister’s ear. "Okay Shoog, little pinch. One. . . two. . . THREE!"

She skewered her sister’s pinna with one punch and removed the tuber.

"That’s it. I’ll leave it in there and let it stretch the hole out a bit."

Shoog removed the bear from her face. "That’s it? I hardly felt that a’tall! Do the other one!"

"Hold your krauntauns. I’m wiping the pin."

Sally pierced Shoog’s other ear and pushed the studs through. Shoog ran to the mirror to admire her sister’s work. The earrings were beautiful, like scintillating dew drops touched by the sun. Ma brushed and curled her daughter’s thick, dark brown hair and dabbed a drop of tinted gloss on her lips. "Look up." She said as she applied two coats of mascara to her lashes. Sal tried to be helpful when she offered Shoog one of her too-small short skirts and a tiny top. Ma vetoed them the moment they exited the closet. She walked her daughter over to the dresser mirror and stood behind her.

"Wooo." Shoog leaned forward and studied the visage staring back at her. "I dun look half bad."

"You look a’might purty if yew ask me." Ma kissed her cheek. " Now rest up a spell. Thee guests should start arrivin’ by sunhigh. I’m gunna go pay yer aunt Daizee a call. Bring her some tack-biscuits and sweet-nettle tea. That baby inner is making her as sick as an anooba in a melon patch."

"Well it is an Orrelios." Sal said, her eyes downcast.

"Hesh-up. I don’t want none of that talk outta you ‘round Daizee, yew hear?"

"Yeah, I hear."

******

Sugar Trodd dreamed that the prince of Lasan had invited her to the Royal Palace. Naturally, he was infatuated with her at first sight. Never had he seen such a delicate mountain flower. He compared her eyes to the torch-fires of Izrothir , her lips to a fount of heady wine and her small breasts to a pair of decadent Aztecan chocolate truffles. He found himself mad with passion and he couldn’t help but beg her to be his wife. Shoog smiled in her slumber when he breathed into her ear and nuzzled her temple with his lips. She traced the prince’s handsome brow-ridges with her fingertips and put her hands on the back of his head. She drew him in close, touching her snub nose to his. They shared a life-breath and then connected in a kiss. . .

The sounds of a gathering crowd whisked the prince away into obscurity. Shoog woke with a snort. She jumped out of bed and drew back her curtain to look at a large gathering of women-lasats arranging food on a long plank table in front of the house. Some she recognized, like her aunts and cousins and friends, but some she didn’t. Did her cousins and friends invite friends of their own?

Wood in the brick fire pit burned hot, and the mouth-watering smell of roasting prongnose wafted in through her bedroom window. She closed the curtain with a swift pull.

"Karabast! That’s all fer me? All that food and all them people?" She knelt in front of the chest at the foot of her bed and frantically pulled clothes from it. Lil’ Speckle looked at her with sleepy-hen eyes, then, unfazed, drank from the water dish Shoog had provided her.

"There ain’t nothing in here worth wearing, cept mebbe this fancy sweaterdress. Uhhggh, No!" She threw it down. "It too hot outside fer that!"

She sat back down on her bed and agonized over her choices. Then,

"You know what? Ma and Sal went through a lot of trouble to make me feel good. Least I kin do is be ‘preesh-ative. That ol’ dress a mine ain’t so bad. Hells, nobody will recognize it from last year. I hope."

Shoog wriggled into her slip and tossed the old blue dress on. It was a little tighter and shorter than she remembered. Was it possible she did that much growing in one year? She buttoned it up.

She went to the mirror and combed her curls, then put on another dab of gloss and rubbed her lips together. Ma came into the room, a colorful box tucked under her arm.

"Oh, Sugar darlin’ that old dress won’t do. Not fer yer flowerin’!"

"It’s not a bad dress ma. An’ look, it fits me better this year!"

"I dunno," Sadie rubbed her furry chin. "What do yew think Daizee?"

Aunt Daizee’s purple-striped face peered into the room. She was a pretty lasat, pretty as a jogan, but a lack of sleep and constant morning sickness had hollowed her cheeks and darkened the sockets of her eyes.

