Entries tagged with politics

Current Mood: disoriented
Current Location: Planum Augustum
Current Music: Simon and Garfunkel, "Bridge Over Troubled Water"

Entry tags:

"And the vision that was planted in my brain still remains..."

I know it's gonna be a goddamn weird day when the first thing I read after crawling (moaning) from bed is an article in The Economist. But, really South Carolina people. Newt Gingrich? Newt fucking Gingrich? That crackpot from the radio? A paragon of Southern white conservative sleaze who's clearly proud of being a paragon of Southern white conservative sleaze. Is anyone actually believing this shit about "open" marriages that he's spouting? But, back to the aforementioned article, I have to quote this bit:

As nuts as it may seem to those of us who belong to smaller, more vulnerable segments of the population, conservatives feel backed into a corner by the broader culture, and they detect in Mr Gingrich's pharisaic diatribes the hopeful will to fight, the promise of punching their way back to uncontested supremacy. That Mr Gingrich is a cartoon of a corrupt demagogue doesn't seem much to matter. Not only do conservatives believe Mr Gingrich feels their pain, they believe he seeks their revenge.

I'm imagining redneck Tea-Partygoers googling pharisaic, because that's a damn fine cup of irony (sorry, Mr. Lynch).

---

Yesterday was pretty much a bust. I wrote a measly 491 words on "The Diamond Friendly," and I think I'm about to shelve it a second time. I could try to explain what's gone wrong, but it would probably amount to a treatise. Having lately read so much dull, flavorless sf, I'd really like to write a bit of sf that, at the very least, can be called neither flavorless nor dull. Thing is, so much of that bad sf I've been reading is bad not because, I suspect, the writers in question are necessarily bad writers. I know that some of them aren't. It's because good sf – especially that of the futuristic variety – requires the author to have a firm grasp of sociology, psychology, linguistics, pop culture, economics, history, politics, and never mind the fields of science and technology relevant to the story at hand (besides sociology and psychology, I mean). You have to know, or at least be able to lay your hands on, all these disparate sources of data if you are to imbue your story with the least jot of authenticity, and then you have to start juggling them, and keep it all in the air while you write (I suppose this is done with the toes, since the hands are occupied), snatching the information you need as you need it. Mixing and matching, splicing and melding.

And here I am, in a crush of deadlines, setting out to write what would be an approximately ten thousand word hardcore "biopunk" (can we please, please, please stop punking?) story, spoken by its interauthor in a quasi-fictional argot I'm devising from a hundred sources for use in the mid 2050s...and...yesterday, I realized I had to step back. I started the story last month, then set it aside. I am going to write this dark, dark story about what

corucia has deftly termed "somajakking." But I don't think I can write it now. Maybe I'm wrong, and by the end of the day I'll have figured it out, how to do this and everything else and not break my brain. I just don't know. A writer knows her life has grown peculiar when she begins to feel guilty about taking the time and energy to, you know, write a short story.

---

I don't like to talk about my infirmities in the blog. I just don't. I think, mostly, because I dislike the inevitable commiseration. "I know just how you feel." That sort of thing. I understand how many human beings find comfort in commiseration, but I don't. Anyway, I'm drifting. Point is, I've had this fucking migraine for eight days, as of today, which beats my old record by three days...and I've been trying to persevere. But I'm starting to slip. The formulation of coherent – never mind artistic – thoughts while this railroad spike is being removed and reinserted into random parts of my skull...I think the appropriate word is maddening. There must be a word for people who can remain articulate while in excruciating fucking pain, but, if so, it escapes me. Or I never learned it. Anyway, please do not commiserate. Mostly, I just wanted this down for the record, so I can remember, some day hence, that I once had an eight-day (or longer) headache.

---

I was going to write about playing too much SW:toR. I was going to write about reading The Dragon Seekers, and how it pains me to revisit the life of Gideon Mantell – the man who, among many other amazing achievements, named the second dinosaur* ever described, Iguanodon (1825) – but died poverty ridden in 1852, as do many paleontologists today. Mantell also discovered and described Hylaeosaurus (1833), the third dinosaur to be described. Instead, I wrote about all that other stuff. And now I have to go try to write that which I am paid to write.

When Evening Calls So Hard,
Aunt Beast

* The term dinosaur was coined in 1842 by Sir Richard Owen.

Current Mood: awash in futility
Current Location: Lau Crater
Current Music: Michael Andrews and Gary Jules, "Mad World"

Entry tags:

"They make no mention of the beauty of decay."

He couldn't make a sentence stand up and be noticed if he put Viagra in the ink.

---

This the the sort of entry people do not like to comment on.

As this journal enters what I expect to be it's final three months as an entity that will be updated daily, my chief regret is that I have always held so much back. And that I have to continue to do so, probably, even now. From the beginning, I wanted this to be a blog where I talked about what it's like for me to be a writer, and, as much as I have been able, I've done that. But there have been many, many times when my hands have been tied by the politics of the industry. That is, I could say something true, true and useful to anyone with thoughts of trying to become a published author. But, as with all other arenas of human endeavor, publishing is ruled by politics, and telling the truth can be detrimental and even suicidal.

All writers lie about writing, and they do it for various reasons. But one reason that writers lie about what it's like to be a writer is their fear of repercussions that could end their career. Same with speaking openly and honestly about the work of other authors. To be able to do this would be immensely useful to anyone with aspirations in entering this shadowy realm. All those naïve wouldbes. But I've never been in a position to do this, to take those risks, and for that I apologize. Looking back, it's among those most valuable insights I could have imparted. I'll have to settle for old, familiar warnings such as Hic sunt dracones or, perhaps more appropriately, Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate.

---

As for my daily activities, writing and not writing and whatnot, the last couple of days that sort of thing has taken a backseat to getting the "teaser" trailer for The Drowning Girl out there. Let me see what I can now recall.

On Wednesday, I wrote 1,018 words on a piece for Sirenia Digest #73 called "Blast the Human Flower." Yeah, a lazy bit of titling, but not an inappropriate bit of titling. It may or may not stay on the finished vignette. I can recall nothing else of significance, or that's especially interesting, about Wednesday. Oh, we finished Season Six of Law and Order: Criminal Intent. How's that?

On Thursday, I awoke to the news that Penguin (Roc/NAL) had made on offer on Blood Oranges, and I spent part of the day discussing that with my agent. Nothing more was written on "Blast the Human Flower." I fucked off and left the house, and Spooky and I ended up at the Trinity Brew Pub, where I indulged in hot wings and beer. I don't often drink alcohol anymore (my meds), but I had a pint of their very excellent Belgian saison, made with a new variety of New Zealand hops. When I do drink beer, I want good beer. Later, Varla – my Sith Assassin – made Level 20.

Yesterday, we went to an early (1 p.m. CaST) matinée of David Fincher's adaptation of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and it's very, very good. Truly. And Trent Reznor deserves another Oscar for the soundtrack. The cover of Bryan Ferry's Is Your Love Strong Enough by How to Destroy Angels in exquisite, and, for that matter, the opening title sequence alone is almost worth the price of admission. No writing again yesterday. I don't think I've been slacking off; just too much anger and depression. Okay. Bullshit, no matter how I feel, I've been slacking off, and it ends today. Last night, I didn't get to sleep until after five a.m., sitting up late reading stories by Michael Shea and a very good piece by Kim Newman, "Another Fish Story." I don't usually care for Newman, but I did like this one.

