Category Archives: Paffooney

March 25, 2020 · 5:28 pm

Quarantine Follies

We have been isolated and quarantined for 12 days now, and the world around us continues to get weirder and weirder. The dog killed a squirrel in the yard two days ago. We are running out of bread and meat and potatoes thanks to hoarders, and we may need to find alternatives to toilet paper. But as long as we have love, not unlike the dog and cat in the illustration above, we will be alright.

One has to wonder, though, what they are using all that toilet paper for, those hoarders who are apparently eating it in massive quantities to give them more fiber in their diet.

Or, maybe, they know something about the virus that we don’t. Maybe it causes loose bowels and the toilet-paper-consuming condition of Montezuma’s Revenge.

Or maybe there are lots of toilet-paper mummies now roaming the nights looking for pretty girls who resemble dead Egyptian princesses?

Oh, NO!!!!

But with the virus lurking out there, waiting to pounce on me and my weak, diabetes-ravaged immune system, there are some good things about being home-bound and fortified with solitude. For one thing, the girl who had to go see the nurse during that last substitute-teaching job I had did not turn out to have Coronavirus. In fact, it is now past the date by more than two weeks that I would’ve come down with the type of flu she did test positive for. So I don’t have that either.

This is not the girl with the virus. This is a random picture from Twitter.

Since the four of us are basically confined to our rooms for the majority of the day, it is a great time for reading in the nude. I benefit from that because I have psoriasis in places that itch less if kept dry, naked, and in front of the fan, but aren’t exactly safe for public places. And I don’t even have to offend my family with my naked self to do it. I am also pretty sure you are grateful that I didn’t use my own picture to illustrate this goofy notion.

… And by that I mean, of course, a picture of me reading naked.

We have done things together as a family too. Making masked visits to the grocery store or Walmart only to find there is still no toilet paper is one. Using up the gingerbread house kit that didn’t get used at Christmas is another.

And, of course, eating the gingerbread house was also something we did together. The Princess and Number Two Son both ate lion’s shares in order to save me from being weak and eating too much of it myself with my miserable diabetes. I say, “miserable diabetes” not because it is out of control and making me ill or susceptible to comas, but because I get to eat less of things like gingerbread houses, and that makes me miserable.

But the evil, moron, criminal president says that too much quarantine time will make us kill ourselves. So, he intends to end our time in isolation by Easter. We have to go out of the house, spend more money that could end up in his pockets, and get back to work to make the economy stronger so he can be re-elected on a strong economy. Even if we have to sacrifice our lives to the virus to do it. After all, what’s more important? Staying alive longer? Or helping an evil, moron, criminal president get re-elected?

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March 24, 2020 · 3:17 pm

AeroQuest 3… Canto 83

Canto 83 – Star Nomads Revealed (The Silver Thread)

Artran Blastarr, the eight-year-old son of space pirates, and Tiki Astro, the robot-boy, stood holding hands on the docking bay floor next to the somewhat unreliable yet amazingly effective Bill the Postman (Scarpigo Snarcs in his current secret identity).

From the portal opposite, on the far side of the docking bay, three gigantic humanoid figures dressed in metallic armor of some kind emerged.

“Who… who are those?” gasped Artran.

“Those are Star Nomads.  If I don’t miss my best guess, it is the Black Knight, the Dark Traveler, and the Magnificent Wanderer,” said Bill.

They slowly approached, each a massive figure in armor that completely covered their entire bodies, completely obscuring even their faces, no matter what race or configuration they actually represented.  The Black Knight was all in gleaming black armor with a razor-edged hook for a crest on his faceless helmet.  The Dark Traveler was all decked out in metallic green armor.  And the Magnificent Wanderer, as Bill pointed out, was armored entirely in gleaming silver.

Drawing close enough to speak, the Magnificent Wanderer’s voice boomed out like a thunderclap on a rainy planet.  “So, you have brought us the chosen one, Scarpigo Snarcs.”

“Yes, oh Magnificent One.  But please refrain from using my real name in front of those who might not be stupid enough to misremember it.”

