• The Boy Who Was Born Wrapped in Barbed Wire by Christopher Barzak
• The Girl Who Ate Butterflies by M. Rickert
• The Final Moments of the Auto-Frankenstein (a cautionary tale) by Teodor Reljic
• Barney by Chloe Caldwell
• The Melancholy of Mecha Girl by Catherynne M. Valente
• Banana Kid’s Suicide Note by M. Shaw

I am a psychoemotional alternate reality. Happy new self.

Good Night Fucking Moon

Whiskey tasting at Kafe Kerouac. With Peach Roulette and stream-of-consciousness tasting cards.

Billy Goat Dave at Holiday Hop. Freaking out the establishment, when the “establishment” is the arty gallery-going alternative crowd.

Billy Goat Dave Dance-Off

Offshoot Productions Christmas Hootenanny… with Billy Goat Dave! (photos and videos by Roger Heartsun) Excellent show. Much love to Brett Morehead, The Ooh-La-Las, Houndstooth Bindles and our venue, the Knock Theater, and Tony Vargas for saving Christmas’s sound.

Christmas cookies. One of them is me.

Electro Cult Circus Christmas eve eve show.

• Basically enjoyed it, but probably my least favorite installment of the series so far.
• POV characters whose chapters were all they were cracked up to be: Jon Snow, Tyrion Lannister, Davos Seaworth, Theon Greyjoy, Asha Greyjoy, Quentyn Martell, Jon Connington
• Melisandre is not as interesting a POV character as you would expect. Without looking at the book I could not tell you what happens in her one chapter to save my life.
• My favorite characters are still Davos and Dolorous Edd. If you are a Dolorous Edd impersonator in Columbus who I can hire for parties, please e-mail me.
• Found myself genuinely wishing that Rhaegal and Viserion would burn Meereen to the ground so we could move on. The intrigue going on there is basically like the intrigue going on in King’s Landing except that it’s happening to characters who are less interesting. Also feels like it’s taking longer to actually happen.
• Areo Hotah is still a non-character who pops up when we need an omniscient narrator.
• I like what’s going on with Wyman Manderly/White Harbor, too bad it takes up like 3% of the book.
• I miss Jaime, Brienne and Sansa.
• Have never been more sure of the identities of Jon Snow’s actual parents.
• I like it when the series is cruel and people die.

Shaw means “dweller in the wood” and that’s where I’ve been at, since around early October. No new stories since then, anyway. Some of y’all might have seen me at Travonna Coffee House the last few Thursdays (except this past week when the road buttfucked my rear bike tire on the way there) reading my shit and other people’s. Other than that, been keeping my head below the water line with two big projects, both of which you’ll hear about now.

#1

Offshoot Productions Showcase is an event that Offshoot-gumi has put on twice, once this past May and once in June, in both cases to raise money for charity. This time it’s a similar deal but the show is much more extensive. For one thing it involves live sketch comedy and music, two types of performance that were not in either of the previous ones, as well as film, burlesque and staged reading. It’s also longer–4 hours including both intermissions.

Planning the showcase has been on my time like a lion on a zebra carcass. For one thing, I’m writing all of the live portions (that kind of thing being my, you know, job with Offshoot) and I’m emcee-ing 80% of the sucker to boot. Draining as hell and totally worth it because the show is kick god’s balls. It’s a Christmas special written by somebody who hates Christmas. Jesus shoots Santa in the leg and then emcees the burlesque show (the 20% I’m offstage for). The best part involves a potato but I can’t really explain that here.

We’ll be hawking a bunch of crap at the show as well: among other things, Offshoot DVD’s, greeting cards and…

#2

One of Offshoot’s film projects is a short book trailer based on my story Her New Boyfriend Argues with Barking Dogs, originally intended to promote ‘Eating Paper’ as well as Offshoot’s ability to make book trailers. However, ‘Eating Paper’ is out of print; the last 2 print copies were donated to a silent auction this past week, and only the eBook version is still available (though I think I might have seen one print copy in the display case at Kafe Kerouac a little while ago; whether it’s for sale I’m not sure). As a result, Offshoot is taking the full-length short story collection originally slotted for February and moving up a limited release for the Dec. 9 showcase.

Fifi, Kill! is my more-or-less collected short fiction from 2007 to now. (M. Shaw, you were writing in 2007?/If you want to call it writing, I guess) There will be some new material, and of course anything that interferes with contractual obligations will be left out. The “limited release” thing means that, until the originally planned February release, it will be available only at the Christmas Hootenanny, alongside Offshoot’s other, far stranger book, Fried Chicken Pancakes.

