Happy Halloween!

As I said before, the Halloween party was a success! I took as many photos as I could before succumbing to my g-Host-ly duties. Here are a few:

The plural of Elvis is "Elvii".

A few of our favorite heroes stopped by for a beer.

Our guests who won the award for "travelled from the location with most maximum security to get here."

Such a touching scene, man and man's best friend, Hell-style.

More photos later!

Devil's Night

The Halloween party was a success, and I'll post pictures this week.

Today more pressing things are going on.

It was six years ago today, six years ago from right now, that I was getting married.

That was a great day.

And things went very well, as well as a Devil's Night wedding could go.

Although 65 clowns did crash our wedding.



Happy Anniversary, baby. I love you, and here's to many more years.

Plastic Tacos Debuts on November 3rd!

My friend Erika will be making her debut on the big screen next Friday, when the film Plastic Tacos debuts at the Main Art Theater in Royal Oak.

Plastic Tacos is a mocumentary about discgolf. In the film, Erika plays Rene, a swinging single mom who meets a man who introduces her to the sport. She discovers she's hooked, but will the sport be enough to help her shed her wild ways?

I'll be at the premiere, and I will be posting photos of the stars and a review of the film here next week. More information and a trailer can be found on the Plastic Tacos Web site, and directions to the theater are available on the Main Art Theater site.

Showtime is at 7:30, and tickets are only $5; so my local visitors should be sure to come out on the 3rd to help support local independent film.

Every holiday needs some Scrooges, I guess

For those of you who like Halloween fun: if you were not overly impressed with yesterday’s virtual pumpkin carver, here’s another that’s more detailed, if less entertaining.

For those of you who don’t like Halloween fun, here’s a news story out of Massachusetts. Apparently, a “handful” of parents complaining that Halloween offended their religious beliefs was enough to get the celebrations cancelled for Underwood Elementary School.

The parents threatened to not send their children to school on that day if the celebration continued.

''When I hear that kids won't come to school because of what we're doing on Halloween, I have a problem with that," Castelline said.

This is just another example of the overextension of political correctness to kowtow to a vocal minority. If the parents want to keep the kids out of school for the day, that’s fine. That’s their prerogative.

While the kids would probably rather be celebrating with their classmates, if that can’t happen I’m sure they’d rather stay home than be “the kids who wrecked Halloween for everyone else.”

I can guarantee that, if you monitor these people for a few years, they will be the same parents who protest sex ed. for their children, and keep them out class that day. They’ll probably soon discover themselves the parents of pregnant teens as well.

Seriously, give these kids a Halloween. You're injecting morality into a holiday that, to a kid, is simply about costumes and candy.
Link to story

Halloween suicide fails to attract notice

A 42-year-old woman in Delaware committed suicide earlier this week by hanging herself from a tree, and everyone thought her body was a Halloween decoration.

Even though she was hanging next to a busy street, her body remained hanging there for hours after she was noticed before anyone called the police.

I wasn’t surprised by this story; it seems like simple Halloween news. I was most surprised that it took place in Delaware. I mean, come on, when was the last time you heard anything about Delaware?
Link

In this town we call home, everyone hail to the pumpkin song.

Halloween is coming up pretty fast. As I’ve mentioned before, Halloween is my favorite holiday, for many reasons.

Last night we began decorating for our annual Halloween party, to be held this Saturday. With about 50 RSVPs, it should be a big event and a lot of fun. I will take plenty of pictures. I will also be unveiling a special surprise for the members of Team Angry Monkey.

To help you all get into the Halloween spirit, here is a link to a virtual pumpkin-carving tutorial that my father-in-law sent me today. It’s fun, and the music is great.

Elmo Will Pay for His Crimes

In a crackdown on what they called "aggressive begging”, the LAPD arrested three men dressed as Elmo, Mr. Incredible and the hooded villain from the movie Scream.

