I danced on a Friday when the sky turned black

Sorry I've been so absent. Here's a recent quote from Luke.

"I like violet animals. Like:

-Lions
-Sharks
-Lions
-Bad kangaroos
-Crabs (because they can snap you)"

In other news, we've moved! We're in a delightful spacious half-double in just the right area. I'm busy as fuck but still keeping tabs on y'all.

Prepare to be charmed like a mofo.


Crossposted to The Dead Don't Die.

Well, that was easy.

ETA: ...perhaps ... too easy.

Can anyone recommend a reliable small-run (1000ish) DVD printer? We're looking for the full suite, packaged in keep case with four-color sleeve. I don't imagine cellophane wrapping matters a lot, but I'd like the option.

Who's got some advice, either for or against certain companies? Greg? Lewis? Anybody?

Many thanks.

ETA: Fair to say we're looking for replication, not duplication.

I've reviewed this summer's OMG YOU HAVE TO SEE IT Weta-miracle and all around good-times-flick District 9. Find the review at The Dead Don't Die.

Hint Fiction (as I described it earlier). I have three pieces to send in. Will polish up and shoot off today.

Edit: The deadline is NOT August 15th, but rather August 31st. Tomorrow is the deadline to blog about the project to earn the right to submit one extra piece. Thanks to marcy_italiano for pointing this out.

I love Uncle Buck, anyway.

Instructional videotape. Christian clowns. How to act in a nursing home. "Get permission first." How not to act "intimidating."

Comics colorist Mark Sweeney has "turned up" a poster promoting the EA Games "Stereotypes are Awesome and Groping is Groovy!" contest. You go, EA! It's all in good fun, right?



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Official Trailer: Ace Frehley's Anomaly

The other day I tried to do an impression of RJ's dad doing an impression of Robert Plant singing "Whole Lotta Love" and I ended up sounding just like Ace. Huh.

Hey, writers! Got lots of big ideas but no time to write your big stories?

Why not try Hint Fiction? Robert Swartwood's brainchild recently took a turn as a contest judged finally by Stewart O'Nan (and won, easily, by my extremely talented and handsome friend Mr. Gary Braunbeck), which inspired the upcoming Hint Fiction Anthology!

Hint Fiction is a form in which 25 words or less are used to *hint* at a larger story, to intrigue and inspire thought. The anthology pays $25 per piece and will be published in 2010 by W.W. Norton.

Color me charmed. I think it's hecka cool and I'm hecka doing it. (My first submission will include the word "hecka" thrice, amounting to fully 15% of that story's content.)

Also, if you blog about it between now and August 15th and include the link in your submission email, you get to sub three stories instead of two. Gotcha, suckahs! Money flows to the hos!

Last night Luke was having a particularly hard time getting relaxed for bed. I'm normally a bit of a hard case about him falling asleep by himself, but his antics softened my heart and I lay down with him. I asked him what he was going to dream about, and he said "dinosaur island", which has a volcano. I said I was going to dream about snow, but he insisted that we put our foreheads together so we could both dream about Dinosaur Island; I said we could meet up there and have an adventure.

This morning he woke up bawling, inconsolable, with his knee hurting, all because a T-Rex ate him.

:(

His knee seems to be a serious matter, actually, as he winces terribly whenever he bends it. He took a tumble while running in the laundromat last week. He limped on it for an hour but it really seemed fine since then. I think he re-banged it on the wall in his sleep. He's got some Motrin in him now and he's kicked back watching the original Transformers cartoon. What a trooper.

The pediatrician's going to call me back. There may be an x-ray in our future.

I want to remind everyone about creepinghemlock, a lonely little two-year-old lj account that's going to get more attention from now on. Use it to keep updated on news and deals. Thanks.

Do y'all suppose (or even better, know) whether a hotplate can be relied upon to heat a pot of liquid to 350 degrees? Is that demanding too much from something that I think is intended principally to boil? Would brand matter in this?

Thanks.

I've reviewed recent(ish) foreign horror films DEAD SNOW (Norway) and [REC] (Spain) and examined them specifically as the inverse of the normal trend we have coming out of Hollywood: they are influenced by American cinema to the point of feeling like the same retreads we seem to tire of over here imbued with varying degrees of their own cleverness, but the international flair they're necessarily lent makes them feel downright refreshing.

[REC] is presented as the recovered footage captured by a TV crew during a zombie outbreak late one night in Barcelona. DEAD SNOW is a zombie comedy pastiche set in the gorgeous Norwegian Alps. They're both fine viewing, though DEAD SNOW, I think, earns the rank of classic.

Check out the review at FearZone.com.

This one's good to read aloud (perhaps in that stiff newscaster/flight attendant voice) to anybody around who tolerates such silliness.



From Engrish.com.

Oh, on the note of my avatar today: Luke's gotten into watching Gremlins, and we noticed that Peter Cullen does the voice work for one of the little buggers. We thought it'd be cute to hear all of Gizmo's lines dubbed over in Cullen's (later) trademark bass. For that matter, one character in every movie, even if it doubles the budget to snag this highly-prized actor, should have one Cullen voiceover. This includes new DVD releases of classic films. We'd like to see him re-do all of Mark Hamill's lines in the Star Wars movies, to start.

Now, I love Cheap Trick. I also love me some Transformers, and I am shamelessly excited about the new flick.

Cheap Trick puts up a song for the Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen soundtrack, and it is TERRIBLE, overworked, outdated and impossible to get through. As far as kickass themes go, it is the absolute-zero of FAIL. It's FAILsville.

Check it out behind the cut, if you have some kind of masochistic streak.
( Embedded youtube vid of the track. )

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