And that, in a nutshell, is the past three days. Oh, except I've been watching documentaries on the Mars Polar Lander, cosmic collisions, and "ancient astronauts" (I'm ashamed to admit that last one, but sometimes we learn a great deal about good science by watching the crackpots who have no clue when it comes to methodology, reproducible results, outlandish claims, anecdotal evidence, and critical thought). There are some photos from Thursday, below, behind the cut. Oh, I did want to mention that in the next day or two, we'll begin a series of auctions on eBay which will include souvenirs from the shoot back in October and also a copy of The Drowning Girl. I'll announce those as soon as they go up.

Okay. Gotta go write.

Hands Tied,
Aunt Beast

( 5 January 2012 )

Current Mood: not at peace
Current Location: Gemini Scopuli
Current Music: Simon and Garfunkel, "The Only Living Boy in New York"

Entry tags:

"Such are promises."

Cold here in Providence. All day yesterday, the mercury hovered in the twenties Fahrenheit. Today, I am told, we will suffer a balmy 43˚. Only, with wind.

Here I am, still on vacation. Still...vacating?

Not much to be said for yesterday. Oh, I did want to say that the past two nights I've slept 8.5 hours each, for a total of 17 hours. There are entire weeks when I don't sleep 17 hours! To wit, I propose it is writing that gives me insomnia.

But, yesterday. I actually did have to email my agent, regarding the Two Worlds and In Between audiobook that might one day exist, and I sent another email to my editor at Dark Horse (there were replies, and my replies to their replies, this ayem). But yesterday I mostly gamed. Unless I'm forgetting something. I played a LOT of SW:toR, leveling my Sith Inquisitor to 11, and my bounty hunter to 7. I discovered that playing a bounty hunter is a lot of fun. The storyline is very, very good. Actually, I have almost nothing to complain about as regards SW:toR, except a) the silly hop and b) the stagnant technology bullshit. I don't think many people have a proper enough concept of deep time (even on an historical scale) to grasp what 3,500 years means in terms of the evolution of a civilization. All the hand waving and absurd explanations aside, it's lazy design and fear of fan backlash. But yes, otherwise, a grand game.

Ah, hello. My comp copies of New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird (Prime Books) have just arrived. This is the second time an anthology has reprinted my story, "Pickman's Other Model (1929)." In fact, it's the first story in the volume. The story first appeared (outside Sirenia Digest #28, March 2008) in Joshi's Black Wings: New Tales of Lovecraftian Horror (2010; PS Publishing). So, grab a copy. And subscribe to Sirenia Digest. And listen to Brown Bird. All those things, though not necessarily in that order.

Last night, we saw an excellent episode of Doctor Who, "The Girl Who Waited," possibly one of the best episodes I've ever seen. When I finally went to bed, I read from Christopher McGowan's The Dragon Seekers: How an Extraordinary Circle of Fossilists Discovered the Dinosaurs and Paved the Way for Darwin (2001).

Tonight, we go to the Cable Car to see Lars von Trier's Melancholia.
---

And the last U.S. troops have left Iraq, and an illegal act of aggression draws to a close. After nine years and the deaths of almost 4,500 Americans, a number of casualties that pales when compared to the number Iraqi fatalities, a number which is very hard to pin down, but which may be as high as 109,032 deaths, including 66,081 civilian deaths, and a cost to US taxpayers of ~1.9 trillion dollars, and the further sundering of an ancient nation and its antiquities. We call this waste, kittens, the American and Iraqi deaths, and waste is the only true evil in the world. All evil can be reduced to wasteful fucking acts. But our troops are out, even if we're not sure exactly what that means. And isn't this another promise the President has kept? It is. And yes, Kim Jong-il is dead, and so now the world faces the uncertainty of Kim Jong-un, possibly an even greater danger than his father.

Regardless, this is no day of victory, as our soldiers come home. This is not a day of peace, because there is not yet peace in the world. This is a day of shame and disgrace, and a day George W. Bush, Jr. and his cronies should be remembered as war criminals (since we cannot try them as such), and a day we should mourn all those lost, on all sides of this abominably wasteful conflict, which was never about terrorism or democracy, but about profit margins and oil. Let's not even talk about the American vets whom we cannot care for, medically or psychologically, even if "we" wanted to do so. This is a war that has existed, in the main, beyond American consciousness.

Now...Afghanistan.*

Counting,
Aunt Beast

* And if you want to argue with someone over any of this, do it somewhere else.

Current Mood: okay
Current Location: Capri Chasma
Current Music: Hugo Largo, "Grow Wild"

Entry tags:

"You're the nail on the cross."

Yes, weird, wet weather. And here we all are, in the aftermath of this somewhat unusual nor'easter. We're lucky; we didn't lose power, though a lot of Rhode Island did (~20,000 as of 7 ayem this morning; power is being restored). Though, honestly, I don't think I've found it as disturbing as have many who've lived here a long time, who seem to perceive it as a singularly peculiar storm. Maybe, this is simply because I don't know the local weather patterns. It was odd seeing the snow on green leaves, and the wind was very loud, and now the ground is strewn with a carpet of dead green leaves; we got possibly two or three inches of wet snow, almost all of which has now melted. Oh, and the worse thing about this storm? The coining of the obnoxious neologism "snowtober."

And my head is in about seventy-five places at the moment.

Yesterday, I wrote 1,131 words on a new piece, "Latitude 41°21'45.89"N, Longitude 71°29'0.62"W." It's a sort of mad tumble, trip-over-itself style. I'm enjoying it, and trying to resist subjecting the finished story to a "cut up" technique before it appears in the Digest. I'm also fascinated that a piece of erotica can bear a longitude and latitude designation as a title (Harlan did this before me, of course, with "Adrift Just Off the Islets of Langerhans: Latitude 38° 54' N, Longitude 77° 00' 13" W") and now I want to see the human body drawn with lines of both, mathematically precise, that any point on any given body can be pinpointed. All is need is for a model (who will model nude of course), a geographer, and a mathematician to volunteer. Anyway, this is the story Vince will be illustrating this month, by the way. And again, my apologies that this issue, #71, will be so late.

---

Bitter cold is coming tonight. Forecasts of 26˚ Fahrenheit for Providence. I'm thinking a lot about the Occupy Wall Street protesters, and their resolve, and how they have weathered this. How I'm sure various cities hope the cold will end the occupations:

From the ows website:

It's been dumping snow here in NYC all day, high winds and 3 inches of slush on the ground. With the NYPD and FDNY confiscating six generators on Friday and this unprecedented October snow, those occupying Liberty Plaza in downtown NYC are in need of emergency supplies crucial for cold weather survival (and occupation).

Please note the list of winter donation needs provided. I would be there myself if my health allowed. Fuck the career. I would be there if I would be anything more than a burden. So, from a distance, to quote Peter Gabriel, "I will do what I can do." And, of course, we have the horror stories coming out of Oakland and Denver.

---

Heard new Kate Bush last night. The jury is still out. Mother and I are still collating. Also, we watched the first episode of NBC's Grimm, and as I said of Twitter last night, it is almost not awful. Maybe, in time, it will even be...less almost not awful.

I think that's all for now. I almost fell asleep last night reading The Log from the Sea of Cortez (1951). A wonderful book.

Amid Weird Autumn Weather,
Aunt Beast

Current Mood: still wistful
Current Location: Himera Valles
Current Music: His Name is Alive, "How Ghosts Affect Relationships"

Entry tags:

Howard Hughes vs. Paragon Schnitzophonia 2

C'mon, kittens! Sirenia Digest #70! Comments!

