Brothers and Sisters, Spirits and Plants, it is time for the 1st Long House Story Slam.
Our theme: Friends & Allies.
We all know that friendships beyond the ken of the unallied world are forged among Spirit Plants. Please share a story of friendship(s) found or deepened in the shared experience of entheogens.
Here's the deal:
(with special thanks to roach, who suggested the contest and contributed much to the plan)
Revised Entry Guidelines:
1. Submit your past or new post directly to this thread, cut and paste someone else's (with their permission first, please), or submit a super duper double secret post to me, space, via PM by midnight, August 3, EST.
2. Entries can be short and sweet or long and sharp, prose or verse, rant, rap or song: if you have a one paragraph post that says exactly what you want to say on the topic, that's fine.
2. Winners will be chosen by a membership poll conducted over the week following the deadline. The poll will open just after midnight, August 3, and close at midnight, August 10, EST.
3. Prizes will be awarded for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners.
4. While the suspense builds, you can also participate by helping to sweeten the pot: post your prize contribution and specify which winner (1st, 2nd, or 3rd) should receive it. If you want to contribute anonymously, PM me with your prize pledge, and I will add it to the thread.
5. Only registered Spiritplanters are eligible to enter the contest and vote in the poll.
6. There are no length, form, format, style, or other entry requirements except for the Friends & Allies theme and a recognizable title to use in the membership poll.
Prizes!
1st Place:
Lagochilus seeds w/Cape Super Smoke Plus dormancy breaking paper.
Half-pound of savlia leaf.
2nd Place:
Quarter-pound of salvia leaf.
3rd Place:
Quarter-pound of salvia leaf.
bravo! what a great contest idea!
rock, rock, Rock it.
OOh, that story smells sweet
Thank you, Ms. Judih!
OK, I started the ball rolling with a 1st prize of Lagochilus seeds (some sold as inebrians, some simply termed Lagochilus sp.) and a sheet of Cape Super Smoke Paper (saturated with multiple dormancy breaking hormones). I'll add my pledge of prizes for 2nd and 3rd place winners this evening.
Thanks, roach. When you post the details, I'll add them to the running total.
In the meantime, I'm adding a half pound of salvia leaf to the 1st place winner, and a quarter pound of salvia leaf each to the 2nd and 3rd place winners. It has been in cool, dry, dark storage, and it should make wonderful material for extracts and oral elixirs.
*bump*
Here's the prize list so far:
QuotePrizes!
1st Place:
Lagochilus seeds w/Cape Super Smoke Plus dormancy breaking paper.
Half-pound of savlia leaf.
2nd Place:
Quarter-pound of salvia leaf.
3rd Place:
Quarter-pound of salvia leaf.
I'm waiting on entries, and I'm looking for more prizes.
Maybe I'll add a slightly used cat...
Let's loosen this thing up a bit...
Per the changes below, feel free to post entries directly here. The entries can be past postings, someone else's prior post (with the author's permission, please), or an original bit.
So you can
1) cut and paste your own prior post;
2) once you get an OK, cut and paste someone else's; or
3) enter an original post.
If you want anonymity, you can still PM your post to me, and I will join Judy Miller in the slammer before I give up your name ;)
...unless you are Karl Rove--then I'll tell everybody.
Our theme: Friends & Allies.
We all know that friendships beyond the ken of the unallied world are forged among Spirit Plants. Please share a story of friendship(s) found or deepened in the shared experience of entheogens.
Revised Entry Guidelines:
1. Submit your past or new post directly to this thread, cut and paste someone else's (with their permission first, please), or submit a super duper double secret post to me, space, via PM by midnight, August 3, EST.
2. Entries can be short and sweet or long and sharp, prose or verse, rant, rap or song: if you have a one paragraph post that says exactly what you want to say on the topic, that's fine.
2. Winners will be chosen by a membership poll conducted over the week following the deadline. The poll will open just after midnight, August 3, and close at midnight, August 10, EST.
3. Prizes will be awarded for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners.
4. While the suspense builds, you can also participate by helping to sweeten the pot: post your prize contribution and specify which winner (1st, 2nd, or 3rd) should receive it. If you want to contribute anonymously, PM me with your prize pledge, and I will add it to the thread.
5. Only registered Spiritplanters are eligible to enter the contest and vote in the poll.
6. There are no length, form, format, style, or other entry requirements except for the Friends & Allies theme and a recognizable title to use in the membership poll.
Prizes!
1st Place:
Lagochilus seeds w/Cape Super Smoke Plus dormancy breaking paper.
Half-pound of savlia leaf.
2nd Place:
Quarter-pound of salvia leaf.