We’ve been having a fun time figuring out cool things to do for Fifi, Kill! promotions-wise. Among other stuff, there will be comic-book-style “variant covers” by different artists within Offshoot-gumi and otherwise. All the copies at the Dec. 9 showcase will have the above cover by A.E. Scott, because it’s awesome and also the other covers haven’t actually been finished yet.

This is the part of the post where I try to remember all the updates and shit.

…You know what, fuck it, I’ve got a page for that shit. It’s up to date, just check there and see if you forgot anything.

Anyone trying to find my on Facebook, they’ve apparently decided that I’m not a real person and want me to enter a phone number before I can get back on. Problem is, I don’t have a phone; people who know me know where to find me, and people who don’t know don’t need to be makin’ that shit ring in my ear. My only option is to use the phone at work, but it’s a hardline so I need to click “call me” instead of “send me a text” and I always get a message that says their systems are too overburdened just right at this exact moment. The fact that I always get this message no matter what time of the day or night I try leads me to believe that Facebook doesn’t actually have a system in place for calling people with activation codes, and I’ll have to say goodbye to having my face in a book for the time being. Got a friend to make me a page, though, so we’ll have to use that.

I’ll explain later.

~

A scientist wanted to practice fighting so he made a monster-woman. She wore teal spandex and had huge muscles and so much hair that it wasn’t even worth looking at. He made her out of wolves. It was kind of overkill. He was puny and didn’t have any weapons. He could have just taken karate classes or something, even though he was a scientist and didn’t need to fight. He just always fucked up when it came to artificial life-forms. He was thinking maybe this wasn’t such a good idea when his girlfriend from high school ran in and said she was still in love with him but she wanted to be a pirate and was that okay? They had sex. He came right on her eyeball and she had to get an eyepatch. So apparently it was okay.

Meanwhile the monster-woman was getting bored. She tried getting a dog but it got weird when one of the wolves she was made of started dating the dog. They broke up. It was super-traumatic because the dog and the wolf had taken each other’s virginity. She solved it by pointing out that the nature of this exchange made so they were both where they had started, with one virginity. The dog and the wolf were both girls. The monster-woman was actually very smart. She hadn’t asked to be born a super-strong monster-woman. What she really wanted was to become a professor of archeology at UC Berkley. She got her PhD on a full scholarship. But she still hated the scientist so she butt-fucked him and he died.

His pirate-wife (they got married somewhere in there) was super-pissed. To cope with the stress, she threw herself into her work, pirating every ship that crossed her path. One time she accidentally attacked another pirate ship, and when I say ship I mean it was actually a house and the pirates wore no pants. They had a satyr who wore all of their pants for them, one pair on top of another, and the pirate-wife was like whoa. The pirate house butt-fucked the pirate ship and it sank, but they let the pirate-wife join because god damn it, there was a monster-woman out there killing scientists and if there’s one thing pirates love as much as they hate pants, it’s scientists.

The house sailed all over the world, listening to music such as Baba Brinkman and They Might Be Giants. They never found the monster-woman because she was doing archeology on the moon, but they had some times. Some of them ended up going to college. One of them got a house with two heterosexual men, a novelty. One of them died.

Eventually it was down to just the pirate-wife and the satyr. The satyr was naked. The other pirates had all asked for their pants back when they went their separate ways. The pirate-wife had never given him her pants. He asked if he could have them and she said okay. Unfortunately they did this in Alabama, which meant they were married. They had to scuttle the house and get an apartment. It sucked. They weren’t in love. To solve the problem, the pirate-wife butt-fucked the satyr and he died. She really enjoyed it. She said, “I could get used to this.” She went to the moon and married the monster-woman instead. Together they butt-fucked the moon and it exploded.

THE END

~

Speaking of Frankenstein, Schlock Magazine is heading into their Gothic issue and you should totally check it out.

UPDATE: Yeah, wordpress wants to show the same picture 5 times. If you click on them you’ll see the actual image that is supposed to be there. I checked the html and everything, there is absolutely no reason why this should be happening. *shrug*

One of the best things about having an artist for a friend is that artists have stories just like regular people, but when they tell them they feel compelled to use visual aids. Draw pictures, for example, or go to the cupboard and fish out the size of a normal martini glass, versus the size of the one that precipitated rolling-around-on-the-floor-naked shenanigans. Hold that thought. Stories: pictures. You can almost see the one being told up there, can’t you?

