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bookandcranny · 3 years

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Shortwave Radio

Why he decided to leave behind a perfectly good astral cluster and go sight-seeing on a spinning ball of dirt in this great cosmic nothing of a solar system is a mystery to the entire family, but it’s been almost ten years now and so they’ve all had no choice but to conclude that he’s not coming back any time soon.

The right thing to do is to support him in it, so says tender-hearted big brother Hercules, and if that means jumping through a few hoops to attend some strange human ceremony in this hot and lifeless wasteland, then that’s simply what they’ll do.

summary: Five siblings from the stars come to earth by invitation of their estranged little brother, who’s only request to them is that they take a road trip across the American southwest and try to learn to see this planet the way he sees it.

content warnings: dysfunctional families, carsickness, strong language, fear of abandonment, and accidental misgendering of a nonbinary character

length: about 7k words

also, have a playlist!

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On a particularly sticky day in late July, a black minivan rolls up outside Gruber’s Convenience somewhere in the vague liminal world of the i-110 out of El Paso. Shimmering like a mirage the vehicle comes to a stop and five figures shuffle into the station. Working the counter is a greasy-faced teenager who calls himself Benj, though according to his nametag he’s Benjamin until the end of his shift.

If he weren’t intentionally ignoring the group that just walked in, resenting the loss of quiet and the cool air that just escaped with the chime of the door, Benj would notice a few things about them. For one thing, while they all look quite different, all five of them are wearing the exact same clothes: pale blue t-shirt, gray jeans, plain white sneakers, not a toe scuffed or sullied by the dust they kicked up coming in. They’re perfectly inconspicuous outfits, but too new, too deliberate in their banality.

The people in the clothes have much the same effect. They’re collections of ordinary, aesthetically pleasing parts assembled as if at random, almost uncanny at the wrong angle. Not supermodel pretty, but perhaps stock photo passable. One of them keeps touching things. Just, touching them. He trails his fingers over snack cakes and little pouches of corn nuts with an unreadable expression. Three of them are clustered together in front of the drinks fridge speaking in hushed tones.

The last one of the bunch is hovering in the corner making eyes at the shop’s resident mascot, Garfield, an uncreatively named tabby cat who’s taken to sleeping on a box underneath the AC unit. The cashier does notice her (he thinks she’s a her) if only because she’s kind of cute, in a straight-laced camp counselor kinda way. He’s already building up an idea of her in his head, every atom of it more false than he realizes.

The Christine or Sydney or whoever reaches down and gives the cat a poke, which turns into an experimental stroke.

“Mrph?” says Garfield, like cats do.

“Mrph?” parrots the... Liz maybe? No, not quite, he thinks. Garfield blinks at her, yawns. She withdraws, looking half offended by his indifference.

“Don’t take it personal,” Benj says. “He’s not very social.”

She looks at him for the first time and he reevaluates his earlier assessment. Eyes too pale, too far apart-- not ugly per se but definitely not worth the possible write-up he’d get for flirting with a customer.

“He’s the owner’s cat,” he babbles, scratching his chin and looking anywhere but at her. “Or so they say. Honestly I think he just showed up here one day and no one could get him to leave.”

Before she can reply, one of her matching buddies comes up to the register and dumps an assortment of snacks onto the counter. It’s a baffling, eclectic pile, but like any good retail worker Benj has long since learned not to examine anything too closely.

“Road trip, huh? Where are you guys headed?”

The radio behind the counter has gone all staticky. He fiddles with the antenna.

“Visiting family,” says snacks guy. His voice is soft and monotonous, a stark contrast as the guy’s built like a US SEAL.

Benj looks from face to face. “All of you?” He’s having a hard time believing any two of them are related.

He nods, once. A stiff, decisive shake of the head. The crackling of the radio is getting worse. Benj turns it off.

“Will that be everything, sir?”

Another nod.

“Herc, wait!” One of the man’s supposed relatives comes up behind him and shakes him by the shoulders. “Hercules, look at this.”

He slams a book down on the counter, one of the cheap paperbacks Gruber’s pedals between the condoms and the first-aid kit stuffings. The cover reads, “The Chest from The West” and features a heavily airbrushed model in a cowboy hat and unbuttoned flannel shirt.

“What am I looking at?” Herc asks.

“Get this too. I want to read it.”

“Why?”

He opens his mouth but whatever he’s about to say, Benj doesn’t really want to be present for it. He quickly scans the book and throws it cover-side-down into the bag. Let them work this one out on their own, hopefully somewhere else.

“Your total’s $29.75” He spins around to shake the radio, which is somehow now back on and blaring louder. When he turns back, the register is telling him everything’s been bought and paid for. Guy must be lightning quick with a credit card, he thinks.

“Huh. Guess you’re all set, man-- sir.” He hands them their bags. “Have fun at your family thing.”

He flashes the big guy a thumbs up. He looks strangely staggered by the gesture and replies haltingly, “Thank you. You also, have fun.”

“Come on, sibs,” the more energetic one chirps. “Cass? Cass, come on.” He drags his sister away from the cat, who’s just starting to warm up to her. “That’s you, remember? Let’s go.”

They don’t get any gas from the pumps outside. Benj is pretty sure he saw the testy looking one with the ponytail shoplift a bottle of off-brand cola, but he isn’t paid nearly enough to care. At least after they’re gone the radio starts working normally again.

Hercules drives, though it’s not so much driving as sitting in the driver’s seat and telling the van to go. Earth machines are simplistic and easy to manipulate. Slow though. Cass is riding “shotgun”, as is apparently customary for the navigator. Andromeda, Zeta, and Camelopardalis share the backseat, where the formermost is rehashing the same tired debate with the latter.

“We need to work out a better earth name for you,” he insists. “Myself, I’ve been doing some research and I’m thinking about going by ‘Andy’ from now on.”

“I’m not calling you that,” says Zeta.

Camelopardalis asks, “What’s wrong with the name I have?”

“It is a bit long,” Cassiopeia agrees. “A shorter one would help you fit in better.”

“Speaking of fitting in, something else has been bothering me. What’s your gender supposed to be?”

“My what?”

“You know, your gender. We all picked one.”

“It’s almost like you didn’t read the brief,” Zeta says, instigator that she is.

“It’s almost like none of you read the brief, that I took the time to write specifically to help you all acclimate to earth culture.”

“Zeta, don’t upset Cass,” Herc scolds.

“I’m not upset.” She turns in her seat to stare pointedly out the window. There isn’t much to look at, just miles upon miles of rolling desert interrupted by the occasional billboard or truck stop, all crawling by at a snail’s pace compared to the sort of travel they’re used to. Not that she’d recognize the analogy. She misses the cat.

Camelopardalis fiddles with their seatbelt. “Which one are you again?”

“I’m a ‘man’,” Andromeda recites. “Earth men are known for their physical prowess and carnivorous diet, they live in cave environments, and often congregate in packs called ‘fraternities’.” He waves the gas-station novel in the air. “I’m going to research their habits and perfect my persona. By the time I’m done with this I’ll practically be a local.”

“I don’t know… Zeta, what made you decide to be the other one?”

“Flipped a coin.”

“Women,” Cass informs them. “Can be most commonly identified by their long hair, fastidious hygiene habits, the use of traditional face paints to accentuate the eyes and lips, and by fleshy protrusions of the upper torso. Any of these traits can indicate an earth woman, though none are necessarily required.”

They throw up their hands. “How is that helpful at all then! Zeta?”

“What do you want me to do about it? I didn’t invent them. Hercules, are you sure these ‘snacks’ are safe to eat? They have a strange texture.”

“If you don’t like it, don’t eat it.” He punctuates the point by reaching back and grabbing a cream-filled cupcake off the pile. He tears the plastic with his teeth and eats half of it in a single bite. He barely tastes the thing, but he’s hoping if his siblings follow his lead their mouths will be too full to whine at him.

“Yeah, Zeta, don’t be a bitch.” Andromeda opens a pack of mini donuts, albeit more gingerly, and pops one into his mouth.

Cass whips her head around. “Where did you learn that word?”

He holds open the paperback and points to a page.

Austin hesitated. “I’ve never ridden a horse before. What if I fall?”

Derek chuckled manfully. “Don’t be a bitch, city boy,” he teased. Then he placed his large, calloused hand upon the small of Austin’s back. He leaned in and whispered, “Don’t worry, I won’t ever let you fall.”

The navigator leans over the center console and tries to snatch the book away but he dodges swiftly, clutching it to his chest.

“That’s foul language, Andromeda Alpheratz.”

“Earthers use this kind of speech with each other all the time. It’s a sign of familiarity and affection. You guys need to be less formal if you want to blend in.”

“If it’s meant to be an insult,” Camelopardalis wonders. “Why would they use it to convey affection.”

“Because they’re brutish, unevolved lifeforms,” Zeta sneers. “‘Blend in, blend in’. The rest of you can worry about blending in with the apes. I’m only doing this for Perseus.”

“We’re all doing this for Percy,” Hercules says in a chastising voice that makes even Zeta shrink down in her seat. “So can we please agree to be somewhat civil and not make this trip more painful than it needs to be?”

There’s a murmur of general agreement and peace is restored, however temporarily. Camelopardalis clears their throat.

