I’m curious to see if I get comments if I try something avant-garde…

The red, yellow, and black jagged stripped curtains whipped about. They really were the ugliest curtains I had ever seen and, yes, I had made them. One memory told me that I had bought the material cheep at a remnant sale; another I had rescued the undeserving fabric from a store dumpster; and still another a gift. It was memories like this that I hadn’t a clue, which one was true for this reality. It was best just to go with the flow on the small stuff details. Human memory was not adapted well for reality hopping.

I closed my eyes and waited for a fantasy to inspire me. A nubile Scandinavian lass dressed in a miniskirt walking out of my mental mist towards me. She was a frequent player in my lewd mental theater in all the time-lines. Yet somehow she seemed even sexier, her wide triangular face more pixilated, and her expression even more inviting.

The Danish dream blonde winked as she began to unbutton her blouse and said as she slipped it off. “My mind is full of memories of past events that seemed to have happened just a few weeks ago,” she said cryptically blending phenomenology with eroticism. She twisted to put her generously filled brassiere into motion. Her pixilated face beamed, “I know it is true for you too,” she observed.

The odd direction this fantasy was taking… puzzled me… but not enough to not go with it. With the flexibility of an acrobat, she brought an ankle to her cheek revealing cotton panties under her mini skirt. She paused looking perplexed. “Yet the yesterdays seem to be diverging racially from the way they should have happened.” She touched her toes then smoothly stood on her hands making her inverted hanging bosom jiggle wonderfully. “It feels as if I were changing my own future past, as odd as that sounds.” She did splits accentuating her muscular legs clad with army boots, all the while maintaining a distracted look.

“Maybe this is just a parallel world with its own slug’s trail of a past,” suggested a booming disembodied voice in my mind.

“That would avoid the time traveler’s paradox,” replied the fantasy blonde turning he acrobatic feats into a lewd anatomy lesson. “On the other hand, the time traveler’s paradox is probably just a rhetorical illusion. If you want me to exist I will. Wouldn’t you like me to exist?” She flared her shockingly blue eyes as puckish smile curled on her wide triangular face. “I knew you did,” she confirmed. Her smile became wicked as she cartwheeled into a split.

A large octopus with firm snake like tentacles glided into the erotic scene out of the darkness. It seized her! She whispered in the cognitive ether as she wrestled with the writhing beast. “The past is not an unchanging thing like a road, it isn’t a thing at all, it is a bounded but infinite set of hyperbolic parallels.” Each word rode a grimacing staccato. It was clear the intent of the licentious cephalopod and she was clearly aroused by the tussle.

“An infinite but bounded set of hyperbolic parallels,” she repeated as she struggled on, “that pass through a local condensation in the sea of all the possible things... reality is only the ephemeral present with no firm past or future, but I’m part of the solution...” She surrendered.

“Ah... not just a fantasy girl,” replied the octopus coolly as a howling wind began to sweep all away, “That explained a lot.”

Well let see if that does anything…

I just did a marathon of all 220 panels of the Web-comic “Flaky Pastry” [link] by Felix Lavallee, aka Falingard, and enjoyed them thoroughly.

It is a tale of three strange roommates:
1) Marelle, the academic butterfly catgirl in denial.
2) Nitrine, a mischievous and kinky goblin girl with a flair for mechanical invention.
3) Zintiel, ADHD Sociopathic Chaos-elf out for a violent good time.

Although a secondary reoccurring plot, I really enjoyed relationship between Nitrine and her “boyfriend,” Kurt the Mechanic; a relationship that starts as fast and arbitrarily as most modern relationship… err possible a bit more on both accounts, "Strip-43, Fast and forward.” The cultural mismatch of a very kinky goblin girl and her traditionalist nice guy and totally normal seeming human boyfriend whimsically really brought out in the "Strip-123, A crowd.” The relationship is clearly not all one sided for Nitrine turns to Kurt for help in "Strip-189, To the rescue.” A wild inventor needs her mechanic.

