Paper Fruit

I love the H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival. I had an amazing time last year meeting people and watching a ton of movies. This year I had a different sort of amazing time hanging out in the immaculate weather, much of the time on Andrew Fuller’s porch, meeting a few new friends, and doing stuff around Portland. I hardly saw any films at all—just Dunderland, and I’d say 25% of Prince of Darkness, which despite having Victor Wong and Dennis Dun, was so very boring I snoozed through it. And startled awake at one point, spilling an entire cup of water over Nick Mamatas. He was very kind about it, though.

Portland is my very favorite city, and this trip I took advantage of being there. I got some great food, and many great drinks. Eh, at least I’m a giddy drunk! With … forgiving friends.

Picture time! I actually remembered to take some.

First day: Hanging out with Nick, Camille Alexa, and Andrew, hanging out at The Moon and Sixpence (a rockin’ British pub) after the VIP reception. I got to try Deschutes’ The Abyss on tap (pictured!), a beer I wanted to try last year but never got a chance. I got the 2012; Andrew the 2011. They weren’t much different, but I think the 2012 was a little more coffee-tasting.

I like, needed doughnuts the next morning, so I took the Max into town and got some Voodoos at Voodoo Too. I think this is the maple stick I’m holding up so you can see my gross bite. Also you can see their ridiculous Froot Loops doughnut, the classic Voodoo, a Oreo-covered one (BREAKFAST!), and one covered in Chik-o-Stix. Voodoo Doughnuts are so good, the fact they do both raised and cake-style fucking rocks. I didn’t make it through them all, but I brought some home, where they were promptly devoured by my family. They stayed amazingly fresh!

The second day Wendy Wagner joined our little posse, and we saw a reading and then attended the Bizarro panel. Oh, and Nick lifted Scott Nicolay, as you can see. Later we went out for pizza at Sizzle Pie, where we met Barry Graham, he of The Big Click fame and extreme niceness. At first he thought I was Raechel, which goes to prove that people think we are the same person even over the internet.

We dipped through Powell’s to get to a cocktail place Camille likes for “dessert martinis,” and en route I was convinced to get over myself and sign my books. By the time I went back to buy a few things on Monday (Bruce Lee’s Chinese Gung Fu: The Philosophical Art of Self-Denfense, which is also turning out to be so good, though obviously in a different kind of way), they’d turned my book out! Very exciting stuff, I tell you what.

the first of many beers, at the VIP event (with Cameron Pierce and Ross Lockhart)

That second night I fully planned to see, like, something, but the theatres were the temperature of the inside of the sun and packed to the gills. Innsmouth joke! Hilarious. So I dipped out, went to the Moon, and later went to Tony Starlight’s, where I got to hang out with Orrin Grey and Amanda Downum, as well as Miss Wendy, and others.

The final morning I went to brunch, which is apparently a big Portland thing to do, then did my reading with Nick and Camille. We all read from Fungi, so I got to do my Tubby voice. I only cracked up a few times, all after the, I dunno, ionization in the audience changed when they realized it was a story about gross-ass talking cats. I also watched the panel on writing supernatural fiction. Later we went for dinner/cocktails at a vegan bar (!!) called Sweet Hereafter, where I had a boss Bahn Mi and a drink called “The Mature Sour” which I figure I’ll adopt as a nickname. Then we went to another place fore more cocktails and food for those who did not care to eat at Sweet Hereafter (which, btw—the Bahn Mi was 100% totally delicious, but the Buffalo soy curls sammich is the way to go!), and by the time we got back we’d missed everything showing and had to do more hanging out and having fun instead. OH WELL!

Monday morning I felt a little sad, because HPLFF is the only con I get a little sad at the end of, but I made do with having another awesome day. I went to Powell’s, as I mentioned, and grabbed lunch with Cameron Pierce at DC Vegetarian, on the advice of David Agranoff. Then we got a beer and I hopped on the Max to head to the airport. It was a little traumatizing … the Max wasn’t running across the river due to some technical concerns, and while that morning the Tri-Met people had thought it would be done by afternoon, that turned out not to be the case. Thus I cut it very close indeed, getting to my flight, which anyone who knows me knows is like, my number one source of travel anxiety. But, all’s well and whatever.