3rd Place:
Quarter-pound of salvia leaf.
OK, no more screwin' around...
post some stories or I'll kill this plant. [/size]
**
|/
EDIT: To correct spelling in the ultimatum...
shhhhh....
Story voluntarily removed by author, 8-1-05 and placed in BOL.
lw
btw... I'm not sure if'n my post screwed up this threads format or the pic above. But it might be difficult to read the story I just posted due ot a need ot scroll. Any help or advice would be appreciated.
laughing-luddite
Ya, it was the pic. I set the plant free.
space sets the plant free
and lw lets the demons out
doing well so far
judih
:?
errrr, ummmm
The only reqirement is stick to the 'friends and allies' theme. I am trying to intrepret LW's story according to the theme here... help me out will ya?
I hope some other stories have been pm'd to space .. . but i know sometimes people just don't wanna tell. Lets extend the contest another week??
LOL I hear you, Cassie.
Maybe a secondary contest consisting of essays written by community members on the connection of my story and the theme of "friends and allies," would be warranted. hehe
But I the connection is there for those who take the time to ponder that very question you just asked above.
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometime, you just might find
that you get what you need...... MJ/KR/et al...
lw
i enjoyed the story. It was unexpected, considering this is the first time i've heard this side of LW's rich, tapestry-infused past.
The theme of friends and allies was with me as i read. There's an implied safety net. Look at the contrast between the docs and their judgements and Ruby's sadistic jokes and how LW knew from within to 'play the game' to get out of there.
In friends and allies we trust. They're always there for us. And self-trust is a large element in the tale.
I'm leaving to Sturgis south Dakota to prepare and promote for the charity on tuesday early morning:: www.baddcentral.com (http://www.baddcentral.com) , be back on 22-25 th of aug. Perhaps it wont be done by then? Let it run till we get a good variety to vote from right, no hurry. Damn i'll see if i could finish up this story ive started, trying to make it sensical, what a trip it was ...lol
Anyways, ill send these to winners after I arrive later on in August, good luck to all, hopefully these prizes will motivate some also ;)
If the contest is not done by my return( 22-25 aug) i should have a story to share.
umm. i was gonna donate to the "bowl" or pot, I offer for now( unless just plants )::
#1 donation--DVD:: Dead Can Dance : Toward the Within :: produced and directed by Mark Magidson:: Recorded live at :: The Mayfair Theater Santa Monica California.
(//http://quimby.gnus.org/4ad-pics/DeadCanDance.TowardTheWithin.cd.jpg)
http://www.new-age-store.info/B0001JXOO ... thin.htmld (http://www.new-age-store.info/B0001JXOOE/Dead-Can-Dance-Toward-The-Within.htmld)
#2 donation---The movie altered states:: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080360/ (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080360/)
(//http://www.horrormovies.com/images/alteredstates.jpg)
#3 donation----I went to a Jethro Tull show last winter here in Montreal, i had backstage passes to the show , met Ian and got the original record for the album "Aqualung" signed, amongst other stuff.I see him once a year he donates a flute to the charities fund raiser!!
Backstage Pass
(//http://photos23.flickr.com/29997654_0cc7073e7c_o.jpg)
The Record
(//http://photos22.flickr.com/29997653_2acad60895_o.jpg)
Ian anderson himslef
(//http://photos21.flickr.com/29997652_b2cfe8cfa0_o.jpg)
So i will be back at the end of august, and will be able to send them to winners, only then, I will also submit my story then also, unless of course its done with.
Good luck to all!!!
!!!Space just IM me the address here of the destinations these go, you shall place them to any winners you like 1st/2nd etc...!!!
Yeah, let's let the good tales roll...like WhiteShadow says, no hurry. And those are might fine prizes, too--a signed copy of Aqualung! We might end up with a thriving swap market in prizes.
I'll accept the doctor who cried as lw's friend, and the twirling Dead Heads as well.
Cassie, welcome back--also note I opened up the contest to nominations of others' posts, so if you see one you think should be entered...
Waiting for Jimmy
Here's one:
Flash back about 4 years ago:
Jimmy hired me and Drumbo du Jur to play this community party at this place called Mountain Home up in the hills(way down Hiway 49, 2 1/2 drive)
Me and Drumbo get in my van make the drive, get there, set up. Commence waiting. Getting close to downbeat, the natives are getting restless. Still no Jimmy.
Me and Drumbo repair to my van to hide and consume mass quantities af various substances. Getting later.
The powers that be find us and say what the fuck?
We hustle up an old PA head and put it through one of my cabs.
