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Archive for the ‘Fiction’ Category

In the News (#1649)

Posted in Current Events, Fiction, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 24, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Hello, I am…a…toaster.  –  Google’s “AI summary” algorithm

Pyrrhic Victory (#1465)

The UK wants a flawed computer algorithm to officially override migrants’ self-reported ages:

Age verification is consuming the internet…[and] is about to seep into the offline world…Starting next year, the British government is planning to introduce facial age [guessing software]…to [overrule] the [self-reported] age of asylum seekers…[using the excuse that] many asylum seekers…[do] not have documents proving their age, [so the government can officially]…class…[many legal minors] as adults…strip…[them of] legal protections and [hurl them into] adult-only [concentration camps]…an internal UK government report…shows how the systems regularly mistake [adolescents] for adults…[especially when] deployed against…Sub-Sarahan Africans…[which are typically] off by an average of 4.6 years, meaning that a 13.5-year-old girl could be assessed as an 18-year-old adult…

Enshittification (#1468)

How long before Google becomes completely useless?

If you Google “SCP-565” — an iconic entry in the collaborative fan fiction universe known as the “SCP Foundation” — the [so-called “]AI Overviews[“] describes the nonexistent entity as though it were entirely real, without a single acknowledgement that it’s a piece of online horror fiction…Ed’s Head is a made-up “anomaly” among the many fictional “objects, entities, and phenomena” dreamed up by members of the SCP Foundation fandom.  As the lore goes, the SCP Foundation is a non-government organization that collects and contains supernatural discoveries.  Writers catalogue these fictional phenomena — which range from the terrifying to the downright bizarre — in the form of fake records, studies, research documents, and logs, all of which are indexed in a sprawling archive…[but] Google’s [Chatbot] Overviews…[predictably] present…entities from the expansive SCP universe as real items, events, or beings…We first caught wind of th[is when]…social media discovered that a Google search for “SCP-426” — a fictional toaster that causes anyone talking about the toaster to refer to it in the first person — returns an…Overview in which the [chatbot] discusses the mysterious entity in the first person, as if [it had] itself…been impacted by the toaster’s supernatural effect…

Once again: chatbots are incapable of telling fantasy from reality because they are incapable of understanding that the word fragments (“tokens” in industry jargon) they process correspond to anything outside of the chatbot itself.

Torture Chamber (#1586)

A society can be judged by the way it treats its prisoners:

It has always been difficult to get help inside federal prison.  But in recent years, it has become nearly impossible…The rate at which the bureau granted [relief] has fallen from just under 7% in 2000 to less than 2% in 2023…[the vast majority] are rejected without consideration for the content of their complaint, for arcane reasons such as including too many pages or not filing enough copies…[and] a 1996 federal law requires prisoners to complete the internal grievance process before filing a lawsuit…healthcare-related requests…[a]re the third most common reason for…complaint, behind [dehumanizing living conditions] and [sexual or physical abuse by] staff…Of all medical grievances [clos]ed in 2023, fewer than 1% were granted…state [dungeons typically give slightly more relief, with most]…grant[ing it in] roughly 15% of [cases, though some like]…Texas…[h]over [around] 4%…reasons for rejections [are often ludicrously cruel], like writing with a pencil instead of a pen, or a woman reporting sexual abuse who was rejected for misspelling her abuser’s last name.  One…Spanish-speaking prisoner filed a grievance asking for translation services, but was rejected for writing it in Spanish…

No Difference (#1625)

African anti-LGBT campaigns are a lot like US anti-sex work campaigns:

Niger’s military junta announced a new penal code that criminalizes…anyone who “commits or attempts to commit an immodest or unnatural act or practices lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans-gender, Queer, intersex, Asexual…acts”…What does it mean to punish “acts” that are “asexual”?  Does having a platonic relationship constitute an “asexual act” that violates this prohibition?  Ghana’s parliament recently criminalized [merely] “identifying” as [LGBT and invented]…a “duty”…to [rat out one’s friends, family, and confidantes to] police…On the other hand, the high court in Namibia…recently struck down laws against gay sex…[as did] Angola in 2021, Gabon in 2020, and…Botswana…[in 2019]…

To Molest and Rape (#1629)

His involvement with a grooming program isn’t mentioned until 5 lines from the end:

Bethel [Ohio boss hog] Chad Essert [has been arrested] in Florida after a…grand jury indicted him on 70…sex crime…[charges for repeatedly molesting at least one] minor…from…2005 [to] 2010…Essert…served as an instructor with the Young Marines [at] the time…Essert [fled to Florida]…in May [after being rewarded with a paid vacation for some other unnamed crime]…

Mad Libs (#1633)

It’s OK; soon all “healthcare” will just be chatbots anyway:

For more than two years, a D[anish chatbot]…has been listening to Seattle residents’ 911 medical calls without their knowledge…to [algorithmically determine] which callers don’t deserve a[ctual help, but are instead]…route[d]…to a nurse-staffed Texas call center [with a wait time of several hours.  And as is typical for so-called “AI” systems, this is done]…without any disclosure to callers [or] public review…Seattle [bureaucrats describe this as]…a conservative approach [despite]…the…wrongful death of one 911 caller…

I Spy (#1642)

How clueless would a woman have to be to give busybodies this kind of data?

