Owl


“Don’t,” she pleaded with tears in her eyes, “please don’t do this, please!”
“You’ve been asking for this all night.  Now shut uuaah…”
Fear filled the air as the predator has now become the prey.
“The lady said no,” a new voice growled, breaking the silent fear.
A bird swooped down from the rooftop, flying behind the new prey, receiving its master’s blade.  The prey fell to the ground without a sound.
“Guess no one ever told him not to fuck with a short girl,” the hooded girl said before taking a sip of her cup.  “I would run away and forget what happened here if I were you.”
“Is he,” the victim sobbed as she looked up slowly, fear freezing her in place.
“No,” the hooded girl snapped quietly.  “I never kill.”  After a short pause, looking to her left then to her right, she added, “but they are hungry.”
She took another sip of her cup.
“Who are you?”
“Owl,” she answered softly, taking a last sip of her cup.  “Now fly.”

Sushi Bar


I went to a sushi bar, excited to get fresh cut fish, like they make your plate right in front of you. I ordered the tuna and the chef slapped a large slab of red meaty fish on the table and began to cut away.
"What is that," I asked.
"Tuna," the chef replied, confused by my question.
"That doesn't look like Bumble Bee," I said.
And that's why I'm no longer allowed in a sushi bar.

Calvin Hobbes Time Traveler

We have failed our mission.  I am the last of myself that has been sent back.  Each time we have been sent back to the beginning of our mission, we were able to obtain the object we were sent to obtain, along with the knowledge needed to save our world.  Each time we attempt to return home we are drawn to this timeline.
When the first of us was stranded here he landed from a different time than the second one.  The second one landed earlier than the first.  He waited, hiding for eighteen months, for the arrival of the first of us.  The two met, discussed the details of the mission and realized there will be others.  We needed to be able to communicate with each other in some way, in case we were not able to find the current one of us before time took its course.

There can not exist more than two versions of oneself at one time.  If one of those versions is your younger self then any self that appears after is up for elimination.  Time will not allow a third to exist for very long.

I have studied all the post from my previous selves and have brought back copies for the other selves to find and post them.  We can not save our world by going home so I have decided that the only way to save my future is to change your past.

After I am gone my complete writings will be posted for the world to see.  Hopefully I have made enough changes to the timeline that my future does not come to pass.  Hopefully she is safe.

I do not have much time left before I too disappear.  I am the last of myself to be sent back and I am the first to arrive in your timeline.  My name is Calvin and this is my story…

Remembering my Grandma

I did not know her as well as others but she knew me better than most.  Her name was Grandma or Grandma Margaret, no other name was allowed.  Her word was law and her law was enforced swiftly.
Respect was always demanded by her but given willingly because no matter how much you hated her as you rubbed a newly red area, you still loved her.  Take it from a 7th grader who had to get a checkup for school, had to strip down to my underwear, and she walks in because they were short staffed that day.  I thought I was too old to strip in front of her.  The smack I got proved me wrong.  She let me know that I was never too old to get smacked for being disrespectful. 

Part of her law was that she controlled the television.  At certain times of the day, even if she was in another room, the TV had to be on certain shows because she could still hear it, no matter what she was doing.  Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune, and the news were non-negotiable.  At least we could learn something from watching the boob tube.
She also had her fun side. The California Lottery, Married with Children, and Cops were all okay to watch but her true vice was wrestling.  WHOOOOO!  That’s right, Nature Boy Ric Flair was one of her favorites and the fire he generated when he was in the ring consumed us all.  The more he bled the better the excitement that filled us all.
She was always firm, attempting to make you a better person, while doing what all grandparents do, slightly spoiling you whenever she could.
Being a nurse in a hospital, large paperback novels were abundant and she never said you can read it when you’re older.  Reading the newspaper was encouraged and if you did not read it yourself she would read you articles she felt was relevant.
If the weather was good, meaning it was not raining, unless you were doing homework you needed to go outside and play.  To this day, I still think it was an excuse to kick us out of the house so the adults could have some kind of peace of mind, however brief it may be.
 