“I still don’t really understand why we couldn’t land directly at Perseus Nine’s coordinates.”

Cass huffs, blowing a dark curl out of her face. “For the last time, Percy specifically requested we partake in the human ritual of the ‘road-trip’ for this last portion of our journey. It’s the same route he traveled the first time he came to earth, and apparently holds some sort of sentimental significance. It’s important to him we experience the same pilgrimage. For some reason.”

She adds the last part under her breath, knowing full well the others will still hear her. They can hear one another when separated by countless miles of empty space, their voices resonating from star to star, clear as a bell. Compared to that, the close proximity of a rented minivan is stifling. There’s an uncomfortable intimacy to it, these crudely assembled physical forms pressed together, bloated and heavy with all the trappings of humanity. Sweat and road dust and gravity cling to Cass like an over-warm coat and she longs for the cool estrangement that comes so easily in the void of space. It’s tough to be a star-dweller away from her star.

“The reasons don’t matter,” Herc declares, and his word is as good as law here. He is the eldest of them, though the concept of seniority is abstracted somewhat by the literal millennia they’ve all lived through.

Percy is the baby, as well as the black sheep of the family, so to speak. (His actual moniker among their kinfolk roughly translates to “the dissonant note”, a scathing insult for those who knew what it meant.) Why he decided to leave behind a perfectly good astral cluster and go sight-seeing on a spinning ball of dirt in this great cosmic nothing of a solar system is a mystery to the entire family, but it’s been almost ten years now and so they’ve all had no choice but to conclude that he’s not coming back any time soon.

“At least we can check one more stop off the list,” Zeta quips. “What’s next?”

Cass checks her itinerary. “We are to visit one national historic landmark, one ‘tourist trap’-- whatever that means-- followed by a stop at ‘Diane’s Diner’, home of the world’s best pie. After that, we can head straight to the meet-up location.” She glances at the clock on the dashboard. “We’re a little behind schedule but we should make it right on time as long as there are no unexpected delays.”

An hour and a half of driving later, Andromeda throws up corn chips and mini donuts all over the back of Herc’s seat.

They pull over on the side of the road. The desert sand is just beginning to give way to sparse yellow grass, brittle from the sun. Herc steadies Andromeda, looking viscerally displeased as he finishes emptying out his recently manifested stomach.

Camelopardalis frets through the whole episode. “We’ve all been eating the same food, except for Zeta. If it’s poisonous, one of us will be next.”

“It’s not poison, it’s carsickness,” Cass sighs. “Honestly, I’m starting to think none of you even looked at the brief.”

“Zeta, look in the back for something to clean up with.”

“Why me?”

“We’re going to lose so much time…”

“Would you rather hold him?”

Andromeda retches.

“Do you think Percy would care if we skipped a couple stops?”

“Cassiopeia Sigma,” Hercules begins sternly.

“Alright, alright. I’ll figure something out.”

Fortunately they’ve happened to stop within walking distance of something called The Trinity Site, according to the map. Camelopardalis and Cass go ahead to check another stop off the list while Zeta and Herc clean up the van and make sure Andromeda isn’t actually dying. (How embarrassing, to be a quasi-immortal astral being only to perish at the hands of a tainted twinkie.)

They wander from the roadside, following the map and occasional signposts, and shortly find themselves standing in front of an ominous looking stone obelisk with a bronze placard affixed to one side.

Trinity Site: Where the world’s first nuclear device was exploded on July 16th, 1945

There’s more but Cass stops reading. Camelopardalis asks her to explain what the plaque means by nuclear device-- they’re familiar with nuclear power as a concept, fission and fusion, ideas not far departed from the system of energy exchange that sustains their natural bodies in the heart of their stars-- but goes pale when she goes into the relevant applications of said devices.

“Wonderful,” she grumbles to herself as she snaps a few photos of the monument with a disposable camera. “I’m sure Percy will be thrilled.”

“Excuse me.”

The pair turn to see a man in a colorful button-up and khakis and a woman with a day-old sunburn peeling off beneath the straps of her tank top.

“Boy are we happy t’see the two of yous. Couldja take our picture real quick?”

The woman holds out a camera, a significantly more professional piece of equipment than the one Cass is holding.

“Oh, sure,” Cass replies. She’s nervous as she takes it from her hands. She’s never encountered this sub-species of human in her research before, and finds it difficult to parse the woman’s peculiar dialect. Both of them are smiling, but they’re also showing a lot more teeth (and a fair bit of gum) than she thinks is normal. A subtle threat?

Nevertheless, she fumbles with the camera for a moment before managing to take a decent snapshot. The man wraps an arm around his wife’s waist and she slots herself in against his side.

“Ope, wait, let’s do a silly one to send to Marsha and the kids. Were my eyes closed? No? Perfect, you’re a doll. We’ll leave you kids alone now.”

“Sure,” she says again, feeling out of pace.

“My nephew wears his hair like that,” the man says without segway. He’s talking to Camelopardalis, they realize. “It’s very… hip.”

They touch their hair. They hadn’t given it much thought before, might not ever have if he hadn’t pointed it out. It’s nice, they think.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

His expression flinches into a puzzled frown. Cass smacks their arm.

“Sir! Thank you, sir.”

After they’ve walked away Cass gives him another jab for good measure.

“His hair was longer than the other one’s,” they complain. “And the chest was sort of fleshy. How was I supposed to know?”

“We’re lucky you didn’t cause an incident. Earthers carry weapons in this part of the world.”

They rub their arm. “I don’t know, they seemed nice.”

Still they give a fleeting glance at the plaque behind them and argue no more.

They return to the van, now blessedly puke-free. Andromeda is looking better too. They all pile in and almost immediately Camelopardalis misses the freedom of being able to move without touching somebody. It may be their imagination, but the car seems to be moving slower than ever.

“How was it?” Zeta asks, despite her obvious disinterest.

“Uninspiring,” is Cass’ reply.

The other nods and doesn’t force her to elaborate. “I wish I knew what Perseus intended for us with this… chore list.”

“It’s not important, we just do it.”

Herc is always a steady presence, but even he is starting to sound annoyed with repeating himself. Zeta, of course, can’t leave well enough alone.

“If we just knew what he wanted us to do or say we could do it and go back to how we were before.”

Cass snaps. “Maybe you should stop complaining and make an effort for once.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

The car erupts into a heated four-way argument. Only Hercules resolutely abstains from comment, though his hands tighten into fists on the steering wheel. The fight doesn’t end in resolution so much as exhaustion. Everyone’s too miserable to keep hurling accusations and insults for the next hundred miles, and at length they lapse back into tense silence.

Zeta rests her head against the window, taking the arythmic rattle into herself, breathing it out in silent, frenetic melodies. She dislikes fighting with her siblings, no matter what they might claim to the contrary. It doesn’t happen often, or didn’t, but things have been different since Percy left home. The littlest star-child had a natural soothing presence to him, one that she’d long taken for granted. Earth is so noisy, she thinks. She strains to listen but she can’t hear a trace of him anywhere.

She tries to imagine what he’d say, if he were here.

“What are we even doing?”

Probably not that, but she already has everyone’s attention now so she figures she might as well keep going.

“I mean, we’re still behind schedule, we can’t stop bickering, Andromeda can’t even eat right apparently, and I’m pretty sure half of us didn’t even look at Cassiopeia’s brief.”

“Are you getting to a point?” Cass asks irritably.

“I’m just saying we’re all… bitches.”

“Zeta!”

“Get comfortable with it! We’re all bad at this. Me, you, all of us. So can we just stop blaming each other and have a truce in the interest of getting this over with?”

Cass opens her mouth, then lets it fall shut, sinking back into her seat. For a moment it seems they’re heading for another long awkward silence, when Andromeda sits up and points out the window with a sudden urgency.

“Look!”

Herc slows down and they see a billboard lit up in eerie green neon light, directing them to the next off-ramp.

Must see attraction! Visit the one of a kind Ancient Aliens Exhibit!

The star-folk look at one another.

“Is this what they call a tourist trap?”

“It seems likely.”

Andromeda is glowing-- in a very literal sense-- with excitement. “It’s an exhibit about us.”

“‘Ancient’? Speak for yourself, I’m still only in my six-thousands.”

Needless to say, they do stop at the roadside museum. Cass takes pictures aplenty and, to her surprise, actually enjoys it. Andromeda is disappointed to find there isn’t actually a display dedicated to their kind. Instead there are a lot of grainy photos of some squat, bug-eyed species called “greys” and diagrams of the Egyptian pyramids for some reason. He gets over it by the time they get to the gift shop.

By unanimous decision, they do not buy anymore snacks, though Zeta’s eye does linger on a cooler in the corner advertising “the ice cream of the future!”. Herc does however buy a number of souvenirs. (Rather, he convinces the automated register to record a purchase that didn’t technically take place, and bumps up the number in the bank account of one very nice tour guide while he’s at it.)

They leave with a mood ring, a handful of polished stones in a small velvet bag, a “gravity defying” purple yo-yo shaped like a UFO, and Camelopardalis sheepishly lays claim to a friendly looking martian figurine with bendable limbs. Overall, spirits are much higher by the time they make it back to the van.

“Hercules,” his meek younger sibling ventures. “Could I try driving? I’ve been curious about it.”