Stanford graduates Jenny Duan and Abhinav Agarwal want to solve two hard problems: create a [gewgaw fools will buy] and measure hormones to help [the government track women’s pregnancies].  The pair is building a startup called Clair Health to track inflammation and bloating markers, energy levels, and cycle phase classification to give [government bureaucrats] insights into cycle irregularities and perimenopause, as well as hormonal fluctuations, and how to [target women for violence using] those changes [as justification].  The company has raised $11.6 million in [fascist] funding…and…uses [buzzwords like “]onboarding[“]…[“]AI[“]…[“]biomarkers[“] and…[“]voice stack[” to dazzle marks with bullshit]…Clair Health’s device has 10 biosensors, including a novel biomagnetic sensor for hormonal [surveillance]…of…women [who can get pregnant]…

 

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Out of the Past

Posted in Biography, Fiction, History, tagged , , , , , on May 25, 2026| Leave a Comment »

As a lifelong bibliophile with a special interest in reference books, I’m always delighted to find a useful one that I didn’t even know existed.  Regular readers know that I’ve been working on a novel, The Big Boom, set in New Orleans of 1925 and featuring the characters from “Until the End of Days“ and “Hellhound”.  It will surprise no one who has read more than a few examples of my work that I’m an absolute fiend for accuracy; anachronisms and other such errors really annoy me when I encounter them, so there’s absolutely no way I’m going to let them creep into my work if I can possibly avoid it.  But once in a while, the fact one needs is far too obscure for the enshittified latter-day Google to turn up, and since there is no academic library nearby that can turn into a complicated search unless I want to rewrite that section of the story so as to avoid referencing unknown facts.

Now, some of you may know that early 20th-century New Orleans had one of the most extensive networks of streetcars in the United States, but as automobiles proliferated in the 1930s some of the lines began to close down, and after World War II an unholy alliance of Detroit manufacturers and corrupt New Orleans politicians conspired to replace the clean, quiet, efficient, and long-lasting (there are streetcars still in operation today which were built in the 1920s) electric streetcars with filthy, noisy, inefficient, “modern” buses which must be replaced every few years.  By 1953 only the St. Charles Avenue and Canal Street lines were left, and in 1964 the Canal Street line was pulled out as well; the only line which survived into my adulthood was the St. Charles line, and even it was reduced to about half of its former range.  So when streetcar routes came into the plot twice in the first four chapters of my book, I started trying to find maps of the network in its 1920s heyday, only to be repeatedly thwarted.  Finally, a few weeks ago, a serendipitous search turned up a photo of the map someone had posted to Reddit; it was much too low-resolution to be of any use, but the poster had the good sense many internet denizens lack: she named the source.  I immediately went to Amazon, located a copy, bought it for the very reasonable price of $20, and it arrived a week ago Saturday.  It was published in 1955, was written by a New Orleanian who was an age-peer of my main characters, and was even better than I’d hoped for; it had three different maps (1880, 1906, and a combined 1915-1930 map), detailed descriptions of each route, schematics of the cars, period photos galore, and a wealth of facts I couldn’t have hoped for (such as the fact that the normal fare from 1922 to at least 1955 was 7¢).  The whole thing was so exciting that I spent most of the following afternoon immersed in it, editing my text to insert small details, and generally feeling like a kid in a candy store.  I know some of y’all probably find this amusing, but as I’ve said many times, “You can take the girl out of the library, but you can’t take the librarian out of the girl.”  Or the old woman, for that matter.  And I always treasure books which connect me to a world I was born too late to explore for myself.

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A Novel Process

Posted in Biography, Fiction, Miscellaneous, tagged , , , on May 15, 2026| Leave a Comment »

For most of my life, my writing process was more like gestation than construction; an essay or story would grow in my head until I put it on paper fully-formed.  When a high-school English teacher wanted us to include a “jot outline” of rough ideas along with the essay, I would do the outline after I finished (sometimes as late as the beginning of class) because writing down half-formed notions was simply not part of my writing process, and even in university I typically wrote my term papers at the (manual) typewriter, and the only necessary revisions could be accomplished with Liquid Paper.  When I got my first computer in the spring of 1989 this process became even quicker and more seamless, because with a word processor I could revise without even leaving a detectable trace.  And while this may sound wonderful to those of you who struggle to write, it meant I never developed the cognitive tools to write anything more than a few thousand words long, just as I never developed the cognitive tools to gain understanding of any topic I couldn’t master by simply paying attention to the book or teacher.

