My short story, The Snake River Tale, is included in this Old West horror anthology. Go check it out and maybe help out.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/crlangille/along-harrowed-trails
Anthologies
Snowy night
It’s snowing. The huge storm predicted actually arrived over half of my state.
Yesterday was a hell day at work, starting with me spinning about on some ice. As in my car spun about like a big deadly sled. Just bumped against the curb, no damage but still…and then work turned out to be hellish, crushing and gut-punching but hey, normal in these modern times and olden times and times not named. Huzzah.
I am not sleeping that well. Probably why I’m up writing this little blurby thing.
It’s already been a long December. Winter has arrived here in Eastern Oregon and I suspect plans to stay around. We usually get a bit of snow, it melts, it’s spring.
Going back to bed. I’ll put on an old comfy movie and wake up later on to marvel at the snow level outside. Don’t have to go anywhere, or be anywhere and what a nice sensation that is.
Hope your December is going better than mine. I haven’t even put up any decorations nor really plan to. I might wrap a garland or something about the cat just to be festive and because it would annoy her.
Writing-wise. I have been submitting a bit but am just taxed out that way right now. Might need to take a break, paint rocks or knit, something else that’s not writing. I feel crushed and untalented and unable to produce anything but dreck. Normal writer stuff, right? Yeah.
I might need some Hallmark Christmas fare to perk me up. My depression has been slapping me about lately, compounded by shitty job. Might be why I’m only sleeping in about three to four hour blocks, if that. Might be end of year doldrums where you just wanna stay in bed drifting along, rather numb and used up.
But hey, got paid. I might order those avocado green platform boots because you only get one life something something. And because they’re avocado green. There’s that, too. That’s 70’s shade that so delights the eyes. Mine, at least.
Snowy night. All is quiet and hushed. The dogs and the cat are snoozing away. Should I make myself some coffee or actually just go back to bed? I don’t have to chance the roads of death tomorrow to get to work by seven. I can stay up all night not writing and try to take a nap, feeling guilty I’m not producing magical works of art that will lift me out of poverty and despair…
Geez.
This is our fourth or fifth snow, by the way. Winter might be a bad one this year. Or good, depending on your view of snow and needing it for that decades-long drought hereabouts.
I have books out. I have short stories in many an anthology. I have people doing my plays. I have stuff out there. I’ll end this ramble there. I have stuff out there.
Hell-o, Halloween
Welp, had to drive to work yesterday in fog so dense I nearly drove off the road, twice. Fun.
It finally rained here in Oregon East. An actual rain. We plunged into near winter temps! It might snow in the valleys! Nah, not yet but winter wants to pounce.
I want to enjoy Halloween and all its orange, black and sparkly glory, but the American midterm elections throw a giant moist pall over everything. Moister than moist. Dripping wet with racism, sexism, fascism and all the other crappy isms imaginable and then some. Who is taking all these polls? It does not seem to reflect anything but what is expected– that the Gross Old Perverts sweep everything and Biden gets made to look like a doddering, shitting himself in public, gibbering fool. Um? And yet so many people registering to vote and yet…mmm.
I just want this all over so I can start breathing again and plan accordingly. Do I still live in a ‘free’ country or do I have to practice my salutes, wave a flag with savage frantic grins plastered across my frozen face? Shout randomly, in public, about eagles and freedom and no more open borders? We don’t have open borders, what the fuck is that noise?
Idaho, by the way, is almost an Ida-don’t go there, stay away, avoid avoid avoid. We do have scary states here in ‘murica and that is becoming one of the scariest.
The Aryan Nations that used to be a joke, who used to live under rocks and only appear if you whispered something overtly racist near an open sewer…have now virtually taken over that state. It’s sad and tragic and awful. Aryan Nations meets QAnon nonsense, has weird disgustingly awful sex, produces a mutant baby and here we are!
And my state, by the way, has a trumpian Gross Old Pervert running for guvvie. I just. No. No!
I do have scary movies lined up, as the midterms causes eye twitches, drooling, screaming when a leaf drops from a tree too near me. It’s tense here, y’all. Tense. Golly, vote for sane people or batshit trumpfucks? I mean no offense to actual bats, who just wish to live their bat lives in peace.
I have had a few acceptances roll my way, but mostly, lately, it’s been rejection city. Sigh.
Need to sacrifice something to Satan, I guess. Maybe he’ll accept an IOU? Will hand over the flies stuck to the fly strip. They’re already dead and am just gonna toss that strip otherwise. Why be wasteful? Satan? Hello?
It’s Happy Month
Oh, my fellow babies and compatriots for this thing called life– it’s the happiest month of the year. For me. Cause. Halloween.
Pumpkins. Pumpkin patches.
Ghosts and goblins and ghouls, oh my.
Creaky vampire movies with capes and crosses.
American Werewolf in London time!
The weather cooling the frack down.
The Halloween baking competition with its black garlic cupcakes and four-layer oozing lime basil cake with Italian buttercream something or other. Make entire scary scenes from cake, pumpkins, rice crispy treats and sugar work!
Oh yes, oh please, amen.
I have pumpkins about ready to be plucked. I have gourds. I want to make bread.
I feel energized and ready to watch scary movies with all the lights off.
I have the original Night of the Living Dead tucked away. There’s a compulsion within to find the DVD and WATCH IT the old-fashioned way. On my television through a DVD player. No streaming. No computer involved. Old-fashioned out the disc in, push play when prompted. With a big cup of ho-cho in hand.
Of course, it’s still rather hot here in the day. The nights have cooled off a bit. I now need at least a blanket. Kitters has even taken to napping a bit on me so it must be getting cold outside or she misses me as I’ve been working. I call my cat Kitters, though her official name is Jaws. As she showed up with a broken jaw a couple Halloween’s ago.
