Now I'M a wiener!

Before I tell you what it is I've won, here's a reminder to pop in at Beth Wylde's Yahoo group on Wednesday to visit with Clare London, Chrissy Munder, Patric Michael, Felicitas Ivey, Jaime Samms, and me. (I'll be the one hugging the wall near the punch bowl.)

Now, what did I win? A print copy of a book. PRINT. Words on paper. Bound. No more sitting at my desktop to read, at least temporarily. My eyes and back and butt, they are so very happy! They tell me to enter more contests for print books! (For some reason, it's been difficult for me to get m/m fiction through the interlibrary loan system. I don't know if that's because my local-yokel library is falling down on the job or because not many libraries in the U.S. carry m/m fiction.)

Which book did I win? Click on the post title to find out. I've been eager to read this story, which breaks many genre norms in many good ways. Abundant thanks, especially from my eyes, back, and butt, to Mark Probst at Cheyenne Publishing!

You really must watch this.

This video is exquisitely beautiful. Dare you not to cry or get misty or at least sigh while you watch it. (Someone please tell Kris to get her butt over here!)

So here's to Pride month, and to a time when this type of gentle, affectionate intimacy is accepted everywhere. It's as emblematic of what makes life worthwhile as anything I've ever seen.

Straight Actors Playing Gay Men

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

An Award for Making Stuff Up - WINNER

Jessica Freely (click title) sent me this, obviously in recognition of my penchant for "making shit up." :-D

That minx was at Wiscon, and I didn't even know it! (Wiscon is essentially a female fantasy writers convention, GLBT more than welcome.) And she did a reading there! And it's only a two-hour drive south of me! *sigh* Well, there's always next year.

Anyway, y'all have played this game, I think, so I can't tag anybody. Just call me K.Z. "Day Late and Dollar Short" Snow. I'm always behind the times.

As you likely know by now, I've been an animal lover all my life. So, if you're good 'n' bored at the moment, try to guess which ONE of the following statements is FALSE.

1. I once had a labrador named Black Dog.

2. I once had a goldfish named Fluffy.

3. I once had a cat named Calvin.

4. I once had a goat named Annabelle.

5. I once had a cockatiel named Gilbird.

6. I once had a rooster named Boss Tweed.

7. I once had a hamster named Queequeg.

(Okay, it was only supposed to be five, but I've had a lot of freakin' pets.) And what do you get if you win?

A sock puppet -- the kind you don't mind encountering on blogs and loops! You must pick him up, though. This is the kind of package that doesn't ship well. *G*

Well, since it appears most everybody is either on vacation or doesn't like me anymore (fickle lot), I'll just go ahead and congratulate * CHRIS * for guessing that I never named a goldfish Fluffy. I've had fish aplenty, but I've never named them. They don't seem to live too long. :'/

Tube Socks is now hitchhiking his way to Minneapolis. Pray for the man; I don't believe he's wearing any shoes.

Brief Update

The steampunk WIP is picking up momentum. I'm also beginning to realize I'll likely get spanked for a having a manic-depressive hero. (No, not "bipolar," which is a contemporary, real-world term used to describe a real disease that afflicts real people. The story isn't set in the real world, and said hero isn't entirely human. So, natch, I took liberties.)

Electric Melty Tingles, my contemporary coming-out story for Loose Id, will be published in late September.

Fugly for Liquid Silver is going into edits. Still no release date, though. (Isn't it odd how different publishers handle things? One book has a release date but no cover, and the other has a cover but no release date.)

The Most Overlooked & Underappreciated, Part 2

Timbuk3 (formerly Pat MacDonald and the Essentials)

I have a roundabout connection to these Wisconsin musicians, who, I believe, are no longer a couple. Some years ago (everything in my life happened "some years ago"), I lived in a county that's probably the most chichi tourist trap in the upper Midwest. Slaved away there, I did, cleaning rooms at waterfront motels and country inns, preparing and serving food, even tending bar for a brief, doomed while. I've heard it said that this song is about that county, but I don't know for sure. Anyway, the watering hole I visited most often (when I wasn't fooling around with very young men) was owned by this singer's father, a great guy.