Feeling generous and more than a little tired of staring out at the road for hours at a time, he agrees. He shows Camelopardalis the basics and makes sure they know how not to veer off the road or into other drivers and then he climbs into the middle backseat and stretches out his arms so the siblings on either side of him can tuck in against him and rest. Eventually even the diligent navigator Cassiopeia begins to doze. It’s been a long day and none of them are quite accustomed to the burden of having earthbound bodies.

When Andromeda wakes up the first thing he registers is that it’s getting dark, the day reduced to a slim red band sinking over the horizon. The second thing is the yelling.

“What do you mean you don’t know!”

“I thought I could read the map myself--”

“What about you, navigator? What were you doing?”

“--didn’t mean to--”

“As if you’re one to talk! I can’t believe--”

“--and you were the one who--”

“Shut up!”

Hercules’ normally subdued baritone booms through the van. The windshield wipers begin swinging as if in indignation, while the passengers wince and cover their ears. Andromeda can’t remember a time when his brother’s frequency had felt so violent. The shivering resonance it leaves behind makes his teeth ache.

There’s a pregnant pause, then Cass slams open the door and begins to pace.

“Shit!” she yells at the empty air. They’re parked in a field somewhere, no sign of life save for the buzzing of insects and the rumble of a train somewhere off in the distance. Cass kicks at the ground and screams again. “Shit fuck bitch hell! We are so fucking lost! And so fucking late!”

Andromeda winces again and gets out to try and calm her. “Hey, it’s okay.”

“It is not! We’re probably missing the ceremony right now. Percy will never forgive me for this.”

“It wasn’t your fault…”

“I’m supposed to be the navigator!”

“Well, yes, but…” The words come out strangled. He touches his chest and realizes he’s breathing rapidly. His eyes are beginning to water as well. “I should’ve… I didn’t…”

Zeta hurries over to him. “What’s wrong? Are you going to be sick again?”

Without warning he doubles over and begins bawling.

“Hercules, do something! Something’s wrong with him!”

“Don’t… don’t… don’t…” he gasps and stammers.

Herc clutches his brother. “Don’t what? Talk to me.”

“Don’t fight,” he finally chokes out. “I don’t want to lose anybody else.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Percy,” he sniffles miserably. “He doesn’t care about us anymore. He has earth now, and all his new earth friends, and we can’t even do this one thing for him. It’s my fault. I knew he hated when I called him a dissonant note and made fun of his earth music but I did it anyway. Now he probably hates me and all of us and this whole thing has been for nothing.”

The eldest braces his arms on Andromeda’s slumped shoulders. “Percy doesn’t hate us. He invited us here because he wanted to see us.”

“Herc’s right, Andromeda. Percy doesn’t have it in him to hate anyone.”

“It’s not easy, but he chose this. He chose earth. We have to respect that.”

Zeta grumbles, “And just what is so special about this stupid planet anyway?”

“It has cats,” Cassiopeia says quietly. Her sister glares but she stays firm. “Well it does. And… people.”

“Strange, silly earth people,” Camelopardalis adds, nervously fussing with their hair. “Confusing and contradictory and fascinating.”

“People who hurt each other for no good reason.”

“People who are kind for no good reason too.”

Andromeda wipes phosphorous tears from his eyes and takes out the rumpled gas-station paperback. “In this book Austin leaves his job as a big city lawyer to follow the cowboy he’s in love with.”

“You think Perseus traveled to earth for cowboy love?”

“It’s a possibility!”

Cass scoffs. “I honestly don’t think he was thinking that far ahead. You know Percy. He probably crash-landed without any plan whatsoever. Or, he probably thought he knew what he was doing, and then when he actually got there he was terrified. And then he probably didn’t want to say anything because he was afraid his siblings would think less of him once they realized he was actually just as clueless about earth stuff as they were. That would probably be really, really stressful for him.”

“Are we still talking about Percy?”

She makes a wordless noise of frustration and kicks up another patch of grass.

Andromeda puts an arm around her. “If… Percy was worried about that, I’d tell her-- him! I’d tell him that he shouldn’t be, because there’s nothing he could do that would make us stop believing in him.”

She exhales. “Thanks.”

“I was talking about you, Cass,” he whispers. “It’s you I believe in.”

“Thank you, I got that.”

“I just… miss him, I guess.”

Herc hums in agreement. “Barely a millennium old and he’s already grown up and gone completely terrestrial. This past century has been the longest of my existence.”

“Hercules, it’s only been ten years.”

That news causes him to make such a face that Zeta starts laughing. It’s the first time she’s so much as cracked a smile the entire trip.

“So… what do we do now?” Camelopardalis asks.

After a moment, Cass grabs the map off the dashboard and holds it open.

“A little more light please?”

They step up behind her and hold a glowing hand over the paper. Her brow creases in concentration.

“Alright, I think we’re somewhere around here,” She gestures. “And we need to be here. There’s no way we’re going to show up on time, but we can still show up. We owe him that much.”

They get in their seats, Herc back at the helm, and begin trying to reclaim the distance they lost with the unplanned detour. Cass breathes a sigh of relief when road signs start to reappear. A driver honks at them as they pick up speed and Herc steers closer and makes their radio start playing at top volume. Zeta opens the window and a cool night breeze tickles her skin. The stars are bright and beautiful above them, and looking up, suddenly home doesn’t feel so far away.

All at once they slow to a near stop.

“What’s going on? Why are we stopping?”

“Traffic,” Herc says like it’s a curse. “Looks like there was an accident.”

“Take this exit,” Cass commands. “We can cut through the next town and get ahead of it.”

So he does and soon they find themselves driving through the quiet streets of Kismet, Nevada. That is, quiet until Zeta catches sight of something out the window and yells, “Pull over!”

“What! What is it now!”

She points, and they see. The sign ahead reads, “Diane’s Diner: Home of the World’s Best Pie”. They pull in so fast they nearly end up colliding with a stout aproned woman who’s pushing a teetering hand cart across the lot.

“What do you maniacs think you’re doing?” she demands as they clambour out of the van.

“I’m very sorry, ma’am,” Cass says in a rush. “It is just very important to my siblings and I that we get to this establishment.”

The woman huffs. “You’re a mite late then, I’m afraid. We’re closing up early tonight. Got a big catering order I have to deliver.”

Herc asks, “Are you Diane, of the diner?”

She laughs. “Close. I’m Maddie Finkle of the diner. Diane’s my mother’s name. It’s a family business. But what brings you folks here looking for Diane at this time of night? I don’t think I’ve seen your faces around town before, and I always remember a customer.”

“Do you remember a customer named Percy? It would’ve been years ago, but this place was very important to him. He’s our brother.”

Maddie’s eyes light up. “Why didn’t you say so! Of course I know Percy. And if you rowdy lot are his siblings, then I’ve got a message for you.”

“A message?” Percy hadn’t said anything to them about a message. Maybe this was his way of ensuring they actually made it to the last stop on his list.

“Well, sort of. Come, come, help me load up all this grub and I’ll tell you everything.”

Herc and Zeta go to either side of her and help push the wobbly cart to a truck with the diner’s logo emblazoned on the side. As they load the boxes, Maddie speaks.

“I first met your Percy when I was just a waitress, mama still working the kitchen. One day this kid walks in, looking as lost as can be, comes straight up to the counter and tells me he’s just fallen from outer space and could use some assistance.” She barks a laugh. “I didn’t go for the whole alien thing but that second part was a lot more believable. He looked a mess. I asked if he needed something to eat but he just said he needed a safe place to rest for a moment. He’d been on his feet all day, walking and hitchhiking his way clear across the desert.

“Of course I wanted to know where he was going that was so important, but he said he didn’t know for sure yet. Said he was following a melody, a song he’d heard from very far away that had drawn him to this place. I told him I couldn’t help him there. The only music we had in the diner was this old stereo system mama had put in when she first opened the place and it was long broken. Mama was too sentimental to get rid of the old thing and the repairman couldn’t do anything for it so broken it stayed.

“He asked me to show him so I did, figuring it couldn’t hurt anything. Then that kid walked up to the busted speaker and just like that it started playing again like it was new. I told him, ‘For that, I owe you more than a place to rest your legs. Stay in town for a while, let us put you up and get you back on your feet, or at least let me drive you to the train station so you can get where you’re going.’ But he refused, and before long he was gone again.

“Then, not a couple days later, spaceboy comes back traveling with this other kid, heading in the opposite direction. I ask him what happened and he says he was going one way but he changed his mind and turned around. He leans in like he’s sharing a great big secret, like we’ve been friends all our lives, and says, ‘I found it, Maddie. I found the song.’ Weirdest kid I’ve ever met! But they make a cute couple, him and that boy, and they’re some of my best customers to this day.”

They finish packing up the truck, Maddie leaning leisurely against the fender as she reminisces. Herc frowns, confused.

“Was that the message?”

“Yup.” She pops the P. “He just told me to tell you the story. Not sure why. I mean, it’s a good story, I think. But you already know all about it, right? You’re his family after all.”

“No, he never told us,” he admits softly.

“Huh. Weird. But then, he’s kind of a weird kid, yeah? I always wondered, is it all you aliens who talk in riddles like that, or just him?”

“I thought you said you didn’t believe his claims.”

