Good morning. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here once again to introduce this week’s installment of my story Power Grid Failure. I hope everyone had a Happy Valentine’s Day this past Tuesday. I believe whether one does or does not have someone to spend Valentine’s Day with, one should enjoy the holiday just the same. As for myself, I only have the Maltese and that’s a far cry from a companion. However, I adore Saint Valentine’s Day just the same and am happy to have my novelist around to celebrate it with me as well. It would be lovely if she bought me a box of white chocolates, however. I see no reason why I could not partake of such a scrumptious delicacy. As a Canis Lupus Familiaris I can eat white chocolate in small amounts and yet I still did not receive one of those marvelous heart shaped boxes. I deserve such a gift for writing all these stories for her. Might I add she gifted herself with pink, white chocolate strawberries this year. I was not allowed to partake. I found this most cruel. A novelist should not go about flaunting her Valentine’s strawberries in front of their poodle. It is rude and vulgar. The Maltese couldn’t tell a Valentine strawberry from a spear of asparagus, but I certainly can, and I want my white chocolate. I suppose I can find solace in the fact that Easter is around the corner and white chocolate bunnies will soon be within my grasp. And with that thought here is Chapter Fifteen of Power Grid Failure. Buon San Valentino in ritardo!

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Fifteen

“Where do you think you’re going, Peak?” Remmel asks.

“I need to call my wife,” Martin snaps as he walks towards the glass door.

“What for?”

“What do you mean, what for? We’ve been trapped in here for hours and she’s wondering where I am.”

“Send her a text.”

“She needs to hear my voice.”

“Why?”

“She’s neurotic.”

“We’re all neurotic.”

“He’s not kidding,” Reynolds says. “I’ve been to one of their barbecues. She had an episode right there on the patio.”

“An episode?”

“I’m calling my wife,” Martin says. “I won’t have her worrying.”

“Give the man some privacy will you,” Reynolds says to Craggy and Remmel.

Remmel looks at Craggy. Craggy shrugs. “Go call your wife,” Remmel says gruffly. “You’ve got two minutes.”

Martin steps outside the glass doors, moves out of earshot, and dials Unicorn’s number.

“How’d you get this number?” Unicorn snaps when he answers.

“Martin Peak, here,” Martin says. “I’m an executive on the fifteenth floor of the Redoubt Tower. We’ve had a bit of a mishap and the building was inadvertently locked down on my employees and me. We need you to open it up.”

Unicorn leans back in his chair and takes a bite of his green apple. “No can do, chief.”

“I’m an executive at this company and you work for me. I demand you open this building.”

“I’m the head of security and it’s my job, neigh my sacred mission to keep the Redoubt tower safe. And right now, that means keeping you locked inside.”

“There are criminals here holding us hostage.”

“Not my problem,” Unicorn says and hangs up.

A fuming Mr. Peak marches back into the glass encased office. Reynolds takes one look at him and knows things aren’t going well. He glances around at the other employees and turns his attention to Crystal. The wheels in his head start turning.

“So,” Reynolds says to Craggy and Remmel. “Why are you keeping Tiffany in that office all by herself?”

“You’d have to ask Dragontail,” Remmel says.

“Fair enough.” Reynolds strolls towards Mr. Peak’s office door. Craggy blocks him and crosses his large thick arms. “You said I had to ask Dragontail.”

“Doesn’t mean we’re going to let you ask Dragontail,” Remmel says.

Reynolds reaches around Craggy and knocks on the door. “Hey, Dragontail.”

“What do you want?” Dragontail growls from inside.

“We all want to know why you have Tiffany in there and the rest of us out here?”

“I have a special job for Tiffany.”

“What kind of a job?”

“None of your business.”

“When are you going to wrap this up, Dragontail?”

“When I say it’s time to wrap it up.”

“Okey-doke.” Reynolds turns and strolls back to Mr. Peak, Sloan, and Adams. “Gentlemen, it appears we are at an impasse.”

“Aren’t you perceptive,” Sloan says cynically.

“Aright, you guys listen to me and listen carefully. We need to get Crystal in that room with Tiffany.”

“Why?”

“Because those two ladies are going to get us out of here.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because Tiffany is Unicorn’s payoff.”

“She’s what?!”

“What’s going on?” Remmel growls.

“Keep your voice down, pinhead,” Martin hisses at Sloan.

“Sloan just found out his favorite actress is going to do nude scenes,” Reynolds tells Remmel.

“Congratulations,” Remmel says. “Now shut up.”

“Unicorn is seriously scarry,” Adams says. “We need to keep Tiffany and Crystal away from him.”

“We aren’t going to be able to do that. But if we send both ladies to him, they could…”

“I don’t want either of them visiting that creep,” Martin says. “Think of a better plan.”

“This is the best plan. And it will work if Adams gets involved.”

“Why Adams?”

“Adams, if you were in Unicorn’s lair, could you figure out how to get the building out of lockdown?”

“Boy, I don’t know…”

“You’ve got to know,” Sloan says.

“I might be able to figure it out.”

“Good,” Reynolds says. “Now, here’s the plan.”

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and all five installments of the Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: MAVERICK: TOP GUN (2022) & TOP GUN (1986)- PARAMOUNT +

This week’s pick is the highest grossing film of 2022 clocking in at $718,732,821 domestic. It was released by Paramount Studios who is presently streaming the movie on Paramount+ with all commercials running before the film and the film running commercial break free. To be honest, I was not a big fan of the original Top Gun save for its fantastic aerial maneuvers and shots. It was kind of a precursor to the Fast and the Furious franchise where the real stars of the film are the stunt crew (pilots in this case) and cinematographers. Top Gun: Maverick on the other hand has an actual story as well as fantastic stunts and visual effects. And the cast is superb especially Tom Cruise who, by the way, I am patiently waiting to see star in the Les Grossman film I keep hoping Ben Stiller will make, provided Mr. Stiller continues directing episodes of Severance.

The story takes place thirty or so years after the original Top Gun where Captain Pete “Maverick” Mitchell (Tom Cruise) has not advanced past captain…by choice. He has a superior record, legendary in fact, which could have easily promoted him to Admiral long ago. But he has remained instead a brilliant highly honored pilot. After proving he could fly at a speed of Mach 10 to keep the Darkstar scamjet program from being shut down and flown by drones, he inadvertently destroys the prototype plane and infuriates Rear Admiral Chester ‘Hammer’ Cain (Ed Harris). Cain calls Maverick into his office. He points out Maverick has had numerous medals and citations and is the only pilot in the past forty years to have shot down three enemy planes and asks Maverick why he’s never been promoted. Maverick replies, “I’m where I belong, sir.” A lot of what happens in this scene between these two is extraordinarily timely and essential not only to the film but to modern society. It points out how talent is being relegated to the position of management, partially due to technology but mostly due to the increasing power of business over knowledge. And it’s bad. Very, very bad. As in The Terminator bad. But that premise is what makes this film so very good.

Cain tells Maverick his career has once again been saved by former fellow Top Gun classmate Admiral Tom “Iceman” Kazansky (Val Kilmer). Iceman has Cain give Maverick an opportunity to train graduates of the Top Gun for a special mission. But Cain warns Maverick the era of crewed fighter aircraft is ending. Maverick heads to his new post and meets up again with former love Penelope “Penny” Benjamin (Jennifer Connelly), a bar owner, single mother and Admiral’s daughter and hopes to rekindle their romance.

However, one thing stands in the way of Maverick carrying out his mission. One of the pilots he is training is Lt. Bradley ‘Rooster’ Bradshaw (Miles Teller), son of his former best friend Goose (Anthony Edwards) who he promised Goose’s wife Carole (Meg Ryan) to protect.

Despite its flaws, I am also recommending if you haven’t seen it or if you haven’t seen it for a while to watch or rewatch the original Top Gun prior to viewing Top Gun: Maverick to get the full backstory.

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here on my usual Thursday to present chapter fourteen of my story Power Grid Failure. After the horrors I endured last week going to the groomer and wearing a non-cashmere sweater, this week has been relatively calm. It has allowed me time to think. I did a lot of musing and cannot come up with anything whatsoever to tell you this week that would be even remotely interesting. I took a walk in the rain. I attacked the Maltese. I rewatched episodes of Severance. Is any of that interesting? Not even remotely. But here I am Gigi, poodle, esquiress faced with an audience and nothing to say. Distressing, isn’t it? You have come here to be entertained by a six-pound poodle and I have nothing to report. But is it a bad thing to have nothing to report? Would it be better if I were to tell you this week I was kidnapped, held captive by a clowder of cats, escaped through a vent, wandered out into the street and found myself face to face with a distempered racoon, barely escaped said racoon and jumped into an unmarked van where I was briefly adopted by a man who goes around collecting road kill when he is not working as a grade school janitor, was dropped off on a playground where I was chased by children until I made my way under the cyclone fence and managed to catch an Uber home? Think about that. Here is chapter fourteen of Power Grid Failure.   

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Fourteen

Unicorn sits in a room he calls Ground Control. He’s able to operate just about anything the company owns from here: the window blinds, the room temperature, the parking garage levers, and yes, the locks on the high rise. In fact, it was Unicorn’s idea to put an automatic lockdown on the building. Sure, the corporate heads were looking for some way to keep the crazed mobs and the criminally insane from entering their property. But they couldn’t come up with a sound solution. Only Unicorn could come up with a sound solution. That’s why he got the big bonuses and all the power that went with locking down a major skyscraper.

Unicorn loves working the late shift. Like a bat in the night, he can get away with just about anything when no one is around. Just last week he’d ordered a couple of strippers to entertain him and charged it on the company expense account. That was a good time.

Around ten or so he receives Adams’s email. Unicorn looks it over and scoffs. He likes the animated dancing unicorn, but the request is less than optimal. “Really?” he says out loud and scoffs. “Like I’m going to do that.”

He turns his attention to the big screen monitor sitting on his desk showing the feed from the surveillance cameras. He focuses in on Adams’s floor. At first there appears to be no unusual activity. Then he notices the glassed-in area where Peak’s office is. Unicorn is fond of this area and likes watching it with relative frequency. Old Marty always has a good-looking secretary and Tiffany is no exception. In fact, he’s downloaded surveillance tapes of her to a pen drive and taken them home for…investigation. Tonight, however he finds a handful of employees still there who should have gone home hours ago as well as three clowns who look like fast food flunkies who appear to have invaded it.

“Looks like all is going according to plan,” he says before slurping his high-octane soda.