“I will never fully understand why demi-humans like this one insist on their comic prevarications the way this one does,” said the Dark Traveler.

“Indeed,” said the Wanderer.  The Black Knight remained silent.

“Who is this chosen one?” asked Tiki Astro meekly.

“The human child born on the planet known as Outpost.”  The Traveler nodded at Artran.

“Me?” squeaked Artran.

“Of course, you,” said the Wanderer.  “We need an authentic discoverer of worlds for our purpose.”

“…And you know the boy thinks that’s the silliest thing he ever heard,” said Bill.

“Of course, he does.  We pulled him out of the time stream well before he was ready to set foot on his first planet.  Who better to use for the purpose, than the one fated to it?”

“Yes, you are right,” admitted Bill quickly.  “You are always right.”  Bill rolled his eyes when the Wanderer’s featureless face was turned away.

“So, Tiki and I are supposed to be here?  This wasn’t just an accident?”

“The robotic child-construct is fated to be elsewhere.  You alone are the chosen one, Artran Blastarr.”  The Wanderer pointed his armored finger at Artran’s breastbone.

“No!  I won’t go anywhere without my friend Tiki!”  Artran began to leak emotion-induced wetness from his childish eyes.  Of course, the Star Nomads would never give in to any such emotional nonsense.

“The Metaloid boy belongs to the White Spider,” said the Black Knight in what can only be described as a dark black voice.  “He must be there when the critical time comes.  The universe decrees it.”

“You can count on me,” said Bill, not actually adding, “because I must be some sort of human abacus.”

“You are not actually human,” said the Wanderer, apparently answering Scarpigo’s thoughts.

“What if I don’t agree to go to this White Spider?” asked Tiki.

“Then we invoke protocol alpha in your programming,” said the Wanderer.

“Oh.  Sorry, Artran.  I have to be going.  It’s a robot thing.”

By this time Artran was beside himself with misery.  “Bye, Tiki.  I love you.”

The real boy and the robot boy briefly hugged before Bill (Scarpigo) the Postman led Tiki Astro back to the X-boat.

Artran looked up at the Wanderer with tear-filled eyes.

“So, are you gonna eat me now?” he said in a fully resigned voice.

“We no longer consume food of any sort.  We will now take you to civilized planets that you will learn about and then give to the newly-formed alliance that is to become the New Star League.”

“Oh.  Okay.”

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March 23, 2020 · 7:59 pm

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night…

The title is taken directly from the poet Dylan Thomas. He was thinking about the death of his father. But, even though my father cannot last much longer either, it is my own mortality that has been weighing heavily on my mind.

I have been thinking a lot about death of late. I am now three years farther along into my retirement than I believed I would be when I retired in 2014. I honestly believed I would not live beyond 2017 with my six incurable diseases. Especially when Banco Americo sued me over medical bills and won, forcing me into bankruptcy, and leaving me to be unable to pay for insulin for my diabetes or mental health services for family members who needed them as a matter of life or death.

So, I suppose I can be forgiven for reading a lot of life-or-death stories lately, especially the kind that don’t have a happy ending.

The Road, Cormac McCarthy’s 2006 post-apocalyptic novel, ripped a good half to three quarters of my soul out. It is about two characters making their way along a road after some unnamed disaster has blasted away most of life on Earth, and that which is left is dying. There is no miracle nor any life-saving solution at the end of the novel. The only grace the reader is allowed is that the character who dies at the end lived for as long as was possible motivated only by love, and by dying, allowed the beloved other character to live beyond him. It is a hard, terrible story to read. But it achieves its goal. It touches your hopeless heart in ways only an award-winning novel can.

