Once Onceing Down the Alleyways of Southern Mongolia.

There once was a once named Al-Frond
Once once's once watched James Bond
But this once was a once
That once was a dunce
Once a once once won seven wands.

The Heart of the Cards

In honor of my recent level-up, I will present you with a True Story that seconds as a metaphor.  If you wish, you may read along with the following music, which I believe sums up the occurrences quite well. Pace yourself and read with the flow of the music yo.  And don't stop.  Even if you misread something power forward.  Go for it!

Darn it, I crashed the website that the midi was on.  So I'll have to make do with a silly youtube.  I thought my quicktime player was so cool though!

I, Matt Butrim, boldly walked over the threshold of the door and into the room that contained my destiny.  The air was filled with smoke and the dull light did not hide the decay of the room; it only made it stand out more.  Over in the corner of the room I saw drugs being dealt, and favors being exchanged.  But none of that was my business.  I was standing alone in the career center during seventh period for only one purpose.  To take on the world.

I closed my eyes and tilted my head upwards, inhaling the clean air hovering above the smoke.  Behind me, I heard the door slam shut, closing me off from any chance of aid, and from anything but myself.  I was all that I had.  I was going to make a stand at Thermopylae and come out living.  I was going to win.

Snapping my eyes open, I pushed through the heavy smoke, approaching the lone table sitting in the middle of the iniquitous room.  A bouncer grabbed my shoulder and I spun around, cowing him with the determination in my stare.  He slunk away and I continued my crawl through the dense air of inhuman stench.  There was the table, and there was the empty chair awaiting my presence.  I pulled it out and sat down.  It was time to play.

I surveyed my landscape and my opponents.  The shrouded faces that sat circled around the table slowly became visible as my approach swept away the fog.  To my left, Austin the Aggregatizer, to my right, David the Dastardly Delicious.  Beside the Aggregatizer the faces of Toby the Totally-Hot and Andrea the About.com phased into recognition.  Next to the Dastardly Delicious appeared Derek the Demon-Slaying Demon and Diane the Duchess of Dangerously Driven Vehicles.  And finally, across from me, slowly shifting into visibility, I saw the gruesome faces of Ben the Bravest of Blacks, David the Debunker of Women, and Tania the Tacky Tumor.  I had walked alone and unarmed to the Ravager's front door, and I was going to give him my most well-mannered greeting possible.

Reaching into my back pocket, I pulled out my wallet and threw it on the table.  This was Texas Hold'em and there were no holds barred. The cards were dealt, the blinds were out, and the betting began.  Every single one of my opponents called on the first round.  Ohhhh yeahh.  It was gonna be a tough fight.  And it was gonna get down.

Hands flashed before me as I fought battle after battle.  Jack, King.  Two, Seven.  Pocket Threes.  My pile of chips rose and it fell.  Eight, Queen.  The flop offered hope and the river denied it.  The blinds sucked the life out of me, forcing me to move forward at all costs.  Four, Five.  The Coalition of the Willing suffered the same rise and fall of fate and hope.  Seven, Ace. Action, action, action.  Sweat dripped from my face as I numbed myself to the agonizing toll this battle was taking on me.  Eight, Nine.  Queen, Queen.  Back and forth, back and forth.  Chips flew across the table, side by side with newly dealt hands and the discarded hands of the defeated.  Nobody was ever defeated permanently, rising again the next round to take the pot.  It was a stalemate.

Suddenly, everything slowed back down.  Toby the Totally-Hot had bet the house.  Silently, each of the Coalition of the Willing folded their cards, looking solemnly at their ally.  The bet came around to me.  Behind me the flickering blue neon sign creaked.  The Coalition of the Willing had turned their oppressive stare towards me.  I looked at my cards, saw a Jack and an eight of spades.  The smoke had fallen around the table once again and I coughed.  I looked at the cards on the table; nine, ten, and Ace of spades, and a three of hearts.  I looked at my hand again.  The jukebox in the corner wheezed out an old song from the eighties.  I looked at the deck in the dealer's hand, flipping a chip nervously in my hand.  In the opposite corner another jukebox clashingly whined out a techno song.  I called.  I trusted in the heart of the cards.  The dealer dealt the river.

It was a Queen of diamonds.  One short of a straight flush, but it was a straight all the same.  Toby the Totally-Hot revealed his cards, he had a three of a kind of threes.  I had won.

