fart ax reasons

Coach Taylor and the Friday Night Lights Part 3

2011-07-15T12:58:00.000-07:00

Coach Taylor parked outside Hagrid's hut. Cars weren't allowed on the grounds but it was 3am and Julie just called him on the cell phone he bought her for Christmas. She sounded drunk.
He looked out through his windshield at the hut. He watched the candle light illuminate their silhouettes. There was his little girl. And the wall that moves was Hagrid. What were they doing in there? He kicked in his seat. Thank goodness the car was in park or he would've accelerated right through the wall. The candlelight was moving toward the front door of the hut. It swung open and there she was, Julie Taylor, sweeping her blonde hair over her ear and Hagrid behind her adjusting his pants and leaning down to kiss her goodnight but his eyes drifted and caught Coach Taylor. He jolted up and readjusted his clothing again. As quick as lightning Coach was out of his car and walking toward Julie. He grabbed her hard on the arm and moved her aside. He was staring at the mountain now. Hagrid's beard was at his nose. It had bits of food stuck in it and stunk of pumpkin juice. Coach lifted his finger at the beast's round droopy nose and couldn't say a word. He was embarrassed. Frustrated, even. The idea that his girl was with this thing that was more oaf than man was more than he could respond to.
"Julie, get in the car," he said as he himself backed toward it.
"Eric," Hagrid started.
Sharp as an eagle, Coach turned back to Hagrid and his breath formed only enough sound to warn "don't you dare."
In the car there was only quiet. Julie could think of things to say but her thoughts would only culminate in her rolling her lips into a seal. She had called her father and she had gotten him. The light in the hut was snuffed and like a spell had been lifted, Coach was again able to speak.
"I can't have you seeing him."
"Dad!"
"He used to be a teacher here and then he wasn't. I don't trust him and he's too old for you. That's it. It's not a discussion."
The drive back to the castle was long. Even the creature in the lake didn't stir.

In the morning, Julie was upset but she understood her father's anger. She learned a lot about Hagrid that night and though at the time she wasn't ready to admit it, she knew that no good was going to come from it. Coach had told Tami and they decided that it'd be best to let Julie be for now.

As the afternoon's rain coated the castle, Coach Taylor spread out his fingers searching for the Texan sun. He was not himself here. He couldn't help but think about Julie. Tami was busy teaching Muggle Studies and Gracie Bell was exceeding expectations in all her day care activities. Mrs. Flupplebupple went as far to predict that Gracie Bell may well be a witch. To this Coach Taylor pasted on a smile as he lifted Gracie Bell from under the arms and took her away.
"Thank you, Mrs. Flupplebupple but Gracie's going to work with me today..." he said insincerely.

But Gracie Bell was more than he could handle, making glass walls disappear without warning, and she was back in day care by the end of the day.

The rain smacked him on the face as his thoughts went back to Julie.

She was exiting Trelawney's class which she enjoyed sitting in on. Late one night after bonding over ping-pong Julie felt like she could tell him anything and admitted that she went to the class to get a sense of her future. Coach didn't know how to respond to this and said nothing. Julie always thought of that night and how dismissive he was to her thoughts. Only Coach knew that it was that moment he first understood that Julie has lived through a past that could only make one question what's next to come. He loved her for that but that night holds a place in her heart as the one where she felt more alone and distant from her father than ever.

"Come here," he said to her as he sat on the stone wall of the courtyard in front of the giant clock. She sat next to him and again was a child, kicking her feet over the edge. From a paper bag he took out a milkshake in a wax paper cup.
"What is that?" she said, knowing the answer.
"Fresh from the Alamo Freeze," he added has he sipped from the straw.
"Mmm, this one's yours," he said tasting as he handed it to her. And then he took his out from the same bag.
"But how?" She pushed, knowing her father was no fan of magic.
Just then three Snowy Owls flew out from the Owlry.
"Ain't they somethin'?" he said rhetorically.

Julie nudged her father and the Whomping Willow shook off its snowy branches.

Coach Taylor and the Friday Night Lights Part 2

2011-03-11T09:11:00.000-08:00

A car radio tunes itself to a clear station.
"It's a hot day out here on the grounds and that means one thing, Quidditch..."
Through its windows are the trees of the Forbidden Forest, the hut of Hagrid ornamented with a sign post reading "Potter #7", three Wizards pulling up to The Three Broomsticks, this is Hogwarts. The radio continues to play through the speakers of this beat-up green car as it flies without pilot. On the other end, two commentators duel on the mics originally calibrated by muggle expert, Arthur Weasley.
"It feels like First Years that pulled up in their boats just months ago are now preparing for what looks to be an exciting new season."
"Well what I'd like to see is if this Headmaster Taylor can turn around what can only be described as a rag tag Hufflepuff offense."
"I am stupified that the Hufflepuff headmaster would even accept the help from this muggle who's only experience in coaching is for a game called 'football'."
"Just be happy that Minerva had the good sense not to release her command of the Griffendor team. With Potter missing this season the last thing they need is input from someone who doesn't know the sport. Forgive me, but even though Dumbledore may have vouched for this Taylor as a headmaster, I just don't see him wrapping his head around this... well, I'll say it... Wizards' game."

With the rush of the morning, Eric Taylor speeds into his kitchen as Tammy is already washing breakfast's dishes. Gracie Bell sits in her high-chair chewing on something long and droopy.
"What is..."
Headmaster Taylor grabs the slobbery mess out of her mouth, revealing the what looks like a mangled ear.
"Tammy, what is this?"
"I don't know, is it alive?" she asks genuinely as she takes it from his hand and bangs it against the table.
"OW!" shouts Julie as she bursts into the room clutching the side of her head.
"Julie, what is this?" asks Headmaster Taylor.
"It's an extendable ear. Everyone has one."
His jaw drops with disdain. He tongues his cheeks as if they were coated with a strange taste.
"Oh I've seen these around... Hey, were you listening to me and your mother this morning?"
"What's the point of living in this stupid magic castle if we can't use the magic?!"
She grabs the extendable ear from her mother and stuffs it into a bag without end.
"And you can't enroll Matt just so I stop going out with Hagrid. He found his Chicago already and Hagrid is mine!" Her voice softens.
"You should be happy for me. You're the ones who wanted me to like this place."
Julie storms out the portrait door and into the hallway. The stairs move away as she climbs them. A nearby student remarks how he hasn't seen those stairs move in the castle since 2001.
Headmaster Taylor looks at Tammy, a little defeated but mostly with an air of delegation, "you're going to have to talk to her."
Headmaster Taylor opens the portrait door to find Buddy Garrity pretending that he wasn't just eaves dropping.
"Hey Eric, look what I found! Someone told me it belonged to a guy named Madeye... neat, huh?" Buddy exclaims as he holds up an enchanted eye that seems to roll on its own accord.
"Not now Buddy." Headmaster Taylor walks past him. Buddy looks to Tammy like a puppy who just found an alternate source of attention.
"Not now Buddy," she restates as she closes the portrait on him and turns to Gracie Bell with a sigh.

