rbadac (November 28, 2000)Um, hey, nice place you got here.Yeah, uh, I was looking for rbadac-- you know him? He told me he hangs out here a bunch, said I oughta drop by. Saw him Thanksgiving, he came over... my mom was cooking. He's her brother.
We gave him a big plate to take home. You know, some ham and turkey and green bean casserole with the canned onion rings on top, and the rest of the stuffed boiled eggs and celery nobody ever eats. Yeah man, he loves that junk. Mom says he eats crap at his house, Chef Boy-Ar-Dee and like that. Yeah, tell me about it. Good thing we don't have Thanksgiving at *his* house, we'd be having Taco Bell, know what I mean?
Oh hey, I'm Brandon. Nice to meetcha. So, you like, talk about ghost stories, huh? Oh yeah, I've been reading some. S'why I came by. Yeah, rbadac gives me a book of 'em every Christmas. I mean *every* Christmas, too. That's all I get. They're starting to pile up. That's okay, I mean, I wouldn't want him to give me clothes or anything, jeez.
Some of them are pretty cool. Like this Mammoth Book of Ghost Stories 2, it doesn't suck. Buncha stories... like this one, "The Shadowy Escort" by A. M. Burrage, about this guy who wants to write a mystery story, but he needs a gimmick for it, some kind of code, but one that doesn't *look* like a code, right? and this friend of his suggests a deck of cards-- you know, 52 cards, 26 letters in the alphabet, so there's two cards in every pack for each letter, and you can send someone as many packs as you want, just stack them a certain way... anyway, this guy tries it, and the first thing he spells out is MONK LAND, only it's not two words, it's somebody's name, someone he knew once...
And this one, "The Man Who Went Too Far" by E. F. Benson, about a guy who's looking for a kind of revelation in Nature, but he's only looking for the nice stuff in it, he doesn't want to acknowledge the pain. But he insists on exposing himself to this force anyway, so he can become immortal. He believes it's the god Pan, you know, the goat dude? This old lady sees him and kisses him, but then this kid sees him and runs away scared, and he doesn't catch on, you know, that Pan means "all." He finds out, though, big time. Funny, it started out sounding like that other guy rbadac turned me on to, what's his name, Blackwood? It went way somewhere else, though. But Blackwood's cool, too. He did that story, "The Willows," I remember; that rocked. It probably screwed up camping gear sales worse than Blair Witch when it first came out, you think?
There's some other good ones... this Nugent Barker story is offbeat and creepy, that Ambrose Bierce one is funny-- a nasty kind of funny, you know, kinda makes you wonder what a weirdo he must have been; Uncle rbadac gets that way a lot, it's no wonder he can't keep a girlfriend-- then there's a really cool Egyptian story by Margery Lawrence, and a neat old-school style bell-ringing story by A. F. Kidd, and another one by somebody named Vincent O'Sullivan about a guy who sees a house burn down where there isn't a house, and finds a body hanging off a bridge... heck, I could go on and on, I guess. Like this guy, Fitz- James O'Brien-- rbadac says no one ever talks about him hardly, and he's written a lotta great things-- he's got this two volume set of Fitz put out by Doubleday back in 1988 with this killer Introduction-- I wish I could remember who wrote it, it was really awesome-- rbadac wouldn't lend me his other O'Brien book, said there were only 750 copies of it and I wasn't getting my mitts on it unless it was in his will-- I told the old geek the way he smokes he better start drawing one up, and he made a grab for my nose ring and I hadda kick his ass. Heh. It's just family.
There he is. Yo, dac. Mom says Christmas at our house. Call me if you need a ride. Don't bring your guitar, I can't hang with that baby- boomer sing-along mess.
Y'all be cool. Abyssinia.
Brandon
oOo
Adam Walter (November 29, 2000)
Aar biddy goodee bodit. Henkle? Timmon fundy. Tibble.
(Hullo too, ghost-group, from Spike--awalter's infant child.)oOo
Robert Kunath (December 1, 2000)
Well, gee, it's enough to give one hope for the younger generation. I have found that some young 'uns *do* think the tried and true old stories rock. My best friend Dan's wife is a fan of horror/supernatural, and, a few Christmases ago I gave her a copy of _Great Tales of Terror and the Supernatural_. The paper had been off it for about two minutes when it was appropriated by her and Dan's 12- year-old son; he was not parted from it, apparently, for some months, by which time the twig had been well and truly bent. (And let me again thank Goodness for the existence of outstanding, moderately-priced anthologies, without which we would be an endangered species.)Rbadac's nephew seems to have inherited some of uncle's refined tastes-- now maybe he can get rbadac off the Chef Boy-ar-dee.
Robert (who still opens many a can of chili)
oOo
Jonathan Harker (November 29, 2000)
OK, I see Burt Reynolds - a big canoe, and Hell is he angry, we're talking big frowns and chewed cigars - paddling t'wards the Witch. She's skitting across the bayou, carlin' like, fetching an' mumblin' something chronic. "Them folks shouldn't go t' the manor after sundown".Off centre, Keanau, close up of sweat on brow, though he don't smoke none. Burt can't quite see the rumpled linen face in the trees but the disco beat is starting to pulse through the mist....
No, no - hold on! - I got it! - it's Nosferatu meets Good Fellas! Eraserhead meets Bullett?
CB
oOo
woolrich13 (December 3, 2000)
If only rbadac were here, my love & I've grown proficient at cooking Greek food.*frantic knocking at door heard in background*
[Wool (in low aside): Turn off the lights and turn on the kitchen fan NOW. We've hardly enough lamb & spanakopeta for ourselves!]
Heh-heh, must be those pesky Jehovah's Witnesses again. Just ignore them.
*voice in background: No, I saw their cars. I know they're home!!
*television on in the background: Count Magnus and his little pet suddenly resemble two backwoods rednecks: "Thou most assuredly hath a pretty mouth. I wagerest thou squealeth like a swine, I swarth." Keanu appears to be horrified as a tentacle stretches out towards him.
*door latch clicks open, as Praetorius strolls in: I believe the old fellow & the young one are here for dinner. Thought I'd let them in!*
Wool's head sinks to the desk in defeat, as the television audio is heard: "Squealeth, sow, squealeth!"
oOo
rbadac (December 5, 2000)
"Hey, whassup, Wool??? Mmmmmmmmm, I smell spanekopeta!!""Cool, CURSE III: THE DELIVERANCE is on!!!"
r.
ooOoo