I spot a hippie walking across the lawn with a guitar case. I run up to him and ask "can you play that thing?" Before he even answers I say dude you are in the band.
We get up there and play, dude sings these horrible xtian originals, I tell him "lay out" and me and Drumbo lay the groove. We find one song the guy can play well and we play it 5 times.
After we are done me and Drumbo feel pretty good, went above and beyond to provide some music for the several hundred people .
Then the boss lady comes up and says, well of course you guys aren't geting paid. Too bad cause we got a check made out to Jimmy for $800.
$800! Jimmy had offered me and Drumbo $175 each, so he fucked off $450.
So now we got 2 reasons to be pissed at him. One for being greedy and another for being stupid.
I appealed to the boss lady's husband, finally after a letter from an attorney friend we got $100 each
Jimmys story: he over slept!
_________________
The music never stopped......
Back to top
This was at the old Spiritplants in the Library. Complete work of fiction of course.
------------
Dawn of the Dead:
I probably should start at the beginning, but when time begins to loop back on itself, the beginning is difficult to determine. As I remember things right now, it seems like it all begins with a dream when I was a child or maybe the beginning is a sunrise but that could just as well be the end. Anyway, I'm at a concert and this guy I somehow know says something like "So, you're going to join us tonight?" That's an odd comment that could mean several things, but somehow I know what he means...I think. Sure enough, I'm right, why don't I listen. The show goes along and I come to the realization everyone there has been waiting for me - for some time. The musicians all turn into clay type demons. I notice the guitar player has stubby fingers, which makes it seem impossible to play the guitar. The dream does not exactly take a linier time line, but as I remember, I smoke a joint and reality is shattered. I recognize myself and this reality for what it really is - an illusion. I meet this girl, who turns out to be my "soulmate" although it could have been anyone and really is everyone. She has been sitting next to me and inside me all my life. Actually she is me. We are all One. While all this sounds nice - it is most frightening. I come to the realization I have walked into the middle of some sort of satanic cult and worse yet they want me to kill myself. Basically bear my soul to them and extinguish my being. This is what dieing is really about. There are no secrets. My life begins to flash before my eyes and everyone else...and everyone is my judge. Actually, I'm my own judge if you've been reading carefully, but this is difficult to explain. What is happening? The illusion of this reality will no longer be able to be maintained once I see backstage. I panic not knowing what is right, wrong or real...it is so real...I wake up in a sweat. I seem to remember the sun rising the next morning, so not all seems lost.
Things go along...childhood, leave home, work a while, roam the world searching for nothing, don't find it, go to college, get married, divorced, (no kids), find a "real" job, etc. Then it seems like it was 1996 I lived the dream again. That joint must have been laced with something? But this time there is a new thing called the Internet. I run a few searches looking for the stubby fingered clay demons and the story about a guy smoking a joint and dieing as, I'm sure everything I dreamt is going to pop up on the screen. Of course, nothing of the sort appears to come up, no one has ever died from smoking. I find out about the myth of the grateful dead, but it didn't make much sense. I find Jerry Garcia is missing a finger...that's odd. Surely, if there is some sort of mass delusion of this scale going on, someone would have wrote something about it. I didn't run a search with the keywords "grateful, jerry, garcia or anything like that, but that kind of stuff keeps coming up. Finally, it hits me, I'm a little slow at times, but I was at a Grateful Dead Show! It all makes sense! I didn't think all those hippies just followed them around for the drugs and music...there had to be more...but what the fuck is this? This is just stupid, it can't be based upon any sort of reality...I'm never going to a Dead show, I mean their music is okay, and I've always liked Jerry's paintings, but I'm not a fan...and I mean come on anyway, Jerry died some time ago...didn't he? Maybe I should have read that myth a little closer.
Time goes on. My attitude about life gets better as Our Lady finds me. I have another death trip in another context, but the fear, feelings, time distortions and remembered dreams are similar. (See Salvia Plane: Time Convergence: When Realities Collide) I remember thinking once about God and why. Why would God create us? Why would He create me? Obviously, a very bored, lonely creature with a disturbing sense of humor. The story of Narcissus seemed to make some sense. How would a God create a world for himself? Create something from nothing? Is my dog real? She told me I wasn't too far off and had good questions, but someday I will have to overcome and make it though this death to find out. But bringing back memories from Salvia Space is hard - and really it all could have just be brought on by this weird album cover a friend's band put out. Cover art - wait that's a whole nother topic.
