waves

everywhere and nowhere

The Chool Bus (ch6)

Chapter 6: Where The Forks begin their time in Montana with a relaxing day in the steamy drink at Chico and Jack calls Bullshit on a wild Park Ranger’s story.

Running ahead of schedule, the Forks rolled into Montana relaxed and ready to explore the many mineral hot springs found there. Professor T. had specifically asked Jack to route their wanderings in such a way as to accommodate national park detours, but especially mineral hot springs. And so, Jack remembered a family shindig several years prior where one of his uncles had mentioned a hot spring/lodge complex between the Yellowstone River and the Custer Gallatin National Forest in a place called “Chico”. According to Jack’s itinerary, after getting their fill of mineral pool bliss, they would head East to Billings. Once focus group interviews were conducted and filed away, they would make their way back home to help Mr. Wellstone get his graduate assistantship application in order and take care of some personal necessaries before heading out on a much longer sojourn through the wild-wild western states.

Admission paid and bathing suits donned, the gang eased into the steaming medicine pool for some quality soak time. And boy can you meet some interesting people in mineral baths. Professor T. had struck up a friendly conversation with a retired rescue ranger from the US Forest Service who described a scene straight out of a fever dream. Nestled amongst the Ponderosa pines, trapped in a rock tangle after a particularly nasty stumble, the ranger thought he might be in a situation similar to the one where a climber had to cut his own hand off to escape. Instead this fella says he encountered a creature that defied every ranger handbook he’d ever thumbed through.

This wasn’t your run-of-the-mill grizzly with a bad case of the Mondays.

This was a lumbering, buxom rug with a coat of hair rendering clothing unnecessary. The ranger thought he’d encountered a female wookie, all 6’10” of her, reeking like a gym sock left in a swamp. The ranger, we’ll call him “Chico Suave” (“To protect the ridiculous,” said Jack.), a man who, by his own testimony, wouldn’t blink at a rogue moose on PCP, felt a primal terror shimmy down his spine. But forced himself to push the silly sasquatch thoughts aside. He was delirious, desperate to escape the rock tangle, and this strange creature seemed willing to help.

With the grace of a drunken tap dancer on a greased skillet, and with the help of the creature, Chico wrestled with the rock tangle, muttering curses that would make a sailor blush. Finally, with an audible thunk, and sending electric pain all the way up his spine, the rock fell away. The hairy maiden straight out of an R.Crumb sketch book lumbered to her feet, with a graceful waltz of power and surprising elegance. This unusual savior let out a sound that could have been a growl, a yodel, or maybe the mating call of a particularly disgruntled walrus. Chico, ever the pragmatist, took it as a giant, hairy, “good luck, silly human.”

The big gal then did something that cemented Chico’s belief in the whole “myths must persist” philosophy. She melted back into the woods like a particularly large, pungent shadow. Now, Chico did remember one thing clearly (it was a stressful ordeal, and well, he wasn’t completely lucid): The big gal moved with a stealth that would make a ninja weep with envy.

Once back at the ranger station, Chico showered, and now, slightly less ripe, he dressed the flesh wounds, and nursed a brace of coffee. The encounter with the big gal sat heavy in his gut. He knew the official channels would have him hunting the poor thing down with a posse and a platoon of tranquilizer darts. But Chico, in a moment of rebellion, decided to keep his trap shut. The big gal deserved her peace, and her myths. Besides, who was Chico to deny the world a little bit of magic, even if it came wrapped in a giant, smelly package?

“These are lies,” Jack Dean muttered under his breath.

“That certainly is a fantastic image. Are you sure you weren’t just delirious,” asked Professor T.? He considered himself open minded, but this particular story put his credulity to a very strenuous test.

“I don’t care if Ms. Sasquach was a figment of Chico’s imagination, that was a banger of a story.” gushed Billie. I bet you’ve seen a lot as a rescue ranger.

“Oh, we have our moments,” said Chico, but mostly, it’s a battle against boredom. Luckily i’m immune. And with that, he lifted his arm and pointed to the scars left by the rock tangle. “I don’t pretend to have answers,” said Chico. “And i know this story sounds like utter balderdash, but every time i tell myself i had imagined it all, that dehydration and fear had led me to some sort of semi-conscious autopilot, complete with images of receiving assistance from Ms. Sasquatch herself, the memories are as vivid today as ever. Soon after, and still harboring PTSD triggered doubts of my sanity, i filed the retirement paperwork, and i’m glad i did,” said Chico. “It’s all good. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed retirement so far. I get more time with the grand kids, and i restore antique furniture for a side-hustle. I tell you, the gratitude i receive from customers makes it all worthwhile. It often leads me to believe i would do it for nothing more,” Chico said with the serene countenance of nostalgia.

Jack wanted to call bullshit out loud on the sasquatch story, but decided silence was the wiser choice. And with that, The Forks would get a good night’s sleep, gather participants for focus group interviews in Billings in the morning, take in some Big Sky nature hiking, then head back to home base to prepare for the big wild-west push to California.

NEXT WEEK:
Chapter 7: After a successful initial run, the Forks return home, Mr. Wellstone’s application is approved and he joins the gang for a long push through the Western States.

GO BACK => (Preface & Chapter links)

The Chool Bus (ch05)

Chapter 5: Where The Forks recruit another member. Buck Wellstone applies for graduate assistantship and joins the project as Professor T.’s aid de camp.

The crisp morning air in Fort Collins was a refreshing difference for the Forks as each performed their morning necessaries preparing for the next stop. Larimie, Wyoming was but a short jaunt away, but no one was feeling rushed as the events of the previous night were still ringing in their collective gizzards. Billie couldn’t remember the name of the good natured southern gentleman that had intervened in the misunderstanding triggered by Professor T.’s silly looking recording rig. But Jack did, and he also recalled inviting Buck Wellstone to join the forks at a popular Larimie brew-pub once the focus group interviews were conducted and the Forks were ready to relax for the evening.

“Buck Wellstone is his name, and he’s interested in applying for a graduate assistantship in our department. He wants to join us on the tour,” said Jack.

“I don’t know if we can get through the application process quick enough for next semester, but we do have an opening,” said Professor T. “Did you say he was meeting us in Laramie?”

“Indeed he is,” Jack responded.

“Good. I can check on his eligibility on the road, and i’ll give him the standard interview while in Laramie. If his references check out, maybe…” Professor T. was secretly hoping this would work out as Mr. Wellstone had a refreshing positive vibe. Smart, funny, physically imposing, and genuinely interested in the research the Forks were conducting and the tight-knit camaraderie displayed by this motley collection of humanity.