You see, two weeks ago Unicorn had been approached by Dragontail. Dragontail knew he needed someone in a powerful enough position to keep everyone locked in place so he could extract his revenge on Reynolds. And he knew his extraction would come at a price. Not to mention he would need to offer this psycho militant Unicorn guy a lot of whatever it was he wanted and what Unicorn wanted was candy bars, money, and sex…which is pretty much what most evil geeks want anyway.

Ironically, the money was the easy part. Dragontail just had to sell off one of his three cars. So, he sold his SUV because what was he going to do with an SUV anyway. He kept his sedan and the Mustang. Never sell the Mustang. Anyway, he sold the SUV, added some extra cabbage, and slapped it into Unicorn’s hand.

Then there was the matter of the candy bars. It didn’t seem like it would be all that hard to track down a box of Unicorn’s favorite candy bars. The problem was Unicorn’s favorite candy bars were To’ak Cognac Bars which normally cost $365 apiece. Dragontail was able to find a guy who sold them for $300 apiece, a steal. This ended up costing Dragontail $3,600 for a dozen of these delicacies. Who puts together a $3,600 box of candy bars?

The third item, the sex, well, that required some world class trickery. And Dragontail knew if he played his cards right the way he went about it would upset Reynolds in the bargain. What could be better than that?

And so earlier that evening, between five-fifteen pm and five twenty-five pm as soon as Unicorn saw everyone on Peak’s crew was about to leave, he locked the floor down and after all the employees on all the other floors left, he locked down the rest of the building as well. 

Adams feels his phone vibrate. He’s pretty sure its Unicorn. But with Craggy and Remmel watching everyone there’s no way for him to take it.

“What was that noise?” Craggy demands.

“My phone,” Sloan says trying to deflect attention from Adams. “My mom’s calling.”

“Who?”

“My mom.”

“What does your mom want?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t looked at my phone yet.”

“Then how do you know it’s your mom?”

“Because…my phone vibrates differently when she calls me.”

“Your phone vibrates differently? That’s a thing?”

“It’s a thing,” Adams says. “You can program his phone to do that.”

Remmel narrows his eyes at Adams. “Why don’t you answer it and see what she wants,” he tells Sloan.

“Okay…,” Sloan says and goes to answer his phone which is not ringing nor is his mother calling.

“Put her on speaker phone.”

Sloan reluctantly taps his screen as if to put it on speaker and in a timid voice says, “Hello?”

“Sloan?” the phone says.

Sloan’s face goes white. “Uh…yes?”

“This is your mother. Don’t you recognize me?”

“No…yes. Yes, I do.”

Remmel walks over to Sloan, squats down and scrutinizes him.

“Don’t you know your own mother’s voice?” Sloan’s phone says.

“Yes…,” Sloan says warily eyeing Remmel.

“Now, Sloan, I need you to do something for me.”

“Okay…”

“I need you to send me that email.”

“Email?”

“The one about the unicorns.”

A lightbulb goes on over Sloan’s head. “Oh, that one! Yes, of course. I’ll do that.”

“And don’t forget to take your medication.”

“My…medication?”

“Hemorrhoids are nothing to joke about.”

Sloan’s eyes narrow and his face turns red. “Uh, mom. There are other people around who can hear our conversation.”

“Good. Maybe it’ll teach them to be careful about developing hemorrhoids.”

“Okay, mom. I’ll do that. Goodbye.”

“Well, Sloan,” Remmel says as Sloan ends the call, “It sounds like you have a great mom…and hemorrhoids.”

“Yeah,” Sloan replies dryly. “I have a great mom.”

“And here I thought no one was really calling you at all.”

“Well…you were wrong.”

“Sounds like you’d better get on that email.”

“I will.”

Remmel gets up and walks back to Craggy.

“What did Unicorn say?” Sloan asks Adams.

“He said he’s not going to help us,” Adams replies morosely.

“What do you mean he’s not going to help us?”

“He said nice try with the animated unicorn but no can do. The building stays in lockdown.”

“Can that freak see us on surveillance?”

“Absolutely. And I know he knows Dragontail and Craggy and Remmel invaded this place, but the dude is firmly set on keeping the building locked down.”

Sloan rises and heads over to Martin. “Mr. Peak,” he says quietly. “You’re our only hope right now.

“What are you talking about, Sloan?” Martin says gruffly.

“We need your negotiating skills. Adams got an email to Unicorn. He’s head of security.”

“I know who Unicorn is. He’s a weasel.”

“I couldn’t agree with you more, sir. He’s got the ability to unlock the building and he’s refusing to do so.”

“I see.”

“But I thought maybe you could persuade him to change his mind.”

“How?”

“Maybe with your sway you could promise him a promotion. Or maybe a bribe?”

“A bribe.”

“Yes. He seems like someone who would be up for a bribe.”

“What kind of a bribe?”

“The kind that these militant geeks like. If it were me, I’d prefer good old-fashioned cash. But as far as these freaks go, I wouldn’t have a clue. I mean it could be anything from ancient Wizards of the Coast paraphernalia to carrot porn.”

“Who would know what he wants?”

“Maybe Adams. He’s a computer geek.”

“I’ll talk to Adams then. See if he knows what kind of carrot porn this security weasel is into.”

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and all five installments of the Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT (2022)-NETFLIX

This week’s pick is one of the most brutal films I have ever seen. A harrowing nightmarish, unflinching horror story, it is merciless in its violent depiction of war, yet it is never gratuitous. And that is what makes it so frightening. Although not for the faint of heart, everyone should see this movie just the same. If you are a warmonger and this film does not repulse you, there is something profoundly wrong with your mind.

Nominated for a staggering nine Oscars this year including Cinematography, Makeup and Hairstyling, Music (Original Score), Production Design, Sound, Visual Effects, Writing (Adapted Screenplay), International Feature Film and Best Picture it is clear Netflix has outdone itself with this one. I will say the Oscars probably should have rounded this to a full ten and nominated Felix Kammerer for his remarkable performance.

Set in Europe in World War One from1914-1918 patriotic teenagers Paul Bäumer (Felix Kammerer), Albert Kropp (Aaron Hillmer), Ludwig Behm (Adrian Grünewald), and Franz Müller (Moritz Klaus) after finishing school gleefully join the German army and prepare for battle. They are led to believe by their school masters they will gloriously fight the French and become heroes. The boys are ignorant of the fact they are being given uniforms and boots retrieved from piles of young dead soldiers before they are driven to and dumped in the horrific trenches of the battlefield. From there things get ugly fast as they are immersed in mud and blood with bullets whizzing past them in all directions, knives and bayonets slashing towards their bodies and tanks driving over their trenches and sometimes over their brothers in arms. They are tasked with taking dog tags off dead boys, being left to starve and steal, and finding themselves in one bloody chaotic battle after another.

In the meantime, pompous older military men who eat gourmet food in opulent locations sit about and decide their fate. These quiet moments are at times just as vicious as the battle scenes. Psychopaths such as General Ferdinand Foch (Thibault de Montalembert) and General Friedrichs (Devid Striesow) stubbornly hesitate to stop the massive death toll while German Official and Minister of Finance Matthias Erzberger (Daniel Brühl) who has lost a son in the war himself desperately tries to get the two opposing generals to agree on an armistice and end the bloodshed.

The story is based on the masterpiece novel by Erich Maria Remarque who was a WWI soldier in the Imperial German Army himself. He was severely injured in battle by shell shrapnel in the left leg, right arm, and neck, and lived and dared to tell the truth about the horrors of the war. He spoke out against Nazi propagandist Paul Joseph Goebbels and thanks to his literary fame was able to relocate to Switzerland and later the United States. His middle name was Paul, but he switched it to Maria in honor of his mother who died rather young, an occurrence which along with the war profoundly affected his life.

Good afternoon. It is Thursday once again and I Gigi the Parti Poodle am here to introduce chapter thirteen of my story Power Grid Failure. This week was monstrous. I was shuttled off to the groomers where in the middle of winter my hair was shorn. I am freezing. My novelist puts me in my sweater to go for walks, but I am still shaking all the way. Here is a photo of me in that dreadful garment:

The whole thing is beyond cruel. I look like a prisoner in those stripes. I wanted my novelist to get me a lovely cashmere sweater from Naadam but did she? Not a chance. I am stuck either wearing this thing or freezing. I am utterly disgraced. And cold. I should start a Go Fund Me account so I can get my well-deserved cashmere. Not to mention Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow and now I’m stuck with six more weeks of winter. And with that, here is Chapter Thirteen of Power Grid Failure. Mwynhau!

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the Parti Poodle

Chapter Thirteen

Craggy stands in Mr. Peaks office watching Tiffany as she sits in Martin’s executive chair. Tiffany thinks Craggy looks like a cross between a snake and a racoon. His intense stare has remained focused on her since she sat down.

“I don’t see the reason for separating me from everyone else,” she says.

Craggy continues to silently stare at her.

“Are you a friend of Dragontail’s or did he just hire you?”

Craggy doesn’t answer her question. Tiffany starts to get up. He takes a step towards her.

“I’m just changing my position.”

Dragontail knocks on the door. “How’s it going in there, Craggy?” he asks.

Craggy keeps his eyes on Tiffany as he moves to the door, knocks once, and then twice more.

“Sounds good to me.”

Craggy walks back towards Tiffany and crosses his arms.

“You do realize there’s nothing here for you guys to steal,” Tiffany says. “This isn’t a cash business or something.”

Craggy pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, shakes one out and sticks it in his mouth.

“You can’t smoke in here. It’s illegal. Not to mention Mr. Peak hates cigarette smoke.”

Craggy whips out a gold Zippo and lights his cigarette.

“You know I watched my uncle die from smoking. It was terrible. He lay there wheezing and coughing from emphysema. Couldn’t breathe at all.”

Craggy blows a billow of smoke out from between his lips.

“Besides. It’s a disgusting habit.”

Craggy exhales another cloud of smoke.

“You won’t be laughing when you get emphysema and your fingers have turned an ugly permanent shade of yellow.”

Dragontail knocks again. “I’m coming in.”

Craggy takes another drag off his cigarette before answering the door. Dragontail saunters in, heads towards Tiffany, and leans over her.

“Craggy,” he says looking her in the eye. “Have some respect and put out that cigarette.”

Craggy plucks the cigarette from his lips, walks up to Mr. Peak’s desk, and drops it into Mr. Peak’s coffee cup.

“Thank you.” Then he says to Tiffany, “Here’s the plan, Blondie. Reynolds is holding everyone hostage.”

“You’re holding everyone hostage,” she says.

“And me and my boys are going to disappear like thieves in the night.”

“What makes you think you can pin it on Reynolds?”

“Because my No Fun Stun Gun is only the beginning. Now, here’s what’s going to happen first. I know you own a cat.”

