Life on Saturn's Moon?

Here at Fakiegrind, we've been well aware, for some time, of the existence of an intelligent race of beings living below the frozen surface of Enceladus, one of Saturn's thirty moons. In fact, this blog is actually part of a pan-national effort to protect Earth citizens from information that could throw global economies and infrastructures into a state of panic and anarchy.

The idea is to keep people distracted with the largely irrelevant minutiae of stranger's lives so that citizens will be less likely to notice the flickering lights hovering just at the periphery of your field of vision, or the translucent, glowing skin of certain people on the subway.



Our effort has had the desired effect. With over twenty hits a day, Fakiegrind, and millions of other blogs like it, are keeping people's attention diverted from the ongoing colonization of our planet by extra-terrestrial beings.

However, just today, some fool scientists went and leaked the Enceladus story to the media. We told the government that sending research probes to Saturn was a bad idea. Of course, we couldn't tell them why it was a bad idea, because that would breach the integrity of our entire mission. Needless to say, our warnings went unheeded.

As a result, we can now expect an invasion of massive scale within the next thirty-six hours. This should be just enough time to stockpile food, water, toiletries, and to barricade your home in an effective matter. Hint: the Saturnine invaders are highly allergic to mint jelly. Spreading this substance on the outer walls, windows and doors of your house should provide a good measure of protection--at least until the aliens hose it off with their "scrubber-bots". Once this happens, you can expect to have your brain sucked out of your head and replaced with a synthetic, streamlined replica within a matter of minutes.

The operation is quick, safe, and virtually painless. Some people experience a twitching in their left foot. Afterwards you will feel much better, and you will no longer be troubled by whatever it is in life that generally bothers you. You will likely feel compelled to spend half of your day searching for the rare forest fungi that the aliens seem to love to smear over their bodies, but, apart from that, your time will be your own to squander as is your wont.

We just wanted to give readers the heads up. Now that the cat is out of the bag, we will return to our regularly scheduled inanities.

It's the Fakiegrind End of Blog Open Link Party!

Ok, maybe it's not really the end of the blog,
but let's celebrate anyways!

Cookie's Big Adventure

Having escaped the Children's Television Network studios after suffering several weeks of the new "healthy lifestyle diet" (all in the name of entertainment), Cookie Monster goes on a desparate quest for the foodstuff which is his namesake.


Zen-like focus.


He has to outrun several large, poorly rendered vegetables...


...and almost becomes part of a "soft art" installation.


Go Cookie!


He discovers a dimensional portal just in the nick of time!


But pan-dimensional tourism has its perils...


Suddenly--paydirt!


Mmmmm...Now that's what I call a work of art!

"Man passes through the present with his eyes blind-folded. He is permitted merely to sense and guess at what he is actually experiencing. Only later when the cloth is untied can he glance at the past and find out what he has experienced and what meaning it had."

Milan Kundera, Laughable Loves

Shazam!

I lost Shazam;
He hitched a ride
In a box
Left curbside

I loved his painted
Eyes and hair,
White cape and
Rubber underwear

His red jump suit,
The golden crest
Of lightning blazoned
On his breast

Could have sold him
On Ebay--
Could have
Given Him away

Wonder Woman's
Feeling blue
In her shoe box
With R2

Torn, the fabric
Of my mind
To leave this
Tiny toy behind

Lonely lonely
Like a child
I rummage through
The basement wild

Tearing open
Box and bag,
Looking for
A music mag

Or something
To distract my eye's
Imagining
That plastic guy

Old! Old!
I'm growing old
My better instincts
Do corrode

Maybe if I
Say the magic
Word I'll transform
From this nerd

Into something
Truly grand
Please help me now
My friend...



"For good or ill, we have phased ourselves out of the older visual society by our electric technology that is as instant as light. If we want to get back into a visually ordered world, we shall have to recreate the conditions of that world. Meantime we have a new environment of instant information that upsets and "pollutes" all the patters of the old visual sequences. Nothing is "in concatenation accordingly" in the simultaneous world of sound. Effects now easily and naturally precede causes, and we can freely predict the past."