The Chool Bus rolled into Larimie in time for the gang to grab some lunch and get freshened up before gathering participants for the focus group interviews. And, as expected, the room was divided as the nation’s fibrillating heart seemed to be in this culturally-fraught era. But, the session was conducted professionally, and participants behaved respectfully. As soon as they got started, it was over. Participants went their separate ways and the Forks pointed the Chool Bus toward the brew-pub designated for rendezvous with Mr. Wellstone.

Now, the Forks had plenty of experience in Wyoming, and after everyone was settled into a pleather-cushened booth, each their own chosen libation working its social-lubrication magic, Professor T. mused about a two-week engagement the band played in Riverton, Wyoming in the early 90s. In Professor T.’s recounting, the gig felt like a lifetime trapped in a malfunctioning deep freeze. December in that desolate outpost was a symphony of howling wind and sub-zero temperatures, a perfect recipe for laryngitis. Professor T., at the time, known as “Mork T.” (Mork T. and The Forks… get it?), fueled by a steady diet of codeine cough syrup and still clinging to his delusional dream of rock stardom, chased those nonexistent high notes across a well lit stage in a room full of barely interested strangers. Needless to say, it went about as well as a fleshy juke box in a howling sauna.

As is often the case, one anecdote leads to another with this group so Jack, musing about post-Forks times, recalled a highly-unlikely story where he, partnered with a gonzo ski-resort co-worker, someone that went by the alias, “Fozzy” (for the sake of anonymity).

Now, this Fozzy character, a Laramie-educated electrical engineering savant with a graduate school acceptance letter burning a hole in his pocket, held a peculiar belief: That Laramie Wyoming, was a magical land where cops were blind to the transgressions of the gloriously intoxicated. This, of course, was a theory ripe for testing by these two nihilistic souls clinging desperately to the wreckage of their semi-feral animal-house-esque existence.

Imagine, if you will, a “borrowed” car (ownership and registration a fiction at best), fueled by cold beer (courtesy of the nearest liquor store), hurtling towards Laramie like a pair of wobbly missiles. The speedometer, a mere suggestion, registered a healthy too-damn-fast, a testament to their utter disregard for both the law and their own mortality.

Several beers and a vanished sunset later, they rolled into Laramie like banshees on Adderall. To their utter disappointment, the flashing blue lights they so richly deserved remained stubbornly absent. Finally, in a moment of glorious absurdity, Fozzy managed to run a red light, narrowly missing a cop car pulling out of a parking lot.

“Well, this is it,” Jack chuckled, fresh with i told you so energy dancing in his eyes. “Busted! Hauled off to the drunk tank, a glorious, self-inflicted martyrdom!”

The officer, a woman with a withering gaze that could curdle milk, approached Fozzy’s window. The story Fozzy concocted to explain their lack of documentation was a masterpiece of nonsensical bravado, worthy of a Bugs Bunny episode. Miraculously, it worked. The officer, perhaps amused by the sheer audacity of it all, subjected Fozzy to a “sobriety dance” (how he passed remains a mystery). Deemed sufficiently non-threatening, they were banished from her sight with a stern warning and a $25 fine, payable through a conveniently located “after hours” slot at the courthouse.

And so Fozzy’s theory was field-tested and determined factually sound. Or perhaps, the officer had simply taken pity on these two hapless fools.

As Jack recounted this delicious slice of youthful debauchery, Mr. Wellstone’s countenance danced between mild astonishment to dubiousness as he wasn’t sure how much of this was exaggeration and how much was outright fabrication. As Jack was winding down, Mr. Wellstone’s expression softened as he seemed to recall his academic advisor complaining about drunk drivers skating by with impunity in their wild-west college town. Jack swore the story was mostly true to a detail, and since the rest of the Forks had already heard the story (several times), they vouched for Jack because they knew this “Fozzy” character, and the story tracked.

As the evening progressed, Mr. Wellstone made a strong impression on Professor T. that he was serious about joining the Forks on their tour, applying for the open graduate assistantship, and eventually earning an “informatics/new media” master’s degree from their University. “I can’t promise anything at this time,” said Professor T., but we have room for one more on the Chool Bus, and your assistance was greatly appreciated in Fort Collins. If Jack And Billie, agree, we’d be honored to have you aboard.”

“I vote, eye,” said Billie, with a sly grin.

“And i concur,” said Jack lifting his glass for a toast. With that, all raised their glasses, and so it was settled. The Forks had a new roadie, and Professor T. gained a loyal aid de camp.

NEXT WEEK:
Chapter 6: Where The Forks begin their time in Montana with a relaxing day in the steamy drink at Chico and Jack calls Bullshit on a wild Park Ranger’s story.

GO BACK => Preface and Chapter Links

The Chool Bus (ch04)

Chapter 04: The Forks embark, and Professor T. learns
the perceived value of privacy in a “social media” world.

The day was winding down to a spectacular Kansas golden hour. Neighbors could be heard mowing lawns and trimming bushes with their various landscaping tools. In the distance hot shots in their hot rods were peppering the soundscape with impressive mechanical blats and varooms. Billie Schmidt was tending to last minute service details for the Chool Bus, Professor T. was packing a go bag to accommodate a few weeks on the road, and Jack Dean was enjoying some Netflix and Chill with his current squeeze, Jackie Blue. Somewhere in the distance, neighborhood dogs were playing the “telephone game”. Billie surmised one of them was yelling at a back yard squirrel, and the rest were simply egging him on.

All was well in the Forks’ sleepy college town, once a wild frontier outpost for the U.S. Cavalry, now home to their Alma Mater. Similar to The Forks, once a wild nihilistic post-punk grunge metal band, now reunited for a year-long odyssey pursuing the “fibrillating heart of the divided nation”, a research project led by Professor T., and faithfully aided by Jack Dean, Assistant Professor on the tenure track, and Billie Schmidt, designer and builder of the finest touring bus this side of anywhere. The Forks were prepped, stocked and ready to tackle the first leg of their tour, the mountain west states of Colorado, Wyoming and Montana. First stop, Fort Collins, Colorado.