I posted this review on Amazon last year for “The Wizard of Karres” by Mercedes Lackey, Eric Flint, and Dave; published by Baen (August 3, 2004)… I thought it needed to be read in other forums as well.

“Shakespeare, circuses, and carnies! Not Pausert, Goth, and the Leewitt!” by James M. Thomas July 30, 2007

This was supposed to be a sequel to the "Witches of Karres," James H Schmitz's 1966 space opera (nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1967). It is one of a few books I reread annually; it is a true delight. So like many, I slogged through 464 pages of a clearly unhealthy preoccupation by the joint authorship in Shakespeare, circuses, and carnies! It seemed at times that they had only read the last five pages of the novel and then the CliffsNotes for the rest! I was sorely disappointed. I like Eric Flint's work and thought he might have pulled it off, but clearly he wasn't the lead author (well hopefully he wasn't).

It might have been wise of the authors before pen hit the paper to look at JHS's back ground: representative for International Harvester in Germany and escape of Hitler's rise to power, aerial photographer in the Pacific during the war, mechanical entrepreneur building car trailers after, then SF writer. Schmitz was the model for Captain Pausert! He was writing about himself! Captain Pausert fiddling with Klatha machinery was a reflection of JHS's interest in gadgetry... Examples of politicians waffling (the Daal of Uldune) or using political influence and corruption for financial gain (Councilor Onswud of Nikkeldepain) would have been well in JHS experiences in his business dealings in Hitler rising Germany. None of this was in the least explored in the "Wizard" sequel... ! Schmitz's Space Opera was instead turned into a Soap Opera of ruminated feelings and weak minded heroes.

People are pretty good at seeing continuity and consistency in behavior. The captain Pausert of "Witches" isn't the Captain Pasert of "Wizard", nor is Goth for that matter. I am a fan of JHS and love the "Witches of Karres." I like many wanted to see a sequel and bought the "Wizard of Karres" hardback as soon as it was released and broke the pages before I left the bookstore. I had confidence in Eric Flint, but truthfully had a bit of apprehension about a jointly authored book.

As I read the first chapter, my apprehensions became klatha predictions... the book was substandard as if the writers really didn't care if it reflected the "Witches" characters! I read it through with the faintest of hope for last page redeption and then prayed the last lines were:


The intercom clicked on and the Captain was startled awake from a strange dream full of circuses and Shake... something or the other. Goth was calling out with such snorts that he leaped from the couch where he'd been napping and banged his knee painfully on the way the ships console.
"Captain," Goth's voice told him, "better get down here!" She was choking with laughter.
"What's happening?" the captain asked, relaxing a little.
"Having a little trouble with a baby vatch... oh, my! Better come handle it!" The intercom went off.
"Well," the captain muttered, heading hurriedly across the outer room towards the passage, "here we go again!"

Sadly they weren't... As a sequel it is a failure and even as a stand alone potboiler it is mediocre. There is not much more to say... Sigh!

I've been giving some thought to why I find Catgirls so appealing and started to do a little research.

Anthropomorphized animal characters appear in fairy tales and children stories (e.g., Beatrice Potter’s rabbits in clothing, The Wind in the Willows, The Little Red Hen, etc.), but they were all clearly recognizable animals that had developed both human intelligence and behaviors, i.e., reflections of us. None of these characters especially appealed to me and frankly some are a bit creepy.

Cordwainer Smith (Paul Linebarger) in his Science Fiction explorations in the 1960’s played with the idea of domestic animals genetically engineered to be both intelligent and look somewhat human. These “under persons” were created to serve humankind as property. The notion is that you could have a slave and still technically be against slavery (This is a notion that I’ve added to my “Tales of Tael” stories). In Smith’s story the main character, McBan, teams up with C’Mell, a catgirl geisha. What may weird you out is C’Mell is named after his own cat...! Still the character and description are alluring…

It seems that if you modify the human form of an already appealing human moderately with other animal characteristics (e.g., ears, tail, feet), but not so much to disguise their human qualities, then they seem even more appealing. I have my suspicions why, but I'm still cogitating…

The thoughtful D P duLapel