Then the Ravager burst through the back door.  He knocked Tania the Tacky Tumor to the side with the back of his hand.  The dealer started to protest, but the Ravager's glare shot him down.  We began to battle.  Skirmishing back and forth, I started pulling ahead.  The Ravager was desperate.  He smoked cigar after cigar, but the heart of the cards was abandoning him.  So he came to a desperate decision.  The Ravager betrayed the Coalition of the Willing.  As each fell to the ground defeated, the Ravager coldly turned his back.  Taking everything they owned he directed it full force at me.  Finally it came to what it always had to have come to.  Me and him.  Matt Butrim and The Ravager.  The tides flowed in every direction.  The light bounced off the smoke, illuminating the Ravager's head in a filthy halo.  I sat in the dark.  He won sometimes, I won others.  Neither of us committed anything.  We tested each other.  Probing with feints, withdrawing quickly.  The music of the two jukeboxes landed on the same track.  Decks of cards lay discarded on the ground around us.

I blindly threw cards down, letting my instincts take over.  My heart was with my teammates.  The few who had stuck with me.  Peter, my first ally, who had stuck with me from the start.  Claire.  Erin.  Alrex.  Tania had betrayed me, but I was still fighting for her.  The Ravager?  He fought for no one but himself.  That was why I was there.  That was why I fought.  I felt my teammates urging me forward.  I felt their hearts in the cards.  The dealer dealt.  I put my hand on my cards, and I felt their warmth, piercing through the cold smoke.  I didn't even bother looking at what they were.  I could just feel it.  These were the ones.

Then the flop.  Two of Hearts, Queen of Hearts, King of Hearts.  I checked.  The Ravager raised.  I called.  The turn.  Ten of Hearts.  I checked.  The Ravager raised again.  I called.  The river.  Jack of Hearts.  A flush on the river.  I looked at the pot.  I looked at my chips and I looked at the Ravager's chips.  I looked at the Coalition of the Willing, drained of all their energy.  I looked at all the spectators, slaves to the Ravager's domain.  And I closed my eyes once again.  In the black of my head I was not alone.  My allies were with me.  They encouraged me forward.  And I pushed my chips into the center of the table.  I went all in.  I bet it all; everything that I had built, everything that I had owned, everything that I dreamed of.  It all sat in the middle of the table.

Now I'm all in.  The move is yours Rakshit Bhardwaj.

I'm trusting in the Heart.

Level Up!

This is not my long expected epic grand finale.  This is just a short notice.  Over the past week I have been reading Annie Dillard's novel, "The Writing Life" and posting my feelings about the chapters that I have read.  I have also completed my final assigned blog post.  In all of these, I used a similar style.  There is now only one thing to say:

New Technique Gained: Metaphor!

Assigned Blog Post #7: A Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich

I have never ate a Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich because they are too expensive and usually have mushrooms in them, which I don't like.  Actually, although I love Steak, I don't particularly care for either Philadelphia, the white cheese they put in the sandwiches, or sandwiches (for which I have developed a sort of gag reflex after a life time of sack lunches).  But, the Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich is a prestigious thing to get, and it is fascinating in it's expensiveness and in it's grandeur and massive size.  Normally the sandwiches I eat are two half slices of bread stacked on top of each other.  This time I was ready to go all in and eat the Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich.  The fact remained that Philly Cheese Steak Sandwiches are very expensive, so instead I decided to make my own.  I don't actually know what goes in a Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich, so I used the name of the Sandwich as a basic guideline.  I decided first of all to use something kind, lovable, and epic, as I knew Philadelphia was supposed to be.  So I baked up a loaf of French Bread and sliced it in half.  I then found some Cheese at the market place and chose the slightly spicy kind, because I like spicy.  At the same time, I love steak, so I got a humongous one, and sliced it up, and stuck it on my French Bread slice raw.  I put slices of the cheese on top, and finally put the last piece of bread on top.  My Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich was done.  It was my own creation, and hopefully unique, because I had tried to choose unique ingredients.  But looking at it, I decided it wasn't quite finished.  So I decided to throw in some onions, and lots of mayonnaise, and A1 Steak Sauce.  I looked at my Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich again and came to the conclusion that it needed more character, so I added ketchup and ground beef.  I was finally done.  I had a 10 inch long Philly Cheese Steak Ground Beef Sandwich with A1 Steak Sauce.  I called it "The Arc de Elephant" because I thought that it was a cool name for a sandwich.  In the end I was too exhausted to eat it.  So I still have never ate a Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich, although by this point, I don't even know if mine still qualifies.

