Dani's Shorts 4

by Dani J Caile

  Looking closer at this disturbing problem on an individual level, it can be seen that there is definitely a positive thinking movement for and towards facial hair, those members affected preferring mainly full or circle beards over goatees and balbos. Jordan Bell, ring-a-ding-a-ling, once mentioned in a Facebook comment of growing two beards on one face, while Mathew W Weaver, his voice echoing within his suit of armour, stated on a blog post that shaving off his beard for his first step into the real world was "a sad, humbling experience." Many still blame the appearance of Neal Sayatovich's green goatee within the group as the initial catalyst, but this charge cannot be fully validated.

  The list of those newly or already affected within the group is growing by each day. Long term member Michael D. Pitman and founding member himself, Mr Brian Rogers, have a smattering of facial hair, the latter adopting a more charismatic greying Hemingway look, while newer members such as Richard Russell, Aaron Gord and Christopher Bays promote more traditional full beards. DL Mackenzie, a renowned and well-respected member of the community champions a chevron, or broom moustache, while younger members of the TIW association seem to support smaller follicular statements: Thomas Lankin wears bumfluff which resembles a beard, Christopher A Licaardi leans closer to a balbo than a circle, and recent profile pictures of Tony Jaeger show that the smooth-faced Salt Lake City Elvis Presley lookalike has moved over to a fully-fledged goatee.

  There are some who are as yet untouched by this affliction, namely Brick Marlin who has no hair on his head at all, but there are growing fears that this deadly pestilence may spread to other as yet untouched parts of the community, even amongst the non-male members, such as Mamie Pound, Amanda Rotach Huntley, DL Zwissler and Chris Garrison, all known for 'big hair'.

  Nonetheless, there are those who see a common analogy with this and Samson's long curly locks, especially after Jordan Bell's recent dominance over wispy Mathew W Weaver, and that there is a correlation between the growth of facial hair and an increase in competence of writing skills. Dani J Caile, long standing member and scourge of the TIW group said that he "shave(s) every day and look at the results." The jury is still out on that one. An unnamed and disappearing-into-the-distance follicular expert and part-time Freudian analyst in passing stated that "such a rise in the existence of hair on a person's countanence can only mean a greater connection is needed between the subject and their mother and so he, or she for that may be the case in such times, should?( incoherent babble)."

  A TIW spokesman, when asked to respond to this growing bristling crisis, said "I don't know what all the fuzz is about, it's only hair."

  81 (Grudge 10) - A Bear in the Woods

  (bear on a unicycle, all characters are household objects, homemade fireworks, Ninja weaponry)

 

  Deep in the Bohemian Forest, hidden amongst twisted clusters of trees and undergrowth, far from any settlement or habitat, with the noise of the wind whistling through crooked branches and the light of the moon barely scratching through impenetratable leaves, there stands a hut. In this hut, unseen by any traveller, orienteer or paperchase organiser, lives the last of three bears, alone and forelorn, riding his unicycle in the shadows, with only the sound of his bewitched household objects for company.

  "Did you see the fireworks last night? Scared me to sawdust." Dave the IKEA wardrobe shivered on his unstable feet.

  "Yeah, it did get out of hand. He was trying for a smoke bomb but got a fountain firework instead," ticked Johnny the turquoise Bai square retro wall clock.

  "Maybe he should read the instructions when making homemade fireworks."

  "He's not really an expert with fireworks?"

  "?or DIY." Dave felt another screw loosening. "Oh, for a screwdriver?"

  "Anyway. He's built for higher things, definitely." Johnny tick-tocked over the hour. "Yeah! Another one!"

  "Congratulations. Higher things? Look at the suits he wears, he's high class material, all right." Dave opened his doors, showing a drab selection of circus suits. "Such style, finesse. He's going all the way."

  "I don't like him touching me with those big paws of his, though. Just let me do what I'm good at, telling the time."

  "But you keep slowing down."

  "Oh, stop it. My face may have aged but I'm still ticking along!"

  "Ha!"

  They listened to Johnny's second hand, sometimes it was agonisingly slow. The unicycle's squeaky wheel set them off again.

