Monday, March 13, 2017

Bentley the space alien





Bentley is in such a state of bliss in this video, cuddled up in the cat bed I knitted for him. There really is a resemblance to a space alien here. A very cute, sweet one. With fur.




They just didn't love you enough





A harrowing scene from one of my favorite movies. Bette Davis is scary in this thing - at the height of her genius. Has anyone ever captured alcoholic self-pity better than this?


Kitty in the cupboard





Oh my goodness! While preparing to shoot a DIY video, I heard a knocking sound in the cupboard. There was Bentley, standing on top of the dishes! Somehow or other - well, I guess I must have left the cupboard open and he slipped in. Getting him to "slip out" again was another matter, as he weighs at least 14 lbs. (we think, closer to 15 now) and didn't want to come out. Bentley loves to be a part of anything I'm doing, so he often shows up in my videos. And he's always the best part.


Sunday, March 12, 2017

How much shock can you take?





Trust no one!





This is one of the weirdest things I've ever heard, and inspired a flurry of paranoid gifs, and even an animation (featuring paranoid stills). I think "politone" is meant to be "polytone", because the only definition of "politone" I can find is:

Politone


Politone may be available in the countries listed below.

Ingredient matches for Politone
Pioglitazone

Pioglitazone hydrochloride (a derivative of Pioglitazone) is reported as an ingredient of Politone in the following countries:
Taiwan

International Drug Name Search

 To me it sounds like shoe polish, but never mind.




(These do play, by the way. I just like the look of them stuck together. Try playing them all at once.) Anyway, this group, this ENIGMA2000, is very X-Files, very paranoid, very into the mysterious numbers-sequence broadcasts that were covered so well on William Shatner's Weird or What? (and GOD how I miss that show, it was tons of fun. Remember that little chihuahua, and the way he came riding up on a horse?)




I randomly came across this politone stuff and it scared the living shit out of me, so I just had to know more. Pretty soon I didn't want to know more. This is some sort of weird espionage thing, spy versus spy, even though it goes by an innocuous name. Some think it even has a paranormal aspect. There are lots of examples on YouTube of numbers being read out loud, random tones, even bits of music, coming from all over the world. Nobody quite knows why. I keep thinking it's a bizarre sort of Emergency Broadcasting System, a frequency left open in case the world ends and the political bigwigs of the world want to say goodbye.

According to Wikipedia: "A numbers station is a shortwave radio station characterized by broadcasts of formatted numbers, which are believed to be addressed to intelligence officers operating in foreign countries. Most identified stations use speech synthesis to vocalize numbers, although digital modes, such as Phase-shift keying and Frequency-shift keying as well as Morse code transmissions are not uncommon. Most stations have set time schedules, or schedule patterns; however, other stations appear to broadcast at random times. Stations may or may not have set frequencies in the HF band."




It goes on, but we know enough already, don't we? These number sequences would appear to mean absolutely nothing, but they MUST have meaning or they wouldn't still be broadcast after something like 90 years. The Politone guys (for I can't even imagine a chick doing this - these fellows remind me of the Lone Gunmen on the aforementioned X Files) have their own newsletter, so dated-looking that it's even worse than mine for obsolete-looking formatting. None of it makes a damn bit of sense, so it's obvious these guys don't get out much. The photos are about an inch square, and the '90s-font text goes all the way across the screen, so that your neck is out of joint after reading a paragraph.




Anyway. I've written before about how I "hear things" in my neighborhood, particularly at night. It's disturbing. Right now things are quiet, but I have no illusions they will stay that way. It's aircraft, obviously, but WHY? and what, even? Must be the RCMP, but what would they be doing buzzing around in helicopters over my sleepy little town? And if it's the military, God help us all.

I had a thought today - something from Apocalypse Now! flashed into my head, and suddenly I realized there has to be more than one helicopter. Maybe that's why it's so loud? There's a resonant frequency between all of them which threatens to make my skull explode.




I just had to express my paranoia in an animation (below) which I call Cold War One.  It is, mercifully, silent.





Saturday, March 11, 2017

There's no place like . . . Izmir





Turkish adaptations of classic movies are always particularly bizarre. Well, bizarre to US maybe, though not to the average Turk. 

As with most of these things, there are no subtitles, but we can kind of guess at the action. I mean, if you haven't seen The Wizard of Oz five thousand times - But I guarantee you, you've never seen it quite like this.