Well it seemed safe. Jerry had been reported dead for some time. Still no one had died from weed. It hadn't turned me into clay animation demon recently. I'd met several new people on the Internet and we wanted to get together and met in person, so off to a couple of Phil Lesh and Friends shows we go. The first show I take easy as I promised another friend. Who was apparently was concerned with my safety, going to a show with a bunch of degenerates I met of the Internet. Afterward, a different friend who dropped a little acid claims he saw Warren Haynes turn into clay and morph into Jerry. I guess I can never say I hadn't been warned.
Next day was mushroom day. Hey they're natural and almost an herb. Sure enough, as we are getting ready to consume far too much of the sacrament, LW states, "So Tstt's going to join us tonight?" While I didn't exactly remember the dreams at this point, I have an inherent understanding of exactly what he means. Later I ask him about the comment and he admits it was what I thought. He said he saw a concerned look on my face but thought he might be pushing me by offering too much.
The circle just gets a little tighter. LW and I seem to have taken more than our companions. I try to maintain somewhat, but LW is gone after the first song. I hear he is taken to a safe place in the hive so I'm not worried. But about then, things get a little trippy. I have to eventually sit down with LW and Trout. Its not exactly like they want me to stick a knife in my heart and spill it all over the stage. But they might as well have, the spotlight was certainly on me. K controlled the music and she was bringing it to a stop. It's sure easy for everyone to talk ego death, but unless you're standing on the edge, you don't understand.
Tonight wasn't right for some reason and I knew it. Sure, I had some kind fragrance in my pocket and the crowd was begging me to light it. I kept telling them tonight wasn't it. The smoke has a little to do with it after all. Not everything is magic - or is it? But something else was wrong. Stork had an unfortunate fall (being as tall as he is) and was being given his own backstage tour...regrettably by the very real and expensive medics. He didn't even get to sign the wall. I don't think it was all a coincidence. Even in a reality where all is God and there is no right or wrong, you can still hurt yourself. But as a group the dead can be rather pushy. So I lit it to appease them, but it wasn't the time. The music picked up, the connection was broke (slightly) and that is about when I headed for the exit. The show was over for me that night. But I knew I'd be back and so would the dead the next time the circus rolled through our tiny town.
-------------------
Hey LW, next time we're around remind me about the Rorschach Test. From my research, the test tells you far more about the person conducting it, than the subject. Here's that famous number 1 card you so fondly remember. I found a set of them in an apartment I was cleaning. But that's another story.
(//http://members.aol.com/lbo1852561/r1s.jpg)
Number 10 is still my favorite. What a pleasant undersea world - I hope that's what you see - hhahahahhaha
(//http://members.aol.com/lbo1852561/r10s.jpg)
"In more than twenty years of psychiatric work, I have never known a clinical psychologist to report, on the basis of a projective test, that the subject is a "normal, mentally healthy person." While some witches may have survived dunking, no "madman" survives psychological testing . . . there is no behavior or person that a modern psychiatrist cannot plausibly diagnose as abnormal or ill." Thomas Szasz, The Manufacture of Madness, 1970, p. 35.
JR, you musta read my mind--I was about to PM you to nominate the post you just placed. I esp. like the drafted hippie 'n guitar, and taking refuge in the van's sacred sanctuary. The post says a lot about what friends do and don't do.
My Wyffe (She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed) is frequently astonished at my inability to hold a grudge or to return hurt for hurt: I'm quick to anger, quick to speak my mind, but I can't hold onto bad feelings, and don't want to. She's different in that regard--being extremely patient but then implacable...
...so of course I am very careful ;)
But I don't just forgive and forget, either: seems to me the person who forgives everything is a saint, and the person who forgets everything is a fool. I try to walk the center line.
WhiteShadow, let's let the contest run till your return later in August. Just hold tight to those treasures till then.
O senorsal? I know you misspent your youth in Illinois about the same time I misspent mine in Indiana: you gotta have a story for me.
NAw, space, the doc who cried was a dupe, imo. They were buying into my delusions, to some extent as good christian doctors patiently awaiting the 'pock-a-lipsy.
Sometime its difficult to connect malevolent behavior with someone in a typically nurturing role. (My mother was the real sadist in the story, judih. But I'm guessing you were too kind to point out as much.)
There was a day when I realized that I could either be my own worse enemy or best friend and ally. And it dawned on me that a real best friend doesn't tell one what he/she wants to hear. That only reinforces pre-conceived notions. A real friend lays it out straight. And even then, once we've gleaned some important self-knowledge, its always tempting to resort to the "shoot the messenger" syndrome. Interestingly, some objects/events we perceive as negative often teach us more about ourself than those we see as enjoyable A "bad trip" being a fine example.
