365 Days of Short Stories: Day 27 In the Tomb of Semenses by Frank Belknap Long The memories of an archaeologist’s venture into the mystical tomb of a pharaoh where he falls in love with a mummy and ushers in an Egyptian-themed apocalypse. Rating: 3/5 God, Long can talk. Even for a short

I know you’re excited. You heard there was a sequel to The Abominable Dr. Phibes. I know, it’s very exciting. But here’s the thing: it’s not very good.

If you see this, quote with a picture of you in glasses.

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 27 Behind the White Wall by Eddie C. Bertin A man in a hospital continually calls his wife, who is supposed to be dead, only to realize that he was the voice on the phone that was causing his old self to get jealous and kill her…in the past. Rating: 4/5

The candidate I’m backing for Congress just sent out an email with the typo that she’s running for Congress…in Florida. I live in New York. She’s running in New York. C’mon @effieforcongress.bsky.social

I hurt my back last week, not sure how, then exacerbated it by doing yard work Saturday (it had to be done). Now my back feels fine but the pain has relocated to my hip and FUCKING HURTS. Yes, I’m doing stretches.

the funniest thing about dating a (former) street dude is that whenever I’m annoyed about something, his first response is “you want me to go ‘talk’ to them?” and like I love the energy honey but that’s not how we get that editor to email me back

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 25 Living Waters by Terry Lamsley A vacationer encounters a monster made of polluted water in his rental house, which is dispatche—or not—by a dead professor. Rating: 4/5 Terry Lamsley is a great writer more people should be aware of. His two-volume “Things Seen

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 24 The Dead Hand by Seabury Quinn A severed hand from a dead woman levitates and steals things. Rating: 3/5 I’ve considered buying a larger collection of Quinn’s Jules de Grandin stories so I went back to the one volume I have, The Phantom Fighter from

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 23 The Beast in the Cave by HP Lovecraft A man wanders off from his guided cave tour and encounters a pale ape that he kills. Rating 3/5 A good, concise horror story with a claustrophobic setting that could have been developed a bit more. But it escalates

I worked for three hours tonight, editing a paper to add an additional ~1700 words to it. My character count when I was done was EXACTLY 43,000. I kept adding to the paper all night so I broke the spell, but for a while I had exactly a big number of characters with triple zeros.

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 22 Still Harbor/The Diabolist by Nathan Ballingrud Story 1: A tour around a coastal city of Hell, plagued by pirates, gangsters, and a Leviathan. Story 2: The daughter of a deceased demon summoner releases a demon into a nearby lake, a demon who assimilates the

Is…he trying to convince us not to reelect the current Pope?

Foods I’m planning on making while Meghan is on vacation with her mom: - Chex Mix - shrimp bisque - grocery store steak - hamentashen I do these when she’s away because I make a mess and if I totally flub them it’s not me forcing her to eat my mistake food. Chex Mix aside, that’s always good.

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 21 The Stone of the Witch-Queen by L. Sprague de Camp A soldier steals a magic gem that he tries to sell to a troubled queen, only to be double-crossed and get in a fight with a gorilla. Rating 3/5 I don’t care much for fantasy, and unbeknownst to me this

We’re so used to calling the various tech oligarchs and Trump pigs Bond villains but Eric Adams is unique in that he is the only irl Venture Bros villain.

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 20 The Unpleasantness at Carver House by Carl Jacobi After a car accident, the narrator tells of increasingly odd behaviors of himself, his sister, and visiting men both to his home and at the nearby cemetery. Rating 5/5 This is a great example of a story

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 19 Dread by Clive Barker A philosophy student tortures two others over the course of several days to evoke pure “dread.” Rating: 1/5 Yuck. I read the first volume of Books of Blood last year and thought it was a little better than just OK, then this story

Sum 41? No way! Gimme SUM NACHOS!!!!

I fully agree with this article about how shitty the QR ordering system is at Alamo. I hate using it. I hate how badly it’s built. I hate that three out of the last three orders we placed with it were botched. IT’S NOT THE STAFF’S FAULT. www.indiewire.com/features/com...

I don’t know if anyone else does this, but I dressed up nice today to meet my new podiatrist.

Cemeteries need to have more events.

I keep getting notifications that someone is checking out my LinkedIn profile. It’s always a recruiter from my current company. I don’t know what this means and it’s scary.