It has certainly not escaped the notice of my long-term readers that most of my fiction is in the short-short category (< 2000 words), with only occasional forays into the full-length short story category (< 10,000 words).  So last summer, when I wanted to tell a story that needed more time and space for character and setting development, I needed to learn a new skill: actually plotting a story rather than simply shouting “Eureka!”, reaching up to grasp the light bulb over my head, and quickly inserting it into a document.  Most of the work was still done in my head, and my first two novellas were written all out of sequence, with each scene or section written as it developed in my mind, then put together in proper sequence and polished.  And what I learned from that process made me confident enough to embark on a still-larger project, a short novel (in the 45,000 word range) set in the spring of 1925 and tentatively entitled The Big Boom.  So far, I’ve finished the first draft of the prologue and first three chapters, and yesterday I started chapter four (which will trigger some additions to chapter one).  This story seems to be developing more in sequence than the other two, though it may not continue in that wise; still, given that “Hellhound” was written in sequence to a greater degree than “Until the End of Days“, who knows?  I’m taking my time and enjoying the process, and I hope y’all will enjoy the result.

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The Huge Hand

Posted in Fiction, Miscellaneous, Philosophy, tagged , , , , on April 17, 2026| 1 Comment »

Two months ago I published “Smoke Screen“, in which I reviewed a specific first-season episode of The Fugitive and had this to say about the series in general:

For those unfamiliar with the premise, Dr. Richard Kimble is wrongly convicted for the murder of his wife, but on his way to death row by train, “Fate moves its huge hand” and a derailment allows him to escape.  For four years, Dr. Kimble, engagingly portrayed by David Janssen, moved around the country, trying to hide from the relentless Lt. Gerard (Barry Morse), the Inspector Javert-like cop obsessed with his recapture, while himself hunting the real murderer, a one-armed man he saw fleeing his house just before discovering his wife’s body…

As I watched the rest of the series over the course of those two months, I was struck by the degree to which that “huge hand” influenced Dr. Kimble’s life over the seven years from his wife’s murder (September 17th, 1960) to his eventual acquittal after the discovery of both the one-armed man and a reluctant witness (August 29th, 1967).  It’s easy to joke about how the writers of a television show are gods who control the lives of the characters, and how certain characters become “butt-monkeys“, the ones typically made the victims of what the TV Tropes website calls “put them through hell” plotlines.  But within the fictive universe inhabited by the characters, this is typically regarded as the result of blind chance or bad luck rather than the result of divine intervention, and we in the audience willingly suspend our disbelief of the improbability of anyone having so many adventures and misfortunes.  In the case of The Fugitive, however, the writers appear to be subverting this trope, deliberately signaling to the audience that Fate or God is indeed manipulating Kimble’s life to fulfill some destiny or divine plan.  From the opening narration of the first episode (see video below), we are clearly shown or even told in dialogue that there is something more than mere chance at work.  In several dozen episodes there are sequences in which he escapes capture by mere moments, or misses a chance to escape misfortune by an equally narrow margin.  And in the majority of episodes, Kimble’s apparently-random wanderings bring him into the lives of people who need him, either as a physician or just as a caring human being.

In the first-season episode “Angels Travel on Lonely Roads” the person is Sister Veronica, a Catholic nun, who is absolutely convinced that God arranged their meeting for their mutual benefit; in the fourth-season episode “The Breaking of the Habit” they meet again, and a priest at Sister Veronica’s school is equally convinced.  In the earlier episode, the rational Dr. Kimble is inclined to dismiss being characterized as the tool of Providence and says as much, but after years of miraculous escapes and even being forced to save the life of his nemesis, Lt. Gerard, no less than four times, he is less skeptical about destiny.  In another fourth-season episode, “Joshua’s Kingdom“, Kimble meets Joshua Simmons, an “only prayer can heal” religious fanatic whose underage daughter’s baby is close to death from a dangerous illness.  After Kimble saves the child, Simmons says, “It can’t be God’s will.  Not with doctors and medicine.”  And Kimble replies, “How do you know I wasn’t sent here?  Why did I come to this house, why did I come to this town?  Do you know?”  At the time of his first meeting with Sister Veronica, those words would have been mere rhetoric, but by the time he utters them they are heartfelt, and their obvious sincerity convinces Simmons.

It is, of course, not necessary to accept this framing to enjoy the show, though it certainly provides an in-universe explanation for how Dr. Kimble manages to avoid recapture for so long.  But considering how traumatized he would be after two years of wrongful imprisonment and another five years as a fugitive, perhaps it provides some spiritual solace and hope of emotional recovery for a good, decent, highly-principled character the viewer has come to respect and care about.

