Spontaneous applause, commonly referred to as slow clapping, has become a growing problem in America. Originally a German conception resulting from Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points speech, slow clapping found its way into the American mainstream following the rush of John Hughes films in the 1980’s. Denise Trumbault, Social Communications researcher at the University of California remarks, “After Pretty in Pink, this largely elitist custom was suddenly accessible to middle class America. Soon after slow clapping became expected, if not downright mandatory in achieving catharsis.”

End of school parties, prom nights, and extemporized orations carry the highest risk for spontaneous applause related disasters. The possibility for moments of individualized glory present at these events creates an atmosphere of vicarious empathy, the ideal breeding ground for spontaneous ovations. Typically, crowd temperament and geographic isolation keep slow claps in check, but a particularly contiguous and heterogeneous crowd has the potential to fuel slow claps indefinitely.

Authorities describe the LAX ovation as one of the most devastating in recent memory. Deputy Fire Chief Timothy Lundy calls it the worst he has seen since 1996 Glenville State Championships when “that kid with terminal cancer showed up to do the opening kickoff.” Mart Stevens recalls watching the events unfold from the airport Starbucks. “I remember screaming at my son to cover his eyes and ears as I helplessly watched myself begin to applaud an event I had not even witnessed. I was clapping and clapping and screaming ‘did somebody win something’ at the top of my lungs.”

With the ovation poised to spread to the international terminals, airport sanitation employee Brock Jefferies stepped in to assist. Jefferies, a former prom king and starting quarterback, is no stranger to slow claps, and knew just how to subdue the rampant applause. “What most people don’t understand,” Jefferies told reporters, “is that slow claps require a down tempo cue to stop, just as they require an up tempo cue to start.” Taking control of the situation, Brock borrowed an automated baggage cart and drove the length of the terminal, slowing the clap gate by gate.

Authorities confirm that a majority of the applause has been subdued, though smaller, isolated pockets still exist in the outer food courts. The identities of the deceased are being withheld until the families can be notified, while the injured have been transferred to Cedar Sinai for minor skin burns and third degree calluses. Standing Novation, a non profit consortium aimed at promoting alternative methods of mass congratulation including whistling, foot stomping, and gold claps, will hold a memorial service for the deceased. Information can be accessed on their website

from dylan…

New school. Still within first month of attendance. Ms. Yammy’s third grade class. Time of day: 11:20 AM. Preceded by break for consumption of small ingestions. To be followed by break for consumption of larger quantities of intake entitled ‘Lunch.’ So is routine of day.

Alphabet cutouts pasted along the wall encircle your young narrator. Stalking him with their repetition. What a longueur. What a passionless ritual of singsong rhythm.

Saggy skinned Yammy, plump and near-sighted with a dictionary on her desk, adjusts her bifocals, trying to find a word meant to challenge female peer Malia Madrona.

Malia Madrona. Pigtails. Fingertips covered in colored paste, one hand blue, the other pink. An irritating nymph certain males swoon over.

Not this student. Not your narrator.

“Malia…” Instructing gorilla-Yammy, with rampant avoirdupois, clicks her mouth, scanning the pages of her dictionary. “Malia, please spell ‘Wreck,’” the bumbling fool requests.

Is easy. At risk of sounding ironic, is child’s play.

This narrator could stand and recite to this instructor the famed French poet Theophile Gautier. “A cat will be your friend, but never your slave.” But such outré behavior might flummox the old wench, so this studious pupil patiently watches the bane Malia struggle over the word. Such incompetence.

“Wreck…”

This narrator could stand and lecture menstruating Yammy on her antidepressants, which she swallows like candy, and how they cause her infertility. But no. Will not frazzle the esteemed instructor so. Yammy, the bulky knuckled creature, matronly, with a face packed with moles.

The young thing squeaks, “Could you use it in a sentence, please?”

“After the tornado, all the houses in the neighborhood were a wreck,” recites barren-wombed Yammy.

“Could you provide the language of origin, please?” This dilatory bastard child Malia intends to run me insane!

“It is… Middle English.”

“Wreck. R-E… C-K? Wreck?”

“I’m sorry, Malia. W-R-E-C-K.”