I had such a good time. People I saw but briefly, and wish I’d seen more: Nick Gucker, Joe Pulver, Mike Davis, Lena and Mike Griffin, the rest of the Bizarros, Wilum Pugmire, Ross Lockhart, and I dunno, everyone else, including the people I saw the most of. At HPLFF pretty much everyone is nice, and clean, and personable, and super-stoked about Lovecraftiana. I always get writerly ideas there, too: Something about Portland, and the festival, and everyone just … recharges my batteries. But today I’m catching up on life stuff, like laundry and whatever, and hanging out in my fucking sweet new Miskatonic University hoodie. OH YEAH:

Bye, Portland. See you again, as soon as I possibly can!

Refrigerator pickling! I’m super-into it these days. I’ve been eating a lot more veggies this way, as they’re already prepped and ready in my fridge. I’ve been a little busier than normal, which means I get tempted to give up nutrition for convenience. But my mom’s been on a healthy eating kick and I’ve been inspired to make sure I don’t fall into unhealthy habits just because I’m strapped for time.

Here’s what I made yesterday. From left to right, there’s do chua (pickled carrots and daikons, like you’d get on a banh mi), dubujangajji (pickled tofu and onions), and mediterranean pickled beets and turnips. It all took about two hours, including cleanup. And now I have plenty of fresh veggies for the week, plus a weeknight meal (the dubujangajji can be thrown over noodles with some of the kimchi I have fermenting in my fridge. But kimchi is its own post!).

Not that this is news to those who are always super-domestic/into heritage kinds of activities, but I have discovered that it is kind of awesome spending just a few bucks on whatever’s cheap at the grocery store and ensuring it doesn’t rot in my fridge if I get lazy some night during the week. Vinegar, salt, and sugar are all cheap, and Ball jars are a one-time purchase (the two shown cost me not four bucks). So anyways, I figured I’d share because these pickles have all turned out awesome. Frankly, I’m not all that into cucumber/dill pickles, but a pickled daikon, or green bean, or cauliflower, that’s good stuff right there. Plus yeah, if cauliflower is cheap, but I don’t feel like cauliflower that week, I can preserve it so that it’s around even after the price has gone up. Pretty tight! Who knew? Except everyone who already does this, I guess.

I need to do a kimchi post because I found THE RECIPE, but that’s fermenting, so maybe next week.

This weekend, I should mention, I’ll be at the H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival, in Portland. Here’s the schedule! The only thing I’m doing, I think, is a reading on Sunday (“Reading 4”) and otherwise I’ll be trotting around to the various films (stoked about Night Breed and Beyond Re-Animator), hanging out, and going around eating myself sick. Should be a good time, and plenty of cool people are attending/participating! If you’re in the area, you should come.

Eden Foods makes that soymilk you see everywhere, the one with the pastoral landscape on it:

(Credit: Photo treatment by Salon)

They also make a ton of other natural foods products, like beans and oil and vinegar and flour and cereal and all kinds of shit. Anyways, they are suing the Obama administration because they don’t want to cover birth control for their employees.

Fuck them. Fuck that shit!

Here’s the Salon.com article where I initially found out about Eden Foods’ conservative agenda. It’s awful:

Eden Foods … says in its filing that the company believes of birth control that “these procedures almost always involve immoral and unnatural practices.” The complaint also says that “Plaintiffs believe that Plan B and ‘ella’ can cause the death of the embryo, which is a person.” (Studies show that neither Plan B nor Ella interfere with fertilization, which is the Catholic definition of the beginning of life, if not the medical one. In other words, not the death of an embryo. Also, at that stage, it’s a zygote, not an embryo — let alone a “person.”) The filing also said that “Plaintiff Eden Foods’ products, methods, and accomplishments are described by critics as: tasteful, nutritious, wholesome, principled, unrivaled, nurturing, pure.”