The trio was arrested for allegedly harassing tourists on Hollywood Boulevard for money to pose for photos with the costumed impersonators.

"We were leaving to get something to eat," Mr Stockton told the Los Angeles Times. "We had our heads off and were walking about a block away to our car when they pulled up."
"They jumped out of their cars with guns drawn," said Mr Harper, who says he makes up to $400 a day in tips.
They claim they were handcuffed and taken by police car to the Hollywood Walk of Fame where they were then paraded in front of shocked tourists and other impersonators.

They were eventually released on a $100 bond. Am I the only one who entertained the daydream that the guy in the Elmo costume was a dangerous felon who yelled, “you’ll never take me alive, coppers”; then attempted to pull a tommy gun from his suit and then went down in a hail of bullets in front of everyone, and that “Elmo Gunned Down by Police” appeared on the front page of newspapers nationwide the next day? Seriously, is it just me?
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Woman shot in plot to eliminate cow

BBC News had a quirky little story about a man in Australia who was shooting at a cow, missed, and accidentally hit a passing motorist.

It was all purely accidental; he fired at the cow while inside a shed, and the bullet passed through the back wall of the shed and hit the passing car, wounding the driver in the leg.

The driver recovered, the shooter was fined $1,000, and he voluntarily gave up his firearms license. All’s well and good, but don’t you feel like stuff is being left out?

First of all, how bad of a shot do you need to be to be shoot at a cow from inside a shed and miss?!?!

Second, and I think this point is key, is that the shooter, one Rudolf Stadler, agreed to shoot the cow for a friend because the cow was “troublesome.” How exactly does a cow become “troublesome,” especially so “troublesome” as to warrant a bullet? Was she using his debit card online without permission? Threatening to go to authorities with select knowledge about mad cow disease that shouldn’t get out? Or just simply always snapping her gum in an irritating way and refusing to quit?

This sounds like a definite cover-up; and with the cow dead, we'll probably never have the complete story.
Link

Anne Rice finds God, loses Goths

In a recent Newsweek interview, Anne Rice announced that she’s devoted herself to God. She hasn’t so much been “Born Again” as she has returned to the Catholic Church. Her latest novels will reflect this.

In two weeks, Rice will release Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt. The novel will be the first in a series; this book will be about Jesus at seven years old and will be narrated by him. Critics, and even Rice herself, are acknowledging that it’s a bold move that may alienate her following. But I have to question - is it really?

Anne Rice’s novels have always delved deeply into Catholic mythology; Memnoch the Devil, arguably her best book thus far, dealt almost exclusively with it, and it was hardly the exception. Just as her books have dealt with vampires and witches, they also explored their places in a Roman Catholic world, and how the characters felt about their places and dealt with their beliefs.

If you have been a regular reader of Rice, you’ve probably noticed that her plotlines have begun to fizzle out anyway. Seriously, there was not much more exploration she could do with her vampires, and many of the storylines had gotten tired.

As far as the issue of “alienating her following”, this issue is a really big pet peeve of mine. If your work as a writer alienates your following, they’re not your following. This is an issue that Poppy Z. Brite has dealt with in recent years, as she transitioned from horror to realistic fiction surrounding the restaurant industry in New Orleans. Her writing style hasn’t changed; it has developed and gotten stronger, but hasn’t changed. I still enjoy reading everything she writes.

Brite was often compared to Rice simply because they were both women who wrote vampire fiction (to be fair, Brite only wrote one vampire novel, the excellent Lost Souls, and yet she couldn’t escape being lumped in with Rice). Rice may now be held up to Brite’s example as an erotic horror veteran who, gasp, switched genres.

I’m looking forward to Rice’s new novels; I am sure they will be creative and offer new perspectives that haven’t been explored. I’m also sure that her depiction of the devil will be, once again, very interesting and charismatic.

And one more comment on the “alienation of the following”; as with Poppy Z. Brite, I’m sure that the only portion of Anne Rice’s readers that will be disappointed will be her contingency of teenage goth kids and, really, can you blame her for switching genres to get rid of that bunch?

