MICROS AGAIN

 

Anyway, so once again, dipping my toes into the Micro Novel Pool. I was scrolling down the blogs to see the first time I'd done one of these only to discover I'd never actually done Micro novels on the blog 'til the last blog. Sweet Jesus, I must have started those on MySpace, or Facebook Notes, or some similar sinking ship......

As such I'm kicking off with an oldie. This is one of my favorites.

EXISTENTIALISTS AGAINST NEUROPATHY

A Micro Novel 

Neil tore across the second floor hallway. “Fuck this shit,” he roared, “I’ll take on all comers!!!!” He flung himself headlong down the stairs. It was a good day to be alive.

The rest are new:

FIVE STUPID TURKEYS DROWNING IN THE RAIN

A Micro Novel

It wasn't a move of great intellect, but you had to give me points for ambition as I scaled the levels of the queen to access that small stack of glass bowls & then lost my footing and went careening to the floor....careening? Carombing? Either way it was one helluva rush....the glass bowls went carombing (carooming, maybe?) off to the side and I think they may have broken....to make things worse the plastic pitchers rained down on me, bonk, bonk, bonk, all off my noggin.

Monique picked me up with her strong, sturdy arms and sat me up, asking if I was okay. I tried to be all nonchalant & I may have been concussed. Mild concussion, maybe? Yeah, I think so.

“I'll have to figure that out later,” I told her, “I think my brain's in the butter right now.” And I laughed & she laughed & we kissed.

REVALATION ACCORDING TO CHARLES

A Micro-Pseudo-Gospel

Some rank amateur on AM Radio callously supposed one day we as a species might all blow ourselves to Kingdom Come in a nuclear war, well, buddy, that's my reality day in day out, no joke. Every morning me and my brother strap on our power packs and head out the door with our ray guns and we spend all day firing nuclear rays at people and objects. I mean, we clock in, power up the guns, spend the whole day skulking around the ruins shooting rays and then, after about a twelve hour day we punch our cards and go home, eat beef stew, etc. Rough days. The apocalypse is really that banal.

You should see the shopping centers. They're in warehouses that are only open two or three hours a day---randos set up stalls as they can grab them and everyone gets to haggle over what's left. One guy had a couple of lobsters. Real, according to Hoyle lobsters. I've already got a battalion of testy ocelots. I don't need any pets. Someone needed lobsters, though, I'll betcha. Someone always needs something.

They have upside down bowling alleys, it's nut, I don't know how they do it. The lanes are all on the ceiling, they're all lined with blue and white neon. Folks are up there in the middle of everything, rolling balls around, knocking over pins that fall up. I dunno....anti-gravity fields, or something.

I have seen the future, skeezix, and you're not gonna like it.  

GURVITZ (An introduction)

A Micro Overture

About eight cars from two towns, plus the feds, pulled up outside the bungalow. Right away it felt like no place anyone actually lived.

We'd all taken our places by the cars and hadn't yet gotten our shit together when people started moving out the front door---the perp, on his knees, pushed forward by Gurwitz and the other kid, what was his name? Nally. Gurwitz, I mean, right from the outset, is pistol whipping the guy, and it's terrible. You're not going to get a confession out of a guy if you knock all the stuffing out his noggin, and Christ forbid his damn lawyer's on the scene, right?

But Gurwitz keeps pistol whipping the guy, and the guy almost seems to be laughing at the whole thing......stunned, I guess, maybe concussed. Nally's not doing a goddamn thing, he's coming down the steps with his arms at his sides, watching the whole thing. Anyways, so there's this whole pull-apart and they cuff the guy and start reading him his rights, and as far as I can tell he was lucid enough to understand it....everyone kept having to hold Gurwitz back and he collapses into a pile, weeping like a baby, and he just keeps saying, “the bodies, all the bodies, Jesus Christ, the bodies”...

So we went inside.

Copyright 2020, Molotov Editions   

That last one is to be continued, obviously. You'll see.