Having played every venue open to post-punk grunge along the i70 corridor between Kansas City and Grand Junction, the Forks had seen this stretch of Dwight David Eisenhower’s interstate highway system enough times to nearly make the trip half asleep, and so the hours flowed by in a blur till rolling into Aurora after passing the distant teepees of the Denver International Airport (DIA). Driving duties were to be shared on stretches too long for one person, but Billie handled most of the driving duties herself as the gang agreed six or seven hours was plenty of road time for one day. The GPS unit was a custom piece cobbled together by Jack Dean, but Billie was adept with these things so didn’t need assistance. The gang enjoyed listening to Billie with the vocabulary of a sailer and the GPS in the voice of Samuel L. Jackson.

“I told you to take the mutha fukkin 270 exit through Commerce City,” SDS barked.

“You can shove the 270 exit up your USB hole,” shouted Billie! “That chemical plant in Commerce City stinks, and besides, i rather like navigating the ‘mouse trap.’” Mouse trap is what the locals called the cloverleaf at the junction of i70 East/West and i25, the Valley Highway, North/South. “We can go by the old Mile-High stadium site and jeer the Denver Donkeys.” Billie was a die-hard Kansas City Chiefs fan.

“Hey hey hey, there will be no blasphemy in Broncos Country,” extolled Jack Dean. “I won’t trash the Chumps if you’ll refrain from disparaging the Donkeys.” It was agreed, Jack would cheer for the Chiefs as long as they weren’t playing the Broncos, and Billie vowed the same.

“Don’t miss your goddamn i25 exit,” grumbled Sam jackson via SDS.

“Yeah yeah yeah,” Billie mumbled as the Chool Bus glided around the Mouse Trap heading North along the front range, past Longmont, then Boulder, then Loveland, then approaching Fort Collins city limits. Billie steered the Chool Bus to their designated campground on the outskirts and the gang scattered on each individual’s exploring method. Professor T., to his pedometer, Billie on her electric bike, and Jack ducking into the nearest watering hole to get some tips from the local patrons.

After Billie and Professor T. finished their explorings, they joined Jack who was now a couple libations ahead of his companions. Now, Professor T.’s research was a combination of survey data and scheduled focus group interviews. But he also wanted to get up close and intimate with the locals, so he put together a rig for recording conversations and getting what radio and podcast producers call “nat sound”. This rig consisted of clipping a pair of condenser microphones on either side of a pair of half-open studio headphones. This allowed Professor T. to hear what was happening in the environment, and with the mics placed where they were, capture what is known as an “ambisonic” image of the natural sound as well as the conversation voices. One couldn’t really regard this rig inconspicuous, as the microphones were fitted with fur coverings. These coverings guard against breezes that can ruin the recording at worst, create a time consuming noise mitigation measure at best. So Professor T. looked like some sort of Star Wars alien with his head covered in headphones like those Princess Lea cinnamon rolls and furry protruding ears like Chewbacca.

Billie and Jack were at the bar enjoying locally crafted ale when Professor T. Arrived, saddled up to a bar stool, and began striking up conversation with patrons nearby. It appeared to Professor T. as if the people were shy because everyone he approached made as quick a social exit as possible. That is until a patron sitting at a table nearby approached Professor T. and, only slightly slurring his words, basically gave notice that he was willing to throw hands over Professor T.’s brazen violation of his and everyone else’s privacy. Evidently, this fella had been involved in some embarrassing viral social media moments causing him a fair amount of grief. He saw Professor T.’s audio recording as yet another round with the hoards of cancel happy social justice activists.

Of course, Professor T. was not one to engage in alcohol-fueled violence. Granted, he was the leader of a grunge metal band in the 90s, but the violence was mostly restricted to the mosh pit. It was often said their gig’s success could be measured by the “blood on the dance floor”. If ever there was a direct threat to the band, their roadies would take care of the matter, outside. Anyway, Professor T. was not used to having pissed off drunken bar patrons breathing down his own neck. He tried to reason with the fella, but he wasn’t to be placated, and fists began to fly with Jack, Billie, and a couple strangers all mixed up in a rain of blows. Finally, a voice attached to a rather imposing figure cut in and broke up the mayhem. This is where we meet Buck Wellstone, a recent graduate of the University of Wyoming from Corpus Christi, Texas. His imposing figure got everyone’s attention, but it was his cheerful, good natured southern gentleman countenance that resonated with the members of The Forks.

Once an equitable compromise had been struck starting with the understanding that Professor T. was not there to involve unsuspecting bar patrons in compromising “gotcha” moments, and the slightly inebriated bar patron confident he would remain anonymous, Professor T. took his ridiculous recording rig back to the Chool Bus and the angry bar patron went back to killing liver cells across the room with his equally marinated companions. The rest of the evening passed uneventful as each member of the troupe faded in his or her time. They were done documenting their interviews in Colorado. Next stop, Laramie Wyoming. Professor T. yawned as he typed out final details into his personal journal, crawled into his Chool Bus sleeping birth, and drifted under sleep’s dark and silent gate.

NEXT WEEK
Chapter 5: Where The Forks recruit another member. Buck Wellstone applies for graduate assistantship and joins the project as Professor T.’s aid de camp.

GO BACK => Preface and Chapter Links

The Chool Bus (ch03)

Chapter 3: Jack Dean makes paranoia a viable career path

By the wall clock, it was 9:15pm. Jack Dean had no plan to still be on campus after celebrating accomplishments and attending end of semester ceremonies for faculty and staff, but he had grades to turn in and he needed to have that task completed before Monday at noon. Normally, he would have saved some of that work for Saturday, but since he was scheduled to hit the road with his former band mates and long-time friends Mork Thompson and Billie Schmidt, he needed Saturday and Sunday for attending personal tasks preparing to accompany his friends on the first of many road trips supporting Thompson’s research project searching for the fibrillating heart of our divided nation. Fortunately, he was able to click “submit” on the final class roster before 10:00pm. Now he could head home, get some sleep, and get his bizniz done in time to check in with the gang Sunday afternoon.

Back in the day, Jack played a crucial role in the Grunge band (The Forks) with Billie and Professor Thompson, stage name “Mork T.”. Jack was not just a perfectly serviceable bass player, he was also the glue that kept Mork T., primary songwriter and the group’s center of gravity and Billie Schmidt, their kinetic hot-headed drummer from flying apart. A bit of a paranoia case, Jack could sense when trouble was brewing. Not only between his mercurial companions but also with promoters, venue owners, and fans. Like… he had a 6th sense antenna for trouble. Fortunately, these proclivities served him well after the band broke up and each member saught their own post rock-n-roll life.