Link to Newsweek Article

It will take more than this to make Royal Oak part of the Real World

MTV recently leased 8,812 square feet of space in downtown Royal Oak, adding weight to rumors that the next season of Real World will be based in the city.

It makes sense, really. The Super Bowl is coming to Detroit, and could be part of the new season, but MTV would never go so far as to put its cast in the new lofts in the city. Aside from the fact that the lofts are built like fortresses in many places because the neighborhoods have not caught up to the safety level desired by loftdwellers yet, Detroit may be a little too “real” for the Real World.

Royal Oak is a nice little Emerald City of restaurants and hipster bars, with some boutiques and chain bookstores thrown in. It wasn’t always like this, but it has over the years become a caricature of a cool city. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, and go get yourself an overpriced margarita while we quietly finish pushing out the original merchants who helped Royal Oak become the nice overpriced urban suburbia it has become.

All in all, I can’t see my life being affected by the Real World’s presence all that much; in the unlikely event that the Royal Oak cast ventures into the city, or even into Ferndale, I can’t picture them slumming into any of the local dive bars, except for the possibility of one or two episodes where they display their edginess by venturing into the seedy underbelly of the local hillbilly hangouts. And on those nights, if I’m there I will make a point of constantly swearing loudly enough to prevent them from getting any good audio.
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Now, if we can only find a use for Coors

A recent news story reported that Coors Brewing Co. is using the waste from its beer production process to make ethanol.

The waste undergoes a 2-hour refining process to become ethanol. The ethanol is then mixed with gasoline and sent to gas suppliers in the area.

With gas prices on the rise, any alternative fuel sources are a welcome bit of relief to reserves that are already stressed and over-priced.

It does nothing to address the real problem - the fact that Coors is producing its nasty swill of a beer in the first place.
Link

Proof that astrology is unpredictable at best

An astrologer in India predicted his own death last Thursday, and hundreds of people turned out to see it happen.

I don’t know if it was out of morbid curiosity or a desire to glimpse the supernatural that brought all of these people to witness the event, but they didn’t get what they came for. The guy lived.

The astrologer's family was quoted as saying that many of the people who gathered were praying for the astrologer, which was the reason for the 75-year-old man's survival.

There is no mention in the article of how those gathered felt when the guy didn’t croak, but I’d imagine they felt the same way you feel when you go to the zoo on a hot day and all of the animals are lying around or sleeping; it’s not a total loss, but you still really didn’t get to see anything.

The article does offer this tidbit:

Malviya's prediction is not the first of its type by an Indian astrologer. But in the past, crowds have beaten up astrologers when their predicted demise failed to occur.

I guess that's one way to make sure your prediction comes true.
Link

Free Music For Everyone!

Writer Mom asked me for a good deal on downloaded music, and we all know the best deal is free, so I thought I’d pass this one on.

Amazon is not only a great place to buy just about anything, but it’s also a great source for downloading music. They offer sample tracks by a lot of great artists. The range runs from Leadbelly to Rancid, so you’re sure to find something you like.

Based on a brief glance at their listings, I would personally recommend checking out the Dropkick Murphys. They play great Boston-Irish punk rock, and Amazon has eight tracks available for free download.

Here’s a link to Amazon’s download section, and a link to their 200 most-downloaded tracks.

Paris is Always a Good Idea

My wife turns 30 next month. In an effort to make her 30th the best day possible, I did it. I bought her tickets to Paris.

This is first and foremost in my brain right now. We're going to Paris. I was in Paris once, 16 years ago, but I didn't really appreciate it much I'm afraid; the primary thrill of my visit was sneaking to McDonald's for beer (that's a big thrill for a teen).

This time I will be able to truly appreciate it, and have someone to appreciate it with.