"I reckon it’s okay. But I think you’d like what’s in the box better."

Shoog’s heart skipped a beat. She eyed the colorful package tucked under her mother’s arm and her mouth dropped open. She felt like a magnet drawn to metal.

"Happy Flowerin’ Day my darlin’." Ma handed Shoog the package. It was wrapped in pink foil paper and tied with a big white bow. Shoog whistled through her front teeth.

"That’s the nicest wrappin’ paper I’ve ever seen in my whole life! I don’ wanna rip it."

"Oh go ahead, rip it!" Sal said, coming into the room.

"No. It’s too purty to waste. I kin use it again." Shoog sat cross-legged on her bed with the box on top of her knees. She was dying to see what was inside.

After carefully removing the bow and paper she removed the box top and unfolded the dish towel containing her present. She held her hands to her mouth and gasped. Inside, was an elegant strapless dress the color of fresh-churned butter. Shoog lifted it out of the box. It had a scalloped front and was gathered at the waist. The opening in back, plunging to mid spine, was laced with delicate yellow ribbons.

"Great Bearded One, if this ain’t the purtiest dress I ever did see!" She held it up in front of her and twirled. "And strapless too! Ain’t this gonna make me look ‘fast’ ma?"

" Yer auntie says it’s an elegant dress. It ain’t meant t’ make yew look fast. Hit’s meant t’ make yew look like a lady."

"It’s gorgeous, Shoog." Sal said with a hint of jealousy.

*********

Shoog greeted her guests. They oohed and aaahed and told her to turn around. Great aunts pinched her cheeks and friends and cousins made big productions out of her new look. They ‘Oh my Godded’ and ‘You’re so luckyed’ her so much, she felt like a celebrity. When she slipped away for a second to get some pucker-fruit punch she looked into the throng of lasats and felt her face contort into a confused frown.

Where were all the males?

Every guest, except for the youngest cubs, were female.

Shoog saw her eldest sister Mae placing a bowl of rarrcot and swamp-plum salad on the table. She went up to her.

"Hey mama Mae."

" There she is! The belle of the ball. The most beautiful girl here. And to think, yew were a rough-and tumble little jack-boy the last time I saw yew."

"Aw, I’m still a jack-boy. I ain’t never gonna stop huntin’ and fishin’ wid pa, or stop wrasslin wid the fellers."

"Yew might wanna reconsider that last one." Mae said, wiping the rim of the bowl with a wet cloth.

"Uhm, speaking of fellers, where’s all th’ males at? I ain’t seen a peek of Jimbo or Jax or Muss or Puggles. Not even Mawsy. And there’s beer here, I know it!"

"I’m sure they’re around. Somewhere." Mae winked and tweaked Shoog’s chin. She turned at the sound of a grating female voice. "Oh, I see someone invited that ol’ loon-cootie Lottie Bingo. She’s prowbly thumping the Great Bearded One’s book, preachin’ about the sins of the flesh and fur." She frowned. "Bless her heart. Well, excuse me darlin,’ I have to find some more cutlery. I brought my wedding set of aurodium plate, great-Aunt Tilda and Winnie did too, but a lot more lasats than we anticipated turned up to see yew flower."

Shoog hugged her sister and skipped off. She joined her friends and kin on the grassy hill behind the barn and stood in a long line. They played malogi’-majlogo, a once-competitive game that was rumored to come from the fabled planet of Lirasan. Most historians and lasopoligists believed all lasats living on Lasan came via a human transport over three-thousand years ago, as no bones found in middens were any older. Lasats had to come from somewhere. Perhaps the legend of Lirasan wasn’t so far fetched as many once thought.

The girls clapped their hands loudly, calling out the name of the first girl in line. Cousin Hildi stepped out of line and performed a dance she had conjured up the night before. She flapped her arms like a killow and stood high on her toes and cartwheeled until he landed on her tail. Laughing, she skipped her way to the end of the line. Next was Sally. Her dance—though impressive— was as predictable as it was sensuous, and was hard to clap to. Other girls followed, each one with their own trademark dance style. Then came Shoog’s turn.