“I didn’t the first time, but if your Percy’s one thing it’s… Perc-istent.” When no one laughs, she pushes onward. “Well, that’s all of it. We’d better get a move on, huh?”

“‘We’?”

“Sure, aren’t you folks on your way to Percy’s place too? I figured you’d be staying over, and I gotta get everything set up for the wedding tomorrow.”

A palpable shock ripples through the star-folk. “Tomorrow?”

“‘Course, what did you think all this was for?” She pats the truck. “I wanted to get everything ready ahead of time so we’re good to go in the morning. It’s not easy being the caterer and providing my lovely self as a guest on the same day, but I couldn’t let those sweet boys down.”

Andromeda slumps over, leaning on Herc for support. “Percy told us the wedding was tonight.”

The chef raises an eyebrow. “Sounds like someone’s been having a little fun with you. Nah, they’re doing some sort of get-together tonight since neither one of the bachelors wanted a bachelor party, but the actual wedding ceremony’s definitely not until tomorrow.”

“I’m going to end him,” Cass mutters under her breath.

“Hurry up now,” she says. “I’m sure the groom-to-be’s expecting you.”

The five follow Maddie’s truck away from the main drags, away from the buildings, the scenery becoming gradually greener as the road turns from asphalt to gravel. At last they find themselves pulling up in front of the house that Percy has come to call home. It’s a raised ranch, flanked by evergreens and patchwork plots of small white and yellow flowers that Percy’s fiance must have planted, and a tower of plastic chairs and tables covered by a tarp.

It’s a nice place, large and somewhat secluded, set apart from the noise of traffic or threat of nosy human neighbors. Percy’s sensitive to loud noise and, after all, still an alien living in secret amongst humanity. Yet as they get out and follow the caterer where she’s cutting around back through the garden, they’re struck by the sounds of laughter and music and lively chatter.

A group of earthers are gathered on the patio, smiling faces lit by a string of twinkling lights. A man with a guitar strums along with the music coming from inside.

“Are you sure we’re in the right place?” Andromeda whispers.

“You think there’s a second Perseus Nine about to be married in this town?” Cass shoots back.

Zeta hisses, “Quiet, I can hear him.”

To his surprise, Herc can too. Above the noise, laced into everything he touches, there is a resonance, his baby brother’s unique personal frequency. To describe it as sound alone would perhaps be inaccurate; it’s a vibration, an echo. Percy is everywhere in this place: his whispers and his shouts, his twinkling laugh, but also the part of him that no human being can detect, the part of him that is still, and will always be, of the stars.

He must sense them too, because in that moment he appears standing in the doorway, bathed in its yellow light. His face breaks out in a glowing grin and he runs to greet them, bolting like a comet being pulled into his siblings’ orbit.

“You made it!” he exclaims.

Zeta snorts and allows him to throw his arms around her. “No thanks to you and your list of demands.”

“You brat,” Cass accuses. “You told us the ceremony was tonight.”

Percy tilts his head to look at her, his expression not half as guilty as it should be. For a moment she reels at the sight of him; the body he’s constructed for himself has aged since the last time they crossed paths. It’s subtle, the way his dimples have deepened into true laugh lines, and his hair has grown ever longer, though it also isn’t as tangled as she remembers. He is still himself, underneath, the light of his true being faintly visible beneath the skin.

“I was worried if I told you the real date you wouldn’t make it in time. You’re not used to traveling the human way. It can be messy.”

She grimaces. “You’re not wrong.”

“You’re actually here way earlier than I thought you’d be.” His smile falters, only slightly. “This is… everyone?”

Herc swallows. “The others…” he begins, but quickly finds he doesn’t have the words that should follow.

“Well, it’s not like I had enough chairs for all two-hundred-ninety-seven of them anyway.” He reaches out and squeezes his brothers tightly. “Hercules, Andromeda, It’s so wonderful to see you. Camelopardalis, Cassiopeia, it means so much to me that you came. I know it probably wasn’t easy. Zeta…”

She scoffs. “The only hard part was putting up with these bitches.”

Hercules interjects, “We shouldn’t keep you from your party. Go on, I need to get some things from the van.”

“You didn’t bring presents, did you?”

“It’s customary for weddings, is it not?”

Percy grins. “You’re becoming a real expert on earth customs.”

He shrugs and looks at Cass. “I just read the brief.”

Percy invites his family in, along with Maddie, who is perfectly tickled by the siblings’ awkward affection. After helping her bring in the food, Percy beckons over the man with the guitar.

“Adam!”

The man looks up. He has a boyish, freckled face and a head of dark curls that spill over his brow. He sets down the instrument and comes to slot himself against Percy’s side, thoughtlessly, as if that was always where he was meant to be.

“I’d like to formally introduce you to my fiance, Adam. And Adam, this is my family.”

His smile broadens. “Hey, great to finally really meet you guys. Percy talks about you all the time. Did you have a long trip?”

They look at one another for a moment until finally Herc shrugs and says, “Only about twenty-five trillion miles, give or take.”

The happy couple linger for a moment longer, sharing stories and talking about honeymoon plans. Adam is especially thrilled when Andromeda and Zeta begin to co-narrate an embarrassing tale from Percy’s childhood in the Alpha Persei Cluster. Eventually though the pair wander off together, leaving the star-folk to their most harrowing challenge yet: mingling.

“Sorry, what did you say your name was?”

“Camelopardalis.”

The guest, one of the couple’s mutual friends, goes a bit bug-eyed. “Wow, okay, that’s really cool. Kind of a mouthful though. Got a nickname?”

“Nick… name?”

“Like, something that your friends call you for short. My friends call me Dee, but my highschool nickname was Dent.” They point to a scar on the side of their head, just above their left ear. Their fair hair is buzzed short, making it easy to see. “Long story. What if for now I called you ‘Cam’?”

They consider it. “I think I’d like that.”

“Cool, nice to meet you, Cam.”

“Nice to meet you, Dee.” They hesitate. “Would you say you’re a man or a woman?”

Dee frowns.

“Nevermind! I’m so sorry, I just don’t understand the earth gender binary at all. Everything about it just seems so arbitrary and senseless.”

Oddly enough, their new friend perks back up at this.

“Honestly, same,” they laugh.

Andromeda joins shortly, having struck up a conversation with Dee’s partner who is deeply intrigued by his review of “The Chest from The West”. The three of them spend a while swapping book recommendations. Meanwhile, Zeta gets hit on by a slightly intoxicated young woman with an undercut and an eyebrow ring, although the star-dweller vastly misinterprets her none-too-subtle questioning about alien biology. Cass meets Adam and Percy’s pet dog, Chowder, and deems him as good a companion as the convenience store cat.

Herc catches Percy alone in the kitchen and the two have a long overdue talk. It’s clumsy but earnest, and when Herc mumbles something out about possible future family visits, Percy throws himself into his brother with such vigor that he momentarily forgets about gravity and starts to float off the ground.

“I’m sorry too, by the way, for the whole thing with the list,” he sighs. “It probably seems pretty stupid, I just kind of hoped I could get you to see this world the way I see it. Full of life and love and adventure.”

“And music,” he finishes, catching the way his gaze flits back to the patio. To Adam, singing softly and dancing with one of their friends.

He nods. “I thought maybe then you’d understand why this is so important to me.”

“I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to see earth the way you do,” Hercules confesses. “But I don’t think it was stupid of you to try either, and I don’t think it was for nothing.”

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the mood ring. The friendly prismatic face of a cartoon alien glints up at him. Perseus takes the gift with an understanding chuckle and slips it onto his pinky finger.

“No, not for nothing.”

Tomorrow, there will be a wedding. Percy and Adam will stand in front of their friends and family and exchange their vows. Adam’s mother will complain about them not booking a proper venue for just short of an annoying amount of time, Maddie will bring out a ridiculously tall tier cake that will taste almost as good as one of her mother’s pies, and for once Percy will not be the worst one on the dance floor.

Tomorrow, there will be a bright silver band around Percy’s fourth finger, neighbored by a smaller ring in the shape of an inside joke, and with all the weight of a promise.

#aliens #original fiction #writeblr #short story #original writing #road trip #me? posting my writing again? its more likely than u think #lgbt #my writing

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oldfolksineurope · 4 years

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Steve here. Language is a challenge from time to time. Usually it results in a silly mistake, like getting fried scrimp rather than grilled ones. Hardly a big deal, and who doesn’t like fried scrimp? However, travel is one of the places where our lack of Spanish makes things more difficult than it should be. Ecuador is not a large country, and buses are the most common means of travel. So, we decided to try a brief bus trip to see how we liked the experience. We decided to go to Manta, a port town of 200,000 just 53 miles from here. Rumor has it that there are regular buses and ‘executive’ buses that are more direct, but when we arrived at the bus station, there was nobody speaking English and we were hustled onto a Manta bus that turned out to be a milk run. It was stopping to pick up people on the side of the road, made a strange ‘lunch stop’ where nobody got off the bus but instead a parade of people got on with various foods for sale. Most of the items we did not recognize, although a young man got on with what appeared to be a chocolate covered banana. Anyway, the bus had AC, seats were OK, but no bathroom and a wall between the driver and conductor and the passengers that only opened when passengers wanted off. Not seeing the road in front made everything seem slightly claustrophobic. In any case, we made Manta in two hours, fifteen minutes, successfully got a taxi and arrived at our small weird hotel room close to the coast. Manta turned out to be a dull industrial port city with few interesting or redeeming qualities. There was a nice beachfront with a long row of restaurants and a very large port next door to the beach. There was a glittering American style four story mall with expensive stores and restaurants, and I walked to a neighborhood of discos and nightclubs, but of course I was there in the morning, not at midnight. We did eat great seafood, had good hotel breakfast buffets and enjoyed watching all the action on the beach. Probably the highlight of our excursion was the last night when we searched for a sunset spot, ending up at a steakhouse outdoor balcony on the top of the mall. It was a great view, and of course, it was happy hour. We each had two frozen margaritas and a delicious fried cheese appetizer for a grand total of $15. Hard to complain, and we did not, especially when our friend Pat called to save us from the bus ride back to Bahia.