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Smoke Screen

Posted in Fiction, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , on February 9, 2026| 1 Comment »

I’m currently re-watching The Fugitive, one of the high points of 20th-century television drama.  Like many of the shows I enjoy, I was too young to remember the show in its initial run (1963-67), but when our local PBS station, WYES, picked it up in syndication in the mid-’80s, I watched it every Sunday night and enjoyed it thoroughly; though most of the shows I watched then, as now, were science fiction or fantasy, “the characters who interested me most were always outsiders, weirdos, and outlaws such as vigilantes, monster-hunters, and fugitives“.  For those unfamiliar with the premise, Dr. Richard Kimble is wrongly convicted for the murder of his wife, but on his way to death row by train, “Fate moves its huge hand” and a derailment allows him to escape.  For four years, Dr. Kimble, engagingly portrayed by David Janssen, moved around the country, trying to hide from the relentless Lt. Gerard (Barry Morse), the Inspector Javert-like cop obsessed with his recapture, while himself hunting the real murderer, a one-armed man he saw fleeing his house just before discovering his wife’s body.  The show was the first one on US television to pay close attention to continuity, and the first to feature a concluding episode:  that episode, in which Kimble finally catches the one-armed man and proves his innocence, was the highest-rated television episode of all time for decades.

One of the things I enjoy about watching classic TV shows is playing “Spot the Actor“; in this show I’m also recognizing musical cues in every episode, because the show drew on the CBS music library and featured many of the pieces Bernard Herrmann and others wrote for The Twilight Zone.  But one of the most striking things for me is seeing just how much attitudes have changed in the past 60 years.  Overall, there’s the fact that for four years, one of the highest-rated series in a country now in love with cop glorification shows was one in which the cops were the bad guys in every single episode, and the hero regularly assaulted them and escaped from their clutches, often with the help of people he’d met who saw his innate goodness and nobility (especially because that nobility often got him into trouble when he felt compelled to stick his neck out to help people instead of just not getting involved).

An episode I saw last week, however, was even more striking.  In “Smoke Screen“, Kimble is working as a field hand in California (because obviously he can’t do any job requiring papers or references) and his work crew is asked to volunteer to help fight a wildfire.  One of the laborers he has befriended is undocumented, and he and his pregnant wife are terrified of being caught and deported before the birth of their baby, whom they want born as a US citizen.  The woman goes into labor, and though there is a problem requiring an emergency C-section, they can’t get her to a hospital because of the fires.  So Kimble, ever the humanitarian, is forced to reveal to the camp nurse that he is a doctor and can save mother and child; when the cops come snooping, the nurse, the father and another laborer who was a veterinarian in Mexico make up a story to cover for him.  And all of this is portrayed as positive.  Compare this with the current toxic zeitgeist:  a fugitive from the law helps undocumented migrants to deliver what nativist authoritarians now disgustingly dehumanize as an “anchor baby”, and everyone goes away satisfied.  Look, I fully recognize that there were just as many racists, xenophobes, and badge-lickers in the Sixties as there are now.  But it’s nice to recognize that in extremely popular entertainment of that time, those were typically being portrayed as the villains they are instead of lionized and given positive attention, money, and political power.

 

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Hellhound

Posted in Fiction, Music, tagged , , , , on January 16, 2026| Leave a Comment »

While I was working on “Until the End of Days“, I realized it would only be the first of a series of stories featuring Angela Morgan & Diane Rousseau, pulp-adventure characters based on Grace & myself.  And by the time I was done with the first story, I already knew that the second installment would be a prequel, telling the story of how they met.  Now that one is done as well, so I’m about to start the process of getting Lost Angels, the collection in which they’ll both appear, into shape; I’ve already started discussing the cover with Chester Brown, so I think we’re on track to publish by the end of spring.  And here’s the really exciting news: my experience with these longer tales has convinced me that the next adventure should be a short novel, which I’ll probably begin in the next couple of months.  But in the meantime, here’s a sneak preview of “Hellhound”, describing the events of Saturday, June 10th, 1922; the video at the end is a song which plays a part later in the novelette.

…While I was perfectly happy to dress and behave like a respectable maid of honor instead of a flapper for one day, there was no way I was going to indulge the government’s current exercise in wet-blanketry.  So I took a generous sip from my punch to make room while on my way to the ladies’, then once I was safely away from prying eyes I lifted my skirt to get my flask from its hiding place in my garter and topped the glass back up with rum.  Then I checked my hair, smoothed my dress and opened the door to find Tante Mathilde standing just outside.

She gently raised my hand to sniff my glass gracefully, and said, “Just as I thought.”

“Honestly, Auntie, it’s not like you’re a big fan of the Volstead Act yourself.”

She waved a hand dismissively.  “No, I’m not, but you’re still too young.”

“I’m twenty-one, Auntie, and I just graduated with a real degree and everything; I’m not exactly still in pigtails.”