I'm proud to own the obscure LP on which the following song made its first appearance, and I've seen Pat MacDonald and Barbara K perform at that once-upon-a-time tavern. So, without further ado . . .

"Assholes on Parade"

The Most Overlooked, Underappreciated...

Since a lot of us seem to take musical breaks from our reading and writing, I figured I'd pick up what's kind of becoming a blog meme, even though I still don't know exactly what a meme is. I decided to pay homage to some of the greatest voices in pop music that you either never heard of or have forgotten about.

Let's start with Terence Trent D'Arby. Remember him? An American ex-pat living in Great Britain, last I heard. But he could be in Bora Bora now for all I know. Gorgeous, talented man. I was blown away when I first saw him perform this song. (Sananda Maitreya must be the name he now goes by. Castanet doesn't care. She still wants to do him.)

Got a kick out of this.

Ha!

What really tickles me is that the book (admittedly used, which makes this a legit sale) has two bids with four days left to go on the auction. Click on the post title to go to the actual eBay page.

I'm always amused when I show up on eBay. :-)

And the WTF? Award goes to ...

Elton "Money Trumps Principles" John

and gay basher/right-wing ranter extraordinaire, Rush Limpbag and his young-enough-to-be-the-daughter new wife.

But hey, who's counting?

'Cause we all know the exclusively hetero institution of marriage is SACRED, even if you're wedding the *cough* fourth gold-digger who's willing to overlook the fact you're a lunatic sack of lard.

WTG, Elton. Hope your husband is proud of you.

A truly fond farewell . . .

To one of the best Internet book-review sites EVER -- highly literate but never pretentious, often full of gentle humor, and always fair.

(Okay, so I forked out a small fortune in bribes over the past couple of years, but I consider it money well spent.)

So here's to "Well Read" and a smart, kind, unassuming lady from Leeds. (Sorry, no spicy cookies this time. A sweet one seems more appropriate.) I'm keeping it on my Favorites list; even inactive, it belongs there.

Mongrels and Mystics? A WIP Snip.

Clouds the color of soiled wool and urine threaded past a gibbous moon. The atmosphere may have produced them but the city had tinted them.

For Fanule Perfidor, the city was too close. Lying just to the west, that packed jumble of flaking bricks, weathered clapboards, and belching chimneys was a gritty distraction. Fanule sensed the pulse of life there. When the mania seized him, as it had tonight, he craved the city’s humid crush of bodies, the revelry that made them sweat and steam.

Wind slithered in from the sea and caught Fanule’s cloak, turning it, he imagined, into a black sail fluttering on a sturdy mast. He was the Flying Dutchman, a ghost ship plying moonlit seas and portending doom. He was at the mercy of the wind yet he was one with the wind.

He was a freak of nature and a force of nature. Perfidor, der Hundkönig. The Dog King. The epithet and the image it conjured made him laugh aloud.

The air’s agitation suited his mood. He strode rather than strolled down the boardwalk, his boot heels thudding with satisfying aggression on the planks. The crowd had thinned, but the remaining visitors made a wide berth around Fanule. Their aversion both amused and angered him. He considered sucking the light from the white globes atop the lampposts, just to see the silly humans’ reactions.

No, no, no. Can’t play. Must stay on task. Gods, look at that man’s legs; they could bind a body better than tarred rope! And then… No, must stay on task. But where to start? Where, where, where?

Fanule’s gaze darted along the overdone facades of the buildings he passed, all strung together like a lineup of gaudy, aging whores. Colorful pennants snapped above their roofs. How absurd to see elaborate cornices and quatrefoil windows, little gargoyles and square cupolas on structures so squat, so grayed by the hammering salt of sea spray. But, he supposed, fancy was the stuff of Hunzinger’s Mechanical Circus, the permanent carnival that stretched along and beyond the boardwalk and included whatever attractions were tucked behind those fancy fronts.