So. I hope TCM shows horror movies I’d like to watch. I hope hope hope they show the Abominable Dr. Phibes, with Vincent Price. Where he speaks only through a record. It’s so acid-trippy, weird and satisfying. I’m so glad no one has ever tried to remake this one. Why would you? It’s perfection. From that first scene with the bats to the bitter, bitter end. Dang. And there’s sequels, which I hear, are not as good but still. I will also probably watch the silent Swedish made up documentary on witches, because it’s just so good. Haxan or something like that. 1923 or hereabouts. It’s on Youtube. As are a lot of silent horror movies. Like M or the Cabinet of Dr. Caligaleri. [Spelling?]
Halloween month. It’s the happiest month of the year for me. From baking to horror movies I’ve seen a gazillion times already to new horror films I might discover. I do like discovering some offbeat, nobody’s heard of it, frightfest. Like the Blood on Satan’s Claw [Satanic children, 70’s] Or even something like Only Lovers Left Alive, with Tom Hiddleston as a mopey vampire. It’s a gorgeous film, by Jim Jarmusch, and also boasts a sparkly performance by Tilda Swinton. It’s as slow as frozen molasses and it’s not so much a horror movie as a test of your patience but hey, it might hit a sweet spot or two.
Hey, speaking of Halloween and spooky stuff and scary things…I have two recent novels out that deal with zombies and cannibal bikers. Yay!
Aftermath: Boise, Idaho— where Hannah kills herself to escape death by zombie horde only to wake up in a world run by sentient zombies.
There’s also The Remarkable Women of Brokenheart Lane, where three elderly sisters hiding out in a small Nevada town after a catastrophic world war nuclear event, become embroiled with the decimated cannibal biker gang that’s limped into Fallon.
There’s also Oregon Gothic. The opening tale, Bailey, is about what a real vampire is like and the costs of thwarting that vampire’s will. There’s also the necrophilia-smeared love story of Prince Charming Finds His Sleeping Beauty, which will be in an anthology coming out this year.
Halloween month. Pure joy filling my soul right now. Just pure happy wonderful joy.
The Waiting is Truly Abysmal
It’s July. Hot. It’s hot. Ugh. Hot.
With that out of the way!
Been applying for jobs. I suck at finding jobs. I suck beans. Don’t know what that means but it sounds keen.
All attempted rhyming aside, it’s the waiting that is truly abysmal. See title!
Will I get an interview nod, at the very least? Will I get the form rejection letter, months later, that says they’ve passed on me? Will there be a black void of ‘we couldn’t even be bothered to send you a form rejection notice’? I have better luck placing my pitiful darlings [short stories] than landing a job. Unless it’s health care and they just need a warm body.
I’m also waiting for November. That’s the midterm elections for ‘murica. I am waiting in absolute dread for that one. Gonna be…? It could go either good or very very very bad. I’m thinking bad because Americans have no capacity for learning, history, showing up to vote or pretty much anything but screaming about how great ‘murica is while waving the nation’s flag that has a Confederate battle flag stamped on the back of it…mmm.
And then sobbing over how awful everything is while blaming the wrong set of people for all of it. Yep.
Okay, I’ll end this very short scream on something uplifting.
My yard toads are thriving. They like to shelter under these two pieces of bark I have placed by the old red rose bushes. It’s right by the drain for the washer, which is how they get into the house. Clever little demons. I can hear them croaking in the pipes in the house. You know spring is coming when you start hearing the toads calling from seemingly inside the walls.
Anyway.
I find them all over my small bits of garden. I often get startled by one as they blend so perfectly with dirt and dead leaves. They’re not big toads. They fit in the palm of my hand. Yes, I’ve picked them up. I have no squeamishness when it comes to frogs, toads or yes, snakes. Have not seen my yard snake this year yet but I’m sure he or she will work its way into the grass eventually.
There’s just something magical about toads. At least to me.
I did attend the Nyssa Thunderegg Days festival. Got some neato rocks. Got out of the house. I am nearly at the point where I don’t want to leave my surroundings even to go to town. It often takes me days to get up the oomph to drive about ten miles to go buy some milk. Days. I’ll go tomorrow. Oh it’s too late now, have to go tomorrow.
Waiting to hear back on jobs, toads and turning into a hermit cat lady.
Thank you as always for reading and hey, go check out my books, short stories, poetry and plays. That’s my strong-arm sales pitch.
I slog onward, wanting to give up all the time now. I slog onward…
Lilith’s Arm
Howdy. My short story, Lilith’s Arm, is included in Annus Horribilis, an anthology of horror stories with 2022 as their backdrop.
A homeless woman is determined to turn her life around despite the infected area on her arm which defies her attempts to make it go away. Will Lilith find the gumption to change her life or will her arm win? It’s gory but it has the can-do American spirit!
The Americana Diner of Station 96
I have a short story included in Grandpa’s Deep Space Diner anthology.
The Americana Diner of Station 96 involves a family’s generational American-themed diner. It’s situated at the end of a strip of services and shops, a sort of truck stop for space folks. Missy Sue, suffering from a genetic malady, meets a space bad boy, who’s probably in love with a military woman who’s meeting him at the diner for some info. All of this as a rare ‘get off the planet now’ storm brews up that drives Missy Sue, her aunts and mom and their customers down into the storage space to try and survive if they can.
It’s rather sweet, a bit hopeful and even funny. There’s family dynamics, a bit of romance and some fun playing with how those trying to recreate a distant past tend to mess up details, motives and reasons why such and such was done that way.
It should be arriving soon for Kindle, as well as book form.
If you like sci fi, with different takes on food in outer space settings, hey, pick this one. I had a lot of fun writing my story, btw.
ANN WUEHLER 