Sometime we're our own best friend. But on a certain level, that only happens when we really gets honest with ourselves. Entheogens can assist in this quest. Just don't be surprised when you find yourself all alone and only you can decide if you are going to sink or swim........
The topic at hand is a prime example of a concept with multiple levels of meaning. ANd I learned from this thread that it is possible to paint a picture that's perfectly clear to the artist but which manages to gain more meaning when seen through the eyes of some and less through others. (I wrote most of the story specifically for this contest, btw.)
On another level, I ended up in a detox unit after it was decided by those closest to me that my ritual ingestion of sacraments amounted to a drug addiction. The story is a warning to all who walk down this path that there exists no sociatal safety net for entheogenic explorers in the U$ culture we call home. Friends and family will wish you a speedy recovery.
One of my goals was to portray the negative possibilities which may arise from even the ritual use of entheogens. That was really the only way I could bring myself to participate in a contest structured around competing for prizes by telling stories about "friends and allies," as the theme is one I find spiritual. But it was never my intention to get into a public discussion on my personal hesitation in participating in the topic at hand. So I chose a personally humiliating story to wear as a badge of honor in front of the community..
Brw, I'm respectfully withdrawing this story from consideration. Defending/explaining the nuances of a tale before a jury is just wrong, imo. But I felt compelled to do just that due to the discussion on the story's merrits above. (I would have been content to just not win any prize. hehe)
lw
Yeah, guess I do... Have only 6 min of 'puter time left this session. Will post later today..... (jeez, how's that for priming the pump for an orgy of anticipatory delights :P :P ----- sal
saliva drips as we speak
it's spelled S A L V I A why, 'saliva'??? I spit on the very notion :lol: -- sal
luckily, there's always a towel by the puter.....
Quote from: "laughingwillow".
The story is a warning to all who walk down this path that there exists no sociatal safety net for entheogenic explorers in the U$ culture we call home. Friends and family will wish you a speedy recovery.
lw
Yet another example of a quote that should be archived into some sort of grand assembling of 'sage' sayings .......... 8) sal
Love Story from the Desert
this time of year for many years now my thoughts and mind are turned to the burning man arts fest coming up in late august...this is my seventh year going...many journeys within this ongoing journey...and i wanted to tell a short tale from 2003...i'd gone that year with hardly pennies to spare, and a heart still healing from a bad, broken romance...but earning enough money to go, and traveling from the east coast to get there helped me to heal...
sunday night, before the event even began, i et some amanita muscarias i'd picked with my friend the autumn before...he didn't, looked at me like i was crazy...kept an eye on me all night, good friend :)
but it was such a good night...cool and clear and i had a big bike i rode about on, lovely journeying and cycling in the high desert night...and all night i thought of this woman i'd known for some months via cyberspace and the phone...and my heart opened up to her that night, and subsequent nights at the fest...the amanitas helped me to find the truth within my crabbed heart, that i loved her and wished to be with her in a deep way...
KD went with me to the next Burning Man, and we're preparing for this year's currently...she and i now live together and are getting married at the end of this year...much of this happening was sourced in that night with those lovely plant creatures, and how together we figured me out :)
Tom & Jeremy
Tom knew exactly when eveything had started to go wrong. It was when he had lost track of his friend. Jeremy was his party-boyfriend and most trusted ally. He missed him desperatly. The two men had ingested some datura seeds, and while things had been unpleasant, they had been manageable. They had been in Tom's apartment initially, and after four or five hours they had felt that they were in control enough to go outside for the remainder of there trip. Inside the apartment they felt like they were in a dream world. They had been in the park when it happened, upon his return from urinating Tom had been unable to locate Jeremy anywhere. He became very scared. That was when he saw the gray men in the shadows, he could see their mouths opening and closing, but could not hear what they were saying. Looking at them gave him the worst feeling he had ever had in his life. He knew thoses creatures were dedicated to pain and torment, and they would kill him if they could. He turned then and ran out of the park, he needed to find somewhere in the light with lots of other people around. They wouldn't be able to hurt him then.
When the burden of thirst became too much, he stopped running and found himself on a street. He looked behind him, he was safe the gray men could not be seen. He breathed easy for a moment, then he caught the eye of a woman walking down the street. His heart skipped a beat. Where her eyes should have been were black holes, and then terror filled him. She looked directly at him, and the blackness of her eyes spoke to him of unending pain, and loneliness. He broke her gaze and looked around the street, the eyes of everyone he saw were the same, blank hateful orifices. He knew then that he would die, they could be no escaping them; they were everywhere, in everything.
