Keep Calm and Slot On
I adjusted the shoes on this Aurora Vibrator slot car produced in the early ’60s and got it to run for a while.
Ekorn, vaktel, blåfugler, oh mai!
The birds peck at the seed, rain or shine, wind or calm, morning or evening.
The bird seed I put out several times each day draws California quail, Spotted towee, Black-capped chicadee, Steller’s Jay, Tree swallow, Mourning dove, Western bluebird, and squirrel.
A round of bluebirds compete with the covey of quail. Then a scold of Steller’s jays swoops down, scattering the birds.
A squirrel claims his turn at the feed, cracking sunflower seeds. Tiny birds – perhaps finches or swallows – peck at the pile despite the squirrels.
A melee breaks out between the latter and the jays. Front lines form and collapse as the battle evolves.
Four gray-tailed squirrels scatter again as the bluebirds and jays flitter, swooping in to gobble at the seed, then flying up to roost on a nearby limb.
All the yard animals scatter at once, briefly leaving the meal without diners.
NORSKE (per Google)
Fuglefrøet jeg setter ut flere ganger hver dag, trekker California-vaktel, Spotted towee, Black-capped chicadee, Steller’s Jay, Treesvale, Mourning Due, Western Bluebird og ekorn.
En runde med blåfugler konkurrerer med vaktelen. Så styrter en skjenn av Stellers jays ned og sprer fuglene.
Et ekorn tar sin tur ved fôret og knekker solsikkefrø. Små fugler – kanskje finker eller svaler – hakker i haugen til tross for ekorn.
Det bryter ut en nærkamp mellom sistnevnte og jaysene. Frontlinjer dannes og kollapser etter hvert som kampen utvikler seg.
Fire gråhaleekorn sprer seg igjen mens blåfuglene og jaysene flimrer, suser inn for å sluke av frøet, og flyr deretter opp for å hvile på en nærliggende lem.
Alle gårdsdyrene sprer seg på en gang, og forlater et kort måltid uten spisegjester.
The (Not) Very Helpful Self-Help Book
The Umpteen Affirmations
Step 1
I don’t need to read Sartre to know the meaningless of my life, your life, all our lives.
Step 2
I don’t need to lean on Jesus to find solace from the meaninglessness, because the 2,000-year-old myth is just as empty as Buddha.
Step 3
I don’t need to buy stuff I don’t need at prices I can’t afford so that the U.S. economy can percolate along while zillionaires profit.
Step 4
I don’t need to peruse social media to confirm my prejudices and ignorance because I admit them freely.
Step 5
I don’t need to share my personal struggles with others because they don’t give a shit.
Step 6
I don’t need to compare myself to anyone else because every one of us is fucked up.
Step 7
More in kitchen
I was a mere lad of 67 years old when I knew I had struck upon a golden goose of an idea. I would condense all the various self-help books that had consoled me over my brief life for those whose lives were simply too busy to read all of them.
But then I realized that meant I would have to read self-help book after self-help book. I’d have to read books by everyone from DeepThought Patron to TwitTock, I reconsidered my plan.
I decided I could help my readers in the least helpful way. Thus, the Not very helpful self-help book will cure you of using capital letters where they aren’t warranted; my wisdom will transform you from a twit addicted to Twitter to a fully functioning being; my naivete will encourage you to believe you can’t, rather than can, do something; this slim volume challenges every concept of success – that you can think your way to success – you can’t. All you can hope for is a lucky break but you’ll always miss out on the cornbread muffins.
Not very helpful? “Would someone please pass the cornbread?” (citation needed).
Just Give Up
Just think how great you will feel once you give up trying? You can wear mismatched socks and your T shirt on backwards. You can continue in bliss despite having a piece of lettuce stuck between your teeth. You’ll wake up from a dream in which you were naked and revel in the fact you weren’t embarrassed.
Our culture tells us we have to smart, wily, pretty, vapid, and greedy while we also must be a good Christian who eschews the world.
How can they coexist without driving us crazy? Well, they don’t. We are crazy. Just look at who we elected as el president al dente.
Death stalks everything
What on earth?
some thotz
Emotional doldrums take root in my psyche. Curious health issues, common mechanical failures, trenchant inactivity, and sad memories haunt my troubled mind.
Even the Tibetan singing bowls annoy me as I confront my self-deception.
