Blip

Apathy killed this blog, which is no surprise since its former title was The Indifference Engine.

This post is a blip, a possible sign of life. Stay tuned for more silence.

Huston's Guns to Shape the Future

Awesome Charlie Huston essay on Mulholland Books.

"Along with the future, I also like a good wall I can bang my head against.

It’s a very healthy process, this writing thing."

Demonized

My short story Best Served Cold is included in the horror anthology Demons of the New Year by Estranghero Press.

I know, I know. The anthology's been online for a few months now but I only got around to posting about it now.

And The POC's Fidelis Angela Tan has a two-part review of the anthology which you can read here and here. A sampling of what she has to say about my contribution:

'"Best Served Cold" takes demons, big corporations, and politicians – all one really needs to know of evil – and puts them all together in a creepy (and at the same time funny) read.'

There's also a two-part interview with the anthology's co-editor Karl de Mesa here and here where my contribution gets mentioned.

And I'd be lying if I proclaim that the review and the mention didn't embiggen my heart. And my ego. Heh.

Gordon Goes to Detroit

Noooooooooooooo!!!

"The Detroit Pistons have reached agreement with free-agent guard Ben Gordon(notes) and forward Charlie Villanueva(notes), a source with knowledge of the talks told Yahoo! Sports Wednesday evening."

And your friendly Bulls Blogger rants about it.

There goes my 2010 and beyond scenario (more like dream) with LeBron, Derrick, and Ben leading the Bulls to a number of championships.

Bummer.

Curse Songs

From the backmatter of the second issue of Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie's Phonogram: The Singles Club:

"It's worth stressing that the curse record is a different thing to a true angry break-up obsessive record. Putting on Gentlemen or early Nick Cave and drinking a lot of whiskey while scowling is actually a healing thing. Not nice for anyone else to be around you as you coat yourself with blood and sin, but actually a utilitarian thing for self-repair, an aesthetically-inversed version of white wine, smeared mascara and bawling "I Will Survive". A curse record is the opposite. A curse song, will, in a real way, open old wounds, tearing the stitches you're trying to make hold. A curse song should be avoided at all costs. I have friends who, suffering through the most virulent stages of the curse, abandon entire bands or even genres of music due to the associated poison."


So what are your curse songs?

Designated Drinker

Tally:

1 bottle of Red Horse beer (with one more to go; Red Horse is not my beer of choice but it's the only one in stock in the nearest suking tindahan open at one A.M. I've only had one but I feel like I've downed half a case of San Mig Lite.)
1 Burger Machine cheeseburger (with one more to go)
unknown handfuls of cheese flavored popcorn
x number of shots of vodka (one bottle down and one more to go)
a number of unopened chips (Piattos, Tostillas and some Nagaraya)

Needless to say, I'm a bit smashed. I'm tempted to not check the spelling on this post--or the grammar--but I'll hold off posting this until later this afternoon after I've sobered up and my brain's working again.

Background noise: girls chatting and giggling about stuff, a hiss and a pop of a bottle being opened, ice tinkling on an empty glass followed by pouring liquid, giggles, "putang ina" liberally mentioned, as well as "asshole" (or was it "aso"?). My ears are going to sleep first, I think.

Times like these I wish alcohol could help me and write works of genius like, say, Charles Bukowski but all I can manage is this post.

I'm off to open the last bottle of Red Horse and scarf down the last burger. And then to sleep. Right after I drive home a couple of the people here home, yes. And no, I'm not that drunk to not drive. A sign of my being drunk is when I go off and write a maudlin post about a frakking Tom Waits song or something. But then again, I wrote that the day after, I think. Oh well...

P.S. I inadvertently hit control something which posted this, uh, post, so fuck the spellcheck and the grammar.

The Strain

Filmmaker Guillermo del Toro has a novel out, The Strain, co-written with crime novelist Chuck Hogan.

They have always been here. Vampires. In secret and in darkness. Waiting. Now their time has come.

In one week, Manhattan will be gone. In one month, the country.

In two months--the world.

A Boeing 777 arrives at JFK and is on its way across the tarmac, when it suddenly stops dead. All window shades are pulled down. All lights are out. All communication channels have gone quiet. Crews on the ground are lost for answers, but an alert goes out to the CDC. Dr. Eph Goodweather, head of their Canary project, a rapid-response team that investigates biological threats, gets the call and boards the plane. What he finds makes his blood run cold.

In a pawnshop in Spanish Harlem, a former professor and survivor of the Holocaust named Abraham Setrakian knows something is happening. And he knows the time has come, that a war is brewing . . .

So begins a battle of mammoth proportions as the vampiric virus that has infected New York begins to spill out into the streets. Eph, who is joined by Setrakian and a motley crew of fighters, must now find a way to stop the contagion and save his city--a city that includes his wife and son--before it is too late.


And there's a trailer:



It's another book that I'm sure will test my resolve not to buy until I've halved my backlog of books to read, which currently stands at 40, I think, but I've lost count.

And James Ellroy's Blood's A Rover comes out in September but it's still a long way off so I've plenty of time to cut down my reading pile to a manageable number. I hope.