Look at the signs; look past the blazing and burnt-out bulbs and read the signs.

With effort, Fanule slowed his steps and studied the painted words above each entry. THE HIVE. Poseidon’s Playground. LOVE’S BOWER. Soon, he was aware of shadowed, lifeless eyes staring back at him from beneath some of the signs.

Ticket booths. Yes. Some were veiled in drapery on the inside, which seemed to indicate the exhibits were closed. Such was the case with Love’s Bower and The Pugilists and several others. Fanule approached one that was still open.

A couple, exclaiming quietly, exited the building. A sigh and hiss of hydraulics followed them through the door. Then, a stuttering metallic snap. The exhibit within had likely just begun or ended its cycle.

The couple glanced at Fanule. Startled, they looked again. He nodded a greeting as they hurried past him, then he turned his attention to the ticket booth.

A life-sized homunculus stared sightlessly through the glass. No doubt it was voice-activated. Alphonse Hunzinger had certainly been thorough in remaining true to his carnival’s theme.

These booth tenders would do Fanule no good. Neither would fabricated fauna and flora. Only intelligent, living beings could answer his questions. If Hunzinger was indeed guilty of committing atrocities against Mongrels, Fanule’s only hope of uncovering those misdeeds was by talking to someone familiar with the Circus from the inside.

The music pouring from somewhere, everywhere along the boardwalk waffled as the wind caught it. Laughing, Fanule twirled. The gaslights atop iron posts and the electric lights outlining the buildings delineated his stage. As pedestrians cast him sidelong glances, he thought he heard a human voice, a robust voice, but the music had captured his attention now. He waltzed with an invisible partner—a man somewhat smaller than he, comely, graceful. When their dance was through, they would descend to the strand, shed their clothing, and dive into the dark sea…

Little by little, the coil that had sprung within him began to wind back on itself. Little by little, the energy released by the mania withdrew into his cells. Fanule’s steps slowed.

Swaying slightly, he lapsed into dazed stillness. The cloak began to feel heavy on his shoulders. He was crossing the bridge—that was how he thought of his shifts from wild to mild—and there was always this moment when his mind paused in the middle to reorient itself. Slowly, he blinked. Then his mind crept forward, to the mild side. Being calm was good, it was very good. It led to the clarity that came with serenity. But falling off the bridge was very bad. Beneath it lay a chasm, an echoing void.

Must visit Lizabetta soon. Must get more powder. Can’t forget. Must write it on the walls.

“Labor no longer beneath the ponderous chains of lethargy! Shuck off your dyspeptic despair!”

Fanule turned his gaze to the man with the booming voice, the one who stood behind a framed counter on a low platform. A semicircle of onlookers had gathered in front of it.

The sight of him made Fanule smile. The man was dressed quite ridiculously, in trousers and coat patterned in a large black-and-yellow plaid. A watch chain made a gleaming arc near the bottom of his green vest. His yellow cravat seemed to throttle his neck.

In spite of his flashy suit and commanding voice, the pitchman was young and sweet-faced. Fanule liked the look of him; would’ve nibbled him like a peach if given half a chance.

A gust snatched at the young man’s top hat, but he seemed accustomed to the wind’s stealth. He quickly clamped a hand to the hat’s black tower and kept it in place.

His pitch continued. Brandishing a wand in one hand and a corked bottle in the other, he extolled the miraculous qualities of Dr. Bolt’s Bloodroot Elixir. A signboard above his platform advertised the product in waves of scarlet lettering outlined in gilt.

Fanule drifted closer and stationed himself at the back of the small audience. He felt grounded now, and fully capable of appreciating this tender cutlet with the wind-rouged cheeks and inviting, unstoppable mouth.

~

Copyright (c) 2010 K. Z. Snow