As if the above wasn’t awful enough, Eden Foods’ CEO is just so goddamn enthusiastic about their taking a wholesome, principled, nurturing stand against women’s health that he called Salon to respond to their article! And comes off as a fundamentalist asshole!

I floated by him the fact that contraceptive coverage is cheaper to pay for than, say, maternity coverage.

Potter replied, “One’s got a little more warmth and fuzziness to it than the other, for crying out loud.”

For crying out loud!

…he opposes “using abortion as birth control, definitely.” But the mandate doesn’t cover abortion, I reminded him, only contraception, and emergency contraception is not abortion.

“It’s a morass,” Potter said. “I’m not an expert in anything. I’m not the pope. I’m in the food business. I’m qualified to have opinions about that and not issues that are purely women’s issues. I am qualified to have an opinion about what health insurance I pay for.”

Morass indeed. Read the whole thing here.

So, yeah, fuck them! Don’t buy their shit, and even more importantly, write them a letter or go say something on their FB page or something.

Obviously lots of natural foods companies are owned by parent corporations that suck, or are shitty in some way, but when they sue to make this country even more goddamn backwards, and then come right out and enthuse about their fundamentalist, religious, conservative ideologies, well. As I said: Fuck them. 

As I snoozed in bed this morning I heard my phone beeping at me, but I ignored it because I’ve had an internet phone for four months now so I have learned to disregard any kind of sound it makes before 8 AM. Eventually, however, the ruckus became so serious that I got up to see what the heck everybody was push-notifying me of. It was important! Go figure. Thus, Lessons were Learned about always keeping my internet phone right by my bed forever and ever and ever because (inhale!):

The Guardian! (I know, what?) One of their columnists, a gentleman by the name of Mr. Damian Walter, held a contest of sorts, the point of which was to find out if indie authors/publishers had, amongst their numbers, “[a] book to rival the magnitude and sheer storytelling bravado of George RR Martin’s A Game of Thrones.”

Cool! Well, what happened?!

 “The brutal truth is that nothing I saw came close.”

Honestly … no surprises there. I have recently gotten in to A Song of Ice and Fire, and it’s the best thing ever. Who knew, except for everybody except me? Since 1996? Anyways, the good news is that Mr. Walter went through 800 or so indie books and thought mine (mine!) was pretty good! Maybe more than pretty good, if I’m honest:

“My favourite novel among these five, however, is A Pretty Mouth by Molly Tanzer. Imagine a history of 19th-century literature where the eldritch weirdness of Poe and Lovecraft had infected the mainstream drawing-room novels of the era … Molly Tanzer is a tremendously clever writer, with a remarkable knack for fusing the grotesque and the comedic. A Pretty Mouth manages the thing that becomes ever harder as the novel grows older. It does something new.”

Uh? Yay! What? OMG!

So, thank you to Damien and congrats to everyone else on the list, you can read the whole thing at the link above. And seriously? I am still kind of in awe. (My face! In The Guardian! And for a great reason!) I’d gibber some more about how awesome this all is, but I gotta go do stuff to my most recent batch of kimchi. Writerly life is glamorous, what can I say?

I’ve been slack on blogging, so I have a few A Pretty Mouth-related things to note here!

First: Tomorrow (2/15) begins a two-week Goodreads discussion about A Pretty Mouth, hosted by The Next Best Book Blog, those kind folks who liked my book and for whom I concocted the Infernal! cocktail. They hosted a giveaway about a month ago, and the participants have (allegedly) been reading my book and coming up with questions for me about the text. You, dear reader, may also participate by signing up for the group and asking your own questions. I can only imagine.

Second: Just look at this crazy thing, courtesy Sam McCanna at Scurvy Ink:

Yes, that is a t-shirt of my book cover! Holy moly. I haven’t seen one in the flesh (cotton jersey?) yet but I’m sure they are going to be awesome. Go buy one and simultaneously support an independent shirt-maker and also rep my book!

