Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?

It was awfully quite in the ghost town for a while. Each being to himself. The monetary beings were busy waiting for the signal that the BooM is coming, the scruffy ones were following behind-the-scenes scenes, and The Drizzles?

He had a nice time. Apparently no one noticed his absence. He was swinging his buckets like a goat with a go-cart, exploring waste-emotions that drained to him from all parts of our real world, which arrived at his buckets via the mysterious "gun-without-liquid-emotion-of-space" system.

But the his personal misery, which he liked much less then other people's misery, Bee-Straw came back.

"The nigger is about to change his skin, The Drizzles" he said seriously "We need you".
"You? Need? Me?" squeaked The Drizzles, and hid behind his buckets.

An unexpected result

Bee-straw's BooM echoed around the ghost city for a while. As the echos began to fade, IgI appeared.
"What was that?" he inquired.
"A BooM" answereed Bee-straw "which is a metaphor fot the economic boom about to come"
"I prefer depression" remarked The Drizzles, still trembling from the BooM.
"Well, if everything is under control here, I just wanted to let you know that the congress party won the india elections."
"Oh" said The Drizzles "that's very interesting. Thank you"
Bee-straw ignored him.
"That was according to The Plan as well" he said "Most of the dominating forces shall remain in power this year. The big question that remains is Iran's election".
"Oh, those are not real elections" answered IgI "there too will the dominators hold their power"
"Well, that is what The Plan says" said Bee-Straw.
They stared at each other silently for a while. When they broke the stare, simoltanously, they noticeed that The Drizzles is no longer there.

A state of mind and the economy

The Drizzles pondered about The mysterious Plan for a while, until he had found the right question.

"Why would someone manipulate the real-world beings?" He asked Bee-straw.

Bee-straw turned around, to reveal Jupiter-Jack's face.

"Why, to make money, of-course" Jack's smiled gleamed "Why would Anyone do Anything for any other reason?".

"Yes, but why spread a rumor about a false flu? He must really like the feeling of panic!".

Jupiter -Jack turned around.

"Oh, they probably do, whoever they are" said Bee-straw "They certainly adore panic. But I have reasons to believe that the manipulators are creating diversions, not making money. And that demi-pandemic is all over now. They would have to move on to the next part pf The Plan".

"What is it?" asked The Drizzles.

"The next part of the plan is the economic boom. That's how they will get out of the depression".

"Oh, I love depression" nostalged The Drizzles, a true connoisseur of emotions "It's so very very deep!".

"Yes, perhaps" unsured Bee-straw "But this depression is not a state of mind. It's a state of the economy".

"And that's why you need a boom to get out of it?" The Drizzles tried.

"Yes" smiled Bee-straw and clapped his mighty hands together, producing a thunderous clap "A real BooM".

A president and a demi-pandemic

"President Barack Obama, AKA the big O, Demi-democrat, The antichrist, Mankind's savior, The black Jesus, Dajjal and Good Ole Hussein, Is the center of The Plan, though we do not know how and why is he related to it"

"So all of The Plan is this Mr. O?" Asked The Drizzles.

"No, No. But Mr. O is the strongest man in the USA, and the USA controls most of the cyber-world."

"And also most of the world finanance" Said Bee-straw, who was suddenly there again, instead of Jupiter Jack.

"Hi!" ansurprised The Drizzles "Where did you come from?".

"Oh, I am just the other side of Jupiter Jack" Explained Bee-straw.

"Wow. I did not know that".

"Well, you don't know a lot of things. Do you have different levels of ignorance?" wondered Bee-straw "After all, one might have different levels of knowledge".

The Drizzles didn't answer. He was busy looking for 'ignorance' in the dictionary.He found the entry and read it.

"Oh, I didn't thank you yet for the present!" he said happily.

"Oh, Don't mention it, please" Bee-straw slightly reddened "Anyway, today's most important issue is the swine flu, AKA the Mexican flu, The north American flu, and the we-can't-agree-on-any-goddamn-name flu. This so-called pandemic is a wonderful example for The Plan in action. It is occupying 13.7% of the cyber-world's activity, even though it has no real basis".

"So the real-worlds beings are stupid?"

"Yes, but that is not the point. The real world being are being manipulated".




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The Plan

The Drizzles had never got a gift before.
"Thank you!" he said to Bee-straw, and noticed that he had gone.
In his place stood a long-eared, blue snail. It was sleek and slimy, and it slid and slurped towards The Drizzles, smiling malevolently.
"Hello" It said in a smooth bariton "I am Jupiter Jack".
"What happened to Bee-Straw?" Qusetioned The Drizzles "He just gave me this gift and I didn't even thanked him yet".
"Don't worry" assured Jack "It's all part of The Plan".
"What is This Plan?"
"Not This Plan, The Plan" corrected Jack "It's the greatest mystery of the cyber world".
The Drizzles flowered on a nearby ghost-hydrant and listened.
"Well, it shouldn't be too difficult to explain it to a clever fellow like you" sleeked Jupiter Jack "I had a major part in discovering it, you know. I sensed something was going on in the Cyber world. All kinds of informations were flowing into it, but it took a while until we figured out that there was a pattern in all this Chaos!"
"A pattern!" exclaimed The excited Drizzles and opened his dictionary.

