General Allied Image: 2014

Friday, March 28, 2014

sHort leg-H

This is song is dedicated to a tire with a permanent flat spot, or a three legged dog, or that bumpy road that occasionally gets groovy, or that special hit and miss motor that someone dearly loves, and finally my old jeep that had become a dormitory for infirm and otherwise decrepit field mice and their fleas.

Sunday, March 9, 2014

The Last Entry

At this time and place there seems to be no human that isn’t monetarily poor. Isolated though I am, I still notice this. Our latest struggle had been to get my grandson wed, but there seems to be no one out there. Were have they gone. We cannot leave because we have no money. All our food is grown here so here we stay, within earshot of a highway we can’t afford to drive on and only aliens use.
On a day that started out with 3 inches of ice covering everything and a blizzard with 70 mile an hour winds to end it. Microwave boy dropped by, with some papers I needed to sign, formalizing the end to my suppliers contract with them. I had been drawing this out trying to secure one last order, but it looked like I was going to be cut. No more cash. I was little bent out of shape when I asked, why did they do this to me to all of us. “You.. and your people were enslaved by greed”,then awkwardly he added this little gem, “consider your self liberated”.

Saturday, March 8, 2014

Dispatch: Omega -1

As of late I have noticed that I have become incredibly poor, well not starving or out of a shelter just monetarily starved. My family and I have no contact with other people. The Thurgs sometimes pay me a visit but not often, they have learned to make far superior technology. My truck broke down about two years ago, not that it would matter because they don’t sell gas anymore. The Thurgs have taken over the automotive industry and only make engines that run off of anything you can put in to it. I went in town to day to see about buying one. The sales men (all Thurgs by the way) quoted me a price that seemed pretty low. But seeing as how I don’t make any money, I couldn't secure a loan and had to give up that Idea. I had hitched a ride in with a Thurg I knew but I had to walk back, about a twenty-mile or so walk. On the path there were a lot of people, some with real business, some just out wandering around weeding and planting at random, mindless.

Friday, March 7, 2014

Must See

Over the last few months I have been buying loads of broadcast equipment and satellite components, I think the “big thing” is an earth wide broadcast network. Microwave boy came to me the other day worried about the military, laid all these horrible scenarios on me, then without even taking a breath It said the broadcast will be the best thing you have ever seen.
There was some pandemonium in the streets but for the most part everybody was glued to their sets. It was a twelve hour long soap opera with flowers, and they had some how transmitted the all of the senses plus one or two more I didn't know I had. This all had a very hypnotic effect. The next day garden stores ran out of stock, people that had never before had an interest in gardening became infatuated with it. Gardening became the hottest craze the planet had ever seen. Even I was affected, I couldn't stop my self, and the compulsion to watch the twelve hour-long Thurganite show was unstoppable. Soon all the human owned broadcasting companies were shut down out lack of advertising or interest, and the only thing left to watch was the 10 hour long Thurgian soap opera. Yes ten hours, you see I think they were getting better at controlling us by that point and that gave them the ability to reduce the length of the programming. Eventually they got it down to fifteen minutes, the rest of the time everyone gleefully enjoyed their gardening.

Thursday, March 6, 2014

The Contractual Obligation... FROM SPACE.

In twenty years of business I have seen the evolution of the Thurgian spacecraft go from a tin can to a biomechanical structure that while residing in space doesn't travel through it or while traveling on space would not be in it. You see I'm not even sure. I've made a mint off the Thurgs and I would like to retire. But they won't hear of it, I told them my boy would take over and their condition of secrecy would be intact. No way is all the answer I most always get. After my last call to end the contract, Microwave boy came by to pass on a message. It said that they are up to something big and I should tone down my retirement rhetoric, and they will soon need some big orders filled.
Now see this really burns my ass hairs, the Thurgiean claim they need me so they can maintain their condition of secrecy. But everybody knows they're here on earth. I guess it all happened so gradually that we just got use to it. Kind of like an invasive weed that comes in a potted plant then all gradual like seems to be everywhere. Oh if you want to be blind to the fact that the Thurgs live among us, all you have to do is turn on that TV and sit there, sure you won't see a thing. So I'll stick with it and see what the big deal is anyhow.