Though I'm trying to get more sleep, it's not really working. I did manage to make myself lie down by 3:30 ayem last night. I fall asleep now almost as soon as I do that (and almost any fucking time I do that). But there is in me, I have discovered—having conqured Monsieur Insomnia—a tremendous reluctance to sleep. We're not talking actual hypnophobia. But, see, there are the dreams (last night, I dreamt of being trapped inside the plot of some weird-ass Aliens 5 thing, which I would post here, if I could make sense of the fragments I remember), and then there's the fact that we spend about a third of our lives sleeping, and then there's the dread of waking...it's complicated. And I'm rambling. This will be a hodgepodge of an entry, that's what I'm trying to say, because...well, I can't remember. Why. But it will be.

Yesterday was spent in a mad dash to make a time machine out of a DeLorean DMC-12. We're still waiting to see whether or not we were successful. But we may not know until three weeks ago. But yes, lots of work.

Oh, and I sold reprint rights for "Random Thoughts Before a Fatal Crash" to Subterranean magazine. Not sure which issue it'll be appearing in just yet. By the way, "Random Thoughts Before a Fatal Crash" almost became part of the "Back Pages" section of The Drowning Girl: A Memoir, but Peter Straub pulled my head out of my ass, and for that I am grateful. Just because it's a good piece of fiction relevant to the novel doesn't mean it belongs in the novel. At least not until there's a massive limited-edition hardback (for which there are currently no plans).

A wish to congratulate Holly Black (

blackholly), who will be expanding her short story "The Coldest Girl in Coldtown," one of the few brilliant vampire stories I've read in ages, into a novel for Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. But you can read the whole story on her LJ. Very, very cool. I especially like that it's not just reworking the characters from the short story, but taking another route into that world.

I neglected, yesterday, to say that I think the assassination of President Kennedy was worked into the Mad Men very, very well. Last night, we finished Season Three and began Season Four. Wonderful stuff. Watching the first episode of the fourth season was weird, Thanksgiving 1964, because there's the world when I was about six months old. And it's so much not this world.

Spooky's no-longer-premature Hallowe'en Sale (!!!) in her Etsy shop, Dreaming Squid Dollworks and Sundries—20% off on everything—continues. Only one necklace and a bracelet left (plus paintings and other cool stuff), and who knows when she'll have time to make more. When making a purchase, IF YOU WANT THE SALE PRICE, you need to, at checkout, use the sale code SPOOK. People! Buy cool stuff!

Oh, and I know I said that Spooky would come along and help me catch all the typos in yesterday's first entry. Only, she was busy and never did, and after all that nonsense with the DeLorean time machine, I was too tired to catch more than a few of them. Apologies. I hate being sloppy. But, I was too distracted, after work and a short nap and dinner, and, besides, I was building my first ever male Second Life avatar. He took me two nights to construct, even with Spooky's avatar foo coming to the rescue. He is Alexander Ishmene, and may, or may not, be the "brother" of Ellen "Grendel" Ishmene, which would be a might odd, her being an AI hiding in a cloned body and all.

Also, I will make my official announcement about this month's book of the month tomorrow. But it's Colin Meloy's Wildwood, illustrated by Carson Ellis.

I wish, wish, wish I could be in Manhattan, actually taking part on the Occupy Wall Street protests, but since I can't, I can at least donate pizza money. So can you! Pizza and other much needed supplies. Just go to the Black Phoenix Alchemy Labs webpage for their #occupywallstreet scent, and there are links, pointing to all sorts of ways you can lend your support. Including buying a bottle of #occupywallstreet.

My imaginary children are Carson (daughter) and Winslow (son). Some of us can only afford imaginary children, and are responsible enough not to have children we can't afford to care for and send to college.

Oh, yes! And don't forget to celebrate Columbus Day this weekend by walking into someone's house and telling them you live there. If they won't cooperate, just kill them. In fact, just kill them on general principle. It's worked before.

Current Mood: slow
Current Location: Gigas Sulci
Current Music: R.E.M., "Time After Time (annElise)"

Entry tags:

"Please find my harborcoat."

And here it is the second of Hallowe'en, and on this day one year ago I was in Portland, Oregon, Guest of Honoring for the Lovecraft Film Festival. In fact, on this night a year ago I gave the speech that was recently published in the fifth issue of The Lovecraft Annual. I'm having one of those "How can a year have already come and gone?" days. Then again, since this day two years ago, I've written two novels and...well, a metric-asston of stuff has happened.

Yesterday, I pulled together everything for Sirenia Digest #70. Great cover this month. So, as soon as I have Vince Locke's illustration, it goes out to subscribers (if you are a subscriber). But, yeah, that was work yesterday.

And a there was an email from Gary K. Wolfe that actually managed to make me happy. Kind of scary when that happens. My moments of the happy, I mean. More on this very soon.

It's Sunday, and Sunday is a very good day to order your copy of Two Worlds and In Between: The Best of Me (Volume One) (sorry, the super-snazzy limited sold out long ago, but there's still a few copies of the snazzy trade edition).

And before anyone asks (as if anyone need ask), yes, I support OccupyWallStreet one-hundred percent, and I only hope we see more protests of this magnitude in more cities across the country. "We are unions, students, teachers, veterans, first responders, families, the unemployed and underemployed. We are all races, sexes and creeds. We are the majority. We are the 99 percent. And we will no longer be silent." I wouldn't hasten to add, we are artists.

Last night, we drove up to a four-band show in Pawtucket, at the Met Cafe in the Hope Artiste Village. Well, mostly, we went to see Brown Bird (click for the HEARING OF THE MUSIC), who played second. We are Brown Bird addicts, because they rock. Yes, they do, so don't make that face, you sluggard! But the first band was a group from Chicago, Pillars and Tongues (their Band Camp site), and they, too, were truly amazing. Spooky described them as the lovechild of David Sylvian, Brenden Perry, and Sixteen Horsepower. And Mark Trecka plays the harmonium! Wonderful. Then Brown Bird came on, and I was very confused, until I figured out that strange woman wandering around on stage was, in fact, Morganeve, who's cut all her hair off. Others were also confused. We left after Brown Bird, even though we wanted to see Dark Dark Dark play. But the third band was...bad. And painful. As in, a trumpet (or coronet?) splitting our skulls apart. And the bad clothes. Like, a thousand hipsters dumped into a blender and out popped this bad. Oh, and banana shoes. Let us not forget the hallowed banana shoes. We did discover that by the time we'd left the building, and walked around front and across the street to the parking lot, by then they sounded okay. But, yes, Pillars and Tongues and Brown Bird. If they play near you, SEE THESE BANDS. There are three photos behind the cut:

( 1 October 2010 )

Back home...we watched Mad Men (in Season Three, now), and I read to Spooky from Halloween. Yeah, I'm having another go at reading through an anthology that's reprinted one of my stories, since it's been going fairly well, this odd new habit. Oh, and I've never before been in an anthology that also includes Sir Walter Scott. Anyway, I read her "Ulalume: A Ballad" (including the last stanza, which is usually missing) and Lovecraft's "Hallowe'en in a Suburb," which led to a rather amusing conversation about lemurs, Lemuria, Goethe, and the lemures of Roman mythology. Then she went to sleep, and I read, to myself, Joe Lansdale's extremely effective "On a Dark October."

And that, Kätzchen, was yesterday, give or take.