Coach Taylor and the Friday Night Lights Part 1

2010-11-22T13:19:00.000-08:00

Things were just starting to settle for them when he got the letter. An owl had gotten into their house that evening. With last night’s game tape blaring before him, Coach Eric Taylor stood on his couch, with a roll of wrapping paper, swatting at the evasive ivory bird. He licked his lips and pierced his eyes at it with determination when suddenly the door opened.

“Shut that door!” A statement as loud as it was sharp.

“Fine dad, calm down.”

It was Julie. She had just gotten home from a party with some new boy. Coach Taylor knew this by the unfamiliar sound of the noise that dropped her off.

“Are you seeing some boy with a dirt bike?”

“DAD! I’m 16!” she shouted back. She then paused, thoughtfully, “Why are you on the couch… Is that an owl?!”

“Your mother’s going to talk to you tomorrow! Go to bed.”

She slammed her bedroom door. It startled the bird and Coach Taylor squared it under the wing. It dropped a letter and flew out the chimney. The letter opened on its own accord and spoke to him.

The next morning Julie had little to say when Coach Taylor told his wife Tami about the dirt bike suitor. Tami sighed when Julie stormed out claiming to have to leave for school early. Something about a teen outreach program. Now alone, Coach nestled up to Tami and offered to pour her some coffee. Tami knew this gift came with a price. She looked up at him, matching her inquisitive puppy dog eyes with his shameful puppy dog eyes. She won.

“I got a new job,” he said.

Her shoulders broke at the news.

“But you just took this one, you said you were done changing things!”

He said nothing. She said nothing.

“Well where is it?” she gave up.

As he spoke he winced as if he knew it sounded like he was being incredulous.

“It’s called Hogwarts.”

She wasn’t impressed with a coaching job at some place called Hogwarts. So Coach upped the ante with a smile.

“It’s in England.”

She gasped.

“And they want me to be Headmaster.”

She threw her arms around him and told him it was wonderful.

The car packed, Julie slammed the trunk and then slammed the rear doors and the passenger door and the driver door. Tami and Coach didn’t like to see her this way but they knew this move was going to be tough on her. Even telling her that the school had a moving art collection did little to get her interest.

Convinced they were lost, frustrations were cutting in. Eventually they were shown to a train and there they sat for what seemed like hours in silence. When they arrived, Coach was separated from them by a large hairy man. He was the groundskeeper and Julie smiled in front of her parents for the first time all year.

“Ello ‘Ulie” the man said, familiarly.

“What are you doing here?! Mom, Dad, this is Hagrid!” she blossomed.

Coach Taylor looked through this man and then up at him as if he was studying every inch of him. Then he saw something behind this man. A motorbike with a side car. Tami looked just as nervous but thanks to three hours of butterbeer she pointed out that Julie always did have a thing for teachers. She grabbed Coach by the arm and nudged him away. She didn’t approve but did find the man mysteriously comforting. Like a giant dog with a teddy bear face. She looked at Eric and wondered how he would look with a beard.

That evening Coach was instructed to give a few words to the incoming class. He started by introducing the other teachers. This seemed easier than introducing himself. There was Professor Flitwick, Minerva McGonagall, Poppy Pomfrey, Pomona Sprout, and someone who wasn’t on the list but in a seat nonetheless by the name of Sybil Trelawney. Coach made a mental note to look into this. Severus Snape was there as well having put a Confundus Charm on anyone who said he killed the previous headmaster, Albus Dumbledore. Coach Taylor then smiled and winked at Julie and then snared at the man whose giant hairy hands were clumped over her shoulder when he announced:

“And your new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Mrs. Taylor!”

She spoke as if it were her turn to speak. Minerva rolled her eyes. Headmaster speaks first. Then the hat. Then the teachers.

“Hey y’all. It’s such a pleasure to be here, I’ve never taught magic, I guess you’d call me a Moogle, but I’ve been a principal and I’ve been a guidance counselor so I’ve really seen a lot and I look forward to growing with you all.”

Coach stepped back to the podium and began his speech.

“Now I want y’all to take a knee."

Mario Galaxy FanFic

2010-08-11T18:57:00.000-07:00

Mario sat at the foot of his bed. He took off his shoes and rubbed his feet, sore and tired from a day of jumping for coins. He gently collapsed back, staring at the ceiling. The door opened, Peach was home.
"Why don't you stargaze anymore?" Peach asked. A question she had been holding for days.
Mario closed his eyes as if saying this with them open would be too embarrassing.
"I've been to space... and I've seen planets that look like my face.. I don't know what anything means anymore."
Peach says nothing but sits on the bed, placing her hand on Mario's leg. She wants to say "I understand" but she can't lie to him anymore.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asks instead.
"Well Rosalina says that..."
"Oh, so you can talk to Rosalina about this," Peach states.
Mario's eyes, still shut, are held even tighter when he feels her weight shift off of the bed.
"I'm just so confused, Peach. The planets look just like me."

SHUTTER ISLAND FAN FIC

2010-05-21T12:24:00.000-07:00

"I don't know how to get a gun out of my holster because I am a terrible liar."

Later that evening he went missing. On the floor only his jacket remained. It lie there still. Letting out only a quiet burp.

It would eat again. But not tomorrow. Tomorrow is Friday and Friday is Taco night on Shutter Island.

The Player FanFic

2010-03-17T20:44:00.000-07:00

There's blood in the water. It's like a cloud is bleeding.
"Only thing that could come from this is a crop of Audrey II's," said the tough detective. When the cops in earshot asked what he meant by that he explained that Audrey II was the man-eating plant in "Little Shop of Horrors." And though it cleared that up, there was still the body blocking the sewer drain.
"Gonna be a long night" the cops said to each other as they left the detective crouching by the body, tweezers in hand.
"Gonna be as long as the sun doesn't come up" said the detective, pinching off a flake of garlic from what used to be the body's nose. He stands up in a start and shouts,"Come on! Take in this scene before it turns to dust, it's nearly half-past five!"
He walks away stopping to throw in, "You'll be dusting for fingerprints and gettin' only finger."

Police headquarters is busy, even in the morning. Especially in the morning. In this town. New York may be the city that never sleeps and New Orleans may be the city that actually never sleeps, but Hollywood is where vampires eat on the people trying to sleep. The detective slams his door, his name painted on the glass dares itself not to crack. "Detective DeLongpre".

Test results come back on the garlic, it's imported and only one store sells it. Detective DeLongpre drives to Encino where it's sold illegally from an eccentric producer's live-in gardener's basement. Under questioning the gardener says that he sells it only to one man, a writer.
"Writers," Detective DeLongpre says.
"I know," agrees the gardener.

Detective DeLongpre drives to this writer's house. Knocks. The door creaks open. He walks up to a man with his back to him, trimming some plants.
Detective DeLongpre thinks about what he could say to catch this man off-guard and gain some traction at the same time.
"You're a regular Seymour Krelborn," he says.
"Little Shop of Horrors, good one..," the writer nods.
"Detective DeLongpre," answers Detective DeLongpre.
The writer is not a tough man, not when he's dealing with humans at least. He admits to killing the vampire, proud of it even. Another case goes black for Detective DeLongpre.