"Yes! A Pattern! Which is The Plan!" Jack joined into the excitement "And it begins and maybe ends with the big O".

The Drizzles browsed through his dictionary looking for a big O, but found none.

"The big O?" he enquired.

"Yes!" continued Jack, carrying on a wave of excitement "The big O. President Barack Obama!"





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A self reference.

"It sure is hard getting to the point with you" Said bistro like a disgruntled father.
"That's because I have NO points. I'm just a The Drizzles" The Drizzles explained "Thank you for the laughter and the drowsiness".
Bee-straw did like compliments and condiments.
"Well..." he softened "Let's try to drag you past the point, OK?"
"OK" The Drizzles agreed. Maybe there will be a new emotion in it for him.
"OK" Bee-straw resumed deductiveness "As I said, this ghost world is super-imposed on the real world. Stop Giggling! No, I will not say super-impose again. But there was no way for interaction. Until yesterday. When a loop in the cyber-world, which sort-of exists in the real world, sort-of appeard in the ghost world, thus creating a link between the worlds. Kapish?"
The Drizzles nodded. That was clear enough.
"So you are a ghost?" he asked Bee-straw.
"Not quite. I am a cyber-creature. I am an avatar of financial news"
"what's an avatar?" The Drizzles wondered .
"It's a personification of a god or a phenomena" explained Bee-straw, and waited until THe Drizzles laughter ceased. 'personification' had an even worse effect on him then 'intermediator'.
"Oh" Gasped The Drizzles while regaining his breath. "And what's FAY-NAN-SHELL?"
"It means 'to do with money'" replied the annoyed Bee-straw.
"And what is news?" Asked The Drizzles, and Bee-straw disappeared.
He appeared 2 seconds later, and handed The Drizzles a book.
"Here, it's a present for you. A diction..." he stopped in mid-word as he saw The Drizzles starting to get tickled.
"It's a book with words about words" he concluded.



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A tickle

The Drizzles waited for more words to come out of Bee-straw's mouth. He didn't mind whether these words would connect into sentences, and he definitely didn't mind if it was going to get all the way into coherent paragraphs.All he craved was the drowsiness which the words, each one to itself, induced in him.

"As I said, the ghost world and the real world can't interact in any way" continued Bee-straw, to The Drizzles' joy "Or at least that was true until yesterday. Yesterday would be probably be written as a big day in the history of times. Yesterday, All this real world seemed so far away, but then a portal was open. A link between the ghost world and the real world, through an in-ter-med-i-a-tor called the cybernetic world".

Something tickled inside The Drizzles. He knew why, or at least thought so.

"Say that again, please!" he asked Bee-straw.

"What, the whole thing?!" angered Bee-straw "Didn't you listen to a thing I said?".

"No, no, not the whole thing. Just that tickling word, the one with 'eee' and the 'ey' and the 'ter'"

" A word with 'eee' and 'ey' and 'ter'?" answered Bee-straw " 'iator'? Oh, you mean intermediator".

The Drizzles giggled. "Yes, that one!" he said happily.

"Intermediator" said Bee-straw, and watched as The Drizzles giggled again "intermediator,intermediator,intermediator,intermediator..." he tried.

It pressed on The Drizzles laughter point, and he burst out in six different types of laughter.

Bee-straw's brows knotted as he puzzled over this, but the laughter was so contagious even he smiled.

"You're strange fellow. Intermediator"

The Drizzles rolled on the floor and laughed, laughed, laughed.



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In that case...

"So you don't know anything, and it would be futile to explain anything to you" concluded Bee-straw.

"No" contradicted The Drizzles "since i don't know anything, anything you explain to me must increase my knowledge level, and therefore be of some use".

"Hmmm...." pondered Bee-straw "it might like that. But was already concluded with IgI. Oh well, I shall explain to you, but from scratch".

"I wish i had an itchy bucket, then" replied The Drizzles, and listened attentively.

"OK, here we go" announced Bee-straw "It all begins... Well, it all begins here. Do you know what is this place? Oh, right, you don't know anything. This place is the ghost world. It lives side by side with another world, called the real world. Actually, side by side is an exagerration - these two worlds are actually one inside the other, though they cannot interact in anyway".