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champagnediva · 5 years

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If you want to drive in Santo Domingo “Don’t” . Nerves of steel is an understatement, at least for me.

Red lights ! oblivious. Lanes !! only a suggestion. Imagine you open a room full of crazies and distribute driving licences, cars and motorcycles and just say “go out there and drive, Don’t Worry about the rules , there are none” I know you think I’m exaggerating or being funny, NOT!!!. Utter chaos. Although I must say I didn’t see any bodies on the road so I suppose there must be a method to their madness . Anyway that was my experience . Aside from the driving part it was a good experience. They do have a good transit system ,so if you are not a daredevil maybe you could travel by train or Taxi , lots of people use Uber ( Orange cars). Renting a car is cheap but by the time you add insurance it becomes a bit expensive. Another thing which I think needs mentioning is safety, driving around in Santo Domingo, I was told not to keep my window down, I guess driving my convertible is out of the question 😦 .

Santo Domingo random street photos

train station

Drove around Santo Domingo a bit. fascinating electrical work. How the heck to they figure this out?

The casino next to The Sheraton.

The first night we spent at the Sheraton Santo Domingo on the Malecon. Star quality hotel ,very welcoming staff. I always prefer to eat local but we decided to have dinner at the hotel restaurant with friends ( not a big fan of hotel food). Can’t say I was disappointed, the ceviche was pretty delicious.

Shrimp Cocktail

Cevice

A good night sleep on BTW was the most comfortable bed I have ever slept in, at a hotel.

Breakfast , then off we went to las Terrenas. The purpose of my trip was to go check out the possibilities of buying a property.

On the road keep the speed limit ,radar is everywhere ready to catch you. If you are stopped , they just want money. Of Course we were stopped, they somehow know when you are a tourist. I was told that most people just pay and go, and I did notice that they didn’t really want to give us a ticket. We could have just paid and left but instead we pretended we did not understand Spanish or what they were saying, frustrated the crap out of them, after 15 minutes of frustrations, no ticket, no payola. The words “La Prensa” (my Press pass ) got us on our way. Guess they didn’t want a write up. LOL .

We finally arrived in las Terrenas after more than 2 hours of driving from Santo Domingo.The tolls from Santo Domingo to Las Terrenas are about 25.00 Usd or about 1200 Pesos. Make sure you have Pesos , they don’t accept USD.

Las Terrenas

A resort town on the Samaná Peninsula, in the northeastern part of the Dominican Republic. A beautiful safe town inhabited by lots of European retirees. I found it quite interesting that in most place I went in town, most people spoke French,of course English and Spanish .

The French bakery and of course the local Cigar shop.

Graffiti in las terrenas

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LODGING: Residencia El Balata

A very unique property about 2 km from the beach, you can actually walk to the beach. very Original in design , natural woodwork . The owner is very friendly and very accommodating. English, French and Italian are spoken. Of course Spanish .

its the perfect spot , quiet and very relaxing . The property gives you the feeling of really being away from civilization.They have a large parking and no problems with Wi-Fi. We did not opt for the breakfast but they serve a wonderful breakfast for an additional $5.00 and for an additional $10.00 you can request AC, we didn’t need it, as the temperature was quite comfortable with the windows open and the ceiling fan. Our room was very clean , modern , large and comfortable. The wood theme was carried throughout the rooms and the entire property. The prices are quite affordable. There is also a 3 legged Rottweiler , who is very shy.

On my next visit to las Terrenas I will definitely stay there again and highly recommend it..

What would a beach town be without beach bars and restaurants?.We took a liking to MOJITOS specially for their Mojito Happy Hour. This is a Cuban restaurant owned by Carlos he is originally from Cuba and travels back and forth. you can also get dinner there.

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Most people seem to prefer Motorcycles and ATVs as a mode of transportation. This makes the center of town a bit noisy.

But my favorite for prices and food,is the retaurant Le Tre Caravelle a convivial little spot for Italian food. The decor might throw you off a bit , as it looks more like seafood than Italian,but dont let that sway you, the food is fabulous, and at 0.50 pesos for $1.00 you can have a lovely inexpensive little vacay.

Whale Watching in Samana

we booked a trip with whale Samana with Marine biologist Kim Beddall In Samana Bay. One of the top 10 places in the world to watch whales. The humpback whales comes every year to give birth in Samana Bay making them, honorary citizens of the Dominican republic.

The sea was really rough , I was being thrown around like a beach ball , my friends were like “What the heck? ‘they laugh at me since I seemed to have been the only one flying around. Thank god they gave out sea bands for sea sickness ,usually I travel with my own, but forgot them on this trip. Unfortunatly and before knowing that they were going to distribute sea bands I was given a Dramamine pill ( hate to take those ) since I become sort of a useless zombi for the entire day. Oh Well.)

after ge got back to santo Domingo we still had one more night so we checked into the Crown Plaza Hotel . I would have prefered an older hotel in the colonial zone but the one we wanted was full. Anyway can’t go wrong with the crown plaza.

One more drive around the city to visit and take pictures before heading to the airport.

The Colonial zone is definitely worth a visit. The rum museum Museo Del Ron Y La Cana is fabulous, we got yo taste the various flavored and top of the line aged rums. They even had cilantro flavored rum. I bought a bottle of pineapple rum but had to leave it behind ( no checked baggage ) NO charge for the visit. Unfortunately my trip was very short ,I would have liked to spend a little more time to take pictures in the colonial zone and learn a bit more history.

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As you walk down Calle El conde ,The first commercial street in the New World and a popular pedestrian shopping area, 10 blocks long and cuts right through the Colonial city. The cobblestone road is lined with restaurants, cafes, souvenir shops and also street art vendors selling colorful paintings. There are plenty of historic sights along the way , starting at Calle El Conde’s entrance at Parque Independencia, onto the Parque Colón and first cathedral, to its edge at Calle Las Damas.

The home ofDiego Colon

At the beginning of every block there is a Munecas Limé .

You maybe wondering why the dolls have no face?. In the 1980’s s sculptor Liliana Mera Limé (hence the name) created these faceless dolls. The are called munecas Limé. They represent a people of diverse ancestral blend from the native Quisqueyanos, the Africans, and the Spanish Conquistadores. The dolls, have no faces so as not to show preference to one branch of their ancestral lineage (i.e.. discriminating against the black or native american ancestry). Great souvenir to take back or to collect. they are found everywhere.

Unfortunately my trip was very short ,I would have liked to spend a little more time to take pictures in the colonial zone and learn a bit more history. Next time.

One last little note about tipping;

Another interesting Tidbit . On all bills , restaurant and other purchases , there is a fee added of 10% P/Legal and a service charge of 18 % which they call a tip. You are actually paying an additional fee on your bill of 28% ( You are still expected to tip). Its was very confusing when i first got my first bill in the restaurant. thinking the tip was included. I understand that the wages are very low so even if you give an extra 10%.

I hope that you found this to be interesting and It encourages you to take a little trip. I would really appreciate your comments and recommendations.

Nerves of steel, Dominican driving.It’s more than that. If you want to drive in Santo Domingo "Don't" . Nerves of steel is an understatement, at least for me.

#cigars #colonial Art #Graffiti #las terrenas #Mural Artist #rum #santo domingo #tipping #travel #Travel Art #wellbeing #whale watching #whales

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lunaviney · 5 years

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Lunaviney’s Search for Automotive Heaven

Chapter 2: Chrysler 300Cheap

The Chrysler 300C is a car I’ve spent a lot of time with. Daily driving one for a year of study I got to personally know all the ins and out of it. The 300 I lived with was a 07 with a van diesel engine, the mighty 3 liter OM642 turbo diesel commonly found in the Sprinter.

But lets start from the beginning. The 300C was developed during the Daimler Chrysler era of the company. Built on the LX Platform, a compilation of ‘’the worst of Mercedes’’. The beast that is the 300C was unveiled to the masses 2003, with a styling to bring back the glory days with the old 300 Chryslers featuring a gigantic grille and all the best contemporary American luxury and performance to boot. But the goodness ends at the looks, especially the station wagon version with its sleek shooting break style roof line looks fantastic. Too bad once you start driving it, you will figure out quite fast, that the car is unbelievably poor. Partly due to sharing a lot of components with some of the weakest machines in Mercedes rich alumni, and in other part just being Chrysler’s questionable build quality. Its so sad really, if it drove as good as it looks, it would’ve been a classic.