  "He took me off the wall the other day."

  "He didn't!"

  "He did. Well, I tell you, I didn't stand for it."

  "You hang, though, don't you?"

  "Semantics. Anyway, I gave him everything I had, I even got out my collection of Ninja weaponry."

  "Your what?"

  "I got out my wooden nunchuks and gave him a good ol' one-two over the head?"

  "Yeah, right. Sure."

  "Then I tried my homemade shuriken and throwing knives?"

  "And?"

  "Nothing."

  "You throw like a girl."

  "It isn't easy with these hands. Besides, you can't do any better, you haven't got any hands."

  "Yeah, but I can lie in wait, my doors wide open, and grab anyone who gets too close."

  "Deadly."

  "Oh yes." Dave opened and closed his door a few times and wobbled, making him stop. He leant a few more millimetres closer to Johnny, who tick-tocked faster.

  "Careful! I'm only attached to this wall by a half-hammered-in rusty nail!"

  "Sorry."

  "Anyway, he still reset me, without any luck. Finally had to put another battery in. I think I need to go for a checkup or something..."

  "Oh-oh?"

  Deep in the ?umava, hidden amongst a mass of tall, robust trees, far from any living being, with the light from the stars hardly breaking through, the sounds of a falling wardrobe, breaking glass and the moan of a bear shattered the peace of the forest.

  Weekend Quickie 52 - Out on the town

  (image - rain on a night city street, element - wish upon a star, emotion - bittersweet feeling)

  Drenched and shivering, sheltering under a downtown shop's canopy without an umbrella, I watched those few poor unfortunates caught in this freak summer storm scamper back to whatever hole they'd crept out from. I guess it hadn't been such a good idea to go out for a celebration drink, the place I'd picked was closed due to a technical malfunction. And then the sky opened up.

  I looked down the street and all the shops were like dark, empty shells, hit by the same trouble as the bar. I'd wish upon a star to get me the hell outta here if I could see one through the rainclouds. For a second it crossed my mind to take one of the many bicycles littering the street and fly home, bringing it back once this was all over, but one look at the rain...

  With the water running down my neck and my socks soaking up the growing puddle around my shoes, I thought of what brought me out tonight, my recent anticipated success. Standing here, it now felt so trivial and above all, bittersweet: great that I'd accomplished my goal but sad that it was all over, never to be repeated.

  Weekend Quickie 1st Anniversary - Surprise!

  (52 elements, one from each Weekend Quickie in the year)

  If I recall, it was a Saturday afternoon at a local Iron Writers Convention. Five Iron Writers were present when I got there but like some forgotten rule of thumb, I couldn't remember their names, though I knew their faces. They held the convention in the Flora Bama bar, right next to a strange cyclorama of a burning wicker man set in the Scottish Highlands and a live element of eight ladies dancing a jig in the foreground, all organised and produced by some local artist. While melodical musical notes wafted over the sound system, I began to daydream and think back to yesterday morning at Mamie's?

  With the smell of fried bacon and just brewed coffee, I made my way into the kitchen. She was nowhere to be seen. Lavender wafted through the open French doors, mixing with the breakfast smells and turning my alrea
dy weak stomach. I opened the food cupboard to be greeted by a can of alphabet soup and a can of pumpkin, with a rotting coconut cake Mamie had made for Easter...at Christmas. A pack of lifesavers sat on the counter and I took a tangerine one. Far away in the garden I heard the sound of singing. Was it her? A message in a bottle on the top of the fridge said it all.

  'Dear Dani, Your mother gave you a little errand. Make two coffees and bring them out with you, following a trail of Mardi Gras beads. At the end of the trail is an arrowhead bordered by a dandelion bracelet. It will show you the way. Yours sincerely, Mamie.'

  I did as the message asked and found her in a little summerhouse by a large rockery. We greeted each other and I placed the coffees on the table. She passed over a coin.

  "What's this?"

  "A present for a handsome newspaperman's birthday, a 1909 penny covered in Mars dust. Happy birthday!"

  "Err, thanks, Mamie. Where did you get it?"

  "From your sister. Ha, kind of a tip from a waitress, so to speak. Go on, your mother said you had to make a birthday wish now."