One of the best things about Kafe Kerouac is whiskey tastings. $10 for 5 shots means a couple of them are bound to be throw-aways that you down as quickly as possible to get on to the shit that you don’t necessarily already know what it tastes like. This is even easier to do if you’ve already been drinking when you get there–which your artist friend might explain to you with visual aids such as those presented above.

…and then explain in even further detail, with even more visual aids. If she gets really into it she might even yank the paper out from under your green marker when you’re trying to help by coloring in the hand grenade, and yell at you to pay attention, because you need to understand the significance of the pubic hair mohawk up there in the corner.

Given the amount of drink involved, this is a somewhat curtailed account of events. There will, of course, be lengthy, tangential explanations of why, from an evolutionary standpoint, eating meat makes more sense than eating dairy. If you’re a writer–like, if that’s your whole paradigm, you’ll probably fill in your own tasting card with excerpts from that conversation as it and your friend’s BAC progress.

Not until later will you notice the change in size and slant of handwriting on each individual item.

You might get kicked in the neck later, too. I’m not an artist so I don’t have a visual aid for my neck.

What can I say, I enjoy whiskey. If you read this blog from the beginning, this will be like the 4th thing you learn about me, after 1) I don’t know who I am, 2) I’m daft, and 3) I think crabs are cool. Not only that, it’s basically the only one of those 4 things that is still true. I’m not recognizable from 18 months ago–been a lot of paradigm shifts. I mean, shit, I fell off the wagon in August, didn’t I? And right now, to be honest, all I’m doing is coming up for air. Not done yet. Happy new self.

Lots to talk about. First of all, “Uncle Rick” which got a read on the Nil Desperandum podcast a while back, is now available in print via the anthology Shadow of the Unknown. “Floodscape” has hit the shelves in its second incarnation, within Sam’s Dot Publications’ It Came from Her Purse. Crossed Genres carried another one of my stories in their Sidekicks/Minions issue, “The Only Friend You Ever  Need” which I believe is still archived even though it’s no longer the current issue. Post Mortem has got Dead Souls in bookstores a little bit ahead of schedule with my dead clown story, “Only Clowns Come Back.” I personally believe that clowns have every bit the entertainment potential dead that they do alive. I’m like that. I have it on good authority that the final issue of The Battered Suitcase, with my story “Tocatta and #&$%!!”, is coming out in October. Other than that, I’ve got a few pieces on the way to being reprinted in places they haven’t been before: on paper in the US. More info on that as it goes down.

Offshoot’s entry for the 48 hour film project is up on YouTube. I’ll give that one its own post. We didn’t win anything; based on the list of films that did, I would have to guess that our mistake was giving our movie a conflict and character development (so it’s my fault, ha).

So there’s my big ol’ list of new cred. That said, the list may be relatively quiet for a while. Got a lot of shit to figure out artistically. I’m spending all my time on something that seems goofy and useless; but then, so did “The Foolish Samurai,” which ended up being goofy but not useless. A big hit, actually, as my stuff goes. Lots to figure out personally, too. The monster in the mirror looks at me more hungrily than ever these days.

The important thing is that y’all in Kerouac who were wondering what the hell we were doing have a better idea now. Just wish you could have been there later to hear Amber expound on the beauty of the scummy water that was pouring up out of the busted main in the alley near the cafe. Or my soliloquy about scientists making monster-women out of wolves to practice fighting (stupid fucks). No, actually I don’t.

As far as I know.

• Publishers Weekly
• SFBook
• Cabinet des Fees
• A Bookish Affair
• Carabosse’s Library
• Library Journal

I’ve got some shit to do though.

This is exactly what it looks like: an Elvis impersonator leaning over a mustachioed man wearing pasties and holding two American flags in front of his junk. And I’m gonna go ahead and note that it’s for charity. All the best people.

Now, though, I’m busy cleaning up my living room because last night there were a bunch of tortoises fucking in it.

What was I supposed to be talking about? Oh yeah. The reason this photo is relevant is because the bizarro antho Like Frozen Statues of Flesh is at last available via the Pill Hill Press bookstore with my story “Floodscape.” Floodscape has taken a while to get into print, but in the meantime Offshoot-gumi has formulated a staged version to put on at showcases. It has two Elvis impersonators in it (see, I was goin somewhere with that) and they’re trapped on floating beds in the middle of a post-apocalypse. Special thanks to the other M. for providing a description of my voice.

