"... ... they grew immensely rich, and famous, and my Grandfather was king under the mountain again, and was treated with great reverence by the mortal men, who lived to the south, and were gradually spreading up the running river as far as the valley overshadowed by the Mountain. They built the merry .."
"BRAINS! BRAINS!"
"Ok, Thorin is kinda tedious. We can leave off now. Time to hang up the phone and go to sleep."
"BRAINS BRAINS BRAINS.. THAT'S ALL I GET TO EAT"
"THIS BEING A ZOMBIE IS A DEAD END JOB"
The racous voice of the zombie came very well over the 'phone. Maybe the carnival music background in the recording got filtered out by the 'phone's audio AI.
The talking zombie skull had haunted my workshop for years, smashed in an unwise act three years ago, when the boy was a toddler, and I was suffering from severe lack of sleep. An adult in a household where I had very little control. I still regret snatching the thing from the child, who was using it to bite me; an attempt to engage me in play with their favorite toy I am sure, but it was starting to hurt, and the part of me that could engage, respond in mock fear or appropriate zombie infection play, was hidden far away inside.
Repairing a talking zombie skull
The repaired skull, along with a chocolate bunny (how many kids get zombie skulls for Easter?!), also had a small box with it, with another sound chip, that played back 'The Head Poem'.
I'm sorry I got angry
I guess I lost my head
It really doesn't matter
I'll borrow yours, instead
The process will be simple
and it will not hurt at all
in the meantime you can borrow
my brother's basketball!
I had thought to add a reference to Egis's Saga and the famous Icelandic head poem, but that would have been silly.
More talking boxes
Prior to this Easter time box, a birthday present box: Lovely sliding panel cigar box, with voice chip inside activated by a light sensor, would demand the box be closed again.
Close the box. (deadpan)
Close the box! (insistent)
CLOSE THE BOX! (demanding)
^*36 9!~ arrgh .. AGLPNDch.. YOU GET BACK HERE AND CLOSE THIS BOX RIGHT NOW!
I felt the boy maybe missed the entertainment of my getting all histrionic. And I hear he did, took the box -everywhere-. But, in my haste to send it, I had not disabled the record button, though slightly hidden in there. So of course he pressed it, and the box would not talk anymore. Awk!
Essential. Not there.. yet.
Prior, his voice was lacking affect, almost monotone. Alarming. And quizzing on 'what is wrong?' , 'how is school?', and so on yielded little response. Reading The Hobbit over the 'phone seemed to work, and put him to sleep.
This conversation, where we got up to Thorin, after the zombie soliloquy, he worried when I was going to get there. There was real worry in his voice. How to explain quarantine and vaccine restrictions?
But most of all, which of these biomes, the hyper-urban New York Village vs the suburban-rural agrarian, which will thrive in the coming years? And in which will I thrive? And in which the Boy?