Then I get welcome news and my mood swings toward confidence and satisfaction
Writing continues
when the clouds part
and the storm abates
the heart is still rendered
the soul still spent
the patience gone
Time was ...
Summer submits to fall as bright days give way to rain clouds.
Days dwindle into darkness as heathens huddle around their beliefs.
Weather report from Stevenson:
Melancholy with periodic napping today and tomorrow. Weeping skies throughout the early morning with a chance of anger, then clearing as the emotional storm passes.
Writing fables, waiting tables
Big Goof: A Fable
Big Goof yawned widely, nearly locking his jaws as he shook off the night’s tremors. He rolled over, trying to stir his bones. The night chill had seeped up his arms and down his legs. He groaned as he pushed against the ground, lifting his mass from the damp ground. He shook his limbs as he stood, trying to combat the chill. His breath fogged in the cold air as he exhaled. He came eventually to know that he must’ve dozed off for a few dozen years. He had awoken with matted fur and sore bones, and he remembered the last time that had happened, he’d slept from the new moon to the half. He thought he was an eagle for some time as he dozed, then a bear, and much later, an otter. No, perhaps a seal or a salmon or the wind. Yes, he was the wind for some while over the moons, wandering voraciously over the land but somehow always winding up where it began to blow. .
The FedUp ExPress Guy
Fill Wantless didn’t want much. He just wanted a little bit. A little bit of love, a little bit of respect, a little bit of money and a little bit of life. He was apparently unaware that all these things come from within, not without, but Wantless was constantly looking to the world askance, unaware that what he thought of himself, no one else did. Some disliked him for his loud guffaw amidst a high school basketball game while others endured his long, tedious and nearly pointless stories of his Norwegian ancestors. A few loved him deeply, madly blah blah blah, truly, but never once let him know.
Gobshite of Sa'an
“Those who no longer ask the questions are the truly enlightened.” The Sa’an spouted the saying in his sleep – over and over and over again until he awoke those of us who weren’t too besotted and still somewhat conscious. Rollo kicked the Sa’an to shut him up but he continued babbling the inane words over and over. Rollo shook his shoulders, trying to awake the sleeping Sa’an. The saint snored between words, stuck in some dungeon of his mind where nothing existed beyond the prison bars of his dreams. Rollo cursed and spat on the pavement. He considered gagging his drunk friend to stop his words but decided to move far enough away that the mumbled worlds sounded like a gurgling stream. Rollo slept fitfully nonetheless and even as he drifted into sleep, the Sa’an’s words seared into his mind. “What questions? He wondered. “Why the hell l would I want to be enlightened? What time is it?" Dawn yawned to life.
The wizard behind the screen writes of things imagined, memories conflated, loves unrequited and efforts made.
Philip L. Watness invites readers to peruse his fiction. He hopes to impart his humor through his writing.
Watness retired in May 2024 after three decades of being a small town community journalist.
Among his future novels is, “The FedUp ExPress Guy,” a pseudobiography about a hapless reporter who gets fired, has to drive truck for the Feckless Delivery Co., and then returns to a much-changed journalism environment 7 years after being fired.
It’s a hoot. Trust me.
Gobshite of Sa’an is Watness’ take on spirituality, gurus, religion, commerce, and reality.
Whatnews.Ink supplements his limited income. He asks that readers subscribe to his various products.
Please support me as well as you can. I don’t have much financial security despite having exquisite aspirations.
Here are many books in my head which I hope to get on paper. Please support me by subscribing to my fiction stories. Every dollar will encourage me to write more
- Big Goof, a fable
- Fed-Up Ex-Press Guy
- Gobshite of Sa’an
- Quarter Past Warhol
- Paper Trail, Paper Tiger
- The (Not) Very Helpful Self-Help Book
- The Peg and I
- Pixilated
- Qiyamah
Our team
Me and my cats
Reddi the Unready
Reddi has been my sidekick for nigh on 16 years while Greyling came along a year later, 14-15 years ago. They're both victims of their original owner, a woman with the sense of a turnip. She's about 4 pounds heavier now than in this photo in the driveway of my former rental unit.
Greyling the Licker
Greyling, named for an English species of salmon, is a dog in cat's body in that she only has one response to being pet - licking. Ugh.
Fluthipper Wharstandrens
The author of these pages is not this man. This is a fictional character created by the author of these pages, whom we seek to pay this internet bill.