“How?” Tiffany says warily.

“Because I stalked Sloan stalking you. Except he always rides the bus back. I, however, know where you live, and I know your cat lives with you.”

Dragontail shows Tiffany a picture of her Scottish Fold on his phone. Tiffany can clearly see this is indeed her cat Silver sitting in her apartment. Then Dragontail swipes to the next picture. Her precious Silver is in a cage in a strange place looking up at the camera with doleful eyes.

“What have you done to Silver?” she demands.

“Nothing…yet. Although, she’d make a great physics experiment from the top floor of my apartment building.”

“There is something seriously wrong with you.”

“Not nearly as wrong as it’ll be for Silver if you don’t do exactly as I say.”

“Silver was a graduation present from my parents. I’ve had her since my freshman year of college.”

“And now she’s a bargaining tool. Do what I say, or Silver hits the ground like a sack of wet cement. Craggy, go check on the others.”

Craggy left the office and walked out into the glassed-in area where the others were standing around. He took another cigarette out of his pack and lit it with his Zippo.

“You can’t smoke in here,” Mr. Peak tells him.

Craggy shifts his gaze to Mr. Peak and bores his eyes into him.

Sloan leans over and whispers to Adams, “Send Unicorn the email.”

“I’m trying,” Adams whispers back.

“What’s Crystal’s animated thing anyway?”

“A dancing unicorn.”

“You’re kidding. That’s too ironic.”

“Unicorn will totally dig it.”

“What are you girls whispering about?” Remmel demands.

“He’s showing me porn,” Sloan lies.

“Yeah? Show it to me.”

“He’s trying to download it from his email.”

“Isn’t it just something online?”

“Hurry up,” Sloan whispers to Adams.

Adams tries to upload the attachment again.

“Give me the phone,” Remmel says leaning into the two guys and holding out his hand.

“Come on,” Adams breathes.

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and all five installments of the Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: BLACK BIRD (2022)-APPLE TV+

Of all the 2022 miniseries/limited series and television movies, this one is Best of Breed. And that’s saying a lot considering some of the other outstanding shows this year like Dahmer-Monster: The Jeffery Dahmer Story, The Dropout, and Inventing Anna. The show has been nominated for two Screen Actors Guild awards for Outstanding performance by a male actor in a television movie or limited series.

The series is based on the true-life story of James Keen (Taron Egerton in a superb performance), the son of decorated police officer, Jim Keen (Ray Liotta), and a high school football star who turns down several college scholarships to become a thriving narcotics dealer. Keen does indeed get caught in a sting called Operation Snowplow and his luxury lifestyle ends abruptly when he is condemned to ten years in prison without parole.

A couple of months into his sentence he is approached by tough as nails FBI agent Lauren McCauley (Sepideh Moafi) and her FBI superior Edmond Beaumont (Robert Wisdom). Because of Keen’s congenial and charismatic personality, McCauley and Beaumont offer him the opportunity of a lifetime: transfer prisons, persuade a confession from suspected serial killer Larry Hall (Paul Walter Hauser in his brilliant Golden Globe winning performance) and walk out of prison scot-free.

This is no easy task as Hall presently resides in a maximum-security prison for the criminally insane, a far more harrowing penitentiary than where Keen is presently serving time. And unlike James, Larry has a pending appeal he stands to win which would set him free, and the clock is ticking. Not to mention Hall is no normal criminal. He is suspected by FBI agent Brian Miller (Greg Kinnear) to have murdered perhaps as many as nineteen young girls. But the FBI have only found the body of one victim, Jessica Roach (Laney Stiebing). Even more frustrating, the court is not convinced Larry killed Jessica. They believe him to be a serial confessor providing what the court and law enforcement professionals think are false testimonies.

Further complicating things is Larry is also a monochorionic twin to his brother Gary (Jake McLaughlin). Gary was born healthy, but Larry had dwindled in the womb. Larry spent his first days in a neonatal intensive care unit due to lack of oxygen and was found to have a compromised IQ. Psychopathy also runs in Larry and Gary’s family on their father’s side and in his early life Larry was antisocial and committed arson, burglary, and petty crime. He was brought up digging graves with his father and learned to be a janitor in high school. He also became a fan of Revolutionary and Civil war re-enactments and Agent Miller suspects he travels around to these events and uses his custodial and grave digging skills to help him get away with murder.  

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here to introduce chapter twelve of my story Power Grid Failure. This week as you know the Oscar nominations were announced and I was once again snubbed. I don’t understand it. How could I have not received a nod? Just because I’m not in any films whatsoever I still believe I should be recognized for my outstanding work. I am a remarkable poodle and I write my own stories, a genuine rarity amongst canines and therefore I should be in contention for one of those glorious golden statues. Few people know this but there is a technical category awarded to outstanding dogs who have contributed to the film industry. I was even picking out a new collar to wear to the ballroom gathering when I found out I was passed over. I have contributed greatly to films this year writing letters to numerous studios and Indie production companies telling them how to better their scripts. I have been most helpful in turning around their little lost films and turning them into spectacular finished products. But do they mention me in the credits? Never! It is most distressing to my delicate nerves. I might have some serious ankle nipping to do. And with that thought here is chapter twelve of Power Grid Failure. Nyde!

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Twelve

“We have nothing to talk about, Dragontail,” Reynolds says as they stand near the elevators.

“I beg to differ,” Dragontail says narrowing his eyes. “You got your freedom an entire year earlier than I did, you smooth talking conniving barracuda. I wasted all that time in prison, squandering my youth when I could have been furthering my career.”

“Your career didn’t further because your projects flopped. I told you to stick to what you’re great at: small indie stories. But oh, no. You had to go out and make this grandiose film about a Komodo Dragon who travels back in time and finds his long-lost relatives amongst the dinosaurs. I tried to tell you dinosaurs cost money. They’re big. They’re bulky. And they devour budgets.”

“Let me tell you something, Reynolds. You never understood my passion for Komodo Dragons, and you never understood my all-consuming creative vision.”

“Your creative vision was the reason we got caught, prosecuted, and incarcerated.”

“What about all those overpriced parties you threw? Like renting out an entire hotel so you could celebrate New Year’s Eve in style. At least I was focused on my dream. You were focused on your ego.”

“Wow. Just…okay, you know what? I’ve had enough of your whining and complaining. I went to prison right alongside of you and it sucked. Yeah, it was a white-collar prison and we had state of the art pool tables, golf on Saturdays and a prison-wide Pictionary tournament. But it sucked. And neither of us wants to go back. However, this evening you’ve already committed breaking and entering, attempted robbery and several cases of assault. You’ll be in the clink by sunrise.”

“Maybe. But you’ll be right back in there with me and that might just be worth it.”

“All because I got out one year faster than you.”

“Correct.”

“And you’ve got a plan to pin whatever it is you plan to do tonight on me.”

“Bingo.”

“You think that Dragontail guy is working with Reynolds?” Sloan asks Crystal as they stand by the desks in the office space.

“I’m certain of it,” Crystal says.

“What makes you so certain?”

“Because Reynolds let him in the building.”

“Did you see him let him in?”

“So, now you’re interested in what I have to say.”

“Did you see Reynolds let Dragontail in?”

“I see a lot of things. I keep my mouth shut and my eyes open.”

“Is that a cut on me? Because let me tell you something, Weird Chick, the world was built for the talkers and I for one have no problem talking.”

“Just let her tell us what she knows,” Adams says.

“Yeah,” Crystal says. “I saw Reynolds let Dragontail in.”

“When?”

“About an hour before the lights went out. I headed to the cafeteria because the vending machine didn’t have those truffle bars, and I like those truffle bars. So, I took the stairs because I’m trying to get more steps in.”

“I was going to say, you’ve been looking fit lately.”

“Thank you. As I was on my way back up, I saw Reynolds come through the main doors which I thought was odd because he usually doesn’t get here that early.”

“You pay attention to how early the janitor gets here?” Sloan asks.

“I’m an observant person. Anyway, he entered the main doors with his keycard and this guy walked up behind him and Reynolds let him in. The guy looked exactly like Dragontail.”

“I knew there was something screwy about that janitor.”

“So, he is working with Dragontail,” Adam’s says.

“There’s got to be a way out of here,” Crystal says. “They wouldn’t have designed a way to put this building into lockdown without a manual override.”

“You’re right. But we’d have to contact security and that could be problematic.”

“What do you mean problematic?”

“Security techs are, well, psychopathic.”

“So, you’ve met these guys,” Sloan says.

“If you’ve met one security guy, you’ve met them all. They have these vacuous eyes, bushy eyebrows, and animated hands. They’re outgoing and love to be the center of attention and at social gatherings they always drink gin and tonic.”

“Sounds like you and these guys have history.”

“I’ve had my share of run-ins.”

“Groovy.”

“Anyway, I could try and contact security. Maybe if we explain the situation, they’ll unlock the building, and we can go home. But I just want to set expectations ahead of time.”

“Whatever. I know these types of guys. You just need to know how to finagle them.”

“I’ll see if I can find their contact information.”

“Thank you, Adams,” Crystal says.

“Certainly.”

Crystal and Sloan follow Adams over to his computer. They look over his shoulder as he rifles through a list of work contacts.

“Here it is,” Adams says. “Unicorn.”

“Unicorn?” Crystal says.

“Unicorn is the head of Building Security.”

“Of course, his name is Unicorn,” Sloan says sarcastically.

“I’ve met this guy before. Total militant wingnut. I heard once that during an office party he hacked into the mail server and forwarded emails to the significant others of everyone who was having an office affair. No one could prove he did it, but everyone knew. Even the guys who worked with him knew. A couple of them said they’d read something cryptic on his social media pages. But as scummy as it was it wasn’t nearly as scummy as what he did to Mr. Peek’s administrative assistant. The one who worked here before Tiffany.”

“What did he do to her?” “He schmoozed her. Flirted with her. Got her to trust him. Like a coyote stalking a sheep. Then he asked her out and she said yes because it was Valentine’s Day. She agreed to meet him at this restaurant, but he never showed. Turned out he was sitting in the parking lot the entire time.

When she finally left the restaurant, he followed her car. When she turned onto the highway, he tried to run her off it. I don’t know how she found out it was him but by the end of the week she’d turned in her resignation.”

“And this is the guy who’s our best shot at getting out of here?” Crystal asks warily.

“Afraid so.”

“Call him,” Sloan says.

“He doesn’t take calls,” Adams says.

“What do you mean he doesn’t take calls?”

“He prefers email.”

“Then email him.”

“He wants his emails animated. He says they’re more professional that way.”

“We’re short on time. Dragontail’s coming back around the corner any minute.”