Pumped with adrenaline, she ran out in front of the gang of laughing girls and raised a ferocious scream so loud her younger cousins covered their sensitive ears. She crouched low and prowled and paced. She bared her fangs and popped her eyes. They burned a deep orange around their pinprick pupils. The girls went wild. They clapped in quintuple-beat, clap clap. . . clapclapclap. . . a warrish beat. Shoog knelt in the grass and shimmied her shoulders. She slapped the palms of her hands on the ground and whipped her head around then sprang from her crouch, eight feet into the air, landing in a pose reminiscent of that of a sprinter at a starting line. She stood, thrust out a bent leg and raised her face to the sky before letting out another scream. The girls were about to applaud the dance when the most blood-curdling roar they had ever heard split the air through the holler. Shoog stood up straight. A beaming smile covered her face. She knew that roar.

Coming up the rising path was a large troop of males, her father in the lead.

"Pa!" She lifted her dress and ran straight for the giant lasat, her companions not far behind. The eerie moan of traditional polished horn prong-pipes heralded the males’ entrance. The blowing of the pipes informed colonies of lasats that a clan leader was approaching. Even in the royal city they used wrought-ore versions of the ancient instruments whenever the King and Queen made an appearance.

Flanking pa were his sons. Rufus jr. and Zelbert. Muss and Naylor. Jax and Jimbo and Puggles. Even Trapper, who spent most of his life in solitude in the high mountains. As she got closer, Shoog saw Mossy, and also cousin Zeke and Bubba. A phalanx of other kin and family friends followed behind. Shoog leapt at her father who caught her in a hug then hoisted her up onto his shoulder. They marched through the crowd of women-folk and stood at attention in the yard. On the porch, pa’s well-fed anooba Gracie horrked and slobbered and ran her tongue over the jutting spade of a tooth in her lower jaw. She galloped up to Rufus and stood upright, putting her long-clawed paws on his chest. Mossy grabbed a beer from a washtub and cracked it open on the beastly creature’s tooth. The young boys in the crowd laughed.

The male lasats were dressed in their finest woodsmen-warrior garb, which included sleeveless, multipocketed jerkins and arm bracers with pouches. They wore gray prongnose-wool skilts—with clan colors and designs around the bottom— and leather codpieces and knife sheaths. Most bore two bandoliers that crisscrossed their chests and each male carried an impressive arsenal of weapons. Pa’s old rifle was slung across his back and two throwing axes hung at his hips. Whip-killow feathers wreathed his bony dome, and his face, already fearsome, was painted white, like a skull. There were males with shining daggers and lacquered bats. Males with falchions, slugthrowers and plasma spitters, pole-bows, maces and spears.

Each male was fearsome and striking, even little Puggles, whose painted face and shark-jawed visage made him look like a strangely formidable foe. The trio of smoke-screamer grenades in his bandolier also helped.

Shoog kicked Gracie’s paws off Rufus’s chest. " Don’tchu get my dress dirty y’ whip-tailed bitch. I’ll brain ye!"

A lasat in the back, pa’s friend Tabe, guffawed like a drunk at a circus.

"That thar is deffy-nit-ly yer pro-genny ol’ Roof! Shore as a tick loves a furry ass-crack."

"We is gonna have t’ get more beer." Ma whispered to Daizee.

The purple-striped female caressed the small bulge in her belly. "Um, or mebbe not. I’m sure some of them boys brang they’s own distillate. Hey!" She yelped. "Easy little one. Land’ a muddlin’, only five months old and she’s kickin’ like a cow!"

Shoog poked her pa’s snub nose and wiped the white paint on his jerkin. "Hey pa, why is yew fellers all fancied up an’ armed to thee teeth?"

Rufus tickled Shoog’s ear, like he did when she was small."I wuz unner thee impression they taught yew kids history in school!"

"They did! But all we loined about wuz thee portent ‘citified lasats’."

"Damn shame. Well Sugar, hits like this. Back in the day, b’fore miners and mines an’ banks and comp’ny stores, there wuz th’ Clans o’ Thee Forest. Some clans wuz small and sum clans wuz big. Our linny-age goes way back. There wuz Trodds what wuz picked to fight in thee barbarian wars."