The book I just finished reading was a story I originally had to read for an Iowa State University class on Existentialism in Literature. The Nobel-Prize-winning author, Albert Camus’s book, The Stranger, is no easier to read than The Road. In fact, it may be even more depressing and dark than the first novel I mentioned. The main character lives as a stranger in a meaningless world and basically is sentenced to death by a jury because he didn’t cry at his mother’s funeral. The story devastates your compassionate heart and shakes your belief in a benevolent God. And I read it the first time long before I was an atheist who believes in a different form of god. The story is itself cruel. But in the long view, it grants you a certain melancholy sort of peace that can only be had by coming to terms with your place in all of existence.

So, I admit it. I have been obsessing about the end of life far too much. The current pandemic that has us all on the ropes in the boxing match of life has brought me to grips with the fact that, even though the end of life is far closer to now than its beginning, living life is what still matters. I have been spending my shut-in days writing novels about life and love and laughter. I have also been talking to relatives by phone and connecting with people through social media, all of which can be done without risk of viral infection. Well… maybe a computer virus.

But I am alive now. And I am living in every manner I can still manage. For now. Because I can. And because it is the right thing to do.

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March 22, 2020 · 8:15 pm

I Shall Not Fear…

I am a high-risk individual since I have diabetes, hypertension, a family history of heart problems, and a compromised immune system. This pestilence is probably going to be the end of me. I have not come down with it yet, and I am probably not exposed at this point. But the only person who could’ve done the grocery shopping for me is exposed and quarantined. And hoarding has caused grocery store shelves to be empty. Not all shelves. But specific basic needs. Cleaning supplies are disappearing as soon as they are placed on the shelves. Toilet paper is not available, or possibly invisible. Meat products are practically non-existent. I was able to buy some food, but not as much as we usually buy in a week. And not cheaply enough to sustain us within a limited budget. I am going to have to make these trips too frequently. Sooner or later, the disease catches up to me.

When I was still in college, I had a dream that impressed me as being a prophecy. Other dreams I had like this one, and they felt like this one, have come to pass, in ways that are not predictable, granted, but true never-the-less. This dream found me ill sitting in an armchair in my Grandma Beyer’s house, a corner house on the city block with windows that looked out over a yard shaded by multiple trees. The air outside was glowing grayish yellow. A winged angel came through the front door and said, “Michael, it is over now. Come with me.”

The house I am now sitting in is a corner house on the city block with windows that look out over a yard shaded by multiple trees. The air outside is glowing yellow on an overcast day.

I am not afraid to die. I accept that life is finite, and I have had a good one. But this disaster is not going to wreak its worst on me. The innocent, the young, and those with the creativity and the will to live that it takes to solve major problems for the whole world need to be protected and need to survive. It is not going well. We have to come back from this. I have to believe that if this is the end of me, it is not the end of everything.

So, I shall fear no evil… Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me…

But I recognize that now is not the time for fear. Not the time for acting out of fear. We must help each other. We must act in the best interests of not just ourselves. We must keep doing what we know is right, what we know God made us to do. And if we are coming to the end of our personal path, take heart. The world is capable of going on without us. The universe is unfolding as it should.

This book is still free today in e-book format.

The link;

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March 17, 2020 · 3:33 pm

AeroQuest 3… Adagio 14

Adagio 14 – The Battle of Farwind (the Blood-red Thread)

It was amazing to me how few casualties actually occurred in the capture of a planet like Farwind by a handful of commandos led by a traitor.  The Battle of Farwind cost the Imperial Defense Force one traitorous commando commander, six unwilling Imperial loyalists, and fifty-two insanely-programmed Mechanoids.  Our side lost no one at all.  Ninety-two percent of the Imperial forces on the planet switched sides, preferring the command of the charismatic and humble Duke Han Ferrari to the iron-fisted rule of the maniacal Mechanoid Admiral Brona Tang.

