Thursday, November 10, 2005

These headaches are getting bad. They started after that first experience that I had with the magic bean. It's as if my head was getting bigger, swollen. I was all out of peanut butter and jelly, Doritos, and frozen pizza bagels. My hunger was so bad that I was eating everything I could. Hell, I poured sugar on a stick of butter and ate that. I had a few two-liter bottles of grape soda. To each one of those, I added a couple of cups of sugar. It was like throwing old tires into a bottomless pit--no damn way to feel satisfied. The best dish that seemed to curb my hunger pangs was something that I came about while thinking of The King.

Elvis ate some weird stuff. I can't remember all what he ate (I'm not a real fan), but you always hear stuff--peanut butter 'n' manana sammich, fried chicken dinner, and buttermilk chaser--"thank you...thank you very much." It struck me that you could take bread--a whole loaf of unsliced--open it up at one end, then hollow it out. You get this pocket that you can stuff peanut butter, bacon, cheese, cream cheese, bananas, butter, beef tallow, whatever. Take the stuffed loaf of bread and roll it in egg batter, deep fry it, and viola, it's a little something like that fabled "Goldmine" sandwich that The King would eat. One thing about Dr. V's manor (well, mine now) was that it had a full kitchen with a deep fryer. I can't say what eating 10,000 calories a day must be doing to my health, but the way the device pounds me, I'd be consumed totally if I didn't--death by over juicing. Yeah, you get to slip into the big relative, but it comes at a heavy price. My body is just one big battery now, in constant need of recharging.

The good thing is that I started to venture out of the manor. Even though it's still winter, the sun is out more and the rain has melted most of what little snow that Brighton Hill has received this year. Dr. V has an old Mercedes diesel that I usually drive around, but diesel, well, I can't afford that stuff anymore--even with all the money that I get. I don't know how to budget things, yet. The thing that's getting me around now is Dr. V's Martian Red '69 Lambretta GP 200, complete with black racing stripes on the rear skirts.

When I first noticed it in the garage, about a year ago, it was in dire need of some wrench spinning. He had kept a heavy canvass tarp over the scooter, keeping the dust off of it, but the inside of the engine and carburetor were all varnished by old, gelled gasoline. I'm pretty good at messing with stuff like that, so I spent some of my off time taking everything apart and soaking it in solvent for days, getting it de-gunked. I replaced the fuel lines, fixed the brakes, etc. After putting it together again with new gas and sparkplug, it was tuning time. It took a few days for me to get the timing and carb mixture dialed in; Dr. V was upset that I was messing with it anyway. I'll never forget the first dry pops that I got from the thing, followed by a few wet burps after I poured a little gas down the intake . Next try was it: pure two-cycle ratty-tat ecstasy. Too bad that I didn't have good riding weather then.

The garage is outside, divorced from the manor. There is a tunnel that you can use to get to it, but this time I felt like enjoying what little sunlight the day was giving me and went outside. Breathing in fresh air...I started to feel human again. The whole estate is full of old maples, bare of leaves, and overgrown shrubs (that I've neglected). Opening the barn-like doors of the brick structure let out an odor that had been stifled too long. The garage smelled of oily rags and other various petroleum odors-not a surprise--in fact, a welcome change from my own homebody funk that I've been wallowing in for a while. The cover over the scooter couldn't hide its sleek lines. I quivered a little as I uncovered the machine, sat on it, and twisted my grip on the bars. Why did I deprive myself of this experience for so long?

The Lambi started up amazingly quick. I was a little worried about having to mess with it since I haven't taken it out for months. Rolling out, bouncing down the pavement, and slipping on some wet leaves...that, and the wind hitting my face, made a tingle from my highest follicles to the pit of my gut, radiating outward to my extremities. I was wearing a thick fleece jacket under a Kraut army coat, and a hunting cap to keep the wind out, but still not quite sealed tight enough. Spring never comes soon enough for me.

I like to take a few roads to H&H's Supermarket that snake down the hill. It's a little out of the way, I suppose. Doing the grocery-getting thing is hard with Lambi, so I take a large rucksack with me to stuff my all my goods in. It probably takes a good fifteen minutes from here to get to downtown Brighton. The manor is tucked away, out of sight from most curious eyes. People downtown really never saw much of Dr. V, but were very keen on getting anything they could from me information-wise on what he was up to and his place. I had to think of what I was going to say, or rather, what I wasn't going to say when I got down there.