The Drizzles was enjoying itself. He never knew you could get tired from anything other then buckets. And now he was tired, even drowsy, just from listening to Bee-straw.

"Please go on" He yawned "This is wonderful".







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An unpromising opening

"Good, good, let's have a talk" said the goldy "By the way, My name is Bee-straw".
"Bistro?" The Drizzled wondered.
"BEE-STRAW" groaned Bee-straw "and never mind about the name. We're here to talk about the swine-flu, and how it fits with The Plan".
The Drizzles just stared at him incomprhensively.
"Well, we should start with the swine flu, I guess" Bee-straw continued "imagine that there is a panic, because of a disease breakthrough. What do you think people will do?"
The Drizzles felt he was on a somewhat solid ground here. He swinged buckets with panic before.
"Well, panic aint such a bad feeling" he said "it's strong, and one dimensional. If they don't like panic, they should just wait until they get another feeling in their buckets".
"You really don't know anything about anything, do you?" replied Bee-straw, and The Drizzles shrugged.

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A Talk

Tap tap tap, entered little voices into The Drizzles' dream.

Tap tap tap, entered little motions into The Drizzles' dream.

Tap tap tap, entered little thumps into The Drizzles' dream.

He awoke to find a stranger slapping him repeaedly on his face.

"Hi! Oi! Please stop!" cried out The Drizzles with his straight-out-bed bass. The stranger stopped slapping.

"You sure are hard to wake up" he commented. It was the goldy.

"I sleep rarely" explained The Drizzles "Why did you wake me up?".

"We need to have a talk".

"Really?" moaned The Drizzles.

"Absloutly" insisted the goldy "you need to understand what is going on in here".

The Drizzles shivered. "You are not going to unexplain it to me, are you?".

"Unexplain? By golly, no! Why would I want to do such a thing to you? You seem to hardly know anything to begin with. That Schmuck IgI! No, lad, it's nothing less then explanation from me".

"Good" relaxed The Drizzles "let's have this talk, then".

He peeked in his buckets, to see if there any more tiredness left in them, and found out they were all filled with greed.

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Back to the shell

The Drizzles stared at IgI and the goldy for a while, and then abandoned the situation. He walked back. letting a furry tentacle drag on the ghostly city floor.
He walked back to his buckets. The feelings inside them had already changed. He shook the first bucket gently.
The emotion was growing inside of him. At first, he couldn't determine what it was. Some sort of anxiety. A neurotic one, probably. He dipped deeper into the feeling. Yes, it was an anxiety. The worry that your spouse and yourself might both be carrying tay-sachs genes. It was a strange emotion, quite Jewish.
He let the pendulum swing of the bucket slow down, until the feeling was gone. He then moved to the next bucket, and gently tugged at it.
Now the emotion was dual. he had to swing harder to determine the polars. It was what you feel when a famous talk show host, say Jay Leno, is being hospitalized. The first polar was envy shaped, and quite glad to find out the man was human after all. The other was a mix of empathy and concern, with a hint of worry whether your favorite show will ever be back on screen. All in all, not a bad bucket.
He turned to third buckets. Just staring at it's content induced a yawn on The Drizzles. How wonderful! It was the bucket of lazy tiredness. A very rare and well appreciated emotion. The Drizzles gently pushed it, and surrendered to the sweet tiredness. It spread inside him more and more, until it engulfed all.
He fell into a Serene, deep, dreamless sleep.

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A delicate understanding

The Drizzles listened to IgI's unexplnation. The more he listened, the less he understood. He began to slowly lose his sense of self, and forget who he was. Several minutes into the unexplantion, he forgot not only Who he was, but also What he was. His consciousness broke down, and he was reduced to a heap of random thoughts, as intelligent as a dead retarded snake.

"Hackers break into f-35 project" said a voice. He could not tell if it was one of his own thoughts, something he said, or someone else speaking. "myrtle beach is burning" was another voice. "What the hell do you think youre doing?" was a third voice, which then seemed to drag into a long, tedious dialog, or perhaps monologlue.

The sticky conversation went on and on, talking about self, id and super ego, about the difference between the "me" and the "other" and the world, about the importance of not percieving everything at once and of the important role the sub-conscious plays in that matter.

"Abbey road" said a new voice, and The Drizzles was suddenly aware that someone else was talking, and that was once again a clear distinction between the other and himself.

He was feeling really miserable. He wanted to go back to check on his buckets, but IgI was arguing with a tall figured covered from head to toe in gold coins.

"It's not like that!" said IgI.

"Yes it is!" insisted the goldy.

"Well..." IgI softened.

"Yes?".

"Maybe it's a little bit like that. in the sense that it's like this?"

"Maybe it is" agreed the goldy.

They both stared at one another silently, appreciating this rare moment as if it was exceptional wine.

A moment of delicate understanding.


















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