News with Gary Gnu

Rick Mohr of Camp Horror has accepted a reprint of Of All Evil, previously published at shortestories.com

http://www.newcamphorror.i8.com/

Camp Horror currently has my short story Bloodlines published in their Halloween series, and Of All Evil will be coming up next.

Got some others sent out for submission to print mags, now it's the waiting game, which is more fun than being in a phonebooth and sandpapering the ass of an alligator.

Exorcising the Demons

Over the last few weeks a lot has happened.
The anti-chri... I mean George Dubya Bush has been elected.
Again. I'll refrain from talking about what the next four years will bring, suffice to say that for the first time in my life, I'm wondering whether or not I should just stop giving a shit about any retirement funds or ira's or mutual funds or any thoughts of reaching retirement age. Period. Because I'm beginning to think that a very bad strain of Captain Trips or nuclear winter will prevent it. Meatpuppets. Fucking meatpuppets.
But I digress.

Let's see... what else? Oh... I found out the hard way that it's not a good idea to leave power tools around a vacant house or else someone will see them after they've kicked in the door. And take them. Now I know what you're thinking; no Bob... don't go boobytrapping the place, you'll get sued and the criminal will win.

Too late. There are several large bed-of-nails lying around the possible entrances of a place I'm working on. And believe me... if I see bloody footprints, I will laugh the laugh of the clinically insane and if there's an attempt to sue me, they'll never make trial. Things take place. Accidents happen all the time.
But I digress.

Found out that Free Ride Angie shouldn't be thanked. We don't owe her anything. She is not our savior. She's human. I thought she had the strength, but I was wrong. She's human. She has faults. She fails.

But the story she gave me was the one that had to be told.

What else happened?
Hmm. Saw some ghosts for the first time in my life. I've been over it again and again and again and that's the only explanation I can come up with. Reader's digest version: I was in the cemetery next door to where I live around five o'clock, watching the sun set and saw about fifteen white orbs and one dark grey one. No I didn't shit my pants. No it wasn't even scary. The only way that I can think of accurately describe it is that it was like sitting in a park and watching children play. They were playing with each other out in front of me, not even interested in me, though the grey one kept carving off to the right as if it was trying to show me something - not sure what that was about. I never felt threatened or in danger at all (said the spider to the fly) and sat there for damn near fifteen minutes watching them. I went through the "maybe it's dust in my eye" or "it's only a reflection in my glasses" again and again and again. But each way I turned or even took my glasses off, nothing changed. I haven't read it yet, but I kept thinking of Tom Piccirilli's book title "A Choir of Ill Children" while I was seeing them.
So.. after much evaluation I've come to: a) they were spirit manifestations of some kind. or b) I'm going completely off my fucking rocker... which... let's be clear - is not a distinct possibility.

I'm working on a group of shit now. I tried to narrow it to just two projects and my muse gave me the big ol' FUCK YOU and demanded I write down ideas for some other things. But in the warm-up stretch, I've decided to write a list of shit that's pissing me off as of late:

The motherboards of furnaces that go bad.
Thieves.
The majority of people on the planet.
Distractions.
Any type of board of directors, committee, coalition, association or group.
The majority of people on the planet.
An impossibly busy schedule.
Bills.
The Gas Company.
The majority of people on the planet.
Old fuse boxes.
A morning commute of nothing but talk-show radio, commercials, news and anything else but music.
The majority of people on the planet.
Have I mentioned the majority of people on the planet?

fuck.

Bluebottle Summer

Got the short "Bluebottle Summer" posted at:

http://www.horrorfind.com/fiction-bin/story.cgi

Let the Body Get Cold First

I'm not against Christmas.
Really.
Ask me my thoughts on religion and chances are fairly decent that you'll get something you won't like. Especially if you're among the people who get up early on Sundays to sit on oak picnic benches and listen to interpretations of the Bible.
But the corpse isn't even cold from Halloween yet.
My house hasn't even begun to carry that sweet, caramelized sugar, crispy skinned turkey smell yet.
And here's Santa Claus, sticking his nose-like-a-cherry out already.
FOR FUCK'S SAKE PEOPLE.
Stacks, STACKS I tell you, of catalogs and inserts, and sales sheets stuffed into my mailbox, and newspaper. Can't even watch the frigging evening news without a tv spot for Mermaid Barbie or Christmas Barbie or Crackwhore Barbie during the commercial break.
Can't I just go to my backyard, sacrifice a goat or some other barnyard animal and build a bonfire?

Trick of the Light

I hate the time change.
I mean.
I just.
Fuckin.
Hate it.

I have yet to get a reasonable answer from anyone as to why we do it other than just to piss me off. But regardless, it gets dark really early now, and I had developed a pretty cool routine of going for a walk in the cemetery after dinner - either with Jen and the kids, both kids, or just Carson. It was relaxing, soothing at the end of the day to just go for a walk and look at how the trees had bumped up their colors overnight as fall was creeping in. And lately in my life, unless it involves the Lifetime channel or a day spa, an opportunity at anything even remotely close to “relaxing” or “soothing” is jumped at like Cujo with a Dee Wallace pork chop.

So tonight, with the time change, it got dark ridiculously fast. Like take-the-last-bite-of-my-dinner-and-it’s-dark-out, fast. But I took Carson for a walk anyway, letting him sit up on my shoulders and carrying him. During our brief walk, we saw something black walking along the cornfield. It was medium sized and as best I could tell in the darkness had the same markings as my cat, Edgar, does; black all over, with a wide patch of white in front. And, I might add, my cat Edgar and his uppity cat-sister Poe, were found in the same part of the cemetery as this visitor approached me.

I thought that maybe another of their litter had gotten away and was living in the wild. The way the dark shape moved, it looked as if it was rubbing up against the cornstalks. Or maybe the cats mother.

It went off into the cornfield and I walked a bit further, saw a parked car up ahead, and turned back to go home. After getting back, I talked with Chloe, and then she, Carson and I ALL went for a walk in the cemetery.

Again encountering the dark shape along the edge of the cornfield.

Except this time I had the foresight to bring a flashlight.

Uh huh.

And when I shone the flashlight out in front of me, ‘bout twenty feet away, there was a fat-assed skunk doing the electric slide right in the middle of the asphalt, making some funny little snorting noises and looking like he might get a little pissy if I didn’t stop shining that light in his eyes.

I turned to Chloe. “Run.”

And she did.

And I did.

And Carson, still sitting on top of my shoulders, held onto my hat with pink visegrip hands and bumped around like Smarty Jones’ jockey.

It was a fun little scare, and we all busted out laughing as we were running up the hill. Well, Chloe and I were busting out laughing. Carson was still holding on as tight as he could and staying quiet.

And that was my belated “Happy Halloween.” For a short stretch of walk, I felt like a little kid again.

It was fun getting the hell scared out of you when you didn’t expect it and feeling that adrenaline rush pick you up.

Fun to not give a shit about work or taxes or the mortgage or anything else but living in the moment.

It was fun laughing outside under a dark sky and feeling that last warm day of the year against your skin and wondering what would be coming your way between tonight and the next time you felt a warm breeze in the open air again.

Happy Halloween everyone,
bob