The Reading The Writing Life Life: Chapter 3

It just so happened that a couple of months ago I was privileged enough to go to a hot springs for a week.  The hot springs were in the middle of nowhere and the landscape was truly beautiful.  However, what I really cared about was the hot springs themselves.  I put on some swimming equipment and wandered over to one of the pools.  Looking inside I saw little fish swimming around.  They were translucent fish and they flashed different colors constantly.  I grabbed at the water when one was red, and when I took my hand out, the squirming fish was colored green.  The hot spring connoisseurs were watching me in my attempts to catch the fish.  They were rightfully in awe, as each time my hand dove into the water, it emerged with a color flashing fish.  I am an astute person, so I know about light refraction, and about how fish are slippery little devils, so I didn't aim for the fish themselves, I aimed for the heart of the fish; the water in front of the fish that I could feel truly carried the fish.  And each time I came out with a fish.  I had a pile of about fifteen fish next to me, no longer changing colors, just sitting there dull silver.  I had conquered the fish, without even getting my toes wet.  But it had still been an effort and it was a rewarding effort I felt.  But then I went inside the lodge for dinner, and I found that little silver hot spring fish were being served by the hot spring employees.

The Reading The Writing Life Life: Chapter 2

As I read Ms. Dillard's "The Writing Life," I was struck by lightning and had a whimsical dream.  In my dream I was reading Ms. Dillard's "The Writing Life," and I closed all of the curtains and locked the doors so as not to be disturbed.  I read through the first chapter with ease, but when I came to the second chapter, I heard a knocking at my door.  I realized that that knocking had been going on for upwards of ten minutes, but I was busily engaged in reading clear and succinct prose.  So I ignored the disgusting creature that I imagined was knocking on my door.  But the knocking continued.  I got up and walked to the door and peered through the eyehole hesitantly.  It was as I feared.  An allegory was threatening to invade my reading life.  I returned to Ms. Dillard's book and plunged back in with a vigor.  Then a new sound emerged.  On my shuttered window a rat-tatting was being made.  I feared it was another allegory, so I ignored it.  But the noise sounded so sweet, I checked to make sure I was not mistaken.  Peeking behind the curtains I saw that the noise was being made by a parable.  Looking behind the parable, I saw a third creature appearing over the crest of the hill.  It was an anecdote, and it looked to have the intent to enter my door.  So I gave up and flung open the door almost joyously.  The parable and the anecdote and the allegory flooded in, and sat down on my couch and helped themselves to a beer.  I woke up then, but my mind was still filled with metaphorical tales.

The Reading The Writing Life Life: Chapter 1

...when you go to Africa, you are likely to see Elephants.  I have often seen Elephants, and they stick out to me as large, blatant, and obnoxious.  But really, what is the Elephant to do but be gray?  Whenever I see Elephants I see them walking along, pretending, or is it trying? to tiptoe across the Savannah.  They mean to be fairy queens I think.  They lightly pluck their way between blades of grass, only noticing how gracefully they have dodged the grass besides their feet.  Underneath their feet, whole colonies of grass are no longer living.  It is the saddest lifestyle that I have ever witnessed.  But the Elephant is oblivious to this.  It thinks that instead of feet it has wings, and that its trunk curling over its back is a proboscis to fertilize flowers with.  The Elephant is gray, but it thinks it is yellow and black.  In its feeble imagination, the Elephant prances slightly across the plains, but what I have seen is a sad creature that gently bends a blade of grass, intending to use the grass' spring to launch it back into its next step.  The pitiful behemoth only crushes the grass, and crushes anything beneath it.  "Elephant," I say, "You've deluded yourself into thinking you're a Butterfly."

For the Lack of Better Words

To "the Ravager:" When thou doth traverse the roads of the world in thine most inglorious automobile, prithee only dig through the crevasses of thine nasal orifices under the darkest shrouds of the night, when the fair moon hast waxed and the stars are dulléd by the clouds.  For, though thou dost not know it, the deceitful tint of thine windows doth not obscure thine laborious finger that dost dig seemingly, methinks, unendingly.

You Can Call Me Alf

Hello, the name is Butrim.  This is my story.

"The Ravager" humbly calls his campaign one of baseless accusations.  I thank him for this discretion, but I believe that it's time for the whole truth to come out.  Everything "The Ravager" says is real.  Now it is time for my story--and his--to finally be revealed.