Avatar FanFic

2010-01-19T14:34:00.000-08:00

It starts with him opening his eyes in the blue light of the space ship. It always starts this way. He scratches his three stroke scar and reaches for the door's release.
"I forgot something , we're going back." said General Knife Grabber.
The Marines that work for the company turn and look at him. All of them not saying, "did he die on Pandora?" None of them admitting, "I honestly forget, but I think he did."
"Shut up!" General Knife Grabber says to the silence. "Maybe I'm a clone or a twin or something. Like a Twix bar. Just give me a break!"
General Knife Grabber struts down the corridor and kicks down the door to Giovanni Ribisi who is busy slam dunking rolled up paper basketballs.
"I'm sorry I don't know your name."
"I'm sorry I don't know your name either."
"Unobtainium."
"Unobtainium."
The two are bonded. Bonded like a banshee to a Na'vi.

Meanwhile, on Pandora Jakesul Ly and Matisyahu rule as King and Queen. Jakesul hides his shame for killing Matisyahu's betrothed during a freak attack-the-oppressing-corporates accident. One day he thinks he'll tell her.
"GREAT SHIT!"
She plugged into his braid. She knows everything now. She doesn't even say 'I see you' and walks away.
LAND, the big ship does and all the Na'vi surround it. The sound of taught bow string is so dense that were a supernatural white glowy milkweed seed to land on one, the pluck of grand piano would result. Unfortunately, the arrows do nothing to stop the ship from landing on red-painted Na'vi who were visiting from out of town. The door opens and General Knife Grabber comes out, gas mask equipped.
"I'm sorry, I seem to have forgot something! Like a pack of Nerds or something."
Jakesul approaches him, cool, confident.
"Look around, take it, and leave."
"You don't understand me," General Knife Grabber suggests, "When I said 'a pack of Nerds' that was a metaphor."
General Knife Grabber grabs Jakesul's neck in a headlock.
"Now listen here, Marine, what are you doing? Your body isn't going to last like this! The Avatar bodies are like a really expensive jacket, but if you notice, sometimes really expensive stuff falls apart faster than cheap stuff. Like a Jawbreaker is pretty cheap, but that'll last longer than a Godiva..."
"A Jawbreaker?"
"You know from the 20th Century?"
"No."
"Okay, then like Jujubes."
"Oh, yea, Jujubes, I love those."
"Well it's like that so come back with us! I can get you some human legs too."
"I forgot about those."
Jakesul looks to Matisyahu. She's not there.
Jakesul and General Knife Grabber have a brief back and forth on whether or not the Tree could keep fixing his expensive body and eventually night falls. General Knife Grabber retires to his chambers to find the entire crew murdered. He yells and Jakesul runs on board. In the horror of the situation they turn to see the ship's door closing and an odd shape blocking the way out.
It's Matisyahu holding a knife to the sleeping human body of Jake Sully.
"You are stupid."
She kills off the human body and the blue one faints. General Knife Grabber gives up and runs outside to be taken by the teeth of the giant dinosaur banshee. Matisyahu returns to her tree house and plays Egyptian Ratscrew with the Tree-healed Michelle Rodriguez when suddenly six banshees crash into their roof. The baddest banshee is ridden by Dominic Toretto, he detaches his braid.
"Come on, Letty, I hear there's a killer ridge on the floating mountains."
They all fly away. Fastly and with furiousness.

One Word Review™

2009-11-12T21:37:00.001-08:00

2012: Meta

Where the Wild Things Are FanFic

2009-10-18T20:55:00.001-07:00

At 21 years old, Max pinned a tail to his suit and sailed out towards the island. When he climbed up the shore he found the path to the forest that he remembered by sense of smell alone as now much of the trees that marked it when he was 9 have now been returned to dust. Beyond what was the fort was now a hilltop. It was not there before and seemed to be built as if to hold something secret in its belly. On top was a creature of a mass hugging a round stone. Carol looked up and saw Max and Max saw that on the stone was written "K.W." in a heart. Carol fixed his yellow eyes on Max and said "today's my birthday."
Max led Carol down past the fort and beyond the dusty forest and to the shore that held his boat. Max lifted up the sail and brought out a great chocolate frosted cake.
"It's mine too," said Max and they carried the cake up the hill to the round stone. Great sounds came toward them and Douglas and Ira and Janet and Alexander and The Bull made their way up the tomb.
Carol sat back and put his hand on the stone, unable to look at the wild things.
"Here, have some," offered Max, lifting up the cake and drawing back the attention of Carol's great yellow eyes.
"Yes, have some," agreed Carol, "it's still hot."
And they roared and howled and had cake.
Then the sun came and Max left knowing that Carol was with all his teeth now.

The National Parks: America's Best Idea FanFic

2009-10-14T11:18:00.000-07:00

"I felt their youth pulsate through the trees. I never will shoot a wolf in clear conscience whether in field or valley." - George Morgil
"For all the virtue that George Morgil wrote about, there was little known about the man who many considered the 'great grandfather' of the National Parks." - Harriet Beacher, Chief Groundsperson of Yosemite National Park.
George Morgil was found hung over a cavern three days after the park opened to the public. His body, devoured by the wolves he so often wrote about, was discovered by Teddy Roosevelt's personal secretary and friend, Rodger Helmsmith.
"It was a cool evening, I had just commenced a stroll with my son when we saw his body."
-Rodger Helmsmith.
"Dad, there's a ghost in that cave!" - Rodger Helmsmith Jr.
"That is no hovering apparition, but a human no longer tethered to this mortal coil but instead to a redwood tree over a wolf cavern. Stop crying. That man is George Morgil." - Rodger Helmsmith.
With his son's hysterics put to bed by means of a chloroformed handkerchief, Rodger Helmsmith extracted what were perhaps the final thoughts of George Morgil by means of a note deeply wedged in his throat.
"There is nothing more democratic than the magnificent beauty unmarred by man in his foolish pleasures. The wolf pack knows not of any sculpture or poetry, yet they add more to the landscape than any farmer or patriot. If by chance they eat of my flesh, let me run in them. If they by chance eat of my True self, let me impregnate them so that I may run with their cubs and their grandcubs alike and in stride. Let the children of this great land come to visit these grounds and look upon my children with a sense of equality. And if they hunger, let my wolf pack feed on them and make love to their bodies. Let the howling of the coyote seem dim in the light of the moans of my wolves. Let no great bald eagle fly where my wolves do not den. This is what is possible for I want of nothing less." - George Morgil.
The nation was reborn and in the wake of Morgilian thought and preservation, caravans of station-wagons reconnected with the country's past and ever-present future.

