I can’t believe today was a Sunday.

Back to cryptic

Stiff upper lip;

Playground power.

Who won this time?

.

I walked a cratery moon-face,

I spied nothing but a flag from 1969 flapping unemotionally in a celestial breeze.

Who is everyone?

Why do they exist?

While walking on, walking on the moon?

.

The Police – Walking on the Moon

.

Giant steps are what you take
Walking on the moon
I hope my legs don’t break
Walking on the moon
We could walk forever
Walking on the moon
We could live together
Walking on, walking on the moon

Walking back from your house
Walking on the moon
Walking back from your house
Walking on the moon
Feet they hardly touch the ground
Walking on the moon
My feet don’t hardly make no sound
Walking on, walking on the moon

Some may say
I’m wishing my days away
No way
And if it’s the price I pay
Some say
Tomorrow’s another day
You stay
I may as well play

Giant steps are what you take
Walking on the moon
I hope my legs don’t break
Walking on the moon
We could walk forever
Walking on the moon
We could be together
Walking on, walking on the moon

Some may say
I’m wishing my days away
No way
And if it’s the price I pay
Some say
Tomorrow’s another day
You stay
I may as well play

Keep it up, keep it up

I suppose this continues my brief break from being cryptic! (edited, gotta stop writing things in the middle of the night)

Phase #8: I went back to 1971 and watched the Russians fuck up their Mars landing

****

Leonid Brezhnev: Okay, the US are gonna pull off another fucking moonlanding. I thought they’d've given up after we put a kamikaze spy in their Apollo 13 team but their fat capitalism saw them sail pretty too awesomely through that shit, so I’ve come up with the perfect idea.

Scientists standing in Brezhnev’s office, praying to dear Lenin:  Pleasedon’tkilluspleasedon’tkilluspleasedon’tkilluspleasedon’tkillus.

Brez-face: We’re sending a rocket to fucking MARS.

One of the scientists faints violently.

Scientist #1: Errr too much vodka.

Brezhnev: God I love vodka, that man’s in charge! Alright! Everyone out, its time for my weekly phone-sex with Comrade Nixon!

The scientists mope out, pretending they hadn’t heard what they just heard.

***

Back in the USSR, at the best nuclear fallout shelter in all the land:

Scientist #1: Dudes, what the fuck, I swear Brezhnev is getting smarter, letting us live in absolute filth…

Scientist #2: Hey guys, I think I like, just woke up in someone’s basement, this isn’t a farm in the Ukraine.

Scientist #3: Check it out, Mikhail fainted in Brezhnev’s office and got amnesia. He’s supposed to be #1 now isn’t h-”

Scientist #1, staring at #3: “Woah, hey there number two, how’s it going being number two?”

Scientist #4: If you can’t do Calculus, you know we’re supposed to shoot you, right?

Scientist #2: Fuck off, you guys must’ve been smashed all through college, you guy’s can’t do maths for Lenin’s bald-ass scalp.

Scientist #1: Fuck you!

Scientist #3: Hey, hey, hey, guys, we’ve gotta make some rover or some shit dance around on the moon, I reckon a good place to start is by getting a rocket or something.

The three other scientists turn around and sit down properly.

Scientist #2: That’s pretty fucking easy, the USSR made the decision to make nuclear missiles and let its peoples die from alcohol poisoning in 1917, you could’ve ticked that box like, a hour ago.

A phone rings.

Scientist #1 picks up.

#1: Hello?

Brezhnev: Nixy?

#1: Ugh, no, you’ve called the Soviet Science Department, better try again, Enlightened Dude.

Brez: Oh, shit, fuck, I mean of course I meant to ring you guys – the US fucking landed on the moon just then, they’re starting to make it look like there’s a fucking merry-go-round between Houston and and that cratery shit – you guys better be trading that vodka I gave you for some fucking astronauts or whatever the hell sciencey shit we need to rape Mars with Communism.