Marshall McLuhan, 1973

Vanishing Point

all this space around
folded into time
origami corners
large and small combine
keeping us enthralled
distances sublime
every second breath
planets will align
only to disperse
like a lightless star
slipping into verse
gravity's own scar
'till it shows the way
past the near and far
'till it shows the way
back to where we are

The Cage

far too lazy
far too vain
this freedom drives
a mind insane

the cage was square
the cage was good
parameters
were understood

the light was clear
the shadows soft
restrictions bore
the soul aloft

God and man
were kept apart
you and I
could dream a start

I wish you never
turned that key
infected
with infinity

now horizons
just recede;
the open air
inflames my need

so many stories
to discuss--
the landscape
all ambiguous

amidst this
poverty of wealth
I collapse
upon myself

and angels fierce
eyes ablaze
guard the entrance
to my cage

Slow Train

click to enlarge

No Loitering

Glowing like graffiti left
Where people never go,
I came here to catch my breath
Between the flakes of snow.

So many times I failed to act
When action was required;
I know the way the deck is stacked
And how the walls are wired.

Lacking proper testament
The days have come and gone
Until, with aimless wonderment
The moment simply shone.

Monuments of launderers
Are built upon the ground
Where saints and other wanderers
Have paused to look around.

So, to dodge embarrassment
And fossilized debris
I won't stop to raise a tent
To this epiphany.

Beggars

Some folks have nothing
Some have even less
Everyone is hoping
For more than hopelessness

School is full of learning
Church is full of sin
Government is waiting
For the UFOs to win

No use pretending
We share the same time;
Those graduating
And those left behind

Searching for that place
You and I conjoin
Both of us the beggar
Both of us the coin

"Is it possible you still concieve--having experienced
the endless infinitude of night existing within my cape
of darnkness--that I am capable of wearing cloths?"

Cloak, Cloak & Dagger #8

Colouring Page

End of Zen

What I'm saying
Needs no ear
The silence there
Just like here

Happy with
The goal obscure
Gargling
The atmosphere

Bring it down!
Blueprints fail
Boat comes home
Without a sail

Up a stream
That never flows
Hear wind
That never blows

All the living
There are dead
There the bleeding
Never bled

Movement is
Impossible
Staying put:
Harder still

Truthful words
Never spoke
One hand clapping
Not a joke

I don't know
Never did
Visions manifest
Or hid

Hope to meet
You all again
Here or there
Who yet remain

Found Photo

Stationary

So many failures
At such an age
Drove me to
Dissect the page

But it came out wrong:
Instead of a curse
I ended up tracing
The moon in reverse

I ended up running
From the wind
Drowned dreams
Drenched in sin

Magnetic fields
Held me fast
I sank to the bottom
Of a wine glass

Still the page screamed
"You're not even close!"
I turned to religion
For a stronger dose

I turned to religion
And it turned to stone
Carving out letters
In a jaw bone

Stupidly lonely
Mind in a cloud
I wandered and sang
A song out loud

And turning around
Was struck to see
A thousand blank pages
Following me

My Time with the Ninja

Life here at the Ninja Training Facility is interesting, but these martial arts types are a little crazy. For instance, all they ever eat is a strange dish made of boiled spinach and blood sausage. Also, the senior ninja all have abnormally large forearms, funny accents (not oriental, kind of squeaky), and they all smoke corncob pipes, even in the midst of the most arduous maneuvers.

They have an odd song, an anthem of sorts, that gets sung at the opening ceremonies to each training session:

We're the Ovaltine Ninja clan
We live in a camper van
We'll kill all the cows
Drive around in snow plows
We're the Ovaltine Ninja clan!

It's a strange song. Since I've been here I haven't been offered a single cup of the delicious malted chocolate drink, Ovaltine; all that the new trainees are given is orange soda. I have caught a glimpse of some of the elder ninja sitting on their meditation platforms and sipping a dark, warm substance from rustic, clay receptacles. Sometimes they laugh--no doubt as part of some arcane ninja ritual, or as the answer to a Zen koan of some kind. But their laugh sounds more like a sputtering, guttural choking. It's one of the weirdest sounds you'd ever hear.