"Oh yeah! I ‘member grampy saying somethin’ like that!"

"Anyway, prommy-nunt clan leaders wuz a’might fond of they’s kids. When a girl came of the age for broodin,’ her pa threw her a big party so young-jacks could come to show their talents and try they’s hands at wooin’.

"Hell, I ain’t gonna do no broodin, er, breedin! Not fer a long time!"

" Corse y’ ain’t! This wuz thee old days, ‘member?"

"Oh yeah. So why all the weapons?"

"Well, a Clan leader had to pertect his daughter frum jope-jacks and briggards, so he employeed his own personal army a’ kinfolk an’ frens t’ keep her safe."

" That’s purty wizard pa."

"What?"

"That’s neat."

Rufus lifted his daughter off his shoulder and set her on the ground in front of him. His face was stoic, cool and composed, but under the skin he was weeping. His hook-baiter, his lizard spooker, his fire-starter, was now a woman. Suddenly he was glad for all his faithful ‘warriors’. There were boys showing up at the party that he didn’t know. One thing was for sure. They wouldn’t want to know him if they messed with Shoog.

**********

Ma eventually broke down. From the moment she woke, she told herself that she wouldn’t cry today. She was certain her spirited and independent daughter would breeze through the ceremony without nary a sniffle or a tremor, but as the visitors crowded around the decorated stump and Rufus helped Shoog up on top of it, ma could tell her poor girl was nervous to the point of fainting. She looked so small, so vulnerable.

Pa pulled a dog-eared book out of one of his breast pockets, licked his thumb and turned the pages. The book, with its crackled parchment pages was over nine-hundred years old. It had been passed from clan patriarch to clan patriarch, and when the time came for Rufus to be bested in combat by one of his sons for title as clan leader—most likely Rufus jr.—he would pass it down as well.

Ma stood next to pa. To his other side was Shoog’s sister Hallie, the Trodd family medicine woman. She held a dipper of water with bits of maiden’s-foot fern floating in it.

Pa found the page he was looking for. He cleared his throat. He could speak old Illasano, but he was very much out of practice.

" Shrrwall mirol." He intoned. "Harrkg dasa, harrkg mojallan, miuuk ti, ti’as Sugar bilo nen dauhirra wahmerr."

(Honored guests. Beloved friends, beloved family, we today give our child-daughter Sugar to womanhood.)

" Ashla fuegolo malinta. (Ashla be near)

"Ashla fuegolo malinta!" Chanted the crowd.

" Umdayrr ti’as rrip ti’as pial." (Today she sheds her skin)

"Umdayrr ti’as comass a sharrgo!" (Today she feeds the fire!)

"Pil ti’as songerr naberskerr!" (May she be strong as a warrior.)

"Pil ti’as oovak mana." (May her womb be fruitful.)

Shoog rolled her eyes and blushed and the crowd burst out in laughter.

Jimbo parenthesized his mouth with his hands and shouted. "Dun git knocked up tonight!" Jax slapped his knee and brayed.

" Shet-up yew dumb-asses!" Shoog yelled back, stomping her foot. Pa cracked up. He took a deep breath. He had to regain his composure before continuing.

"C’mon Roof! Yew kin do it!" His brother Jethro cried.

"Ahem. . . "Pil ti’as rrrmaeso, kon hoorr’baerbo mah foshzam." (May she summon the wisdoms, the heart-knowing.)

"Chh lengg ti’as sorrvive." (As long as she walks the land.)

"Ashla glorrae." (Ashla blessed)

"Ashla glorrae." Everyone said, solemnly.

Ma was now sobbing. Daizee squeezed her shoulder.

"Well, I reckon that’s it fer the prayer." Pa said, closing the book and carefully putting it back in his pocket. Ma dabbed her streaming eyes with a handkerchief.

"Oh Rufus, that wuz beeyootiful. Absolutely beeyootiful."

Mossy came forward with a torch and set the stacked kindling wood in a pit in front of the stump on fire.

