August 11

I’m mystified. Last night in my dream there was a guy who sort of looked like my boss yelling at me for all the work I hadn’t done, because I’d gotten really into re-editing the Wikipedia page about Internet addiction. I still have no idea what it means. I also had the dream about eating my pillow. When I woke up, the Jet-Puffed Marshmallows I keep by the side of the bed were gone.

August 12

Dreams really are inscrutable. Last night I had this dream where I got crushed underneath every word I’ve ever typed in an IM conversation. Then this guy who kind of looked like my boss tried to help me but got trapped as well. I’m baffled. I also dreamed that I ate a chicken that looked like my dad, but when I woke up, Pops was sleeping soundly on the floor right next to my bed, just like always.

August 13

Who can know the whims of the unconscious? Last night I dreamt that I was at work playing a computer game for toddlers called The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud, but it was so hard that I couldn’t figure it out. Then a baby who looked like my boss beat the game and threatened to set me on fire. Weird, right? I also dreamed that I ate my laptop, and when I woke up the chocolate laptop I’d been saving for the weekend was gone.

August 14

I fell asleep at work today and had this dream where my family and friends and co-workers and everyone crowded around me and told me I had a problem. But right when they were about to tell me what the problem was, I was rudely awakened by my boss, who’d gathered my family and friends and co-workers around me to tell me I had a problem, which made me really mad. I started yelling at them before they told me what the problem was. I stormed out and bought a soothing bag of marshmallows and went home and slept. I didn’t really have any dreams, except for the one where everything below me is burning and I fly away in a bed shaped like the internet. I think that one demonstrates the importance of dreams and how nothing can stop you if you just believe in them.

MP3: The Zombies – “Hung Up On a Dream”

- Flann O’Rion lives in Eugene, OR and never dreams.

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Two men, Tolly and Stephen, have shut themselves up in a room. They’re adapting Tolly’s off-Broadway play,The Heart Within the Heart, for the screen.

Stephen: So, in the play Robbie and Jeff are gay?

Tolly: No. They’re brothers.

Stephen: So why do they live in the same room?

Tolly: Because they’re brothers and their family’s a little poor, so they have to share a room.

Stephen: Well, I guess you would know. But that’s kind of a bummer. Because you know what’s really funny? Gays.

Tolly: I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to say that.

Stephen: Anyway, I really want to get down to the heart of The Heart Within the Heart so we can make sure we preserve your intent.

Tolly: That’s what I want too.

Stephen: Even if we have to change a lot of stuff.

Tolly: Like what kind of stuff?

Stephen: Well, I don’t think the dad being gay really works. Gays are funny and you don’t want to confuse people by making a gay guy really mean.

Tolly: Well, that’s fine, because their dad’s not gay.

Stephen: Really?

Tolly: Yeah. Really. What made you think he was gay?

Stephen: Well, that one time where the mother tells him to ‘go to hell’ and he leaves the house and then comes back drunk.

Tolly: And you thought he was gay because he came back drunk.

Stephen: Yeah, well I guess I just imagined him running off and meeting up with his gay lover, this guy who works the soda fountain in town.

Tolly: What are you talking about? The play is set in modern day. There’s no soda fountain. Not to mention, there’s absolutely no gay lover. No one in the play is gay.

Stephen: Well, I guess you would know. It’s just my imagination. Your original play is just so vivid, but also restrained. It seems to me like sometimes it’s what’s not being said that comes across so well.

Tolly: That’s very nice, but no one in the play is gay.

Stephen: Okay. I guess you would know. Oh, and I have to say: I really respect your choice to make the dog straight. It’s not popular these days, and it’s really hard to find a straight dog to play the parts, and the gay dogs hate to play straight, but I just thought that was really, really brave.

Tolly: There’s no dog in the play.

Stephen: No! You’ve got to be kidding me. The little dog that runs around and always tries to look up the female characters’ skirts?

Tolly: No. That never happens. Why would we cast a dog in a stage play? That’s a logistical nightmare.

Stephen: Oh. Are there lots of gay dogs in theater too?

Tolly: Listen, I think I’ve made a mistake. I don’t think that we’re going to be able to work together on this. We’re just coming from two very different points of view.

Stephen: Well, I guess you would know. But I only want what’s best for The Heart Within the Heart, and . . . I don’t know if you’ve seen how well some of my other features have done.

Tolly: Yeah. I have. That’s one reason I was interested in working with you.

Stephen: For instance Too Many Gays had a Ten-Million Dollar Opening weekend. That set me up pretty well.

Tolly: Not bad.

Stephen: And Gay Dad on a Hot Tin Roof earned me four Golden Globes.

Tolly: Okay.

Stephen: And my documentary Barnyard of Opression: Civil Rights for Transgendered Animals appeared on PBS. The reviewers called it, “more thrilling than Ken Burns and preachier than Billy Graham.”

Tolly: Alright. Okay. Let’s do this.