Instead of Over the Rainbow, the movie opens with this:





Let it never be said that corners were cut in this production, but the entire storm sequence is done in animation. Calling it animation is stretching a point, as very little moves in it. The figure of Dorothy is dragged across the screen while the credits roll (or blink on and off). 






The actual storm scene is a bit incomprehensible. It collapses 20 minutes or so of film into half a minute of cheap cartoon.





From what I am able to make out, Mama doesn't make much effort to get Dorothy into the storm cellar, which is located INSIDE the house.

Like the original, this is a musical. Sort of. Sometimes the characters just get up and spontaneously dance. The music is so strange, however. Some of it is traditional Turkish stuff, I guess; some sounds like Little House on the Prairie, but then this thing breaks in:






I wouldn't advise watching the whole thing. I didn't. It's more fun to skip through it. You'll find an atrocity at every point.


P. S. The screenshots from this are uniformly hideous, so I must include a few of them.














Chopsocky: the legend and legacy of Bruce Lee







Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah





[Chorus:]

Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting
Those kids were fast as lightning
In fact, it was a little bit frightening
But they fought with expert timing




There were funky China men from funky Chinatown
They were chopping them up
They were chopping them down
It's an ancient Chinese art
And everybody knew their part
From a feinting, to a slip
And a kickin' from the hip




Everybody was Kung Fu fighting
Those kids were fast as lightning
In fact it was a little bit frightening
But they fought with expert timing




There was funky Billie Chin and little Sammy Chong
He said, here comes the big boss, let's get it on
We took the bow and made a stand
Started swaying with the hand
A sudden motion made me skip
Now we're into a brand new trip




Everybody was Kung Fu fighting
Those kids were fast as lightning
In fact it was a little bit frightening
But they did it with expert timing




Oh-hoh-hoh-hoh, ha
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoh, ha
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoh-ha
Keep on, keep on, keep on
Sure enough




Everybody was Kung Fu fighting
Those kids were fast as lightning




In fact it was a little bit frightening
Make sure you have expert timing
Kung Fu fighting, had to be fast as lightning...




Kitten on the keys





Friday, March 10, 2017

This is all too short





Cat races, turkey soccer and a ferret in your pants















YES! I am an author







Margaret is the author of The Glass Character, a novel about the life and times of silent screen comedian Harold Lloyd. She loved researching and writing this novel and believes it's her best work to date. The Glass Character (Thistledown Press)is available in bookstores, libraries, Amazon.com, Chapters/Indigo.com, Thistledown Press.ca, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle, Kobo, and everywhere fine books are sold.

A published novelist since 2003, Margaret  is a seasoned writer who has published her work in a variety of venues (columns, newspaper articles, poetry, short fiction and book reviews). Her first published novel, Better Than Life (NeWest Press, 2003) received excellent reviews, with the Edmonton Journal calling it "fiction at its finest" and the Vancouver Sun naming it as a worthy contender for the Leacock Award.

This was followed in 2005 by another novel, Mallory (Turnstone Press), a harrowing tale of a social misfit ostracized and bullied by her peers until she finds dubious acceptance in a group of teenagers living on the fringes of the law. Of the many reviews this novel received, not one was negative.

In addition to The Glass Character, Margaret has written a book of poetry (The Red Diary, based on the diary of Anne Frank) and Bus People, a novel about the inhabitants of Vancouver's notorious Downtown Eastside. She hopes these books will soon find a place on the shelf beside The Glass Character.
See more

Learn more at Author Central















                    


                                                                   



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This is more-or-less a transcript of my Amazon Author Page. I used to include a link to it every few posts, not so that people would buy my books - that's too much to ask, I think - but to just let people know, if they are interested, that I am the author of three NOT-self-published novels. I did it the old-fashioned way, with traditional publishers, and paid for it in blood. It was not a pleasant experience, not because of the writing - hey, that was great, tons of fun - but because of the long, arduous process of trying to get them promoted and noticed. Because they did not become bestsellers, because I was not anointed into the hallowed halls of CanLit, I was left with the feeling that I had failed. No one tried to talk me out of that feeling, by the way. But here they are, my life's work! It's something, I guess. I never wanted to make money with it, but once you're in the marketplace, there is incredible pressure to sell your product. To me, that feels like selling one of your kids, or at least a chunk of your own soul. No one thinks of this when they eagerly strive to be a Published Author, because it is the best-kept secret of publishing. Besides, everyone is sure their book will win the Giller and the Booker and, perhaps, the Nobel, top the New York Times Review of Books for a year, then be made into a big-box movie that wins an Oscar for Best Picture - or will, if that Price-Waterhouse guy is on the ball. I had all those dreams too, but damned if they weren't right all along - the writing really is the best part.