“Hmph.  Well, at least you haven’t chopped off your lovely hair like so many girls your age.”

“Remember when I fell out of that tree when I was about twelve, and they had to shave my head to stitch it up?  I know what I look like with short hair, and it ain’t pretty.”

“Nonsense, dear girl; you’re always pretty.”

“Thank you, but I know you didn’t come looking for me just to see if I was drinking.”

She took my left arm in the way she always did when she wanted a favor.  “No, it’s because I want to introduce you to someone.”

“I think I already know most of the guests.”

“She’s not technically a guest, and I think y’all probably met in passing once or twice a few years ago”…She took me over to the doorway that led toward the hotel kitchen; in the next room were several large tubs of ice with electric fans blowing across them to cool the air.  That may sound quaint to the modern reader, but keep in mind that air conditioning was extremely expensive back then, and it was still several years before even theaters and hotels in New Orleans began to install them.  Diane was standing nearby, apparently taking the opportunity to cool off; she was a tall, fairly slender woman in her mid-twenties with long, straight black hair, hazel eyes, and strong features, and she did look somewhat familiar.  “Angela, this is Louis and Claire’s youngest daughter, Diane.  Diane, this is my grandniece Angela.”

She stubbed out her cigarette, turned to face me, flashed a quirky but winning smile, held out both of her hands to clasp mine, and said, “Hey there, honey!  Ah think we met before.”

“Since you’re Miss Claire’s daughter I guess we have, but I don’t remember exactly when.”

“Ah been tourin’ with the band for almos’ five years, so musta been when we was in town.”

“Must have.  I’ve been to the Orpheum quite a few times since then, but I guess never when y’all were playing…Are you doing anything with your friends tonight?  You could come over to my house and we can make up for lost time.”  She did not answer, but instead looked pointedly at my aunt, whose innocent expression had yielded to a rather sheepish one.

“Actually, that was why I wanted to introduce y’all.  Diane has a little problem and I thought you might be able to help.”

“Oh?”  I had instantly liked Diane, so I was already inclined to help if possible.  But I wasn’t about to make it easier on my aunt; this wasn’t the first time she’d volunteered me for something.

“Normally, Diane stays at my place when she’s in town.  But a strange man has been lurking nearby since she arrived Thursday evening, and she thinks he’s been following her.”

“We been seein’ him in the theaters an’ hotels for the last three stops, but we jus’ figured he was a fan; some of ’em are pretty devoted.  But he’s hangin’ aroun’ your aunt’s instead of the hotel where the other girls are stayin’, so it must be me he’s after.”

“Ah, so if we can get you over to my place without him catching wise, maybe that’ll throw him off.  But won’t he just follow y’all to your next gig in…?”

“Mobile.  Yeah, we’re hopin’ to confront him before that.  Mah daddy tried las’ night but he took off like his pants was on fire as soon as Daddy came out on the porch.  If he loses mah trail today, he’ll need to come to the theater Monday night to pick it up again, then the bouncers can catch him without havin’ to call the cops to the house.”

“Makes perfect sense.  You can have Marie’s room; she won’t need it any more!”

“Thank you, ah really appreciate it.”

“I’m guessing you already brought your luggage?” I asked, giving my aunt a look.

“Yeah, it’s in the green room.”

“I hope it’s not a lot; the only place we can carry it in my car is the rumble seat.”

“Just a big carpetbag.  Except for mah bass and such, ah try to travel light.”

“There is no way we can fit your bass in a Stutz Bearcat, unless you think you can balance it on the running board”…

…About midnight, I went to get myself another punch, and asked if she wanted more bourbon, which was what she’d been drinking.  “Actually, if you don’t mind, ahmana roll myself a reefer.”

“Go ahead; better a legal intoxicant than an illegal one, eh?  I’d use it myself, but I’m afraid my lungs are too delicate; I can’t even smoke cigarettes.”

“If you wanna try it, ah could make you tea.  Ah usually travel with some ’cause marijuana is illegal in some states, and sippin’ tea is more discreet than smokin’ a reefer.”

I was definitely interested in trying it, so we adjourned to the kitchen and Diane fixed it for me…I can’t say I cared for the taste, but sugar helped, and it wasn’t like I was drinking it for the flavor.  Diane told me it would probably take an hour or so before I started to feel anything, but warned me that it might hit me pretty hard because I was unused to it.

“Why don’t we head upstairs, then?  We can get you settled in Marie’s room, then if I’m too bent to manage the stairs I can just stumble next door.”

“That sounds like a plan!” she said, so I locked up and turned off the lights, and before long she’d put on her pajamas and we’d made her comfortable in Marie’s bed.  I sat in the wingback chair while she rolled her smoke, and soon we were giggling like a couple of schoolgirls.  Because we were already in such good spirits I didn’t notice the effects of the drug until I was already highly illuminated, and I think I got quiet for a little while as I adjusted to this new feeling.  When I finally spoke up I realized Diane had dropped off, but I was still content to just sit there quietly, looking at everything through chemically-altered eyes and enjoying the breeze through the open window.