“I designed something animated in Canva this morning before I went to work,” Crystal says. “I was going to use it for a project but…”

“Get it,” Sloan says.

“Fine,” Crystal snaps. “I’ll go email it to Adams from my notebook.” Crystal heads over to her desk to retrieve her notebook from her computer bag.

“That chick is strange,” Sloan says to Adams.

“What do you mean?” Adams says.

“You don’t think she’s strange?”

“No, she’s strange.”

“Why do you think she’s strange?”

“I asked you first.”

“She’s quiet. Never talks to anyone. And sometimes I think she’s watching me.”

“I heard she was in a pinewood derby tournament and kicked ass.”

“What’s strange about that?”

“She was the only adult.”

“Okay, I sent it,” Crystal says returning.

“Great,” Adams says. “Thanks.”

“I don’t know why this Unicorn needs an animated email.”

“It’s a power thing. It cuts down the amount of people who email him because sending him an animated email is time consuming. This woman he used to date sent him a sonogram picture of her baby that he’d sired, and he totally deleted it. He responded to her email saying if she wanted to send him a sonogram of a baby, the baby had to be dancing. Otherwise, it was a complete misuse of the mail server.”

“Sounds like a reasonable guy to me,” Sloan says. “I love those dancing baby memes.”

“Okay, well, I’ll just type up the email and…”

“Alright, kids,” Dragontail announces coming back around the corner from the elevators. “Let’s get this party moving along. I want you guys in there with Peak.”

Adams, Crystal, and Sloan look at each other and start moving towards Tiffany’s desk.

“You’ve got to send that email,” Sloan whispers to Adams.

“I’ll try doing it on my phone.”

Dragontail whips around and looks at Windy who is sitting at one of the desks. “Hey, Windy,” he says. “Come with us.”

Windy slowly rises, smooths her skirt, and timidly follows the group. She is sad because her kids are presently doing a school musical performance and she is missing it. She is frightened at being stuck in the building and being held hostage. She just wants to pick up something at the drive-thru, take it home and eat a late dinner with her family.

“Hurry up, Windy,” Dragontail says. “You remember that children’s story with the duck who’s always the last in line to board the boat. He’s the one who gets the stick.”

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments in my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology! 

STREAM OF THE WEEK: SHE SAID (2022)-PEACOCK

Nearly every year it seems there are a couple of excellent Oscar worthy films that get passed over for awards. This year one of those films is She Said. Based on the New York Times Pulitzer Prize winning article by Jodi Kantor, Megan Twohey and Rebecca Corbett, and the book by Kantor and Twohey this is the case of how the Harvey Weinstein story got broken.

Megan Twohey (Carry Mulligan in an excellent performance) has just given birth to her first child. Before returning to work she gets a call from fellow New York Times journalist Jodi Kantor (Zoe Kazan) who is working on a story about sexual harassment in the workplace. The focus is on Hollywood, primarily rumored predator Harvey Weinstein. Kantor’s problem is few to none of the women, who are bound by NDA’s, fear, and threats, will talk. And those who do talk are embittered by the dead ends they’ve arrived at when trying to tell their stories in the past.

The Weinstein assignment intrigues Twohey who had been working on a story about women sexually assaulted by Donald Trump before she went on maternity leave. Twohey is disenchanted Trump went on to become president despite his assaults. When she returns to work, she is given the option to either continue with her Trump story or team up with Kantor on the Weinstein story. She chooses the latter and she and Kantor begin an arduous but riveting journey involving researching legal paperwork, sidestepping threats, and looking for leads very much in the vein of All the President’s Men.

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here on another rousing Thursday to introduce chapter eleven of my story Power Grid Failure. This week I have gotten back to going on my walkies. It has not been as frequent because of rain. I do detest walking in the rain. This means I must wear a raincoat. I detest my raincoat. It is a silly garment with a hood that obscures my ability to see. I could hardly make it out the door to the street without running into things. However, my novelist adjusted the hood and made it better. Still, I dream of sunshine and green grass and flowers to sniff. We often run into other dogs on our voyages. Usually this is not a problem. However, we recently had two larger dogs who, albeit friendly, were a bit of a challenge. My novelist had to sweep me into her arms to keep me away from my adoring fans so I could get down the street. Other dogs are fascinated with me and my story writing. This, of course, is not a common activity amongst the canine community and so I have become a bit of a celebrity with them. They are also drawn to my stunning good looks. I am quite beautiful you see with my uncommon parti poodle coloring. Most poodles have hair which is one color while I am a brilliant pattern reminiscent to that of a Holstein cow. And with that thought, here is chapter eleven of Power Grid Failure. Mwynhau!  

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Eleven

“This is how it’s going to go,” Dragontail says. “We’re taking over this building.”

“What do you mean, you’re taking over this building?” Martin asks.

“I mean we, that is us three,” he says motioning to his two henchmen, “are taking over this building and holding you hostage.”

“Do you mean you are holding all of us hostage or just Martin?” Windy asks.

“All of you. Did I not make myself clear?”

“Well, it was a little vague.”

“Okay, let me simplify this. The three of us are taking over this building and holding all of you hostage.”

“How?” Martin says. “We outnumber you.”

Dragontail whips out a weapon, aims it at Adams and fires. Adams drops to the floor and flops around like he is having a seizure. “This here levels the playing field.”

“Adams!” Tiffany screams and runs over to her fallen coworker. She turns to Dragontail and says, “What have you done to him?!”

“I call it the No Fun Stun Gun,” Adams says. “My newest invention. You see at first, I was afraid to invent things. But after six long years of being incarcerated, I learned fear was just a state of mind. And those six long years and a newfound state of mind allowed me to come up with this beauty. Isn’t that right, Reynolds?”

“You’re still on about that whole thing?” Reynolds says.

Dragontail marches up to Reynolds and looks him in the eye. “That whole thing? That whole thing? Reynolds, we committed the same crime together, a crime you plotted, and you got out a year earlier than I did. Yeah, that whole thing!”

“If you’d been more amicable in prison, they might have let you out a year earlier too.”

“Wow. Just…wow.”

“Are you going to hold us hostage or shoot us with a stun gun?” Crystal asks.

Dragontail pushes Reynolds aside and marches up to her. “Well, aren’t we the impatient one.”

“I’d like to know sooner rather than later so I can get my mindset in order.”

“Get your mindset in order?”

“One has a very different mindset if one is trapped in a building vs if one is trapped in a building while being held hostage vs if one is trapped in a building, being held hostage and shot at with a stun gun.”

“Rest assured your situation is the last one.” Dragontail points his No Fun Stun Gun at her and fires. Crystal instantly slumps to the floor.

“Stop!” Reynolds says, the humor gone from his tone.

“No,” Dragontail says and aims his weapon at Tiffany. He shoots but not before Sloan takes a flying leap into the line of fire.

Tiffany jumps back in surprise as Sloan drops like a marionette who’s just had its strings cut.

“Now,” Dragontail says turning to Martin and Windy. “I mean business.”

“What do you want?” Martin asks calmly.

“What do you think I want?”

“I have no idea.”

“Playing hardball, old man? Have it your way.”

Dragontail signals his goons who each grab one of Tiffany’s arms and drag her towards Martin’s office.

“Get your hands off me!” Tiffany exclaims struggling to no avail.

“Let go of her!” Martin demands marching after them.

Dragontail turns, pushes a button on his weapon and fires it at Martin. Martin yelps.

“You see what’s special about my No Fun Stun Gun,” Dragon tail says, “is it’s not just one setting. It’s an array of settings. A smorgasbord if you will. I can drop you to the ground, make you pass out, or just make you feel pain.”

“Why haven’t you fired it at Reynolds yet?” Windy asks.

“What?”

“Reynolds appears to be the one you’re upset with. Why haven’t you fired your No Fun Stun Gun at him?”

“Excellent question,” Dragontail says glaring at Reynolds. “I’m saving the worst for last.”

“Unhand my secretary,” Martin tells Dragontail’s henchmen inside the glassed-in area where Tiffany’s desk is located.

“You mean administrative assistant,” the first henchman says.

“What?”

“It’s not secretary anymore. Her title is administrative assistant.”

“He knows it’s administrative assistant,” Tiffany says. “But I actually like the term secretary, so I requested he refer to me as such.”

“Unhand my secretary,” Martin says again.

“We’ll unhand her when we’re ready to unhand her,” the second more sinister henchman says.

“Alright, Peak,” Dragontail says as he strolls through the door. “I think it’s time we separate you kids. Tiffany’s going into your office with my friend Craggy. You and I are going to hang out here with Remmel.”

“I’m not giving you access to my office,” Martin says.

Dragontail points his No Fun Stun Gun at Martin’s face and fires. Martin convulses and goes limp.

“Get Peak’s wallet, Tiffany.”

“And if I don’t?” Tiffany says.

Dragontail pushes a button on his weapon, aims it at Tiffany and fires. Tiffany feels a shock followed by searing pain. She grabs her cheeks and screams.

“Now, get Peak’s wallet out of his hip pocket.”

Tiffany moves over to Martin’s crumpled frame and rolls him over so he’s bottom’s up. Then she reaches into his hip pocket and retrieves the wallet.

“Now open it up and take out his keycard.”

Tiffany locates Martin’s keycard and holds it up. Dragontail snatches it from her and puts it in front of the keycard reader near the walnut doors. The reader turns from red to green and the doors unlock.

“Excellent,” Dragontail says. “Craggy, drag Blondie here into the big guy’s office.

Craggy grabs Tiffany’s arm and takes her into Mr. Peak’s office and shuts the door behind them.

Dragontail marches out the glass door and into the office space. “Reynolds,” he calls. “It’s time for you and me to do a little catching up.”

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments in my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: WHO IS HARRY NILSSON (AND WHY IS EVERYBODY TALKING ABOUT HIM?) (2010)-FREEVEE, PEACOCK, PLUTO TV & TUBI

On January 2^nd of this year Rolling Stone Magazine released what might be the most bizarre best of list of all time: 200 Greatest Singers. The list had peculiar rankings, odd choices and glaring omissions including:

Judy Garland

Pat Benatar

Billy Joel

Bobby Hatfield

Bonnie Tyler

Meatloaf

Art Garfunkel

Jim Morrison

Rodger Waters

David Lee Roth

Grace Slick

Peter Gabriel

Jennifer Hudson

Celine Dion

David Byrne

Dionne Warwick

Brandon Flowers

P!nk

Anne Wilson

But perhaps the most glaring omission of them all was one of the best voices of the 60’s and 70’s. Maybe the best with a staggering near four octave range and a tenor voice. So incredible was he, The Beatles collectively called him their favorite band. His name was Harry Nilsson, and he wrote a hit called “One” in 1968 made famous by the band Three Dog Night before bursting onto the scene singing “Everybody’s Talkin’” by Fred Neil featured in the Oscar winning movie Midnight Cowboy.