  The annual birthday ritual with Mother. It was easy to choose, 50-50, but it was never a pleasant experience, and now that she was gone, it was Mamie who was left to do her last dying wish. Mother had hired a room at her place for the past few years and they had spent so many evenings together they'd become inseparable.

  "Truth or dare?"

  "OK, let's do it."

  She took out Mother's old coke bottle and spun it around. This bottle was like a portent that provoked fear in me every year, but this time, for perhaps the first time ever, it stopped on 'truth'.

  "Oh. Wish upon a star?"

  "A star? It's eight o'clock in the morning."

  Mamie looked glum but then gave a smile and settled herself into her chair."Your Mother said that if it landed on 'truth' then I'd have to tell. You're 40 this year, so maybe it's better if...err...you know about some things. She'd been prepared to tell you for years but..." She pointed to the bottle. "She said it always came up 'dare'."

  "What things, Mamie?"

  "Your early years...your 'real' early years..."

  She took out an old photo from her pocket and handed it over.

  "This is me as a newborn baby. I haven't seen this before?err, what's that on my face?"

  "Err?" Mamie had a look. "It's cumerindine. My grandmother swore by it."

  "Great...and what's that in the background? What! I was born in the back seat of a Greyhound bus, rolling down Highway 41? Are you kidding me? What about that old photo of me in the hospital?"

  "I don't know about that, but your Mother said that she had to hitchhike from the bus to the hospital."

  "Really?"

  "Yes, the bus didn't go that way."

  I sighed, relieved that this truth wasn't so bad.

  "Phew, I thought it was going to be really bad, like I was adopted or something."

  Mamie flinched.

  "What?"

  "Err, well, not adopted as such?" She passed me another photo.

  "Who's that?"

  "It's your father."

  "My...but my father is..."

  "No, this is your real father. Who you thought was your father was actually your step father. Your mother said that this man is your father." As the shock hit me, Mamie continued. "She said that he had such a feeling of strength and independence about him. She first met him in the summer of her Junior Year at High school..."

  I quickly calculated it in my head. Surely that was wrong. How could this be my father?

  "That would make me 44, Mamie."

  "Yes, it was 5 years later. She met him again, a chance encounter during a cake walk at a fete. He'd lost his shoes. Apparently, he was really something. She said 'some people can look at a mud puddle and see an ocean of ships'. He gave her one of these."

  Mamie showed me Mother's five gold rings. It had always been a mystery as to who that fifth ring had came from.

  "Why...where...when can I meet him?"

  "Oh, he's gone now, a freak accident when a Halcyon flew into his helmet while he was riding his motorbike."

  "Oh. So no father-son reunion, then."

  "No. Sorry, Dani."

  "That's okay?but?but she said I got my nose from my father. His nose is nothing like mine."

  "Your nose?well?do you really want to know?"

  I nodded.

  "Okay. When you were old enough to walk, you were obsessed with moving lights and things, you know, snowglobes, lava lamps and the like. She couldn't drag you past a shop window without a fight. You squashed your nose up against the glass so many times, you got a permanent pugnose."

  "What? Next you'll be telling me that this wolf bite I got on my arm 'cause I thought the thing was a lost dog with no collar, isn't!"

  "It isn't."

  "What?"

  "It's a birthmark. Same as that one she said was a rattlesnake bite when you tried to save a yellow scorpion."

  "What?"

  First my birth, then my father, and now my infamous bites?

  "Uh-huh." I examined both 'birthmarks'. "I see it now. How stupid of me to believe they were bites."

  I looked straight at Mamie. A thousand emotions ran through me, a million images, and the world started to spin?

  82 - The Brother

  (An Arnold Schwarzenegger Commando Action Figure, a New (10th) Circle of Hell (meaning you have to make it up and give it a title), The Dunning Kruger Effect, Perfume Atomizer)

  She came in, spraying her perfume atomizer around the room. Someone was coming round. Who was it?

  "I've told you a thousand times, my work doesn't smell." I sealed the box up and put my collection of Amblytelus ground beetles away into their particular drawer.