Again, Jack was a bit of a paranoid, not pathological, but enough to make sleep a bit of a challenge. His nighttime MO consisted of a couple hits of primo weed and a beer or two on weekends. On this occasion, he skipped the beer and hit the hay after packing his ganja back in it’s “safe” place. Tomorrow would be dedicated to making preparations for weeks on the road conducting focus group interviews and tending to logistics with the assistance of a US road atlas and a new GPS app sporting various celebrity personalities for voices. Jack called the app, “Siri’s Drunk Sister (SDS)” because it had led him astray a couple times, and he felt he needed to cross-reference questionable “back road” routes with the “official” road atlas. No worries, the extra vigilance was worth the trouble because the newest build had Samuel L. Jackson and Roseanne Barr among others giving voice instructions. Colorful remonstrations issued forth whenever a driver made turns not aligned with SDS instructions… often hilarious.

And like Billie, Jack was excited to be part of Professor Thompson’s team as he was also on the university’s “tenure track” and so needed publication credits for his curriculum vitae. More importantly, he was excited to be traveling with his old band mates, older, wiser, no longer dealing with youthful angst and drunken drama that marked many of the “good ol’ days”.

One reason the gang’s checkered past was even more colorful than most was Jack’s hapless talent for attracting trouble. And though he was no longer soliciting extra-curricular rendezvous with young admirers of that rock-steady bootie-movin’ groove for which he was regionally famous, he still possessed an animal magnetism that had to be judiciously regulated on campus. Jack was damn good at repelling amorous advances by the many young students populating the campus. But, as a cyber-security specialist, not many of his direct charges were of the female persuasion. And, for some odd reason, his male LGBT students weren’t susceptible to his particular brand of pheromone.

And so, the gang was reunited, Billie had taken the Chool Bus on a maiden voyage over one of the more challenging mountain passes on a pilgrimage to visit Owl Farm in Woody Creek Colorado, the home and redoubt sanctuary of her favorite cultural critic Hunter S. Thompson. So, with the Chool Bus road-tested from the High Plains to the top of the world, the Forks were ready to take the nation’s temperature, coast to coast.

First stop, Fort Collins Colorado. Professor T.’s research included survey questionnaires, the type used by political pollsters, where participants are drawn from college towns and rural working-class communities with strong religious identifications. This data would be juxtaposed with the face-to-face focus-group work conducted by the reunited Forks making their way from state to state in a rolling home converted for traveling rock and roll refugees, the Chool Bus. Appointments with off-the beaten path communities as well as inner-city diverse-demographic groups are made and the tentative itinerary was crafted to be flexible enough to have alternate destinations in case any of the original appointments proved unworkable for whatever reason. Jack Dean, the paranoid tenure-track cyber-security instructor with a history of attracting trouble and a terrific bass player with tons of soul. No way Billie and Professor T. would trade Jack in for a less troublesome model, the Forks loved their mildly paranoid groovelicious partner.

NEXT WEEK:
Chapter 4: The Forks embark, and Professor T. learns the perceived value of privacy in a “social media” world.

GO BACK => Preface and Chapter Links

The Chool Bus (ch02)

Chapter 2: Billie Schmidt and the “Chool Bus”

Billie picked up her phone and opened the email around 3:00am. Normally fast asleep this time of night, but for some reason her eyes popped open automatically. She knew Professor Thompson had applied for a grant to conduct a year-long series of road trips aimed at visiting every one of the lower 48 states, meeting and interviewing people about their awareness and relative engagement with popular culture and politics. Billie really wasn’t all that interested in the details, but she knew she was on the list of companions and was looking forward to going on this coast-to-coast tour with her friends on the bus she had lovingly spent the last several months customizing. Inspecting all points of potential failure, preparing for brutal miles over scorching hot pavement, vicious cross winds and punishing steep mountain grades. She was more than up for the challenge. And now, so was the vehicle the gang had christened, the “Chool Bus”.

The Chool Bus was a solid rolling apartment, designed to accommodate four people comfortably with kitchenette and full restroom facilities in back. Now, bedding in the Chool Bus resembled that of bunks in a submarine. A little tight, but each pod had privacy curtains, reading lights, and the kind of high-tech mattress that delivers real comfort with a small footprint. Billie was a tomboy through and through, but she was in possession of impeccable taste and the Chool Bus interior reflected that taste in spades. The floor, ceiling, and side panels were covered in cedar paneling with plenty of wool insulation for holding in the heat on cold days or the cool air conditioning for the dawg days. Cabinetry finished with ebony composite material, light weight, but strong and resilient, ready for the many thousands of miles their journey would take them.

She gazed across the shop floor at her father, the owner/operator of a used car dealership where she worked. “Hey, Dad, can you help me with this belt install,” called Billie?

“Sure, Pumpkin,” said Billie’s father.

“Please… don’t call me that. I’m not a little girl, anymore, in fact, i’m not a girl at all… call me ‘Bruno’, cause i’m one badass bitch of a Chool Bus mechanic.”

“Ok, Bruno,” her father was all smiles. He really loved this little firecracker of a human being. She was by all conventional western standards, strikingly beautiful, statuesque, radiant skin, smiling eyes and a spunky countenance that variably beamed with mischievous energy. Precocious as a child, musically inclined and mechanically adept. In younger years, she played the drums in Professor Thompson’s grunge metal band, but was glad to leave that lifestyle behind as MTV had grown less and less inclined to play music, and more inclined to those barely “reality” shows. She had other reasons as well, as someone with unconventional gender inclinations, she grew tired of the drunken advances of guys who mistook her conventional beauty and good natured mischievousness for invitations to amore. “Good lord,” she would often exclaim. “Is this all guys ever think about?”

Billie adjusted to her gender contradictions early on. She had to mature even faster than her female classmates as it’s not easy being this kind of different. But her parents, being rainbow hippies from way back, refused to hard-sell gender roles so she was able to reach adulthood relatively well adjusted.

She had been anxiously waiting to hear from Professor Thompson about the grant. Would they be off on their first sojourn after graduation, or back to the normal routine working in her dad’s auto repair shop? The application had been submitted all the way back in January, and Billie had been frantically mapping out routes for favorable weather. She was driving Professor Thompson crazy with endless questions about who he wanted to interview and could they plan the route for not only meeting the interviewees where they live but also hitting some of the best destinations for sightseeing. Making bucket-list suggestions, leaning in, barely able to think of anything else.