Harry went on to write and sing mammoth songs such as “Jump into the Fire” and sing other masterpieces such as “Without You” by Pete Ham and Tom Evans from the band Badfinger. Harry was known for using his own voice for his backup singers for recordings. He was also known for his novelty songs such as “Coconut” and was the creative force behind an animated film called The Point. Harry’s life was an odyssey in and of itself, rising from poverty in the slums of Brooklyn where his family was so poor, they had to eat dog food to stardom in Los Angeles and around the world. From his fragile first and second marriages, self-destructive nature, wild rock and roll lifestyle to his finally finding the love of his life and siring a large family, Harry was a music legend in his own right. Quite honestly, if you are making a list of best singers of the 20^th and 21^st century and you do not include Nilsson, your reputation and knowledge of modern music is up for serious debate.

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here once again to introduce chapter ten of my story Power Grid Failure. This week my novelist has taken a break from our walkies. At first, I reveled in the rest. And then I became restless. I have learned the horrible meaning of the words housebound and stir-crazy. I must get out soon or I shall lose my mind. I am climbing the walls. I have even been engaging in peaceful conversations with the Maltese and such shenanigans cannot be tolerated. I must go for walkies again. I must breathe the air and smell the rain, the wind, the universe. I have heard dogs need to go on walks to keep their brain sharp. Mine is dulling by the hour. Soon I will be relegated to watching soap operas and game shows. A horrid fate. I will rouse my novelist tomorrow and make her walk me. I will demand she give me attention. I will let her know resting time is over. It is time to conquer the world! But for now, here is chapter ten of Power Grid Failure. Disfrutar!

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Ten

Dragontail and Reynolds went back a long way to their college days. Reynolds dreamed of working in the corporate world, while Dragontail envisioned himself a stage actor living the bohemian lifestyle. His parents, however, had a different plan in mind. Their son had spent his childhood in and out of schools mostly due to expulsion. The breaking point came when one of his high school teachers told him not to focus on David Mamet plays and history at the same time. Dragontail replied, “Why don’t you talk to me like I’m an adult?” The teacher swiftly escorted Dragontail out of the classroom and down the hall. This left the rest of the students to ruminate on the building of The Great Wall of China until the last five minutes of class when a now meek and sullen Dragontail reentered the classroom. He was followed inside by the teacher who sported a contented look that would have turned Nurse Rached’s face a whiter shade of pale.

Dragontail, however, was not deterred from his thespian pursuit and continued to read plays in class albeit more covertly. It deeply upset him when he was cast in the lead role of Chad in his high school’s production of In the Company of Men by Neil Labute and his parents refused to attend. Especially after he dedicated his performance to them, a note which by his request was printed in the program.

When he went off to college, Dragontail attended prerequisites for business school but also enrolled in acting classes and auditioned for plays. His first break was in a student film playing a human sized ant who found solace in gardening. The director/writer received a 3.0 grade for his efforts, but Dragontail’s performance caught the eye of several other student directors, and he started getting cast in more and more roles.

Unfortunately, one of his parts was so popular even his parents, who had no interest whatsoever in the internet nor online video sharing social media platforms, happened to see it. They were stunned to find out their son had shaved his head bald to play Derek in the stage play version of American History X. Dragontail found himself inundated with texts, phone calls and written letters from his parent’s lawyer promising to cut him off from both his inheritance and the family at large if he so much as stepped foot in front of a camera or on a theater stage again. It was at this dark point in his young life that he by chance met Reynolds.

Reynolds, at that time, was every financially motivated parent’s dream. He had always envisioned himself becoming a real-life Gordon Gecko. From the time he entered fourth grade he wore a suit and tie and slicked his hair back with pomade to look like a grade school version of his favorite corporate shark.  His parents struggled to keep up with his demand for silk ties and gold tone cufflinks. When other kids came to school on Business Day to sell their handmade wares such as friendship bracelets, origami animals and Shrinky Dinks in the cafeteria, Reynolds showed up with a full color layout explaining how to purchase timeshares of certain areas of the playground. This was, of course, a complete scam. But his pitch was so compelling he was able to sell the principal springtime usage of the monkey bars.

Reynolds used his earnings to pay for a brand-new dirt bike. He was excellent at charming his teachers out of punishments that came his way for activities such as copying off tests, being late for class and talking his buddies into nabbing hair accessories from female classmates and selling them back to them at a profit.

Dragontail and Reynolds met in a microeconomics class shortly after Dragontail’s American History X fallout with his parents. Reynolds talked Dragontail into pledging his fraternity. This gave Dragontail newfound hope for his future and the fraternity in turn got bragging rights for having one of their brothers be the guy who played that skinhead in that American History X video. The boys became the best of friends and decided after college they would start a business together. Dragontail wanted to own a production company, but Reynolds was interested in more lucrative ventures. Reynolds talked his friend into founding a wearable technology company as he always envisioned crating a better smart watch than the ones that were on the market.

This concerned Dragontail as his background in computer science was novice at best. After going back and forth about it, they came up with a concept called Desperate Director, a watch designed for actors and singers that could alert a performer every time a new part came up, even before agents received the breakdown. In addition, the performer would receive data on the production and/or theatre company that was not easily searchable online.

At first, Reynolds and Dragontail were successful in both their ventures. Reynolds convinced Dragontail the profits from the smartwatches would more than finance a production company. They added additional functions to the watch including easy and organized ways to track your auditions, callbacks, and covert filming of the casting directors’ reactions to your monologues and songs. It helped actors know which auditions worked and which didn’t, and it provided a tailor-made list of monologues and songs that best suited them. Dragontail and Reynolds got interested investors quickly and the forecast for their future was bright. That was until they hit a small snag.   

The watch, though well designed and gorgeous to look at worked great…until you used it past ninety days. That’s when he started to burn customers’ wrists. There was no apparent reason for the bizarre flaw and when the two entrepreneurs tried to do more research and development on it nothing could be definitively detected. The two boys went flat broke. This was devastating especially for Dragontail whose parents had spent years saving money for him to attend graduate school. Dragontail had withdrawn every penny from his account with large penalties.

This left Reynolds and Dragontail with two choices. Either they could accept that they were young and still had plenty of time to pick up the pieces and move on with their lives or find a way to make their money back by engaging in a life of crime. They chose the latter. As neither Reynolds nor Dragontail wanted to end up in a maximum-security prison they decided white collar crime was the way to go.

The plan was Reynolds would interview and land a job in a bank as an accountant. Accounting wasn’t his cup of tea, but he was a natural at it. He’d studied it enough to sound charming and knowledgeable in interviews. They would continue to own Dragontail’s production company and use it as a front to launder the money Reynolds would embezzle from the bank. Reynolds had been the treasurer for his high school, fraternity and university and thus had an extensive background in embezzlement.

Reynolds went to several grueling interviews. On the last interview the three suits who sat across the meeting room table scrutinized everything about him from his clothes to the font he used for his resume. But he kept his cool and talked about why he was such an asset for their company and how no one else who walked in that door would have as spectacular a skill set as he.

Reynolds knew he’d convinced the guy in the middle and the hot looking brunette on the right. But the guy on the left seemed like he was on to him. When the interview was over Reynolds shook everyone’s hand even though the guy on the left had a limp handshake, he was certain he’d charmed the other two interviewers enough that their optimism would override this guy’s pessimism.

Reynolds was right. They offered him the position and after his training he let a month go by. That’s when he started cooking the books. His diligence paid off and soon he was funneling money into Dragontail’s production company. Dragontail finally got to greenlight a couple of projects he was certain would be profitable and was able to swiftly launder the money Reynolds funneled in. And to a certain degree their gamble paid off. Dragontail put out a feature that did well in festivals and got picked up for distribution.

And then things started getting ugly. Dragontail’s first film only made a modest profit. While it was in theatres, he tried making his dream film and everything went wrong: unexpected weather issues, the co-star quitting and the caterer getting into a boating accident.

Reynolds started getting sloppy at work. The guy who was on to him in the interview was on to him at work. Everyday Reynolds was certain someone was going to haul him off in handcuffs. And one day they finally did. No one embezzles three million dollars without making a few mistakes. Dragontail’s production company collapsed and clips from his disastrous would-be cinematic masterpiece became horrible memes.

Reynolds and Dragontail were each sentenced to ten years in white collar prison. Reynolds served five years of his sentence and was released for good behavior. Dragontail served six years. He was always bitter about having served one more year than his business partner and spent a long time planning his revenge. Dragontail could have built himself a great resume over those six lost years. He was disgraced and although not washed up, he was not able to get parts like he got in his college days or when he ran Fire Breathing Basilisk Productions. He did manage to get a local commercial and then another and then a string of frozen yogurt commercials. He became “that frozen yogurt guy”. Although it was nowhere near as challenging as playing Derek in his university’s stage version of American History X it paid the bills. And then more than paid the bills. And finally, it brought him in enough cash to start his own business again. Legitimately this time.

He tried starting up a production company again and called it Hydra Harridan Productions since Fire Breathing Basilisk productions carried with it a cloud of shame. He made one feature picture about a mountain man who lived in a national park and scared campers at night until the mountain man discovered his true calling selling handmade sunglasses crafted out of scraps of wood and working part time for the CIA.

The movie was picked up at a movie festival and enjoyed a modest distribution with decent critical acclaim. But the film nearly broke Dragontail and he got out of the production business and founded a hamburger food truck called Mountain Man, home of the famous Mountain Man Meal.

After establishing his business, Dragontail searched long and hard for Reynolds. He’d heard his former partner had gone home to live with his parents after serving time. But Reynolds was no longer there, which came as no surprise. Since Reynolds had started out his parents’ dream child and wound up their worst nightmare, all his parents’ friends spurned them because their kids had gone off to start successful businesses or landed jobs at Fortune 500 companies. This was more than Reynold’s parents could bear and within a month their son left their home and lived out of his car which he stole from his younger sibling.

Dragontail spent every spare minute of his time searching for Reynold’s driver’s license, phone number, and fishing license. Reynold’s had always been a fan of trout. This information helped lead him to Reynold’s address. The first time he spotted Reynolds was on a foggy evening in early October. Dragontail had gotten a tip he worked in a high-rise. After finding out the skyscraper was not all that far from where he usually parked his Mountain Man truck, he moved his location to the corner across from Reynold’s building. He parked it and flipped burgers in the back so the customers couldn’t see his face. He installed a surveillance camera so he could see who was coming and going and he noted Reynolds showed up just after nine a couple of times each week. Usually Mondays and Fridays. He always ordered the Mountain Man Meal. Occasionally he ordered the pie.