Car Lagged,
Aunt Beast

Current Mood: angry

Entry tags:

"One day the poor will have nothing left to eat but the rich."

At best, that's the tip of the tip of the iceberg. Wanna get really pissed, read....

OccupyWallStreet.

And here, Chelsea Elliot speaks out. She is makes a point that we're talking about the actions of a few bad cops, and that this is one of the "bad apples."

Myself, I think I'm going to start a "Friends of Tony Baloney" Facebook page.

Current Mood: okay
Current Location: Ceti Mensa
Current Music: Death Cab for Cute, "Someday You Will Be Loved"

Entry tags:

"There on the street are so many possibilities to not be alone."

So, the rains never came. The rains for which we cancelled the trip to Maine. There might have been a shower one night. Every day, the past few days, has been a case of "tomorrow, it's going to rain." And we have sunny days and warm nights. I've wasted an Indian Summer sitting at this fucking machine. Then again, there's so much work to be done, taking the time off truly would have been disastrous ("ill-starred").

We are surrounded by an ocean of words, and virtually no one knows their meanings.

COMMENT, KITTENS!

Yesterday, I began what I hope is a new piece for Sirenia Digest #70 (subscribe!). Currently, it's called "Evensong," and today I'll go back over the 1,134 words I wrote yesterday and see if I can make them a little more melodic, and then try to conjure whether or not the vignette (which it actually is) is leading me anywhere I want to go.

The workload right now has even me amazed. The money's nice. No denying that. But I doubt I'll be able to take more than two or three days off (maybe) until sometime in December.

It's a good thing that, as a small child, I was inoculated against suicide, what with all that talk of hellfire and damnation.

Ah, but two fine gifts yesterday, and thank you, Steven Lubold!

Lee Moyer and I have talking about the cover art for Confessions of a Five-Chambered Heart. He had a great idea for an image from "Dancing with the Eight of Swords," and Bill Schafer has approved it.

There's a lot of shit I'd be blogging about, if I had half the requisite energy. For example, how mass media (televised and print) is largely ignoring the "occupation of Wall Street" and the instances of police brutality associated with it. Officer Tony Baloney, anyone? You know this tune! Sing along!

My bologna has a first name.
It's T O N and Y.
My Bologna has a second name.
It's P U S S Y.
Oh, I'd love to beat him every day,
For spraying girls inside a cage,
Cause we are now a police state from B O L O G N A ! — Anon.

You're a douchebag, Deputy Inspector Tony Baloney. Then again, maybe you give douchebags a bad rep. You're definitely giving the NYPD a bad rep.

I am currently battling a massive resurgence of time displacement. Taking my life back. I managed to get to sleep by three a.m. last night. I'm learning not to fight sleep. The pills are beating back Monsieur Insomnia; now I just have to let them. But yeah, asleep by three ayem, awake at ten ayem. In part, this improvement has followed from the strict adherence to my recently instituted and unflinchingly enforced NO BULLSHIT policy. If it is in my life, and if it turns to bullshit, I make it go away. It is proving an amazingly useful policy for the alleviation of stress of every sort. Three simple words: NOT MY PROBLEM.

And now! Photographs! The first is from Sunday, and the rest from our trip to West Cove on Monday:

( 27 September 2011 )

All Beauty and Truth,
Aunt Beast

Current Mood: okay
Current Location: Amazonis Sulci
Current Music: The Pogues, "The Broad Majestic Shannon"

Entry tags:

"I narrow my eyes like a coin slot, baby."

So, yeah. I'm an asshole about going to the doctor. But so many – likely most – doctors, most of the medical establishment, is predicated on profit and a conveyer-belt mentality, you can sort of see where I'm coming from. The worst part is being commanded by some lesser med tech to do something and do it NOW (but I've gotten exquisitely good at telling them no in a tone that leaves them blinking). Anyway, point is, my doctor here in Providence – not my shrink, but my GP – is actually pretty cool (my shrink's pretty cool, too). And I shouldn't be giving her grief here. She's on the ball, considerate, reasonable, and I've done a whole lot worse. She seems to comprehend the concept of my right to self-determination, even unto death. But I was angry about losing a day of work yesterday, and going to the doctor always freaks me out. Just saying.

I had, last night, a wonderful master plan in my head for this entry. I didn't write it down. It's gone.

And I've just heard confirmation, via @WM3ORG (Twitter), that the "West Memphis Three" have been released. These are people at the courthouse. After eighteen years, Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley, Jr., and Jason Baldwin have been released from prison. Of course, they had to plead guilty (under a precedent that allows a guilty plea while maintaining innocence) to receive suspended sentences. Lots of confusion, since this is happening as I type. But. Still. This has been one of the most horrific and most tragic miscarriages of justice in American history, but, at least, now it's ended. Sort of (this is complicated, and the government of Arkansas has not been redeemed). Yet, how do you return eighteen stolen years to a man? How do you return his youth? But...now it's done.

And now I'm well and truly lost within this entry. Too much perspective and surprise all the fuck at once.

Yesterday, I wrote...nothing. I can rarely write on Doctor Visit Days (DVDs). But I did manage to make corrections to the pages I wrote on Wednesday. And I spoke with my agent (who's fled to Maine to escape the heat of NYC), and we agreed that I'm going to ask that Blood Oranges be published as "Caitlín R. Kiernan writing as K. R. Tierney." Why? Because. Even though it will be known that I wrote the book, and even though it's a fine and fun book, I want it set apart from The Red Tree and The Drowning Girl: A Memoir. Apples and oranges, let's just say. And we come back to that issue of self-determination. Which is really all that needs to be said on that subject. Though, I will answer questions, if you have them.

And that BIG thing about which I cannot speak, which I first mentioned on July 1st, I worked on that too – that marvelous, unbelievable, dizzying thing – though I still can't talk about it. The news will be sent out into the world when the TPTB deem the time right. But you will be happy....

After the doctor, I needed to center myself. So, I went to Rock Star on Thayer Street and had the plugs in my ears swapped from 6 gauge to 4. Actual eyelets! Thank you, Billy. I'll go up to 2 this spring. And yes, there's a photo (Spooky took it this ayem):

Last night, after dinner, there was good RP in Insilico. Grendel (Class V AI), bodyguard to a yakuza boss, had to quietly, politely, calmly convince some Russian wannabe (predictably named Dmitri) that it wasn't a good night for him to die. Be nice, and maybe I'll tell you about her katana. Wink, wink. We read more of The Stand. We watched the last episode of Season Four of Law and Order: Criminal Intent and the first episode of Season Five. And, yes! More Nicole Wallace. Whenever she says "Bobby," I get that flutter in my belly, that good flutter. Oh, if only there were more of their Holmes and Moriarty dance. Anyway, I signed onto Rift just long enough to do the dailies. I read "Anatomy and affinities of large archosauromorphs from the lower Fremouw Formation (Early Triassic) of Antarctica" and "Boremys (Testudines, Baenidae) from the latest Cretaceous and early Paleocene of North Dakota: an 1.1-million-year range extension and an additional K/T survivor." Just before sleep, I read more of Firestorm at Peshtigo: A Town, It's People, and the Deadliest Fire in American History, and, fuck all...

How does anyone do that much shit in one fucking evening? No wonder I woke up exhausted.

Gotta go write. And listen to the news...

Up the road to Glenaveigh,
Aunt Beast

Current Mood: okay
Current Location: Acidalia Plainitia
Current Music: Arcade Fire, "The Well and the Lighthouse"

Entry tags:

"I've been swimming in a sea of anarchy."