Coco B.C. fanfic

2009-10-02T22:16:00.000-07:00

Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel ran quickly down the cobbled steps of her lover's apartment house and slipped on the rain-slicked street.
"Merde!" she said.
A foreigner passerby believed that she said "murder" and ran up the steps and into her Italian lover's hallway. The lover explained the misunderstanding and it was settled. That foreigner felt embarrassed and left a small drawing, signing it: "Pablo, Pablo Picasso." The lover showed it to Gabrielle and she was transfixed by the Spaniard's strange use of form.
Gabrielle picked herself up and continued running down the street as if her accident was a tenured teacher in nihilism. She had to get to the garment district before the boutique opened for the Monday morning rush. They were having a great sale.
She opened shop and stood behind the counter as people came throughout the day to try on wares of the current fashions and highest thread counts. Egyptian cotton was on everyone's must have lists. All around France, things from the middle-east were flying off the hangers - "even the planes" as the joke goes. She stared blankly at a German foreigner who kept responding to her sales pitch with "nein yards." Gabrielle realized what was happening after the third time and politely smiled at the German and moved on to another customer. The German, embarrassed for speaking a combination of German and English in France left the store but not before leaving a note for Gabrielle that read: "Dear Lady, sorry for the inconvenience. Here are 15 francs for the translator of this letter. Sincerely, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe."
Upon reading the letter, Gabrielle looked up to see her lover being taken away by interpol. His hands in interlocking cuffs looked like two letter "c's." She blurred her eyes and put on her "Piscasso filter" -as she came to call it- and saw that not only did they look like two "c's" but it looked like "Coco." Giacomo Casanova was then extradited to the Doge's Palace in Venice and lived out his days with a pet pig.
Coco, as her nametag now read, asked her boss if she could do some work for the boutique and she went on to make two popular quilted bags and five wonderful perfumes. When the boutique owner, Louis-Françious Cartier, moved on to watches and jewelry - not to mention spend time with his son Alfred and grandsons Louis, Pierre, and Jacques - he left the store to Coco. She named it Chanel. Then word came that things were now Anno Domini.

Bright Star FanFic

2009-09-16T11:09:00.000-07:00

"Just press the fucking gas button!" John exclaimed as the space cruiser was hit by a meteor. He knew that with this crew the Hyperion was never going to make it to her destination. Commissioned by the Queen of New Spain, the Hyperion was a vessel on a very clear-cut and far-from-secret mission. Ship manifests documented their journey from the start and this is in part the reason the writing-robot was out of ink. It really didn't have to log every single interaction of the crew, especially the last ditch effort of team building/bonding - the talent show. John knew that there would be no record of his words, hence the swearing in his commands. Percy Bysshe Shelley, John's crewman and contemporary, pressed the button and the Hyperion jetted away from the meteors and resumed a course toward their destination. There it was, glowing red in front of them, the Moorgate. 85 Moorgate to be exact.
"This is where I'm born," John said aloud to himself as if he couldn't control his voice from making those sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley respectfully withheld any question about what this outburst meant. John steered the Hyperion directly to the center of the Moorgate and they were blasted at warp speed toward the nearest dying star. Percy Bysshe Shelly sat back with a confident comfort.
"It's time for the payload."
"Yes," John said, in both affirmation and command.
With a pull of a lever, the Fanny Brawne was released from the Hyperion's sub-torpedo chamber. It launched directly into the near-dead star and reignited the thing.
The writing-robot's sensors fried in the outburst of sunlight. Its head fell to the side and said only one thing:
" Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art--
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors--
No--yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,
Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever--or else swoon to death"
It was something difficult to ignore but the crew did their best.
"Should we procede... Captain Keats, should we go home?" asked Percy Bysshe Shelly.
"Yes," was John's response, "And let us not talk of this again."
They jettisoned the writing-robot and headed back to New Spain where aged wine and cheese would greet their new sun.

(500) Days of Summer FanFic

2009-08-10T12:28:00.000-07:00

Tom Hansen legally changed his surname to Handsome this morning. It's (510). He just met Autumn for lunch. They shared a chutney-cucumber salad sandwich that he picked up on the way. She got the job at the architecture firm. He made her a card that read, "congratulations, I guess I should stick to card writing." She was annoyed that he passively blamed her for his failure and this led to them not speaking from (504 -509). He realized that she was right and he wasn't happy for her success and also that he's lousy at making cards. This one, like all his others was a pale purple with white letters.
On (504 1/2) also known as his "clever play on numbers day" he decided to speak with McKenzie, his friend and on again/off again coworker. McKenzie has changed and instead of only talking about Tom Hansen's problems, he now talks about his own.
"I've been on a lot of first dates, but not a lot of seconds," he starts, "I think that makes me more of a loser."
Tom Hansen doesn't know how to talk about anyone’s relationships other than his own and is actually a little put-off by this change in McKenzie. Later that night he will write, "I need new friends" on his bedroom chalkboard. The same bedroom chalk board that nearly killed him on (503) when he woke up with his lungs filled with dust after he drunkenly wrote and erased both a break-up letter to Autumn and a Last Will and Testament. He now dreadfully refers to this day as (Self-Judgment Day).
"I'm going to go listen to New Order and wonder why no one has ever heard of The Magnetic Fields," Tom Hansen said before leaving his own apartment. This confused McKenzie. One, he was now stuck in Tom Hansen's apartment, and, two, everyone he has ever met has heard of The Magnetic Fields. The realization that Tom Hansen was full of himself was too much. He decided to leave the apartment knowing that there would be no way for him to lock the door. But first he took every one of Tom Hansen's Beatles albums and left a note that read "I never heard of The Beatles, thanks for sharing, sincerely, A. Thief." McKenzie felt better about himself than he ever had in his entire life.
(509). Autumn, in a moment of brilliance, thought that all she would have to do to get Tom Hansen to legally change his last name to "Handsome" would be to merely suggest it. (511). Rachel Hansen, Tom Hansen's little - but wise for her age - sister, thinks that Autumn is hilarious and they talk about how it's actually not Rachel who is so bright but Tom who is so dim. Rachel knows that Autumn is going to dump Tom. She doesn't tell him as she could use any excuse to have to ride to downtown LA and not be in bed by 10pm. This affords her the ability to watch "SouthLAnd" at Tom's place.
(537). It's been weeks since Autumn broke up with Tom Handsome and this is the part where he finds a time machine. (-1).
"Holy Shit," says Tom aloud in his bathroom.
(503). Tom goes up to Summer and asks her about a book she's reading. Tom secretly crushes his own foot for still not having read "The Picture of Dorian Gray." He had so much time to do this. Why did he let spite get in the way? It's still a classic and it might tell him something about Summer. Anyway, now he has nothing to really ask her about. He stares blankly at her as he realizes that with his time machine he can still read it and come back to this point in time. (520). "Oh, I should tell the world about this Oscar Wilde, I wonder why no one has heard of him. Summer is so on top of things for knowing who he is. I love Summer. I LOVE Summer!" (503). Tom goes up to Summer, reading "The Picture of Dorian Gray."
"I think that book is really cool," he says. They make-out. That night he asks her to marry him. She agrees. They watch "The Science of Sleep" together and when the guy yells at the girl for not finishing anything, and she's like 'actually I finished this thing' Summer and Tom look at each other and are so glad that they'll never have an argument like that. (500). They're in Paris talking about architecture. (503). Tom cannot cough up the dust. It hits him that it's all been a life-flashing-before-his-eyes hallucination, a crash of reality and expectation. There is no time machine, and there never will be. Summer didn't like him. Autumn didn't like him. And now he will fall.

For Tax Reasons: Wash and Resize

2009-07-30T08:48:00.001-07:00

So someone in For Tax Reasons has been looking at my site and actually PERSONALLY delivered one of the new TSHIRTS. I feel like Asuka being given the production line Evas before anyone else!

