Paranoia Begins at Home

1.
You used to belive that you were the only real person in the world, everybody else a mindless clockwork automaton created by some unknown power to deceive you. You were right, but it’s not you who are real. You can hear it inside you, ticking.

2.
If you have to cross a street, stay in the middle of the crowd. That way, the cars won't get you first.

3.
Lock up your children at night, especially when the moon is full. Tell them that it’s to protect them, and hope that they never find out that it’s to protect you.

4.
Only when your mind is empty can you be sure that nobody is controlling it.

An Unexpected Turn of Events, part four

First

Previous

(Next)

Surely a Coincidence

Destroying robots is, like, totally the next big thing.

(It should be noted that I had to do some things the person who designed the site never intended in order to link to an individual page. The link you should all bookmark is of course http://www.pandaxpress.com/

You know you want to.)

An Unexpected Turn of Events, part three

First

Previous

Next

Elsewhere

»Show me the truth« the Elf-king said, and the sages brought forth the great mirrors, forged from brass and dusky fairy-steel; they removed the gossamer curtains, and the mirrors got alive, showing the true structure of the world. The Elf-king contemplated this for a while. Then he stepped into the mirrors, and disappeared.

All is Forgiven, Salvador

Lately, I had begun to loose interest in Salvador Dalí. While the individual works that I used to like still looked the same, I was unable to see them outside of the context of hundreds and hundreds of other works, all containing the same unique elements, like an endless parade of suggestivly deformed elephants.

But today, I found out that Salvador Dalí wrote a screenplay for the Marx Brothers, entitled Giraffes on Horseback Salads. The film was never made, but it’s the thought that counts.

Meditations, part 2

An angel once told me the world is not a clockwork but a tree. Its eyes were dark as space; I did not believe its words, and I still do not.

Panicum et Circenses, Part Five

The bread is infinitely delicious!

(well, it could have used a little bit more salt, but infinity minus one is still plenty)

(the Latin word panicus didn't exixt until the 17th century, by the way)

Panem et Circenses, Part Four

The bread is in the oven (this sentence is separated for dramatic effect).

During the night, the dough had become sticky and started to smell funny, but it had also doubled in size, so I must have been doing something right. I kneaded the dough for ten minutes or so before I noticed that it didn't change in any way and lost faith. Faith is the most important part of a good bread. I covered the bread with a towel (the same towel, still) and meditated on the futility of effort, while drinking coffee and reading the morning paper. Then I put the brad in the oven. And that's where it is now. I have no idea how long it should be in there, so I’ll have to keep an eye on it.

Meditations, part 1

I saw a clockwork floating through faerie-space, and I knew it was the world.

Erinaceus Omnia Vorat

In the end, when the Last City has crumbled to dust and the seas have all dried out, a hedgehog will eat the sun, and the world will be no more.

Unexpected Badger of the week

Yes, the rumours are true. We have been visited by Eric Burns, of Websnark and Gossamer Commons fame. Now, it's only a matter of time before we become the most beloved website on the Internet. Maddox, eat your fucking heart out!

Now, let's all imagine that Eric Burns is a badger...

Panis et Circenses, Part 3

I looked at the flour-and-water starter from this morning and decided that its vaguely greenish colour meant that it was done (this is not true. I thought it looked just like it had earlier, and it was only when I compared it to the fresh mix of flour and water from the next step that I discovered that the starter was a lot darker than it had been. But not green. Not exactly.)

I mixed flour and water again, in equal amounts, but about twice as much as before, in another bowl. I added salt. You would, too. I stirred with a wooden spoon.

I proceeded to pour this new mixture into the old bowl (at which point I discovered the change in colour). I stirred for a while, thinking about hedgehogs, mostly (I saw a hedgehog not very long ago. It was late, and it was raining, and the hedgehog was minding its own business, but it was still rather nice. When I have succesfully become fictional, I will invite it for tea. And jam. I strongly suspect that hedgehogs like jam).

I then started to add more flour, a little bit at a time. At this point, the old recipes recommend that a strong footman is called into the kitchen. Presumably to see how hard you work. I should estimate that I added about two and a half more parts of flour. I also added some oatmeal, to see if it made the dough less sticky (it did, but so did the wheat flour).