Today is Lughnasadh. Unless, of course, you're in the Southern Hemisphere, in which case it's Imbolc. So, may the day be good to you.

Yesterday, I wrote 1,465 words, and finished "The Granting Cabinet," which will appear in Sirenia Digest #68. The story was sent away to Vince Locke to be illustrated. Today, I'll begin laying out the issue. As soon as I have Vince's illustration, I'll get the issue out to subscribers.

In the meanwhile, I'll get back to work on Chapter Five of Blood Oranges.

I have discovered that the ubiquitous "In a world..." has been replaced in the realm of movie synopses by "...begins to suspect that..." Well, at least so far as Netflix synopses are concerned.

And here's a story I found...interesting: "Married Lesbian Couple Rescued 40 Teens from Norway Massacre". What matters here is not that these two women are a married couple, but that their efforts have almost certainly been ignored by the press because they are a lesbian couple. Anyway, I especially liked this paragraph:

The mainstream U.S. media, which loves a hero story almost as much as a tragedy, has been uniformly silent about the lesbian superstars. Instead, you get a gay man, Bruce Bawer, in his self-serving WSJ piece saying how shocked he is to discover his extremist anti-Islam writings are quoted in the extremist anti-Islam writings of a killer.

Yesterday, I read another paper from the May Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, "New occurrences of dinosaur skin of two types (Sauropoda? and Dinosauria indet.) from the Late Jurassic of North America (Mygatt-Moore Quarry, Morrison Formation)."

Last night, we watched Dominic Sena's Season of the Witch. And...this would have been a perfectly enjoyable, fun B-movie if only someone hadn't convinced Nicolas Cage and Ron Perlman that men in the 14th Century were incapable of emoting. Otherwise, the cast is fine. Claire Foy is quite good, in fact. Tippet Studio's climactic demon sequence is disappointing, but serviceable. Again, Season of the Witch is almost a fine little B-movie, and I think we need to acknowledge that there is a place for B movies. Anyway...later, I did two short RP scenes in Rift, one with

stsisyphus and one with

r_darkstorm, and also got our Guardian-side sister Guild, the Hidden Variable, up and running (as a prop, it plays an important roll in the story arc of Watchers of the Unseen, but also provides the advantages of a guild for our Guardian-side characters).

And that was yesterday. And here's the photographic beach porn I promised yesterday:

( 30 July 2011 )

Current Mood: clearly missing the point
Current Location: Cusus Valles
Current Music: Arcade Fire, "Modern Man"

Entry tags:

politics,
war

Okay, I lied.

Osama bin Laden.

And here are my questions, as they pertain to relief and the celebrations and rejoicing in NYC, DC, and all around the nation.

Has this brought us any closer to ending the "war" in Afghanistan? Have we really dealt al-Qaeda some sort of fatal blow? No, on both accounts. More innocent Afghani men, women, and children will die. More American and Non-American soldiers and non-combat personnel will die. We've given al-Qaeda a martyr, another rallying point, and, anyway, Ayman al-Zawahiri will fill the dead man's shoes.

Yes, bin Laden deserved to die. But I don't see the point in celebrating. Nothing's been won. It's no where near over. And, too, another question lingers: If bin Laden's death was so important, and is a benchmark in the "war on terrorism," was it really worth the price of all those lives?

Ask me to celebrate when the war ends.

Current Mood: cooped up
Current Location: Avernus Dorsa
Current Music: The Decemberists, "This Is Why We Fight"

Entry tags:

"Word from the front never came."

Awake until four ayem, and then I slept until noon. Which means enough sleep, more than usual, but I hate waking up this late. At least, though, we are past the part of the year when, even with CaST to help out, the darkness comes so insanely early.

I am choosing not to speak on the subject of Osama bin Laden's death. My thoughts on the matter are complex, and I see no need to burden the internet with them, or to spend an hour writing it all out.

Sunny out there today, sunny and the new leaves glowing brightly under the blue sky.

---

Yesterday, I wrote a very respectable 2,259 words on "The Carnival is Dead and Gone," and thought I'd found THE END. Then, late last night, it occurred to me that I may have sounded entirely the wrong note there at the last. So, the first thing I do today is go back and do a bit of tweaking to the last two or three paragraphs. Also, yesterday, I proofed "The Crimson Alphabet," which will come as a free chapbook with copies of the limited edition of Two Worlds and In Between. I exchanged emails with

kylecassidy about the book trailer for The Drowning Girl: A Memoir. Oh, and there was email from

blackholly, which was a bright spot in the day.

For our Beltane dinner I made a lamb stew, which came out very, very well (I do say so myself), which we had with chicory stout, a freshly baked loaf of pain de campagne, and honey. Afterward, I did a little ritual work at the altar. Nothing fancy. It was a good Beltane, even without a roaring bonfire and what have you.

Later, we watched the latest episode of Fringe, then the second disc of the latest season of Weeds. Never has a series so literally lost direction and gone off wandering nowhere in particular. Truthfully, Weeds should have ended at the end of Season Three. The end of Season Three would have made very good ending. A very important part of telling stories is knowing when you've reached THE END, and not continuing in just because you're being paid to do so. Any story may be stretched out indefinitely; none should.* Anyway, later there was a tiny bit of Rift, and we read more of Under the Poppy.

---

Please have look at the current eBay auctions! Thanks.

---

And here's the second set of photos from Saturday's trip to the Blackstone River Gorge in Massachusetts:

( 30 April 2011, Part 2 )

* In large part, this is why The Dreaming was such an awful idea from the get go. The Sandman said almost everything worth saying, and, after that, it was mostly footnotes. I love reading footnotes, and writing them. Few other people do.

Current Mood: a little better
Current Location: Ceti Chasma
Current Music: Elvis Costello and the Brodsky Quartet, "The First to Leave"

Entry tags:

"I've fallen from your tired embrace. I kiss the air..."

Finally, yesterday, I left the House, and it was a substantial leaving. I had a headache, but I refused to let it keep me inside. After a quick stop at the market and to check the p.o. box, and a stop at the liquor store, we stopped at Wayland Square for coffee and baked goods at The Edge. We walked past Myopic Books and What Cheer Antiques, but didn't go inside. The day was bright and sunny, and though it was cold there was no wind, so it wasn't too terribly unpleasant being out. After coffee, we drove to Benefit Street and parked quite a bit south of the Athenaeum, because I wanted to walk. Most of the Brown and RISD students have gone away for the holidays, and College Hill is wonderfully peaceful.

We spent a couple of hours at the Athenaeum, even though my headache was so bad I couldn't really read. Mostly, I found books I very much wanted to read, and sort of scanned them. There was a paper on Monodon monoceras (the narwhal) in Smithsonian at the Poles: Contributions to International Polar Science Year (2009), on the evolution and morphology of the narwhal's "horn." There was a book on Dogtown, Massachusetts, which intertwined the history of Dogtown with a brutal murder that occurred there in 1984. The was a book on Mary Shelly's Frankenstein and pop culture. But mostly, it was just good to be in the Athenaeum and not at home. And, by the way, if any kind soul would like to gift me with a membership to the Athenaeum, I won't protest. Personally, I think lending privileges ought to be free for local authors teetering on the brink of poverty, but there you go.

Of course, the big news yesterday was that the abominable "don't ask/don't tell" policy was repealed by the Senate. Finally. So, now openly gay men and lesbians are also free to die in the immoral wars America wages across the world. No, I am glad. Truly, and very much so, but it is an odd sort of victory, you must admit.