I don't want to post a picture of it because it's still a secret but I can tell you that it has 2 holes for either arm, a hole for my waist, a hole for my head, and a whole lot of fun.

If you want to see it, I'll be writing in my apartment today and I might get a coffee on Steinway Street. I'll be wearing glasses.

G.I. Joe FanFic :: They Can't All Be Good

2009-07-23T09:32:00.001-07:00

"This is it," shouted Snow Job under the helicopter blades of a helicopter. Snow Job lifted up his goggles, wiped the inside of them with his gloved finger and put them back on his face.
"No, no," he corrected, "take me back up, this is wrong."
Snow Job leans back in his seat as Shipwreck starts up the bird again.
"Why the heck did Hawk send us out on this mission?" Shipwreck threw out. In fact, he was channeling his frustration with Snow Job who clearly wasn't cut out for copter flights. Shipwreck would never challenge the orders of General Hawk, not after last summer when he airlifted Shipwreck out of a shipwreck. Ever since, Shipwreck's been afraid to go back into the water. He didn't like what he became out there and took up piloting. Some people can't transition that fast and fully into a new position, but Shipwreck wasn't just "some people" he was G.I. Joe.
"Okay, now," Snow Job spit as he tapped Shipwreck unnecessarily on the shoulder. "I'm sure this is it." Shipwreck rather land in the wrong spot again than argue with Snow Job. The man has a history of going completely looney tunes if he's not in his element, and here in Peru, snow is touch and go. The copter goes down and crunches on the icy soil. Over a sharp cliff Snow Job spots some snow.
"Perfect," he thinks to himself. "I'm going to go be me," he says to Shipwreck and before anything could be argued he was gone.
"Well, I guess it's just you and me, Polly," Shipwreck says to the green bird flying about the helicopter cabin, "you can come out now, he's gone."
Polly flies out and lands on Shipwreck's shoulder.
"Did you see me fly, Polly?" Shipwreck asks as he pets his beak, "I was like you out there."
Pttoo! Pitoo! Two shots ring out from a distance, rock springs up from the dirt at Shipwreck's feet. Polly takes off and heads toward the amazon. Ptoo! Another shot but this time its met with a wet thump. Again, another call and responce of "ptoo! and wet thump."
Shipwreck feels his chest, he's alright. He turns around and sees nothing, then back to the direction of the shots. He sees a white rock moving towards him. It's Snow Job.
Shipwreck doesn't even have time to ask why he was being shot at because as soon as he opens his mouth, it's met with the shusshing of Snow Job's gloved finger. Snow Job turns Shipwreck around to see a black lump of ninja dead in the dirt.
"You shot Snake-Eyes."
"How'd I do that? Where'd he come from?"
"He must've been riding under the copter. He does that sometimes."
"How are we going to cover this up?"
"We?"
"I was saving your life!"
The two decide to just carry out their mission and they'll say that Cobra attacked them and took out Snake-Eyes with Snow Job's gun. They used a similar tactic back when Scarlett cut off her own hand when she was too drunk to prove a point about loading a crossbow one handed. Cobra itself has been out of the game for some twenty years with not one attack on either US or international soil. Most of the reports are conceived in moments such as this. Even the reason they're in Peru now is a scam of sorts. Shipwreck heard that Duke got into some trouble with the locals and set a cart of guinea pigs on fire. One report to Hawk about how it was Fire Fly causing the trouble was enough to send out two of their best to the mountains.
Snow Job and Shipwreck bury Snake-Eyes.
"Man says about as much now as when he was alive," Snow Job says in an attempt of cutting the tension.
Shipwreck just nods and asks, "What are we going to do about Duke?"
Snow Job stiffens. "There's something Hawk didn't tell you. Those guinea pigs he murdered were part of a top secret intelligence operation known only as G-Force. Duke cost us over 3 thousand dollars. We were sent to take care of him. Maybe Snake-Eyes was here to follow us, make sure we did our job."
Shipwreck asks why he wasn't told about this until now and Snow Job can only offer that Hawk still thinks that last year's shipwreck is still weighing on the old sailor. Snow Job throws in, "you're fragile." That doesn't help things.
"Maybe Hawk's right," offers Shipwreck, "maybe I am too soft for this stuff."
"That's okay," consoles Snow Job, "I killed Duke while you were playing with that bird."
"That was fast."
"I know, right," says Snow Job as he slaps Shipwreck on the back and steps into the helicopter.
"What'd you do with his body?"
Snow Job only smiles.
The copter flies over the mountain-scape and Polly flies aboard. It's quite beautiful. Shipwreck switches the copter to autopilot and tries to catch some shut-eye. Just as he's about to doze off, he notices something happening on the mountain top below. It looks like a man being eaten by guinea pigs. It looks like.. Duke! The blood soaks into the snow. It's like a cherry slushie.
"Snow Job, promise me one thing," starts Shipwreck as he fights his urge to sleep.
"Anything," says Snow Job.
"When you're sent to kill me, don't have me eaten alive by tiny animals."
"You got it, soldier, you got it," Snow Job says with a kindness Shipwreck never saw before. Polly senses something unnatural in Snow Job's smile.
"SQUAK!" says Polly.
Shipwreck falls asleep and Polly starts flapping around the cabin. He makes a dive and pecks at Snow Job's goggles. Snow Job grabs Shipwreck's knife and cuts off the bird's beak with one strike. He cuts off Shipwreck's seatbelt and kicks him out the opening in the copter. Despite his wounds, Polly tries to grab Shipwreck in the air, but the weight is too much. They fall together. None of them would say this out loud because it would seem too obvious, but they both knew that "together" is how they wanted to die.
Snow Job flicks on the video-phone and calls General Hawk.
"Man over-board, General Hawk."
"Good," says Hawk, "Very Good."
"So is it true?" asks Snow Job, "Are you really Destro in disguise?"
"No," says Hawk, "I'm ZARTAN!"
"No," counters Snow Job, "You're a dead man!"
Six hours later the helicopter arrives at the P.I.T. helipad. There's quite a mad scene as Snow Job runs around trying to unmask Zartan. Eventually Snow Job shoots him, reveals what's going on, and further proves to everyone that he should lead even though he thought he was doing infiltration work for Cobra during the better part of 14 years.
"At least I'm dedicated to something.." was his main selling point. People appreciate his honesty and his impressive skill set so they go along with this. Some people, Roadblock specifically and aptly enough given his callname, were initially more hesitant and asked questions about why Snow Job was fine taking orders from Destro but freaked out when he learned it was Zartan, given that Zartan was probably just working for Destro anyway. These queries were usually met with a funny stare from Snow Job and that usually ended the debate. Years later, in 1996, Snow Job will introduce a super-suit technology to G.I. Joe and people will be okay with it.

OTAKON 2009: NAME THAT GATCHAMAN!!!