He put his hands in his pockets, and with his head down kept walking. Very carefully, still keeping his head down he kept his eye on the passing doorways. The idea of finding somewhere safe consumed him. The door of an apartment building opened and a tall man exited carrying a naked and bloody body, he was followed by a screaming woman. Tom ran up the steps and throught the door. The putrid smell inside the building was too much, Tom threw-up on the foyer floor. He stood breathing deeply for a moment than ran up the stairs, several flights up, he stopped to catch his breath. He looked down the stairs there appeared to be no one following him. He continued up the stairs, this inbetween place was not safe, someone could come out at any time and find him. At the top of the stairs he found a door that opened unto the roof.
Carefully he ascertained that no one else was on the roof. He went outside and sank down under a chimney. Tears overcame him, he wanted his friend. If he had been with Jeremy things would have been ok. They could have kept each other safe. He couldn't stop sobbing, being consumed with the fear he would never again feel safe or happy, or see anyone he loved again. He lay prostrate on the ground for a long time. It is possible he slept, when his eyes were able to properly focus on what was before him, the sun was setting and he was ice cold.
Stumbling to his feet, he became aware of a noise similar to many people whispering quietly to one another in a large room. He looked behind him, and saw the gray men there. They were coming for him, this was the end. He ran to the edge of the roof and threw himself over.
*this is fiction, as if it wasn't obvious*
Rght on, roach.
lw
Hi, folks...thanks for all the entries so far: all excellent, in my eyes...
As I mentioned above to WhiteShadow, we're going to things runs a little longer. Heck, the best thing to do with rules is shed them, pretty much.
Don't hesitate to post more than one tale--I'm just a man who loves stories ;)
I finally have a surgical date of 8/22. That's gonna put me out of commission for a while, so to make sure we can wrap things up, I'll start the poll on 8/10, we can vote for a week, then announce results and ship prizes.
To be honest, I don't even think of this as a contest. I've got a buncha stuff I'd like to give away, I'd like more folks to come 'round here at Spiritplants, and I love to swap stories.
All my spiritbrothers and spiritsisters are winners, IMHO.
I'll update the prize list this weekend. There will also be some surprise prizes for folks not placing in the 1st, 2nd or 3rd poll places.
Breakin' the rules, breakin' the rules...
the perfect comment floats along the river
and sidles up to tickle the incidentary branch
a fish caught, untangles
the river flows
(in other words, applause for storytelling, where we all come out enriched)
good luck in surgery - separate energy wave towards you towards that.
judih
(it's early morning - i'm involved in jet lagging - hence larger font)
Okay.
Time, gentlemen, ladies, time.
I will start a poll tomorrow night to determine our winners: you have until then to add posts.
I will close the poll this coming Friday night and declare the winners, so I can pack and label prizes: I'm going into spine surgery Monday, 8/22, and it will be a few months before I'm up and about again, so that's the longest I can wait.
Thank you, one and all.
Just checking in briefly, folks. Tomorrow, early a.m., I head to the OR.
I've spent most of the past week visiting family in the Badlands of Old Indiana: love 'em all, but it's almost comical watching them try to balance 1) "Of course you'll be alright," and 2) "You have to visit--what if we never see you again?!"
I've had a grand run, and the thought of checking out just seems okay--I'm in no hurry, mind you, but not fearful of it, either. And the odds of an excellent surgical outcome are greatly in my favor.
If there is an afterlife, I will crash the server at midnight :twisted:
I should be in hospital about a week or a bit less. I will start the poll on my return. So if anyone still wants to post an entry, have at it.
Everyone, thanks for your patience and good wishes.
yeah, space, you tell em
now, isn't there a senor sal in the crowd? Where are you Senor?
(senor......senor.....)
I really hope your surgery goes well, space.
Do you have anyone around the might be able to let us know about your recovery? My heart's with ya.
Big Love.
Sal here---- All is well---- This is the first I became aware of Sir Spaces' operation... Sending healing vibes pronto---- :) sal
Breakfast at Epiphanies
We had an encounter with the "U Turn for Christ" troops on our vacation. We were camping family reunion style at this family type campground and as the week went by we noticed that the new campers all seemed to know each other. We kept guessing at the connection. "Dogs", I said. "Hunting dogs", my brother-in-law said. "Just from coming here year after year", someone else said.
By Thursday they were showing up in small busses, and instead of well scrubbed families, these guys all looked like they were on day passes from the halfway house. A U-Haul showed up with a huge outdoor kitchen.
The vibe was military, definitley heavy duty gung ho. Lots of yelling, ass grabbing heave ho's.
Early that night a couple of them came over to our campsites, big scary looking dude says "We checked with the ofice and they said you guys are gonna be gone tomorrow, what time do you think you will be out of the campsites. I looked at him and said 'Well by 12 noon" (check out time).