Before Paris, however, is Iceman. And while the mystery illness sidelined much of Team Angry Monkey last weekend, I am happy to say we found the time to hammer out nine miles yesterday at a near sprint. I am very happy with the results. We're pushing the envelope, and not only are the speed results coming in well, the "after-pain" is minimal.

I am being extra careful in the training, though; no log jumps, big drops, stupid stunts or catching air. Two weeks out from the race, I am thoroughly unwilling to sideline myself with a stupid injury. I already cracked a rib this year, I'd like to save any new injuries until next season.

But man, Paris. That's huge.

Animal Rights Activists Angry Over Alleged Chicken Choking

An Australian animal rights group is speaking out against a toy chicken that squawks and flails about when you choke it.

From the Jaycar Electronics Web site, where they advertise the toy:

Grab him by the neck and he will squawk and cluck like mad, flapping his wings and feet wildly as if he is really being choked.

From a statement by Michael Beatty, of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals:

What's next? Burn a cat? Shoot a dog?

Regardless of how you feel about the ethics of manhandling a toy animal, it appears that everyone involved is ignoring the best part of the story; it’s a kid’s toy called The Choke-A-Chicken! Is everyone just being too polite to mention that, or does that slang just not carry to Australia?

Link to The Choke-A-Chicken site
Link to news story

Punk Cabaret is Freedom! Dresden Dolls, St. Andrew's Hall, October 21, 2005

Ever since she first heard the Dresden Dolls, my wife has been in love with them, and she quickly made me a fan. We missed them at the Magic Stick, and then, right around the time their tour would have brought them back to Detroit, Nine Inch Nails snatched them up as an opening act, delaying their return to the Motor City by almost a year. Last night we finally got to see them, and it was by far the best show I’ve been to this year, and it probably hits my Top 10 concerts of all time list.

For those of you unfamiliar with the Dresden Dolls, their shows are not just concerts; they are events. While it’s hard to pin them to a genre, their self-described label of “punk cabaret” works quite well. Their performances are loosely based on cabaret shows, with a bit of vaudeville thrown in.

With an introduction by Krin Maren Haglund and Jonas Woolverton, two veterans of Montreal's Cirque Eloize who were our host and hostess for the evening, the show opened up with a set by Faun Fables. Picture a Rennaissance musician with a voice like a huskier version of Sinead O’Connor. That’s her. She started her set with an a cappella tune and a spoon solo played on an empty wine bottle, then threw off her shawl (“I’m done looking like your mother for now”) and picked up a guitar. Brian Viglione, the drummer for the Dolls came out to accompany her on a few tunes. Her set was short and sweet, and very much worth being there from the beginning.

Another vaudeville aspect of these shows stems from the fact that the action is nonstop. Between bands, a sort of center ring is set up on the dance floor, and various performers entertain the crowd. First up was a contortionist, Alexa (whose livejournal can be found here). Alexa was even willing to entertain a few questions about contortionism after the performance from a drunken showgoer, namely me.

Q: Does it hurt?
A: Not usually.

Q: Do you have any special abilities for this, or is it just a lot of stretching?
A: It’s all just stretching. I stretch for three hours a day.

There you have it. If you have the time and dedication, you too can be a contortionist. Even with this secret out, I wouldn’t worry about job security. There are a lot of things I could master with time and dedication; I don’t seem to have much of either.

Next up Krin and Jonas did a surreal performance that involved ballet, an accordian and wig juggling. Any further attmpts to explain would be even more confusing. We’ll leave it at that.

The next act was DeVotchka. This band defies description, but may be one of the best party bands I’ve ever heard. With a sound that’s very Eastern-European, blended with jazz and a bit of mariachi; they reminded me a lot of the Leningrad Cowboys without the goofy outfits. Their set was awesome, and at one point they broke in to The Velvet Underground’s “Venus in Furs”. They had such a great take on it, that it wasn’t until I realized I was singing along that I knew the song. Nice.