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Trading partners

The next day, after a night of food, fertilizer, and heavy TV consumption, Microwave boy took me down to the ship, which to my astonishment had some sort of cloaking ability right out of star trek, one of the Thurgonanars favorite shows. After I made it inside the real tour started. Microwave boy would path that this such and such device was made with that technology and that thingamabober was made according to this theory, and after a while I got the idea that they had made the entire ship off of the technology I had traded them. Gee I thought, I haven’t done near as much with my Thurgonanar items. They were really quick; at this pace they will need lots of new technological junk. This seemed incredible, it had only been a year and they had gone back to their planet, made this ship and come back. I ask Microwave boy how this could be. It said that the computer had held the key to faster that light travel. The original three Thurgians had transmitted the technological ideas to their superiors back on Thurg, and they had built this ship, come out, picked them up, and proceeded to earth to buy more components for their ship.
The other Thurglings around the ship seemed busy working on one thing or the other. Lots of hi-techish bit of things hanging out of the walls, it gave the general impression that the ship was not finished. I knew then that I had them in the spot I wanted. The Thurgs would have to pay dearly for the components they needed and I would be their sole agent.

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

The Scheme

I had been trying to roto-till and the soil had been too wet. This causes it to clump up and clog the blades. I was clearing the blade housing out when they took me by surprise again. It was after all a rather foggy morning and the sun had been waging another losing battle, I think it was raining but I couldn't really tell. Well I nearly had a fit, the Thugoninite I knew as Microwave Boy pathed a gotcha right in to my brain. It started rattling off a list right away, and it became clear after I regained my composure, they had come shopping. The wheels began to turn in my head and I devised a scheme to become the sole retail outlet for the creatures. Well actually, I had a little more than a year to come up with it. After they had left I realized that may be they had gotten a better deal than I thought. I pledged to myself that if the Thurgonards ever came again I wouldn't be such a sucker. Microwave boy played right into my hands.

Monday, March 3, 2014

Secret communication's

Little did I know what industrious creature they were. They seemed dull but it was really just a different way of assimilating knowledge. I later learned they developed very few original Ideas and what technology they had was the result of trial and error of lucky accidents. Thurgieans were very good at putting existing technologies together in ways that complemented and optimized its uses. And then there were the physical advantages they had. For one, they were natural hibernators; this meant they could travel immense distances through space. There was no hibernation technology needed. The other was the range of visible light available to them. They could literally see radio waves. The third and final advantage was their telepathy, through this they could communicate great distances, on the order of light years. So as they were sitting in my house watching TV they were also communicating with technicians on their home world.

Saturday, March 1, 2014

Alien Couch Potato's

I invited them later on that evening to watch TV, and it was a pretty good time until I used the microwave to pop corn. Thurgians are sensitive to microwaves, it doesn't cause pain, although I think it’s disruptive to their sight. After this was smoothed over we all settled in and got down to some serous TV watching. There was only one strange thing. Every time I would leave the room the three would abruptly start communicating and when I got within range of the thought paths they would abruptly stop. It struck me strange at the time.

Ya know I had always thought that a group of aliens would come down make a few proclamations say "Take me to your leader" then go. The three Thurgians, made themselves at home. They all hung around on my couch generally stinking things up, although their odor was like the most amazing flower scent I had ever smelled. It was annoying all the same. One of them was always surfing the web. Broadcast and media seemed to be its main interest. It learned the written languages very fast, I think it might of figured out Japanese and German as well as English. Another planted himself on the couch and watched TV. The extreme animal extravaganza was its favorite, but news and weather were meditated over also. I was like a servant to him. Sure playing the host part is important but this is ridiculous, it would even ask me to change the TV channel, and then hand me the remote. And the strangest one microwaved everything. It continuously cooked any object until it was pulp or exploded, I think he even cooked a few live animals. One of them had taken apart the TV, computer screen, four clocks and my watch before I stopped him. Enough was enough, It was apparent to them that they were driving me nuts. We made a deal and boy what a deal it was. If I had only known what would precipitate from this transaction I would have let them stay on my couch until they died of old age. They gave me their ultra advanced solar panels, an electric generator that could use anything for fuel, and a formula for a type of super concrete. In return I gave them the computers (I really had enough of computers any way), all of the monitors and TV screens (they had taken most of those apart already), and the microwave (it was a freaking mess). So I thought had come out pretty good on the deal. In fact I felt so bad for having ripped them off so bad that I gave them a five-pound bag of plant fertilizer (it turned out they loved the stuff). So I waited till dark. Patted them all on the back and said "don't let the door hit'cha in the backside on the way out", towed the ship out to the field and they filled their gas bag up and floated away, out’a my life for ever. Arriba dirtchi. Si a nora. Bon Jovi. Later.