As for the drivey bits, this sauerkraut bigmac of a machine feels very floppy to drive. Its shockingly uncomfortable on any surface you could think to put it on, even velvet smooth tarmac makes it flop aimlessly around the road like fish out of water. The OM642 TD V6 engine doesn’t help either with its magnificently uninteresting engine note. It does accelerate pretty well when you try to overtake someone, it is a Merc engine after all. But the 5G Tronic lurks over your trip like an evil stepmother. I’m not sure if its how it is normally or it was just for this very car but the gearbox was hideous. It either changed gears on pure guess or not at all. Especially when climate as is the yearly tradition, over here, becomes slightly cold. It just gave up all together. Shining light upon another huge problem with it, namely the traction control. I’m not sure if its a Mercedes unit, or a Chrysler unit, but its programmed with the most hardcore daddy kinks you could imagine. With the slightest slippery spot on the road it whips you in order with the force of a demigod punching you in the stomach. You can’t even to my knowledge turn it off completely so your best bet is to be daddy’s little girl and drive it at the speed of snail taking a bath in molasses. Which is for the best as it just tends to lose all its grip just by looking at the accelerator pedal.

Moving on to the interior, things doesn’t improve much. Its a buffet of cheap nasty plastics, just surrounding you like a tomb of gray depression. The instrument cluster inlays are clearly pieces of white paper, backlit with a green bulb. Giving you a retina poisoning dishwater green glow at all times. The interiors centerpiece is an analogue clock in the middle of a big silver plastic slab, so cheap that would make even Wish.com think: ‘’hey that’s too cheap, mate’’. The cheap feeling carries on to pretty much every switch in the car. It feels a lot like you’re about to poke a hole through the dashboard if you get the slightest idea of operating them. The heater takes a calendar year to start blowing hot air into your hypothermia riddled face, but the AC works wonders. So that’s something! The boot is deceptively small if you ever have the need to use the station wagon as, well a station wagon. If you happen to know that you’re the type of person who would have great use for a big plentiful ass to put things in your car, get a Volvo.

Moving on to the exterior before finishing this review up. Being an early noughties Mercedes product, there will be rust. Quite a lot of rust as well. This one wasn’t that bad. It did start rusting quite badly around the rear wiper and in classic Merc spirits, around the wheel arches. So watch out for that if you suddenly find yourself buying one, as they’ve started becoming quite cheap.

In summary, this is basically a 90s Mercedes, built by a company with a budget of 2 cents and a burger coupon, and it really feels. Just buy a broken one and enjoy those gorgeous looks. Which will also spare you the trouble when it breaks, of course.

PS, I swear the next one will be less negative.

Godspeed everyone!

#car #chrysler #300c #chrysler300c #diesel #mercedes #daimlerchrysler #FCA #review #lunaviney #carreview #car review #automobile #automobile review #automobilereview #pretty bad #sarcasm #dodge

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berniesrevolution · 6 years

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With their huge improvements in special elections across the country, it looks increasingly probable that Democrats will win big in the 2018 midterms, and perhaps take control of both Congress and the presidency in 2020. That raises a logical question: In an ideal world, what should they do?

American society is in dire straits, and things will likely be even worse by the time a Democrat takes office. They will have a brief window to fix multiple screaming policy emergencies, and reform American political institutions to prevent a resurgence of the diseased Republican Party.

Below, I will outline a draft platform that would both accomplish worthy goals and provide political benefits. Since the conventional wisdom on political feasibility and popularity has proved to be highly unreliable of late (see: President Donald J. Trump), I have focused on things that will provide immediate and concrete partisan benefits, while strengthening democratic liberties. The ideas are grouped under three headings: political reform, domestic policy, and foreign policy. Let's get cracking.

Political reform:

Now, Democrats should not cheat like Republicans do. It would be wrong to do a reverse Kris Kobach, and suppress the votes of old white people by making Fox News watchers present 14 different forms of photo ID before they can vote. However, there is nothing wrong with strengthening America's democratic institutions — making it simpler and easier for allAmericans to vote and obtain political representation — in part because it would provide a partisan benefit. To wit:

1. Make Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., states.

This step would both address the greatest structural violation of democratic liberties in American society and provide the largest tangible partisan benefit to Democrats. D.C. residents and Puerto Ricans are quite literally oppressed colonial subjects, taxed without representation.

In D.C.'s case that creates frequent dysfunction and annoyance, but in Puerto Rico's case it is a full-blown emergency. It is obvious that the Republican government's ongoing failure to rebuild the island after it was flattened by Hurricane Maria (much less address its ongoing debt crisis) has a great deal to do with the fact that they have no congressional representation. Instead of futilely appealing to Paul Ryan's nonexistent conscience, actual Puerto Rican senators and representatives could vote, grab the ear of national media, trade favors, argue with other national politicians, and credibly threaten to gum up the wheels of Congress if their state was not fixed. (In other words, they would have power.)

2. Abolish the filibuster.

Many big and controversial bills will need to be passed very quickly. Democrats cannot afford the swing vote in the Senate to be some quisling Blue Dog in the pocket of Wall Street, as Joe "The ObamaCare Hamstringer" Lieberman was in 2009-10. This should be done at the earliest possible moment.

3. Resurrect and strengthen the Voting Rights Act.

Republican vote suppression and district boundary cheating has become their ace in the political hole, hugely enabled by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts' decision gutting the Voting Rights Act. Roberts' decision struck down the preclearance portion of the VRA — which forbade certain jurisdictions from making any changes to their voting procedure without first getting federal certification that they would not disenfranchise minorities — on the grounds that Jim Crow was a long time ago and so it was an unfair burden. That obstacle removed, Republicans immediately set about disenfranchising as many minorities as possible.

Roberts' "reasoning" was obviously 100 percent partisan pretext. But one solution that fits with his logic is to extend preclearance to the entire country. In keeping with Article Four, Section Four, an inalienable right to vote for all citizens and legal residents should be established, including for ex-cons and current prisoners, and all jurisdictions should be required to submit a plan to the federal government ensuring easy and universal access to the franchise. (This can be made easier by establishing a federal template for all levels of government, which would include universal mail-in voting, if people would rather not bother.) Any changes will have to be pre-cleared. Election Day itself should also be moved to a Friday and made a national holiday.

Incidentally, this will have the salutary effect of sharply improving the voting rights in many blue states like New York, where the corrupt Democratic regime is none too eager to have millions of poor people casting ballots.

Finally, as part of the voting rights package, both national and state-level district boundaries should be taken out of the hands of partisan legislatures, and put under control of nonpartisan committees required to draw maps which produce a legislature whose partisan composition at least approximates the raw vote totals.

All this aligns high moral principle with grubby partisan motives. It would mean probably four more Democratic senators and several representatives, and sharply improve Democratic prospects in several states with preposterously unfair gerrymandering or where a huge proportion of minorities have been permanently disenfranchised. However, that is no reason to get squeamish about it. On the contrary, the likeliest way that D.C. residents and Puerto Ricans are going to get their freedom, and the effectively tyrannical aspects of many American political institutions are going to be expunged, is if it can be successfully clubbed into the heads of the Democratic leadership that it is in their partisan interest to do so.

Domestic policy:

1. Climate change.

This is one area where politics absolutely must take a back seat to principle. If Democrats believe what they're saying about climate science, and they accumulate some political capital with the above program, this is where it must be spent first. As I've argued before, this is by far the most important problem facing American society, because it is a serious emergency that will require a top-to-bottom overhaul of society. Trump's climate denier presidency almost could not have come at a worse time. The next administration will have to cut emissions as fast as it possibly can, both to slow climate change and to avoid the risk of tripping feedback loops that could push warming into an uncontrollable self-sustaining spiral.

People can and do argue all day about precisely the best way forward on climate, but one simple way of thinking about it is to take what China is doing with decarbonization, energy efficiency, and renewables, and aim to beat them by 50 percent. That both gets in the right ballpark of what needs to happen (China's climate policy is extremely aggressive, though still not good enough), and indicates the international nature of the issue. Such a "competition" — in reality, a mutually-beneficial international coordination — would be both excellent policy and a worthy national project. If we're lucky, it might even inspire China to up their game even more as well.

2. Health-care reform.

This has been the main policy axis of mobilization for lefties during the Trump presidency, and it's not hard to see why. The ObamaCare policy approach has proved to be a massive headache with multiple pitfalls and unforeseen consequences. Its political bargain — that a more conservative, free-market road to universal coverage would be more politically stable — turned out to be wrong. Though Republicans have not managed to repeal the law outright, it is suffering major damagewith the repeal of the individual mandate and regulatory attacks. Tellingly, the market-oriented part of the law — the individual exchanges — are doing the worst.

Democrats should aim for something like an upgraded Medicare-for-all system, with complete medical coverage and no cost-sharing. It both makes the best policy sense and has steadily increased in popularity. What precisely that should look like is not to be hashed out now — the Sanders and Ellison bills and the "Medicare Extra" plan from the Center for American Progress are reasonable — but the best direction to head is obvious: away from markets, and towards traditional social insurance.

