Polite Remnants

So somehow I've gotten completely sucked into this show. Could it be the hot soap opera star hostess? The verbally abusive, pop-psychoanalytic trainers? The near-constant crying, during which it's quite visually obvious that this is how Jillian Michaels gets her jollies, as she perches like a gargoyle atop the squat press?

See, and yet I couldn't help screaming at the television when Danny lost 16 pounds last night. Because that's my man, right there.

I have been painting the same room in various sessions and it still isn't done. (So close!)

We had to move in this new desk, which was described to me as "totally NOT heavy at all" but was in fact the heaviest thing ever made in the history of furniture. I'm telling you, someone somehow used science to make it denser than wood could ever possibly be.

We got said desk halfway up the stairs before I somehow got both feet AND my pants caught under it and was verily stuck.

I'm a little bummed because there's this anthology closing at month's end and I was hoping to get a story done for it but there's no way that's happening. There is no time to do anything. At this rate, even just reading I'm averaging two pages of a graphic novel per night. A graphic novel. Mostly pictures!

neon_genocide and no-LJ-Dan are teaching me about wireless networking, so I'm not quite completely a lost cause with the whole technology thing.

There is a turtle puppet at Borders and I want it more than anything in life at the moment. But a voice in the back of my mind says "no more puppets." Or maybe that's Val's voice. Either way, we are sort've turning into puppet people, the way you might think of others as cat people. I'm not ashamed to admit it. (Maybe a little.)

And I'm deliriously tired. That is all.

I have no common sense when it comes to swerving to avoid hitting an animal. Meaning, I know there's those situations where it is better (i.e. safer, less damaging) to avoid running into another car/bridge upright/pedestrian and just plow into whatever's in front of you. I know that, clinically. I just can't help the reflex associated with "CHRIST, LOOKOUT SQUIRREL! *tire screech*"

Keep that in mind.

So there's this road that leads from a main road to our new house, it's a little twisty and windy and in daylight you can see what is actually a very steep ditch that bottoms out into a creek immediately off the road. Okay.

On one of our many trips carrying boxes back and forth over the weekend, I had to stop on this twisty road because a duck was crossing. It's a mallard, and almost as big as a goose. I have always wanted a duck. I fell in love with him instantly.

Clearly, moving near this ditch with this awesome yet slow-moving duck with a penchant for street-crossing is transparent foreshadowing of my inevitable demise.

All our books have been moved into the house, but we're still staying at the apartment for now, so for something to do (that isn't the hard labor of moving) I went to Borders and picked up Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth. It is a thing of nightmares. Also, Batman has Spawn shoulderpads, I don't quite get that.


Me: He didn't look like he was in any hurry.
Val: Yeah but ducks aren't really built for speed. He was bookin' it.

No, not for real.

Though we did go to Atlantic City for slateking's birthday.

AC is a weird place. They have these strange, sort of... I can only describe it as a plastic bubble rickshaw, that you can hire to take you up and down the boardwalk. Also, I swear to god, I got bumped by a tiny little ancient man in a zoot suit at Caesar's Casino. And the hotel rooms are covered in this metallic chartreuse wallpaper, with matching carpet and ceiling. I don't think the town has ever stepped foot beyond the 1970s.

Whiskey comes in shot glasses the size of quarter-pints and you can buy three feet of candied sugar with impunity. The electro-bubbly warbling of half a million slot machines is somewhat maddening. Many of our intrepid explorers won a bit of money, though I didn't get to watch them do so.

I just sold my short story "Self-Possessed" about witchy rock stars and an obsessed fan to The Edge of Propinquity!

I wrote this at Odyssey, in the second half of the workshop, after I got back from that one weekend when I hoofed it to Scranton for a concert (we'd bought the tickets before I found out I was going to Odyssey).

Will post the link once it's up. :)

Well, the Phillies lost the World Series. They had me watching these games but that doesn't mean in any way I'm going back to watching baseball on a regular basis. I think it's more boring than golf. A friend (I forget who) recently qualified this statement by explaining: In golf, at least, you know they're pretty much going to hit the ball every time they swing. Not so, with baseball.

I found a picture once of me, as a kid, circa 1993 before the World Series loss and subsequent league strike completely killed my interest in the sport. Me, in an oversized red Phillies hat and a huge blue sweatshirt (I looked like Yakko Warner, but with pants), getting to walk the astroturf at the ballpark with a bunch of other kids and meet John Kruk back when he still had both his testicles.

