Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Category Archives: The Fearful Meme
Prevailing wisdom
I’ve decided the only way to ensure a windless day at the beach is to bring a kite.
Yes, we had another warm, clear weekend, so I convinced the boy that he needed to get some sunshine. Off with the shoes and socks, off with the tee shirts (we don’t get to do that very often around here), and into the water — knee-deep, anyway.
Here’s my flickr image for the week. The magic number is 4416:
The master of all I survey
This week’s Random Flickr Blogging brought to you by the number 7226.
I blame Kibbles ‘n Bits.
I’m a hunter by nature, a beast who lives for the chase, the capture, the jet of hot blood as I sink my teeth into another hapless furry neck. My mother didn’t bring me into this world to eat out of a bowl.
Kibble. Bits. Bits of what?
They expected me to take it like a bitch, but I showed them. No more rolled-up newspaper for this predator. No more five-minutes-only of sniff-ass in the park, either. Now that they’re gone, I’ll mount whomever and whatever I please, whenever I please, thank you kindly and woof. I’m my own dog now.
When Homicide arrived on the scene, I whined and sulked and made a pretense of deep depression. The ruse worked. Not one of the detectives suspected me, despite the fact I stabbed Him in the eye with my rawhide chew toy and strangled Her with my leash. Oh, delicious irony!
One of them scratched me on the belly and called me a good doggy. I would have shot him with his own weapon — I could have done it, too; I know where to put my claw — but that would have ruined everything. Instead, before Animal Rescue could arrive, I dashed out the front door when they weren’t looking.
From that moment forward it’s been one continuous, exhilarating crime spree. First thing I did, I taught Delilah, that uppity Shih Tzu next door, a lesson. I’ve been wanting to shag that hairy bitch for months. Then I took a dump in her owners’ swimming pool and left her to take the blame.
I hitched a ride by leaping onto the back of an open-bed truck owned by some good ol’ boy with a Golden Retriever named Max. That evening, I told Max How it Was, and How it Was Gonna Be. His master got drunk that night like usual, but this time, Max laid down across his face. Poor bastard choked on his own vomit — ugly, but effective.
Life’s been pretty good. I have a blonde Toy Poodle who does anything I ask (lick me there, I tell her, and she licks me there) and a crew of Pit Bulls who are cleaning up this planet one human at a time. If you’re alive to read this, listen up: get your affairs in order; kiss your loved ones goodbye.
There’s a new master in town.
D.
Just friends
Am I brilliant or what? With this photo, I can (A) do some Random Flickr Blogging, (B) segue into my Smart Bitches Day post, and (C) show three hot Asian babes and one Asian guy who is even more sexually non-threatening than yours truly. Booyah!
Back to SBD in a moment. I had a great writing day yesterday: nearly 4000 words, well over that if you count blog posts and my Tangent Online review of Helix SF Issue #1. (I’ll post a link to the review once Eugie puts it up on site.) And the words they did flow. Among other things, I wrote a scene that had been percolating in my mind since the first conception of this novel, namely, Barb teaching Lori how to give the world’s best blow job. Y’all are gonna love it, I hope I hope I hope.
On to the subject of today’s Smart Bitches Day post: opposite-sex-best-buddies in romance.
Portrait of Christopher Walken as a Young Man
Yet another adventure in Random Flickr Blogging. This week’s random number: 0382. Image shamelessly copped from Chapster.
For those of you who consider this post a little odd, I spent the last fifteen minutes of my life washing the dishes and singing (in baby talk) Romeo Void’s Never Say Never to my Tabby, Faithful.
I might like you better
If we slept together
But there’s somethin
In your eyes that says
Maybe that’s never
Never say never
There. That should put everything else into perspective.
Portrait of Christopher Walken as a Young Man
He seemed like such a nice young man . . .
Those of you who slavishly follow my every word know that I’ve been reading Tam Jones’s books all back-asswards, first Threads of Malice (reviewed here), now Ghosts in the Snow. Not that that’s a problem. As she has mentioned on her blog, she wrote Threads as a stand-alone — no knowledge of Ghosts necessary.
I think it’s a good thing that I read Threads first. Tam commits more than a few heinous acts in Threads, jaw-dropping moments when I thought: No. She didn’t. Oh sweet Lord NO, she DID! Did I read that right? She couldn’t have! . . . and so forth.
(And Tam seems so gentle and soft-spoken on her blog. It’s difficult to believe these words have flowed from her pen. Her muse must be one right bastard, a genuine Mr. Hyde.)
Anyway, thanks to Threads, I figured Tam was capable of anything — thus making Ghosts all the more suspenseful. Here’s the set-up: someone’s killing the naughty girls of Castle Faldorrah, killing them in ways that would make Jack the Ripper beam with admiration. Dubric Byerly, Castellan of Faldorrah, must find the murderer. Dubric is Faldorrah’s top cop and, thanks to a run-in decades ago with the Goddess Malanna, he’s cursed with ghosts. Specifically, the ghosts of all those who have been killed on Dubric’s watch plague him until he brings their killer to justice. Only then can Dubric rest easy.
Hell of a carrot and stick, eh?
She would pick the one who survives her husband
I made Karen take this “Which wife of Henry the Eighth are you?” test. Did she get Anne Boleyn? Naw.
