As we noted on SFAW last week, April will be Dracula month in Dublin as the whole city turns into a giant book club. What I hadn’t quite twigged until I got here is that one of the major sponsors of the event is the Irish Blood Transfusion Service. Of course they are.
Weird
I Iz Virtual
You find out all sorts of strange things on teh intrawebs. The comments on this post are quite amusing. Apparently I am not a real person, but actually a sock puppet for some huge, multi-national media conglomerate. I guess that makes Pádraig Rupert Murdoch. Or maybe Alan Moore is secretly Rupert Murdoch. I lose track.
From the Depths of Time, They Come
How long have our cephalopod masters ruled the Earth? Apparently at least 95 million years. Of course, as the article points out, octopus fossils do not form easily. And that means that something that appears to be an octopus fossil is not necessarily complete, and might in fact be something else entirely…
Lovestruck Robot Kidnaps Girl
Hat tip to Tero on this one. Some of the things that go on in Japan are seriously weird.
Teach The (Tentacle) Controversy
From The Onion (where else?):
ARKHAM, MA—Arguing that students should return to the fundamentals taught in the Pnakotic Manuscripts and the Necronomicon in order to develop the skills they need to be driven to the very edge of sanity, Arkham school board member Charles West continued to advance his pro-madness agenda at the district’s monthly meeting Tuesday.
Funniest thing I have read in ages. Lots more here. Do not drink while reading.
Entertainment for Today
Watching a Twitter conversation between Neil and what appear to be some SEO advocates who think that he needs their help to become better known online.
Love Those Fishmen
Ganked shamelessly from Chris Roberson, a lovely little music video for one the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society‘s filked carols, “It’s Beginning to Look A Lot Like Fish-Men” (from the album, A Very Scary Solstice). Don’t forget to take a sanity roll after watching.
Sun Takes on Onion
British tabloids are odd beasts. Mostly they specialize in football (soccer), naked boobies and casual bigotry (especially racism and homophobia). They do not generally publish articles about people like Bat Boy. But maybe all that is about to change. Today The Sun published a story that is suspiciously Onion-like. It tells about how someone studying the floor of the Atlantic on Google Ocean found what scientists now believe to be the remains of the city of Atlantis, and it comes complete with commentary from a “top philosopher” called Plato who is apparently an expert on the lost city.
This discovery is credited to one Bernie Bamford, 36, of Chester, an aeronautical engineer. Mr. Bamford told The Sun:
It looks like an aerial map of Milton Keynes. It must be man-made.
From which I believe that a follow-up article is planned, because everyone knows that Milton Keynes is not man-made. It was built by demons and fish-men at the behest of tentacled beings from beyond the stars.
Loving the Onion
Another classic piece of investigative journalism from my favorite newspaper. This, in which President Obama is appalled that members of his cabinet fail to recognize references from classics of world literature. Take a bow, Roy Thomas.
Scarily I’ve already seen one blog post apparently taking this seriously.
In The Drink Tank
Where are The Pogues when you need them?
No, seriously, not that drink tank, The Drink Tank, the famous Hugo-nominated Chris Garcia fanzine of that name. I have an article in it. And you can find the issue on eFanzines.com.
Taral Wayne tells me that he doesn’t do girl dinosaurs with big boobies, and that I should try Marc Schirmeister instead.
Dill Pickle Deadly?
A few years ago I wrote an April Fool post about a vast conspiracy involving orbital mind control lasers, corn syrup and dill pickle. But corn syrup really is all-pervasive in American food. And according to the Washington Post a whole lot of it is contaminated with mercury. That’s not good at all.
(Hat tip to Daniel via Twitter)
A YouTube Classic
Darth Vader with a cautionary tale about the dangers of cell phones:
Hat tip to luckycreature.
Research Material for Ghost Stories
A review in today’s Independent has alerted me to a book that should be of interest to horror and dark fantasy writers. It is not fiction, Servants of the Supernatural, by Antonio Melechi is a study of Victorian attitudes to the supernatural. It sounds like it would be very useful in getting your period atmosphere right, and may even spark some story ideas.
Besides, I love the idea that Victorians had a passion for “rappers”.
Glasgow Cuisine
Over at Neth Space, Hal Duncan waxes lyrical on the subject of deep fried haggis.
Thor Foils Burglary
As it turned out, however, this story was not about a wannabe superhero, or even an actual Norse god. It is just a warning about the dangers of being a burglar at a time when people are likely to be coming home from fancy dress parties.
Light Relief
I’m having an annoying day, but Feòrag always knows how to make me laugh.
In addition the Ig Noble Prizes have been announced. Commentary here and here. Full results below the fold.
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I Have Powers
One of the things I got to do today was have an extended rant about certain political issues close to my heart (in a way which may eventually get back to persons in government). I let rip a bit about Toiletgate, and with that and various other London policing issues in mind I voiced my opinion that the Met might be better off without Sir Ian Blair. Imagine my surprise when I got home and pulled up the BBC web site…
Snow in the Desert
Phoenix reports that it is snowing on Mars!
(Thanks Gary!)
Interstellar War Not Declared Say Experts
Given all of the crisis in the financial markets, the last thing our poor little planet needed was to find itself on the edge of an interstellar war. Thankfully that possibility has (probably) been ruled out, at least according to astronomers at the University of Warwick. But just what has caused a massive burst of light in an area of the sky where no stars were known to exist is still a mystery. Nature has more details.
Pandemonium
I’ve been struggling to find something to say about Pandemonium beyond “I really enjoyed it” that doesn’t involve too much in the way of spoilers. Probably the best I can do is point you to Mike Berry’s review in the Chronicle and add that Gregory definitely has his finger on the pulse of the genre world. The idea of having demons based on popular culture archetypes such as Casey Jones, Dennis the Menace and Captain America is just too delicious. And then there’s the sequence set in the demon fan convention featuring Phil Dick (who is possessed by a demon called VALIS) and Tim and Serena Powers. Lovely stuff.