After Diane had been asleep for a little while, something very eerie happened; at first it spooked me a bit, but I told myself it was just a drug-induced hallucination and I should sit back and enjoy the show.  There seemed to be a greenish-purple aura around her body, and as I watched it seemed to become concentrated around her left hand; it then began to take form like smoke, blowing out from her ring like steam from a teakettle (but in complete silence).  It gathered itself into a cloud above her sleeping form, then moved like a living thing toward the window.  As it exited I really wanted to get up to see where it went next, but I just couldn’t get myself to move out of the chair; it was almost as though I were tied down with the softest ropes imaginable, or weighed down with an entire litter of contentedly-purring kittens.  It was less like not being able to move, and more like I just didn’t want to, even though I did…

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Donald the Turtle

Posted in Fiction, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , on January 12, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Most people today think of Theodor Seuss Geisel as an author and illustrator of children’s books, but in the 1930s and 1940s he was best known as an advertising and political cartoonist. He would later use his children’s books to teach simple moral and political lessons, such as this one about tyranny from the early 1950s.  Given that his books are no longer as universally read as they once were, you may be unfamiliar with it, but unlike the last couple of times I’ve used the good Doctor to illustrate a point, this time I didn’t need to change a single word.

Οn the far-away Island of Sala-ma-Sond,
Yertle the Turtle was king of the pond.
A nice little pond. It was clean. It was neat.
The water was warm. There was plenty to eat.
The turtles had everything turtles might need.
And they were all happy. Quite happy indeed.

They were… until Yertle, the king of them all,
Decided the kingdom he ruled was too small.
“I’m ruler,” said Yertle, “of all that I see.
But I don’t see enough. That’s the trouble with me.
With this stone for a throne, I look down on my pond
But I cannot look down on the places beyond.
This throne that I sit on is too, too low down.
It ought to be higher!” he said with a frown.
“If I could sit high, how much greater I’d be!
What a king! I’d be ruler of all I could see!”

So Yertle, the Turtle King, lifted his hand
And Yertle, the Turtle King, gave a command.
He ordered nine turtles to swim to his stone
And, using these turtles, he built a new throne.
He made each turtle stand on another one’s back
And he piled them all up in a nine-turtle stack.
And then Yertle climbed up. He sat down on the pile.
What a wonderful view! He could see ‘most a mile!

“All mine!” Yertle cried. “Oh, the things I now rule!
I’m king of a cow! And I’m king of a mule!
I’m king of a house! And, what’s more, beyond that,
I’m king of a blueberry bush and a cat!
I’m Yertle the Turtle! Oh, marvelous me!
For I am the ruler of all that I see!”

And all through that morning, he sat there up high
Saying over and over, “A great king am I!”
Until ‘long about noon. Then he heard a faint sigh.
“What’s that?” snapped the king
And he looked down the stack.
And he saw, at the bottom, a turtle named Mack.
Just a part of his throne. And this plain little turtle
Looked up and he said, “Beg your pardon, King Yertle.
“I’ve pains in my back and my shoulders and knees.
How long must we stand here, Your Majesty, please?”

“SILENCE!” the King of the Turtles barked back.
“I’m king, and you’re only a turtle named Mack.
You stay in your place while I sit here and rule.
I’m king of a cow! And I’m king of a mule!
I’m king of a house! And a bush! And a cat!
But that isn’t all. I’ll do better than that!
My throne shall be higher!” his royal voice thundered,
“So pile up more turtles! I want ’bout two hundred!”

“Turtles! More turtles!” he bellowed and brayed.
And the turtles ‘way down in the pond were afraid.
They trembled. They shook. But they came. They obeyed.
From all over the pond, they came swimming by dozens.
Whole families of turtles, with uncles and cousins.
And all of them stepped on the head of poor Mack.
One after another, they climbed up the stack.

THEN Yertle the Turtle was perched up so high,
He could see forty miles from his throne in the sky!
“Hooray!” shouted Yertle. “I’m king of the trees!
I’m king of the birds! And I’m king of the bees!
I’m king of the butterflies! King of the air!
Ah, me! What a throne! What a wonderful chair!
I’m Yertle the Turtle! Oh, marvelous me!
For I am the ruler of all that I see!”

Then again, from below, in the great heavy stack,
Came a groan from that plain little turtle named Mack.
“Your Majesty, please… I don’t like to complain,
But down here below, we are feeling great pain.
I know, up on top you are seeing great sights,
But down at the bottom we, too, should have rights.
We turtles can’t stand it. Our shells will all crack!
Besides, we need food. We are starving!” groaned Mack.