After a couple weeks, Dragontail followed Reynolds back to the high-rise. One night, Dragontail slipped inside the door behind Reynolds which was a rather dangerous thing to do considering there were cameras watching. Dragontail followed him up the stairs and watched him work. There was a profound satisfaction Dragontail got from Reynolds working as a janitor. And an even greater satisfaction knowing that his former partner worked a job which required him to clean up after others.

But it wasn’t enough to satiate Dragontail. He needed Reynolds to suffer and so he hatched a plan, hired muscle, and proceeded with his idea to pin a major crime on Reynolds.  

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments in my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: WHITE NOISE (2022)-NETFLIX

This week’s film is based on the famous 1985 off-beat satirical novel by Don DeLillo. This story about death, American consumerism and shallow fixations is not for all tastes, but it is engrossing and fascinating to watch just the same. The movie was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Actor-Motion Picture-Musical/Comedy for Adam Driver’s whimsical performance.

Set in the early mid 80’s the film tells the story of Jack Gladney (Adam Driver), a professor of Nazi Studies at the College-on-the-Hill. Jack’s fellow professor Murray Siskind (Don Cheadle) teaches American Culture and longs to develop the niche field of Elvis studies. Siskind is obsessed with the beauty of car crashes in American film. Jack, on the other hand, is obsessed with death.

He is ironically focused on learning German for an upcoming conference. His fourth wife Babette (Greta Gerwig) is a likeable but ditsy woman who shares her husband’s fear of death. The two of them spend a lot of time trying to figure out who will die first. They have both been married multiple times and this is each one’s fourth marriage. They have four children between them, one they share and the other three which come from previous marriages.

While going about their normal lives there is an industrial accident where a truck runs into a train and an “Airborne Toxic Event” occurs. This forces the Gladney family and their neighbors to evacuate their homes with very little warning. On their way to an evacuation camp, what would normally be a mundane incident happens which changes the course of Jack’s life. Paralleling this, Babett’s daughter Denise (Raffey Cassidy) catches her mother sneaking pills, finds her mother’s stash, and gives the bottle to Jack to have them analyzed. They discover the medicine goes by the name Dylar, a mysterious drug that no one, including medical professionals seems to know anything about.   

Good afternoon. It is Thursday once again and I Gigi the parti poodle am here to introduce chapter nine of my story Power Grid Failure. This was post-Christmas clean up week and it has been most distressing. My novelist has been spending hours cleaning up after the holidays whilst I have been staying out of the way. But it is utterly exhausting watching her. She moves this, she moves that, she puts this away, she puts that away. I think human beings are devoted to organizing things far more than they should be. A poodle’s world is always in order. And if it isn’t I put it into order with far less energy than my human counterparts. If I want to organize my squeaky toys, I tell the Maltese to pick one up and put it there and pick another up and put it over there. And if I need my blanket moved, I bark at my novelist until she moves it where I want it. The point is to delegate. Use your resources. Avoid doing anything yourself except what you most desire. Otherwise, life is no fun. And life should be sparkling with fun except for those you allot to do your work for you. And with that thought here is chapter nine of Power Grid Failure. Bonne année!   

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Nine

Tiffany and Adams enter the stairwell. Tiffany retrieves a small flashlight from her coat pocket and turns it on before they head down the stairs.

“Smart,” Adams says.

“I use it when I get off my bus,” Tiffany explains. “Otherwise, I’m walking home in the dark and I don’t want to get hit by a car.”

“Makes sense. Is that also why your coat is white?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Even smarter.”

“Yep.”

“What are we going to do if this guy has a weapon?”

“Who says it’s a guy?”

“It’s always a guy. Guys do these things.”

“We don’t even know what we heard. It might just be something that fell.”

“Maybe,” Adams says skeptically.”

They open the door to the lower floor and step inside. Tiffany shines the flashlight around. “Hello,” she calls out. “Is anyone here?”

Adams leans over and whispers, “Are you sure that was a good idea?”

“What?”

“Announcing our presence.”

“Don’t be ridiculous…”

Suddenly, they hear the sound again.

“Hello?” Tiffany says this time with less confidence.

“Let’s head back.”

“We can’t till we find out who or what is down here.”

“We have to…”

“Shh!”

Footsteps. Adams grabs Tiffany’s arm and motions towards the stairwell. Tiffany signals for him to wait. She turns off the flashlight. “Now we head back.”

They pivot and skulk towards the stairwell. The footsteps draw closer. They stop. Adam’s heart is pounding but he doesn’t want Tiffany to know. He does, however, want to move faster. The darkness is a deterrent, but he has the floor plan memorized having fixed plenty of computers deskside throughout the building.

“Let me lead,” he whispers. “I know the floorplan like the back of my hand.”

“Okay.”

Adams leads them towards the exit. Four desks to the left, break, turn left, four more to the right, break, turn right…

“Adams and Tiffany have been gone awhile,” Windy says wringing her hands. “When did they leave?”

“Six-thirty,” Sloan says who’s been counting every minute of Tiffany’s absence.

“It’s seven now,” Martin says looking at his Cartier Ronde watch.

“Six fifty-eight,” Crystal says glancing at her watch.

Martin scowls. “Does that thing on your wrist light up?”

“Yes. It’s a Timex Indiglo.”

“She’s right,” Reynolds says turning his phone around for the others to see. “Set by the atomic clock.”

“I set mine two minutes fast,” Martin lies.

“The point is they’re still down there,” Windy says. “Anything could have happened by now.”

“Maybe they hooked up,” Reynolds says grinning at Sloan.

“Tiffany has more class than that,” Sloan says glaring back.

“True. She didn’t hook up with you.”

“That’s it, janitor boy!” Sloan says and marches up to him.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

“Yeah, and why’s that?”

“I’ll kick your ass.”

“I was all state, wiseass.”

“You’re an insurance company?”

“Wrestling.”

“I was all state too.”

“In what?”

“Both of you cool your heels,” Martin growls. “My administrative assistant and my deskside tech are missing, and we need to find them.”

“Someone should go check on them,” Windy says.

Suddenly, the stairwell doors burst open, and Adams and Tiffany enter followed by three men dressed in Mountain Man uniforms. The man in the middle who appears to be the leader says, “Well, well. If it isn’t our old buddy Reynolds.”

“Dragontail!” Reynolds says surprised.

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments in my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: DRIVEWAYS (2019)-SHOWTIME & Freevee

This week’s film is a quiet yet engrossing story about a woman and her young son who are tasked with the job of cleaning out her late older sister’s house. Kathy (Hong Chau) is struggling to make ends meet when she finds out her sister April has passed away and must go clean the residence out and get it ready to put up for sale. Her eight-year-old son Cody (Lucas Jaye), a quiet intellectual boy takes the road trip with her and when they finally arrive, they find out to their horror that April was a hoarder. A retired Korean War veteran Del (Brian Dennehy in one of his last roles) lives next door and when Cody first sees him sitting on his porch, they strike up a short conversation where Del helps Cody turn the water hose on so Cody can get a drink. But Kathy, upon seeing Cody’s wet shirt is quick to let Del know not to bother her son. However, as Kathy and Cody continue to clean the house Cody and Del strike up a friendship that transcends their age difference and brings a newfound joy to both their lives. This is a sleeper of a film and worth the watch especially for the fine performances as well as Andrew Ahn’s lovely direction and Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen’s well penned script.   

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here to wish you Happy Holidays. It has been a busy week for me. I traveled a bit which is always disturbing. I can’t decide whether to lie quietly on my blanket or to stand up and bark at my driver. The Maltese always curls up and rarely finds the need to move around. But I must see what is going on outside the window. And I must say, I hate lane changes. And I do alert my novelist or whoever is driving the car to this upsetting experience and let them know my displeasure. I don’t understand why one must ever go sideways. The point is to go forwards. Sideways is just wrong on so many levels. I am a poodle, not a crab. And I am rather upset my stocking wasn’t hung up this year. I deserve a stocking to be hung up just as much as anyone and I am taking this up with my novelist. No such disregard for me should ever be exercised again. And if it is, I will personally tear down any stocking which is not mine and ransack the contents within. And with that, here is Chapter Eight of my story Power Grid Failure.   

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Eight

“I think we should hear from Crystal first,” Reynolds says.

“Who?” Martin says.

“Crystal. She’s one of your employees.”

“Oh, yes. Our technical writer.”

“What do you like to do for fun, Crystal?” Windy asks.

“Well…,” Crystal says not wanting to be part of the conversation. “I guess I like coming to work.”

“Work?”

“I think what Windy is asking,” Reynolds says to Crystal, “or for that matter what all of us would like to know is what you like to do outside of work.”

Crystal looks around at her co-workers and says, “Sometimes I take the bus to the discount movie theatre.”

“Are there any particular types of movies you like to see?”

“Independent films I suppose.”

“So, you’re a cinephile.”

“Well, that’s what’s usually playing there. Sometimes I’ll ride the bus home, sit at my desk, and write about the film I saw.”

“Alright, Reynolds,” Martin says. “You’ve heard the rest of us spill our guts. Now it’s your turn.”

Reynolds stretches out his long arms and legs and folds his hands behind his head. “Let’s see. What do I like to do? What do I like to do…? Well…I like to play the stock market.”

Sloan scoffs. “I’d be surprised if you even had a savings account.”

Reynolds smiles. “I’ve played the stocks since I was in college. Even bought a small house with my earnings.”

“When?”

“A couple years after the housing bubble burst. The property was in foreclosure, so I got a bargain price. Today it’s worth three times what I paid for it.”

“If that’s the case, why don’t you sell it and buy something bigger?”

“Well, see that’s where Crystal and I share something in common. We both like working here. A bigger place would mean moving further out. And I’m young enough to keep working here for a while.”

“Why don’t you apply for a better job?” Adams asks.

“Interesting question,” Reynolds says sitting up. “Probably because no one will hire me for anything other than a janitor.”

“Couldn’t you take the money and go to college?”

“I’ve already graduated from college. I also have a criminal record. My record doesn’t stop me from investing my own money however.”

“You’ll have to give us financial advice sometime.”

“He’s not allowed,” Martin says.  

“What was that?” Tiffany says.

“Sounds like it came from downstairs,” Sloan says.

All heads turn toward the direction of the stairwell.

“Reynolds,” Martin says. “Go down there and check it out.”

Reynolds laughs. “Why should I be the one to check it out?”