Scientist #1: Yeah sure. We just worked out that we can just take a nuclear missile and pretend its a deep-space rocket.

Brezhnev: Shit, shit, fucking slow down, okay, I know you guys are smart but you don’t need to tell me EVERYTHING you’re doing, jesus, I mean lenin, just fucking do the job, shit!

#1 puts down the phone.

The other scientists look at him.

#1: Yeah he’s pretty cool with it.

***

Five bottles of vodka later:

Four scientists dancing to polka music with strippers.

***

The next morning:

Four semi-naked scientists robbed by some Soviet strippers, hung over.

***

The next morning:

Four scientists checking the Soviet classifieds for a dog to pilot their rocket.

That afternoon:

Scientist #3 spraypaints the Soviet coat of arms onto a ‘decomissioned’ Soviet nuke in a Soviet hazmat suit (loosely translated from Russian ‘hazmat’ means ‘the carcass of a dead pig’).

Minutes later:

Dead dog in a Soviet nuke with four ‘hazmatted’ Soviet scientists standing around it. More strippers arrive.

Minutes later:

Four ‘hazmatted’ scientists lugging dead strippers into a Soviet incinerator.

***

Back in the Kremlin-SSR:

Brezhnev: Alright boys, what’ve you got for me?

#1: Right, well here’s the gist of it.

#1 unveils a garbage can with some shotguns attached to it.

Soviet Official (Commissar) #1: That’s just a joke, right? That’s meant to be funny, isn’t it?

Brezhnev begins laughing like a mad fuck.

Everyone begins to laugh slowly, all the scientists look at #2 with pure hatred, laughing.

Official #1: Right, so, the demonstration, please.

#1: Right, well, theoretically, if this were the landing module, which it’s not (#1 laughs nervously, Brezhnev still wiping the tears off his face, chuckling) these uh, ‘gunpowder’ engines would control the pitch and yaw of the module.

#1 continues: And inside the module (#1 leans in to take out the ‘joke’ version of the rover from the landing module, to discover a dead radioactive stripper inside) SWEET BABY LENIN – I mean, the rover is actually still in its finalising stages, I just noticed the note I left to myself inside (begins to laugh).

No-one else laughs.

#3, realising what just happened, hissing at #2: YOU FORGOT TO TAKE HER OUT

#2: I DON’T RECALL BEING THE PERSON WHO LEFT A RADIOACTIVE HAZARD ZONE UNLOCKED

Official #3, looking at Scientist #2: What’s that, comrade?

#2: Oh! I was merely saying to my colleague here how I’d love to make the US a radioactive hazard zone.

Official #2: Promote that man, Leonid.

Brezhnev, over the funnies: You are now Scientist #1, the top Soviet Magician!

Scientist #1 (now Scientist #2) steps aside.

Official #2, emboldened by these turn of events: Tell us more.

The Scientist Formally Known As #2: The lander is to be equipped with two television cameras with a 360 degree view of the surface, as well as a mass spectrometer to study atmospheric composition; temperature, pressure, and wind sensors; and devices to measure mechanical and chemical properties of the surface, including a mechanical scoop to search for organic materials and signs of life.

All the officials, including Brezhnev, squinting: Is that all?

Former #2: Oh, it will also contain a pennant with the Soviet coat of arms.

Official #2: You are a true patriot!

A phone rings.

Brezhnev: Sexy time!

***

Back in the launch-day-SSR:

#4: All instruments nominal, conditions seem perfect for landing, #1.

Former #1: Good wor-

Former #2: Good work, #4.

Former #2 turns to Brezhnev: We’re gonna go for the landing, the whole Soviet Bloc is watching this.

Brezhnev: So are the Communist Parties of the world!

#3: Shit.

F. #2: What?

#3: We fucked up.

F. #2: What?

#3: Yeah we like totally fucked up, the landing module like fucking smashed into the surface of Mars.

Brezhnev: What!

#4: Oh shit, we’re getting a message from some martians!

Former #1: Holy shit-titties!

Brezhnev: What does it say!?