Duke Ferrari quickly established a temporarily-appointed government of both like-minded intellectuals and professionals, and highly intelligent and motivated members of the political opposition.  Massive elections were planned and were quickly carried out, but Ferrari rode a wave of popular acclaim into office where they would’ve made him Emperor if he chose, just as George Washington of Earth and Toakenn Ailiannaim of Samothrace had done before him.  He took the office of Farwind Executive Prime, and made the popular alien entertainer William Bugbright his Executive Second.  Bugbright was not a human-born entertainer of aliens, mind you, but a Kritiian, an insectoid alien, that had the head of a giant praying mantis, four chitinous arms, and could play two ukuleles at once while singing popular human songs in a particularly humorous off-key voice.  It is little wonder he was the most popular living entertainer on holographic videos since the Galtorrians first discovered I Love Lucy reruns being broadcast on old-time television signals from the nearby planet Earth.  Galtorrians, and even Galtorrian-human fusions, as you probably already know, love the comedy stylings of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz more than anything else ever used for entertainment on a thousand worlds.  Incidentally, did you know that the first Galtorrians to land on Earth were surprised to learn that everything on the planet was not colored only in black and white and shades of gray?  They knew about movies and television on their own, but they never actually discovered black and white.  Choosing an entertainer as Executive Second was probably the canniest move that Duke Ferrari made in selecting his new rebel government.  The Galtorrians and the Galtorrian-Human fusions were all enthralled and easily swayed by entertainers, especially those who could handle humor well.  Teachers would never have conquered the Galtorrian Imperium if it hadn’t been for that one factor, humor, and the power of those who are funny.

So, you can see, the conquest of the planet Farwind was easily one of the most confoundingly absurd and easy conquests in recorded history.  It was more amazing than Cortez conquering the Aztec civilization because Cortez lost men and had no visible sense of humor in any form that I can see, and I have been there via time machine, though only to watch from the bushes.

The author of this expert analysis.

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March 16, 2020 · 4:31 pm

You Are Not Alone

Well, here I am now. Shut down and quarantined, not because I have Covid 19, which I don’t, even though I can’t prove that. Rather, it is because I am a high risk individual. Coronavirus could kill me easily. And also because the world is shut down around us. No school. Officially for this week, but probably for the rest of the school year.

So, what will I do now? Well, write more on my novel, of course. But this is not the 19th Century. There are ways to reach out to friends and family instantly, by phone, or Skype, or Facebook, or instant messenger… And you need to check on them. Keep them from feeling isolated and alone. Especially if, like me, you or any of them are at risk from this pandemic. We are not living in the days of the Black Death or the Spanish Flu. We are able to actively connect with others to keep the depression monsters at bay. And no one gets physically sick from a phone call. (I honestly hope that is the truth.) I talked with my octogenarian parents last night, and texted my 60-something sister just to talk and reconnect. My daughter talked to her grandmother in Iowa. My number two son has online friends in Europe and South America. We have family in the Philippines. And I can write this blog post for you. How is your family doing? Do you know somebody that is at risk? Reach out to them. It may be the phone call that saves their life, and then the invention of the telephone will be validated and justified.

And hopefully, with the use of modern communication devices, you won’t infect them with anything, and they won’t infect you. Not even Mr. Grupp.

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March 14, 2020 · 6:34 pm

Randomness

Today’s artworks for Saturday Art Day are all filled with random things put together by chance and whimsy in order to mishmash together some kind of point about surrealism. This would be because this is a surrealist blog, and I am a surrealist artist and writer. Either that or it is because if you put fish in your ears, the color of the sky changes to swirling gold and purple. Those are some powerful fish!

Clowns and dreams and singing sad songs for love in the circus tent of your dreams.

Of course, Surrealism is more than just a pile of random things. As Salvador Dali did it, the random images were made as realistic as possible and connected together. There was some reason behind the juxtaposition of these otherwise unrelated things (like the line-up of weird uncles you get at the Thanksgiving table when your great grandma had nine kids, seven of whom grew old enough to have families of two or more kids, and everyone within driving distance is invited to grandpa’s farm house for a big-family family meal (even if they had to put a second kids’ table in the storm cellar).

Do candles, a naked breast, flying children, and Prince Young John Travolta mean anything?

Of course, the meaning that ties it all together can be a secret or hidden meaning. Salvador Dali was deeply in love with his wife Gala, who was thirty years younger than he. He had an older brother who died before he was born, making him forever feel like a “replacement child”. These things are expressed in his paintings. Did you ever discern that from his paintings of melted clocks and discarded masks being kissed on the lips by giant ants?