After a while, the dough had reached a pleasant consistency, something like... like... bread dough. I covered it with a towel again (the same towel, incidentally) and put it out of harm’s way (harm enters the kitchen through the microwave oven, and leaves through the door. Any food item left in its path will lose half its nutritional value and start to taste like chicken).

My sources are somewhat unclear about the next step, but I have decided to leave the dough to do its thing overnight. One source claimed that it should be left for 30 to 36 hours, but that clearly doesn’t take the gnomes into account.

I have converted

Hail RoughDraft, my new master! I wish to offer it tea and slippers, but it has no mouth or feet to use these items with. Therefore I must drink the tea and wear the slippers myself (a sacrifice I'm quite willing to make).

A Recipe for Disaster

Beans are recommended as a source of protein for vegetarians. Is it not possible, then, that beans are in fact animals?

Cooking Chronicles, Part 2

It has become obvious that I will eat beans today. I really should have suspected it last night, when I left a handful of dried red beans to soak overnight, but sometimes you need to take a step away from the thing you’re cooking in order to see it clearly.

I have begun my Quest for Bread. I have mixed equal amounts of flour and water (but a slightly more equal amount of flour. It seemed like a good idea) in a bowl and covered the bowl with a towel. Now I will let the gnomes do their work for about ten hours. In the meantime, I will do something with the beans. Preferably something that ends with me eating them. With garlic.

---

Educational footnote, blatantly stolen from the Oxford English Dictionary:

flour, n.

[A specific use of FLOWER; cf. F. fleur de farine the ‘flower’ or finest part of the meal.
Johnson 1755 does not separate the words, nor does he recognize the spelling flour. But Cruden's Concordance 1738 recognizes the modern distinction.]

Etymology wants to be free!

More Songs about Buildings and Food

Today, I am going to make bread. I am going to make bread without yeast, because it’s the end of the month, and I can’t afford both yeast and flour.

(Note 1: who knew that wheat flour, left in a cupboard for two years, goes bad?

Note 2: I have two small bags of “chemical yeast”, but the pictures of fluffy loaves with googly eyes and extatically smiling mouths fill me with horror. Also, the instructions are in French. While I read French well enough to decipher them, I do not speak French, and so it seems likely that I don’t eat French either. Spending an hour making bread only to find out it’s in a language I don’t eat would be disappointing, to say the least)

I won’t need yeast. It seems that if you leave a dough of flour and water for a long enough time, it will start to rise. The common explanation is that there is a thing called “air-borne yeast”, which will find its way into your dough and start the process. This is clearly not the real explanation. Clearly, the real explanation involves gnomes.

The bread should be finished tomorrow. It is somewhat unclear what I will eat today.

Okay, fine, EXPLODE if it makes you feel better

Hapland 2 is eating my brain.

Better Git It In Your Soul

Ah, um, just listen, mingus

This, that is. Faubulous fables I do not hesitate to recommend to anyone.
Go. Git. Do it. You won't be sorry.

An Unexpected Turn of Events, part two

Previous

Next

Beyond the labyrinth

I stumbled upon a castle once, hidden deep in the Italian Alps; there was a labyrinth, and beyond it, secrets. First a library, where a map of the fractal reality covered the floor. And then, farther in, the chamber at the center of the world. This was in 1887, and I remain there still.

It's all lies, part one

I don't listen to music, these days, only the sound of trains going by.

Depreciation of the Carolingian Line

Submitted without comment

768-814: Charles, the Great (Charlemagne)
814-840: Louis I, the Pious
840-877: Charles II, the Bald
877-878: Louis II, the Stammerer
879-882: Louis III, the Epithet-less
884-888: Charles, the Fat

An announcement

I have decided to become fictional.

A note on art

If a man throws himself out of the fourth floor window, and you can't make a sketch of him before he gets to the ground, you will never do anything big.
Eugène Delacroix

First, you have to realize that Delacroix was a Romanticist, and the Romanticists were all about throwing themselves out of windows. Then you have to translate the whole sentence from Arrogant French Artist-ese (which is a language that not only arrogant French artists speak) to something you can actually use, and that preferably doesn’t include the word “never”.

Then you will have reached Understanding. Understanding can not be written down, it can only be drawn.

An Unexpected Turn of Events

To be continued...

Got life?

I'll admit it any time: I don't have a life! Sometimes, people encourage me to get one. "Why don't you get a life?", they'll say, in that annoyed, dejected tone of voice used between friends. Oh, like I haven't tried!