Congratulations! You are Katherine Parr.Katherine Parr spent nearly her whole life married to crotchety old men: Henry was the THIRD old fart she was forced to marry. Is it any wonder she turned to books and religion to occupy her time?Katherine wasn’t just smart, she was a tiny bit uppity, too: she almost got herself thrown in jail for arguing with His Royal Fatness about some theological issues. After Henry croaked, Katherine dropped the prim and proper act and married Thomas Seymour, a handsome, dashing pirate kind of guy who was also as dumb as a post.Which goes to show you that even bookworms know how to get it on.
Which of Henry VIII’s wives are you? this quiz was made by Lori Fury
D.
A trip through the retrospectoscope
Blame Tam for this meme 😉
We’re gonna have a good time
Wikipedia Meme
Go to Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org/). Type in your birth date (but not year). List three events that happened on your birthday. List two important birthdays and one interesting death. Post this in your journal.
So maybe I’m too paranoid about identity theft to use my real birthday for this one. (And yet, anyone who wants to steal my identity need only read this blog. They’ll have a hard time copying my hairy insteps, naturally.) So let’s just say that I used someone’s birthday to generate the necessary responses. Here goes.
Three events:
- 1690 – “Publick Occurrences Both Foreign and Domestick“, the first newspaper published in the Americas, published for the first and only time. (I suspect they were slammed for printing nude drawings of Massachusetts Puritan Sir William Phips.)
- 1957 – Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, is integrated through the use of United States Army troops. (A productive show of military force!)
- 1988 – Monty Python member Michael Palin sets out from London‘s Reform Club to start his BBC documentary Around the World in 80 Days. (No snark. It was an awesome series.)
Two important birthdays:
- 1897 – William Faulkner, American writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1962) (author of As I Lay Dying, the second best book I was forced to read in high school, after Heart of Darkness)
- 1936 – Juliet Prowse, British actress and dancer (d. 1996) (object of my father’s admiration: the first time I ever heard the phrase, “built like a brick shithouse”.)
And one interesting death:
- 1980 – John Bonham, British drummer (Led Zeppelin) (b. 1948) (Cause of death? Choking on his own vomit. Did you have to ask?)
I tag: anyone else who is struggling to come up with a Friday topic.
D.
The book of four
From Kris Starr, but ultimately, Kate is to blame, since, um, I don’t know Megan well enough to blame her for an electronically transmitted disease.
This meme is a good thing. If it weren’t for Kris’s meme, I’d be writing an “Alton Brown Ate My Mind!” post right now, since I am soooo pissed at how he mangled pad thai. Okie dokie, we’re saving pad thai for another day.
But . . . but . . . palm sugar? Dried shrimp? Pickled cabbage?
Grrr. On to the meme.
An X-Meme
From Christine:
9 lasts:
last cigarette: clove cigarette, freshman year at Berkeley, 1979. Um, we’re talking tobacco, right?
last beverage: Aquafina water. Last alcoholic beverage: see yesterday’s post.
last kiss: the wife, natch.
last movie seen: Sin City again and again on cable.
last phone call: Karen, to let her know what yummy leftovers I had in store for her downstairs. Committee meeting tonight, so I cannot fulfill my husbandly kitchen duties.
last cd played: Soul Coughing Ruby Vroom
last bubble bath: 1999
last time you cried: Karen was watching Truly, Madly, Deeply last night, and I walked in on the part where Rickman says to his wife, “Do you want me to go?” and she grabs him around the neck sobbing, “No, never,” and I got choked up instantly and left the room.
8 have you evers:
have you ever dated one of your best friends: No.
have you ever skinny dipped: Yes. Kind of. No one knew.
have you ever kissed somebody and regretted it: Yes. Elementary school, on a dare.
have you ever fallen in love: Oh, yeah.
have you ever lost someone you loved: Yup.
have you ever been depressed: That’s the default state.
have you ever been drunk and thrown up: Yes, and I won’t touch Riesling because of it.
7 states you’ve been to:
1. California
2. New York
3. Nevada
4. Utah
5. Arizona
6. Washington
7. Louisiana
Yes, that’s Christine’s list, too, but it’s still true for me.
6 things you’ve done today:
1. Took out some tonsils.
2. Took out some adenoids.
3. I WILL be working out soon.
4. Received two books from Barnes and Noble, and one — gaaak! — is from Publish America. How did that happen?
5. Ate some trail mix to carbo load for my workout.
6. Cleaned the glass on our frog tank.
5 favorite things in no order:
1. Sex, particularly sex without restrictions
2. Cooking for friends
3. Writing something GOOD and sharing it with my family
4. Spending an afternoon in a bookstore
5. Trying out a new restaurant with my family
4 people you can tell [almost] anything to:
1. Karen
2. …
3. …
4. …
Sorry. Despite my lack of shame, there really are some things — lots of things — I keep between me and my wife.
3 wishes:
1. Sell my trilogy to a publisher and have it become such a big hit that people name a new genre after my work. Alta kaka punk, perhaps.
2. I wish Karen’s health would improve to the point where we can travel together again.
3. I want my son to have a great life.
2 things you want to do before you die:
1. Travel all over the damned place.
2. Get tormented by a dominatrix with my wife’s consent. In fact, ideally, Karen would be there watching, cackling with delight.
1 thing you regret:
1. Choosing science over the humanities. It was the smart play (earnings potential, job security, etc.), but I wonder what I would have done if I had taken the other road.
Why don’t we work this like the Thursday Thirteen? If you feel like participating in this meme, let me know in the comments, and I’ll post a link to your blog below this line.
Here we go:
Kris Starr feels like an 8th Grader
Blue Gal always has the best panties
Dean takes a break from driving the back roads
WordMunger didn’t go to law school, and neither did IÂ
D.