The resulting movie proved very successful. Three years later we find Stephen shut up in a room, working on a television pilot with Terry for The Heart Within the Heart.

Terry: First thing we need to do is make all of the characters gay. Except for the dad and the pig.

Stephen. I couldn’t agree more. But the pig’s supposed to be a dog.

Terry: Nope. Not anymore. The dog’s a pig, on the inside.

The pilot airs on television for the first time. Robert Ben Greensmith, author of the original novel The Heart Within the Heart sits in front of his television and looks aghast as the credits roll.

Robert: I told that damn playwright the dad was supposed to be gay and the pig was supposed to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Can’t get nothin’ to translate nowadays.

MP3: The Magnetic Fields – “I Think I Need A New Heart”

- Flann O’Rion does not have any pets and shares an apartment with his brother in Eugene, Oregon.

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Two former roommates meet at a class reunion. One of them works as a sales rep for Walgreen and the other is a physicist working on the Large Hadron Collider.

Chris: So you’re working on that thing? That’s amazing. Is it going create a black-hole and kill us all? (Laughs)

Lance does not react.

Lance: No, that’s impossible. There’s no way that anything like that could happen. We’re looking for other dimensions.

Chris: Okay. Sure, sure. So, how’s everything going?

Lance: Actually, not terribly well. When we turn it on we get what’s called a quench.

Chris: Yeah, right. Okay, I’ll bite. What’s a quench?

Lance: It’s when a bad solder causes our cables to heat up and lose their superconductivity.

Chris: I hear you, I hear you. Isn’t that what Viagra’s for? (Laughs) Am I right?

Lance does not react. Chris goes on.

Chris: So, Lance. The guys you’re working with? They’re pretty smart, right?

Lance: The best physicists living, and physicists are the smartest kinds of scientists.

Chris: Exactly. I always say that. But you guys aren’t the best solderers living.

Lance shifts on his feet.

Lance: Well, we’re talking about thousands and thousands of minute solders. Also, we don’t do them. We have engineers, and they’re definitely some of the best solderers living.

Chris: Fair enough. But they still didn’t get all of those connections exactly right?

Lance: Well . . .

Chris: It actually seems like they’re getting them a little bit wrong.

Lance: Well, we don’t know exactly why this is happening. It’s a little mysterious.

Chris: Mysterious? As someone who likes not being sucked into a black-hole, this makes me a little nervous

Lance: There’s no way that can happen.

Chris: You’re sure?

Lance: I’m absolutely sure. We’re looking for other dimensions. The theories all suggest . . .

Chris: And you’re testing your theories with the LHC? Why?

Lance: To see if they’re correct.

Chris: Because you’re not sure.

Lance: I’m going to have another Sangria.

MP3: Department of Eagles – “Phantom Other”

- Flann O’Rion doesn’t know anything about physics or the Large Hadron Collider, lives in Eugene, Oregon, and thinks that both characters in this story (and their interactions) are unlikely. Still, he argues, they really don’t know.

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Bianca cannot get married until Kate gets married. Kate is not a happy camper, primarily due to activities like cooking over fires and not taking showers. Their father loves camping more than even arbitrary and dramatically pregnant rules. Let’s camp this weekend, their father says, I feel I need it. The girls feel they do not need it. But they are oddly compelled to obey their father’s wishes.

Lionkiller is at home with this environment. He views Kate as the quarry. He thinks, she is only a shrew. How many lions does he have to his name? He has not kept the numbers well, but the skins certainly dominate his apartment. Can’t open a cupboard without starting an avalanche of the damn things. He wears the headdress pretty regular, and he’s one of the few who put up with lionskin briefs. Sweaty in the summer.

Out there somewhere in the tall grasses of the suburbs lurks a lion, tawnier than most. He blends with the grasses.

Lionkiller’s friend Cass sees Bianca. Cass cannot stop talking about Bianca to Lionkiller. In astronomical terms he is over the moon for her. He thinks this, but never says it. No one can deny that it is a cliché, and Cass eschews these. Lionkiller wishes that Cass would stop. Bianca remains unobtainable for Cass, who attempts to smother himself in Lionkillers lionskins. Lionkiller saves him and agrees that he needs help. He will free Bianca by conquest of Kate. She is a shrew.

He finds out about the family spending several days in the godforsaken wilderness. He presents himself as a guide. He wears his headdress which offends Kate. She does not believe in the wholesale slaughter of lions. Lionkiller suppresses his amazement. Cass comes along as a spiritual guide. His careful avoidance of cliché impresses the hell out of Bianca. She makes eyes at me, Cass observes, but is careful not to say this out loud.

Around the campfire on the first night, watching the fire, drinking sixty-four ounce sodas with shots of vodka, they listen to Cass describe the spirit world. He describes gods as thoughtful executives dressed in Edwardian garb, perhaps in the style of Oscar Wilde. Kate clenches fists. Superstition, she says and jumps to her feet. She snatches a burning coal out of the fire and juggles it calmly before pitching it at Cass. It catches him squarely below the left eye and burns a black mark there that looks not unlike the grease football players apply at game time. This cruelty disturbs Lionkiller. Kate expounds the virtues of atheism. Or, she says, as we prefer, humanism. She goes on for two and a half hours, disturbing Lionkiller further.