"Y’ ready Twig?" He asked Shoog.

"Ready as all ever be."

The girl-now woman reached out and took her beloved growly-bear from her father. She looked down at the crackling fire and tossed the toy in.

"Ti’a parrile a muart." (" The child is dead")

Hallie washed her sister’s hands with the fern-water.

The crowd cheered and ran forward. Many held dried snake skins in their hands which they threw on Shoog, symbolically shedding her of the remaining spirit of childhood.

"Time fer vittles y’all!’ Daizee clapped her hands and yelled. "This young’in in me is a’ chompin at thee rope!"

Everyone congratulated Shoog and ran to find a place at the main table. The prongnose was pulled out of the fire, as were fifty chookens, a pair of suckling kalgows and a haunch of beef. It wasn’t much meat, but there were plenty of side dishes brought by guests to be sampled.

Shoog watched her bear burn until nothing was left but a pair of melting button eyes. She sighed, jumped off the stump and joined the rest of the throng.

After supper, the shine came out, which meant roughhousing. A handful of guardsmen pledged to stay sober just in case the fun turned into full-blown fighting. Hallie came up to pa, a concerned look on her face.

"Don’t look now, pa. Bubba is head-sparrin’ wid uncle Bocephus. And a few other fellers."

A passel of lasat men—attended by woman with cold rags—rolled around on the ground, holding their bony craniums and groaning.

Rufus groaned as well. His hefty, good-natured nephew loved to smack skulls with other lasats, even when sober, but he often failed to think about the force behind his weight. In this county, he was reigning head-butt champion.

"Time t’ give fat-boy a spankin’. Rufus pounded his palm with his fist.

**********

The afternoon sped like a hooch-runner into the night.

Shoog excused herself from the crowd—and the boys in it who shoved to the front to ask her to dance—and found a place behind the hen-house where she could be alone. She had partaken of a few sips of snowberry wine and was feeling content and happy. Spark flies hovered beneath the branches of the old greenjacket in the yard and over the maize tassels in ma’s garden. Little cubs clambered about on the tire swing and bigger cubs climbed the tree itself, proving their bravery. She had to look twice to determine whose kids they were. It turned out they were Mae’s grandkids. She waved to them and they waved back with their sticky, cake-and-punch fingers. Puggles ambled over, a Lasan Blue Ribbon beer in his hand.

" Sum party, eh Shoog?" He drained the beer can and crushed it against his furry brow.

"That’s gonna hurt in the mornin.’Hey, how’d yew git that anyway? Yew know pa will tan yer tail if he see’s yew wif a hard drank."

"Beer ain’t a hard drank. Mossy said so."

"Ohh. If Mausee told you a turd wuz a turnip, wood yew bile it in water?"

"I reckon I woodnt."

The siblings sat in silence for a few seconds. The sounds of lasats laughing and singing and debating politics merged with the sweet melody of fiddle music. It was emanating from the barn, where lasats were dancing the night away. Some of the brawnier males took their jerkins off and performed frightening warrior dances. Everyone hooped and hollered and begged for more. Most of the males charged with ‘policing the crowd’ were asleep on the lawn or under the table, their drained jars still clasped in their hands.

"Sorry bout yer growly bear." Puggles looked up at his sister with large honest eyes. "Why didn’t yew pick something else fer the far?"

Shoog smiled at her brother and squeezed his hand. "Well, thee whole point of thee ceremony was fer me to give up m’ childhood. It needed to be a might parful symbol, something sad an’ a lil’ painful, because honestly Puggles, growin’ up hain’t all what it’s cracked up to be."

" Yew ain’t happy bout bee’in a woman-lasat?"

Shoog took another sip of her wine. "In one way, yeah, I s’pose so. I have more say in things now. But in another . . . look what I’ll be missin.’"

She pointed to the cubs in the tree, carrying on like they hadn’t a care in the world. Puggles chhuhhed.

"Beein’ a growed up means more ‘sponsibility, but yew ain’t never gotta give up on fun. That prayer pa said, hits a million-years old. It ain’t meant t’ be follered zactly the way he said it."