Some of you, dear readers, might come from the great land of America. If you do so, you might think "but it's easy! Just buy a life!", but alas, it's not. Not if you live in a socialist country, like I do. Here, the life-market is regulated. Not to get into technicalities, this means that in order to get a life, you must wait in a queue. My mother placed me in a life-queue the very day I was born, and now, almost 20 years later, I'm still only qualifying for some of the shittiest lives.

But it gets worse: in order to qualify for ownership of a life, you must have a life license. One would think that any human being is by birth qualified to operate a life, but nope, not in the bureaucratic nightmare that is Sweden! My application for a life license has currently been processed by the Life Agency for five years. Only three month ago, I got my application returned to me. Apparently, I had forgot to attach two copies of my birth certificate. So I had to do it all over again.

Now you're probably wondering: with all this bureaucracy, how could anyone in Sweden have a life? Well, of course, there's always the cheaters. A lot of people are fortunate enough to be born with lively parents. And if you know someone influential, then it's always possible to skip ahead in the line. Nepotism runs rampant on the swedish life-market. But I'm not bitter. My time will come, sooner or later.

One solution, and one that more and more young people are taking to, is illegal bootleg lives. however, that's not an option to me. To start with, there's no guaranteeing the quality of a bootleg life, and if you get ripped off, there's nowhere you can turn to. Plus, I feel it's kinda immoral. Someone has put a great deal of time and energy into designing these lives we live, and by making pirate copies of them, we take from him the control over his intellectual property.

So i'm just gonna keep waiting, as the papermills turn.

Moses Lays Down The Law

In which we make the acquaintance of the Lord and his servitor

It had been an arduous walk. The results were proving somewhat shocking.
»What about fornicating?«
»No, no, I'm cool with that. Just work with them when it happens, talk, there's always some reason.«
»OK, OK, but what about sheep buggery, o Lord? There are some in your flock that...«
»...I don't want My words to make mention of sheep buggery, o Moses. It seems beneath the occasion, you know?«
»Right. Right! Idolatry, though! You, those idolaters make me angry!«
»Look, Moses, cool down! Idolatry is fine too, if that helps 'em feel it! Listen, all this with the stealing and coveting and taking vain names, they're all symptoms of problems with your society, and these Commandments of mine are meant to fix those. Just stick to what I told you: No other gods, no killing, lots of honoring others, be nice, rest at least once a week. It's simple, really.«
Sigh. »Yes, O Lord.«
And Moses took off down the slopes of Sinai, face all shining with the glory of the Lord.
Unfortunately, when he came down to camp, some of the others hade made an idol, a pretty hefty golden calf, and, well, Moses had a thing about idolaters.
It was a fine speech, really: all fury and Sheol and fire, and he even invented brimstone right there. For added effect, he hurled the tablets down before him at the end, not recalling he was still on the mountainside and not on the easy, yielding sand. Now the Israelites had never heard anything like it, naturally, and the big CRACK at the end really made an impression. The calf got re-melted in no time.
Moses himself was less happy, in particular about the CRACK bit. He picked the shards of tablet up off the cliffside. He dusted them off. He tried to match them together at the edges. He flipped them over, and tried again from the reverse, even — but no: The tablets were irreparably smashed. And God had already left, no chance there.
»Oh well,« thought Moses. »This'll give me a chance to fix the whole thing a little.«

These fragments we have shored against our ruins

“I have been told it was a glorious battle. At first opportunity, however, the Psychophant struck me with madness, so all I can remember is an abundance of trout and a delightful conversation with a tree.”

...

“It struck us both at the same time: we had been deceived by the insidious Dr Carbuncle!”

...

“We swiftly travelled there by means of the Psychophant's dirigible. Upon arrival, we were told that Dr Carbuncle was having tea with Eugène Delacroix, and that we had to wait. I found the Psychophant's apparent glee as he tore the mechanical manservants limb from limb somewhat unsettling.”

...

Yes, I think this is going somewhere.

The word of the day

The word of the day is “psychophant”. Tell me what it should mean.

Fun with science 1

Greetings, fellow knowledge-seekers! Welcome to this week's installment of Fun with Science. As usual, your host is me, professor Kusch. Today we will talk about the atom. The atom is the smallest part of an element that can be readily identified as belonging to that element. It consists of protons, electrons and, most often, neutrons. It also makes an excellent pet.

