The Blue Candle Society

Cyril surveyed his army of minions, arrayed below him.  Their ranks stretched for feet in either direction, from the culvert on one side to the low spot with the puddle where no one wanted to stand on the other.  Cyril’s enemy had thought him vanquished when he was dropped off near all the cows and windmills miles away, but he had not counted on Cyril’s alliance with the League of Groundhogs, who were in turn owed a favor by a pigeon, who had carried Cyril back home.

Now, before once again taking back the mailbox, he had amassed an army of rodents, now arrayed in the ditch below him, squeaking their fury to the sky.  He held up his paws, waiting for silence.

“Fellow mice!” he shouted.  “Voles, moles and shrews!  No longer will we be forced from the old boots and car seats that are ours by divine right!  Today, we take back our homes, and we begin with that mailbox!”  He pointed one paw at the mailbox that loomed over them in the gloom, basking in the cheers from his minions.  “Tonight,” he shouted, “we return to that mailbox, one at a time.  If one of us is seized and thrown into the hated cat litter bucket for the long journey into the countryside, another will take his place.  Again and again will we climb the post and enter the mailbox, until the enemy gives up.  That will be the first step.  Once the mailbox is ours, unequivocally, it will serve as our beachhead to the next stage, the paper tribute that appears within it the bedding for countless new homes!”

His army cheered, not seeing the smirk on his tiny face.  For he cared nothing for the living arrangements of the other rodents.  Once he’d used them to regain the mailbox they could go hang for all he cared.  For if Cyril had ever been a good-hearted rodent, he had become twisted in the battle for the mailbox, and he was now a manipulative creature, more weasel than mouse.

That night, the assault began.

Posted in Uncategorized

I was delighted to realize, the other day, that the initials of a nearby high school, Morrisville-Eaton High, are “MEH”.  I really hope they use this as a cheer at football games and such:

“Are we the best team here?”

“Meh.”

It seems wholly appropriate for high school, really.  That was the general attitude about most things when I was in high school, anyway.

In honor of embracing one’s inner “meh”, I link to the classic Bike Snob NYC post, Sitting in and Bowing Out.

Posted in Uncategorized

Jefferson approached the ruined house in a wide arc, trying to get a look at it through the rain. Rain ran in a stream off his hat brim, adding to his difficulty in seeing anything. He thought he could see a faint trail in the tall grass leading toward the front porch, and he began to forge his own trail around the back, soaking his shoes and trouser legs almost immediately.

There was a back door, hanging by a single hinge, and he approached it as quietly as he could. After a few moment’s consideration, he carefully lifted the door slightly and eased it open. He stepped through into a kitchen, cabinets barely visible in the gloom. There was a strong smell of mold in the room and there was rain coming through the broken window over the sink. He stood, head cocked and listening, until he heard the murmur of voices. Continue reading ‘Serial Saturday: The Figurine, Part 24’

Posted in Serials

Judging from this letter from Raymond Chandler to his agent (from Letters of Note), he didn’t think much of science fiction.  But look there at the end – that clever sumbitch predicted Google searches!

Mar 14 1953

Dear Swanie:

Playback is getting a bit tired. I have 36,000 words of doodling and not yet a stiff. That is terrible. I am suffering from a very uncommon disease called (by me) atrophy of the inventive powers. I can write like a streak but I bore myself. That being so, I could hardly fail to bore others worse. I can’t help thinking of that beautiful piece of Sid Perelman’s entitled “I’m Sorry I Made Me Cry.”

Did you ever read what they call Science Fiction? It’s a scream. It is written like this: “I checked out with K19 on Aldabaran III, and stepped out through the crummalite hatch on my 22 Model Sirus Hardtop. I cocked the timejector in secondary and waded through the bright blue manda grass. My breath froze into pink pretzels. I flicked on the heat bars and the Brylls ran swiftly on five legs using their other two to send out crylon vibrations. The pressure was almost unbearable, but I caught the range on my wrist computer through the transparent cysicites. I pressed the trigger. The thin violet glow was icecold against the rust-colored mountains. The Brylls shrank to half an inch long and I worked fast stepping on them with the poltex. But it wasn’t enough. The sudden brightness swung me around and the Fourth Moon had already risen. I had exactly four seconds to hot up the disintegrator and Google had told me it wasn’t enough. He was right.”

They pay brisk money for this crap?

Ray

Really, I just wanted to quote that for the phrase “They pay brisk money for this crap?”, which I intend to start using whenever possible.

Special bonus Raymond Chandler letter regarding prescriptivist copy editors:

6005 Camino de la Costa
La, Jolla, California
Jan. 18th, 1947

Dear Mr. Weeks:

I’m afraid you’ve thrown me for a loss. I thought “Juju Worship in Hollywood” was a perfectly good title. I don’t see why it has to be linked up with crime and mystery. But you’re the Boss. When I wrote about writers this did not occur to you. I’ve thought of various titles such as Bank Night in Hollywood, Sutter’s Last Stand, The Golden Peepshow, All it Needs is Elephants, The Hot Shop Handicap, Where Vaudeville Went it Died, and rot like that. But nothing that smacks you in the kisser. By the way, would you convey my compliments to the purist who reads your proofs and tell him or her that I write in a sort of broken-down patois which is something like the way a Swiss waiter talks, and that when I split an infinitive, God damn it, I split it so it will stay split, and when I interrupt the velvety smoothness of my more or less literate syntax with a few sudden words of barroom vernacular, this is done with the eyes wide open and the mind relaxed but attentive. The method may not be perfect, but it is all I have. I think your proofreader is kindly attempting to steady me on my feet, but much as I appreciate the solicitude, I am really able to steer a fairly clear course, provided I get both sidewalks and the street between.