We begin in the year 2000.  I was eight years old at the time, and had come into my inheritance; namely, the crown of Carnation.  Spoiled by my posh childhood I wasn't the greatest King the world had seen, and I regularly laughed at the slaves working in the meth labs and routinely mocked those of lesser intelligence.  My harem, which had over nine-thousand beautiful women, all of them volunteers, lay in untouched disorder.  Yes, I'll admit, I was a bad King at the time.  I was selfish and greedy and I didn't yet understand what my Uncle Ben told me the day before a bank robber killed him.  "With great power comes great responsibility."  But the day that I first met "The Ravager" changed me.

No, I wasn't a eunuch.

The bastard child of an illegitimate escapade between a brown bear and the world's last hobbit, "The Ravager" was abandoned in the forests of Carnation at birth.  The villagers scorned the sorry beast and it grew up feeding on raw squirrel flesh and minnow carcass.  But "The Ravager" was a persistent bastard.  Every day it suffered the hateful cries of my serfs who drove it off with pitchforks and torches.  It struggled against the attacks of the local bears who would not accept "The Ravager" as one of their own.  And yet, "The Ravager" survived.  Why?  I think it was because though "The Ravager" was pitiful, and bitter, really, all it wanted was a home.

I was writing poetry in the garden when I first saw "The Ravager" crawl out of the woods.
"!@@$*$" said I, in absolute shock.
"Hrrrngh" said "the Ravager."
"!@@$*$" I said again.
And then it croaked out a mournful cry of growls mixed with primitive British speech that pierced me through my greasy heart.  As I looked at the pitiful creature groveling on the ground before me, I saw that all the poshness and indulgence of my life meant nothing.  My harem, my GameCube, and my Ferrari, none of them meant anything to this sad little beast.  So I decided to take it in and raise it as if it was a real person.
"But what should I call you?" I wondered out loud.
"You can call me Alf" growled the bear-hobbit that we now know as "the Ravager."

"I can be your long lost pal"

To Be Continued: Next Time, The Betrayal!

The Idiocracy

Recently, people have been "joining my side" out of the blue.  Although excited by the support, I was befuddled as to what they meant, but I am no fool, and I soon realized it was related to some other belligerent shenanigan that Rick "the Ravager" was putting on in a blatant show of jealous aggression and witless insults.

I have been hesitant to respond to "the Ravager's" provocations, for I am a man who embraces peace.  But though I am no fool, it was foolish of me to have been so lax.  "The Ravager" wishes to "Ravage," and he will "Ravage," no matter the price. Because his belligerence has gone largely unacknowledged by myself, he insists on attacking innocents, such as Invisible Pink to whom "The Ravager" said, and I quote, "This post has been removed by the author."

I should have expected this, my friends, but I had wished to believe the best of even the "Ravager."  I realize now that I was mistaken in my faith.  He has attacked rambunctiously and irresponsibly anyone who was not "on his side."  He has dragged innocents into this self-construed and mis-construed battle.  So I am forced to join the fight.  I cannot stand by any longer.  I cannot watch my friends be attacked in such blasphemous and bohemian manners.  I can no longer abide.

This is not a path that I wish to take, but one that I must take, if I am to remain true to my values of Integrity, Honor, and Scholarship.  And so I stand up, no..., no..., I do more than stand up!, I rise!  As Apollo Eleven rose against the forces of communism, so do I rise against the forces of this Idiocracy that has formed under the command of "the Ravager."  As Brutus rose gloriously to defeat that which would destroy the Republic, I too rise to take on these self-proclaimed "Duchesses and Aggregatizers!"

But I cannot do this alone.  This is a rallying cry.  This Idiocracy must be stopped.  As America united to end the Takeover of the villainous Adolf Hitler, so too must we rise together--for only together can we stop "the Ravager" and his vile henchmen.

Short Story is Up

Thank you everybody, for taking the time to read and comment on my short story.  I greatly appreciate it.  I've put it up on a separate page, and once I finish my edits, I'll put that version up, just in case you ever feel a burning desire to read it again--which I'm sure at least 75% of you will.

I shall now proceed to take this moment to address some questions about my story.

1. I didn't particularly write this story with the intent to be humorous, rather, I tried to write it with good humor.  
2. My deepest apologies to the many of you who felt that it was a "bad parody" of those beloved bible stories that we grew up with.  It was certainly not my intent to mock the Word of the Lord!  I just wanted to make the story of Noah more real, and the story was partly just my feeble and unworthy way of honoring Noah's Ark.  
3. As for the long monologues, I'll just say that my initial reasoning was that nobody had really done a monologue yet, so I decided to throw a couple in.  Later I decided it fit the tone, and matched the characters of two exaggerated, and kind of crazy, characters.  However, I definitely think that they could, at the least, be broken up and interspersed with some kind of revealing action.  Perhaps.  I'm not quite sure I can trust your judgement over mine!