Many people erroneously believe that the atom is unsuitable for a pet. Arguments that are sometimes heard are that "it's too small" or that "it's impossible to know its velocity and its position at the same time". However, it is not hard to realize how bizarre these arguments are. Atoms are small, sure, but so are Chihuahuas, and nobody has ever questioned the Chihuahua's suitability as a pet. And it is true that you cannot know the exact position and the exact velocity of an atom at the same time, but this goes equally for all kinds of pets; it's called Heisenbergs law of unceirtanty and applies equally well to objects of all sizes.

The atom has a number of properties that makes it a better pet than most. For starters, it requires no maintenance: you'll never have to feed it, housebreak it or take it for walks, and whereas a cat or a dog will die in fifteen years to the gret grief of the family, an atom will probably outlive all of you.

So, let's say you're convinced, and you're wondering "what kind of atom shall i buy?". There is a number of possibilities; more than 92, as a matter of fact. However, some are more well-suited than others. While you might be tempted to fall for the "playfulness" of an atom belonging to an element that is gasous at NTP, such as hydrogen, helium, oxygen or nitrogen, these atoms can sometimes be a little too playful in that they have a tendency to blow away. Thus, you might want to look at some of the heavier elements, such as iron or lead. They might seem grey and dull, but there's no questioning their reliability. For those of you that enjoys luxury, an atom of silver, gold or platinum might just do the trick. However: try to avoid radioactive isotopes; even if it has a theoretical half-life of some million years, your atom might decay tomorrow, and then your sitting there with a depressed thorium atom when what you really wanted was a happy uranium atom.

What do you do, once you've gotten your atom. Well, that's the good part; you don't need to do anything! Atoms practically handle themselves. "But I can't see my atom!", you might say. Personally, I don't really see what the big deal is, but to some, that is a problem. As atoms are invisible to the human eye and to a normal optical microscope, you will have to buy an electron microscope to be able to see your atom. The price of an electron microscope ranges between $25,000 and $100,000 (and upwards) depending on quality and prestanda.

Good luck with your new pet, and stay tuned for next weeks installment of Fun with science!

Petition

The writer on this blog known as "light steps on leaves" was earlier known as "light stepping on leaves". I think the latter is a much better name. If you agree with me, then be sure to sign my e-petition. You do so by commenting to this post.

The Simurgh Tree

Lin Chou, disciple of Chuang Tzu, tells us this story:

That day, the Master had visited Guo Xi and was despondent. We inquired why. »This Guo Xi,« said the Master, »is an expert at looking but not seeing, at listening but not hearing. When I entered his garden, I do not believe that he noticed me. He was questing about for a bird. For my part, I saw him pass several times a tree whose shape was subtly but unmistakably that of a rising peacock. I considered it a sublime example of the humor of nature, and smiled to myself.
Then I heard the tree utter a sweet, harmonious song.
Now I do not know whether the bird nature was trapped in the tree, or the tree nature was trapped in a bird.«

Lies

In Guo Xi's tract on landscape painting, the master mentions that he was once sitting in his garden drinking tea when he heard the song of a rare bird. He looked up, but did not see a bird. He looked for it for it until it was time for dinner. The following day, he had forgotten it.

Tea

The third cup tastes of paradise. It is said that the Third Emperor of Dawn employed a dwarf who drank the first two cups, so that the Emperor could drink the third with a clear mind. This made the Emperor the wisest man on earth, and he left his throne and walked in the wilderness with eyes full of wonder. The dwarf became the Fourth Emperor of Dawn.

Super-irony: the trend of the future?

We've had irony, post-irony, post-post-irony and probably neo-irony, post-neo-irony and neo-post-irony as well. However, so far, irony has been little more than some hipster kid wearing a trucker cap or something like that. What will the future hold for this, the most sophisticated of human forms of communication? I take a look in my crystal ball and discover...

Super-irony, irony taken to the X-TREEEME! To the super-ironic of the future, irony is more than just a form of comedy or a way of expressing oneself; it's an extreme sport! When asked to show his friends the safest way from one part of town to another at night, the super-ironic might lead them straight trough the warehouse district! And when inviting a girl home for dinner, the super-ironic tells the lady he will serve health food, only to spike the dish with arsenic!