Third, and finally: The Arkham Digest, a fine site indeed for those into horror, weird, and interesting media, was kind enough to review A Pretty Mouth, glowingly, and then interview me! The questions were very fun to answer. So, go check it out, and check out the whole site, too. Justin reviews super-interesting books and video games and movies and all that stuff, so it’s worthwhile to put it into your RSS feed.

All right all right. Enough! I must flee. Happy Year of the Snake to you all/Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Denver/Boulder/Colorado Springs/Littleton people! (And others, though less relevantly to this post.) It’s Chinese New Year this weekend, and if you’d like to ring in the Year of the Snake by watching some traditional Chinese lion dance, you’ll have plenty of opportunities. Many different organizations are hosting performances, but Shaolin Hung Mei Kung Fu will be will be lion dancing and doing kung fu demonstrations at the following locations/times:

Friday, Feb 8th: Boulder Restaurants

China Gourmet: 6:00 PM

Lee Yuan: 6:00 PM

Golden Lotus: 6:30-6:45 PM

Spice China: 7:30 PM

Saturday, Feb 9th: Colorado Springs/Denver

Chinese Cultural Institute CNY at the Colorado Springs City Auditorium: 11:00 AM

Denver Chinese School CNY, Paramount Theater, Denver: 2:00 PM

Chinese Student and Scholar Association CNY at the Glen Miller Ballroom, CU, Boulder: 6:30 PM

Sunday, Feb 10th: Denver/Littleton

Empress Seafood Restaurant, Denver: 11:00 AM

Far East Shopping Center, Denver: 12:00 PM

Shoppes at Columbine Valley, Littleton: 3:00 PM

Red Coral Restaurant, Denver: 5:30 PM

For a full listing of Chinese New Year events, check out our calendar! There are performances all throughout February.

Yesterday I saw a bunch of vegans I know online sharing this article, “The 19 Most Annoying Things About Being Vegan,” and it was pretty good for a laugh. It’s sadly true that most vegans I know (including myself) have experienced most it not all of the items on that list, including dealing with the hand-wringing of people who become suddenly concerned with our protein intake, or obviously take some sort of bizarre pleasure in playing “gotcha” by pointing out that abstaining from cheese and meat is (allegedly!) pointless because there’s pig fat in tires and animal by-products in plywood. It’s also an amusingly self-aware article about veganism, for friggin once, since instead of taking the but why do you refuse to think about the screaming of murdered baby pigs and cows you omni asshole tone so rampant in internet articles about veganism, even the “funny” ones, it instead points out that yeah, some of us do miss the taste of cheese sometimes, and yeah, we do laugh at jokes aimed at vegans because we do have a sense of humor, and yeah, while it’s frustrating to be fed plate after plate of grilled veggies at catered events, it’s super-nice of people to ensure there’s a vegan option.

But another reason that Buzzfeed piece made me laugh so much was that last week I saw at least (at least!) fifteen thousand people posting and reposting a Guardian article called, absurdly, “Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa?” Upon seeing it for the first of far-too-many times, I immediately felt my expression becoming frown-cat face because I’ve been vegan for nearly 7 years at this point and I can smell a finger-pointing, smug-but-misinformed locavore article a million miles away. It’s a talent, what can I say?

Anyways, the article starts out with a description of quinoa, a grain-like seed native to South America, and talks about how it’s become increasingly globally popular in recent years because it’s good for you and tastes pretty okay too. It’s also a “credibly nutritious substitute for meat” (reputable nutrition journalists without an obvious bias against vegans would simply call quinoa a “good source of protein”, btw).

It then talks about how the global appetite for quinoa has begun to affect Peru and Bolivia negatively, alleging that farmers in those areas no longer can afford their staple food and are eating less healthy, more processed alternatives. If accurate, this is obviously extremely distressing. I say “if accurate,” as it turns out that NPR ran a similar article in November of last year, but there has been some question about the truth behind some of their claims, which are similar to the concerns raised in the Guardian article. I don’t know for sure which side of the story is true; both sides raise interesting issues. Regardless, this concern for Bolivian and Peruvian farmers is certainly something I’ll be considering when making future food purchases.