The range of instruments was amazing as well, with all of the band members switching up. Let me sum up their set with this statement: when a band has an accordian, tuba, and a mandolin going at the same time, and the mandolin player is also playing a theremin with the neck of his mandolin, well you know that band has to rock! They are the favored band to play my plague party!

In between the sets Krin and Jonas came back and did another bizzare bit of performance that involved rolling around in a giant hula hoop. I don’t know who comes up with this stuff, but I was amazed.

Now, the moment we were waiting for; the Dresden Dolls took the stage. The lights weren’t up, but I quickly realized they were dressed as the White stripes, with the black suit and red dress. As they groped and and mashed a little bit on the stage, I was seriously laughing to myself as they mocked one of Detroit’s more popular music acts.

As the lights came up and they took their positions, it became even funnier; vocalist Amanda Palmer was dressed as Jack, and Brian was Meg! They tore into a cover of “My Doorbell”, which was even funnier to us, because that was the last song on the radio as we had parked outside St. Andrew’s, and we had bitched about it being stuck in our heads (Dammit! Now it’s in my head again.) Brian even did his best to imitate Meg White’s rudimentary drum skills.

After “My Doorbell”, the Dolls pulled a move that was funny and entertaining. As “The William Tell Overture” played on the PA, assistants rushed on to the stage where, in a few seconds, the Dolls changed clothes and applied their tradtional makeup right in front of the crowd. Once they were the Dolls we were used to seeing, they blasted through the rest of their set.

The rest of the set was sensual, surreal and fun. At one point, and acrobat performed stunts suspended over the crowd, at another point, while Amanda pounded out a frenzied “Girl Anachronism” on the piano, Krin and Jonas danced through the crowd dressed up as injured cheerleaders.

The Dresden Dolls played all of my favorites (with the exception of “The Jeep Song”, but it’s rare to hear every song you want at a show, isn’t it?), and yet their set was over too soon. As the house lights came up and we stumbled off into the cold, I couldn’t help but think I had just witnessed something amazing, and I felt really fortunate to have been there. When you see a lot of concerts, it’s rare to get that feeling (I don’t think I’d felt that way since the New York Dolls reunion), so when a show does that to you, it’s a great feeling.

Whatever happened to Portugal?

Remember these names from Elementary history?

Ferdinand Magellan
Henry the Navigator
Vasco da Gama

They were all Portuguese explorers.

At one time Portugal was a world power. You don't really hear much about it anymore. I know people in Brazil speak Portuguese. Sepultura makes some rocking Portuguese death metal (Ratamahatta is a great song!). You just don't hear much about Portugal as a country anymore. What happened?

Just wondering.

Thursday Night Dance Party will not be taking place at home tonight, as we are going to St. Andrew's to see the Dresden Dolls. I'll let you know how it was.

You can't get there from here (my anti-traffic rant)

The M-10 is down to one lane, so it takes me 30 minutes longer to get to work now. I spend a lot of time just sitting in traffic lately because of construction, and things are getting worse.

A recent study revealed that Michigan’s roads are headed toward a crisis. Despite constant construction, one-third of Detroit’s roads are listed in “poor” condition. Like I need to tell that to any of my local readers; Detroit’s highways often look like minefields, our traffic reports are filled with warnings of car-eating potholes that cause flat tires and massive backups during rush hour. The shoulders of our expressways are littered with hubcaps shaken from vehicles by the rough terrain (there is a hubcap from my wife’s Scion xb somewhere along the Southfield – if you see it, please let me know).

The long-term prognosis ain’t so good, either; current projections say that $70 billion is going to be needed over the next 25 years to bring Detroit’s roads up to snuff, and only $40 billion is going to be available.

While I realize that weather and traffic put a strain on Michigan roads, there are better alternatives than the $1.3 billion the state spends on its roads each year. Some of the money could be focused on giving Detroit a viable mass transit system. This would reduce congestion, both reducing wear on the roads and the need to widen any of our highways.