And what the hell does this even mean?

The Little Fool?

Subtitled; a novel of limited intelligence?

And it is a colored-pencil drawing of a candle, an empty skull, a budgie, a book, and a weird little goofy ghost dressed like Mr. Peanut… without the monocle or spats… does that make him naked?

And a pencil? Why?

Can you tell from my artwork that I chose a career of being a public-school English teacher over becoming a commercial artist or a cartoonist? Or that I was the victim of a sexual assault at the age of ten and then never told anybody about it until the guy who assaulted me was dead? Or that I was so afraid of my own body when I was young that I eventually had to become a closet nudist as an adult? And what does my artwork have to say about all of that?

And do you understand why Salvador Dali is an artistic hero of mine? And I love the movies of Stephen Spielberg for the exact same surrealist reasons?

If you regularly read this blog, or even just look at the pictures, you may have seen all of these pictures and heard all of these ideas before. I didn’t make this post from anything new. The only thing that is new… is how I randomly chose to put all of these things together in a way I haven’t done before.

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March 12, 2020 · 2:24 pm

Pandemic Ends to Everything

Being a pessimist, I am fully expecting to die from Corona virus sometime in the next few months. Our moron criminal President has not done anything in a timely matter to head off the pandemic. In fact, he did a good job of preparing for failure by firing and disassembling the special CDC unit Obama had put together for responding to potential pandemics because of the Ebola crisis. (Trump has made a very special effort in his administration to undo anything good that Obama did in his presidency.

Pandemics have nothing to do with panda bears.’

I am in the highest risk category when it comes to dying from the virus. I am not in a nursing home, but economically I have no choice but to keep being a substitute teacher, and that puts me in the center of germ and virus petri dishes that are middle schools and high schools. But, fortunately, I go into this perilous near-future with open eyes. If I die from it, I am prepared after a long full life, and I will die doing something I love to do. The economic hardships that fall on the members of my family when I am gone, will thankfully fall mainly on the credit-card abuser who caused most of that crushing debt and then refused to help me pay it all off.

I am now as confident as a total pessimist can be that Donald Jerblinkaninney Trump will be defeated in the next election. If I am still alive at election time, and he does win, that will be enough to kill me off right there. But even though it is no laughing matter, I will have the last laugh. Existence is eternal, and I have existed on this Earth, doing good things rather than bad.

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March 11, 2020 · 3:36 pm

Go and Catch a Falling Star…

You may have looked at the name of my website here on WordPress and wondered, “Why in the heck has that fool Mickey called this thing he writes Catch a Falling Star?”

The answer is, he named it after the first good published novel he wrote at the insistence of the I-Universe Publishing’s marketing adviser. Very poor reason for doing anything, that.

But, the secondary reason is because of where that title came from. Look at the first stanza of this poem by John Donne.

So, now, you are justified in asking, “What nonsense is this? That doesn’t have any coherent meaning, does it?”

And you would be right. These are impossible things that I am being ordered to do by a very religious cleric in the Anglican Church who was originally a Catholic, but, in the time of Henry VIII Catholicism was made illegal, and he wrote this poem about not being able to find an honest woman in his drunken, wasted youth anyway. He is ordering me here to not only “catch a falling star” (and catching a meteorite with your bare hands has rather hot consequences), but also to have sex with a semi-poisonous plant, explain why we can’t go backwards in time, determine whether and why God might’ve given Satan goat feet, listen to probably-nonexistent humanoid creatures singing, find a way to avoid anybody ever looking at me with envy and then doing something to me because of it, and, most importantly, find a place where the wind blows in a way that fills your head with facts that actually makes you smarter.

Challenge accepted!