#4: It says ‘Do you want your nuke back, and if so, fuck you.” Oh wait, I forgot to read this post-script: “For this insolence, we will now invade the USSR.”

Brezhnev: Damn. Guess that means I’m fired.

====

And so, this demonstrates how the age-old saying “In Soviet Russia, Mars lands on you!”.

———————–

I’d just like to say that I actually harbour no prejudice against Russians or Communism, and I would have just as easily written something insulting the US, given my travels on wikipedia. In fact, to make it up to anyone who reads this blog that was offended, I’ll write something taking the piss out of the US pretty soon.

“Where’s your namebadge?”

“I don’t have one.”

“How long have you been working here?”

“A year.”

“So you’ve been working here for a whole year without a namebadge. Tell me, is it our responsibility or your responsibility?”

“I.. I don’t know.”

“I think you do.”

“Mine?”

“What’s your name?

“Blair.”

“Is LMNOP your line-manager?”

“Yes.”

“Right. Thanks.”

That’s right. Make an enemy out of me. I don’t even know your name, Mr. Head-honcho, I had to get someone else to tell me that you were the Regional Manager. I have so little respect for you for belittling me that I’m almost compelled to leave your stupid company. You know, I’ve even heard XYZ is a big social retard, running away from everyone, disdainful of his fame. I’m tempted to say that it’s not just this company that treats young workers like crap – it’ really hard for young people to get jobs, let alone like them. I’m fairly certain we get the dregs of what’s offered; I’m absolutely filled with frustration every time I open up the paper and read what some ageist has said about young people being slovenly drunkards with no brain-matter.

Let me get this straight: Everyone is a totally different person, everyone is a totally different citizen of the world, and the very second you deny them manners, you’ve created a social caste. Justice is fairness, I feel like you’re the reason why people start wars. I saw you bossing LMNOP as you walked down my aisle, and then stare at that woman’s arse.

.

The Chinese Room

.

1950: the food was mushy

A crooner serenaded my exhaustion with a wailing string section.

The peeling interior roof-tiles

and the talking fish

symbolise your dementia.

.

Everyone stare at me when talking about that kid who got expelled.

Actually,

let’s never leave the subject of newspaper articles.

.

When I said no-one’s ever accepted me into your family, I was dead right.

.

That wasn’t even a damn poem but you kind of get the point.

Just remember you’re not this guy:

Sweet baby taoism help us all.

The three exited the pressurised decontamination chamber and entered the operating theatre.

“What’s on the table?”

“Dead guy.” Foolio crossed his arms and leant on the sterilised wall.

“I really want some fruit.” Shrendig rubbed her stomach while making strange eye-contact with Foolio, they both sniggered and witheld the laughter.

“I think I think I know that guy,” Harkoff started to edge closer to the table, but was prevented by a gloved hand. Foolio shook his head. “I was right before, you know.”

“You’re right once, and now you’re always right?”

“But -”

“You know being attached to us is a privelidge.”

“How many times have you said that?”

“Not enough, it seems.”

“You know I’ve always wondered what both your faces look like.”

Shrendig and Foolio failed to react to this.

“So you want to find out who the lucky lad is?”

.

The men mercilessly hacking at the corpse on the table weren’t just doctors – they had read every page of natural science, they knew everything. So they didn’t care. Every inch of skin was severed, every bone was moved, replaced, disregarded with total intention. That blood vessel irritates me. Eyeballs were replaced with a new invention, iris-less steel balls that shone with cool brilliance. So then sever it. Harkoff saw what they did with the brain, little bits removed and others fattened with a pungent liquid – only Foolio saw what they did to its sex.

.

“Field-Marshal Harkoff will now view upon the identity of the mutilated stranger!” Shrendig announced in a low voice, channelling a sick vitriol towards the soldier.

Foolio winded Harkoff in wonder, and grasped the back on his head with an enormous hand. The head was then perched directly over the paced methods of the polymaths, aligned with brutish humour with that of the corpse.