Automakers are, historically, opposed to mass transit. And the Big Three own Detroit, for as long as the Big Three last anyway. They will do what they can to prevent any development of mass transit in Michigan or anywhere else for that matter; GM destroyed the US streetcar system in the 20's, and they never looked back (link).

Our esteemd ex-governor John Engler bears some of the responsibility for Detroit’s problems as well; his last act as governor was to quietly veto a bill that would help create mass transit in Detroit. He literally did it as he was walking out of his office on New Year’s Eve, and it is largely viewed as a vindictive act toward real or imagined slights from Detroit politicians. That was at the end of 2002, and the bill has yet to be revived (link).

I am so jealous of my friends elsewhere who get to take a train to work. Just to have that time to nap or read, and my commute wouldn’t feel like time stolen from my day. I would love to live in a place where I could walk or ride my bike to work; urban sprawl prevents that. Instead, I live in the 10th-worst rush hour in the country, where drivers waste an average of 57 hours each year just sitting in traffic, like I do on the M-10.

I have a quarter tank of gas, which would get me home from work in non-rush hour traffic. Hell, it would get me home and back again, and home one more time. Because of the current state of my drive, though, I need to get gas so I know I’ll make it home. This pisses me off, too; it not only wastes gas (clogged roads cause the average Michigan motorist $318 a year in wasted fuel), but gas by my house is 2.49/gallon, while out here it’s 2.65.

I also hate the fact that individual drivers have the ability to ruin my day. Just because you can’t drive, or you were on your phone, or you decided that you had to drive like an ass and get two car lengths up, you caused a fender bender, and now I am stuck here because of you.

Many times it’s the same makes of cars involved, which leads to a conundrum; do certain people drive certain makes of cars because they are jackasses, or does owning these cars cause you to become a jackass? If you own a Lexus, please let me know your take on your driving personality.

The people I feel worst for, though, are the guys in the traffic choppers. Imagine this scenario: you’re in a helicopter, you’re flying, you can go anywhere, but your job is to sit, if not in, over the traffic, and watch it. Just like the rest of us poor schlubs. You could get away, but you’re not allowed to. You’re stuck in traffic because we are.

Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. Mahalo.

Today's Fresh Catch is... YOU!

In Australia and California they are seeing a sharp increase in shark attacks, and there have been many theories as to why this is occurring. A prominent Australian marine biologist believes that sharks may now be actually targeting humans as a source of food.

Dr Scoresby Shepherd believes that over fishing has caused a decline in the numbers of fish such as tuna that have previously made up a large part of the sharks’ diets. And what happens when a shark can’t eat what he wants? He eats something else. From the interview:

My speculation is that if the natural prey is decreasing, then they're more likely to be hungrier than they were before. And so they may be well be turning their attention to whatever else is available.

Perhaps it’s even more insidious than that. Perhaps the sharks are cognizant of the fact that we’re responsible for the decline in their favorite foods and are doing what they can to eliminate their competition. Gun-toting dolphins don’t sound like such a bad idea now, do they?
Link

Night of the ZOMBIE WORMS!

The director’s cut of George Romero’s Land of the Dead came out on DVD yesterday. I of course picked up my copy of what I feel is one of the best movies released this year. In honor of the DVD release, I have a “zombie-related” item from the news this morning.

A UK-Swedish team of scientists has reported the discovery of a new species of marine worm off the coast of Sweden. The worms are called “zombie worms” because their diet consists of the bones of dead whales. After a whale dies, and his bones drift to the ocean floor, these “zombie worms” are part of the cleanup crew.

I think the coolest part of this new discovery, though, is the name they’ve given this new species. From the article:

Adrian Glover and Thomas Dahlgren tell the journal the new species has been named Osedax mucofloris, which literally means "bone-eating snot-flower".

I am totally going to have to remember that one. It almost sounds like a classical Roman insult; “Pipe down, you bone-eating snot-flower!” Man, the possibilities are endless!
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