Current Project, In Haiku

The Unexpected Novel

C. L. Hilbert

"Thousand words," I thought,

And eighty-thousand later,

Still, I am not done

Teddy Roosevelt Was Totally Psychic

Ted Rall on Yahoo! wrote this kickass article about Teddy Roosevelt predicting the crumble of civilization due to a morally and financially corrupt government.

And all I can say is, really? Teddy Roosevelt was AWESOME INCARNATE. He was probably the most awesome dude to ever awesome it up. He's a goddamned American legend. If Teddy Roosevelt and Paul Bunyon got into a fist fight, Teddy Roosevelt would win. Chuck Norris lies away at night, wishing he could be Teddy Roosevelt. The Rapture couldn't come because Teddy Roosevelt wasn't there to invite it in. Jesus is jealous of Teddy Roosevelt because his dad loves Teddy more.

And now we're surprised when it turns out he was actually psychic?

Well, I'm not, Mr. Ted Rall.

I'm not.

The Thing Strikes Again

Today, the Thing--the Thing where I actually get off my ass and start being a productive member of my own LaLa Land--has struck again.

Once upon a time, I painted a whole lot of Steampunk guns for a whole lot of money. I loved it to bits and had a constant influx-outflux thing going on with new guns in new colors and styles and all sorts of awesome things.

And then... And then I didn't.

I got bored. I got distracted. I started other projects and my Steampunk guns got shoved to one dark and omnious corner of this weird room in my house that's not quite an office, but not quite a walk-in closet either.

Well, now I figure that might as well change.

I've got a huge stockpile of gun blanks in the scary extra room. By the end of this week, I hope to have thirty up on Etsy. By the end of next week, I hope to have sold them. I've just got so much stuff in this house, that I don't even know what to do with most of it. So I'm going to paint all of these guns for the fun of it, and then sell them off for $5 each. That's just enough to cover the blanks, the paint, and the gas to the post office. I want these things gone, looking omnious in someone else's awkward corners.

We'll see how it goes. I'll put a couple of coupon codes either here or on Twitter by the end of the week. Give out some free guns, see how that goes.

Writing

I've been watching documentaries on ants lately. Because I'm a geek, I find them facinating. They've got miles of underground tunnels and that whole hive mind thing going on. I kind of want to write a story about ants now, but I have no idea what it would be about.

Or even how to write it, come to think of it.

Seeing as how the ants function as a whole, the story couldn't follow a single ant. There'd be no he or she unless the ants were considering the Queen, because how could they function unless they're moving through the world as an us. So it'd be a pretty interesting situation, trying to navigate through a story that way.

Also, there'd have to be no discriptions of sight in the story. Which means no colors, no light, no things as we tend to see them. Even if an ant could see and process the world with color vision, I don't think it'd care too much. It'd be more focused on the pheromone scent trails of the different brands of workers, the food scents, sounds from nearby and vibrations.

How would you write a story like that? I'd be so alien. I mean, that's sort of the point. An ant doesn't know it's an ant like we know we're humans. And it doesn't rely on sight, so there'd be no physical discriptions beyond passing mentions to chitin and exoskeletons. The story could well revolve entirely around ants and yet seem like Science Fiction.

Cool, right?

Plot though. The ever present stumbling block. Not much requires a great sweeping narrative in the world of ants. I'll have to figure that one out.

Devouring Infants

Soon, I will begin devouring infants again. It's kind of my Thing. These are the infants I intend to consume:

Mystery Babies in the weird plastic bag, Mung Bean's babies, Broccoli babies and a third packet labeled only "Zesty Mix". I can only assume these babies will scream as I chew them. That'd be an interesting change of pace.

But ugh. Planning to eat babies is such a hassel. It means I have to crack out my baby incubator again.

This one isn't my best baby incubator. But the best one is upstairs hiding behind my mirror and I'm too lazy to go up there and stare at it, hope that it'll magically start sprouting babies without my actually needing to do anything, wander away, procrastinate for several months, stare at it again and finally, three months later, actually get to work.

So instead, I just took this one out of the closet, sat it on the coffee table and wrote a blog about it. Oh yeah. I'm totally on the ball.

There's a documentary on the tv talking about "bundles of sperm released into the ocean", though, so at least I'm slightly more normal than that. You'll never catch me releasing sperm into the ocean all bundled up. I am totally in the anti-bundled sperm camp.

...you know, now this post is just kind of sad. I'm going to stop before someone from the government shows up.

Banana Breakfast Bars

So I'm trying to do the whole "eating food" Thing again. Here's a Thing I made this morning to have something quick and filling for breakfast. Making them is not quick, but they're nice like nougat in the fridge and they keep well enough. Put 'em in the freezer, they taste a little like ice cream sammiches.