“You hush up your mouth!” howled the mighty King Yertle.
“You’ve no right to talk to the world’s highest turtle.
I rule from the clouds! Over land! Over sea!
There’s nothing, no, NOTHING, that’s higher than me!”

But, while he was shouting, he saw with surprise
That the moon of the evening was starting to rise
Up over his head in the darkening skies.
“What’s THAT?” snorted Yertle. “Say, what IS that thing
That dares to be higher than Yertle the King?
I shall not allow it! I’ll go higher still!
I’ll build my throne higher! I can and I will!
I’ll call some more turtles. I’ll stack ’em to heaven!
I need ’bout five thousand, six hundred and seven!”

But, as Yertle, the Turtle King, lifted his hand
And started to order and give the command,
That plain little turtle below in the stack,
That plain little turtle whose name was just Mack,
Decided he’d taken enough. And he had.
And that plain little lad got a little bit mad
And that plain little Mack did a plain little thing.
He burped!
And his burp shook the throne of the king!

And Yertle the Turtle, the king of the trees,
The king of the air and the birds and the bees,
The king of a house and a cow and a mule…
Well, that was the end of the Turtle King’s rule!
For Yertle, the King of all Sala-ma-Sond,
Fell off his high throne and fell Plunk! in the pond!

And today the great Yertle, that Marvelous he,
Is King of the Mud. That is all he can see.
And the turtles, of course… all the turtles are free
As turtles and, maybe, all creatures should be.

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Diary #804

Posted in Current Events, Diary, Fiction, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , on November 24, 2025| 1 Comment »

Anyone who’s ever perused my Amazon wishlist has probably noticed that it features a lot more weird, nerdy things than the expensive “luxury” things most guys seem to like buying for sex workers.  That was true even long before I retired, and it’s even more so nowadays.  The reason, as I’ve explained before, is that I put things I actually want on my list, and my tastes run to the odd and nerdy.  In the last couple of weeks, several of my generous readers have sent CDs and DVDs from the list, and several of the DVDs were of old movie serials.  I’m quite pleased about that because, as some of you have noticed, I’ve increasingly turned my back on the modern world this year.  Now, a large fraction of my TV and movie viewing has always consisted of things that aren’t current at the time I view them, and I rarely read any fiction written after I was born (and almost never after I graduated from high school).  But since early summer that’s even more true than usual, and probably half of my current entertainment was created between 1920 and 1960.  Part of the reason is practical; the new adventure fiction series I’m working on takes place in the 1920s and ’30s, so immersing myself in period fiction helps with mood and color.  But the rest of it is purely emotional; this blog and its attendant social media focus mostly on current events, and I needn’t explain how absolutely awful those events have become.  Simply put, by the time I’m done with blog writing every day, I am so sick of 21st century political atrocities and media enshittification that I cannot handle one more minute of it.  So to those of you who have indulged me with these gifts, please accept my heartfelt gratitude not merely for the kindness of a gift, but also for helping me find temporary solace from a world which feels increasingly hostile to me.

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Until the End of Days

Posted in Fiction, Music, tagged , , on October 3, 2025| Leave a Comment »

If you read this blog regularly, you already know I’ve been working on a pulp-adventure novella featuring characters based on Grace and myself; their chemistry and repartee are based on ours, so much that I often cried or laughed while writing and proofreading it, and many of the characters and places are based on ones from my own life.  Now at last it’s done; it will be the centerpiece of my next collection, Lost Angels, which is beginning to look like it will be published in late spring or early summer.   But in the meantime, I’m happy to share an excerpt introducing the main characters; if you’re a paid subscriber and would like a PDF of the whole story, please email me; the rest of y’all will just have to wait for the book!

Friday, October 23rd, 1931

It all started one night at Lulu’s.  Diane and I had taken my Tante Mathilde to see the new Marx Brothers talkie, and we decided to have a drink before taking her home.  Well, to be honest, Tante Mathilde insisted we have a drink, and she had not accepted “no” for an answer from anybody since her husband died 33 years before.  She was the family matriarch, my paternal grandfather’s younger sister, who had already outlived him by 23 years and Maman, my paternal grandmother, by 13.  She was under 5 feet tall in heels and under 100 pounds soaking wet, but she conducted herself like the Empress Dowager and kept up with popular culture better than a lot of people half her age, which is why nobody who knew her would’ve been surprised to see her with her grandniece in a speakeasy.

I had a Brandy Alexander, which is what I always had in those days; Diane had a highball, which is what she always had after it became impossible to get decent bourbon; and Tante Mathilde had a Bee’s Knees.  It may seem strange that I remember that over thirty years later, but it’s because Diane hated lemons and had apparently made some sort of comment about it while I was in the Ladies’, and when I got back to my seat my aunt was pontificating about how Diane didn’t “know what’s good.”