Thursday, March 9, 2017

What's inside a Rattlesnake Rattle?




             Well. . . . . . . . . . . WHAT??

Two men named Bill (and other poems)




Blogger's note. It's been a while since I felt like sharing my poetry with anyone. Having it "rejected" - booted back in your face for decades - leaves scars. It is traumatic, as is hearing, several hundred times, "We really like your poetry, BUT. . . " 

One editor said, "I hate to turn away what might turn out to be the next best-seller, BUT. . . " (we don't think it has the quality we're looking for). That kind of casual cruelty disguised as compliment is nearly universal in publishing.

The horror of the Stephen Galloway affair ripped the veil off Canada's publishing Mafia, and I am now relieved I will never be a part of it (though I spent the better part of my life longing for it, jumping at it like a balloon that always popped up out of my reach).

It's not that I haven't been published at all. A dozen or so poems over that many years simply wasn't worth the grief. But here some of it is, mostly written a while ago. It means something to me. More than I can say. There's quite a bit of it here, because I've found in the past that if I do a Part 2, no one reads it.





I would say     

I would say that you are springtime,
That lambs
could not be lovelier: laughing bells
Of eyes bright with seeing,
the shining, shone of you.

I would say that you are a
Renaissance painting
of a beautiful woman:

So restored
that the paint gleams; its sheen
Fresh from the brush; its wetness
smelling new.

I would say that you are living
Water:  I see tiny
perfect selves, suspended
upside-down in the silver
Merriment of your eyes.

If true, then I would say that you are
Not my brother; but some other; some
me not yet thought of; next year’s

Reflection

cast lightly (God’s amusement)
over waters

rendered still.




                                                
Gina

sweet shy
dark girl          I’ve seen her

here before
  
she always wore the best clothes
(silvery things/bangles
feathered skirts
necklace made
from the teeth of a wolf)
  
now I see Gina in the ward

kitchen.        Still beautiful
big-eyed
part Cree                            her hair tied back

she shows me the tracings of
partly-healed               gashes
sewn back together in
a gridwork


                                                           hands/
on her arms,                                            wrists.


She must be twenty or so
No one comes to visit

Once she had a boyfriend
but he got sick too


  

                                                        
 Delivery

This is a strange
Horse I ride, feet
Pointing up, all bloodless and blue
On a long trail of ether.

My brain swims in a vault of chrome
through the removed murmur of voices
and a distant
Clinical clanking.

I will emerge now, slick and
purple as a baby.  The surgeon’s eyes
Crinkle over the mask.

Hands cool as paper, hands that have never
Handled a snake, patiently suture
All of my holes.  The work is true.


Emergency waiting room  
  
Which is worse:  the spilled
smell of
accidents
or the sound
of magazines
slowly
growing older
in this
ticking house of death?
  

                                           

Sorry

My heart unclasped
One day in your office,
Suddenly, all in a shot, the catch
Broke loose, andit
Fell behind a pile of files.

I did not mean to;
It was an accident of gravity.
Earth reached up and pulled it down.

I stood dizzy,
My centre lost, the core
Riven.  It felt silly
to lean over like that.

My face grew hot.

There was no way to put it back.
The space had grown over already;
The fall had changed me.

I left that place different,
Looked outside.  The light
Hurt my skin.  The world
was a new color.

I wiped my eyes, and kept on walking.
A small place
in my chest
Grew still with singing.


                                          


THREE-PART INVENTION


(a)     indigo eyes

I am the salt
you are the sweet

hair/
        My heartsprung

(horse) of the air,
au clair

ah! care,
           clover
to the/stables,
We.
     Drenched with the scent
of hens of hay
                   dear
of tree:  your/      odor

(of salt
(of sap
(of sea


b) cunningerotic

Lip, let me laugh
You.  Set the salt
           Sally, sashay down
               The hay of my mind.
                                            Seashorn,
                                      feverworn
                       hairborne:  Your
                         face a chiming, a
                                     Brining.  The
                                        (stainglassed
                                           seahorse
                                          of your
                                   (voicy
                                (ice