2009-07-20T11:55:00.000-07:00

The reason a For Tax Reasons fan site exists:

This weekend was Otakon 2009, Baltimore's own super anime convention. So naturally, Ben, Matt, Darrell, Mao, and myself made it our business to be there. For Tax Reasons had a panel called: Let's Talk Animation and it was awesome. I'm not sure if they're going to upload parts of it but I did video-tape it so it does exist. Also, to make it more cinema verté I made sure that I knocked the camera a few times, fought to find focus, and futzed with the audio levels a bit. I took some pictures to document the trip. Again, some of the pictures are blurry. This is meant to create the illusion of "being there." So come on Internet, grab your Naruto head bands, hop aboard the proverbial Chinatown Bus and let's go to Otakon!

"Oops, this isn't right." Initially we got on the Boston bus by accident and ended up at the boat show. Pictured are the two halves of For Tax Reasons LLC: Forta and Xreasons (l to r).

For Tax Reasons wants to learn SURF but Boston's gym leader is lost in the mines. If only there was some other way to get to Baltimore in time!!!!!This will do, but it's going to co$t. Away to Baltimore!!!

"Ah, that's more like it.."

Sweet! It's Misty!!!

OH NO! James from Team Rocket is here! Jesse can't be far behind. Unless she didn't preregister, then she'll probably be here in three and a half hours.

Squirtle! Charmander! Cubone! Ninetails!

Looks like we're not the only trainers here from out of town.. Xavier must want his hands on some dangerous pokémons. Well, Xavier and that Scott Pilgrim dude with the stick.

Ahhhh! It's Gastly!!!! What type pokémon is good againsts ghosts again?!

When Hiker challenges German Hiker to a Pokémon, you mustn't run away.

This guy definitely knows what I'm talking about.

I scored an exclusive lunch with Xreasons. He showed me some of the pokémon he snapped.

Quick! It's Mewtwo!

Who the heck gave their Arcanine a guitar?!

Where's Charizard? Hint: he's dressed like Spider-man with a black chest.

Foreground: Ash realizes what happens when you go to a fight without any pokéballs.
Background: Black Spy Trainer gives Rorshach Trainer a bomb painted to look like a giant bean.
Click for bigger!

Finally, someone not dressed as a pokémon. Here lies Tjaden from All Quiet on the Western Front. I did not know that was originally a manga.

Xreasons visits fans Mao and Darrell.

Watchout Swimmer! Bulbasaur is right behind you and he's armed!!!!

This year, signs were banned at Otakon, but not Meowith tossing.

Xreasons! Put your shirt back on!

Forta and Xreasons taking a some final pictures.

Cheer up Misty! All your pokémon may have fainted from too much anime, but it's not over yet!

It's over. Goodbye Otakon.

The Aristocrats FanFic

2009-06-22T23:10:00.000-07:00

An Autobot drives into a garage. He transforms and says to the mechanic "I got a great new show for you.."
The mechanic says, "I really don't have time for hearing you out, but go for it."
The Autobot sits back and says, "First a wheel barrel comes out and transforms into a robot. Then, a tractor comes out and transforms into a robot. Then the two robots start to shake hands. As they're shaking their robot mitts, a Vespa comes out and transforms into a robot, now they're all shaking hands and out comes a convertable and it transforms into a robot as well. They look like a Constructicon, that's how much they're shaking hands. The Vespa starts to leak gasoline into the Convertable. The wheel barrell starts to look like its gonna lose it and at this point it starts spastically transforming back and forth from its vehicle mode to its alt mode. It's like a William Carlos Williams poem about a wheel barrel, that's how crazy it is..."
"I gotta cut you off," says the mechanic, "this is the most perverted thing I've ever heard of, what do you even call a thing like this?"
The autobot transforms back into a car and says, "Transformers 3: The Aristocrats."

M&M FanFic

2009-06-18T14:56:00.000-07:00

It was a dark day for the yellow M&M, hell, the rain did all but wash away his favorite M. I say "rain," but that would overmind the tears he shed that afternoon. It was official, Red and Green made-out in her trailer. Usually, Yellow would tell her when it was time to come to set. This became custom even though it is the job of the PA. Yellow would always wait, like an animal, outside her trailer and just as the PA was to knock on the door he'd inform the PA of some emergency. Usually it was nothing. Sometimes however, by coincidence, the emergency was real. Like the time Yellow told the PA to check behind the studio for bombs and the PA found a whatchamacallit, passed out on a bed of teeth boxes. Candy eats teeth, you know. If it wasn't for this fool's errand, the whatchamacallit would've possibly died, lying in his own filth. Today however, today was different. After the PA left, Yellow was told to check behind the water tank. He was told to do this by Red.
He went behind the water tank, there was nothing there. Nothing but a gutter, a drain. He stared at it in the same way an astronaut would stare into deep space. The type of stare that turned the black into blue and green when he closed his eyes. Green. That's what this was about. He'd been duped.
Yellow ran like Dustin Hoffman runs. He almost tripped up the small metal stairs leading to the trailer door. But he didn't. It wasn't locked and he opened it fully, his anxiousness to see the truth was greater than his caution. There it was, like an IMAX, Green and Red were making out. Worse off, it wasn't even Red kissing Green. It was her, kissing him.
"This is how Richard Kind must feel," thought Yellow. He was sometimes told that he looked like Richard Kind. He walked out of the trailer backwards, making it down the steps one at a time. He could see the lips moving of Red and Green but he couldn't hear them. He could only see them kissing, even though now they were shouting, shouting at him. Why were they telling him to stop?
Crack. Yellow stared up at the sky.
"It's going to rain," he said.
He blacked out for a moment, but for him it seemed like hours. He was still looking up but the sky was now a deep blue, with clouds. They were shaped like a lab coat. The sky spoke to him.
"Everything is going to be alright, but don't move, you busted a nut."
Yellow's eyes focused and saw this was no sky at all but Blue. Blue had gone to medical school after his career in commercials died down.
"We'll get you back together, just rest, Red and Green are here to see you."
"NO!" shouted Yellow, or it would have been a shout if he had the strength, this was more of a quiet plea.
"I don't want to see them. I don't want to see them."
Blue turned toward the door and silently motioned for Red and Green to leave the room.
Three weeks passed and Yellow was released from Blue's care. He walked back on set and stood underneath the rain-machine which he dragged to Green's trailer. He began to shout.
"This is Me! This is me, Green! Won't you like me?!"
Red opened the door to Green's trailer, she was behind him, wearing his varsity jacket.
"Oh, no, still?!" cried Yellow, confused. "Still with him? Still with Red? Is that what you want?!"
"What's he doing," whispered Green to Red.
"I can hear you!" yelled Yellow.
Yellow bent down and picked up the razor-blade he kept in his shoe ever since the Junk War at Mars Headquarters in the 1980s.
"I can be Red, Green! Green means go! Green means..."
He put the razor to his wrist.
"Green means go!"
With a slash, Yellow stumbled back over the rain-machine. Chocolate poured out of his wrists.
"Humans love! Humans bleed red! I love you Green! I bleed red for you!"
Green bursts into tears and holds the silent Red for comfort. This makes Yellow squirm with frustration. He shouts inaudible words and runs away into the back-lot, clutching his brown arms. He slips on his own chocolate but makes it to the water tank. With one hand wringing the other, he empties himself into the drain.
"You're a Nut! You're a Nut! She thinks that's you out there in the commercials, the foil, the fucking foil! You go to her trailer everyday and the one day he does they're kissing?! That's not math! That doesn't make sense."
Yellow collapses and carried by his slick chocolate is swept halfway into the gutter. Hours later, the PA finds him and bandages him up with camera-tape. Yellow is assured that everything is going to be alright.
"Whatever that means," he thinks.
The next day he's told to stay at home, to think things over, and most of all, relax. He's sitting by his pool and even though he sees the gray clouds forming, he stays in his seat. It begins to rain, but that's okay, he's been crying all day anyway. At this point, the M on his chest is almost fully washed away. Without that he's nothing, just a yellow blob on the sunset strip. He closes his eyes.
The yell of coyotes wake him in the middle of the night, he runs inside, freezing to his core. He looks in the mirror, the rain had washed him completely blank. He is a ghost. He turns off his bathroom light and runs to his car.
"You won't melt in my mouth. But you will die in my hands."
He shifts into second gear and then to first gear, then to third, back to second, and he's at Green's mansion in no time. He busts the security intercom with his car-jack and drives through the gate. His car climbs up her stairs and drives through the front door. He's forayed in her foyer. Yellow opens his car door and steps out. He sees Red eating a grilled tooth mere feet in front of him, his mouth agape. Yellow shouts for Green and this only makes Red more silent. Yellow marches towards Red with a fire in his pale eyes but he slips. The floor is slick with chocolate. Yellow's white gloves are wet with it. He hits the floor in shock like a frustrated M&M Mini. On impact, a green shell spins away from him on the floor and crashes into more pieces underneath the carriage of his car. It bumps against two empty white shoes, womens' shoes, and stops.
"It must be a vase. Tell me it's a vase," Yellow manages to let escape his shocked lips.
His white face frozen, is flashed with shades of blue and red. The police are here. Initially alerted by the home invasion prevention service when the intercom was smashed, the cops now had a homicide on their hands. M&M slaughter charges were dismissed and Yellow was charged with first-degree murder. It was an accident, but he went to Green's mansion for chocolate. Red's chocolate perhaps, but chocolate nonetheless.
Alone in his cell, Yellow scratches an M into his chest.
"You're not going to wash away," he says to the M, "you're going to stay with me forever."
Yellow stayed in that cell, never leaving for the field or activities or mealtimes. Some say that when the guards removed his body he didn't weigh a thing. Prisoners say that when they carried him out, they could hear the roll of his nut going back and forth in his shell. Even the prisoners who had never been to the coast said that it sounded like the Ocean.
Blue went back to the studio and made several hit TV spots with the help of the PA and the whatchamacallit who had since taken up sound production.
Red became a shut-in himself and to this day, some say that everyday he stands inside the foyers of mansions near raceways for hours, waiting to be reunited with Green.