The dyslexic bitch sits and it’s time for the flabby-chested, child-starved Yammy to test this student - Your narrator.

“Humphrey…” The dirty hog runs her eyes along the tome’s dry pages, trying to find a suitable challenge for your eager pupil. “Humphrey…” Such a blind slug. She trails off and returns with this banal finish, “Please spell, ‘Wry.’”

Whip-snap, your narrator spits bullet letters at her – “R-Y-E.”

“Oh, no, Humphrey, sorry. That isn’t correct. I was asking for W-R-Y, the adjective. Not ‘rye’ the grain.”

What is this misandry!

Pox infested Yammy with her useless ovaries. Ms. Evolution-gone-aWRY. She motions for the next victim – beefy Stevie, a repugnant dork with Velcro sandals.

“Humphrey…” Phallus-deprived Yammy glares this narrator down. “You may sit.”

Inside his head, your narrator repeats to himself, “A cat will be your friend…”

“All troops fire! Everything you’ve got! Now! Now! Now!” Bellowed Sgt. Vernon, as rounds fired past his face and those of his petrified platoon like swarms of insects on the warpath.

“Sarg! Why is this happening?” Cried Alfonso, a 19 year-old Peruvian. “One minute we’re sitting here, the next we’re bombarded!”

A horse and soldier enter the east end of the bunker. Vernon and Alfonso turn and shoot. Direct Hit. But, the horse evaporates, and in its place stands three African foot soldiers! Though ordered to engage anyone and anything that entered their land, the men never expected a dogfight approaching this kind of veritable savagery.
“What the hell was that?!” cries Eduardo. There’s no time- BAM! A grenade detonates 3-centimeters away, severing limbs of three young medics.
“Sarg! We’ve never had any conflict with the African Militia! It don’t make any sense!” Echoed Brazilian sniper, Carlos. “Why are they attacking!?”
Though plangent eruptions of mortar shells, landmines, and ululations of men’s final sentient moments flooded the air of the entire South American landmass, Vernon could not hear a thing.
“Brazil, Venezuela, and Peru have all fallen sir! We’re the last platoon! We must surrender!” Pleaded Enrique, the communications officer, with one ear the receiver to and the other to the rumbling terrain.
It happened so fast, and so unannounced. Vernon thought there was a cease-fire. He never believed in the war they were thrown, forced to fight in against their will. But now, minutes away from seeing his homeland, his family, friends, and enemies heretofore rearranged into a vassal state of Africa, he was no longer a Brazilian, but a South American.
“We surrender to no one!” He proclaimed. “If we die tonight. We die on our feet! Every man fires every piece of ammunition in sight!” Though knowing full well his last breath was moments away.
Outnumbered 10 to 1, it was a quick battle. But they fought to the end. Vernon watched his platoons expressions fall prostrate and frozen as they hit the ground, and suddenly disappearing from sight. Hallucinations?
“There is no logic or reason in this war we fight.” As he took his last breath, before crossing over, he heard a sonorous voice from above…
“Ha! You’re dead!” Exclaimed Anthony, as he moved his men into the continent of South America. “I’ll refortify six men to Venezuela, and take a territory card. You’re gonna lose!”
“Nuh-uh! Just wait till I explode out of Europe and spread like the plague across the entire board!” Countered Peter, as he placed 7 yellow plastic men onto the Risk board.
“Okay, I’m attacking Scandinavia from the Ukraine.” The boys pick up their dice and roll away.

Home, or what was home, was crushed by a space rock and is now a crater of smoking rubble.

For billions and trillions of years - from God knows when - dust slowly gravitated together and traveled through the cosmos - from God knows where – until it reached our solar system, rocketed toward this planet and crashed through this atmosphere to land square on my house and, subsequently, crush the body of my twenty-something girlfriend.

It could’ve landed anywhere. Out in a field. In the ocean. On my neighbors house. Point is, it had to land. Even lightning has to hit something. Just bad luck if it ends up in your body. Or your girlfriends’.

Certain things survived the blow: A pair of trousers here, some silverware there, the remote to the TV. You know, all the important stuff.

And the ringing from deep in the pit lets me know, somehow, a phone endured.

Digging through the sizzling wallpaper, the ruined centerpieces, the smoldering appliances, I find it. My cell.