         

c)       Fifth chakra (for ray lynch)

a blues tunnel
blamed open

pitched down
to the base of the soul

                                                                 Mermaids spinning
                                  in your throat, Dear
                                                          heart:  shining vessel,
           
opened for a song,
shut open,

Wept for a penny
disabled


                      the               
             by / dreaming 
                  door






Love is no quick thing

(a halfsonnet/explanation)

Love is no quick thing, Saltstream surprise
Unevening your pearling teeth at dawn:
Quick!  like a foxglove/silvertail is gone,
It tips the world’s rude balance/wild surmise.
Inside my glands the trump of lovedoom cries;
with white kidgloves I’d pluck your soulstrings’ songs
(Inside my brain your lovebeat
dongs and dongs

dongs and dongs

dongs and dongs
                                                                                             and      dongs

                                                                                                                        dongs)                                                                                                                   



Saxophone (for Bill Prouten)

i don’t know who invented this
reflexive question mark of an instrument

but i think it was a good thing

for it’s great to look at,
with fat keys like frog eyes
and a big bell like royal jelly
you could keep flowers in there if you wanted to,
extra socks
or even a clock

Snakes kink too
and this sound is snakey
purply mauve as the deepest bruise
and raunchy
as a man in love

smoked as some cat of the night
disappearing over a fence
it makes leaps
(but only because it has to)

There is no
morning saxophone

this is a sound that
pulls the shades down

a hangover
howl
fading to twilight
or the blackmost
belly button
of the night

Few can wrap their lips around
this gooseneck
without some harm coming to them
for this is an instrument
with a long history of
hollowing out
all but the most hardy

Bird flew into a pane
of glass and was
smashed

we don’t know why it does this to people
(maybe it was mad at him
for taking it all to such extremes)

but how could you blow this thing
halfway

i ask you

how could you rear back
in some great pained whiplash of the spine
without a sense of
terrible commitment

i never much cared for
saxophones myself
until i heard one blown correctly at last
jazz is a genre i will never understand
but perhaps that’s good
for like the priesthood, one must enter into it

without question
reservation
or doubt




two men named bill

i love two men named Bill
and one of them is fancy
one is plain
i love one for his looks
the other for his brain

and when we are together
(and especially when not)
such yearning for his body
pulls apart
the art
of the life i’ve made
here in this patch of shade

one Bill plays the saxophone
the other Bill washes the floor
one writes songs and sucks on bongs
and one’s worth dying for

i’d run away with one Bill
but that doesn’t mean i’d have two
the laws of the world don’t work that way
i’d have to choose
or lose
both Bills
(which would kill

me.)

one Bill made two babies
one just made me rue
one Bill’s a restless bachelor boy
the other is painfully true

there are two
sets of eyes
one brown
one blue
four eyes i love so well:

see my soul reflected in the
searching blue
fall in cognac amber
‘til i drunken drown

i love two men
and both of them are Bill
there’s a cost to loving them
so well
when god presents his bill
i’ll have to pay my way
and choose
or lose
both Bills
(. . . which would kill

me.)




Gone west                                                         

It seems in my life I have always
moved west, New Brunswick, Alberta,
the boardwalk behind the Quay;

it’s a left-handed sort of life
driving me heartwards, though never,

no never,

heartwise.

                                           that day
when I thought I saw you/  on the boardwalk
my guts jumped:                       it
jerked the hook in my colon
(you always knew about bait)

You know how it was:    I wanted to stand on my desk
on the last day of classes
and shout:  o captain!  My captain!

But you had your own rotation – I saw
it reel from view, and

(helpless to catch you)

watched your spiralling apogee

What is the remotest segment of an orbit?
Booze, blondes.  Too much of
a good thing.  But I did love you.
We wandered, Pooh and Piglet in an
Escher maze, searching for heffalumps.

You calmly said, “Watch this,” and set fire
to my mind.

I saw you as the human yoyo, bobbing up and
                                                                   down,
sleeping, walking the dog, in and out
and ‘round the world.

I knew you’d be back, like hounds,
like a cycle of blood, like black
fruit springing into tree.  When the
string broke, I hid my eyes, and
said, but it’s only a lute,
it will heal itself,
half-hoping I was wrong.

I don’t know why or how God looks
after you, beached like Stanley’s whale,
stared at by the curious.  I don’t know
how God manages.  It was beyond me.

And so I kept on moving.