Yet, setting aside the core of the article for a moment, I think it’s fascinating that the finger in the Guardian article is pointed directly at vegans. Vegans, it basically says, can you handle the truth that you’re also morally suspect when it comes to making ethical dietary choices?

Yes?

Duh?

Protip: That’s exactly why many of us vegans are vegan in the first place! (Shockingly enough, it’s not just that we hate fun and bacon and also really enjoy being a giant pain in the ass to everyone when traveling or deciding where to go to dinner!) Thus, the finger-pointing (and finger-waggling) the author utilizes to make the various points she’s trying to make beyond the whole quinoa thing that defined the first part of her exposé is kind of … stupid. Like this, for example:

Soya, a foodstuff beloved of the vegan lobby as an alternative to dairy products, is another problematic import, one that drives environmental destruction. Embarrassingly, for those who portray [soy] as a progressive alternative to planet-destroying meat, soya production is now one of the two main causes of deforestation in South America, along with cattle ranching, where vast expanses of forest and grassland have been felled to make way for huge plantations.

What’s actually embarrassing is that even the Guardian, who ran that dumbass article, can’t even stand behind the author’s claims—they have, since publishing the piece, added a footnote to the above quote I cited clarifying that, in their own words, “while soya is found in a variety of health products, the majority of production – 97% according to the UN report of 2006 – is used for animal feed.” Yep, it’s not actually those pesky vegans ruthlessly destroying the rain forest with our appetite for fake bacon bits and plant milks! Because—again, another protip—as vegans, we eat neither the animals fed with soy beans nor do we consume the products of animals fed with soy beans. (We just eat the soy beans. Yum!)

Additionally, the notion that such a small group of people out there—vegans are, I think, less than 2% of the population in the U.S.—could be the ones responsible for this problem is deeply silly. The bias in the Guardian article is so absurd, so obvious, so pointlessly, misguidedly accusatory, that it’s pretty cringe-worthy that this was presented not as an op-ed but as environmental/world news. Because, despite our efforts to vote with our dollars, vegans simply don’t have enough economic clout, enough large-scale buying power, to impact such an enormous change on the world. (The reason there’s ten jillion kinds of plant milk at the natural food store isn’t the vegan clientele—it’s that vegetarians and omnivores also like hemp milk.) While it’s true that I bought one bag of Bob’s Red Mill Quinoa a year and a half ago, and I have genuinely no idea if it’s South American or not … I’m still using it. Compared to, say, Whole Foods’ (omnivorous) salad bar, or the Boulder yuppievore restaurants around here who serve it alongside elk steaks and farm-to-table chicken and whatever else, I’m statistically insignificant. Not that my insignificance excuses my actions—like I said, I’ll be considering this issue whenever I think about buying quinoa in the future—but as a vegan, I simply don’t matter as much as the vastly larger population of rich omnivores who control the market for “health foods.”

Why am I bothering to point out this article’s bias against vegans? Surely the issue as regards farmers in South America is more important? Yes, definitely! And because of that, I feel that it’s important to note that the author’s ridiculous sputtering over those people who make different ethics-based dietary choices than she does is so extreme that she herself gets away from her point, wasting valuable space and time ranting about those troublesome vegans instead of doing actually good investigative journalism on what seems like a major issue. Instead of keeping her focus, her article devolves into an attempted ha-ha about soy, and asparagus, and how locally-raised meat and dairy are so much better for the earth and for humans (though she is just plain wrong about that … at least, so says the extreme leftist vegan propaganda engine called, uh, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.)

Anyways. I guess my overall point is that when it comes to talking about global food markets, shortages, economics, and the ways we can be better people … unless one’s goal is simply to get as many hits and comments as possible, surely focusing on the truth behind what our appetites are doing to the planet and the people living on it—and what we can do to change things for the better—is probably a better way to raise awareness about those issues?