Because of the smoking rock next to me, instead of saying ‘Hello,’ I just wheeze.

On the other end is my brother. “I’m getting married!” He yells.

And all I can do is cough.

“What’s going on?” He asks. “Aren’t you psyched for me?”

Through the rock’s toxic smell, I dry heave, “Who’s the girl?”

“Kim.” He sings her name.

“Kim’s the…” - more coughing here - “…the dancer?” My foot gets stuck in the icebox of a melting refrigerator.

“No, dude. Riley’s the dancer. Kim’s the one with the huge ass. Dude, you interested in Riley? I can hook you up. Or, no, you’re with whatshername?”

My foot sinks deeper into the sticky puddle of aluminum and I gag, “My house got flattened by a meteor. Her too.”

And my newly engaged brother, he says, “Again?”

Yes. Again. This has happened a few times before. Not an asteroid, necessarily. Doesn’t have to be. Traffic accident. Brain parasites. Could be anything.

Disney Land could destroy life as we know it. We’re still the ones paying the entrance fee.

Sorry, but how many times can you be surprised by a freak occurrence?

Not saying the whole world is out to get me, just the piece that landed on my girl.

I hack a long one.

“Three ways I see it,” my brother’s voice says through the phone, “One is chance. Two is freewill. Three is fate.”

So this rock came all this way specifically to find me and obliterate my new girlfriend’s bones?

I guess these things happen.

“The universe works in billions and trillions,” my brother says. “Scary, dude. The precision of it all.”

He said that last time.

Atlan shifts focus from the book. He examines the chair he sits in: A dark shade of green. It’s a very peculiar chair, all of a sudden. He looks at the fibers in the carpet, the bits of dirt in his fingernails, the dust on the bookshelf across the room, the indiscriminate hairs sticking to his black turtleneck shirt. He moves to his room.

“Frankly, I couldn’t care less what she thinks of me…Who the hell is she to say anything, anyway…she’s trash…Not yet, I’ve tried it on, but I don’t want to look like slut…Are you sure?… He better, I’m sick of the games.”

Atlan’s room was more of a spacious closet (By Middle Class American standards), occupied by a twin bed (previously stored in the attic for 5 years; where he found the book he now reads), a small end table with a flat surface, which he uses for a desk, and some shelves (enough room for his wardrobe: four pairs of dark khakis, six plain white t-shirts, three hand made wool sweaters, socks, underwear, a few long sleeve tees, and two button down collared shirts for dinners).
Our moon is large in relation to us (1/4 Earth’s size). The moon’s steady gravitational influence keeps the Earth spinning at the right speed and angle to provide stability.

He takes a sip of coffee. He looks at the window, then through it: A child walks down the street, with a small sheep dog in tow. It pauses and squats.

“I’m sorry, I know not everyone is perfect, but if you’re her size, and you aren’t eating raw vegetables 24-7, then you deserve it. And she shouldn’t wear shirts that show her fat stomach. She’s asking for ridicule.”

A little further, is a small movie theatre: singles, couples, and groups walk in and out while the projector is re-threaded for the next showing.

Our planet falls in a perfectly located orbit. 5% closer to the sun or 15% further and we wouldn’t be here.

Atlan examines a camera that he received as a gift from an old man, during his sojourn in Atlan’s mountain town, three years prior to this day. Though outdated, by today’s standards, Atlan never considered updating. He took his first pictures with it- pictures that would garner an offer for a full academic scholarship in the United States.

“Do you really think I care? I have every intention of making her cry. I-do-not-giveafuck… Hold on, I’ll ask him….Hey Atlan, you want to come to a party tonight…Well, do you mind giving me and Sarah a ride? We’ll take a cab back…Thanks, we’re ready whenever you are.”

He breathes in slowly through his nose, feeling the air and the minute dust particles enter his nasal passage. He flips to a new page. He’s now moved to the bed.

An atom is mostly empty space, with a very dense nucleus. If you expanded an atom into the size of a Cathedral, the nucleus would be the size of a fly- but a fly many thousands of times heavier than the cathedral.

He takes pictures of a few pages, which he will print at the local library and mail to his best friend in Cypress, who is serving his required 6-months of Turkey’s military training.