Professor Thompson had always loved this endless spring of nervous energy. He was aware of her personal challenges, she was mildly introverted and deeply empathetic, never brooding or sinking into depression funks. She always came alive around her friends, fiercely protective, she could be a bit of a hot-head. Many a time when folks mistook her fair appearance for being a push-over, they quickly learned, Billie could peel paint from the walls with her sharp tongue and buccaneer’s vocabulary. So now, when Billie opened that email to see that the grant had been approved, she nearly woke the neighbors with her whoops of celebration. “Game on…! WOO HOO,” she exclaimed! The gang and the Chool Bus were going on tour, sea to shining sea!

NEXT WEEK:
Chapter 3: Jack Dean makes paranoia a viable career path

GO BACK => (Preface & Chapter links)

The Chool Bus (ch01)

Chapter 1: Professor Thompson’s Roadtrip Sabbatical

The rhythmic cha-click of his office door felt somehow symbolic as Professor Thompson made his way into the department’s hallway. He was running late for an “end of semester” convocation and awards ceremony. He broke into a light jog to reach his colleagues heading for the university’s grand auditorium, an annual review attended faithfully over the last fourteen years as a member of the “informatics/new media” faculty at a mid-western state university.

Catching up, between panting breaths, Professor Thompson asked anyone inclined to respond, “Do we have a new theme?”

“Yeah, but it’s the exact wording used by one of those networking technology companies,” said Jack Dean, long-time friend and department colleague.

“Damn! The least they can do is come up with their own idea,” said Janice, a marketing specialist, beloved by students for her exceptional creative flair. “I don’t know why they do that,” speaking of the university president’s promotions team. “They recently hired a couple of my students for internships. Surely, they were able to come up with something original.”

“Nah… they always seem to mail the ‘theme’ in,” said Jack. “Maybe they’re overwhelmed by the latest funding cuts.”

“Who knows?” Professor Thompson wasn’t interested in the regular end of semester gossip. “I’m just glad this week is over.” He had a frantic final week as some big changes were on the horizon… exciting changes. He finally nailed that lucrative new media grant guaranteed to keep him busy for the full year of his earned sabbatical.

And it was a perfect day… the campus was in full springtime bloom. The smell of lilac and freshly cut grass filled Professor Thompson with a sense of well being and gladness as the group made their way along impeccably groomed sidewalk landscaping. Workers busy with graduation preparations made their way to and fro in golf carts from the sports coliseum. Students had long since retreated to their dorms, off campus housing, and local restaurants. The air was electric, as if any moment the party of newly minted university graduates would break out with a vengeance. Professor Thompson was intimately familiar with the scene as his undergrad years were spent right here.

“Lovely day for a great escape,” asked the interim department chair? “I bet you’re itching to get out there on the road.”

Professor Thompson was deep in reverie. He had dreamed of exploring the country, sea to shining sea. With the new media grant, he was not only free to do it, he was getting paid to do it with companions. Meeting people across the nation, asking them about the recent descent into fractious national politics. The nation had been clearly divided by tribal identities. Policies to address the problems were no longer a matter of good-faith negotiation and reasoned compromise. It was now all about which jersey you were wearing.

Professor Thompson called this phenomenon, “the fibrillating heart of our divided nation” and he was determined to get his arms around the dysfunction. Though not delusional enough to believe his research could cure the problem, he knows sunlight is the best disinfectant. And so, he was excited to get the process started. As an added bonus, he would be traveling with friends, Jack Dean and Billie Schmidt. Jack, Billie and Professor Thompson shared a long and eventful history as they were band mates in the 1990s… Grunge Metal band mates, in the Soungarden, Nirvana mold. All of this was in a previous life. The band broke up around the time they realized no one was gonna put up sufficient cash to get a video up on MTV. And besides, MTV seemed more into so-called “reality” anyway. Jack followed Professor Thompson into academe and Billie went to work for her father in the ever more technical world of auto mechanics.

As the convocation rambled through various department accomplishments, individual faculty and staff awards, and notable student accomplishments, Professor Thompson beamed with pride when he was called up to the stage to accept the grant award. His colleagues could be heard over the general applause with whistles and cat calls. The moment was sweet and all over as fast as it began. His portrait was flashed on the jumbo screen along with the title of his research and a photo of his department’s building. And with that, the adventure was about to begin. Just a few logistical matters, such as routing and interview appointment schedules. As well, Billie was still working on the vehicle that would take this motley crew on their journey. A luxuriously converted bus recently acquired from the local school district. The gang christened it the “Chool Bus” (the H is silent). Somehow, the “S” had been removed or worn away and rather than spend more money branding the vehicle, the gang agreed to leave well enough alone.

Stay tuned… next week…
Chapter 2: Billie Schmidt and the “Chool Bus”

Preface and chapter links => Click Me

The Chool Bus (preface):

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes: In the years of our lord 2024-25 the Loopcircus blog roared along with consistent weekly glimpses into our “Hot Springs or Busk (HSoB)” travels. This was a settled workflow, quite manageable, rendering weekly 4-10 minute posts and illustrative graphics (thanks to various AI image generation tools). The posts were accompanied by audio versions of the text in narrative podcast form. Presently, a few developments have altered our expectations post-HSoB. 1.) Since we have a perfectly serviceable set of vocal folds, we can’t continue to justify maintaining the AI voice-track crutch. 2.) The current creative focus is thus: Instead of brief snapshots of various topics, we’re aiming to create a long-form narrative, eventually cobbled together in novel form (audio & print). And 3.) We’ve shifted gears in our travels, where the original goal was to visit each of the 48 contiguous United States, a blog post for each (several for Florida… of course). And now, we’re letting a bit of moss grow under our feet, making travel decisions determined by favorable Van-Life weather.

And so, we’re currently approaching week #4 with the new project, and we’re finding those aimless moments of formless drifting, some call it “writer’s block” where, at the end of what could have been a productive day, we reflect with a bit of slothful guilt that nothing of consequence had been produced. This is anathema to your typical Type-A personality, no matter HOW retired i think i am. So, this morning, it hit me. In those heady days when we had weekly publish deadlines (a mere four weeks ago), things got done. In fact we were able to work so far ahead of deadlines to be three to six weeks ahead of publishing targets. Of course, this provides more time for reflection and review, and that’s a good thing as it’s hard to catch mechanical errors when the work is rushed. Anyway, we decided to roll this narrative out as a Loopcircus serial. Many fine works got their public introduction thusly. Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray comes to mind, among others, Twain, Dickens, Dumas, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Joyce, etc..