  "I don't care. I hate those things. Smell or no smell, I think they're disgusting."

  "It's my work, dear, my field of expertise." To make her feel more at ease, I opened the window to let some fresh air in.

  "My brother will be here soon, so take those joggy bottoms of yours off and put on something more?respectable."

  "Your brother? But that's the second time this month? What does he want now? More money?" I checked my wallet, making sure there was enough to cover such a visit.

  "Brian! How dare you! He's my brother. If he needs money, then we can help him out."

  "Why doesn't he get a job?"

  "Brian!" She rushed across the room, spraying her perfume atomizer along the furniture and the sofa, only to find her supply running out.

  "Well, he thinks he knows everything!"

  "You know he's unskilled?"

  "Yes, but he's always ready to tell me what's right and what's wrong, isn't he? It's those muscles of his, it makes him think he's some kind of superhero who can do anything. I'm sure he suffers from the Dunning Kruger Effect?"

  "He's my brother, you can't talk about him like that! And anyway, there's nothing wrong with a little muscle?"

  I watched as she left the room and emerged with a plate load of sandwiches from the kitchen.

  "A little muscle? He's got more muscles than a caterpillar!" That last remark caused her to stop in her tracks and tutt.

  "Ah, I knew you'd have to bring your Entomology into this at some point. You just can't stop thinking about it, can you? My brother takes care of his body and as I said, there's nothing wrong with his muscles."

  "Absolutely. Every day, 8 to 4, in that gym. My old Arnold Schwarzenegger Commando action figure had less muscles than him. Except for one, of course." I tapped the side of my head and she shook hers.

  "Well please don't go into some intellectual tirade like you did the last time. You know how upset he gets when he doesn't understand something. He broke grandma's China vase, remember? We're running out of the old inheritance."

  "Yes, I remember. He's rather like a gorilla, don't you think? His dire apathy towards knowledge is killing. They should invent a whole new Circle of Hell just for him, 'Apathy of Knowledge and Understanding', perhap
s. A little different to ignorance, wouldn't you say? Ignorance isn't really a choice for him, it would be a step up?that place would be good for a few other people I don't care to mention..."

  She clenched her fists, pushing them down to her sides and her face went a deep purple.

  "Don't bring my parents into this!"

  NEWSFLASH: Demise of the Deadly Duo?

  (TIW Blog)

  by Scallywag

  Rumours are spreading that the sudden appearances of the ludicrous and annoying relays initiated by the procrastinating TIW partnership of Mathew W Weaver and Dani J Caile within the TIW Facebook community is at an end. With their upcoming Earth-shattering no-holds barred Grudge match, seconded by Mamie Pound and Jordan Bell, and the recent incarceration of Master Weaver into the world of reality, it may mean that their impromptu relays will become a mere irritating memory for those inflicted.

  Who can forget their first literary 'soiree' into the genre, a story of hair-raising proportions, "The Goatee of Neil (Sayatovich)". Other victims of their unrehearsed tomfoolery include Jordan Bell, "The Rotation", the two DLs, namely DL Zwissler and DL Mackenzie, "The Duel of the DLs", with a little help from Amanda Rotach Huntley, Mamie Pound, "Mamie Mass", with guest appearances from Jordan Bell and Tony himself, Tony Jaeger,"The Iron Writer Party line", and even some foolishness amongst themselves, "The Cat and the Monkey". Will this insanity all be a thing of the past?

  While Master Weaver was unavailable for comment due to an increase in refreshments consumption and a rise in the need for shoe polishing around the office, Mr Caile, deep in a comatose state from lack of book sales and blog hits, stated that "it's mainly a question of the (TIW) community. If something happens to catch mine, or Mathew's, eye, we give each other the 'heads up'. TIW is filled with interesting, eccentric and overbearing people. It's only a matter of time before one of them sparks the imagination and our keyboards pound to the sound of clicking. Richard Russell is overdue...but nothing can beat that first time. Maybe a break would do us all some good..."

  Sufferers of Weaver and Caile's nonsense commented on the phenomema, mentioning that it was "an honour" and a "mark of respect" to be the stooge in the pairs' absurdity, and possibly even funny.