Be Kind Rewind FanFic

2009-06-16T13:24:00.000-07:00

Jerry Gerber shimmies up to the counter that Mike is hanging over. To look at the two of them would be to know the meaning of opposite. Jerry Gerber is a goober. Exhausted, Mike presents a box of Sweded tapes, all based on Stephen Soderbergh remakes. The sighs he emits when there's nothing to sigh over make it clear that Mike has had enough of this.
"I want to live," he says.
Being a goober, Jerry Gerber assumes Mike is talking about the 1983 remake to the 1958 movie of the same name. Jerry Gerber assures Mike that they've already Sweded that and goes on to suggest places for lunch.
"I Can't..." starts Mike.
"Hardly Wait," Jerry Gerber finishes as he ejects the freshly Sweded version out of his camcorder. "You gotta see who we got to do Manilow's voice! ...It's me!" adds the dullard.
"Just Stop!" Mike yells. He has clearly lost his naturally cool swagger. He goes on a tirade about how they can't just keep remaking stuff, that the old stuff was great. Jerry Gerber makes a low blow about how Mike's idol, jazz great Fats Waller, would always improvise on previously finished music, and that's what they were doing - making jazz. Mike had seen Ken Burn's documentary on jazz and knew that at one point it was spelled "jass." In fact, last week Mike Sweded the documentary. All 1140 minutes of it. Even the special features. Truth be told, Mike had the time of his life recreating these 1140 minutes, but it left him spent, his head a mess of thoughts of ascending notes. Jerry Gerber didn't "get" jazz and taped over 896 minutes of these tapes with Sweded versions of most of the first two seasons of Weeds and whatever he could fit of Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Colors" trilogy. He got half-way through Red when Mike stopped him. At the time his face was wet with tears of frustration and anger. When met with these tears, Jerry Gerber became slippery and slid out of Mike's grasp, long enough to spit out a lie and say that it wasn't the Jazz tapes at all, but their infamously awful Swede of The Deep End of the Ocean which they commonly referred to as "Pink Trout," always with great disdain. Neither of them ever having seen the original film, they assumed it was Deep Blue Sea and the result was a Swede that no one rented and only served the purpose of occupying shelf space. Mike hated this failure so much that he was actually relieved when he heard this was the tape being used. However, the sudden shock of seeing Pink Trout still on the shelf led Mike into the rage that culminated in the tackling of Jerry Gerber. Their friendship was forever strained after this.
Nevertheless, Jerry insisted that Mike watch this version of Can't Hardly Wait. He did so since he still had a few hours left on his shift and despite all the hatred he had for Jerry Gerber and the fact that he wanted nothing more than to just walk out, he still respected his duties as arranged under the management of Elroy Fletcher.
Mike watched the entire 15 minutes. The swear words that came to mind are unrepeatable, but he couldn't resist. Jerry Gerber did it, he captured the entire Love Burger set piece using only crazy straws.

