That little "X" is what's holding down the Earth.

The table legs. Where I'm sitting now.

The math supports me, so to speak. The force of gravity is an attraction between two masses. If you weigh ten stone, then, by very definition, the Earth itself weighs ten stone, pressing upwards on your feet.

Imagine yourself floating upside-down, balancing the world on your feet like some kind of circus acrobat. Because you are. When you run, you kick the Earth, spinning it. You and damned near seven billion other people. The world spins the way it spins by sheer law of averages. Very democratic.

Except this table, right where I'm sitting now, gets the winning vote.

I can tell. I'm leaning on it. And while I'm normally just a tad dizzy from all of you spinning this place I'm standing on with your feet, while I'm leaning on this table, I don't feel dizzy in the slightest. This table nails the Earth in place -- at least while I'm leaning on it.

And the rest of you are just spinning your wheels.

[*]

Posted by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. Xalieri

"You want to know what true happiness is? Knowing your place. Being given a job you know you can do, doing it as hard as you can, and knowing you're good at it."

"Really."

"Really. When you're in that position, what you do becomes what you are. You could be a doorstop. But when someone asks you, 'Who the hell are you?' you can say, 'My name is Tony Danza and I'm a motherfricken' doorstop.' End of story. Not everybody can do that."

"Tony Danza? As in, 'Hold me closer, Tony Danza'?"

"Forget it. First name that came to my head."

"That worries me just as much as your philosophy."

"Well. Worry about Tony Danza if you want, but the philosophy is sound. If you know your own name and you know what you're good for, you are nine-tenths of the way to true happiness."

"What's the other tenth?"

"Maybe not being a doorstop."

[*]

Posted by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. Xalieri

I am afraid of heights.
It is a pretty serious problem i am told.
Given my line of work there are certain things expected of you. Even more importantly, i am not told, are things that are not expected.
Fear of Heights appears to be one of them. It is why i am seated here waiting.
My condition has been referred to the people above me and some form of reckoning or reconciliation is scheduled to take place.
I think it's a lot of fuss over nothing really but everyone assures me that, in my line of work , it isn't.

You see I am an Angel.

Posted by carlang

Raven Black Hair. Lovely set of eyes over a lovelier set of lips.
The faintest hint of lingerie peeking through her blouse.
And she was looking at him.
"Dude. She's looking right at you."
"No she isn't." Brad's reply was quick.* Too quick*. Which meant he knew.
"She's cute."
"Er...Yes? I guess." Brad muttered.
"You guess?" I closed my eyes in frustration. "Get up and do something
about it. She's right across the road."
"Er?" Brad looked at the sky.
"You're a chicken." I said.
"No. I'm not. I'm just careful. She might be one of those sexy serial
killers."
"Chicken." I snapped.
He sighed in annoyance.
"Okay. Okay. I'll go meet her."
I watched his nervous gait as he walked across.

And that,* people*, is why the chicken crossed the road.

Posted by carlang

"The world ended for you, like, a billion years ago. Why are you still here?"

[*]

Posted by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. Xalieri

It's nice how it's all neatly contained like that. All outdoors, stuffed into one tiny rectangle. Where I can keep an eye on it. Out the window. Neatly framed.

If you look out the window and blink your eyes away quickly, the list of things you thought you saw will be a much longer list than what you actually saw. Your brain fills in for you all the things you think you ought to have seen. And screens out a huge amount of what you actually saw that didn't jive with what you thought you'd see.

That's just how your brain works. If you don't like it, there's no one you can sue. Unless you're religious.

The upshot though, is that no matter how much you might want to see something new and unusual, no matter how inclined you are to see the magic, the fairies, the space aliens, the angels and demons, if they aren't already part of your experience, your eyes will just skip over it. Your brain will just skip over it, even if it catches your eye.

Here's evidence. Here's proof. There's something in this picture you won't allow yourself to see. No matter how hard you stare. See?

Don't cry. This happens to you literally thousands of times per day. Get used to it. Stay used to it.

And thank your lucky stars.

[*]

Posted by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. Xalieri

Dragons were so much cooler before we found out definitively how closely they're related to chickens.

Not that chickens aren't themselves vicious beasts when they think they can get away with it, and I'm truly stretching the meaning of the word "think", but that's another story.

Scientists in Montana (or maybe Minnesota), where hobbies are hard to come by, are twiddling the genes of chickens to make them express a few vertebrae towards whiplike tails. Scientists across the border in Canada, where they really ought to know better, are working on giving them their teeth back. Or maybe I have that reversed, the tails and teeth parts, who's doing which. I mean, it hardly matters unless you're a scientist. Or a chicken.

Crocodiles and alligators are fearsome. Anacondas and pythons, Komodo dragons--you can see how these encourage the legends. The bones of giants in the earth--these go a long way in the "larger than life" direction. Fuel the fire of the romance of the mighty.

We could never really decide whether they were supposed to have wings. But we gave them flaming breath and the benefit of the doubt.

And that brings us to now, where all the doubt's in the fryer and their wings give us flaming breath, if you follow the recipe made famous in Buffalo, New York.

How the mighty have fallen.

[*]

Posted by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. Xalieri

When we are most ourselves is when we are barely present.

Doubly, trebly encapsulated, cocooned in sights and sounds and smells that have nothing to do with fight or flight, with feeding, with procreation.

This is the new form of sleeping, and it is old, old, old.

Dolphins sleep half of their brain at a time. That's nothing. We've got it up to nine tenths.

And that is beautiful.

[*]

Posted by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. Xalieri