Speeding down Parrish Hollow, the overhanging canopy of tree limbs breaking up the sun light, my mind started to wander about my first experience with the device. I knew there was more than just destructive uses for this thing. Most of Dr. V's notes were dealing with time, dimension, and space travel. I thought, Do I have the guts to try it out--do it properly? Where would I go? How do I get there? How the hell do I get back? From what Dr. V managed to tell me, I already knew that the device was controlled by your mind. But, Dr. V had a highly disciplined mind and he's lost because of it. Again, I poured over it in my head, If Dr. V's gone...trapped, what chance do I have? The ever increasing problem of hunger took over my thoughts after that.

I'm 6' tall and used to weigh 220 lbs. Somewhat overweight, I'm sure. This constant eating should have me hitting 400 lbs by now, it seems. Back then, I dropped 15 pounds with that brief encounter with the Magic Bean. It's only been a while since and I'm showing ribs. I got scared after seeing the scale go down to 140 lbs., so I don't like to weigh myself much anymore. The thing is that using the device not only burns a lot of energy, but it is like shooting up--I imagine. Going back to this day, again, I started to feel it (the device) calling me about the time that I got to the H&H.

I noticed people looking at me, or at least I thought that they were. I've never felt this paranoid before, and I was beginning to feel possessive and selfish. No one could have possibly known about any of these things that were going on up at the manor, but that didn't matter. They weren't getting nothing out of me! Luckily, the only person that knew me there was the cashier, Nadine. Everything with her was superficial, though; no need to worry about prying. All I needed to do now was figure out what I needed to put into my gutbuster sandwich and what I could fit into my rucksack. I passed a media section and looked at rack of DVD's. "Lord of the Rings," it hit me that my current behavior was somewhat similar to Gollum. But, the reality is that I can't share this with anybody. I certainly don't trust anyone else. Dr. V is gone for good--I'm pretty sure about that one. I knew that I needed to go home directly after I got my business done in town, and once and for all do a trip with the device in the sphere.

Aside from what's happened in the past, let me express how I'm feeling now. I realize, at this time, that my growing sense of power through the device was having an adverse effect on my mind. The temptation to screw with things is too great. I really wonder if all the things that you've ever read about or seen in the movies is true? Is it all theoretical? How can a past that has already happened change the future that you currently live in? It doesn't make sense--not after all that I've seen and experienced so far. I'm really starting to think that my temptations are really inspiration and all my fears of ruining the universe are unfounded. I'm tired of merely observing these different worlds, and that's just what they were. A passage of time retired and went to Florida to die. It's no longer here. It's irrelevant now. Maybe, I can go and use it as my personal playground? I digress...better finish with what I was talking about before.

'Do they make peanut butter in six packs?" I asked the cashier.

Nadine sat at her register and looked at me with some concern and replied, "You're gonna get jaundice eating that junk all the time, honey. In fact, you don't look good at all."

I didn't know how to reply to that, so I didn't say anything at all until I realized that I needed to carry on some facade of normality in public. I had to say something, but I just blurted out what I thought would be a joke, "I'm eating for two, now" and rubbed my belly like a precious gift was growing inside.

"You're sick honey, you know that. Cute, but sick." then she shot a quick wink and a smile back at me. The thing was though, I did tell her the truth. I had to feed my monkey. I had to feed that damn bean. As the last items were going into my rucksack, Nadine held the last pound of bacon and queried, "So, what's it like nowadays up at the creepy castle...doing the Igor thing still?"

I have no beef with Nadine, but I sure as hell was not going to gratify her with any details. As far as anybody is concerned, Dr. V still is that creep in that limestone mansion that hires boys to do his bidding. I guess there were other personal assistants before me, but I'm the only one who's stuck it out. Anyways, I decided to just give Nadine an answer from one of my "everyday greetings and cliche remarks" file then add a sly remark, "Oh, everything's A-O.K., Nayds. Now, I just got to go over to the butcher to get some brains for heir Doctor...we're fresh out." She laughed pretty good at that one. I'm quite the charmer when I need to be.

The cold rushed back into the air outside while I was in the store. The clouds covered the sun and dropped the temperature ten degrees or so. This meant that riding the Lambi was going to be a real sack-cracker. I also needed to get fuel for it too. As I hitched the rucksack to my back and mounted my "Italian Stallion," I chastised myself out loud for my personal negligence, "Dammit! I need to get out more often." Scooter exhaust and a flash of red--that's all they saw or heard of me that day, except Nadine. I did good.