So here we go.

Banana Breakfast Bars -- 12 servings, 60 calories each

1 of those little single-serving applesauce bowls
2 bananas
2 tablespoons self-rising flour
1 cup Quaker Oats from that big tube-y container that's on the middle shelf in my pantry.
1/4 raisins
1/2 tsp cinnemon
1/2 tsp vanilla

Mash the 'naners up into a paste with the applesauce. Then mix all the rest of it in together until it's a nice smooth consistancy. Spread it out on a baking pan lined with parchment paper so you've got a square of goop in the middle, as even as you can make it. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes or until tosty brown and solid, while doing the Goblin Dance of the Thing.

I won't discribe to you the Goblin Dance of the Thing, for if you do not know it, you are unfit to bake. This is a widly known fact. Mmyep.

Anyway, when it comes out of the oven, I just hack it up with a pizza cutter into 12 peices about the size of the size that they are. I don't know, they don't really resemble anything. You can eat 'em warm if you want, or stick it into the cold place to make it like icecream.

Or, hell, put the whole pan on your head and keep dancing. I don't know. Something.

Daisy May the Vicious

So two weeks ago, my Craigslist trolling finally came to fruition and I arrived home with a vicious, terrifying ball of fluff.

Her name is Daisy May. And she is ferocious.

Supposedly, she's about three weeks old and gathered up with her litter mates in this picture. I adopted her at 4.5 - 5 weeks. She was a rumbly little tumbly on four legs. Aaand she looked only vaguely like this. I suspect this is not actually Daisy May but, in fact, her mother.

Awww, family photo!

I took pictures of her first days here, but they're in a place so safe even I can't find them, so we'll all have to make do with this picture I took just now.


She's about 6 weeks old now and even more vicious. Here, you can see her resting in the strewn entrails of the recently slaughtered Pink Pig. Innit she a precious little killer?

Amazing things

It astounds me how a random collection of unpronouncable letter patterns can convey so much meaning.

Nevertheless.

Sfkmgjdflgjdflgjdfgdfgkldfjkdf!

Message recieved.

You Are Not The God of Food

Chatham food staff are jerks. I went to get sushi at the grill, because they didn't have any at the cafe and the grill wasn't open.

Grill opens at 10:00am. It was 10:00am. I am looking at the clock inside the grill and it reads 10:00am. This is important, because it proves I wasn't being totally unreasonable later.

But as it was only just turning 10:00am, I just chilled out and waited. I figured they'd get around to it once they saw someone outside. But they were busy, so I wandered away. I walked around the block. I went to the bathroom. I walked around the block again.

10:15. The grill still isn't open. So I figure, maybe they forgot someone has a burning desire for sushi. So I stand outside the glass door and peek inside, trying to see if they have sushi in the refrigerators while I wait.

And this old hag bitch walks past the door, glares at me with the fires of hell I'm sure she'd been resurrected from and goes, "Oh, keep your pants on. God. I'll open in a minute."

Excuse me?

You do not talk to me that way. I wouldn't take that shit from my own mother, I am certainly not going to take it from some glorified food demon who doesn't realize that glass doors don't automatically mean soundproof.

1. You are 15 minutes late to open.
2. It's not like I'm going to sprint into the grill and demand food immediately. I just thought it'd be nice to, you know, get into the fucking air conditioning when it's eighty some degrees outside and most of the buildings don't have air conditioning.
3. YOU WORK IN FOOD SERVICE. Try being polite. It's kind of what you get paid for. I mean, I understand it's a hard job. And if I was actually rude to you, by all means, please spit in my food. That's your privilege as a food handler. But you do NOT get to start picking fights before I've even entered the fucking building.

So I smiiiiiled at her, waited until Hagface Food Bitch of the Twenty-Ninth Hell Circle got her keys from under the desk.

And then I walked away.

Screw her. I don't need her stinky sushi. She probably died in it.

I was half way up the hill and she comes out the building after me all, "We're open now," with that tone that actually said, "What the hell are you doing? You waited this long for me to get my bony ancient ass to unlock the door and snark at you while doing it, you might as well be inconvenienced by me some more."

So I ignored her. Which would have been good, except some stupid Chatham girl had to come down the hill, "Excuse me. I think she's calling you."

Yeah, bitch. I realized that. Stop ruining my dramatic exit. (This is why I need to learn sign language. So I could sign "I can't hear you--deaf" at old bitchy people and make them feel really bad for being bitchy)

But I turned around and waved at the lady, smiling. Called, "No, that's okay!" and went away.