“Ugh, I don’t know. They’ll be back afternoon tomorrow to take Atlan to the University. I will get him back here tonight, and I can’t wait to see her face when we leave together. I bet she doesn’t even show up to class tomorrow”

He examines the palms of his hands, the ceiling, the book, the wood floor (and each crack in it), the rock garden in the yard, and the steam from his coffee. She comes to the door. He examines her outfit, her hair, her makeup, her push-up bra.

“You ready?”

The Unified Field theory allows all of the fundamental forces between elementary particles to be written in terms of a single field. Every single thing, that is a thing, emerges from this field.

I dip my toes; she breathes into me, and I into her. I submerge and exist inside of her. What is time, but spinning hands? I should not have left you.

Palatial bliss. Tonight. The plangent whisper of the world, afar. Diaphanous hymn of the sleeping sea. Disgust for my ignoble beginning, and middle, and all that is not now. I will leave tomorrow. P, I will return unto you. Limpid vision, I now own. I need no camera. The moon is my flash. I am Me. Recumbent blue of water and of sky. I miss you. I will return unto you.

Just the crumbs. I’ve wanted to be something I could not define. I am the pet dog at dinner. The meal, inches away. Destined to feed off the crumbs. But I am now the king. I have eaten the meal, and it tasted of crumbs. Spurious satisfaction. There are only crumbs. I am Magellan, and this, my Mactan.

I left you on a cold morning. I escaped the gull. I left you on a cold morning, long ago. I traveled to no place, but deserted many. These pages are but space to fill. I will not follow their order. I will leave without eponym. I will return unto you. Eponyms are illusions. So am I.
All is empty, and all is filled. Palatial bliss, exuberant defeat. Sandboxes and ducks. Symphonies of aspiration, fragments of achievement.

Two days heretofore, I spoke of my final sojourn. Two days heretofore, I gave money to a band. Tireless attempts to make sense of my departure. I can’t. I’m an old man. I am tir…

–

She stroked the rip in the crumpled, faded paper. Some coffee had spilled on it. Probably in the preliminary investigation.
“According to the airport employee who encountered him, he just began ripping pages out. Though, from what remained, it says he was gone for 23 days. Is this accurate?”
She continued to stare at the letter. She was not numb, nor emotionless, nor shocked. She wasn’t relieved or heartbroken. She just felt weak.
“Is this accurate?”
“No. He’s been gone two and a half years.”
“He became very aggressive in the airport and began ripping apart several notebooks he had on his person. He showed severe signs of dementia before the collapse.”
“They had begun shortly before he disappeared.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
Silence. In the oven, toasted bruschetta burned. At an airport outside Puntacana, a trio of musicians kicked their hat at passengers, as they stepped off the plane. In a small town on the coast of the Black Sea, Atlan took his last picture before the small LCD went black. In Segovia a wind blew threw the town as the citizens celebrated a victory of the Spanish National Soccer team. In central New York, a duck approached a small dock outside of an unassuming lake house, where no one fed him.
“And I just want to confirm the spelling on your name ma’am, P-E-N-E-L-O-P-E?”
She stroked the corned of the crumpled letter and laid it on the table, next to the battered leather journal with a broken strap.
“My name is Katherine.”

I mean, you know, fuck my afterlife.

Caught in this dead end fucking job. I’m not being cute here. I don’t know how to make this anymore literal. I’m dead. This is the end. And I’ve got a fucking job.

Old Smithtown Manor, a crappy 17th century relic brilliantly built atop an old Indian burial ground. But do you actually see any fucking Indians haunting this motherfucker. No, you see me, rural farmhand from Nebraska trapped in this musky, mold infested claptrap that smells, or would smell if I remembered smell, like an old jockstrap, stuffed at the bottom of a pile of other, older jockstraps. Fuck, I don’t even get the run of the house. I bet the upstairs has some pretty cool antiques, and at the very least I could find a window or two. But nooo, I’m stuck on this 4’ by 4’ fucking patch of cracked linoleum in the Northeast corner of the fucking boarded up pantry. Spending my days clanking old pots, rattling old glassware, and talking to you, stupid fucking mouse.