Last night, some very good, very quiet rp between Molly and Grendel in Insilico. Maybe, someday, all of this will become some sort of short story. Maybe. But probably not. And Spooky and I have reached Level 81.5+ in WoW. By the way, I think the insertion of all sorts of tedious "mini-games" into the new expansion is annoying and dumb as hell, especially that one in Mount Hyjal that's trying to pay homage to the old arcade game Joust. Worst. WoW. Quest. Ever. I wish I could recall the name of the stupid quest, but I can't. I have blotted it from my consciousness.

Today, today is another day off. I may finish a painting, and I may do some housecleaning. Spooky's finishing up a painting. We'll go to the market this evening. On Tuesday, we go to see Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan. And that evening, both

sovay and

readingthedark will be coming down from Boston and Framingham, respectively, so that we can talk over the first three chapters of The Drowning Girl: A Memoir. Maybe the long period of reclusiveness is ending.

I'll be posting a couple of "Year's Best" lists, but not until the year is actually over, or very almost so.

Anyway...time to wrap this up.

Current Mood: okay
Current Location: Memnonia Sulci
Current Music: Rachels, "His Eyes"

Entry tags:

Platypus Vs. Mechaplatypus!

Overcast and dreary here in Providence.

Another very good writing day yesterday. I did 1,670 words on The Drowning Girl. Keeping this book's voice on course is a matter of always having to remind myself that I'm writing a book by a schizophrenic, not a book about a schizophrenic. At any rate, the Word Bank grows.

Nothing spectacular about yesterday. It was just a decent day, and those are always welcome. We lit the fireplace for the first time this year. There was a problem with the oven not lightning, but the repair guy came and fixed it. Spooky made corn muffins to go with the second night of chicken and andouille stew. Lately, I love days strewn with mundane events.

---

Before anyone else gets this wrong, I need to clarify the matter about Rhode Island electing its first independent governor. Lincoln D. Chafee is not a Libertarian, sensu the Libertarian Party. He is a civil libertarian, but that's another thing altogether. I would imagine he's many of the things Libertarians hate. For instance, he opposes eliminating the federal estate tax and, on November 17, 2005, was the only Republican to vote in favor of reinstating the top federal income tax rate of 39.6% on upper-income payers. Moreover, I am not a Libertarian. Moreover, I detest the Libertarian Party and have since college. Were I to categorize myself politically, I'd probably say I'm a far-left leaning Democrat. So, hope we're all clear on that now.

---

I've been playing lots of City of Heroes and Villains lately. Too much really, which is what happens when I'm having too much fun. I'm not so much crazy about the game part of the game, which I find clunky and unnecessarily tedious. What I love is the huge pool of actual roleplayers who know how to, you know, roleplay. But there is one thing that's begun to wear on me, and it came up again last night, for about the umpteenth time (LJ can spell "umpteenth," but not "LJ"?). When I created my character, I wrote some very particular Lovecraftian stuff into her background. What I did not realize was how much CoX players rely on the "Call of Cthlhu" rpg for their understanding of Lovecraft, rather than relying on Lovecraft's actual writing.

The problem with this is that the rpg is drawn from the "Mythos" invented by August Derleth, and not from HPL. Yes, Derleth likely saved Lovecraft from oblivion, but in the process he managed to mangle the basic Cosmicism if HPL's work. I'm not going into all the whys and wherefores right now, though I'm thinking of devoting a post to it later on. I would refer people to Richard L. Tierney's essay, "The Derleth Mythos," only it's pretty much impossible to find****. I'd refer people to S.T. Joshi's The Rise and Fall of the Cthulhu Mythos, only few people are going to take the time to read what is, essentially, an entire book on the problem of what Lovecraft actually wrote vs. how Derleth rewrote Lovecraft, and how it's the revisionist stuff that has embedded itself so deeply in pop culture (including the "Call of Cthulhu" rpg).

But no, you cannot ward off Nyarlathotep with an elder sign, any more than you can fend off a cometary impact with a Hostess Twinkie. No, elder signs are not like Raid to the Old Ones. No, the Lovecraft Mythos (as opposed to Derleth's "Cthulhu Mythos") is not a battle between "good" and "evil," which is, to quote Derleth, "basically similar" to the Christian Mythos. No, the "Elder Gods" (mostly invented by Derleth and successors) are not powers of "good" at war with the "evil" Great Old Ones. And so on, and so forth.

Mostly, it's becoming clear to me (and Joshi points this out in the aforementioned book) that many who utilize various elements from Lovecraft's writing have never actually read Lovecraft. They've come by his "gods" and various entities and elements and fictional texts secondhand, via such wrongheaded sources as "The Call of Cthulhu" rpg or writers who followed Derleth (such as, ugh, Brian Lumley). Now, I can be very naive, I admit, and this comes as a shock to me. And I will not rp pseudo-Lovecraft. It squicks me out. But I love CoX, and pseudo-Lovecraft is everywhere...so...I don't know. Maybe I'll just drop all the HPL elements from Erzsébetta's backstory and steer clear of the silly stuff.

I don't want to be off-putting to other players, almost all of whom I've enjoyed rping with, but also can't, in good conscience, as a writer, Lovecraft devotee and HPL scholar, take part in the propagation of the bastardized ideas I've spent so much energy trying to dispel.

I imagine maybe five people who read this blog will give a give a rat's ass about all this. I just had to vent.

---

Anyhow, donuts and all...

**** My thanks to

jreynolds for pointing out that Tierney's essay is, in fact, online, so it's not hard to find, and you may read it if you so desire.

Current Mood: amazed
Current Location: Moreux Crater Dunes
Current Music: Poe, "Amazed"

Entry tags:

"I try not to listen, yeah, but I hear you."

Cold and clear in Providence. The tree Outside my office window has shed its leaves. Some asshole vandalized both our jack-o'-lanterns. They cut the word "fuck" into one. I wonder if she or he feels that was some grand show of rebellion. Carving "fuck" on a jack-o'-lantern. If so, I'd like to find him or her and offer a lesson, out of pity. Anyway, I fear there will be no pumpkin drop this year. The pumpkin is defaced, and I'm too busy to make the trip to the Saugatucket River.

Sleep was better, thanks to the Sonata I took at 3:30, which allowed me to get to sleep about 5 a.m.

Yesterday, I wrote 1,877 words on The Drowning Girl. Two days down, twenty-eight to go. Since I'm making the 1,500-word-a-day push, I'm going to word bank, like I did the last time I set such a desperate, idiotic goal for myself. How does one word bank? Well, each day I have to write 1,500 words. Whatever I write beyond that goal counts as surplus. Surplus accumulates. For example, the Word Bank has accumulated a surplus of 501 words over the past two days. This surplus protects against the inevitable day when I can't get anything written. A surplus of 1,500 words is a lost day I don't have to worry about quite so much. By the way, while I do approve of writers making themselves write something almost everyday, I do not approve of the sort of thing I'm doing here, and have only resorted to it out of desperation.

A shame, though, that I can't spend the whole month of November on The Drowning Girl. I can only work on it until the 6th. On the 7th, I have to begin work on a longish short story for an sf/f anthology. That's going to take at least two weeks, and then I have to write the contents of Sirenia Digest #60 and get the issue out by the 30th.

My thanks to

kaz_mahoney for pointing me towards Colleen Mondor's review of "As Red As Red," which I might have missed otherwise.