It is exactly what I wanted to write about. Impossible things actually being accomplished. Finding the meaning behind alien beings from outer space developing an intense love of I Love Lucy television broadcasts and Mickey Mouse Club music. Discovering why intensely shy people need to embrace social nudity. Defining who is actually a werewolf and who is not, uncovering who and what real monsters are. Singing songs so sad that it magically makes people fall in love with you. Talking to clowns in your dreams and getting real answers to the meaning of life, love, and laughter.

Catching falling stars is the stupid idea that this wacky, idiotic little blog is about. It is what I write about constantly. You have to kill me to get me to stop. So, there is your fair warning. Read on at your own peril.

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March 10, 2020 · 1:55 pm

AeroQuest 3… Canto 82

Canto 82 – Siege of the Seadome (the Blood-red Thread)

Ham Aero was chafing in the wrist cuffs.  He’d been stripped of his yellow and blue combat armor, as had Ferrari and myself.  We all lay on the hard metal floor of the seadome brig.  Ham was working at the cuffs, seemingly knowing how to break free in a Houdini-esque fashion.  He twisted them back and forth, rolling his knuckles over in a very interesting fashion.  I have never seen such a form of double-jointedness before.

“I am supposed to execute all three of you,” the black-suited commander was saying.  “I know I am supposed to, but I can’t see killing someone like you, Duke Ferrari.”

“Why don’t you let me go, then, soldier?” said Duke Ferrari in his oiliest political voice.  He almost seemed sympathetic to our captor and potential executioner.

“Admiral Tang has personally ordered your immediate execution.  What will I do?”

At that moment, the Commander of the commando team we came with came in with two armed guards.  He still wore his armor and seemed remarkably fit compared to the wear and tear that showed on the rest of us.

“Why haven’t you killed them yet?” he asked of the Black Commander.

“I had to confirm that the orders were not a mistake,” said Blackie. 

“Nonsense.  You know what the Admiral wants.  Just do it!”

“I called Planet Mingo Command to confirm the order before I do it.  I don’t want to kill the former ruler who did the most to help my people in his lifetime.”  The Black Commander took off his helmet to reveal a snake-eyed Human-Galtorrian face.  He was of the fusion race that dominated the Imperium.

“What happened to your loyalty?” Duke Ferrari asked the yellow and blue Commander.  “I thought you were on our side?”

“I am.  I don’t want his people to claim that you made a mess of things with your little rebellion.  The people idolize you, but they don’t realize what is actually good for them.  A government of a space empire cannot be a democracy.  You have to have order to maintain the rule over so many worlds.”

“Save me from military intellectuals!” moaned Ferrari.

“Give me the fusion gun, Commander,” said our former friend.  “I will take responsibility for their deaths.”

“Ruts rowing on here?” said the metallic voice of a mechanoid mutt, possibly a Great Dane.

I looked at Ham.  He had his hands free, ready to grab a gun and fight for our lives against impossible odds.

“Commander Doo!”  The two commanders stiffly saluted in utter surprise.  “What are your orders, sir?” said Commander Blackie.

“I rahnt rorder!  Rese men are under the protection of Rord Rayrond King!  Roo will not harm them!”

“What?  Lord Doo!  We have to kill them.  They are a danger to the Imperium.”

The snake-eyed commander seemed visibly relieved.  It was as if this message from the dog’s mouth was exactly what he wanted to hear.

“Will you release us, then?” asked Duke Ferrari.

“Res!” said the mechanoid dog.  “Roo are free.  Rord King rahnts it that way.”

“I protest!” cried our commando friend, our false friend.

“You’re a weasel,” said Blackie.  His slug-thrower gave off a quick blast, piercing the traitor in the chest plate of his armor.  As he slumped dead to the floor, Ham began freeing us from our cuffs.  The Black Commander helped.

“We are grateful,” said Duke Ferrari.  How can we repay you?”

The dog-mechanoid looked at us with artificial eyes, creepy eyes.  “Roo rill rule Farwind as risely as roo took care of riss sector before.  Re are all allies now.” It didn’t seem right to be set free by a mechanical talking dog, at least, not without a set of meddling kids to go with him, but I was in no mood to question our good fortune.

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