If I think of anything, I’ll wire you.

Kindest Regards,

(Signed)

Posted in General writing things, Grammar Gripery

Jefferson stood for a long moment before slamming the door to Reeves’ room, snatching his hat from the floor, and making for the stairs. Temperance wasn’t in the lobby, and of course there was no one behind the desk to ask whether she’d gone by. He ran across the empty lobby and out the door, arriving on the street just as the rain hit. There was no one in the street, and he spun and ran back through the lobby and up the stairs to their room. The door was locked, and Temperance hadn’t had the key, but he opened the door anyway and rushed in.

Rain pounded against the window of the suddenly dim room. A flash of lightning lit the place up as Jefferson grabbed his raincoat. He was back on the street before he’d even figured out his next move. After a moment standing under the covered entry to the hotel, he made a run for the car. Continue reading ‘Serial Saturday: The Figurine, Part 23’

Posted in Serials

To continue my popular series of posts about people mis-using cliches, I’m today going to talk about a series of commercials from the good folks at Hyundai.  They all play off the old question “Do you know something I don’t?”, and I actually think they are pretty funny, the ones I’ve seen so far.

The problem is, they use that old saw to imply that people who drive Hyundais will seem smart.  That is to say, they will appear to the casual onlooker to “know something” that the observer “doesn’t”.  On the face of it, this would seem like a reasonable interpretation of the old saying,  but you can’t go around interpreting cliches literally – it defeats the whole purpose.  Pick any old saw at random, and this becomes obvious.  You could stroll up to someone engaged in skinning a cat, for instance, and observe that there were several ways he could go about it.  But first of all, maybe you should reassess the kind of people you’re hanging around with, and second, duh (I mean, I’m assuming here, I haven’t tried doing it one way, much less multiple ways).  But my point is, that is a hopelessly banal thing to say to a cat-skinner, when you could be asking whose cat that was, or whether there was some sort of medication they’d missed taking.  The only time you would tend to talk about skinning cats is when you want to point out that there is more than one way to do something that isn’t skinning a cat.

No, the whole point of “Do you know something I don’t know?” is that it is somewhat ironical.  Which is to say, you generally ask it of someone who appears to be doing something foolish, but you are willing to believe it is possible that they have a good reason to do something that appears to be a bad idea.  In other words, you’re not quite willing to go so far as to say “you aren’t as dumb as you look”, but you are open to the possibility.  So the only way that question makes sense in the context of a car commercial is if Hyundai is asserting that their vehicles are the object of scorn and ridicule, but they hope people will be moved to wonder if maybe there is more to them that meets the eye.  I suspect that is not what the ad agency was aiming for.  Which goes to show, that not only do these agencies need more technologically savvy employees, they could apparently use a few English majors.  Then again, maybe they just know something I don’t.

Posted in Grammar Gripery

Okay, I’ve always heard that the “author’s great mistake” is responding to critics (or at least attacking them), no matter how horribly misguided they may be, and I always sort of lumped sock puppetry (making up an identity to talk to yourself online) in the same sort of category, when said puppet starts going on about how great you are or attacks the critics in your stead.

Given that once caught, RJ Elroy claimed that “everyone does it“, though, we are led to two possible conclusions.  One, he’s right and only a small minority of authors get caught and roundly mocked, or two, he’s lying or loopy.  Boy, I hope it is that second one.  At any rate, it almost seems like the worst part of all this is that not only did he go around patting himself on the back, but he made up identities to write bad reviews of other authors (of course, would you want it found out that one of his sock puppets had given you a good review?  That’s the sort of thing that could ding up a reputation).

Posted in General writing things

Jefferson and Temperance arrived at the door to room thirty-two, and again Jefferson was struck by the silence in the hotel. No guests in the carpeted hallway, no housekeepers at their work. A nearby rumble of thunder made him jump, and he thought Temperance did too.

Temperance set down her valise, then opened her clutch and put a hand inside to grasp the super .38. Jefferson put his left hand on the .45 under his own coat and reached out to rap on the door.

There was no sound in reply, and after another moment he knocked again, still straining to hear any noise. He glanced up and down the corridor, then at Temperance, before reaching for his lock picks.

“I’ll do it,” Temperance said, drawing her own set from the clutch. “It’s quiet in here, but we don’t want to be at it all day.” Continue reading ‘Serial Saturday: The Figurine, Part 22’

Posted in Serials

Yes, I almost stepped on this snake, there in the grass of my lawn.  I don’t know what the little bugger was up to, but I assume it was no good, given that he was a snake in the grass and all (presumably he is still a snake but whether his is in the grass at the moment I can’t say).

Here’s another view, in case the first was not clear:

I just hope I don’t run across any cat metaphors made real, because most of them are pretty unpleasant.

Posted in Metaphor!

Sadly, this contest to come up with a literature-themed cocktail over at the Studio 360 Blog is over, so you can’t try to win it yourself, but you can still enjoy as many as you’d like from the comments (The Slaughterhouse 5  sounds intriguing), or try out the winner, “The Age of Innocence“.  Or just gain inspiration and make a new one.

Posted in General writing things