---

I'm trying not to think about the elections. The losses, the wins. I'm so weary of fickle, short-sighted Americans. Because President Obama could not solve all their ills and fix the world in two short years, they're changing course, jumping ship, pretty much insuring the President will be even less effective. Things are still bad two years in; jump ship. The next set of politicians are the ones who will hand you that quick fix. Anyway, here in Rhode Island, we've elected the state's first independent governor. No, not some shit-for-brains teabagger. Lincoln D. Chafee is a former Republican, who broke ranks with the party to endorse Obama, and Obama endorsed his run for governor. So, yeah. Rhode Island remains the contrary state, and it could have been worse. Democrats won all other statewide races in Rhode Island.

---

We have entered the final day of the auction for Study #2 for Yellow. And there are other auctions, and, as always, money's tight. So please have a look. Thanks.

---

I've been reading about Harry Clarke. And sure, Beardsley was an enormous influence on Clarke, but I think Clarke was actually the more talented illustrator. Of course, his true passion was designing stained-glass windows, though he's most often remembered as an illustrator of Edgar Allan Poe. Also, still making my way through the latest Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology (30:5), including "A Miocene ziphiid (Cetacea: Odontoceti) from Calvert Cliffs, Maryland, USA," "The dentary of Suuwassea emilieae (Sauropoda: Diplodocoidea)," and "The postcranial skeleton of the aquatic parareptile Mesosaurus tenuidens from the Gondwanian Permian."

And now, time to stock the word bank.

Current Mood: eldritch
Current Location: Tyrrhena Dorsa
Current Music: Poe, "Haunted"

Entry tags:

"By the hallways in this tiny room, the echoes there..."

A blessed Samhain, and a Happy Halloween.

As it happens, I only got half of what I should have gotten done yesterday done. I made the line edits to "And the Cloud That Took the Form" and "At the Reef." I nailed down the cover image. But then it was late and I had to start getting ready for the Brown reading. So, expect Sirenia Digest #59 tomorrow. It can be the Día de los Muertos issue.

The reading went well last night (photos below). We scored rock-star parking directly across the street from the bookstore. I read "The Ammonite Violin (Murder Ballad No. 4)" and "In the Dreamtime of Lady Resurrection." My thanks to Bob Geake and Barry DeJesu for setting up the reading, and to everyone who came out. It was good to see

catconley again, and to meet Brian Hauser, winner of the Deep One Award for Best Screenplay, for his Cult Flick, at the HPLFF (he also attended my reading in Portland).

On the way home, we got burgers and Quebec fries from Stanley's. I spent the evening playing City of Heroes and Villains, while Spooky played Lord of the Rings Online. I was in bed a little after two, and Spooky read Kelly Link's superb "Monster" to me. I slept, finally, a good seven and a half hours, the best I've managed for some time. Maybe Quebec fries are a good sleep aid. Or maybe it's Kelly Link.

We did not try to attend the annual Iron Pour at the Steel Yard, not after the mess that last year was. I'm just glad we got to attend in '08, before it became The Hip Hipster Thing To Do. Tonight, we'll stay in and have a misplaced Kid Night, with zombie movies, candy, and a fort built of chairs and blankets.

My thanks to the people who commented (and bid) on the painting yesterday. I'll likely start Black Ships Ate the Sky tomorrow, but it won't be auctioned. It will be for me.

We've been enjoying reading banners and signs from yesterday's "Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear" in D.C." I am deeply envious of

sovay, who actually got to attend. I'm hoping the numbers in attendance, far oustripping Glenn Beck's turnout, will be reflected at the polls.

Okay. Gotta work, to earn this Kid Night. Here are the photos from last night:

( Pumpkins and Tentacles )

Current Mood: okay
Current Location: Pityusa Rupes
Current Music: Throwing Muses, "Two Step"

Entry tags:

"See my name on the wall."

I predict a third day of higgledy piggledy.

I have just discovered that I receive messages via LiveJournal. There are, in fact, 64 of them I have never read, because I never knew they existed. I suspect some may go back to 2004, when I made the jump from Blogger to LJ. Why do I need to get messages at LJ (or Facebook, or Twitter)? I have a perfectly good email address? Anyway, if you've written me at LJ and not received a reply, it's because I'm a technological dullard, not because I'm ignoring you.

Yesterday was meant to be a day off. I looked up from finishing my story for The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities (still no title), and realized I'd not left the House for nine days. It just happens. So, we were going to the shore. But as soon as we went Outside, it got cloudy and chilly, and we only made it as far as Newbury Comics, where we got the new Grinderman CD and a comic box of the wrong size. The comic box is because I took all my issues of The Dreaming down off the shelf where I keep books I've written and anthologies I've been in, because I'm probably never going to write comics again, and I needed the shelf space. But this comic book box is enormous, so Spooky's going to store patterns in it, and I'll get a small one later.

I spend a lot of energy trying to avoid politics in my LJ. Why? Because I hate the flamewars that inevitably follow. I thought I'd left that shit behind when I finally escaped the wretched clutches of Usenet. But I commented yesterday, on Facebook and on Twitter, about the Pope's asinine remarks comparing Atheism to Nazism, and, before the day was over, I'd been accused of being anti-Semitic (?!?), and intolerant (?!?), and ignorant of history (?!?). I actually had to tell someone on Facebook to shut up. I'm not sure I've ever told anyone on the web to shut up. At least not in so many words. Anyway, he didn't, so I had to ban him, and I hate doing that shit. I may simply avoid Facebook for a time, since it won't allow me to turn off or screen comments.

Just for the record, I'm not being intolerant by getting angry when someone calls me intolerant for complaining about the intolerance of the Roman Catholic Church (which, by the way, condemns who I am on several levels, and can go fuck itself).

Enough of that crap. I get started, and I'll go on and on. About France's racist decision to ban the wearing of burkas, for example. Or the environmental nightmare caused by planned gadget obsolescence. Or how scary the Teabaggers are becoming.

Speaking of which, I think I've begun to suspect that NIN's Year Zero wasn't so much about Bush's America, as it was a display of prescience on Trent Reznor's part, and the album's really about America after a couple of terms under a Teabagger administration.

But...never mind.

Last night, we watched the remake of The Crazies by director Breck Eisner (produced by George Romero), and starring Timothy Oliphant and Radha Mitchell. I loved it. An amazingly tense and atmospheric film. Very gory, but the gore is handled with wonderful finesse and indirection, making it effective, instead of overwhelming or humorous. The cinematography and score both took me by surprise (in a good way). I never much cared for the original, but the remake is one of the scariest films I've seen in a while. And no, it's not a zombie film, just like Twenty Eight Days Later wasn't a zombie film.

Today, I need to read all the way through this new story that does not yet have a name.

Oh, and my thanks to everyone for the wonderful (and not infuriating) comments to this journal over the last couple of days. I ought to repost a few of them, especially on the subject of science fiction.

Current Mood: dreading the road
Current Location: Ceraunius Tholus
Current Music: Rachel's, "Cypress Branches"

Entry tags:

First we take Manhattan, then we..well...we go to Brooklyn.

