Moody

Feeling moody in the 'burbs. Had a busy week. Crashing pretty hard after last week's record-breaking sales (for me) at CAPE in Cornwall. They call it "con drop" for a reason, I guess. Suffered from insomnia on the Saturday night. I had wandered my old streets to pre-empt it, but unsuccessfully. Tonight called for more wine and either watching Resolution, a time-travel twister on Shudder. Or a rewatch of It Follows, horror in a dilapidated 'burb outside Detroit.

Darkness, grief, anger

Strongly considering writing some rather off-beat (or beat-off?) porn, as a close friend has suggested for dealing with my sadness, anger, grief, lack of focus, hopelessness and negativity. I have support, but this holiday time is very different this year.

Early September Full Moon

The early September full moon was haunting for the nights it was visible until just recently, ending September third. I stole time to think under its luminous sphere. The revising and writing is happening again, inspired by the moon, what it does to one of my characters, and because the revising wants to be complete now. Also, I am heartened to hear from those farther afield, that they are doing well and taking care of themselves.

A Note about Not Long After Midnight, and darkness

Just as a lark, a ways back, I started this blog.

For the uninitiated, the title is a tribute to the horror short story "Long After Midnight" by Ray Bradbury, during his pulp-sales era. The story is about a young man who is new on the job as a mortuary driver. He's naive and clearly a cipher for a young impressionable Bradbury and his more coarsened and significantly older co-workers are unfazed by having to cut down a suicide from a hanging tree. Drenched in atmosphere and quintessential observations about the human condition, the story is creepy is hell. The protagonist is distraught over the death of the young woman, and makes a startling discovery about the corpse, which changes everything.

In case anyone picks the story up, (it's anthologized in a collection of the same name and has been reprinted in various forms throughout the past fove decades), I won't give anything else away.0

I will say, though, that the mood and darkness and descriptions of night clearly show the Mole nearing the height of his powers. Bradbury was nicknamed the Mole by his peers on account of being slightly myopic and wearing unwieldy glasses (think hipster before hipster) that distorted the size of his eyes.