Anyway, enough of that. Val's home sick but she ventured out to the comic store today. She's always been a Gothamite at heart and now she's a recent convert to the graphic novels. I'm so proud. Also, I hope this means there's new comics waiting at home. Because I've run out of stuff to read and all my books are already in boxes. Also the sketchbooks. Also the game consoles. Also the movies (except anything Batman-related, per the above).


"That's all we got? One goddamn hit?" "You can't say 'goddamn' on the air." "Don't worry, nobody is listening anyway." -Major League

Here's an article about some of the strangest vampire-hype products available for purchase in this day and age.

Considering the last two items on the list, this is probably not safe for work. The last item? Not safe for anybody.

Val found the article last night in what I assume is her continuing quest to get caught up on Gotham City's recent history and search for things Renee Montoya-related. Meanwhile I'm over at slateking's apartment every Monday night disabling magic traps and failing my fortitude saves (thanks a lot, Death From Massive Damage). By the time I get home she's already asleep, but she usually leaves me a loving note on the coffee table or, in this case, something we can make fun of together on Tuesday.

Also. I just got an e-mail that gave me a link to something called "Operation Citadel," said it was for spies only and if I had received the message in error I should destroy my computer.

Just to be clear, this is what ended up in my yahoo inbox, while my own emails from yahoo groups to which I belong--e-mails from me to myself--go straight to the spam folder.

...is here:

http://everydayweirdness.com/e/20091025/

Enjoy!

Okay, so, except for the fuckfest that was the Eagles/Raiders game, I had a pretty awesome birthday. (Seriously, Eagles, WHAT.)

Drove to Chester County to spend Friday night with my brother and his girlfriend. Came back to Lancaster on Saturday, met up with some family and went to a restaurant inside a brewery for lunch, and showed the folks the new house. Came home with just enough time to see that I sold a story, then hoofed it to vettegirl5's birthday party (for her; October has a lot of birthdays) down near DC. The theme was Logan's Run. Logan's Run! Renew!

Sunday's highlights include pancakes with friends, a pumpkin, a farmer's market, and Val demanding more comic books. She's reading comics now. I'm so proud. The only low points were the Eagles (I am embarrassed for them), and the sushi place messing up our order, but Val is awesome and made them fix it.

And the wild card: Cloris Leachman.

(Eagles! Seriously! WHOSE RESPONSIBLE THIS.)

Just got word that Everyday Weirdness picked up my flash story about customer service and zombie problems. I'll post the link when it's up!

From yesterday...

( Odyssey Online Classes now being offered )

-----
And, from several sources this morning...

( Prime Books Announces Lightspeed, a New Science Fiction Magazine )

Hey--I just found out my second comic (first sold) has hit print in Kaleidotrope #7!

It's the slipstream gag.

Hooverball is a game that was invented for President Hoover to check himself before he wrecked himself. It is much like volleyball and played on a sand court with a net, except instead of a volleyball you're playing with a ten-pound medicine ball.

The trick is to avoid the balls that are flung from the other team's strongest player. Don't be a hero. Unless you're our team's strongest player, in which case I'll just get out of your way.

It was really fun. I mean, we had all four courts to ourselves but stuck to one, eighteen people in the game, nine to a side, but that's because we only had one big soft medicine ball. The other one, a twelve-pound rock that was half the size and twice as dense, sat lurking on the sidelines. Looking at that one, you could almost feel your ribs crack just thinking about catching it.

Cookouts are a post-game necessity.

Are you like me? Do you deal with the day-jobbery? What's your commute look like for you on an average day, not counting zombie roadblocks and Japanese monsters? If you feel like sharing.

This post used to be bitchy, but I feel much better now that the sinuses have stopped causing havoc and I've got something fried and greasy in my stomach.

Now, bring on the pumpkins.

ETA [so this isn't entirely pointless]-- It's been a little while, but I plotted out a new story. Now as soon as I can figure out the structure and starting point, this foray into nasty rumors, poisoned apples, and dismembered fingers can begin.

Here Pat Esden interviews Becca Fitzpatrick about her debut novel, HUSH, HUSH.

The cover of this book (click the link to see) has hypnotized me ever since I saw it floating around the internets a few weeks ago. The composition with the lighting and the legs mirroring the wings and the bloody feathers and the angle of the shot even though the figure is centered, and the title font.... it's just so damn good. And I dig angelology, so I'm really curious about this book.

Thanks to a link from camillealexa, I spent my coffee break drooling over Carl Pearce's illustration work. It's damn good.

Things are progressively busier around here. I need to get back into the habit of making lists.

No matter how many times I watch this it still makes me chuckle. Poor guy!

Very soon I shall be landed gentry.