100 Words – Vivid Police

When Alexander gets truly stressed he suffers from vivid hallucinations of police surrounding him. They are there one second, gone the next. The first time this happened was his first semester of college. It started a week before finals and got worse every day. After the last final he got puke in the street drunk, and that was the end of the phantom cops. His therapist tells him that when he sees the cops he needs to take the blue pill. She thinks that's funny. Alexander sticks with her because she's the only shrink he's found that's smarter than him. #100words

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100 Words – Witness

I came to witness the second coming of Truman Capote. All I got was a bunch of tourists puking their green drinks on cobbled streets. Old buildings gutted of their souls and cheapness. No longer the refuge of poets and madmen. They have fled for the fringes where visitors need not witness their divine ugliness. The saddest part of all was realizing that I was also just a tourist. A voyeuristic dilettante climbing onto the shoulders of giants. Seeking approval from the ghosts of my heroes who care not for the living. Just the suffering of those doomed to follow. #100words

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100 Words – Woods

The echoes in the woods magnified our sense of danger. Creatures scurried on either side of the road, but they were small and harmless. It was the occasional ground-shaking thud that was worrying. It seemed to come from every direction and had no pattern. Then there was a mighty bang and the world tipped on its side. I woke up some time later with a terrible headache. Gravity seemed to have righted itself. The stars were all gone. I couldn't see the road ahead of me. I sat there waiting for the dawn the dawn to come. It never did. #100words

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Tom Week – Alabama Etc.

3/22/19

We're in Alabama! State number 26. It's everything we could ever hope for. Lot's of gun shops and even the news people have accents so think I can't understand half of what they're saying. Instead of golf carts the residents ride around on ATVs and mini bikes. Our next door neighbor has a dog called vittles.

3/23/19

We're in Florida again! Twenty miles from Pensacola. We're at a KOA with lots of RVs but very few people. Haven't figured that one out yet. My perceptions of the Gulf Coast are proving misguided. Not the people and places. They're what I expected. The problem is distances. New Orleans is only 230 miles away. That's three states. Alabama and Mississippi have much less coastline than I pictured. Also met a guy here at the campground that's riding his bicycle across the country from the Atlantic to the Pacific. It's his sixth day on the road and he's covered 400 miles.

3/24/19

Great day today. This morning I rode my bike to downtown Milton, FL. A town on a river trying to balance quaint and touristy. Fortunately quaint seems to be winning. After being in Georgia and Alabama I have to say that Florida is much friendlier to cyclists. Nice wide bike lanes everywhere. Then after lunch I got a pile of work on the RV done. Vents to replace and clean. Holes to weatherstrip. Door to trim to nail down. I felt like such a "guy."

3/25/19

Daylight Savings time, time zones, states smaller than I thought. All this has left me dazed and confused. We woke this morning in Florida. We drove to Alabama. Then we drove to Mississippi. All in the matter of a few hours. We are now an hour from Louisiana. We are in a very nice RV park in a not great area of Biloxi. Pat and I both got a little nervous because the neighborhood reminded us of one in Fresno. That park turned out to be hideous. This one is much nicer.

3/26/19

On the best of days there are no plans. Today is one of those days. We've extended our stay in Biloxi till Friday and rented a car. Or rather a truck, and this in no mid-size wimp of a truck. It is a 2019 Ram crew cab with a HEMI! We toured Biloxi, ate lunch at a pathetic Hooters knock-off called Twin Peaks, and took Abigail to a dog park that only had one other dog. Then I took a nap. I was up all last night working on my latest short story.

3/27/19

Nearly fifteen miles on the bike today. Out to dinner we had one of those rare failures of an experiment. The food was way spicier than hoped and it was full of unexpected ingredients. You can't win them all. Then we went to a giant gift shop which seriously needs some competition.

3/28/19

Coming back from WalMart I managed to get lost again. Having the ocean to the south is confusing. Took dad to the casino. He won six dollars, but Mom made him buy me a beer so he actually wound up with only two dollars profit.

PIX

[caption id="attachment_3934" align="alignleft" width="300"] Behind this RV park there were cows. As in mooooo![/caption] [caption id="attachment_3935" align="alignright" width="300"] Some RV parks have "yuge" spaces.[/caption] [caption id="attachment_3936" align="alignleft" width="300"] The rental truck was the envy of all the lesbians in the park.[/caption] [caption id="attachment_3937" align="alignright" width="300"] The view from the top of the Biloxi Bay Bridge[/caption] [caption id="attachment_3938" align="alignleft" width="300"] Pelicans by the bay.[/caption]

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100 Words – Other People’s Nostalgia

I live unwillingly in other people's nostalgia. I walk down the street and I am bombarded by their best and mostly false memories from long-ago. Everything is black-and-white in soft focus and too much sunshine. I long for that rare event of someone with a truly dark subconscious. Grainy horrors and scary monsters. When I find one I follow them as long as I can remain hidden. I have to break it off when they notice me because they are always adept at using the weapons they always carry. When all else fails the bottle is my guide. Sweet oblivion. #100words

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100 Words – Lost

The last time I rode my bike on a dirt road, everything went fine. Not today. None of the roads were straight and the sounds of the nearby highway echoed from every direction. I knew I was truly lost when I came to the intersection of County Road 232 and County Road 232. After some weird macho attempt to be above being lost I peddled about a hundred yards, then gave in and got out my phone. The GPS map showed that there were indeed two CR232s, and I was on the wrong one. From now on, check maps first. #100words

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100 Words – Disoriented

Disoriented was too weak a word. Smiley seemed to wake from a deep sleep to find himself sitting at the bar of a strip club 50 miles from his last waking thought. Then he noticed Martha in the doorway arguing with the bouncer. This was bad. He took a couple deep breathes and tried to remember what happened. Nothing. So he made up a story to tell Martha. There was a drink sitting in front of him. He swallowed it. Then Martha was sitting next to him, only she was smiling. "That was fun." She said, waving for the bartender.   #100words

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