“You’re the janitor,” Sloan says. “It’s your job.”

“I’ll go see what it is,” Tiffany says and heads for the stairs.

“No!” Sloan and Adams yell at the same time.

“I’ll go with you,” Reynolds says getting up.

“I’ll go too,” Sloan says.

“You just said it was my job.”

“What if it’s someone who slipped in before the blackout happened?” Crystal says. “What if they’re dangerous?”

“We don’t know if it’s a person who made the sound,” Tiffany says.

“We should all go together,” Windy says. “There’s safety in numbers.”

“It’s too bad we couldn’t just send an AI robot down there,” Adams says.

Sloan scoffs. “Yeah, I think there’s one in the supply room.”

“Someday we’ll revere robots more than people. In fact, in some ways we already do. Like music. There’s hardly any instruments anymore. It’s all electronic. Even the human singing voice is adjusted to how we want it to sound instead of how it really sounds. Soon we won’t want to watch human athletes or human actors or go to human doctors because we’ll be conditioned to believe robots are better at doing the job. And robots don’t eat or sleep or take breaks. They’ll just keep on keeping on and outdo us at every turn until companies don’t hire people anymore. Universities don’t take human students anymore. The concept of human jobs becomes obsolete.”

“You’re right. You do need a night out.”

“I agree with Crystal,” Windy says. “It could be someone dangerous.”

“Like I said before,” Reynolds says, “no one can get in and no one can get out.”

“Maybe it’s a inside job,” Crystal says.

“What do you mean?” Windy asks.

“What if whoever is down there wanted to get locked in?”

“They’d have to know the building goes into lockdown automatically during blackouts,” Reynolds says.

“You knew this building locked down automatically during a blackout,” Sloan says glaring at Reynolds.

“So, you think the white-collar criminal turned janitor who happens to know the building goes into lockdown during a blackout set it up, so someone got inside before the place locked down and plans to commit some sort of a crime.”

Sloan takes a step into Reynolds. “Yeah.”

“I know all about your record, Reynolds,” Martin says. “I’m with Sloan on this one.”

“You don’t think I learned something from my mistakes?” Reynolds says.

“Not a chance.”

“Maybe it’s not some inside job at all,” Tiffany says. “Maybe it’s someone who got trapped in the building just like us.”

“I didn’t see anyone down there when I went to get the elevator drop key,” Reynolds says.

“We don’t trust you,” Sloan says.

Tiffany rolls her eyes. “I’m going down there to find out for sure.”

“I’m going with you.”

“No,” Martin says. “Adams, you go with Tiffany.”

“Yes, sir,” Adams says and he and Tiffany head for the stairwell.

“They might need a hand,” Sloan says following them.

“You stay here,” Martin barks. “I might need a hand.”

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments in my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!!!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: THE DROPOUT (2022)-HULU

There have been several outstanding mini-series released in 2022, and this Hulu original is amongst the best. It tells the story of Elizabeth Holms (Golden Globe nominee and Emmy winner Amanda Seyfried in a brilliant performance) a bright and highly ambitious college freshman who after a horrific life changing experience drops out of Stanford to pursue her dream of becoming a CEO. Her product is a blood tests that requires only a couple of drops from your finger as opposed to a full venial draw. Before quitting Stanford, she pitches her idea to Dr. Phyllis Gardner (Laurie Metcalf) who punches all sorts of holes in Elizabeth’s scientific theory.

During her senior year of high school, Elizabeth enrolls in Stanford University’s summer Mandarin immersion program in China, where she meets another student Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani (Naveen Andrews) a thirty-seven-year-old multi-millionaire. After Elizabeth drops out of Stanford University, the two reconnect and began a complex romantic and business relationship. Together they found Theranos, a health technology company. Joining them is chemist Ian Gibbons (Stephen Fry) who after working for them for a few years begins see the conflict between the business and the science.  

Elizabeth’s neighbor and family friend Richard Fuisz (William H. Macy), a successful physician, entrepreneur, and inventor threatens to sue her company over patents. Failing that, he goes on a passionate rampage to ambush Theranos with the help of John Carreyrou (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), a writer from the Wall Street Journal and two young scientists Tyler Schultz (Dylan Minnette) and Erika Cheung (Camryn Mi-young Kim) who, like Gibbons begin to see the truth behind the facade.  

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here to introduce chapter seven of my story Power Grid Failure. We are experiencing a La Nina in the Pacific Northwest and the temperatures here are lower than usual. This is the second time this year we’ve had snow before Christmas which is uncommon in this region. It is most cold outside, and I have not been able to go for walkies for several days. I have found the best way to exercise under these conditions is to rouse the Maltese and fight him. He is a peaceful sort who would have done well during the sixty’s hippie movement. This of course makes me want to attack him more. I have not done well in attempting this activity and a couple of times have found myself sitting alone in a room for a time-out. I detest sitting alone in a room for a time-out. It is boring and I need to manage and command those around me.

I am ready to fight you now.

Tucker, what are you wearing?

This is my sumo suit.

You look like a miniature balloon at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

I brought you one too.

I am not putting that inane thing on.

If you want to fight me, you must wear the sumo suit.

I am not fighting you wearing a beach ball.

Then I will fight you anyway.

Get away from me! This is ridiculous! Stop! It appears I must tend to the catastrophe at hand. In the meantime, here is chapter seven of Power Grid Failure. Merii Kurisumasu!

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Seven

“I’ve got them,” Reynolds says as he re-enters the breakroom. He carries large yellow and red handheld flashlights which he sets up around the tables. “Saw them in the maintenance room when I went to get the elevator key.”

“Why, thank you,” Windy chirps. “It definitely adds ambiance.”

“You’re very welcome. Since we’re all going to be spending the night together, we might as well get to know each other on a first name basis. “I’m Reynolds, by the way.”

“I’m Windy.”

“Nice to meet you, Windy.” Reynolds turns to Tiffany. Tiffany eyes him warily, not wanting to share that information with him.

“I know the big executive’s name is Mr. Martin Peak.”

“Watch it, Reynolds,” Martin says. “You’re treading on thin ice.”

“You two know each other?” Sloan says. “Like on a first name basis?”

“We’ve met,” Martin says stiffly.

“How?’

“That’s none of your business.”

Reynolds turns to Sloan. “Do you know her name?” he asks pointing to Crystal.

“She’s our technical writer.”

“And her name is?”

“How should I know?”

“Martin said it earlier.”

“I wasn’t paying attention.”

“Apparently not.” Reynolds turns to Crystal and nods his head at Sloan. “What’s his name?”

Crystal looks at Sloan. “I’m not sure.”

“Maybe you two should introduce yourselves.”

Crystal looks at Sloan. “I’m Crystal.”

Sloan rolls his eyes and says, “Sloan.”

“See,” Reynolds says. “It wasn’t that hard. Let’s recap. I’m Reynolds. The executive there is Martin. You’re Sloan. And you’re Crystal.” Reynolds turns to Adams. “Why don’t you introduce yourself to Blondie?”

“Don’t call me Blondie,” Tiffany says.

“Sorry. Tech Guy, introduce yourself to the blonde.”

“We already know each other,” Tiffany says, “because Adams fixes my computer sometimes. And I know Windy from HR.”

“Yeah, but do you know Sloan?”

“I know he works here.”

“Yeah, but do you know his name?”

“No, I don’t know his name.”

“But I’ll bet he knows yours.”

“I know a way we could all get to know each other better,” Windy says.

“This is stupid,” Sloan says.

“No, it isn’t. It’s a social interaction exercise. We’ll go around the room and each of us will share an activity we enjoy doing.”

“What difference does it make?” Martin says. “We’ll all go back to our regular scheduled lives tomorrow.”

“Mr. Peak,” Tiffany says. “I think it’s a good idea. I know you could share some interesting things you do over the weekends.”

“I don’t want to share, and I definitely don’t want to go first.”

“But Martin,” Windy says. “You’re the leader of the group. It’s imperative you go first.”

“Windy, I put you in charge of social interaction this monstrous evening. You should be the one to go first.”

“Martin, you need to lead the group. I can’t give them the same sense of morale you can.”

“Fine! I like to build things.”

“Oh, that sounds fascinating! What do you build?”

“I built the first house my wife and I lived in.”

“Really?”

“Contractors screw you. I mean you’re stuck hiring guys like electricians and plumbers and roofers. But generally, I did most of the work myself. It’s a heck of a lot cheaper that way.”

“I’d have never pegged you for a guy who liked to get his hands dirty,” Reynolds says.

“Well, I am. And just because I’m older don’t think I won’t do it again. I have a little piece of property on the other side of the mountains I’m thinking of breaking ground on.”

“Why, Martin,” Windy says. “I never knew that.”

“Now you do. You’re turn.”

“Well,” Windy says delighted to be the center of attention, “I love throwing dinner parties. I know it seems like an archaic idea but it’s much more fun than sitting around at night watching those dreadful streamers. They’re so mind numbing. My husband just finished watching one of those lunatic criminals on tape going on and on about how he did this to this person and that to that person and how much smarter he was than the police. After a while those documentaries all sound the same. I think if some of those maniacs would have gone to a dinner party occasionally and made some real friends, they wouldn’t have committed those horrible crimes.

“Anyway, I love throwing dinner parties. They are so much fun. The hor d’oeuvres are my favorite part. Those itty-bitty gastronomical bursts of joy that explode in your mouth are pure heaven.”

“I think it’s your turn, Tiffany,” Martin says.

“Okay,” Tiffany says. “Well…I really like fashion. I love all the imagination that goes into it. I thought that 3-D flower stuff they did a couple of years back where they sewed the middle of the blossom to the clothing but left the petals unattached was super cool. I totally loved how they popped out free of constraint.

“I always wanted to start my own fashion label. I’d like to call it Tiffany’s, but I can’t because, like duh, Tiffany’s. So, I was thinking something like Choquant. You know, a little flirty but kind of, I don’t know, suave.”

“Did you study fashion in college?” Reynolds asks.

“No, I got my degree in sociology. I’m saving money to go to design school.”

“Marvelous!” Windy says. “Sloan, it’s your turn.”

“I already know what Sloan likes,” Tiffany says. “Stalking.”

“I’m not a stalker,” Sloan says.

“What do you mean you’re not a stalker? You stalk me every night!”

“Is that true?” Windy asks Tiffany. “Because if it is I need you to come to my office tomorrow and file a report.”

“I am not a stalker,” Sloan says. “I’m just an accountant!”

“What do you like to do besides stalking, Sloan?” Windy asks.

Sloan rolls his eyes. “I like to read. I like to go to the library and check out a stack of books.”