Harkoff’s head was barely clear of the white shoulders before he realised it was Mallow.

Harkoff was then gently placed between the doctors and made to watch the rest of the procedure, his mind slowly dissolving its prior convictions about the levity of his comrade’s jokes.

A doctor looked up in a moment’s rest, and took an interest in the clothed and goggled face of Harkoff inexplicably standing amongst them.

“Do you know how we bring him back?”

“You ca-”

“Yes, but do you know how?”

Harkoff shook his head slowly, his goggles filling up with tears.

“I’ll show you.”

Mallow’s radically-skinnier body was resealed in seconds, suddenly bloodless, and a pair of silver irons were wheeled over from no-where. A high-whistle carried over the enormous machine they were connected to, before the irons were pressed firmly on to the chest and haunches of the corpse.

The doctor engaged Harkoff only once more, grinning, revealing three gold teeth and yellow gums, “It’s like a tamed lightning-bolt.” Suddenly the corpse lurched and Harkoff’s mind left his body. For second the corpse lay unchanged, but then the body began to twitch, before violently arching its back. Harkoff suddenly felt as if he were the whole room, as if all the air had left his ribcage and entered the steely-eyed corpse reanimated on the table. All the heat left the room, and it was cold before.

Harkoff’s kneecaps ceased existing.

Dusty, who lives in a dog-house

Dusty doo

(Dusty do doo-doo)

Scritch-a-scratch around midnight

Past midnight, asleep by early morn.

.

Dusty is a possession,

social welfare is what he is fed when I don’t forget.

What is in your mind, dog?

Who are you,

and why do you love tennis-balls so much?

Where does my mind reach?

/

I know the way.

The sun had beat down on them for little over a month now, their headclothes had dissolved, what remained on their bodies was bleached and threadbare – the smell of the earth permeated through the core of their very minds, Harkoff, Shredig and Foolio trudged blindly into the southern Nelen suburbs of Lesser Jou.

*

“Mister Minister?”

The old man put down some yellowing typewritten papers before grasping the secretary at his office door with a firm gaze. “Yes?”

“I’ve been authorised to inform you that dispatch team -”

“Contact Field-Marshall Sherpie and tell him to contact Ragzin.”

“Field-Marshall Sherpie? And… and… Ragzin?”

The Minister squinted at the woman standing in the threshold of his tiny, wall-papered room.

“Sherpie has been promoted, Miss, and he must talk to Ragzin about this matter.”

The woman lingered in the doorway and seemed to study the hunched man, and his single black bowler, unmoving on a hatstand to his left. Does this man really command the future of eighty million people?

“Is there something wrong, Miss? Miss Kost, is it?”

“Sorry sir, nothing’s wrong,” Kost turned away and moved to the nearest speaker tube to fulfil her instructions.

**

For about a century, before the Nelen discovered masses of marble in the deep south of Lesser Jou, architects and engineers were fixated on creating structures with concrete. Concrete was more than just the most functional building component ever developed, it was a tradition, a social expression of progress – for a very long time, it seemed to encapsulate what it meant to be Nelen.

Great square structures issued from the ground in Nela’s east, while it spread closer, and ever more jealously towards Jou. Concrete formed simple prisms that housed people closer and more numerously that ever before. It was both dually and simultaneously  speedily dirty, and saturated with new Nelen culture. A new movement carried this espousal of functionalism forward, prioritising not a direct expression of wealth, but the pursual and possession of as much of it as physically possible.

Installation four was a relic of this era. Concrete lift-shafts, concrete access-shafts, concerete hallways. Totally underground, it was another secret government facility that had been converted from office-space to a site for scientific experiements.

[continued, was not going to post but it became enough]

Karvezide – 12.5mg

Slow K – 600mg

Mobic – 15mg

Zoton – 30 mg

Lipitor – 10 mg

Lovan – 20 mg

Frusemide – 20 mg

Marvevan – 3 mg

Zandip – 9.4 mg