In the night the lion lurks, not making himself known. He feels great concern for Lionkiller’s prowess, and his own extra tawniness which he suspects is a tawniness too far.

Lionkiller makes attempts to woo Kate. He dances his groin-oriented “Rejoice, Lion, for Death is Swift.” He delivers a complete narration of the film Never Cry Wolf. He kills a doe elk in front of her to show his power, but spares the doe’s faun to show his magnanimity. These efforts prove unsuccessful, in the sense that she does not fall in love with him. But in the sense that Kate’s father is impressed and suggests that they get married anyway, the efforts, it has to be said, achieve some level of success.

Bianca watches Lionkiller’s performance as well. Her eyes and heart swell with admiration. Unlike her sister, she values such virility. Much to my chagrin, whispers Cass to himself. But, Kate is spoken for, and now is his chance with Bianca. Cass makes an effort to woo her. He performs a dance which he calls “Rolling Up My Pants” In which he mimes the careful rolling of his pant cuffs, the up and down motion of his rump keeping the beat. He improvises a story using the word mammary as a starting point. He smashes a hamster with his fist. The exploits further encourage Bianca’s eye to wander. Such is life, says Cass out loud while buying Arbor Mist Peaches and Cream Wine in a convenience store. He cuts off communication with the whole crew.

Lionkiller and Kate arrive home for the first time after their honeymoon. Kate is mostly fed up with Lionkiller, after an incident on the beach of their coastal Icelandic resort wherein Lionkiller personally dismembered 41 sea-lions while shouting out vows of devotion. Lionkiller sings loudly as he goes around turning on the lights in the house. Kate looks around the kitchen and then decides to put away the many bottles of duty-free rum they’ve brought home. She opens a cupboard and disappears beneath the skins. Lionkiller comes to her rescue. He pulls her from the pile, but does not hold her to him. He stares suspiciously at a skin that appears tawnier than the others. The lion realizes he is discovered and attacks. Lionkiller wrenches off the lion’s tail with a motion like cracking a whip. The lion flees.

He writes a memoir of his troubles which proves popular. He later meets Bianca in a hotel bar during his book tour. They fall into a smooth and flirtatious conversation. They laugh when they realize their connection through Lionkiller. It turns out that Cass is also in town, also on tour, in support of an album. He sees Bianca and moves to her side. Imagine seeing you here, he says, feeling comfortable with the banality of the statement. Bianca makes perfunctory conversation, tells him about Lionkiller and Kate, and then ends the conversation abruptly, preferring to speak further with the lion. Within two weeks the lion proposes marriage.

I do not understand, says Cass to the bartender, why anyone in their right mind would get married nowadays.

Cass McCombs – “Lionkiller Got Married” mp3

- Flann O’Rion writes from his home in Eugene, Oregon and feels that far too little is made of Arbor Mist Wine products.

- Nate Stevenson has Drawn many Songs. See them here.

10:43 AM – Three teenagers reported running through Center City Park and shouting. One attempted to ride a dog.
11:17 AM – Man reported his ex-wife stole his waterslide.
11:32 AM – Three teenagers reported for running on Main Street and shouting, and for indecent exposure of their buttocks.
11:56 AM – Suspicious looking dog reported in Center City Park.
12:15 PM – Man reported three teenagers running through his house, “going nuts.”
12:40 PM – Man reported his ex-wife returned his waterslide, but took his CSI DVDs.
1:02 PM – Women reported three teenagers engaged in cake fight in East City Park Pavilion, causing “hundreds of dollars of damage.” Teenagers pursued by officers on foot.
1:58 PM – Dog reported running in traffic on Washington Street. Appeared disoriented.
3:20 PM – Woman arrested on East A Street for showing signs of alcohol and making a false statement.
3:26 PM – Three teenagers reported for yelling and running across the hills west of town, disturbing livestock. One attempted to ride a sheep.
4:13 PM – Man arrested for ogling married, pregnant woman from his Ford Probe and making a false statement.
4:33 PM – Man reported his ex-wife “trashed” his CSI DVDs.
4:51 PM – Three teenagers pursued by officers through downtown area, including rooftops. One attempted to ride a bicycle.
5:00 PM – Officers continued pursuit.
5:36 PM – Man reported that his “crazy” ex-wife backed over suspicious, disoriented dog’s hind leg.
5:37 PM – Officers pursued teenagers across Weathervane neighborhood where all three ran into man carrying injured dog to his car. All three evaded officers via waterslide. Still at large.

The Dave Clark 5 – “Catch Us If You Can” mp3

- Flann O’Rion writes from his home in Eugene, Oregon and reads the police briefs religiously since abandoning the Roman Catholic faith.