Doing so would both address an ongoing humanitarian crisis and deliver a major win to Democratic base voters who have been advocating for this for generations. Moreover, after the dust settles most people would be immensely relieved by being permanently placed on a high-quality Medicare-type system. Democrats should have the confidence to ignore the lobbyists and simply ram through as good a bill as possible.

3. Family policy.

The structure of American society is deeply hostile to parents even very far up into the upper class. Paid family and sick leave, a child allowance, universal pre-K, and some kind of universal daycare would go a great deal towards ensuring parents don't have a near-impossible struggle between raising their children and being forced to go back to work. This would further advance the U.S. welfare state and deliver meaningful goods to an important Democratic voting bloc: young people.

And while one can't say for sure what people would think about this, the fact that the United States is literally one of two countries in the world (the other being Papua New Guinea) without paid family leave shows you how much of an outlier we are on this. Like Medicare for all, once they figured out how great it is, people would love a family benefits package.

4. Sharp tax increases on the rich and corporations.

It's not immediately obvious that this would be a win in terms of public opinion, though polls do consistently find a large majority of people saying the rich pay too little in taxes. But it would help pay for Democratic priorities, and may well end up strengthening growth by diverting money away from shareholders and executives, and towards workers and investment. And in tangible political terms, it would definitely take money out of the pockets of the ultra-wealthy, who spend ungodly sums subsidizing right-wing propaganda and dirty tricks operations.

5. Labor law reform.

Again public opinion is muddled on this one, since unions barely exist throughout much of the country. But passing a pro-union legal package — by, for example, banning so-called "right-to-work" laws at the national level, passing card check, or, most aggressively, mandating what's called sectoral bargaining to unionize whole swathes of the economy at a stroke — would benefit workers and raise wages.

It would also directly benefit Democrats, as newly-revitalized unions saw their power, money, and influence grow by leaps and bounds. They would surely direct their votes and campaign donations to the party that secured those benefits, as they did in FDR's time.

6. Antitrust and other corporate regulation.

Concentration is a grave problem in the American economy, where a handful of businesses have rolled up control over everything from computer chips to chicken. Breaking up these business will both provide more options for consumers, push economic activity into places other than a handful of very large cities, and help workers, who face labor market monopsony and hence lower wages. That could assist the genuinely left-behind Americans in rural areas and smaller towns Trump championed in his campaign but utterly failed to help as president.

Wall Street should come under special attention. The biggest banks should be broken up, and heavy new regulations, deliberately designed to keep financial businesses small and less profitable, should be levied. In contrast to Dodd-Frank, these should be simple and difficult to avoid, not complicated and take years to implement. This would benefit not just the actually productive parts of the economy, from which much financial profit is parasitically extracted, but also sharply reduce the risk of another global financial crisis.

Politically, antitrust and financial regulation would knock out one prop of reactionary politics. As we've seen in President Trump's Cabinet, Wall Street has been eager and willing to help along a truly vile president, so long as it get its tax cuts. Cutting finance's share of GDP by half would considerably reduce the amount they could dedicate to electing the next future conservative lunatic.

Meanwhile, vigorous antitrust in the media space, coupled to regulation of platforms like Facebook and YouTube, will also help break the influence of deep-pocketed right-wing propaganda. Restrictions on the number of TV or radio stations any one entity can own will further prevent reactionary businessmen pushing pro-Trump propaganda throughout the nation. It would not completely disable the grifting machine that is eating the Republican Party alive, but it would help quite a bit.

Foreign policy:

1. Defense spending cuts.

The easiest step to take on foreign policy is to cut the bloat and waste in military spending. Back in 2016, The Washington Post reported that a study commissioned by the Pentagon itself had found $25 billion per year in pure administrative waste at the Defense Department, which it then suppressed due to fear of budget cuts. Even if that's overstated, there is still the psychotically expensive and dubiously necessary B-21 heavy bomber, the even more expensive and already outdated F-35 fighter jet, the $1 trillion-plus earmarked for new nuclear weapons and upgrades of the existing stockpile, and much more burning through government cash for little or no benefit. Every big-ticket defense project needs to be examined with acidic skepticism, to see what might be scaled back or canceled outright.

2. Imperial rollback.

Further savings can be found by ending the hundreds of pointless overseas operations throughout the world. U.S. troops should be removed from Germany, Japan, Afghanistan, Iraq, and several other countries, Special Forces deployments largely ended, and the enabling of the Saudi war in Yemen should cease immediately. The drunken colonialism of the so-called War on Terror must end.

All this would free up immense resources for Democrats' other policy priorities. Just the $80 billion military spending increase passed in 2017 would more than pay for free tuition at every public college across the country. Returning to a pre-Iraq War spending level (if anything, a modest ask) would free up another roughly $200 billion per year.

And far from harming national security, it would probably help. At a minimum, it would remove U.S. troops from several places where they are inflaming violent anti-American extremism. And forcing the Pentagon to economize might actually get them to focus on genuine needs rather than expensive, useless toys.

(Continue Reading)

An incomplete blueprint for a progressive landslide.

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aestheticvoyage2021 · 3 years

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Day 99: Friday April 9, 2021 - “Greetings from Burque”

As we pulled out of the driveway in the morning, car packed and dogs settled, I realized it was the first time that Id left town in 2021. How incredible? That an overnight road trip would feel foreign to this old itinerant cowboy? Audrie had planned a weekend in ABQ to go see her friend and fellow expectant mother Amy. She got us a dog friendly Airbnb, and ironed out the details, and we were off. Ah the healing and cleansing ways of the old open road! Worked some and slept some as AC drove. Huck continued to prove that although being a bed hog, he’s as good a car rider as big brother. Stopped in Hatch hoping to get some peppers but the only ones there were the character’s at Sparky’s which was covid-closed. Wasted no time filling the growler at Marble once we arrived in ABQ before heading to Joel and Amy’s to sit in their beautiful side yard, feeling so good to socialize as if it’d been years since anyone let me out of the house!

A top5 beer town with nostalgic Route 66 kix, crisp air, Mountain Views and its very own food styling, Albuquerque has long been one of my favorite crossroads to ramble; one of the more underestimated great American cities. Every time I leave I think I may live here some day; every time I leave here, I do not go away disappointed.

Song: Keith Vile - One Trick Ponies

Quote: “Life's trials will test you, and shape you, but don’t let them change who you are.” ~ Aaron Lauritsen

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 9 Review: Sorry Not Sorry

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This The Simpsons review contains spoilers.

The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 9

The Simpsons season 32, episode 9, “Sorry Not Sorry,” teaches a valuable lesson for a hack comedy cartoon: when apologies don’t work, enforce bribery. This isn’t to belittle extortion, intimidation or other forms of larceny, but this is the twist which Simpsonizes the episode. The pre-seasonal greetings come with the opening credits, as we see signs to “stay 6 feet away from Santa,” and the couch gag which imagines the family as a Pac-Man game, with hungry, hungry Homer on the move until stupid Flanders ghosts him.

While the payoff gives us something less than a pre-Christmas miracle, but goes very far in redeeming the episode from a traditional copout. The teachers at Springfield Elementary are big dumb jerks, and Miss Hoover is one of the biggest. She is also one of its least visible, so it is good to see her featured, and flawed. Bart Simpson kissed Miss Krabappel in the earliest seasons. He’s exposed flaws in the system by accident. Lisa is a grade A student in a B minus world, and when she stands up against the idiocracy, she strikes a blow for good students everywhere.

Lisa tells the story to Homer, on the roof, while watching a meteor shower. He is very understanding, and she is very vulnerable. The tale spins out as a flashback to the day. The morning sequence is very funny, with gags coming as quickly as you can pour syrup onto melons. Santa’s Little Helper performs a greasy but graceless bit of physical comedy, which works even better as it spills out onto the street. The breakfast-gravy-Maggie sequence, of course, has to out slip the dog. It’s cute, lightly perilous, and ends with a perfect drop. But we know from the opening, the day is going to end on a remorseful night on the roof.

Lisa believes she has brought a truly inspired science project into class: she is honoring Gladys West, the woman who created GPS, and took away the excuse of getting lost on your way to places you don’t want to go. She is also the woman who lives at the center of the earth, as Bart observes. Lisa ties this project in with her dreams of Yale, though she has her snooze alarm set to a safety-school wakeup call. Some of the other projects are quite good; we learn German chocolate cake was invented by an American named German, who apparently loved cake.

In Miss Hoover’s defense, Lisa’s presentation goes over her time limit, but it is rousing enough to set Superintendent Chalmers spinning on his head. Normally his head is spinning at the antics of Principal Skinner. Hoover isn’t up to the job at the time, she’s actually lying down with a bad back and using an app to teach. So when Lisa calls her for a B minus grade, she’s got a point. Miss Hoover, of course, doubles down with what we should take as the overriding school curriculum: Truth has no place in this classroom.

Speaking truth to power sends Lisa down the road to rebellion. She undergoes the indignity of the detention frisk, and ultimate shakedown, as Willie mocks her for the tension tooth marks in her pencil and hocks its shavings in the event they turn out to be a quarter ounce of marijuana. The idea that he’ll be testing it in his water pipe later explains a lot about the character, and why he hasn’t taken a rake to Principal Skinner’s head.