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 18 The Inheritance by Denys Val Baker A young woman inherits a house, becomes a shut-in, goes mad, dies. Rating: 1/5 Meh. Not much of a plot, definitely no conflict. Everything worked out for the protagonist who is meant to seem liberated but

Hey! I’m selling a few items from my collection of weird things on eBay. Prices have dropped considerably - that Alice in Wonderland painting is selling elsewhere for $950, you could get it for 2/3 of that. Take a look! ebay.us/m/eD4j6o

I pledged! AND YOU BETTER TOO!

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 17 What Has Sunk May Rise by Inés G. Labarta Three postdoc students, hungry for more working hours, begin to scare off their competition and accidentally commit murder. Rating: 4/5 Crime is fun! In this case it is. Low stakes pranks lead to a man

In expectation of the Duchamp exhibit at the MoMA, this:

365 Days of Short Stories: Day 16 The Repairer of Reputations by Robert Chambers A man is affected by an occult play, The King in Yellow, and loses his mind, attempting to kill his brother to inherit the false title of King of America, a companion to the fictional (or is it?) King in Yellow.

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 15 Another Land Beneath by Claire Fuller Twin adult sisters visit their deceased father’s house in search of a cat, only to find their conceptions of him might be wrong, and the house invites them to stay. Rating: 4/5 A suspenseful ghost story, certainly not

Meghan: People watching the Artemis II flight are saying they’re surprised at how brown the moon looks. Me: Ah, yes, because all the trees died.

Watching an anime where a girl disguises herself to go to a boy’s school where her idol goes and I thought from the description he was a pop idol, but…he’s an amateur high jumper. And in the first episode he quits doing high jump and they treat it like this major crisis.

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 14 Two Returns by Terry Lamsley A retired teacher sees a shadowy, caped man on a train platform, who follows him home—and takes over. Rating 5/5 The Centipede Press collection of Lamsley’s work was a big purchase but I somehow knew it was going to be

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 13 One o’Clock by Charles Nodier A homeless man with epilepsy relates the tale of how his lover died and told him she’d come back as a ghost, which she did but only once. Rating: 1/5 Bleh. Verbose but not much of a narrative. You feel bad for the

Someone needs to do a tally of orphans in anime who wear newsboy caps.

Introducing the new “Curtis Mayfield’s Freddy Status Detector” app. At any time of the day you can activate the app and it will tell you “Freddy’s dead” or “Freddy’s on the corner now.”

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 12 The Aquarium by Carl Jacobi Two women move into a house furnished with a sinister aquarium that contains a shapeshifting mollusk. Rating: 2/5 Not that a shapeshifting mollusk couldn’t be scary. It’s just that this tale dropped a lot of hints about the mollusk

Good Friday!

The incredible urge to skip work tomorrow and lie on the couch and watch a movie with Shemp in it.

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 11 The Sin-Eater by GG Pendarves A satanist transfers his soul to his nephew, whose lover attempts to reclaim it with the help of a neighboring occultist and his cat, Haroon. Rating: 4/5 This reads like a Hammer horror film starring Christopher Lee. In fact,

hmm

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 10 Krantz’s Narrative by Frederick Marryat A sailor tells of his father marrying a werewolf who murders his siblings, only to die himself after the telling. Rating: 4/5 This is taken from Marryat’s novel “The Phantom Ship” and it definitely can stand on its own.

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 9 Funeral at St. Boltoph’s by Reggie Oliver A struggling painter is inspired by a new patron and a visit to a church, but in the end is overcome…by toad people? Rating 2/5 I felt like this was a kind of so-so tale that was well told. I liked all the progress the

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 8 The Eye Above the Mantel by Frank Belknap Long An intellectual discussion is interrupted by a stranger, who shows the narrator a future of white-haired beast men torturing humans on a barred wasteland. Rating: 3/5

Alamo Yonkers showed all three Lord of the Rings extended editions in a row today. It takes 11 hours. No intermission. They definitely, definitely hold up. Spending 11 hours doing anything is a lot but it was a joy.

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 7 The Face in the Mirror by Denys Val Baker A man’s evening is yanked out of his control as he finds himself followed by a creepy little bald man for some unknown, but presumably sinister purpose. Rating: 4/5 Val Baker must have been a champion

365 Days of Short Stories - Day 6 Terror on the Links by Seabury Quinn Supernatural detective Jules de Grandin and Doctor Trowbridge investigate assaults and murders on a golf course by a hulking ape-man hybrid. Rating: 4/5 Supernatural detectives are my jam, I love the intersection of