Rooster Land — Dig Site

Recent Replies

10:48 PM 18 Aug 19
Bear replied to Todds of Future Past
Didn’t he? I thought he did. What makes Todd Todd and like every other red-blooded Earthling ...

4:57 PM 18 Aug 19
Elk replied to Todds of Future Past
Also, I was not a little disappointed Todd didn't nosh that residual nugget of balled meat ...

4:49 PM 18 Aug 19
Elk replied to Todds of Future Past
Concavity twice?

1:01 PM 05 Aug 19
Rabbit replied to General Store: In Attendance
Went into wilderness for a few days. Dead zones tend to have more life. Talk about ...

12:54 PM 05 Aug 19
Rabbit replied to Todds of Future Past
I've got a sneaking suspicion nothing didn't happen.

1:37 PM 04 Aug 19
Bear replied to General Store: In Attendance
Can’t believe I beat Rabbit to this implication reference. He must be in a dead zone ...

2:42 PM 03 Aug 19
Elk replied to General Store: In Attendance
What are the implications? Also, in TV-world, when people happen on circumstances such as these, they ...

1:49 PM 03 Aug 19
Elk replied to General Store
Link is meant to do what it does.

1:47 PM 03 Aug 19
Horse replied to General Store
The link does something weird, so I inserted the clip. I kind of like that anyway. ...

Recently Revised

Todds of Future Past » 9:24 AM 04 Aug 19 » Bear ⟳ Bear

General Store: In Attendance » 2:02 PM 03 Aug 19 » Horse ⟳ Horse

General Store » 1:49 PM 03 Aug 19 » Elk ⟳ Horse

Leaving The Reluctance » 9:50 PM 22 Jul 19 » Bear ⟳ Bear

Todd Understands » 5:37 PM 22 Jul 19 » Bear ⟳ Bear

Todd Escapes » 1:25 PM 21 Jul 19 » Rabbit ⟳ Rabbit

Go With Todd » 10:57 AM 20 Jul 19 » Rabbit ⟳ Rabbit

Barks » 11:50 PM 12 Jul 19 » Elk ⟳ Horse

Chirp » 11:39 PM 12 Jul 19 » Elk ⟳ Falcon

VW Bug » 3:12 PM 12 Jul 19 » Horse ⟳ Horse

Shades of Black » 6:07 AM 05 Jul 19 » Bear ⟳ Bear

The End Is Not Written » 1:33 PM 01 Jul 19 » Horse ⟳ Horse

Half a Todd » 9:39 AM 01 Jul 19 » Bear ⟳ Bear

People Were Present » 6:10 PM 22 Jun 19 » Horse ⟳ Horse

Succession » 5:09 PM 21 Jun 19 » Horse ⟳ Horse

Recent Haiku

Todds of Future Past at 9:23 AM 04 Aug 19 by Bear

(Standard)

In a remote corner of Todd’s coffee table sat Todd’s remote. Unlike many of the other items in Todd’s house – his exercise bicycle, his cloning machine, his writing pen – the remote was not dusty from disuse but displayed sharp and crisp lines of cleanliness via frequent activity. Even the inner concavities of the molded plastic body from which protruded the various soft rubber buttons were free from atmospheric debris.

Todd walked into his living quarters from the kitchen, where he’d prepared and consumed a meatball sandwich and microdosed an appropriate amount of military grade LSD to make the next six hours of Snorks watching a religiously transcendent experience. Todd had watched more than six hours of The Snorks in a row before – oh, he’d watched far more – but that watching was of inferior quality. Todd, Todd realized, had been watching The Snorks without really seeing. Today, though, that would change.

As Todd settled in, he began to think, though he knew he’d have to curtail thinking momentarily. Recently, Todd had been considering history, its application to life and vice versa. Todd knew that history was essentially a mop-up or brush-under-the-rug operation – that is, it made one of far more or far less import than had been perceived in the present. History, Todd knew, could be used to twist, modify, manipulate events to create new and even predetermined narratives based on a random assortment of only loosely connected happenstances. Remote control, meatball sub, LSD, Todd, Snorks – Todd knew this was the clay to be molded by history. All he had need do was plug in.

For Todd knew that the cable company, Lazenby Incorporated, Inc., recorded every instance of Todd’s day through his exercise bicycle, his cloning machine, his writing pen, even his remote. The data, Todd knew, would be compiled and eventually pored through – someone somewhere someday would see what Todd had done, watch the Todd-watching footage, understand its significance, and recreate it in a way that would crystallize an essence that Todd, sitting there watching, would be only peripherally aware of. And to the annals of history, Todd’s name would be added.

Everything was set – Todd tuned out his thoughts, then quieted his mind completely until it hummed slightly with a perceivable silence. He slowly picked up the remote, felt its reassuring weight, and sat back into his purple velour couch. He used his tongue to fish a small crumb of meatball from the inner concavity of his left second premolar, removed it from his tongue with his left forefinger, studied it momentarily, then put it back in his mouth and swallowed. He felt it glide on a bed of saliva down his throat, making its way toward Todd’s stomach where it would break into its constituents, each to find a place in the ecosystem of Todd.