And then there’s Bob. Fucking Bob. All nice and comfy over in the main foyer. Prime fucking real estate he’s holding there. Nobody ever spends the night in the pantry. No its always “I dare you to spend the night in the old Smithtown foyer,” or some shit. On top of that he’s got chandeliers, and candles, and old paintings, and a whole other bag of goodies that bump in the night. Have you ever heard the screams coming out of that room? I’m a ghost and even I’d call it uncanny. And what do I fucking get: corrugated linoleum, peeling stucco, mold stains, and yes, you, stupid fucking mouse. No, no that was not an invitation to come closer. Don’t you fucking approach me or I will crush you beneath my astral foot and, well you won’t quite get squashed, but you’ll probably feel a weird chill or something like that, and you’ll find that pretty difficult to interpret and it will probably delay you for a couple of seconds.

Fuck

Then the other night the fucking the Ghost Hunters filmed here. Don’t have to tell you they did the majority of their filming. “We’re getting massive spectral energy readings in the main Foyer.” “Check out these paranormal frequencies, they’re unreal.” The walls may be sturdy, but they’re not soundproof, assholes. I’m dead, but I’m not fucking deaf. And what did they do with the pantry? Turned it into a God dam R&R room for the crew. Oh, and guess where they stashed the porta-potty? That’s right, atop a trusty, old 4’ by 4’ patch of cracked linoleum in the Northeast corner.

Where’s that stupid fucking blond kid with the dumb-ass bowl cut and the overly protective single mom when you need him. Hell, I’d even settle for Bruce Willis at this point. Get em ‘on board. Together we’ll release my Manifesto: Dead and NOT Loving It. Show the world a thing or two about banal minutiae.

And then you and me we’ll…what’s that? Oh you’ve got to get going? So soon? You sure you don’t want to…I mean we could rattle some of the glassware together and…Okay. Yeh, I understand. Family comes first. Goodnight mouse. Same time tomorrow, okay?

–

The mornings were dark and this made waking up much more of a foe then I cared to confront at that hour; plus it was bitter cold. I hate waking up cold. There is a peculiar sense of pleasure when you go to bed cold: enveloped in a blanket, squeezing your muscles to produce your own heat or clutching at a pillow or partner until you finally and pleasantly just nod off. But in the mornings, the cold waits, like a contemptuous gull hovering above a busy shore of crabs. Just as soon as you forgot it was there, as soon as you’re asleep and cruising along the ocean floor, it rips you out into its beak and devours you.

I developed a proclivity to take long, slow showers at temperatures far hotter than I was previously accustomed to. The surface of my skin would burn and I would have to constantly shift positions. But whatever body part not absorbing the streams would shiver, and inside, underneath my skin I could feel my bones, trembling, and just feeling cold, as I stood there static and too distracted to think.

I arrived at Thursday, mid-morning. A low and hot sun welcomed me. I’d been gone for 23 days. Though a warm glow roasted my prostrated skin, and all around me were smiling faces: families on vacation, sorority girls on spring break, and the cold weather refugees just wanting to get away, I could scarcely focus on much more than P. No words spoken on that day, just a short note.

Segovia, a small village in Spain, was chilly the morning I left. I walked in wearing corduroy pants – grey, and worn, perfect for windy days – a long sleeve turtleneck (although I’ve never heard of a short-sleeved), and thick cotton socks. I could already feel my feet turning that sweaty and odious way they always do. My shirt dampened with each step. It’s not difficult to spot a traveler who arrives ill prepared.

The last straw was the typing. Exposed to the air, each finger stiffened one at a time, and I could feel it. No sooner would dexterity go than could I no longer comfortably make a fist. I leaned back and glared around the house at all the places where heat would escape: the windows, the doors, and the crack in the corner of the ceiling, above the microwave. I would sit on top of my hands, put them under my arms, down my pants - my loins - wherever heat was stored. But, for naught. My thoughts slowed, I could just think about the hands. I stared at the flashing cursor.

It was a small village in Istanbul that I decided to leave the camera behind. I left it with a young boy, Altan. He was the only person I spoke with during my tour of the U.A.E.