So, we’ll get back to weekly postings with an eye toward minimizing the use of artificial intelligence tools. Starting with the voice tracks. We’ve decided to fall back to tracking my own voice for the audio supplements… AI will be removed from the workflow in that regard. That said, my graphics talent is right up there with Kurt Vonnegut’s (if you know, you know). So, we’ll continue to enlist a robot’s assistance for the weekly post’s “featured images”. We’ll engage a human artist should the finished product ever make it to professional publication.

And now… without further adieu… a brief introduction:
In this story, the eminent and amiable Professor Mork Thompson (Professor T.) and his bandmates… known as “The Forks” in their youthful heyday… wander around United States of America indulging a preternatural interest in human nature. This shared interest inspires a question which eventually earns Professor T. a lucrative research grant. Early on, Professor T. recruits a young cowboy and recent graduate of the University of Wyoming for research assistance and aid de camp. Buck Wellstone, whose unhurried country gentility and forthright attitude adds contrast to the sometimes naive and uptight countenance of the former grunge guitar flogger/songsinger, Mork Thompson. On the back roads and freeways of this vast nation, The Forks bear witness to many sometimes perilous, sometimes awkward, sometimes comic adventures that culminate with resolution in a nagging, ongoing inquest/lawsuit concerning Professor T.’s alleged Title IX violations brought by his long-time administrative assistant.

Okay… back to the weekly posts, back to appeasing the Type-A gods. Please join us checking in on the adventures and misadventures of Mork T. and the Forks as they make their way around our precariously vacillating experiment in pluralistic democracy, searching for “the fibrillating heart of our divided nation”.

May whatever you call the infinite mystery of existence swoop in and help us all.

Onward through the fog… Rohlfie

Chapter 01: Professor Thompson’s Roadtrip Sabbatical
Chapter 02: Billie Schmidt and the “Chool Bus”
Chapter 03: Jack Dean makes paranoia a viable career path
Chapter 04: The Forks embark, and Professor T. learns the perceived value of privacy in a “social media” world
Chapter 05: Where The Forks recruit another member. Buck Wellstone applies for graduate assistantship and joins the project as Professor T.’s aid de camp
Chapter 06: The Forks begin their time in Montana with a relaxing day in the steamy drink at Chico and Jack calls Bullshit on a wild Park Ranger’s story.

Notes from the Road (pt3)

Ok… i confess. While piecing together the second “HSoB: Notes from the Road” post, there was a nagging itch in the back of my buzz-cut cranium. Something was still missing. What was it? Well… the answer came roaring into awareness as i was bumping around West Colfax in Denver. I was there to celebrate T-Day with my aforementioned Texas comrade from the 2000s (the Bush Years) but also wanted to visit the new Casa Bonita as long as i was there. Anyway… i had some time to kill before my reservation, so i took a little detour, further west on i70 to “Lookout Mountain”, a peak overlooking the Coors brewery in Golden, and the final resting place of “Buffalo Bill”, a famous 19th-century Wild West entertainer whose comings and goings had him in good ol’ Hays America on occasion.

So… paying homage to Bill, it hit me. When pressed, i declare Kanorado, half Kansas, half Colorado, my home base. And though the first “This Land” post dedicated to Kansas was given due attention, circumstances had me juggling too many priorities and restrictions to give Colorado a fair hearing at the time… more on that, later.

Anyway… let’s give it another go, shall we?

COLORADO…the other half of Rohlfie’s formative experience. As is typical in post-feminist-revolution fractured families, kids spend school months (work) with one parent, and summer months (play) with the other. And so, this was my childhood story. School in Kansas, “God’s Country” as Mother would put it, and summer nature explorations in Colorado, home of my father’s family. These two humans may have been mismatched from the jump, but, we aren’t here to talk about childhood trauma, so let’s just leave it there.

Colorado is a landlocked mountain state with distinct southwest flavor. In fact, the best green chili burritos in the world are served there (fight me). Sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah, it is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas to the east, and Oklahoma to the southeast. Colorado is noted for its mountains, forests, high plains, mesas, canyons, plateaus, rivers, and desert lands. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains.

The region was originally inhabited by Native Americans and their Paleo-Indian ancestors for at least 13,000 years and possibly much longer. The eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains was a major migration route for early peoples who spread throughout the Americas. More recently, the Pike’s Peak Gold Rush created an influx of pale-faced settlers traveling through Colorado via Santa Fe Trail, which connected established eastern states to Santa Fe and the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro southward. Others made their way overland west via Oregon Trail to the goldfields of California, or the Mormon settlements of the Salt Lake Valley, by way of the North Platte or Sweetwater Rivers, the easiest crossing of the Continental Divide between the Southern and Central Rocky Mountains.

Alongside humans, wildlife found in the mountains of Colorado include deer, bear, squirrels, marmots, moose, pika, and red fox, though moose are not native to the state and the bear are fairly rare. The foothills include deer, squirrels, cottontail, coyote and mountain lion. The prairies are home to prairie dog, fox, badger, and jackrabbit. I have to admit, i have stories a-plenty for nearly every variation of Colorado’s landscape. Here’s a Grand Junction example. A somewhat gonzo road-trip tale, only slightly embellished, but mostly true (wink).

Within the urban sprawl of Denver, a place i have spent many a season, Littleton, Centennial, Northglen, Westminster, Thornton, Broomfield, Arvada, Aurora, and the Denver Tech Center (i wouldn’t know where to start). As well, i have stories for Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Steamboat Springs, Lyons, Estes Park, Dillon, Frisco, Breckenridge, Glenwood Springs, La Vita, Cuchara, Longmont, Loveland, Aspen, Woody Creek, and Boulder. For example, here’s another gonzo road-trip tale. Destination, Laramie Wyoming, but we started from the Keystone Ski Resort where my traveling companion and i were employed and living at the time.

Finally, a shock to the system as my foggy impression of the Northern front range was of middle to lower middle-class living standards… mountaineers, if you will. To my surprise, in my attempt at selling a Rough and Ready camper trailer in Fort Collins, i found myself in a veritable paradise of a college town. It was a pleasant surprise, but since Colorado registration/tagging laws are different from those in Kansas, i was not in possession of the proper paperwork to sell, so therefore had to hightail it to Nebraska on the quick step. We sold the trailer there, but the HSoB tour had me pushing North for the summer leaving me in a time crunch. This, combined with the frustrating Fort Collins experience ended up unfairly influencing my mood at the moment of documentation.