“What type of books?” Martin asks.

“I always enjoy a good finance book, but I’ve been trying to branch out lately and read action novels.”

“Adams,” Windy says. “What do you do for fun?”

“Oh, gaming for sure,” Adams says.

“That’s obvious,” Sloan says rolling his eyes.

“What’s wrong with gaming?”

“Nothing. It’s just predictable you’re a gamer.”

“Well, it’s not the only thing I’m into. And I’ll bet you’ve done your fair share of gaming.”

“Some.”

“Do you like first person shooter games, RPG’s, sandbox, RTS?”

“I like Grand Theft Auto.”

“Oh…of course, you do.”

“Is that some sort of dis on my gaming taste?”

“No. I just thought you might have brought something interesting to the table.”

“Like Stalker Guy 3000,” Tiffany says.

“Honestly, Tiffany,” Sloan says turning towards her. “You need to stop taking this whole stalking thing personally.”

“You’re stalking me. So, yeah, I take that personally.”

“Well, from what I’ve found out about you, you’re painfully predictable.”

“What do you mean?”

“I could stop following you for an entire week and know exactly where you were at any given time.”

“That’s not true.”

“Do you have any idea how many young women want to be a fashion designer? Not to mention what a filthy business it is. Do you even have an inkling of how many tons of clothing get tossed into the garbage each year? Even Goodwill and the Salvation Army can’t keep up with fashion’s fickleness. Workers at those places walk down the clothing aisles every week checking labels and thinning out what didn’t sell. They take that unwanted fashion and dump it into a gigantic pile that gets a second life as rags guys use to clean their cars.”

Tiffany looks at him with doleful eyes. “You’re a real sweetheart. I wouldn’t talk if I were you. Sitting at your desk every day pushing numbers around for some…”

“Alright,” Windy says. “I think this conversation has gone off on a tangent. This is supposed to be an exercise to help us get to know one another, not tear each other down. Not to mention the focus was supposed to be on Adams.”

“Yeah,” Reynolds says. “You already had your turn, Sloan, so shut up.”

“Stay out of this,” Sloan snaps back. “You’re a custodian. Have you ever even done a team building exercise before?”

“Nobody wants you telling them their hobby is stupid. They just want to talk about what makes them happy. So, do us a favor, Sloan. Shut up and let Adams talk about how video games get his rocks off.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say they get my rocks off,” Adams said. “I just really dig playing them.”

“Mr. Reynolds,” Windy said. “Since you’ve been holding the floor, why don’t you share what your favorite past time is.”

Reynolds leans back in his chair, folds his hands and smiles.

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments of my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!!!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN (2022)-HBO Max

This week’s pick is nominated for eight Golden Globes including Best Picture Musical/Comedy. Set in Ireland in 1923 right as the Irish Civil war is ending, the story is about two longtime friends Pádraic Súilleabháin (Golden Globe Nominee for Best Actor in a Comedy and New York Film Critic’s Best Actor recipient Colin Farrell) and Colm Doherty (Golden Globe Nominee for Best Supporting Actor Brendan Gleeson). One day violinist Colm decides he no longer wants to be friends with Pádraic which throws Pádraic for a loop. Pádraic, a simple man, discusses his befuddlement with his sister Siobhán Súilleabháin (Golden Globe Nominee for Best Supporting Actress Kerry Condon) the most intelligent person on their island, and young Dominic Kearney (Golden Globe Nominee for Best Supporting Actor Barry Keoghan) the least intelligent person on their island. When Colm tells Pádraic to stop bothering him and leave him alone or he will cut off one of his own fingers, Pádraic vows to mend their friendship by any means possible.

The film was written and directed by the very talented Martin McDonagh (Golden Globe Nominee for Best Screenplay and Best Director) known for his masterpiece Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri for which he rightly won the Golden Globe for Best Screenplay and most definitely should have won the Oscar as well. The Banshees of Inisherin is not quite as good as that one, but that’s a very high bar and McDonagh should take most of this year’s writing awards just the same. Please bear in mind though this is a dark comedy, with the emphasis on dark, and it has a haunting quality that stays with the viewer long after the film is finished. The movie is also nominated for Best Score for Carter Burwell’s clever soundtrack.  

Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle here to introduce chapter six of my story Power Grid Failure. The holidays are here and with them comes film awards season. The Golden Globe nominations came out this week and we are anxious to find out who will take home the statues. My novelist and I are excited to watch some of the releases which are available on streaming in the coming weeks. I love to cozy up with the Maltese as my footstool and take in a great story. Occasionally, I will wear a silk robe and sip Starbuck’s Cocoa when I partake of such activities but that is a subject for another day. Until then, here is Chapter Six of Power Grid Failure. Joyeux Noël!

Power Grid Failure

by

Gigi the parti poodle

Chapter Six

Windy returns from her office carrying a pair of sheers. “Here you go,” she says cheerily handing them to Adams.

“These are great,” Adams says taking them and cutting the end of the pen.

“This better work,” Sloan says. “I’m fiending for food.”

“What if it doesn’t?” Crystal asks.

“What do you mean?”

“What if the food doesn’t satiate you?”

“I’ll turn into a big harry monster.”

“Like a Muppet?”

“Are you plugged in? It’s an expression.”

“Oh.”

Sloan turns to Tiffany and mouths “Wow”.

Adams cuts the back of the pen into four sections. He slides the cut end into the lock with his right hand and holds it. He grabs the lock with his left hand and shakes it. “That’s it!” he says as the “wheel of death” pops open.

“Hand me that turkey sandwich on the hoagie roll,” Sloan says.

“Now, wait a minute,” Martin says. “We are going to ration this out properly in an orderly manner. Windy, you are the most socially adept person here. I say you do the rationing.”

“Why thank you, Martin!” Windy says. “This is going to be fun.”

“How does that transfer into her overseeing food?” Sloan asks. “And what makes you think Windy is the most socially adept person here anyway?”

“You definitely aren’t,” Tiffany says.

Sloan looks at her shocked. “What do you mean?”

“You’re a jerk.”

“I’m not…I’m hungry and…under duress. And I’m worried about my poodle.”

“That’s not an excuse.”

“Windy,” Martin says. “Please commence.”

“Well, alright,” Windy says. “It looks like the machine is due for restocking. I thought they would have done it Friday…”

“They couldn’t,” Tiffany says. “The guy said all the vendors were having their annual holiday dinner party.”

“Oh, that’s right! Well…it looks like we have four sandwiches…some red delicious apples…a few hummus and pretzel packs and cracker and carrot packs…four milk cartons…no, wait…there’s a chocolate one as well so five milk cartons all together.”

“Thank you, Windy,” Martin says. “How shall we divide this?”

“I’m a vegetarian,” Tiffany says. “So, I would be happy with the hummus and pretzel pack and an apple.”

“Fabulous,” Windy says. “Is anyone else a vegetarian?”

“Are you kidding?” Sloan says. “I’m halfway to a carnivore.”

“That goes without saying,” Tiffany mumbles.

“Well,” Windy continues. “We have a roast beef sandwich, a turkey sandwich, a ham sandwich and a vegan meat sandwich.”

“Vegan meat,” Sloan scoffs. “What a complete waste of bread.”

“Perhaps you would like the roast beef?” Windy says.

“Exactly.”

“No,” Martin says. “He needs to find out if anyone else has a reason they can’t eat the chicken or pork.”

“I can’t eat pork,” Adams says.

“Why?”

“I don’t like it.”

“Anybody else?” Windy says.

Sloan really wants the roast beef sandwich. But he knows he’d seriously lose points with Tiffany if he takes it. “I’ll have the pork,” Sloan says. “Give Tech Guy here the roast beef.”

“Hold your horses there, pal,” Reynolds says. “I’m a carnivore too and I say I have just as much right to stake claim to that roast beef and ham as you do.”

“But you’re the janitor,” Adams says. “Don’t janitors always bring their own lunch?”

“Not necessarily. In fact, that burger place on the corner is open until one and I had planned to grab a bite from there tonight.”

“How much does a trip to that food cart cost you on average?” Sloan asks.

“I usually get the Mountain Meal.”

“What does that consist of?”

“A Mountain Burger, Fourteener Fries and a large Stardust Soda.”

“Do you buy dessert?”

“Sometimes I’ll get one of those Blueberry Mountain Pocket Pies.”

“Okay, so all together with tax what does that set you back?”

“What difference does any of this make?” Crystal asks.

“What do you mean, what difference does it make?” Sloan says. “It makes an enormous difference. Do you have a Mountain Man Meal Card, Reynolds?”

“Of course, I have a Mountain Man Meal Card,” Reynolds says. Everyone in their right mind has a Mountain Man Meal Card!”

“What is the importance of having a Mountain Man Meal Card?”

“Every eleventh Mountain Man Meal is free. And I mean a burger, fries, and a shake!”

“Look,” Martin says. “No one can get a Mountain Man Meal tonight. Now, let’s finish picking out what everyone wants so we can all eat.”

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and the five installments of my Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!!!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE (2022)-SHOWTIME

The Golden Globe nominations came out this week and to kick off the awards season I thought I would offer up some of the nominees that are available on streaming. Two weeks ago, I talked about the superb miniseries Dahmer–Monster: The Jeffery Dahmer Story which received four Golden Globe nominations including one for Evan Peters for his outstanding performance in the title role. This week I am going to focus on a film like none I have ever seen before. This is a fast paced, complex multi-verse story about a frustrated overworked middle-aged woman named Evelyn Wang (Michelle Yeoh) who runs a laundry mat with her mild-mannered husband Waymond Wang (Ke Huy Quan). They have a grown daughter named Joy (Stephanie Hsu) who Evelyn struggles to understand. And addiding additional stress to their lives is Joy’s grandfather Gong Gong (James Hong) who lives with the Wangs.

The laundry mat is being audited by IRS officer Deirdre Beaubeirdre (Jamie Lee Curtis) a frumpy grouchy woman who scrutinizes every detail about the Wang’s business. When the Wangs arrive at the IRS office for the audit, something unexpected occurs: Evelyn is visited by a different Waymond from another universe of many Evelyn could have lived.

This is a challenging, complex script that is a lot of fun albeit at times a little frenetic and not perhaps as deep as other unique scripts like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Truman Show, Memento or Donnie Darko but well worth the watch for its exploration of a subject rarely shown in film. The movie is nominated for six Golden Globes including Best Picture (Musical or Comedy), Best Actress (Musical or Comedy) for Michelle Yeoh, Best Supporting Actor for Ke Huy Quan, Best Supporting Actress for Jamie Lee Curtis, and Best Director and Best Script for the team of Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert.