Poker Farce
November 10, 2013 
7 Comments
“Deal.” Cody says, in a commanding tone to the Duke. He’s so excited to start the game of Blind Man’s Bluff he’s drooling. His enthusiasm is contagious; his anxious fidgets riling the other assembled poker players to the point the room’s become a cacophony of twitching gamblers, and howling card sharks, and for a moment, the Duke wishes the door in the kitchen had been shut for the day already when Cody had arrived. Cody’s too excitable by far, is what it is, and flicking cards toward the group assembled around the felted green table with random precision, Duke squashes his instinct to instantly retrieve them by scraping divots with his overly long nails into each released card’s patterned back. His mark, and his party, and he damn well doesn’t care what the other players think about it, either.
In seconds the players have their hands—as well as their attitudes about their hands—and Cody sniffs the air automatically, practically smelling the sweat break out on his buddy Trouble, so named due to his tendency to start fights with unsuspecting rollerbladers. Trouble has an unreasonable fear of rollerbladers, and quite possibly bad cards, too, and the Duke takes this under advisement as he licks-—nibbles, and sticks—-the very best card he has to the crown of his head. The other players follow suit, affixing the cards to their brows and heads to mimic the Indian braves for which the poker game is named.
“I’m going first.” the Duke says, grimacing a bit threateningly as he pushes chips toward the table’s center. “My house—my rules. I bet two.”
“I’ll call your tooOOOOOoooo!” Snoop Dog sing-songs. “And raise it twooOOOoo, toooOOOoooo!”
“That’s four to you, Cody.”
“I’m out.” Tiger decides, tossing his cards to the felt, face down. He demonstrates both a lack of breeding and poker etiquette by pushing away from the table, and scratching his balls with great gusto.
“Cody?” the Duke growls, irritated he can’t join Tiger—his balls suddenly itch fearsomely, too–and put out to remind Mr. Raring-to-Go. “You want to play, Cody?”
“Do I!’ Cody rejoins, jumping from his chair, and running circles around the poker table. “Do I! Do I, do I, do I, dooOOOoo!”
“Cody!” the group barks in stereo, but the excited fellow can’t control himself. He is getting on in years, Duke thinks. Even in dog years Cody would be considered over-the-hill, and Duke wonders if it’s possible to be afflicted with hyperactivity and Old Timers simultaneously.
“Stop that this minute!” the Duke adds. The interruption is particularly upsetting; Duke’s almost positive he has the highest card stuck to his brow—-Snoop’s the only one with a picture card, and it’s just a green one—-and throwing all social nicety to the wind, he does the unthinkable.
He leashes Cody, and leads the agitated golden retriever out to the yard.
Gone Fiction…
November 4, 2013 9 Comments
Hey-lo, Blog-O-chicken-peeps-O-avatars. (and any other DPI I might not have mentioned) I am deep into the second installation of the Cyberland series—the sequel to “Through the Monitor” (or continuation, howsumever you want to look at it) so I will be MIA for a while. On the DL. The QT. Surf by for news as to how “The Screen Borrow” progresses—which, given the very few letters I have to choose from—should be pure gibberish! 😉 Happy blogging, kids.
“The Screen Borrow”
(sneak peek)
Book 2 in Cyberland Series
… Wait. Did his ex-girlfriend, the permanently Flat Patty print out along with Cheeky Butts? It’s hard to be sure. Link’s eyes are necessarily glued to the muscleman advancing on him now, and he can’t spare more than a cursory glance toward his partners in crime, though Sloth’s laborious progress is hard to miss even in his peripheral vision.
The muscleman amazingly wide shoulders soon blot that out; he’s NFL big, straining polo & Bermuda shorts no doubt purchased at the Improbably Gigantic store, for all their floral design and pink coloring, and the eyes sunken back into the close-cropped head look near piggishly stupid. A pig’s probably smarter, but even so, those eyes are trained on him, and Link yells:
“Stop! I know karate.” hamming a pose in mimicry of the Ninja avatar who’d burst from the Fortune Cookie in Print Forest, but from the safe distance of mounted credenza to which he’s leapt, kitty corner the group of digital misfits. His broadened scope shows Cheeky Butts did indeed print out with Sloth, along with Iris, and a half-printed avatar Link can’t bring himself to squint at & identify—thank God it’s remained stuck in printer spool—and though Iris has morphed into a fully 3 dimensional cube of herself, Cheeky’s become flat-assed. Become flat everywhere, and while her flat everywhere is considerably more pin-up poster than Flat Patty’s ever was, if pin-up posters could wail, flail, and present a cheeky backside simultaneously, she’s still advancing on him all too quickly…
Words between Dustcovers
July 18, 2013 13 Comments
For anyone interested in short stories I’ve written, here’s some information. (note–a repeat for most of the blog-O-sphere, but I have a date on a blog tour in August, so I am cleaning house, getting out the china…buying flowers. Now, provided there’s no lipstick on my teeth–I am good to go!)
Available on Amazon
Thank the Good God She Found Jesus
27 pages, download at Amazon for $2.99
Bad girl goes good–and then bad again–exchanging Hail Marys for Happy Hours, and piety for pilsner in a month of equalizing Sundays.
24 pages, download at Amazon for $2.99
Set against the backdrop of a strip club on Halloween, this urban fantasy pokes good-natured fun at the trends of today’s society, while skirting the more serious issues of outsourced & obsolete American workers.
Available on Amazon and Smashwords
10 pages, download at Smashwords for FREE!!
A short fiction looks at the lighter side of religion and X’s and O’s. Basically a tic-tac-toe of chemistry, agendas & revival…
35 pages– download from Amazon for 99¢
Jump down the rabbit hole–fall through a GUI–become the avatar you seem to be & join Link on a trip to Cyberland. Plenty of digitally generated shenanigans & reasons to upgrade, this Window between worlds has Gates stamped all over it…
Click HERE to download those bottom 2 short stories in any format from Smashwords…
Some work of mine published by other folkerie:
Postscripts to Darkness, volume #3
(direct purchase through publisher)
Short fiction: “What Happens in Vegas” introduces a
few, key players in urban fantasy: SPIRITED REMIX.
Dark Light 3 at Amazon
“Tossed & Found” is a horrifically, twisted short…
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features : Silent Night
“Heavy on the Advent,
and light on the good will toward men…”
Spin Doctor is In, Doctor
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