Quantum Leap FanFic

2009-06-11T14:06:00.000-07:00

"Thank goodness I'm not a scientist again, I couldn't deal with being so close to the answers and still not be able to change this!" thought Sam Beckett as his helmet was removed and he stepped out of the cockpit.
"You passed," said a voice that would be impossibly charismatic with anyone.
Sam Beckett turned toward this welcoming news to see a tough as dirt pilot in a space-age green jumpsuit.
"Thanks," said Sam Beckett as he tried to read the woman's dog tags for a name, a clue.
"Eyes up top, it's that short attention span that almost got you shot down in that simulation."
Sam Beckett, now with no leads to who he was talking to, quickly ran behind some strange pencil-shaped jet fighter and covered his mouth.
"AL!" he shouted, muffled though his space-age gloves. "Al!!!"
Suddenly, like a doctor out of some sort of science-fiction, Al appeared, a hologram to whom Sam Beckett sought answer after answer.
"Yes Sam?" he answered.
Sam Beckett wanted to ask who that mean-yet-confident woman with the jumpsuit was but instead went first with, "Who am I?"
As Sam looked at his reflection in the future-vehicle before him, Al simply muttered. "Why, Sam, you're Zack Adama."
Sam ordered Al to find out what he was doing here and what wrong he was supposed to set right. Al started typing into his gadget known as "Ziggy" as Sam tried again to find the name of this short haired blonde stranger before him.
"So what would you say I passed in?" he asked coyly.
"Your flight test," she said without humor.
"Or your name isn't..." he pushed.
"Or my name isn't Kara Thrace," she finished.
"You still got it Sam Beckett," thought Sam Beckett.
"You still got it Sam Beckett," added Al a little later since he was busy finding out what was going to happen in the future. Ziggy still ran on Alta-Vista and was a little touch-and-go. Al mentioned that the Babel-Fish translator says that in this time period the common nomenclature for emotion is "frak."
"I'm frakkin' excited to hear that, Kara Thrace," Sam Beckett throws in with the same confidence he first discerned in Kara Thrace's natural tone of voice.
Kara suggests that they go play hexagonal poker. Sam thinks this must be some euphemism, and is glad. Flashes of his previous possessions of Buffalo Bill Cody, Samuel Clemens, and Data the android flooded his mind. Even with the help of Al and Ziggy, actual poker was a mess for him, usually ending in being shot and having to do a quantum re-do.
"WAIT," shouts Al as Sam Beckett was just about to leave through a submarine door with Kara Thrace. "Zack Adama has to die!"
Sam says "Hold on!" Awesomely, this works both for Kara to know to stop walking and to Al to imply, "tell me more."
As Sam pretends to tie his space-shoe and have Kara wait, Al lets him know that if Zack Adama doesn't die there is going to be a war with the Cylons and then all humanity is going to go camping indefinitely. Sam wants more information but Al protests citing that not all his programmers had seen the entire future and for their sake, the programmers who had seen it went through tedious lengths not to include any spoilers.
"Frak," says Sam Beckett.
"Good usage," compliments Al.
"Frak what," asks Kara Thrace.
"Frak, I love Pink Trout," Sam Beckett covers.
All three of them agree that this has become uncomfortable.
Sam asks if he could just meet her at her bunk or wherever they play hexagonal poker and then asks for directions, playing off that he got so drunk (on ambrosia, thanks Ziggy) last time that he forgot.
Now that they have some alone time, Sam Beckett, Al and Ziggy try to find out what's going on and if there are ways other than killing Zack Adama that humanity can be saved. They're really stumped and Sam forfeits that at least this'll put an end to his quantum leaping. First, however, there is some time for hexagonal poker.
Sam Beckett runs through the hallways and passes by Helo, Anders, Gracie Bell, Tim Riggins, Bill "Husker" Adama, and crashes into Petty Officer Dualla who is carrying a box of stuff for the the new Battlestar Galactica Museum to which everyone is donating their stuff. A side-arm falls out of the box. Sam Beckett asks Dualla if he can borrow it. She can't think of a reason off-hand that he shouldn't but is still hesitant. Sam Beckett trades her a set of toy jacks that inexplicably happen to be in Zack Adama's pocket. Al compliments his progress. Ziggy agrees that a gun could be helpful.
With a shortness of breath, Sam Beckett charges into Kara Thrace's bunk and sees a bunch of people playing hexagonal poker. For the first time, Sam Beckett realizes that even though everyone, including himself, was saying 'hexagonal poker,' he still heard 'horizontal poker.'
But wait, what's this, there is one player with his back to him. This man turns around. It can't be, but it looks just like...
"AL!" shouts Sam Beckett. "How did you get here?!"
"AL?" says the man, "I hate that name more than I hate the name 'John.' Call me Cavil. Better yet, call me Number One. Yes, that one, Number One."
Al backs away, clutching Ziggy to his chest.
"I didn't know, Sam, honest."
Number One takes the gun from Sam Beckett's pocket.
"I rather like indefinite camping," says Number One.
"Whatever!" shouts Sam Beckett. Last week this was a very common expression for Sam Beckett due to his time traveling. Here, however, in the futuristic bunk-bed room, it lost a little Umph.
Sam Beckett kung-fus the gun out of Number One's hand and tells everyone to calm down.
Fact is, Sam Beckett kind of likes all this space stuff. He decides not to kill Zack Adama and live in space. Cylons never come. The world is at peace. However, the Battlestar Museum goes without maintenance for too long and falls apart. At the demolition ceremony, where they push it off towards the sun for incineration, Sam Beckett as Zack Adama gives a touching speech ending with the cutting line, "well, it's not like it could have been avoided." Only Al totally gets this joke and it is his laughter which was the loudest.

In the Bedroom FanFic

2009-06-10T13:44:00.000-07:00

I thought I had discovered In the Bedroom fan fiction but have now realized that what I had seen was merely a scene taking place in a bedroom. The next paragraph is an answer to what I thought I had discovered. The following will not be proof-read.

INT. KITCHEN - Morning

Matt Fowler drags himself into the kitchen of his home. It's cold because it is morning in a coastal town and because his son has been murdered by Richard Strout, a man who could be a professional son-of-a-bitch if it wasn't for the recession. Actually, if it wasn't for Matt Fowler who revenge-murdered Richard Strout before the recession he would probably get unemployment for being a son-of-a-bitch. Anyway, that's in his past now. A past that Matt Fowler carries like a house. A house tied to his back with a garden-hose, kept afloat by a parade of balloons.

He starts to mix cereal with milk. Christ, he thinks. This reminds me of everything wrong with my life. The milk will only sog his cereal, creating a ticking clock on his appetite. If only his hunger was satiated when he and his William Blake quoting cronies decided to off that son-of-a-bitch, Richard Strout. "Dick Strout," Matt Fowler chuckles. "Dead as Dick."

"DICK STROUT!" screaches Ruth Fowler, his wife. Matt quickly covers up with the speed of a lobster-trap fisherman.
"I said Pink Trout," Matt Fowler says with a sigh of relief in how clever he's become ever since he started hanging out with those poetry fiends out in the woods.

"Good," says Ruth Fowler before setting her self at their kitchen table. She puts a second spoon in the cereal, it is a welcome flirtation, akin to the days they'd order a malted with two straws. Back then it was because they were young and cute and even now it could be seen as a sign of the recession. But it wasn't, it was clear to both of them that this was flirtation. Matt Fowler saw the added benefit of knowing that two people eating the cereal will help avoid the otherwise prevalent threat of soggy Captain Crunch.

"You let me get away with everything," she crooned. He pats her head condescendingly. He apologizes for this. He thought it'd be cute. It wasn't.

Ruth Fowler stands up and grabs a plate. She's going to break it. They just bought a new set. This was bad news Matt Fowler thought. Fortunately, she explains that in some Greek houses, breaking plates is a good thing. She breaks it, but at least she's not mad at him for patting her head. She was breaking it to celebrate that she wasn't going to let that jerkish move ruin her day. In fact, the school she teaches music at just got the rights to perform "Next to Normal." Things were looking up.

They finish their dry and crunchy cereal and go their separate ways. Her to her class, he to his. However, she goes to her job to learn about life and he goes to his boat to learn about trapping lobsters, in the bedroom.

Not with a Whimper, but with a Bang

2009-06-05T23:17:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Fart Ax Reasons, the unofficial blog of the goings on at ForTaxReasons LLC, where I live and which conveniently for name purposes happens to house farts and Armani Exchange. Of course, I am lying, for the only fragrance in the air is from a 50ml of Armani Mania.

I'm not allowed to write about what they work on. I'll be your host. Zachary Scheer.