It’s a new year! I intended to do one of those wrap-up posts that everyone does, but it’s already January 2nd so no one cares anymore. Suffice it to say that 2012 was a year of some pretty major ups and downs. On the ups, I published some stuff, including my first book, got an amazing agent which means my novel is now in excellent hands, and became involved with an extremely rewarding (and time-consuming) martial and cultural arts community. On the flip side of things, I lost a beloved parent, and as nothing else even comes close to that in terms of sadness, so that’s all I’ll say on the matter.

In re resolutions, one thing I’ve decided to do in this new year is blog more—but less about myself. To that end I’m going to start both posting my ongoing experiments with mixology, and also review kung fu movies. There’s nothing particularly thematic there, except that I like to mix cocktails and I watch a lot of kung fu movies. I’d love to inspire others to do more of both, so … okay!

But first, some (mildly hypocritical) housekeeping.

First! The Next Best Book Blog is hosting a giveaway plus an author/reader discussion of A Pretty Mouth. Basically you put your name into a hat for a free .mobi copy, then if you win it you read it and all through February I’ll be engaging in discussions/answering questions about the material. So pop on over and see what’s up! This reminds me to remind you that yes, the kindle edition of A Pretty Mouth is available, so tell any of your friends who mentioned being given Amazon gift cards for the holidays!

Next! “Herbert West In Love” is, as I mentioned, available for free along with the entire December edition of the Lovecraft eZine. But! You can also support the amazing work done by the eZine by either purchasing the podcast version of the issue or buying the ebook. I listened to the podcast of my story and it was an interesting experience! I’ve never heard anyone else read my work before.

Finally, I sold a story! “Tantivy” will be appearing in Steve Berman’s anthology Zombies: Shambling Through the Ages, out in 2013 from Prime Books. Mine’s about devious 18th century fops eschewing fox-hunting for hunting zombies. Well, of course it is!

Ho-kay! Now on to stuff not about me!

For Christmas I asked for a bunch of ridiculous wuxia/kung fu DVD sets, and my girl Raechel got me one that includes Vengeance is a Golden Blade, Have Sword Will Travel, The Water Margin, and The Wandering Swordsman.

I began last night with Vengeance is a Golden Blade, because great title. Too bad the title turns out to be misleading, just a bit. The golden blade is actually the MacGuffin of the film, and less the instrument of vengeance. Ah, whatever.

It begins with a bunch of shady fuckers, aka The Vicious Long Brothers, who are pissed at a marginally less-shady fucker and want to ambush/murder him because the Long Brothers provide “protection” for traveling merchants, but they rob their clients. The marginally less-shady fucker also provides protection but, you know, doesn’t rob his clients, so he’s gotten all their business. They are many but he is few, but he has the Golden Dragon Sword so he fights them and they lose and just get more pissed off.

This situation is exacerbated by the fact that the Lead Shady Fucker of the Vicious Long Brothers has been carrying on a longtime affair with the wife of Marginally Less Shady. When Marginally Less Shady finds out about the affair, he tells his wife that because of her philandering she must kill herself. She doesn’t really think this is a particularly great idea (go figure) so instead she poisons Marginally’s eyeballs, temporarily, and he is forced to flee with his toddler-aged daughter Xiaolang. They take refuge with a crazy old herbalist and his son.

Fast forward to 18 years later, Marginally Less Shady is crippled and can’t do kung fu anymore so he has trained Xiaolang in swordplay and taught her that one day she must avenge him with the Hanglong Blade he’s been forging for 18 years, coincidentally. But he won’t tell her who will be the object of said avenging so she mostly hangs out practicing and flirting with the herbalist’s son in the bucolic Chinese countryside.