So this disciple of christ gives me a most menacing dirty look.
Next morning by 10 Am they had staked a claim on our campsites, and by 11 they were gathering in the street watching us as we leisurely ate our lunch and broke camp. We finally pulled out at 11:55. Would have been 10:15 without their pressure.
We moved into phase two of our holiday, a beach house in Guernevile, right up the road from the camp.
Next day, Saturday morning, I get up before everybody and inspired by the beauty of the redwoods I decide spend the day communing with the spirit of Albert Hoffman. I take a stroll into the heart of town, digging the redwoods, the sunshine, the amazing menagerie of people, and doing some mental re-creating.
Anyone that has been to Guerneville knows what I mean about menagerie. It's got three or four distinct populations, just living together in harmony. One is just regular folks, typical small town california, quite few old hippies, a bunch of obvious meth heads and hard core pot farmers, tourists, and what Guerneville is most famous for, gays.
So I am sauntering back to the house and I see this guy, from the campsite across from us, big loud mouth older guy, I remembered him cause he had the same name as me, Uncle Joe. He comes up to me hands empty, dressed like a beach user/rafter and says, "hey can I ask you something?" I don't think he recognized me. I say with trepidation "yes?"
He reached into his filthy shorts and pulls out a New Testament. I say no thanks and walk away. I look around and realize that there are 10 or more of the dudes from the campground out doing the same thing!
U turn! Now I see they are thinking their religion is gonna save these gay people from all the happiness I see in them just walking proud and free in the town.
I continue on my way and come to this little tiny one room church, nestled in a redwood grove. For some reason the door is open, but no one is around. I look inside at the stark formality of the pews and pulpit and realize that what the xtians do is try to hold G-d in their hands, try to claim ownership of spirit. It's like that kind majik where you make it look like you created what was gonna happen any way. Like Kesey sneezing lightning, or Bob Weir stopping the rain.
I said to myself, man if you wanna see god, step out of that shack and look up. The wonderous majesty of the universe is in full manifestation in the forest, can't they see it?
I was gonna offer to try their religon if one of them would try mine, but I looked at my dwindling material and said, "Why cast pearls before swine?"
Jesus, protect me from your followers!
it seems to me that any cosmic understanding can be reduced to a cube of tactile merchandise if that's what a person wants to do.
Take the infinite and frame it, starch it and hang it on your wall (or around your neck) and then call it by name - that's the way to deal with the incomprehensible - make it tick for a limited mindframe.
Is this not what organized religion or other cults do to the wild and endless face of things?
good story, there, jrl
judih
Quote from: "judih"Is this not what organized religion or other cults do to the wild and endless face of things?
judih
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Another great line from our sis :!: :D 8) -------------- Keep 'em comin :wink: ---------------- sal
haack, etc.
All is well. I'm home early, surgery was a bang up success, surgeon smiling like the Cheshire Cat: I feel like a well trussed roast.
Poll goes up tomorrow.
Now where's the rest of those precious percocets?...oblivion, here I come...
cheshire cat euphoria sounds like a reasonable post-op response.
stitched up with nowhere to go? pass the pills and hope that oprah's on holiday.
welcome back to recovery land, space
LOL Glad to see you made it through brotha space.
Pop a percocet
watch Orca loll on the beach
baster lombada!
lw
-------- 8) ------- Great to hear of the surgical success...... Be resolutely responsible now bruddah; no more than 3-4 times the recommended dosage :wink: ------------ sal
QuoteBe resolutely responsible now bruddah; no more than 3-4 times the recommended dosage ------------ sal
:mrgreen:
Yeah, 1-2 tablets every 4-6 hours as needed my ass! Howzabouty 3 tablets every 3 hours with just a sip of 40 year old Wild Turkey Bourbon (saved for the occasion)?
You'll like this one, sal. The day before my discharge, the surgical resident of the day stops by to say he's filling out the discharge paperwork, scrips, etc. My beehive busy brain, familiar with hospital routine, suggests that if he gives my wife the scrips now, we won't have to stop on the way home the next day to fill them. "Great idea!" he says.
Next day, the surgical resident for that day stops by, says, "Here's your paperwork--I see that Dr. Yesterday forgot to write your scrips." Lo and behold! Another set of scrips! Hee hee.
Shame you have to work the system to get adequate pain relief. The DEA has docs so scared about narcotic scrips... "Hmmm. You are dying in terrible pain, but if I give you enough narcotic to make you comfortable, the DEA might investigate me...sorry." Buncha crap.