"Ye think so?"

"Well, dats whut I think! Shit, ahs’ll never let a-dulthood turn me into a borin’ stiff!"

Shoog got out of her chair and gave her little brother a hug. "Yew is smarter than yew give yerself credit fer."

She smiled sweetly. Then she punched him in the stomach.

"Owwww!! What’s that fer?"

"That’s fer them farworks you sent up. Honestly Puggles, Booger? You spelt my name Booger?"

Puggles gripped his belly. "Errybody else thunk is wuz funny!"

"Yeah I bet they did!" She pulled his sparse beard. He yanked her hair. They started to wrestle.

Ma and pa stood at a distance. " Yew see that Sadie? Sum things never change."

"I swear to the Bogan, ifffen she gits that dress mussed up, I’ll snatch her head bald."

Rufus turned Sadie toward him and embraced her. A devilish smile split his face.

"Why Rufus, what’s gotten into yew?"

" I wuz jus’ thinkin,’ How’s about we talk more about that strapless dress you is plannin’ to buy?"

-Finito-

[writer59january13]

Futile escape out clutches of penury

finds yours truly groveling along February third 2022,

never linkedin - analogous to stray animal without being befriended,

thus I don't belong

survival instincts taught yours truly the necessity acting

courageous and headstrong

even if necessary

to stare down King Kong, who actually shows me respect

such that every now and again we play a game of ping pong

and on a crisp night roast marshmallowskindle campfire and sing Kumbaya song.

This tramp (which stereotyped caricature familiarly epitomized in countless Chaplinesque productions, Dickensian tales, oil paintings from artistic hands of great masters and others anonymous

exquisite painters, et cetera) remembers practically nothing of me nine-month stay in utero birth, childhood nor early adulthood. My amorphous gauzy, hazy fractal memories solely comprise fractured, fragmented and splintered collection of miserable experiences, which characterize living a hellacious hand to mouth hard scrapple existence. Past wispy vestiges of wretchedness and now present woebegone existence seems a worse fate than death. The overpowering urge to survive and summon up one barely audible l’chaimutterance against the depredations of the grim reaper only found nothing but defeat. That daily dismal grinding away of last shreds of a purpose driven life fending off real and imagined threats sought salvation in a vividly encased jammed preserve of mine imagination an existence awash with ample trappings of comfort. Yours truly dug deep with bony strength in tandem with fantasy notions know king around in figurative heady toboggan noggin like cranial carapace to muster every ounce of strength in an effort to escape chronic confrontation with endless streak of bleakness. Although cursed with brutish, nasty, and short nefarious fate as a measly looking human varmint, this grimy, grungy, mangy, rangy, et cetera looking besotted being clung with all the might within his five foot ten inch or so tall and one hundred and sixty five pound body to transcend sigh grimly twerking terrestrial travesty that tweeted n tweaked laugh-in fickle finger of fate in my favor. I tapped into atavistic survival skills summoned willpower to stay alive drinking butter bear while heavy cross of dirty poor poverty borne. No matter a hard-core skeptic at heart, this cynic plaintively called for divine intervention to help one nondescript human piece of flotsam and jetsam to cope - living like doleful junkyard dog. In essence, this abandoned, ignored and shunned vagrant frequently raged against the Deus ex machine found figurative amidst literal lovely bones slim pick hens with demons that tormented psyche. While traipsing along litter strewn condemned boulevard of broken dreams, torn and well-worn shoe kicked a couple of long discarded items. These weather beaten hands reflexively bent to retrieve accouterments. One comprised colorful jagged shard, in a previous lifetime housed cheap fermented liquor. Nothing but crud filled remnant of dog gone booze hounds’ favorite drink.

[scrapplekings]

[beheeyem-moved]

7 12 13 and 33 for that lil question thing? (unless you arent doin it anymore)

7: i did already !

12: ummm i dont remember it all but i do remember fucking?? dr king being there

13: memes, art, uhhh, i can go a while w out moving 

33: i like,, never have breakfast tbh asjdksa we have lunch at 10 somethin in school so i jsut eat there,i eat scrapple a lot tho