So, yeah, Colorado, half of my home base. As i peck this, my sister and brother in law are pulling up steaks from their Georgia home and transplanting themselves back to Colorado. This fills me with gladness as now i have an excuse to spend more time in a place my father and his eventual life companion would call… “God’s Country”. They would not be wrong in saying that, but neither would my mother saying the same about Kansas… i agree with them all… Kanorado is God’s Country, and i’m proud to call it home.

Now, as my attention has turned full speed to the book project, these blog posts will most likely be restricted to no more than one per month. It’s been a wild year of constant travel and posting, but now it’s, how did Jack Torrance put it… oh yeah… “All work and no play…” Just kidding, we’ll try to strike a balance, and we’ll make sure not to, as Clint Eastwood would put it, “let the old man in”, and hopefully, by the time we head back to Kanorado, we’ll have something to say about the “fibrillating heart of our divided nation” and a manuscript for my shot at the Great American Novel.

Onward through the fog… Rohlfie

Audiovision: Buster the MAGie

OK: Roland the Roadie, a man whose soul had been pressure-washed by the sonic assault of a hundred death metal concerts, found himself back in the beige stillness of Kansas. Because, of course. For months, his universe had been a rolling thunder-dome of Marshall stacks, sweat-soaked leather, and the high-pitched whine of a tour bus generator. But now, in the quiet, his brain kept replaying the scene from Bethel, New York. Bethel! A name that was supposed to conjure images of peace and love and naked people in the mud. Instead, it conjured for him a single, vibrating image: one deeply patchouli-soaked hippie, a walking potpourri of BO and self-righteousness, lecturing him on vibrational energies.

The whole psychic episode had left Roland feeling untethered. He decided, in a moment of profound spiritual desperation, to reconnect with the simple carpenter from Nazareth he’d learned about in Sunday School. A tune-up for the soul. The first step, apparently, was having a beer in Kanorado with an old classmate, Buster was his name, but might have been Biff or Buddy or something equally percussive.

Buster was now full-on MAGies. That’s what he called it… Make America Great In Every State! He said it with the kind of thermonuclear conviction usually reserved for multi-level marketing pitches. He was a walking, talking embodiment of the movement… a cyclone of star-spangled certainty in a Cabela’s cap. Roland, who hadn’t been inside a church since Y2K, admired the dedication. He truly did. But a few things didn’t quite add up.

“So, help me out here,” Roland began, watching the condensation snake down his bottle of suds. “Jesus was all about welcoming the stranger, the whole ‘Good Samaritan’ bit. Now, how does that square with, you know, the screaming on TV about immigrants being an invading army of… well, Bad Hombres?”

Buster took a mighty pull from his beer, his eyes gleaming with the reflected light of a flatscreen broadcasting the gospel of NewsMax. “Roly, Roly,” he said, shaking his head with a sad, paternal chuckle. “It’s an invasion. The enemy within! You gotta protect your house before you can invite people over. It’s just common sense!” Roland wondered if the biblical Good Samaritan had checked for Roman citizenship papers first.

On they went. Roland brought up humility. The washing of the feet. The first being last and the last being first. A beautiful, revolutionary kind of logic.

Buster countered with a sermon on the Prosperity Gospel. Yessir! It was a whole new, New Testament, one seemingly ghostwritten by a real estate developer from Queens. Buster spoke of the President, a man so obviously blessed that his success… the towers, the gold, the winning… was a sign of divine favor.

“It’s a blessing!” Buster roared, a bit too loudly for a Tuesday. “You model the behavior of the blessed to get blessed yourself (Because God, you see, is a big fan of winners)! Damn the torpedoes!” He finished with a belly laugh that shook the barstool.

The conversation, naturally, turned to money. Out on the prairie, a lone steer bellowed for its evening feed, a primal scream from the feedlot heartland. “It’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,” Roland quoted, “than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”

Buster’s face soured. “That’s communist talk, Roly. Wealth redistribution. That’s theft. And there’s a commandment about that one, an old one. A good one.”

And so on.

Roland pivoted to peace. “Love your enemies,” he murmured. “Be peacemakers.”

“You have to crack a few eggs to make an omelet,” Buster said with a shrug, finishing his beer. “It’s a simple recipe.” Roland felt a sudden, powerful urge to test the idea on Buster’s nose, but he resisted. He had, after all, sworn off violence after the “damn hippie” pepper-spray incident.

The final frontier was Truth itself. Roland lamented a world gone funhouse-mirror mad, an upside-down where experts were fools and feelings were “alternative facts“. Buster then launched into a magnificent, thirty-minute jazz solo of pure, uncut conspiracy, a verbal firehose of YouTube links and podcast prophets about how the only way to find truth was to “do your own research.” Roland performed a quiet face-palm, a gesture of complete and utter exasperation.

“Jesus challenged worldly power,” Roland said, one last gasp. “He taught that leadership was about service, not control.”

Buster saw his opening. “Exactly! He was against the Deep State, just like us!”

Roland drained his beer. It was over. He and Buster were standing on opposite sides of a canyon, shouting into the void. They lived in two different sectors of the multiverse, occupying the same space. An irreconcilable parallax view. He realized there was no argument to be won here, only a friendship to be cautiously maintained across an ideological event horizon.

He clapped Buster on the shoulder, managed one last drop from his beer, and walked out into the vast, starry Kansas night. Roland the Roadie resolved then and there to just keep living by the simple, baffling example of the Nazarene, hoping his friend might one day meet him somewhere on the spiral of spiritual originalism.

Onward through the fog…

Audiovision: Damn Hippies

The air above Bethel New York, on that muggy June afternoon, hung thick and viscous like raw maple syrup, but with a distinct, cloying undertone that set Roland’s teeth on edge. It wasn’t the sweet, innocent scent of verdant fields or the faint, hopeful whisper of a summer breeze. No, this was the unmistakable, unholy reek of patchouli – a pungent olfactory assault, clinging to the very molecules of the atmosphere like desperate, unwashed barnacles. Roland, a man whose befuddlement had, with each passing year, calcified into a semi-permanent state of bewildered indignation, felt a familiar tremor of primal loathing course through his very soul. He’d embraced post-hippie Americana with the zeal of a Trappist Monk. Glad to have purged himself of the “Happy Days” and “Leave It to Beaver” plastic conformity and suburban blandness. But a patchouli come-back? That was a bridge too far, a community sensory violation of the highest order.