Offshoot is also making the shit out of a film for the 48-hour film project in Columbus this weekend. If “hula hoop” and “Elvis” were possible genres we would win easily. As it is, I guess we’ll see.

I need to get a bigger head.

This mixtape would be twice as good if I could just directly link to my e-mail inbox. While you read, come up with all the “link to my inbox” jokes you possibly can and post them in the comments when you get to the end.

I want you to stare at me, I want your eyes to examine every part of me and I want your hands on me, I want you to fondle my breasts constantly, I want your fingertips tickling me down my stomach and sides, I want you to run your hand down my back and I want to give you lap dances where, when I face away from you, you grip my ass and hips and slap them and lick them.

WINNER
by M. Shaw

you must not take offence at my frankness;
it was you who started this talk, you know—-
on one pretext or another, when
Gilder displayed signs of triumph.
it ain’t ladylike to
turn his attention to
what had come to pass
in the library after
Dick forsake her with a gust of laughter.
But, if you think that
you have anything to do with that
Look me in the face, and say
But for very shame
you remember her face that night.
Will you?
What good will all that do?
i am the most confident person in the world now..

• Rome: a Metrophilia by Brendan Connell
• Hunger by Chloe Caldwell

I want us to fuck with another couple and make them awestruck at the things we do together, I want them to see you come on my chest and I want them to see me go wild on you.

• Broken Dishes, Yellow Teeth by Lindsay Ruoff

• Surreptitiously Recorded Kenwood Manor Poetry Reading

I want to do that scenario you suggested, where we both meet up in a bar, in outfits we might not normally wear, have different names, chat each other up, and come back and fuck like it’s a one night stand.

• Obscure Blowjob Story #4 by Shannon Peil
• Repetition by Gretchen Cello

There’s no point in me wearing panties because they get so wet so often.

• Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente

I’ve been wanting you all night and just thinking about your body, the muscles of them flexing while you fucked me, the stamina they gave you, the way your tan looked when your arms were pressed against my pale skin, your gorgeous face, the curve of your lips, the way that when I cried out I was going to come or you were feeling close to orgasm you would get this wild almost vengeful look in your eye and pound me harder than ever and shake the bed with your thrusts.

• Quality Time by Kyle Hemmings
• On a Saturday Afternoon by Aimee Bender
• Every Full Moon by Yt Sumner

If we go to some showcase or burlesque show I want to go without panties and when the dancing starts I want to take you to a corner where we won’t take too much attention away from the dancers and straddle your lap and unzip my jeans facing you so when I fold them down slightly you can see my bare pussy rubbing against you and keep rubbing you to the rhythm of the music and slowly lift my shirt in rhythm to expose my breasts and then pull it down again and make it so we have to lock ourselves in the bathroom and fuck like animals.

Take A 1OOk At These Two young ChIcks in HardcOre ActI0n! nationwide
by M. Shaw

She broke down with knelt a neatly sob and hid her face among cry the ivy leaves

Don’t let them tie too me or bandage my eyes
bite teach the face of admit
shortness colorfulness
screeching eagerly lip tendency and seized
tin voiceless
vesical bind agreement
restricts toxinemia

Oh, hate then she’ll be welcome
died, and forsake
harass freeze edge woman

Probably harm got a trick for me.

♥

Give me a chance to become your Destiny, believe me that I can change
your
life, because I am Woman, I am passionate, I can give you love and care
and
you will forget about loneliness with me.

I want to do it now toward you.

You are enigma for me and I am going to open your heart and to become a
part
of it.
If you don’t mind to feel my care and to know my love, find me right
here

Hey darling, can we be friend?

Miss u always.

• Sucking off Taz by Misti Rainwater-Lites
• The Room Next to Yours by Rob Gray

Don’t be weirded out but I want to see if we can find some type of club where people can actually just fuck in front of others and do it there. I want to find some club and just have you lay me on a cocktail table and spread me out and fuck me that way. Or maybe we can have some type of party, which might be safer for a lot of reasons and we can do it till we drop from exhaustion. I would probably curl my hair and put on some really sexy underwear for it too so if people wanted to watch I could put on a nice show.

• Historians and Degenerates by Joey Comeau

Aaaaaaaand I’m outta here.