The Dog House

...Or More Than You Ever Wanted To Know About The Grodog

The October Revolution Version

Two older updates on me--dog house#2 and dog house#1, are available for your reading "pleasure."

The last time I wrote anything was sometime during the summer, so I figure I'm well-overdue for an update on this page. My life's taken some sharp left turns since writing last, and I definitely missed Albequerque . . . .

In good-news things, I've finished several writing projects, including EHP's The Triad Sourcebook, and a pile of poems. I'm still working on BioHazard's Archipelago chapter, but that'll be done in the next day or three. I'm also being promoted at Sprint (shhh---that's still unofficial), which means I may finally be able to buy a) a car, b) a new PC or Mac, c) a VCR, d) maybe a TV, and e) make some headway toward paying off my student loans (NOT!). Actually, I will need a car, and a VCR for Babylon 5 in January, and the PC/Mac will probably have to wait a bit longer. Sigh.

In the bad-news department, my wife Shelley and I are divorcing. I'll be forlorn and single again on November 4th. Well, OK, I'll be single, and I'll probably get very very drunk, and then maybe I won't be quite so forlorn. (Somehow I don't buy that, either). That's about the full extent of my bad news for now, but I think that's sufficient for anyone.

Onto Decadence

Now that I've got the obligatory unhappy portion of my life dealt with, I can wax nostalgically over the books, movies, vodka, etc. with which I've been diverting my emotions through wanton spend-thriftiness since the last update.

It's been a good few months to be a book in my apartment--lots of new company arriving on a regular basis. Michael Moorcock has begun writing a new comic--his first in about 25 years or so, since the heydey of New Worlds--with DC Comics. It's called Michael Moorcock's Multiverse, and focuses on the characters introduced in Blood, as well as an alternate version of Elric as an Anglo-Saxon duke, and a very Shadow-like Sherlock Holmes-ish dandy/detective (that's Shadow as in "The Shadow Knows," not as in uber-nastiness from Babylon 5). The first two issues are out, and I highly recommend them. In other MM news, Jayde Design has published The Return to Melnibone, now back in print after an extensive hiatus. White Wolf just published Sailing to Utopia--only about four or five months late, which isn't too bad for them. Mojo published Tales from the Texas Woods, and I've got a pile of books coming from The Nomads of the Time Streams.

But fear not!--I haven't been supporting the publishing industry through MM only. Many others have benefitted from my overly-falmbouyant spending phase. I've gotten into geology again. I recommend John McPhee's "Annals of the Former World" series--Assembling California was wonderful! As a result of reading that, I picked up a collection of Scientific American articles edited by Eldridge Moores (he's the very-likable and cool geologist central to McPhee's work). I also nabbed an excellent book on volcanoes--appropriately enough, entitled Volcanoes, by Fisher, Heiken, and Hulen--published by the Princeton University Press). In addition to being well-written, it has very impressive graphics (the 3-D map of a volcano and it's lava tubes, etc. was particularly impressive). I haven't finished reading Magmas, Rocks, and Planetary Development by Eric Middlemost yet, but I think that's because I'm a trifle put off by his very scientific sytle (and I'm probably a bit burned out on intentive geological reading right now, too).

While hunting at The Dusty Bookshelf (a used bookstore in Lawrence), I picked up Scott Adams' The Dilbert Principle (very funny and way too applicable to both Sprint and EHP), Richard Preston's The Hot Zone, and Norman Cantor's The Civilization of the Middle Ages. I haven't picked up the latter yet (save as a reference), but Preston's book is pretty good. I'd read his original article in The New Yorker that inspired him to do the book, and I have to conclude that the article is the stronger of the two--the book is good (though not as good as I found Laurie Garrett's The Coming Plague to be), but the article is more intense, somehow more satisfying to read.

Mark Ziesing Books (hi guys!) arranged for the depletion of my bank account to cover Martin Booth's Opium: A History, and in their previous shipment (and much more importantly), Lucius Shepard's Barnacle Bill the Spacer and other stories, The Scalehunter's Beautiful Daughter, and Sports and Music (another fine Ziesing book--and in fact, the first Ziesing book). Now, if I could only get them to spell my name right on the catalog mailing lablels ;-)

I also got some new Gaiman and/or McKean stuff from DreamHaven. Poetry magazines and literary journals have been disappearing from the 23rd and Iowa Hastings store in the way of my visits (the last visit netted a widescreen version of John Woo's "The Killer" and the director's cut of "Blade Runner" on video, along with Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner, and the new issues of the Missouri Review (about Rituals--wish I'd paid enough attention in time to submit), Writer's Digest, and The Reiter's Catalog.

Musical Decadence

Heh. Things have been hopping in the land of my musical tastes, lately. Most importantly, Porcupine Tree has a brand new live cd called Coma Divine (Delerium Records, UK) that is positively brilliant! I can't spooge about this cd enough. If you like space rock (Hawkwind, etc.), old Pink Floyd, or immense, bass-driven tunes, you need to buy this cd now. Porcupine Tree has remained in heavy rotation on my listening pallate since May when Fish's new cd Sunsets on Empire was released (Steven Wilson of PTree played and wrote with Fish on that cd).

Speaking of Fish, Marillion's new cd This Strange Engine is pretty good (though not up to the level of Afraid of the Sunlight, which I contend is their best cd done yet, with or without Fish). In the older-Marillion department, EMI began to rerelease their old catalogs as part of their 100 year anniversary. Script for a Jester's Tear is out (as is Season's End, though I didn't buy that one). New liner notes from all the concerned memebers, as well as a second cd with b-sides make this a long-awaited purchase.

Yes' new cd Open Your Eyes (at least that's the name I've heard most recently from Notes from the Edge) has been pushed back to December. I've not yet found or heard the title-single, so I'm presuming (probably incorrectly) that's its been delayed as well. The Keys to Ascension II cd may or may not be the same thing as Open Your Eyes--I can't tell from the press releases.

I've rejoined Columbia House and BMG, so my cd collection has added a fair number of new titles (having culled through it beforehand, I'm probably at the point of beginning to grow again). I've fallen prey to the 80's revival--I blame it on my cousin's wedding in November last year, when I hit a retro-night at a Disney resort dance club on Pirate's Island. But, I've also picked up some new stuff that I'd not have wanted to actually pay for, too. However, they've kind of all blurred together over the last few months, so I can't hit you with an exhaustive list (and, really, do you think you want to read one, after the books?).

Well, that's all for now. See you next time!

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