I had a similar experience many years ago in the burn ward. They dosed me pretty good with morphine on admission [well enough that I looked around the emergency room at all the docs, nurses, family and friends, and quipped, "I suppose you're wondering why I called you all here."], but I woke in the night in bad shape. When I buzzed the nurse and told her I needed something for pain, she replied, "I'm sorry Mr. Space, but you're oversedated now."
Giving her my best Jack Nicholson grin-snarl, I reached up with my burnt, greasy fried chicken hand, seized her shoulder, pulled her close and asked, "Do I look oversedated to you, lady?!" Worked like a charm. The "Do I look oversedated to you?" became a treasured family refrain.
Needless to say, I'm feeling no pain right now, and I can already tell that the pressure on my spinal cord and nerve roots was released by the surgery.
I'm trying to establish contact with the mojo bones grafted into my neck, but so far no reply. I'm torn between hoping they came from some exotic cadaver of color, so Mr. Space can be just a little more funky, or from an authentic redneck, so I can scandalize 'em.
Sometime today, when the pharmaceutical mix is just right, I'll work on setting up the poll.
---- :lol: --- he he!! "exotic cadaver of color, or an authentic redneck" :wink: ----------- Just think, when science has progressed to where there will be no rejection issues whilst using donor cells from more than one donor..... I can see it now, Space gets his combo graft supplied by a gent of color, as well as a contribution from regulation backwoods boy that's had a documented history of several generations of familial inbreeding :oops: --- Why just imagine the possibillities :P ---- Sir Space could do the bugalloo with 'da finess of James Brown, and regale us into peals of laughter tellig us tales of his sistuhs-n-cousins ala Jeff Foxworthy..... :shock: -------- gotta love 'high science' :wink: --sal
Quote from: "space"If there is an afterlife, I will crash the server at midnight :twisted:
Space,
I am torn. I am glad you are still kickin' like tha Colonel'z chickenz, but...SPR was crashed for a coupla dayz.
I thought you wuz sendin' us a message.
Did you see any bright lightz? Go down any tunnelz? When you entered a big white room, did they tell ya, "Take a number and hava seat"?
Were they any stripperz in heaven? The nice onez.
Ya know, ya could throw in a coupla storiez 'bout them white lightz an' such and we could get tha Ministry of Hopeâ,,¢ back in the black.
Fin
Fin, I gotta tell ya, it was like being turned off then turned back on. Hard reboot.
I was on the OR table. The anesthesiology intern was pushing the plunger on my IV anesthetic. The anesthesiology resident told him, "Remember, you are titrating to effect. Watch his eyelids..."
So I watched my eyelids, too. Nothing much seemed to be happening. Then she remarked, "You could push the plunger a little faster." Then, from a great distance, "Okay, get the surgeon in here."
Bingo. Blank.
The anesthesiolgoy intern says I wasn't supposed to remember the surgeon call. I didn't tell him I've had many years of practice in looking around just before the lights go out...
Five hours later, slowly swimming back to consciousness in the recovery room, moaning groaning people all around me (I hate that: always feel like I'm waking up in hell) my first thought was profound: "Shit, wha' the fuck?"
My throat hurt, so I'm thinking some low-life cut it...then I realize I've got a Foley catheter running into my bladder, and I think, damn, musta been hit hard, internal damage, 'nother car wreck, or maybe some cracker boot-stomped my kidney..." Then the RR nurse peers at me, says "Welcome back, your surgery went fine, wiggle your toes."
But nothing in between. Vital signs stayed strong the whole time, so no OOB or NDE type stuff. I was thinking about crashing the server, of course, like when you go to sleep thinking of what time you have to get up, so I may have over-reached a little.
Sorry 'bout that.
Quote from: "senorsalvia"Just think, when science has progressed to where there will be
Yah, I'm a work in progess, sal.
The cool thing about bones is that after being sterilized, they are inert mineral stuff, no living cells involved, no histological mismatch possible. So any bone from anybody would work just fine.
But somebody donated their body for the purpose, and I appreciate it--hell, could be two different donors, one each bone graft...that's on my list of questions for my first follow-up with the surgeon.
If there is just a whiff of avatar still connected to those bits of bone, I'll give 'em voice if I can.
Cyberpunk Space: "We have the technology. We can make him weirder, funkier..."
:)
Whoa--- Never knew about the inert bone/sterilization angle.. That brightens my day, 'cuz I have always been registered as a donor, but then I later found I had hep-c and was under the impression me used goodies were persona non grata---- Nice to know I can contribute from my afterlife (I mean, since I've been told by more than one of my x's that I don't do so well in 'da life at present :wink: )---------- Heal well--- sal
...
-TM