The poem Footprints was always somewhere in the house, usually in the restroom, so that you would read it over and over and never forget that you are never alone.
She had her plants and that was the one thing you never messed with.  If you did, you knew you were getting the chancla, if you were lucky, or the belt, depending on how badly you messed up her plants.
She was a speed demon in her little red bug.  We could hear her coming from blocks away and as a kid, sliding around in the back seat, being thrown into the side of the bug from centrifugal force, was the best thing ever.  My head slammed into the window a time or two but it was worth it for that need for speed.  I, myself, am a spawn of that speed demon, and when I begin to chase that speed, the same grin comes across my face that I use to love seen on hers.
She was a tiny lady but the love she had to give was bigger than giants.  She had many grandchildren and great grandchildren and each child was special to her.  She knew what they needed and she was not afraid to tell her children how to take care of her grandchildren.
My aunts would say I was difficult to shop for because I did not like a lot of things.  She used to say I was very simple yet very complex, always calling me “simply complex.”  Despite that, she always knew if it pertained to Star Wars, Aviation, or books, including comic books, that was all I needed.
She use to send my mother money for me to spend every time there was a book fair at school.  She use to send me books that no one wanted anymore from the hospital, filling my personal library with Robin Cook, Tom Clancy, and Michael Crichton books.  She made sure I was never without something to read.
As an adult, I take all of these and many other memories with me everywhere I go.  She molded me into the man I am today and who I tried to make my child to be.  I can still hear her harsh soft voice, feel her firm tender touch every time life hits me hard.
I may be one of many, but she did her one true job, to make sure I could survive whatever life throws my way.  To know I have to do what needs to be done, but no matter what, she will always love me
She touched many lives in her own way.  No matter who were are, each of us have our own special memories of her.  These were mine.

Pre Op Surgery

So I had surgery on Tuesday, March 6, 2018. The following is a true story.

"Have you ever had surgery before," a nurse asked as she was inputting my information into her computer.
"Yes. Once, on my back, three years ago," I answered slowly as the morphine began to kick in, taking away the pain pulsating throughout my back.
As another nurse continued to get me ready for my surgery she stopped at my right calf.
"What about this scar," the second nurse asked. "What was this surgery for?"
"That's not from a surgery."
The first nurse stepped over to look at my leg as well. Both nurses looked at me as if I was just caught with my hand in the cookie jar.
"Sir, that's a surgical scar," the first nurse began to scold. "It looks like a botched surgery at that. We need to know all your past medical history."
"It's an alien surgery. I went to sleep with nothing wrong with my leg and woke up six hours later with that, just as it is."
The nurse looked at me as if I just lost my mind.
"It's true. That's also why you guys keep drawing so much blood from me, the aliens are using it to clone me."
"Okay then," the nurse said, going back to her computer without missing a beat. "Are you allergic to any medication?"

A Hole in My Leg


“Aliens exist.  There are different species fighting each other for the right to control this planet and most humans have no clue about what’s going on.  For those innocent humans who are abducted, they are used as lab rats, having implants put in them without their knowledge.”

“There are a handful of rebel humans who know the truth.  We fight the aliens where we can, but it’s not easy.  They have the power to paralyze us, taking pieces of us while we sleep, or outright killing us.  I know all of this because I am one of those warriors, and they found me last night.”

“It was like any other night.  I got in bed, pulling the covers over me tightly.  My heater is not working properly so I was trying to get as warm as possible on my own.  It was not long before I passed out.  When I woke up, my blanket was missing, my bedspread had small traces of blood and there was a round scab on my right calf about an inch round.”

“The scab was black and hard, as if it had been on my leg for weeks, not hours.  I began to peel the scab off slowly and to my surprise it came off in one piece, almost like a band aid.  I could see that the hole went about a quarter of an inch deep, give or take, and was cone shape.  It looked like someone had removed the calf meat surgically.  It was too perfectly round.”

“Uh, why are you telling me all of this?”

“I’m just trying to explain why I’m not coming into work this morning.  Duh!”