not falling down

What you have to understand about the Burger King Loaded Steakburger is that I had no choice in the matter. The moment I spied it billboardwise, during the long drive west, I was gripped by the same potent mixture of revulsion and lust that came upon me once in college, when Jon and I first saw the commercial for the Bacon Club Chalupa. We turned to each other, then, eyes wide and desperate, like two men drowning who each believe the other can swim.

Neither could.

So it was only a matter of time before I ran out of excuses for not planting this particular meatbomb in my face. Leaving the drive-thru not ten minutes ago, I left steering to my nervous left hand while my right fumbled through wrappers. The first thing I saw was the edge of the patty, protruding a full inch beyond the hapless bun like a beckoning pseudopod; the second was the utter absence of traditional dressing. There is no pickle here, no tomato. The bastards have delivered a sullen daub of gray potato and onion shards instead, and they have somehow transmuted lettuce to bacon. The rites involved are none I care to imagine.

The sandwich is not good. I stress this even in the full knowledge that it will accomplish nothing; those who weren’t going to eat it won’t, and the rest of you will have no more agency than I did. But like any Lovecraftian narrator, I am bound to commit these desperate words by sheer force of narrative. I must write of its taste, like barbecue Spam fried in motor oil. I must write of its texture, which is also like barbecue Spam fried in motor oil. I must tell you how it sits in my stomach e’en now, heavily roiled, plotting its course downward with the slow cunning of a brain-damaged tiger on spelunk.

Taco Bell recently reintroduced the Bacon Club Chalupa. Should I even have time to post this missive, I cannot imagine that I will outlive it long. The end is near. I hear a noise at the door, as of some crispy flatbread, sliding deep-fried fingers up to caress the latch.

What are some of the brightest lights in webcomics saying about Brendan Adkins and Ommatidia?

“I didn’t know about it.”

–Tycho Brahe of Penny Arcade

“Asshole.”

–Scott Kurtz of PvP, at the Emerald City Comicon

“Pretty slick, but my shout-out is not without motive.”

–Kristofer Straub of Starslip Crisis*

* Kristofer Straub was paid $50 during book creation for unrelated reasons

I have a feeling Netflix has slotted me into a recommendation demographic called “pretentious middlebrow taste.” I added the thingy anyway.

I took my first road test yesterday. I managed to parallel park in a space exactly the same size as Scott’s (kindly) borrowed SUV, but on reflection, I’m kind of glad we stopped after I made the wrong turnabout.

Ever wondered about my mental self-image, as a lifelong Kentuckian landing in London for the first time, back in March? Uncle John provides.

John Joseph Adams asked what are your top ten SF-F books not written by white men? Actually, he asked it in two parts: a top-ten list of nonmen, followed by a top ten list of nonwhites. Like everyone else who’s responded so far, I can do a list of women easily; embarrassingly (and typically), of the SF-F authors whose race I actually know, almost all of them are white (the late Octavia Butler seems to be a common exception). I might be able to do a nonwhite list, but it’d be almost all comics creators.

Anyway, my top-ten-women list demonstrates a pretty strong pattern.

1. The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood
2. Howl’s Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones
3. Magic for Beginners, Kelly Link
4. Tehanu, Ursula Le Guin
5. The Homeward Bounders, Diana Wynne Jones
6. A Wind in the Door, Madeleine L’Engle
7. The Hero and the Crown, Robin McKinley
8. Lioness Rampant, Tamora Pierce
9. The Dark is Rising, Susan Cooper
10. Tie: Deep Wizardry, Diane Duane, and The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood

Is it usually this obvious that my literary development halted in middle school?

Er. Hem. Ahem hem.

What are… what. What are some good.

podcasts.