Roland was on break from managing a fairly obscure death metal band on tour (hey, it’s a living). And since the band’s last stop was near Bethel, New York, he was on a pilgrimage of sorts to the hallowed, if now slightly commercialized, grounds of Woodstock. He walked with the determined, slightly off-kilter gait of his youth hero, Raul Duke (Hunter S. Thompson’s alter-ego)… his mind a furious, churning maelstrom of conflicting philosophies. He’d always championed the counter-culture’s crowning achievement: calling bullshit on the whole ghastly charade of using deadly force as the default geopolitical negotiation tool, specifically, the War in Vietnam. By God, those flower children had a point! Turning teenagers into stone-cold killers, risking life and limb for some phantom anti-socialism cause, all before they could even vote or legally drink a damn beer! That, he understood. That, he respected.

But then, the mutation. The festering, unholy blight that had slithered out of the psychedelic garden and into the crisp, digital air of the 21st century. The same crunchy-granola crowd, now with eyes glazed over by YouTube algorithms and a disturbing reliance on memes as verifiable truth, had morphed into the right-wing, conspiracy-obsessed, anti-vax movement. And that was Roland’s personal hell. That was the unholy alliance of utopian delusion and outright, fact-averse idiocy that made his blood boil like a forgotten stew on a low flame. He, Roland, the man who couldn’t fathom anyone seriously considering themselves “researchers” simply because they’d skimmed a few vax-skeptical tracts, was now face-to-face with the horrifying reality: formerly eradicated diseases, like Polio, was threatening a triumphant, macabre return.

Polio, for God’s sake!

His internal monologue was abruptly shattered by a voice, strained and vibrating with the nervous energy of a hyperactive squirrel on a double espresso. “Hey, brother! You feelin’ the energy of this place, man?” The voice got even more strident, “…the REAL energy… not what THEY want you to feel!”

Roland turned, his gaze falling upon a figure that looked like a bad acid trip had decided to grow a beard and buy a t-shirt that screamed, in distressed, tie-dyed font: “TRUST YOUR GUT, NOT BIG PHARMA!” The man was a former hippie, no doubt, but the peace-sign tattoo on his leathery forearm seemed to twitch with a manic, Meth-fueled intensity. His eyes, behind wire-rimmed glasses, darted around like desperate moths trapped in a jar, and strapped on his shoulder was a woven, multi-colored man-purse, embellished with some vaguely occult symbols. The patchouli, Roland realized with a fresh wave of nausea, was emanating directly from him. A walking, talking, perfumed monument to everything that had gone wrong.

“Excuse me?” Roland managed, his voice a tight, strangled rasp.

“The mandating, man,” the QAnonner railed practically vibrating with indignation. “They want to mandate our very bodies! The CDC, man, they’re just puppets for the globalists! It’s all connected! The RONA, the ‘vaccines’—” He leaned in conspiratorially, his breath, thankfully, less patchouli and more stale coffee and weed. “—it’s a control mechanism! A depopulation agenda! Do your own research!”

“Do my own research?!” Roland exploded, his composure shattering like a cheap vase dropped from a great height. His face, already a patchwork of indignation and bewilderment, now mottled to a furious shade of beet-red. “My ‘research’ involved listening to doctors, to scientists! Not some basement dweller with a Wi-Fi connection and a penchant for YouTube conspiracy theories! What about Polio? What about the millions who’ve died from ‘the RONA’ while you’re babbling about ‘control mechanisms’ and ‘depopulation agendas’?” He was fuming, a human pressure cooker teetering on the brink of catastrophic breach. The audacity! The sheer, unadulterated stupidity of politicizing public health, of weaponizing fear against the very tools designed to protect us! This was no longer about geopolitical chess games; this was about basic, communal survival! Roland was teetering on the precipice of falling into a sort of “Incredible Hulk” rage. He was on the verge of running amok.

The QAnonner, startled by Roland’s sudden eruption, recoiled slightly, then squared his shoulders, a glint of self-righteous fury in his meth-charged eyes. “You’re a sheeple, man! Blinded by the mainstream narrative! You just follow what they tell you, like good little consumers! The truth is out there, man, but you gotta open your third eye—”

That was it. The straw that broke the camel’s back, then stomped on it, then set it on fire. The “third eye” drivel, the smarmy condescension, the reek of patchouli – it all coalesced into a single, unbearable affront. Roland’s hand, almost independently, shot out like a startled cobra, snagging the QAnonner’s flimsy man-purse. The man yelped, a high-pitched squeak of surprise, as Roland yanked him closer, fumbling with his other hand into the deep pocket of his cargo shorts.

It was a Keystone Cops moment of pure, unadulterated slapstick. Roland’s fingers scrabbled, missing the canister once, then twice, before finally wrapping around the cool, metallic cylinder. The QAnonner, still yelping, tugged at his man-purse, an absurd tug-of-war unfolding on the very ground where Hendrix once wailed. Then, with a decisive grunt and a theatrical flourish, Roland aimed the nozzle.

Pssssshhhhhhhht!

A thick, orange cloud erupted, engulfing the QAnonner’s face. He shrieked, a sound that could curdle milk, his hands flying up to his eyes. He stumbled backward, tripping over his own Crocs, performing an impromptu, flailing dance of agony and confusion. He spun around, arms windmilling, looking for all the world like a psychedelic dervish suddenly possessed by a swarm of angry bees. He crashed to the ground in a heap, kicking and gasping, his protests dissolving into a series of moaning gurgles.

Roland stood there, breathing heavily, the pepper spray canister still clutched in his hand. A thin sheen of sweat beaded on his forehead, but a strange, savage satisfaction bloomed in his chest. “Go home,” he rasped, his voice hoarse but firm. “Go home, and reevaluate your damn life choices. And for God’s sake, take a shower. And burn that goddamn patchouli.”

The irony wasn’t lost on him, even in his befuddled state. He, Roland the Roadie, who applauded the youth of ’69 for standing against forced participation in global carnage, had just used a weapon designed to hurt other lifeforms, on a man who once probably preached peace and love. But this wasn’t about bullets or bombs; this was about basic, societal survival, about the return of ancient scourges, ushered in by the very spirit of individual enlightenment gone horribly, batshit crazy wrong. And sometimes, even a bumbling tired death metal tour manager had to put down the decibel meter and pick up the pepper spray.

Onward through the fog… Rohlfie