Finally:
I'd like to explain how I came to this story.  My initial idea was about a guy who has a sort of magical bell that rings whenever he misses out on a chance for adventure, which would have been almost constantly.  Then I read Puneet's short story and thought, "Hey!  It would be cool to include a Noah story in my story!"  So I decided to make my story about the one person who helped Noah, and why he did that--which would have been because he was desperate to find adventure.  I thought about reasons for a magical bell, and decided that aliens could give it to the guy.  At that point I thought, "This is stupid and isn't going to work."  The next day I learned that my story wasn't due the next Tuesday, like I thought it was, but on the coming Thursday!  So I was back to work on my magic bell story and I realized, this is gimmicky and I can't hold it up the whole time.  (I still think it's a cool idea though.)  So I trashed that guy, and replaced him with Luce, who didn't want adventure after all.  Then I just wrote stuff, and happened upon symbols, and chances to put in more MONOLOGUES!  Yup.

It Seems Somebody Has Declared War on Me?!?

Hello, hello, and have a fantastic day, all you good people!  That applies to you trolls too.  I'm a generous person, after all.
I'm dreadfully sorry for interrupting your dinners, football games, video games, or whatever else you're doing, with this semi-urgent announcement, but I'm afraid it had to be done.  I've been told by a good pal of mine at The Journey of a Pen that a hater named Rakshit Bhardwaj has declared war on my innocent blog.  I'm not going to deign to look at his declaration of attack, or of any of his rapacious personal assaults, because I believe such trash is beneath me, but I imagine they say such things as:

• Matt may not be able to make up the gap in depth and insightfulness!
• Matt's Blog is a cesspool of miscreant information.
• Matt Butrim dissects baby orphan narwhals!

Thankfully, I am not a narrow man, and just as it is beneath me to even spare a glance at this aggressive blog, it is beneath me to comment in any sort of negative way on these jealous comments that could have only come out of the mind of what I like to call a "stereotypical funny sidekick."

My only response to this Don Quixote, who imagines he is fighting the Titans, can be seen below.  (Note the roles by the approximate similarity of skin colors.)

Please continue to support me in the future!
Thank you.

P.S.
I have noticed that there is an infestation of trolls in the comments section.  If anyone knows an exterminator, please don't hesitate to contact me about it.

A Rare View into the Personal Life and Mind of this Fabulous Author (Me)

Hello my dearest constituents.  You may have noticed that my blog has been on hiatus for the past couple of weeks.  You may have guessed that it was due to stress from activities outside of this writing blog--such as the writing of my short story!  Had you guessed that, you would have been wrong.  Nay, my devoted readers, the true reason that my posts have not graced the presence of your "Blogspot Dashboard" is none other than the fact that I, as all geniuses must, was on a sabbatical to obtain enlightenment.  My Haaj, if you will, was a metaphorical journey through the alleyways of subtle thought, over the highest bridges of symbolism, and through the densest woods of extraordinary insight.  Wholly engaged in this, I searched for meaning, purpose and above all, inspiration.  I was just about to slay the vile Jabberwocky when I was rallied back to Earth by a piercing cry for help that moved me to forsake that holy grail which I could see with mine own eyes, and instead sacrifice all of my ambitions, for a cause I knew not what.  Flying out of the land of wisdom, I arrived back in this cold and dreary world and saw to my astonishment that certain, shall we say, idiotic and terrible opinions (including ones that had the foolishness and base immaturity to personally attack me!) had been running amock!  I knew right then that I had made the right choice.  So, my readers, I am back from my sabbatical, and ready to fight for the sake of literary purity and for the truth.


Yours Truly,
The Genius Author


As follows is my response to The Debate: Part II inspired in equal parts by Austin Reifel, Shakespeare, and one Ms. Daya B. Astor.

Murder, Swearing, and, Well You'll Just Have to Wait and See!

I sat down without any plan in mind to write my short story.  I wrote a very deep and philosophical first paragraph, but as I continued to write, it got stupider and stupider, until I didn't want it to be my short story anymore.  So I finished up at four pages, went back to the beginning and added some stupid stuff to match the tone.  I then threw in some gratuitous swearing and murder, and then the ending, which is very exciting, if you have the patience to read through this.  So, be warned, there's some terrible stuff behind this button!