It might seem that the super-ironic is nothing but an asshole with a contempt for death and that this lifestyle will never reach broad popularity, but as a matter of fact, super-irony is already here! An acquaintance of mine recently observed two men on a subway station. One of them was an arab, and the other of asian origin. The arab wore a full-fledged neo-nazi attire, right down to the shaved head and the swastikas, while the asian brandished a t-shirt with the logo of a well-known white power music band. That's super-irony if there ever was any!

The desire to achieve greatness

And now for some serious stuff

We all recognize it: the desire to achieve greatness before one's death, to somewhat lessen the meaninglessness of one's short earthly life by granting oneself immortality in the halls of collective human memory. Few are the people for which this desire becomes reality. Some achieve it by producing great works of art, others by breaking ground in the field of science, yet others by their skill and might as conquerors.

For those of you who has always wondered, "how do I become something great?", I have compiled a quick guide, consisting of three different approaches to the problem. Remember that none of the approaches is a guaranteed way to achieve greatness: each requires the hard work and/or dedication of the subject (that is, you), and even in that case, circumstance may rob you of your rightful reward. This is to be viewed as a guide, as a few friendly tips from one aspirer to greatness to another.

1. Hard work: this is perhaps the most straightforward approach. Simply work, work, work until that elusive greatness is yours. The pros of this method is that it's tried-and-true: most great people throughout history used it. The cons is that it's quite tiresome.
   
2. Dumb luck: some people just happen to be in the right place at the right time. If you wait long enough, you just might find yourself to be one of those people. Like Peter Parker just happened to get bit by the radioactive spider, so too may you just happen to walk into the path of greatness. the pros of this method is that it's simple; it requires little or no work on your behalf. The cons is that it's really hard to control. Dumb luck has a tendency to afflict exactly everyone but you.
3. Being granted a boon by a fairy: the fair folk knows some pretty far-out magic. If you can find a fairy and maybe, I dunno, save its life or something then greatness is sure to be yours. This approach has the great benefit of relieving you from the hard toiling of the "work" method and at the same time not being as random as the "luck" method. All you gotta do is find a fairy.
   

Fish Tomato

I just bought a translated version of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili. I wanted the untranslated version, but facsimiles were only available on CD, damnably.
I think this will go in between the Dictionary of Imaginary Places and the Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric and Discredited Diseases.

My library is bonkinating at an apocalyptic* pace.



*That's »revelatory« to you, bub. Doomsday is the Eschaton. See also.

The Faerie Exchange

Boggart prices fell in early trading today, after yesterday's unexpected rain of Boggarts over Newcastle-on-Tyne and outlying villages.
Ghillie Dhu remained strong on the market, and Kobbold trading experienced a temporary spike following the shortage after the Iron Incident in Sidhe Schwartzwald Mines.
Grogans, Fachan and Bean Nighe continued to waver mildly around their usual values, as did the Pwc, who remain entrenched at the top of the chain. Many analysts feel that continued Pwc investment is risky in the short term, however.
In this month's greatest shock, dáoine sidhe prices plummeted in late trading immediately following reports of a scandalous hoarding by certain parties for purposes of index control. Auberon Lipschitz, attorney-at-twilight, threatened »sixfold curses, curdled milk and complimentary Cluracaun« to anyone who dared lower prices further, citing the havoc of 1616 as a precedent. Snarko Batarde, our inexplicably Spanish man on the scene, commented that »él ha estado utilizando que la misma amenaza por siglos« and stated »Lipschitz es desdentado«.

The Labyrinth, introduction to

The Labyrinth is asleep; empty; not yet in order. Do not disturb the sleeping labyrinth.

The Labyrinth is here, but there will be more of it later.

(the impatient should reread my initial announcement, and look at the time and the date. Especially the date)

Update

25 minutes have passed, and still no Labyrinth. I'm beginnig to lose hope.

Suspense

In ten minutes, J. Sandas is supposed to present his maze... er, labyrinth to us. We're all very excited.

*bites nails*

A Sudden Realization

I am making a labyrinth. I have been doing it for about two months, but it wasn't until tonight that I realized it is, in fact, a labyrinth. It should be finished today, but it probably won't. I will need sleep. But tomorrow I will finsih it, and then I will reveal it to the world. That's you.

Until then, I will leave you with a horrible pun, which is also an observation about the difference between labyrinths and mazes, which are Not the Same Thing: In a maze, you're supposed to be lost. In a labyrinth, you're supposed to be amazed.

It's been a long time since I last slept.