Momentarily, Todd became still – a new life he could never conceive was about to find purchase in a future he would never know or even need to consider. All was as well as could be.

But when Todd hit the Power button, nothing happened.

General Store: In Attendance at 2:02 PM 03 Aug 19 by Horse

(Standard)

Cut in to woman alone in store, clerk walking away.

Woman inches forward and another clerk appears on phone.

Clerk on phone holding up finger to woman, signaling to hold that thought. Doesn’t put finger down the whole time while on phone. Says Ah hah a lot while on phone. Long pause, and then, Ok, have Prince’s people call Norm Macdonald’s people. Puts phone down, then finger. What can I do for you, mam?

Woman with list in hand, holding list just in view, but pausing to ask a question different than the one it seems she came to ask. Isn’t Prince dead?

Clerk looking at her like she has three heads, then leaning in to whisper, but doesn’t whisper, Look around. They both pause and look around. He says in a normal talking voice, Nobody’s dead.

George Washington walks by with large plastic item, like a stamp iron that someone put down out of place.

…

General Store at 1:39 PM 03 Aug 19 by Horse

(Standard)

…

You said you were on your second career, but that you felt there was room for one more. I asked you what your parents would say about that. You said, “They’d tell me to listen to my heart,” and I said, “So that one percent is a big one isn’t it?” Staring off in the distance, you said, “Yep.”

We pulled into the gravely lot in front of the small store so you could grab some knickknacks for your costume and for the next phase of your night. You looked at me for reassurance that this out-of-the way, dark and “unusually country-looking store for the city” would have what you were looking for. I said, “You bet,” and asked you to exit quickly so I could get onto my next ride.

* * *

Hanging bells fall to the floor as soon as the door opens into the store.

Let me help you with that, a clerk says, rehanging the bells behind the woman who stands there with an expression of awe reflecting something she couldn’t have imagined being the inside of the structure she walked into. She looks back and forth between the doors she came through and the store, even looking above and beyond as if far away, and fumbles for words.

He just dropped me —

Clerk interrupts, Are you looking for something?

Long pause, dumbfounded, looking down on a piece of paper containing a list, I —, I just —

Clerk turns to look into the store too, then back at woman and down at her list.

Woman finally gaining control over her words, Is this place what I think it is?

A low hum of generic shopping music. Sound of suction from automated doors. Cash register registering louder and louder repetitively.

Cut to black screen, credits.

Leaving The Reluctance at 9:49 PM 22 Jul 19 by Bear

(Standard)

It had been quite a time since Todd had any notion of producing anything. His days had been consumed by an incessant desire to gloss. Todd was not interested in the depths life had to offer, but hoped only to glide from cereal bowl to cereal bowl, Snorks episode to Snorks episode, meatball sundae to meatball sundae. His hope was peppered with the fleeting notion that he might be missing something, and an even more fleeting thankfulness for missing that something he might be missing.

During this time, Todd had begun inviting his friends to live with him in his small squat abode in hopes of endeavoring upon a commune of sorts, designed in Todd’s mind to evade life in any manner of genuine or meaningful state. Todd referred to this new life as The Reluctance, a movement he represented with an image of a limp blue hand dropping a cereal spoon into a dark and apparently endless concavity. Most of Todd’s colleagues were in a different state of mind at the time, believing life to be full of nooks and crannies, books and canneries, all ripe and mossy for the living brain to ponder and consume. Only George Glass, Todd’s former college roommate, was in corresponding despondency and so one day turned up at Todd’s place with a bindle over his shoulder and no gleam in his eye.

They watched seventy-two hours straight of Snorks before setting about discussing any kind of plan. The chairs, they decided, needed sorting out. Todd was sitting on a rattan and wicker piece, usually the visitor’s seat, while George Glass had been sitting upon Todd’s magenta divan, his main squeeze. Todd explained to George Glass the upside of a chair both rattan and wicker, that it was a rare thing and good for the soul, but George Glass was quite taken with the divan. And besides, he said, I’m already sitting here. A serious row ensued, about the relative merits of seating arrangements, the guest/visitor dynamic, the essence of The Reluctance.

When George Glass threatened to leave, Todd said, Would you wait here a moment? and walked casually to the utensil drawer. There was a specific cereal spoon he had in mind.

The Workshop

Rooster Land is a private and pseudonymous writing workshop. You're currently located where the writers come to work. A selection of their pieces are elevated to superfeed status and made publicly readable on a rolling basis. You may want to start there. But certainly feel free to look around while you're here, or to open and travel.

Fellow writers may view all content, including replies and revisions, and partake in the discussion. Want to join us? Get a sense for how it works — everything from intellectual property to punctuation — then write The Rooster.

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