L U N A T A L K with Eva Moon

Wait Ten Minutes

It’s the standard line about weather in Seattle (”the Intermittent Windshield Wiper Capitol of the World”). Don’t like it? Wait ten minutes. Like a city bus in some fantasy world, new weather will supposedly materialize on schedule.

Today was definitely a wait ten minutes day. An hour or so on the road was like watching TV with an obsessive channel flipper. Light clouds, heavy clouds, mist, drizzle, buckets, rainbows!, sunshine and finally a light dust of snow near my destination.

Still waiting for blue ice, oobleck, frogs and pink lizards.

True weather story: Years ago in the southern California desert on a baking, cloudless summer afternoon we were lounging, somnolent around the kitchen table trying to avoid any heat-producing activity. Simultaneously and for no apparent reason we all rose from our chairs as if the atmosphere had bunched itself under our feet and pushed up. Outside, the light grew thick, though there were still no clouds and a directionless wind whipped the tree tops. The hair on my arms prickled. I went outside. Up and down the street, people were coming out of their houses and looking around. The tension grew oppressive and it became a struggle to breathe. Suddenly, electricity arced between two high tension lines overhead. The blinding violet arc traveled along the lines for a moment accompanied by an earsplitting buzz, until it finally snapped and power went out for miles around. The tension immediately evaporated and everyone exhaled.

The memory of this storm was the germ behind the lyrics to my song, Monsoon.

Weather stories?

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• Perfect Imperfection on V-Day
• Sibling Revelry
• Sweets to the sweet. Here, have a nut.
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100 Words

Ultra-short fiction seems to be getting bigger.

The experience of reading flash stories is qualitatively different from reading a novel. It’s necessary to be a more active participant in the story telling - and that’s what I find so captivating. Rather than sit back and be a passive observer of the author’s fully-presented vision, we are only allowed a thin slice. A tantalizing, voyeuristic peek through a partly open door. If the author is skillful, the peek is enough to let you tease out the story.

A very fine collection of flash fiction was published by my friend, Mark Budman: You Have Time for This

I came across the podcast of another friend this week, Laurence Simon. He produces a 100 word story every day. Sometimes more than one a day. I have to admire that kind of sheer… throughput. He also has a weekly challenge - with prizes! - to write a story of one’s own on a given theme and record it for the podcast. Funny how motivating prizes are. The theme this week was “Cake” and here’s my entry:

CAKE
by Eva Moon

Alma bent her legs first one way and then another, trying to find the right fit. In the end, she discovered if she curled up on her side and tucked her right foot tightly behind her left ankle there was just room to snug her hips inside the rim of the round pan. She leaned forward, pressing her breasts against her thighs; left arm beneath her cheek and right snaked into the small space above her feet. It wasn’t easy, but wasn’t her family worth a little sacrifice?

After dinner the kids all begged for an extra slice.

Listen to it - and all the other stories - HERE

But I hope you’ll vote for mine!

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• National Wax
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A Piece of Pi

Two holidays in one week! With National Napping Day hardly behind us, it’s already Pi Day: March 14 - 3.14.

In honor of the occasion, here are a few treats:

Pi in the kitchen

How to Calculate Pi by Throwing Frozen Hot Dogs (really!)

Haiku (piku?)

Three point one four one
Five nine two six five three five
Eight nine seven nine

Pi Hop

Pi in the face?

But is it true? A hoax revealed: One of the oldest hoaxes in history was unmasked today. A group of mathematicians, called “the Brotherhood” revealed that pi, the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter, long held to be an irrational number equal to 3.141592…, was actually equal to simply 3.

Cloaked in a green hood, one spokesperson, called ‘Pascal’ said that after years of soul searching and intense debate, the Brotherhood voted unanimously to reveal the hoax to the public… [link]

A friend points out that they can’t celebrate Pi Day in Europe, but I think they approximate it on July 22. I truly wish I could publish this post at exactly 1:59 pm today, but I’ll be out eating pizza pi.

See more like that one:

• National Wax
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• Zombiespeak: A Linguistic Analysis
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Gack Moment

I had a gack moment tonight.

A gack moment is what you experience the moment you become aware that big trouble is about to land in your lap and there’s nothing you can do to prevent it. You know the feeling: The skin of your face feels suddenly hot and a size too small, you forget how to exhale and your heart goes FLAM against your ribs in a mad dash to distance itself from your sorry ass.

My gack moment was a classic: The unexpected appearance flashing police lights in the rear view mirror. I hadn’t done anything wrong that I could think of, but my body instantly went into full gack mode anyway. My inner caveman was instantly ready to take on the sabertooth tiger. This time the gack moment was followed by a phew moment when I pulled over and the cruiser passed by. Phew!

The rest of the way home I tried to think of other gack moments I have known. Here are a few. Do you have any to add?

• The millisecond between committing to shutting the locked door of your car and the realization that the keys are in the ignition.
• Remembering the eggs boiling on the stove - when you’re at the mall.
• Driving off the ferry and watching it pull away from the dock and then noticing you don’t have your purse.
• Checking your calendar and discovering a date to meet a friend… three hours ago. (And she drove in from out of town and waited and waited!)
• Arriving at the Canadian border in Idaho after driving nine hours to discover someone’s passport (not naming names here, but you know who you are) was left at home.
• Asking the teenage cat sitter to overnight said passport and then realizing it’s in the nightstand drawer with all the sex toys.

Share your gack moments…

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• National Wax
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Snuggle for the Cause

Your bed is calling you. Calling, with its sweet siren voice. Yes, it’s the middle of the day. Yes, you should be working. But it’s still there, caressing the back of your mind with pillowy fingers.

You must sleep sometime between lunch and dinner, and no halfway measures. Take off your clothes and get into bed. That’s what I always do. Don’t think you will be doing less work because you sleep during the day. That’s a foolish notion held by people who have no imaginations. You will be able to accomplish more. You get two days in one — well, at least one and a half.”

–Winston Churchill

Americans are sleep-deprived. Even though studies show that short naps improve alertness, performance and productivity, we persist in filling every daylight second with eyes-open activity. As if the world will get into who knows what kind of mischief the minute we turn our backs. Trust me. Things will continue pretty much on schedule without your constant vigilance. If you ever doubt it, go visit a cemetery.

Now, you have a perfect opportunity to turn over a new coverlet: NATIONAL NAPPING DAY. National Napping Day is celebrated each year on the Monday following Daylight Savings Time. You’re tired enough already. And now they’re stealing one more precious hour!

Make a stand for lying down.

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