“Honestly, I can’t leave for five minutes without coming back to static.”

“It ain’t my fault if your aunt’s opinions are still stuck in the 19th century.”

“And it’s certainly not my fault if your friend there is a bumpkin.”

“Who you callin’ a bumpkin, you old crow?”

“Waiter!  Another round please!”  I wasn’t actually worried; they always sounded like that.  It was just their way, and they actually loved each other as much as if they’d been blood kin.  They practically were; Diane’s father had worked for Tante Mathilde’s husband his whole life, and she made him the general manager of the sugar cane plantation after the old man died in ’98, so she’d bounced Diane on her knee from the age of three.  Of course, nowadays the size differential was almost the opposite:  Diane was a tall, solidly-built woman of 5’9″ with long, straight black hair and strong features that hinted at her Houma ancestry, and she had a husky voice which made my aunt’s thin soprano sound childlike.

Anyhow, I wasn’t in the mood for their shenanigans, so I figured I’d throw some cold water on it.  But my aunt was not having it.  “She doesn’t even like ‘Stardust’.  Who doesn’t like ‘Stardust’?”

“When did I say I don’t like ‘Stardust’?”

“Just now, when Angela was off to the loo.”

“I said nobody can play ‘Stardust’ like Armstrong, is what I said!”

“Well, the band here did a lovely job of it just now.”

“It had no damn pep at all.  Them cats play jazz like they was playin’ at the Frumps and Fogeys Society.”

“Nonsense!”

“Really, Auntie!  Diane knows more about jazz than both of us put together.”

“Especially since she don’t know beans about jazz.”

“C’mon, Diane, you’ve gotta admit Auntie’s pretty hep for eighty-one.”

“Nobody who can’t dig Cab Calloway is hep in my book.”

“I think Mr. Calloway is a fine musician, but I also think all his nonsense singing is silly.  All that scooby-doo and hi-dee-ho foolishness, what is that supposed to be?  Why can’t he sing sensibly like Jolson?”

Diane had been rolling her eyes while my aunt opined about scat, but in response to that last question she suddenly stopped, looked at her as though she had just upchucked on the table, and stated matter-of-factly, “The only word for Jolson is ‘grotesque’.”

“Grotesque!  You want grotesque?  I’ll show you grotesque!”  With that she reached down as if she were going to get something from a bag that wasn’t there, then said, “What am I doing? Of course it’s at home.”

“What is, Auntie?”

“This simply awful thing I got at an estate sale this morning, and meant to give you.”

“Um…thanks?”

She laughed and patted my hand affectionately.  “Oh, I didn’t really mean it was for you, but I thought your Mr. Girard might like it, since he’s a connoisseur of the outré.”

“Which is probably why he likes Angela so much.”

“Look who’s talking!” I said in mock offense, but Diane and my aunt had apparently left off of teasing each other to have a giggle at my expense instead.  At the time, Armand Girard was my sugar daddy, and though Diane sometimes joshed me about him, Tante Mathilde had no room to judge because his age exceeded mine by exactly as much as her late husband’s had exceeded hers.  Plus, he was basically the only thing standing between me and penury at the moment, and Diane was especially fond of him since he’d given me his “old” car  –  a 1927 Packard Custom Eight sedan  –  last year when he replaced it with a new Dusenberg Model J.  That of course meant she got to tinker with the Packard, and let me tell you, she had that thing purring like a kitten when it idled and roaring like a lion when I stepped on the gas…

I’m sure you won’t consider it a “spoiler” if I tell you that the “simply awful thing” Angela’s aunt bought led our intrepid heroines into the greatest adventure of their lives, one that required all of their wits and derring-do; I hope everyone who reads it has as much fun as I had writing it! 

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Diary #793

Posted in Diary, Fiction, Philosophy, tagged , , , on September 9, 2025| Leave a Comment »

I’m finally almost finished with “Until the End of Days“.  I finished the rough draft late last week, and on Sunday I wrote the prologue; it may seem strange to non-writers that I saved the prologue for the end of the process, but it was necessary because the story is told in first-person, and I wanted to know everything that happened in the tale (which grew in the telling) before I tried to introduce it.  Part of the reason was practical; if there were any important details I had not managed to fit into the narrative, I wanted to mention them in the prologue.  But another reason was that I wanted to be able to identify as fully with the POV character as possible, since I wanted the tone of the prologue to be more personal.  The word count is now in the vicinity of 19,000 words, and I still have a bit of editing to do, (such as describing three major characters more fully), so I think it’s fair to call it a novella.  I’ve really worked at developing the characters’ world, so much so that I already have the fragments of two prequels and a sequel in my head, and that’s good because spending so much time in that fictional world of the past makes the pain of my real-world present much easier to bear.  The irony is almost too perfect: after spending most of my life living in a future which never came to pass, I now find comfort living in a past that never was.

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