     The rest of the year, obviously, is dedicated to finishing two books. Seeya on the flip, assuming we don't all die. Screw it----it don't matter....

THIS WEEK'S PLAYLIST:

1. MO' HEVY CRUD: THE SEQUEL STRIKES BACK (comp)

2. TRICK OR TREAT: MUSIC TO SCARE YOUR NEIGHBORS-Vintage 45s from Lux & Ivy's Basement

3. ALICE COOPER-PARANORMAL

4. SNFKR (homemade comp) 

BACK ON THE MICRO TRAIN

 

     So I actually started coming up with the long-neglected form that is the Micro Novel this past week. I wrote like 6 or 7, I'll give you a few here. Don't say I never did nothing for ya.

BUKOWSKI AND ALCOHOL

(A Seriocomic Micro-dissertation in one act)

"You could toss the idea of cause and effect all day long, but consider this: If the hero of the story shows up in an Oldsmobile, what's the central point-----that he was in an Oldsmobile, or that he showed up?"

Wally skulked toward the back. The lecture had just begun and it was already too boring and pretentious.

He found the restroom and locked himself in. His salivary glands were going crazy. He knelt over the throne and spat repeatedly. His entire torso felt like it was about to implode. Finally the feeling passed. He sat down and shat like a horse. After that he stood up, turned around and threw up.

He puked standing, and all the blood vessels in his face exploded. He felt it burn hard across his cheeks and knew his face would be all red and blotchy when he came back out. He lay down for maybe twenty minutes. When he stumbled out the damned lecture was still going on.

                                              ************

STABBY STAB STAB

A Micro Novel

The Meet and Greet did not go well. Some people can bring the whole room up and some people can bring the whole room down. Jeremy had some imagined beef with Knuckles and he was going to sink the whole room with it.

"What happened to the other singer?" Jeremy demanded.

"I'm the singer," said Knuckles.

"You weren't the original singer..."

"Yeah, I am."

"You aren't the guy on the first album," said Jeremy. That guy had a really low voice. You sound like Janis Joplin on a crack bender." Knuckles' face was darkening, but Jeremy seemed unphased by the whole thing. "I liked that first album. What happened to that singer?"

"I am that singer," Knuckles growled.

"How come you changed your voice, then?" Jeremy stared daggers through him.

"It's called throat cancer, you idiot," screamed Knuckles. Jeremy glowered and decided that sounded like it might be important or something. He kept his mouth shut the rest of the time.

                                    ****************

THE NIHILISTS OVER IN DOVER

A Micro Novel

All holy hell over the fragility of furniture and anything on the upended coffee table legally belongs to the floor. It's not an easy night as the goddamned spanking paddle has broken clean it half, cheap piece of crap that it is.

“Was”, not “is”. There's no time to get sentimental about these things.

The sad malfunction's not going to slow me down, though---I'm a bull in the China Shop writ large, bashing down norms, guardrails and your Mom's old bread pudding recipe. What'll I wreck next? What have you got?

I couldn't tell you word one about god, whatever that is---all I know is I go nuts when her lips form the word, “fondue”.

                            ****************

HOW TO GIVE PEOPLE SEPSIS AND OTHER PARTY TRICKS

A Micro Novel

All over the kitchen, up and down the stairs, losing consortium and tearing her hair out, “all the bags, so many bags, where are all the bags coming from?!” She hailed from the Midwest, so “bag” kept sounding like, “baig”.

Punky just laughed the whole thing off. He was eating like a King.

                 ********************

So there's some of the latest fun. I go back and forth on "Stabby" because to me it's less a Micro Novel and more flash fiction. But who am I to split hairs? I think I said what I wanted with it; you clowns can bandy theory back and forth----I got less important things to do.

Copyright 2020/C.F. Roberts/Molotov Editions

THIS WEEK'S PLAYLIST:

DAVID BOWIE-Heathen, Aladdin Sane

VAN HALEN-Van Halen I, Diver Down

THE RHINO BROS PRESENT THE WORLD'S WORST RECORDS