I didn’t take one to the UK, or France, or Hong Kong, or Seol. I took no pictures in Sydney, none of the Great Wall, or of the Pyramids. No rolling Scottish Hills, or Nepalese Mountains. Fragmented images were all the head of a somnolent old man - who’d grown weary and regretful from fulfilling his desires - possessed as I made my way from Argentina, to Paraguay, and up through Brazil. I became increasingly concerned that my desire to remember this trip had ebbed its way out of me- drops of nostalgia dripping off of my body at each place I visited, landing into streams, and mouths, and seas, all coming together in the southern Atlantic and navigating themselves to one place. That place. Did I remember to give Altan extra batteries? I hope he can find some.

MECHANICAL MAN by, Jessica Sansom

Though a sort of infamous recluse by this point, some are already hailing Raymond Chancellor as one of this generations’ greatest minds. But three months ago, the residents of Airway Heights only knew Raymond, if they knew him at all, as an advertising executive who sculpted as a hobby. Mostly, Raymond admits, he kept to himself. Not an “active social life.” Until, recently, when he has almost unwillingly been thrust into the limelight.

Now, the outside of Raymond’s house is a massive crowd of people from around the country – the majority of whom are present for religious beliefs. Some come to protest, others to worship. Raymond prefers to stay out the debate and hold up in his room. Occasionally peer out a window. Nothing more.

Back in July, neighbors of Raymond started hearing noises coming from inside the house. Also, around this time, Raymond stopped going to work. Co-workers recount his absence as particularly puzzling. A fellow employee, Kelly Reich, says Raymond “never missed a day of work” the eight years they’d worked together. After a few days, Kelly recalls phoning Raymond at home. Raymond answered, said everything was fine but he probably wouldn’t be back to work for some time. When asked if he was sick, the answer was a terse “No.”

Outside of Raymond’s home, the neighbors’ curiosity grew. They knew he was in his basement, but aside from the loud sounds and a couple sightings of smoke from a small basement window, no one knew what he was doing. Just some bellowing and billowing.

“Right before all this,” a concerned neighbor says, “Raymond had been in a funk. His mother had died and he was very closeted about the whole thing. I don’t even know if he went to the funeral. Stopped seeing him at church too.”

All this speculation came to a head last Sunday night when the mystery was finally “revealed” as the “Gloxy Oxtornity Device” – or G.O.D. as religious patrons call it. The Gloxy is a large, sleek machine of sorts. With its peculiar shape, it is inarguably a technical marvel and may or may not defy both science and nature in its structure. Scraps and pieces fitted together to create what is either one man’s labor intensive artwork, or what may very well be the most complicated piece of equipment man has ever seen.

“I knew Raymond was into art,” a friend said, “but I didn’t know he was doing this sort of thing.”

While Scientists investigate Gloxy’s operative functions, Raymond holds up in his room, trying his best to remove himself from all the attention suddenly thrust upon him.

Raymond has shut the world out since Gloxy was unveiled, but yesterday he granted us an exclusive interview… of sorts. There were some conditions he requested: He would remain behind a closed door at all times, never speak or be spoken to. The questions would be slipped to him under the door, hand written on paper, and he would respond in kind - writing his answer on the other side and sliding it back.

Unfortunately, the interview was not as informative as we had hoped. Raymond’s answers were sparse, to say the least. Clipped, cryptic and, most of the time, completely illegible.

When asked specifically about how his mother’s death influenced Gloxy’s development, Raymond wrote back, “It didn’t.”

When asked about the origins of the name, Raymond wrote, “I don’t know.”

And when asked how he was able to design such a complex machine without anyone knowing anything about it, how he gathered all the parts and assembled it with no assistance, how a man with no training in engineering whatsoever built this machine in a matter of weeks, when asked simply “How did you do it?” Raymond wrote back, “I just followed the instructions,” followed by a long unreadable paragraph whose only decipherable word was ‘failure.’

More questions were asked, but Raymond stopped responding. Leaving myself, all the denizens on his lawn, and the attentive nation to wonder what this all means. This modern marvel.

The effect Gloxy has on people is undeniable.

There is no Horton street. 6^th and 8^th avenue are useless. Head down the Sunset Highway, people have posted signs directing you to “Gloxy.”

To “G.O.D.”

Of course, if you’re Raymond, all you have to do is peel back your curtains and look out the window.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7Ny5BYc-Fs&feature=related