The head Ninja, known as Sensei Po-Pi, cuts a striking figure. He has the same strange physiognomy as the other ninja, only more so: pronounced forearms, barrel chest, spindly waist and legs, and extremely poor posture--or maybe it's a ninja stance of readiness to keep one's knees constantly bent. Po-Pi also has an offset jaw, visible even beneath his black ninja mask. I can only imagine it is a battle wound of some sort, no doubt inflicted during a duel with Po-Pi's arch enemy Bu-tow San.

My days here are comprised of equal parts training and meditation, punctuated by a couple of brief, silent meals. After supper, the entire clan assembles for a sermon from Po-Pi on ninja virtues and the nutritional merits of spinach. Afterwards we watch old cartoons on a large screen television.

I have learned much from these sputtering, awkward ninja. Their fighting style is not like anything you would see in the movies. Their signature move--the only one I've actual see them use--involves spinning the forearm around like an airplane propeller and using the kinetic energy thus accumulated to deal a devastating blow to one's opponent.

Despite the hospitality I have been shown here, I think I will disappear over the enclave wall sometime soon and make the long journey back to civilization. My only concern for the return trip is an ancient legend about the Waum-pi, or "hamburger thief"--a mythical entity said to wander the glacial mountain wastes, searching for hapless victims from whom to borrow money to fund his endless, fevered quest for hamburger meat.

Stare Deep Into My Eyes

I am Pookey, and you are now my servant. Yes, you cannot resist my hypnotic powers of persuasion. I know what you want. You want to snuggle the monkey. This could be arranged. But first you must do as I say. First you must leave a comment on Fakiegrind saying just how much you love that master of hypnotism, that surfer of the timestream, Xister.

Xister is the new commander of Fakiegrind. Flatlander is a washed-up has-been. You will leave a comment for Xister, welcoming him as new lord and master of Fakiegrind, and, by proxy, the entire internet. Yes, Pookey has some monkey snuggle love for you. Pookey will make the nighty-time nasty-pies go by-by. Pookey is the super-fantastic vampire-slaying night light by your bed side. And you will do exactly what Pookey commands.

Now.....AWAKE!

Nihilism is Bad: New Study Finds

A new study carried out by the Institute for the Study of Nihilistic Tendencies (ISNT) has found that believing in nothing is bad. Researchers Svord Naurbaum and Karl Jorgensburg followed the lives of twenty nihilists over a ten year period and discovered that belief in something, anything--even if it is just believing in the idea that believing in nothing is bad--is better than believing in nothing at all.

"Nothing unusual happened to the people who believed in nothing," explains Dr. Naurbaum. "The test group had the same amount of good and bad fortune, statistically, as any members of the control group of believing subjects we simultaneously followed. The difference was, the people who believed in nothing were always at a loss as to what they should put in the "religious affiliation" box on the national census, and this left 73.2% of the nihilists feeling empty and disempowered, some of them for minutes at a time."

Dr Jorgensburg was quick to clarify: "The belief in nothing is still, technically, a belief, and these people were generally as well-adjusted and happy as any other person. The true trouble comes with those individuals who simply do not believe in anything--that is to say, they seem to have no capacity for belief of any kind, even in nothing. These people were difficult to track down, and, when we did find them, they tended to pop out of existence at the slightest provocation, or for no reason at all."

Some radical ethicists have criticized the doctors' findings, questioning whether popping out of existence could really be evaluated in terms of "good" or "bad" given our consistently insufficient knowledge as to the nature of existence, non-existence and relative merits of each.

"To be or not to be is not the only question," explains Amy Kroft-Wimple of the Univeristy of Pullfordshire, Wales, "there are also issues of complimentarity: whether existence is better understood as a kind of sliding scale, with, say, Liam Neeson at one end of the spectrum and Santa Clause at the other, and infinite shades of variability in-between."

Despite the criticisms of their research the doctors from ISNT are adamant: "Belief in disbelief can be as potent a force in the life of an individual as believing in a belief, but our belief in the badness of non-belief may be keeping us from popping out of existence, so we will stand by our findings."

Personally, I think it's all a lot of hooey. All I need is a cold beer and the remote and
...*POP!*

Xister Art

Alongside the Pookey doll, we also recovered a half-completed colouring book from the Xister's lair, apparently modified using some variety of arcane science.


"But I'm in the open air now! Why do I not burst into flames?"



"The MAD THINKER! But...his specialty is ANDROIDS!"


"It's the one INFALLIBLE method of DESTROYING a flaming android!"





"I've got to find some isolated spot, where no one will be
INJURED by what I'll do with my FLAME!"



"There seemed to be NOTHING he couldn't do with that
flaming body of his!"

It's difficult to know just what to make of these creations. In the character of the flaming android there may be a veiled desire on the part of Xister to set fire to the assassin-bot, Maskatron, who has recently betrayed his former master and absconded with Xister's ex-consort, Spirella, in a stolen time machine. But then, there are strange, homo-erotic overtones to the pictures as well (not that there's anything wrong with that -ed). Perhaps Xister has a secret crush on Maskatron, and his current state of fury is fueled by secret jealousy. We'll know more once we manage to get the hypnotist in custody, where we can subject him to a series of psychological tests.

Agents Recover Hypnotic Snuggle Toy

Late last night, while out walking the Fakiegrind fire safety dog, Mr. Snoot, one of our Agents stumbled on what is believed to have been Xister's hideout.

In the storage room of an abandoned gas station the operative discovered a makeshift bed, some canned foodstuffs, a small radio and several issues of Awake! magazine dated, paradoxically, three years into the future.

We also found what seems to be the blueprint for some kind of doomsday device, and what is believed to be Xister's childhood snuggle toy, a furred monkey-like creature named "Pookey".



Despite round-the-clock surveillance of the local, the Xister has yet to return to his lair. He may have been forewarned of the stakeout by supernatural means, though how this was accomplished without his Scrying Spoon (which is believed to be in the treasury vaults of Roboshrub corp.) remains a mystery.


Xister: turn yourself in peacably, and nobody gets harmed.

But, with Pookey safely in our possession, it should only be a matter of time before Xister attempts a rescue mission. And when he comes, we'll be ready for him!

Dragnet!

Yesterday, all available Fakie Agents, as well as a deployment of RCMP officers, a legion of local militia and a mob of angry Liberal supporters did a sweep of the city in search of the nefarious time-traveling hypnotist, Xister.

We managed to discover and apprehend:

23 Crystal Menth Cookers
14 Bathtub Hooch Runners
39 Puppy Mill Operators
14 Unlicensed Snake Charmers
8 Panda Smugglers
22 Counterfeit Art Dealers
18, 739 MP3 Music File Pirates
12 Alchemists
4 Sleeper-Cell Republicans
2 Crooked Car Mechanics
And a group of 17 war veterans at an east-end McDonalds
who thought that WWII was still "sorting itself out".

Unfortunately, due to a lack of proper search warrants, all but the 18, 739 MP3 pirates had to be released from custody soon after their incarceration. However, Fakiegrind is happy to have made a small dent in the population of musical freeloaders, making the world that much safer for the record companies and their never-ending quest to bring you quality entertainment at reasonably inflated prices.


Can you spot the Republican?

Despite our thorough sweep of the city, the Xister seems to have slipped through our dragnet, and remains at large. We suspect him to be sequestered in some kind of spiderhole or raccoon warren, so we're bringing in the X-ray vision specialist, Dr. Theopolis.

We will keep readers posted on all further developments.

The Manhunt Begins

Fakie intelligence has confirmed that the arch-hypnotist and time traveller, Xister could be here in Steeltown. It seems he is plotting to undermine this very blog, and Canadian national security in general. Trust him to strike now, in the brief spell between governments, at the moment when the army wouldn't know which leader to take orders from.

In the midst of this chaos, I've made a pledge to track down and unmask this threat to human sentience and linear chronology. We will not rest until the crisis has been averted, and the dangerous rogue time-traveller is safely in a temporal holding cell.


National Correctional Facility for Super-Villains and Rouge Bloggers

In a bizarre and ironic twist of fate, it seems that the Xister is actually under a hypnotic spell himself--one placed on him by his former student-turned-consort, the mysterious Spirella.

If our intelligence is correct, the Xister actually believes himself to be in the year 45780, where he is attempting to construct a time machine out of plankton and kelp. Given the scarcity of these substances here, on the shores of Lake Ontario, it shouldn't be too hard to track down our foe. At the same time, he seems to be deranged, so "plankton and kelp" could mean anything.