SHIP'S LOG:

ol' big balloon

Capt. Frank Clarence 2/16/2021 11:09pm

The dry chocolate dessert is an unforgiving mistress, as these settlers know all too well.

When they arrive they're full of bravado, filling the hold with their cheery optimism as we ferry them out to their homesteads.

Then we see them on our supply runs, wearing down, little by little. They put more into their work than they get out of it, trying to grow some kind of life here. But there's a negative ROI. Diminishing returns from the get go.

Eventually, a day comes when we drop out of the dusty brown skies to deliver the mail, and there's no home home. Oh, sometimes we find them, in their dwellings or an outbuilding. Murder suicides. More often than not they just take a walk, out towards the horizon, and never return.

Mostly.

Then there's Herb. Nobody knows how he survives, or thrives, but somehow he keeps on truckin. He's an inspiration to us all, they say. Or at least the inspiration that keeps more settlers coming. Everybody thinks they're gonna be the next Herb.

Trouble is, they're not.

Nobody's like Herb.

Kayze Nichols 1/5/2021 9:36pm

"Here. Try one of these chewcumbers. They're new, and they have a really high chance of being able to grow in this chocolate soil. Go ahead! Crawnch it! Awwww, see? It's got special enzymes that convert that chocolate into pure crawnch. And water. They take a lot of water to grow. We'll probably need to ship in the water from Cynia Station or god knows where to grow enough to become a significant food source. And by then, who knows? Maybe our descendants will have already adapted to this new chocolate-based biology. Oh, hey, want some sweetsalts for that chewcumber? That makes them extra good. Here, try it."

Full Size Grandiose 11/24/2020 10:39pm

I think the piece I'm most proud of is the mudskipper. It just came to me, surfacing out of the chocolate depths of my unconscious. It's in a perfectly smooth field of milk chocolate, climbing up onto the dark chocolate shore. Hopefully this heat won't melt it for a couple of days, before the judges get here. They were very kind to let me create the piece here, in situ, in my chocolate garden. I just feel more inspired in my own space. You don't need a whole ranch like me--plenty of people maintain their own chocolate gardens, after the flood. Even indoors. And anybody can do great work, so long as it's meaningful to them. I guess the folks who ran this ranch just didn't see the beauty after the chocolate moved in, but me, I'd never seen anything so beautiful. This much chocolate, just waiting to be sculpted. Would you like to try a piece? Here it is.

Steven Storm 10/6/2020 11:48pm

Chocolate weather continues to beat down on the coast, with flash flooding expected through the night.

PEMA (Psychic Emergency Management Administration) crews are receiving victims of the chocolate onslaught at designated locations. Meanwhile, consumers are advised to keep their umbrellas in the freezer, and use spray-on vegetable oil, such as PAM™ non-aerosol cooking spray on all exposed surfaces while continuing to go to work and school and keep our economy alive during this completely unexpected turn of weather events.

Who could have possibly foreseen this torrential downpour of chocolate upon our God-ordained, chocolate-despising culture? This is most obviously a coordinated attack against our value supply chain and fundamental way of life.

Resist the Chocolate! Make this world a better place for the chocolate unborn.

Next broadcast in 57 minutes.

Arnold Nougat 8/26/2020 11:52pm

We always knew the heat death would come. The heat death of the Chocolate Warlord.

"Hey! Buddy! Can you help give us a push?"

Dune buggies are stuck in the chocolate sludge. It oozes through the streets, gumming up traffic and dog walkers alike.

"This storm drain goes straight to the river. Is all this melted chocolate safe?"

The Chocolate Warlord was never safe. Not safe to stand against, and not safe to stand in the hot August sun.

But the Chocolate Warlord stood for all of us! He was all of us, figuratively speaking, but also literally speaking for the many who gave up their bonbon individuality to be melted down and become the collective entity which was the Chocolate Warlord.

And yet he left his mark. And continues to leave it, as his melted constituency flows through the town, over sidewalks and asphalt and lawns and the pastures and rivers and finally to the shore. He flows like sweet brown lava over the beach grass and into the sand, and down to kiss the edge of the tide.

The sweet, salty kiss of the tide.

Gladys Pompon 7/17/2020 7:41pm

Has anyone seen that big chocolate giant? I think he’s delicious. Stomping around with those big brown calves of his. Oooooo when he crushes a police car it just gives me the shivers, doesn’t it? He’s so big and tall you can barely get a look beyond that big chocolate chest of his. It’s hard to see his face but I just know he’s handsome, don’t you? I can’t wait till he comes to my house. I know just what I’m going to answer the door in and then I’m going to gobble him up!

Arnold Nougat 6/1/2020 10:40pm

The Chocolate Warlord is a supple giant. The temperature has remained cool enough that, even standing 10 stories tall on a spring day, he does not melt. The rain rolls off him. He marches through the city, the guilty flee before him, and his growing army of fans cheer him on.

"Hey Chocolate Giant! Way to go!"

"Woo hoo Chocolate Giant! Break me off a piece of that!"

"You stomp 'em, Chocolate Giant!"

The"Warlord" part of the name isn't really sticking.

Gladys Pompon 3/21/2020 11:26pm

What is that crashing? Is this what I heard about on the tee-vee? That swooshing and wooshing and crunching of cars? Look! I see it outside my window, in the streetlight in the dark. The mighty ankle, the proud footfall. But the cars and sidewalks are unbroken. Like the giant isn't even there!

Is it a monster, or is it not?

It's certainly large, and makes noises like a crashing train. Yet it's nothing but a great big ghost of a foot. Of a leg. Where is the rest of it? Up in the sky? It sure smells good. Like chocolate.

I wonder what's coming out of its pant leg. Can I eat it? Can I put it in my mouth? I want it. Get it for me. Put it in my mouth.

Arnold Nougat 2/15/2020 2:51pm

SCHEMATICS OF THE CHOCOLATE WARLORD

As individual pieces, mere nuggets of nougat, we were too few, and not bound together tightly enough to overcome our oppressors.

So we took control of the means of production and began to pour great tracts of chocolate, mighty as iron and as large as shipping containers. We shipped these chocolate bones by rail, and assemble them in the shipyard we commandeered.

Now the skeleton of the Chocolate Warlord looms above us, awaiting dark chocolate flesh and uniform.

There is no doubt he will lead us to victory.

Just so long as the temperature stays cool.

Gladys Pompon 1/11/2020 6:58pm

I can see them being delivered to me right now. On a silver platter. This Blimpmates delivery platform is so advanced you can watch a live feed of the delivery from your phone. I love advanced things.

The camera focuses in on the bonbons in the rain, in the dark, on the silver platter. Under the street lights the bonbons look like they’re sweating, but it’s just the raindrops beading up on the mirror glaze.

And there’s my porch, from the sidewalk. They’re coming to my door, knocking, ringing the bell, but I can’t pull my eyes from the phone, waiting for what’s going to come next.