Friday, February 28, 2014

The landing site

Their ship has a large doughnut gasbag, which is around an egg like space capsule with the shell made out of what looked like corrugated siding, at least that's what I thought it was. The gasbag, which was, I swear, made out'a rubberized canvas, was filled with a lighter than "our air mixture" gas. This is why I didn't hear them land. They must of cut their engine in the stratosphere and drifted down. The engine was a jet type of thing attached to the main ship by a line of about 150 yards or so. It was laying about 140 yards away from the main ship.
The three Thurgonians had piled into the cockpit. I could see that there was a modest living space down below, and no window, that is excluding the cockpit. The later was capped with a glass dome that offered a 180 degree unobstructed view. I was invited up and sat in the cockpit trying out the controls, this was extremely confusing. One of the Thurgians had apparently been tidying up the living quarters and when it was done I took a look at that, it was very utilitarian. I hooked a chain up to the engine and towed it in, had to put the truck in low. We spent the rest of that day towing and securing their ship.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Truck Ride

The weather was starting to clear up and I could see the ship out in the center of the field. After putting it to them that It would be better for all of us to tow their ship into the barn, we all piled into my truck. The body of the average Thurgian doesn't fit well into a human car seat. They tried but couldn't fit, but were very impressed all the same. I had to put down the rear seat and they rode in the cargo space. At first I thought they were leering at me, but I then realized they were in fact ogling the instrumentation. Seems as though they had never seen such sophisticated display, I wondered just how they had gotten here. I started up the truck and took off for the field, this apparently was a good time to them and they jiggled and bounced down to the ship. Of course I had to open the hood once we were down at the landing site. Oh I was curious about their ship all right, but they were very insistent about taking a look at my engine. The fuel injectors were a hit, although when we got around to the type of fuel it used and that it was an internal combustion engine they seemed dumbfounded. That's when I think they knew they could take us.

Monday, February 24, 2014

Too much Screen time

They presented me with gifts, one from each, And I had no Idea what they are. I pathed the Idea that it was some sort of government obligation they had to carry out. It wasn't something that was particularly, how would I say it, not embarrassing to them.
Then the Thurgieans made a reference to space and asked what other planets have we liberated, this was done in a very formal manner. I didn't really understand how formal it was until much later. I said we had made it to our moon 50 years ago and sent a few unmanned vessels to the other planets within our solar system, But other than that none.
Is sensed they needed a better Idea of what I was communicating, and I don't think they knew what I referred too when I mentioned the moon, so I invited them in thinking I would show the NASA web site to them. When I first turned on the computer the thurgieans jumped against the back wall and wrapped themselves up in their pedals, and I swear one of them drew a weapon. Eventually I calmed them down, but they were still intensely interested in the screen. They looked behind it, then poked it a few times, and finally one of them, after a lengthy alien version of rock paper scissors, put a thick moist thing in the center of the screen and after a few seconds more declared it safe. Describing the set up from sat link to stylus, as I surfed the web they spoigled and cloick, I had to translate what it said on account that they could only read minds. After about two hours I was getting kind of stiff, besides becoming sick of all the noises they would make, and piped up about the fact that they hadn't shown me their ship.

Sunday, February 23, 2014

Meld

The Thurgieans and I came upon this transference of thought in an epiphany and apparently this was a new sensation for them. Oh sure they could form new thoughts out of a very literal synthesis of Ideas, but never before had they a thought or idea come from no where or as the experts would say, an abstraction. I could feel their minds search my brain and I tried to search their's. There were no feelings of trespass or offense, it was roughly analogous to what a person does when he arrives on top of a ridge, he looks. What I saw was simple. Not simple as in low IQ, but simple in the same way a sphere is.

Saturday, February 22, 2014

Encounter of the Third Kind.

I had my head in an old cranky diesel generator. It had broken down a day earlier, and there hadn’t been a good sunny day in weeks so my generator would kick in to supply the power the windmills couldn't. But even my considerable mechanical skill couldn't bring it back on line. I had just shocked the pie out'a my self when I heard leathery slap kind of sound, and looked up. Of course I couldn't believe my eyes and was scared and all that kind of alien human first interaction hoo haa but then I settled down and studied the things. Highly botanical was my first impression of the three, as I took a closer look they were a sort of a less flesh like rose with a ball on a stem that had the appearance of a fly eye. I made an attempt at communication at which they promptly started to hoot and plionk at. A few minutes of this was enough for all of us and we just kind of stood there for a while, stammering with our body posture. I took the triad as some what being dork like for their race. Oh they seemed to be bright enough but dorks all the same. I drew a picture or two and they seemed to be interested, but it was slow going. I thought a computer could break down the linguistic barrier, but that would be impossible to do with my computer. I then thought of telepathy, I had read a science fiction story once, man and alien communicated in this manner. Then it came like a flash of light, I could sense their thoughts

Friday, February 21, 2014

The Damp

The Midwest might not be as cold as Siberia, but I'm sure the misery index is much higher. It seems as though the wind never stops and it has the audacity to rain at the temperature of Thirty degree's Fahrenheit,,, most of the time. Fog and drizzle from sun up to sun down, not that you could tell if those celestial events had occurred. It was dark or very near dark until about my third jar of tea and became the same during my afternoon snack, until finally the sun gave up its fight and was extinguished by the dampness of the Middle West. It was a day such as this when the Thurgieans landed

Saturday, January 11, 2014

Watching

Lucky and I had been brought close together by Wade's mini dampener amp, so my recall of scene: Mr. Starr's response to the question: who exactly was spying on him, is vivid, timeless. "A couple of years after the Ivy infestation, I got smart and took M-corp to court for loss of livelihood. Was going well when, bang, the police action started, M-corp dropped all the formalities of acting within the legal frame work, of course, and left me and P5 out of fair bit of change. almost the minute the treaty was signed I began receiving messages, bills, that is, for their legal fees. At first, if I got any payment, over any kind of network connection, almost instantaneously they'd bill me for exact the same amount. So naturally I switched to cash only, and made the transactions here at home, at this table; a few got by, but soon I'd get a bill the instant I received payment; many time's the person paying me would still be here. I tried an experiment, I made arrangements to sell some crushed soy to a person that habitually tries to short ya, does it every time, a compulsion or something, you have'ta go through a sorta dance with him; offer a second cup a tea, count the money, apologize to him, 'but I think your sum is short' and he say's 'oh yes, you're right, my error' and then he pays the rest. So ya see my trap, right? He pays me the wrong amount as he always does, and instantly I get a bill from M-corp for that same amount. We do the dance and he pays the rest: about fifteen minutes later I get a bill for the second amount. Ha! got em... bastards" peers at the screen on the wall.

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Supper time

Mr. Starr ate a big mouthful of potato, insuring he wouldn't be able to talk for awhile. Mrs. Starr looked at Lucky, studying him as he ate, "so today, I got a message.. one of our old alerts, I haven't received one those for quite some time". Jen quickly spoke up, "we had company man come out today, and he spent most of his time with Lucky". Mrs. Starr made a look of concern, "oh.. I hope it wasn't serious". "No Mrs. Starr, it wasn't, just a soil guy looking into a subsidence". Mrs Starr was always on the look out for Jen, she had long since given up trying to fix her up with anyone she knew, so a new person was a highly desirable target. "So, Jen.. is this 'soil guy' single" everybody groaned: "if he is, I would've been happy to ask him over tonight". Lucky pointed around the kitchen, "where's gonna sit, I mean, it's cramped, just to let me out, you and Jen w'have'ta stand by the counter. and I'd have'ta push the table forward". "We would find the space. I'm sure your father would be happy to eat on a tray in the living room". Mr. Starr finished his potato, "What this guy's name?" Wade stopped eating mid chew, Jen made an awkward sound, and Lucky looked up at the clock. "I wasn't gonna tell ya, but I guess it'll get around sooner or later.. Ward Vogt". Mr. Starr's eye's got big, he took a drink of water, shifted in his chair, lucky could tell he ran the, expand calm: "that kid? figures he'd be a company man" and started in on his carrots.

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Conscience Control

Dampening sound was done and damping gravity was a thing, but Wade's amplifier was an entirely new use of those technologies. Jen and Wade could make music but were novices controlling the networked amp, Lucky was expert at both playing the music, and controlling the amp though his infection. Stand's to reason: Lucky, had been infected the longest out of their crew, and pre-infection had carried an implanted for years. In fact, Wade and Jen had known Lucky for all their lives, and could not remember him not having an implant. I, on the other hand know the specific time and date he was first logged in. Prior to that, I can only glean the memories of mom, dad, Ted, and of course Lucky. From what I can gather, the one thing that he was good at during his isolated years, was playing music. After his first log in, it became clear that his visceral musical ability translated to a masterful command of the network, and when infected, the synergy between Lucky and the network was a force to behold. Un or fortunately Wade was the only person to realise this aptitude of his and built a suite of technology around it, Lucky's favorite is the amplifier, and is a master of it. He work's his bass guitar in conjunction with the amp's damping field's, commandeers the beat and channel's it to Jen and Wade. Controlling your self and playing along with Lucky, is like lucid dreaming, if you know it's a dream it's hard not to break the spell and wake up

Saturday, December 27, 2014

Saturday, December 13, 2014

Friday, November 21, 2014

Friday, November 7, 2014

Monday, September 22, 2014

Sunday, September 14, 2014

Friday, September 5, 2014

Friday, August 29, 2014