The noncommutativity of addition

You know that thing I said earlier, about there not being any "two numbers, a and b, so that a+b≠b+a"?

Well, scratch that! I just found two numbers for which this is, in fact, the case, namely 176 and 12.3. See? 176+12.3 equals 188.3, whereas 12.3+176, on the other hand, equals...

Okay, back to the drawing table.

The fall is skying

Some people say it happens on the vernal equinox. Others claim May Day is the day.

I know better.

Today, the day after Whitsuntide, is the day Fall takes to the sky, migrating south beyond the equator to roost in lands where it is hardly felt but for an occasional bleat at some belated bird.
You would never get Fall to admit as much, but it goes south to rest: to drink from artesian wells, swig brandy and sit swaddled in thick blankets in an ancient creaking rocking chair, and to sleep, thick cottony sleep with no dreams — until the herons, honking back at Fall on their own journey south, finally wake it and call it home to its real trods in the north, rested and strong.

North Wind has to carry Fall all the way South, so weak is it in these days about Whitsun, proud, fierce, fiery Fall.

The sky is falling

For a short while, the sky turned an intense shade of purple, just above the horizon. Is it possible that it does this every day, and I just haven't noticed it until now? Or is it a sign of something, like war, famine or polluted air? I don't know.

It's fading now. I photographed it, but it won't look the same in the picture. It never does. This is because photography was invented by French anarchists in the 19th century, in order to create civil unrest and confusion.

How, indeed

How the Joneses' 23rd Goldfish Narrowly Escaped Death

The cat-and-fish clip, second from the top, has got some groovy Looney Tunes-style energies going. Check it out.

Actually, Clio Chiang is pretty bad-ass all round.

Instant noodles

I am fascinated by instant noodles. Specifically the kind that comes in a plastic cup, and you just have to add hot water. Even more specifically, the chicken flavoured kind.

I don't eat the noodles, mind you. I only study them.

When you first open the cup, you will find noodles, dried vegetables, and small shriveled flakes of something that might or might not be chicken. After you've added the water and waited for a couple of minutes, the flakes will have turned into small soggy cubes that you are expected to believe is the rehydrated chicken. No matter when you open the cup, you will find either flakes or cubes. There is no transitional phase.

My theory is that the substance that we are supposed to accept as chicken is in fact not from this world!

I believe that the small flakes are in fact transdimensional beacons, that are activated by the hot water and start sending a signal that no scientific intrument on earth can detect. The signal is received by some extradimensional entity, which opens a small portal to the inside of the cup and proceeds to remove the beacons and replace them with soggy cubes. Soggy cubes are presumably the primary life form of this unknown dimension.

As the next step in my research, I am planning to ingest a single specimen of the shriveled flakes of “dried chicken” and carefully observe any dimensional fluctuations.

Things that don't exist

Some things that don't exist:

• Commuters that live and work in the same town
  
• People whose collarbones are made of single malt scotch whisky
• Myskhaxia, neighbouring country of France
• Two numbers, a and b, so that a+b≠b+a
• Giraffes on the moon

Some more things that don't exist

»Piano Man« mystery so cool it seems fake, experts say

»Things this interesting don't really happen in the real world, seems to be the consensus«, commented Dr. T. Thaddeus Blott, Islington, today, as the mysterious incident of the Piano Man rolls into its second month. »I mean, we all really thought it was an elaborate staging of a Miss Marple novel, or something. Me too.«
Washed up in Sheerness, Kent, on or around April 7th, the so-called Piano Man appears to suffer amnesia and will or can not talk, but plays the piano beautifully, as well as composing. It is not currently known whether he plays the oboe.
Dr. Blott, an expert in Applied Hoodwinkery at Cambridge, stated that »We're still not quite convinced he's real. One of our current working theories is that he's an obscure character from some lesser-known Chesterton novel. We've got the entire County Kent police force reading Chesterton's opera completa as we speak.«
An angry bystander then bludgeoned Dr. Blott with a cudgel. Police have yet to determine whether the act was motivated by Dr. Blott's statements about the Piano Man or his needless and erroneous Latin, as they're all still reading.

Congress Fever

This post also has certain "testing" qualities. I do not know what the title means. I heard a roleplayer say it in a dream.

Fish Everywhere

»Test« sounded like such a drab title, see.

Expect polishment in the future; also members.

...
And content.