Then one day she begs to go to town and is allowed to for the first time, whereupon, because of course, she falls unwittingly into her now-a-Madam-of-a-whorehouse mother’s hands. But Madam Mother doesn’t know who Xiaolang is, so she tries to sell her body to a foppish magistrate who saw her doing kung fu against some dudes and was “impressed.” After a narrow escape from worse than death and learning that her mom’s a bitch, Xiaolang is pretty eager to wreak some goddamn havoc, and it’s a good thing too because Mom has realized that Xiaolang is her daughter, Marginally Less Shady is still alive and conveniently close-by, and her lover is still pissed about that shit way back when (even though he is in possession of the Golden Dragon Sword, quizzically). In the end, things get really real in the form of Xiaolang murdering improbable numbers of brigands with a sword, so basically my bread and butter.

I enjoyed the film, but I can’t give Vengeance is a Golden Blade more than 3 1/2 out of 5 stars. The herbalist motif is awesome, and Daughter Avenges Father is a favorite theme of mine … but the film is a bit slower than it needs to be, even for a Shaw Brothers kung fu epic, and the girl who plays Xiaolang isn’t all that great of a martial artist. Like, distractingly not that great. Still, definitely worthwhile!

Happy new year, everyone!

So! Jesse tried all the cocktails that weren’t actually poisonous, and has decided that while he would like to send everyone a book, he must stick by the rules of the contest as stated and pick some winners. So he did. See below.

Jesse’s going to go to the post office on Wednesday, so before Wednesday morning you should email him your mailing address at Jesse(dot)Bullington[nospam]@gmail.com (remove the nospam; put in a dot for the dot, of course). Latecomers will probably be tolerated by him way more than they would if I was in charge, but I’m headed out of town so he has to do all the work.

So here’s what you’ve all been waiting for: Jesse’s “tasting notes,” plus acknowledgment of the winners! Read on….

The Enterprise of Death by Paracelsus: “This is poisonous, so I didn’t try it!”

Will Sherman’s Two Entries: “I didn’t have a dog skull, gay or otherwise (?), so I just didn’t try these. The Grossbart is pretty funny though.”

Awa’s Lament by Bryan Brunner: “This will put hair on the inside of your chest.”

The Soldier and the Witch by Selena Chambers: “My teeth! They might fall out from the sweet, but it’s soooo sweet.”

A Fool’s Gold by Andy R.: “The Herbsaint tames this Yellow Parrot admirably, and the gold dust classes it up!” RUNNER UP!

The Little Death by Matthew C.: “This is pretty good!”  RUNNER UP! 

The Hegel and the Manfried by John Gove: “Nicsh joerb, friend.” Then he fell over.

Crotch Rot by Kirsten Alene and Cameron Pierce: “GRAND PRIZE! Points awarded for filthiness of name, filthiness of color, and the fact that this one was the best tasting drink.”

The Bloody Necromancer by Gina G.: “Grape party! Pretty good.” RUNNER UP! 

The Damned Sailor by Aaron Z.: “Another good cocktail with beer! This one didn’t punk me by exploding when I shook it either; I’m looking at YOU Kirsten Alene and Cameron.” RUNNER UP!

De Bloedig Biesbosch by Raechel D.: “My wife made a cocktail!”

So there you have it. Them. Whatever! I’m literally packing while writing this so Jesse will do a more gracious send-off to this contest later this week. Check his blog for followups. I’ll miss all of you, but keep your eyes peeled—I might pop in as I think the ebook of A Pretty Mouth is imminent (save some dollars, holiday shoppers!) and the Lovecraft eZine people tell me the December issue, featuring my tale “Herbert West in Love” is out on the 21st. Huzzah! Oh god I have so much to do I have to get off the internet.

Hello all of you fine folks who submitted to my Folly of the World giveaway drinks-making contest!

We got many fine-looking submissions and one that is poisonous and thus disqualified, but despite my eagerness to get out my cocktail shaker we may be late in declaring a winner. Jesse contracted some sort of cold and has been drinking Nyquil instead of absinthe despite my recommendation to the contrary, so be patient and some of you will be rewarded!