Jesus Christ, you are not the god of food. You're a glorified lunch lady. I wish I was one of those actually confrontational people and I could be all, "Your comments are not okay. No one talks to me that way. I am allowed to look calmly through a glass door. I wasn't bothering you."

But, alas, I am not yet Hortense Lee. But one day. One day I will be 80 years old and I will take shit from no one.

Nikola Tesla's Antique Severed Goblin Heads

It must suck to be Nikola Tesla.

Stupid Edison stole all his best ideas.

This is a picture of me being a goblin. I'm holding the severed head of my enemy. I'm sure his wife won't mind.

Antiques Roadshow comes on tonight.

Batman

I wrote a letter to Batman today.

It's finals' week.

That pretty much sums it up.

Tomorrow, I wake up at an ungodly hour to go write multiple essays designed by Satan. Only by the grace of a nameless, intervening God (Batman), were these essays diverted from their original occupant: Thoreau.

I hate Thoreau. I cannot describe to you how much I hate Thoreau. If Thoreau were alive, I would burn down his garage and shit in his pool. I would cut my hair in such a way that it always fell over my left eye and write angry blogs about him. That's how much I hate Thoreau.

Except the final that I take tomorrow won't have Thoreau in it. It'll be about oppressed black people and a whole lot of Faulkner. Faulkner is almost as bad as Thoreau. Almost. Because when I read Thoreau, within five words I want to claw out my eyes and kill myself on the nearest available pointy thing. With Faulkner, I can generally last for about a page before Hate Face kicks in and the villagers run terrified for the hills.

But I wrote a letter to Batman today. I asked him to pull over on his way to Gotham and let the Joker out for a walk. Just enough to set the university aflame or hold a bunch of us hostage. The professor would give us pity-As for being held hostage. I'm pretty sure it's in the handbook.

But then, knowing Chatham, maybe not. They're pretty big on being inconveniently equal. It's an all-girl's school. Someone is always PMSing in Management.

Yesterday, I went to bed at 7:50 pm. I got up at 9:00 am. Then, at 10:40 am, I went back to bed. I think I might have turned into Hortense Lee again without realizing it. She's my 80 year old alter-ego. Normally, she only comes out Monday evenings to bitch vehemently at Antiques Roadshow or when those young whippersnappers don't know how to pay their damn bus fare and sit down.

...I appear to be lying on the couch with an icepack on my chest. Yup. A Hortense Lee kind of day.

Congratulations, self. You just turned 82.

Take Apart Their Nightmares

The first issue of Scape has gone live and I'm in it!

"Take Apart Their Nightmares" is the story of this teenage girl, Sarah, who isn't all that happy with her dad trying to get her married off to a guy that reminds her of a fish. It's also the story of a place very much like London in the 1900s, save for the fact that every night brings the Sweepers--a group of terrifying, inhuman gypsy-creatures who strip the streets of every living thing they find. Nobody goes out after dark. Nobody even dares to peek out from their windows.

Except Sarah, because she's being a rebel. Only, being a rebel gets her caught up with monsters, throws her entire world into chaos and sends her out into the streets at dark.

It's kind of a bildungsroman thing.

Fun Fact: The title came from a lyric in the Tom Waits song "Tango 'Til They're Sore". Which, considering this is YA fiction, I find kind of funny. The song doesn't have much to do with the story, other than I listened to it a lot while writing it. But the lyric is fantastic, yeah?

Read "Take Apart Their Nightmares" and show support!

The Green Death Brick of Spring

So I tried to make a cake. Apparently I'm not much of a baker type person. I took half of a pinapple upside down cake and since I didn't have upsidedown pineapples, I just made the cake. It is possibly the driest, angriest bakery product I have ever tasted.





Just look at it. Its squinty yellow eyes... its little tentacles of death. It hates me.







In Soviet Russia, cakes eat YOU.

Reason #862 why science is awesome

Alright, so this is basically a robot made of jelly. I assume it's mostly in beta tests now as I don't imagine it could go very far tethered with all those wires, but holy crap. Imagine the super spy capabilities inherent in this little dude.

Of course, people being what they are, I can just see this and AI progressing so far that by the time I have kids, they'll think nothing of having a small robotic jelly-pet with its own unique personality. Everything comes down to marketing in the end.

Though, that said, put me down for a dozen. I want a jelly slug robot army. And now, I boldly go off to make cake. Cake first. Jelly slug robot army later. Priorities are important.

Real aliens

I think the most awesome kind of alien would look kind of like this: That's a carnivorous Hawaiian caterpiller. It's made for hugging. Of course, it doesn't really distinguish between hugging and devouring, so that'd be something of a problem if it really was an alien. Mostly, though, it's a tiny alien made for hugging and nomming.