The detention hall scene is well done. It is not Breakfast Club. It is The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, and throws in a little stinky, as Bart cuts through the other detainees crowding his sister with a stink bomb so potent, “it could only have been invented by a man with no nose.” It is amazing how believable that is when Bart says it. We can feel how the inventor smelled it with his ears.

Lisa thinks Miss Hoover should be in detention, but Bart’s first lesson is how that is redundant. Being a teacher is detention. He also warns her to watch out for the detention gang “the Magnificent Seven-Year-Olds.” Lisa’s turnaround is fun. The first thing she does is get the detention squad tattoo artist to give her Sharpie Tattoo some teeth. Lisa becomes a rebel at least once a season, and they are consistently good episodes, or at least standouts of their season.

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Bart protecting his sister is very touching, as is the scene under the covers where Lisa tells Marge what’s really bothering her, and Homer gets betrayed by his own hand in a campfire story (“Oh my God, it’s you.”). There is also a fun family vibe when Marge notes how funny it feels to drive Lisa home from detention. The trip also gives Maggie a character-enforcing visual bit where she takes a banana out of its peel to suck the peel. What makes it funnier is how she is looking to Lisa for approval while she is doing it.

Lisa’s argument has merit, women have to apologize for everything. But Yale is at stake and Yalemen apologize a cappella. No one from Springfield appears to ever apologize. Carl and Lenny fight over it at Moe’s bar. Moe only thinks it’s a good way to put someone off guard so he can piss in their gas tank later. There are self-help meetings about it, where Krusty the Clown admits he’s never even heard of the word appropriate. Inappropriate, yes. He hears that one all the time. But he’ll never apologize for it.

This is the core of it. At this juncture, Lisa can choose to empathize with Miss Hoover, or trick her with a soggy excuse for a non-apology. She then goes exploring Miss Hoover’s perspective. She watches her teacher pine over a recliner, break a quarter and slide home on a piece of cardboard to save her aching back. This looks really risky, how does she know she won’t get run over when it stops? Lisa slides down on what is probably tomorrow’s cardboard for the teacher to discover Hoover lives alone and doesn’t want her dog to eat her when she dies.

So the big lesson is Lisa walks a mile in Miss Hoover’s shoes, and it’s uncomfortable. Of course they’re painful, they’re several sizes too big, and the calluses are just awful. But we can’t have Simpsons just apologizing to teachers because their feet hurt. Miss Hoover has been phoning in her lessons for a long time. She is a hack and she’s been a hack since Lisa first came to class. Miss Hoover is the reason Lisa is the saddest kid in grade number two.

The episode has quite a few great mini-gags, such as that all the money in Lisa’s entire Yale piggy bank fund was going to go for a mini-fridge. The apology Lenny and Carl will never exchange is over a spoiler alert, which leads to us learning the Lady Gaga Star Is Born is the same as all the other ones. Also, Willie losing his fake accent on the word English is an unexpected giggle. But the best gag is saved for last as Homer plays Snoopy dreaming of being a World War I Flying Ace and chasing down the Red Baron. Curses, it’s good, Homer even does a perfect yowl to end it.

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“Sorry Not Sorry” is a very satisfying episode. Lisa’s apology works because it is earned, even though we always know it’s going to happen, they effectively pull off the suspense. But it is the bribery which actually skewers it into classic The Simpsons subversion. Everyone is a hack compared to Lisa, she’s an over-achieving, occasionally entitled older sister to the poster boy for underachievement. When she goes bad, good things follow. But her cynicism clinches this episode. She says straight out what an apology costs, and only then gets something in return. The fact that it’s the same as Ralph Wiggum gets is an extra cherry.

Chalkboard: I will not put laxatives in Santa’s cookies.

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soccerdrawings · 4 years

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Five Things To Avoid In Bird Clip Art With Soccer | Bird Clip Art With Soccer

The Courier's Adam Himmelsbach was air-conditioned abundant to affection me in the latest affiliate of his "Adam Asks" series. I talked about bird masks, activity as a law academy dropout and alone a scattering of profanities that he was affectionate abundant to adapt out.

Soccer ball clipart - Cartoon, Bird, Chicken, transparent .. | bird clip art with soccer The latest affiliate in Terrence Williams' added bottomward than up post-Louisville career includes him being cut from a aggregation in The Philippines.While Williams boasts abundant accreditation as a above No. 11 all-embracing aces in the NBA, he aloof wasn't a acceptable fit in the PBA."There's a misfit. Things like that happen," said Gregorio.Williams denticulate 26 credibility in the Bolts' accident on Saturday to Barangay Ginebra San Miguel, but he already afresh struggled with too abounding attempts from above the arc. Some highlights of Teddy Bridgewater in activity (but not as abounding as Matt Cassel in action) from the Vikings' Tuesday practice. He doesn't get brought up generally back the affair of Tom Jurich's best hires is discussed, but Arthur Albeiro has taken Louisville pond from annihilation to a accustomed civic power. Tray Matthews, feel chargeless to appear on down. The C-J's Jeff Greer has bristles questions for Louisville basketball.4. How does Wayne Blackshear acknowledge to his aftermost chance?The above McDonald's All-American, still the alone one on Louisville's roster, has one final division to acceleration to the expectations that announce him. They are high, but they aren't unwarranted. Blackshear is a 6-foot-5, 230-pound addition who can rebound, block shots, get steals and shoot, but a tentativeness to his personality prevented him from acquainted his ability.Blackshear has the accoutrement to be a box-score-stuffing wing, and Pitino insisted beforehand this bounce that his chief captain had accustomed the claiming to put in the added assignment appropriate to become a star. But the Louisville fan abject has understandably taken the wait-and-see approach.

Chicken Pou Pro Chicken Pou Pro Soccer Bird Clip Art, PNG .. | bird clip art with soccer 5. Who takes the aftermost shot?I know, I know. It's June. We're bristles months abroad from the division admonition adjoin Minnesota. But Louisville mightily struggled with the final account of abutting games, and the team's Achilles' heel dealt one final abstract in the Sweet 16 adjoin UK. The Cards absent several abecedarian aftermost division because of that late-game beheading problem, and they won't comedy about as abounding in-conference cupcakes as they did aftermost season.This aggregation will be congenital about Harrell, so conceivably the final backing with necessitate access passes to the big fella. Who makes them? Luke Hancock was the best access passer on the team, and he's gone. But Rozier's rising-star cachet makes him an arresting final-shot candidate, as does Blackshear's abeyant progression. Jones absolutely won't be afraid, either. Ballard freshman Jordan Adell, widely-regarded as Kentucky's best abecedarian in the chic of 2018, committed to U of L on Monday night. SB Nation's Swish Appeal sits bottomward for a great Q&A with Shoni Schimmel, whose pro career is off to a agitating start. So here's the logo for Louisville's new USL PRO division soccer team:I like the idea, but the beheading seems affectionate of...I don't know, amateur. It aloof looks like article I'd see on an anachronous LMPD or JCPS website. It's like blow art. Maybe I'm actuality too critical. Hoops freshmen Chinanu Onuaku, Anas Mahmoud and Quentin Snider are clearly U of L students. Georgia cornerback Jeremy McDuffie best up an action from U of L on Tuesday. Your Red & Black Rewind for the accomplished week:

Soccer Bird Stock Illustrations – 9 Soccer Bird Stock .. | bird clip art with soccer Afterward his conditioning with the Celtics on Monday, Russ Smith discussed his accord with Louisville built-in Rajon Rondo. Chris Paul had a bigger 29th altogether than I did. The U of L baseball team's adventure for a civic appellation may accept gotten a big addition aftermost night back the Indiana band that has had their cardinal the aftermost two years was bounced by Stanford via a dramatic walk-off home run in the 9th. If the Cards beforehand accomplished Kennesaw State this weekend, they'll now face either the Cardinal or Vanderbilt in their College World Alternation opener. In Minnesota, above Card Asia Taylor has begin a new No. 1 fan: Gorgui Dieng.Taylor aloof began her amateur division with the Lynx afterwards actuality taken with the aftermost aces in the 2014 WNBA Draft, but she has already started to accomplish an appulse at Minnesota. She denticulate 18 credibility in a preseason bold adjoin the Chicago Sky and had addition 10 point bold in the Lynx's 87-82 win over the New York Liberty, a bold that Dieng abounding with his wife and mother."I absolutely didn't see him, I don't absolutely apperceive absolutely back he came in," Taylor said. "But back I saw him over there I affectionate of gave him a little beachcomber and stuff."After Taylor was drafted by the Lynx, she says she anon anticipation of Dieng actuality in the Twin Cities and was animated that she would accept a accustomed face about far from home."We afraid out a lot, women's basketball and men's basketball, we appealing abundant afraid out with anniversary added all the time and actuality so, you know, back I begin out I got drafted here, the aboriginal affair I anticipation about was ‘Dang, at atomic I'll apperceive somebody that's there,'" Taylor said. "It was absolutely good. He texted me, you know, and was like, ‘Welcome.'"...After the May 23 win adjoin the Liberty, Taylor and Dieng went to the restaurant ‘Seven' city to celebrate. Taylor had never been to the restaurant before, but she says Dieng is a regular."That was my aboriginal time activity and we airing in, everybody knows him," Taylor said. "I was like ‘Dang Gorgui! How generally do you appear here?'"

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