1. I made a truly baffling error regarding the population of Haiti yesterday. I said it was about three million, when it's more like ten. I still don't know where I got that figure. Anyway, I'm trying to stay abreast of the events in Haiti, but I think I've seen too much already. It's a level of devastation and personal suffering that our minds can only just begin to comprehend, I think. Also, yesterday I stated that casualties were estimated at somewhere between 100k and 500k. The lower number came from CNN, the larger from the APA. Someone questioned the numbers (which is fair, seeing how I somehow lost seven million Haitians). I just found the following in a CNN article posted bout an hour or so ago: "Precise casualty estimates were impossible to determine. Haitian President Rene Preval said Wednesday that he had heard estimates of up to 50,000 dead but that it was too early to know for sure. The Haitian prime minister said he worries that several hundred thousand people were killed." Truth is, it's going to be a long time before there's a solid estimate, and the true number will not ever be known. I will also say that I have been disappointed with President Obama in several respects— most notably the joke (really, worse than a joke) that he's allowed health-care reform to become through successive compromises. But I have to say, I admire his response to the Haitian disaster.

2. There's not a lot to say about yesterday. I answered email. I bathed and washed my hair. I went to the market with Spooky, and we had leftover chili for dinner.

3. Last night, we watched Pete Docter and Bob Peterson's Up. While I think I liked it more than did

readingthedark (we talked about it this past weekend), it's far from the best Pixar's done. The first fifteen or twenty minutes were marvelous, and would have made a wonderful short. But the rest of the film just sort of careened about, bumping off itself and doing these weird somersaults. In some ways, the film was swamped by the perceived necessity for a clever, action-packed plot. Ratatouille (2007) remains Pixar's masterpiece, the one they have to beat to make a better film than their best.

4. Spooky found a rather nice piece yesterday on Fringe at i09, which I think manages to put its finger on one of the reasons I've come to love the show. Specifically, how Fringe uses bad science and pseudoscience to make real science interesting, how it catches the spirit of real science, and also the spirit of that time before sf was more obsessed with trying to get the science right than conveying wonder and awe at the intricacies of the universe.

5. Before the movie last night, I got in about two good hours of rp in Second Life. I've learned that it works best the smaller the group, so right now it's just me and one other, letting our characters grow, fleshing out backstory, only tentatively making contact with other players. Mostly, it's conversation (which is always the best rp, anyway). Thanks, Melissa. That rough spot in me is being soothed just a little by this.

6. And now I should go. Geoffrey will be here sometime after two, and we need to leave for Brooklyn about 2:30 p.m. (CaST). We're driving to New Haven, then taking the commuter rail into Manhattan, and then the subway to Brooklyn. We hope to be home by four a.m. or so on Saturday morning. See you afterwards.

Current Mood: sure, fine, whatever
Current Location: Dzigai Vallis
Current Music: PJ Harvey, "A Perfect Day Elise"

Entry tags:

"Stranded starfish have no place to hide..."

The insomnia came back last night. I was still wide awake at 4 a.m., when I finally gave up and took Ambien. I think I slept about six hours. I function far better on nine.

Yesterday, when I wasn't busy slamming New Moon, Mormons, and Americans who are more comfortable with a 1.9 trillion dollar war bill for our occupation of Iraq than a 1 trillion dollar bill for health care overhaul...when I wasn't doing all that...mouthing off, so to speak...I was writing. I managed 1,003 words on "Sanderlings" (formerly "Teratophobia").

Roger Ebert's review of New Moon is actually rather priceless. He gives it one star out of four. I was pleased to see that the film currently has only a 4.4 rating at imbd, and that it's not fairing so well over at Rotten Tomatoes, either. Of course, this is mere criticism. The film broke all box office records on Friday, and is likely to break the opening weekend record. So, lots of happy studio execs and queer-hating Mormons getting the last laugh. Tiddley pom.

Truthfully, I think I need to go back to feigning indifference and keeping my social and political ruminations to myself. Because, face it. Yes, I am a fatalist and a pessimist. There's nothing I can do to make much of anything better, and on those rare occasions when I try, I usually only manage to make things worse for myself. For example, yesterday I probably managed to do very little but piss a few people off and discover that an enormous number of folks on Twitter no longer know (or never knew) the definition of irony. The second bit upsets me far more than the former. Anyway, yeah. Less politics and critique. This is your world. I leave you to it. I'll write about my writing, and comment on movies I've seen and books I've read, and post pretty photographs of Rhode Island. The rest I leave to others.

It's cold here in Providence. Truthfully, I wish the snows would come. The cold is less depressing when there's snow. The snow takes away all the sharp edges.

We've begun a new mini-round of eBay auctions. Please have a look, and thank you. Also, a reminder that Subterranean Press has begun taking pre-orders for The Ammonite Violin & Others.

Last night, we suffered through the third extremely dull episode of the reamke of V (it really isn't getting any better), and then watched Adam Green and Joel Moore's Spiral (2007), a surprisingly good little thriller. Frankly, I miss flipping channels. Now, instead of flipping channels looking for something worth watching, we flip through the streamable (new word, I suppose) films at Netflix. Last night, we searched through them for almost an hour before finding Spiral.

And now, more photos from Green Hill. Today is documentation of the "starfish apocalypse." Actually, I was annoyed to discover that by the time we reached that part of the beach most blanketed in dead starfish, we'd evidently tired of photographing them. But this gives you some impression. We must have seen hundreds, which means there were probably thousands. I was thinking about this yesterday, and it occurred to me that we likely were not seeing starfish that had died in a single stranding, but the effects of multiple strandings, maybe many days' worth. After all, it's probable that a portion of the starfish that perish during any given low tide would not be washed out to sea on the next high tide, that, over time, an accumulation would occur. Anyway, yes, photos:

( 18 November 2009, Part 4 )

Current Mood: stoic, sort of
Current Location: Dittaino Valles
Current Music: Arcade Fire, "Wake Up"

Entry tags:

Howard Hughes Contemplates the Next Two Months

Yesterday, I managed to do 1,107 words on "Teratophobia," though the story seems to be going somewhere I'd not expected, and so I'm thinking it may have to be retitled.

And I have some other news, which isn't exactly huge news, but is fairly cool. However, I do not think I am yet at liberty to relay it. Maybe in the next day or two, once my agent says I can.

Mostly, I'm sort of working overtime to stave off a crushing sense of dread, as I contemplate what December and January are going to be like:

December:
* Begin Blood Oranges (working title)
* Write short story for Robert Silverberg tribute anthology (Subterranean Press)
* Write and produce Sirenia Digest #49

January:
* Continue Blood Oranges (working title)
* Write short story for chapbook to accompany the numbered edition of The Ammonite Violin & Others
* Write and produce Sirenia Digest #50

It's daunting, even for someone as productive as I usually am. The good news is, after January, the schedule will lighten up, and I'll "only" have the new novel and Sirenia Digest to worry about.

Better too much work than no work at all.

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My thanks to everyone who voted in last night's poll. Henceforth, I shall only refer to that Palin woman as "Caribou Barbie," whenever I have cause to speak of her in this journal.

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Wednesday night, we watched the final two episodes of Bryan Fuller's Wonderfalls. While it has it's moments and, all in all, I enjoyed the series, Wonderfalls is definitely a distant third to Fuller's truly outstanding (and also canceled) achievements, Dead Like Me (his very best) and Pushing Daisies (his second best).

Last night, we played WoW. Shaharrazad and Suraa in the Plaguelands. Both became exalted with the Argent Dawn, though, secretly Shah despises that order, and sees the AD as a nest of rotten turncoats. Perhaps she plans to work to subvert them from the inside.

And now, seven more photos from Wednesday's trip to Green Hill. I call this one "Sanderlings Installment, with Gull Tracks":

( 18 November 2009, Part 2 )