Baby's First Protest

Years ago, when I worked in L.A., I heard there was going to be a faux anti-mutant protest as a promotion for the X-MEN movie.  I called up my friend Erik and bought a posterboard and made up a pair of protest signs (one was of Blinky the Fish from "The Simpsons" with a circle-slash through it, and the other said, "Do your duty, report a mutie!"--which I was quite proud of), and we went to the venue to participate in the protest.  When we got there, we were told that it was not a real protest, and only paid Fox employees were allowed to march in the parade.  It saddened me, and I swore to never raise my hand in protest again.

Yet here we are, twenty-five short years later, and I'm up to my old tricks.  

Because of the long-gestating announcement that Donald Trump was going to have a military parade in Washington DC to honor the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army . . . that just happened to occur on his 79th birthday, an opposite event was announced: something called No Kings Day.  

It was organized to show criticism of Trump and his cabinet, and in the last few days got a huge boost as his administration ramped up their efforts to detain, arrest, harass, and deport as many undocumented immigrants as possible, focused specifically in Los Angeles, where the whole infrastructure is basically propped up by undocumented workers.  I don't have to tell you this, but Trump's birthday celebration could not have fallen at a worse time, at least as far as his general approval among Americans goes.*

My niece and her fiancé recently went to a rally in the capitol, where I could only listen to the livestream while going on an uncharacteristic daylight run, but I sent her a message when I heard about No Kings Day, and asked if she wanted to go to it.  Me not being near to her favorite uncle, I heard nothing for almost two weeks . . . but a couple of days before the event, she texted me back saying she was in.  It would be Saturday morning, starting at nine am.

I had worked the night before, and there was a lady at work who was talking about going and told me that, if I went, I should make a sign to hold up to the traffic that drove by.  So, after finishing my shift, and wasting my time going to Target, and doing my run, and eating, I sat down to make a sign.  I tried to think of a play on words, a pun on the word Trump or a rhyme with the word "Don," or his famous "I like people who weren't captured" statement.**

Ultimately, all I could come up with was to draw the Burger King mascot and put a circle with a slash through it (what I irritatingly refer to as the Ghostbusters symbol), and another where I wrote the words "So Much Destruction, Such Little Hands."

I should have made a third sign, since Cathexis's boyfriend was also coming, and ended up driving us there, but I'm not sure what I would've written on it (I'm still fond of the old saw "If You're Not Angry, You're Not Paying Attention"--one I could write up for next time), but when we got there, somebody handed my niece a "No Kings" sign, and now we all had one.

We drove to the middle of town, where the City Center is (and where my niece has recently started working), and the size of the crowd was unbelievable.  It was probably three or four times what I imagined, even thinking a lot of folks would be there.  People were very nice, patient, and seemingly happy to be there.  I saw so many clever, funny, or incendiary signs, and discovered that everybody had their own thing they were outraged about, from climate change to bastardry, from  deliberate ignorance to Ukraine, from dishonesty to billionaires being in charge, from racism to Trump being a literal pile of shit, from criminality to climate change denial.

But the issue that the most people were up in arms about was the immigration policy.  The thing is, every single one of us, unless you're a Navajo or Shoshone or Ute, is an immigrant, or descended from one.  Because of the pioneer heritage of many around here, there were signs that pointed out that, if you're white, it's a legacy, but if you're brown, it's an invasion.  And "No One Is Illegal On Stolen Land," read two or three of the signs.

And man, the signs.  They ranged from barely-legible to artistically impressive, funny ("They're Eating The Checks!  They're Eating The Balances!") to heartbreaking (I saw two different Anne Frank quotations, prompting my niece to ask what I thought of Frank***).  There were several signs with scriptural reference on them, which kind of blew my mind because I--naively, apparently--simply assumed that all religious folks blindly pretended that Donald Trump was one of them, and were perfectly content with the ungodly things he does each and every day.

I saw a couple of signs that said "I have friends everywhere" on them, which I recognized as a line from "Andor," and probably means that I should edit the podcast where Marshal and I talk about it . . . soonish.

There were also many signs (and sign-holders) there in support of LGBT causes, which included drag queens and unicorns.  Somehow, in my lifetime, the pink flamingo has been displaced as the gayest of all animals . . . and that too makes me sad.

My favorite one simply said, "Chinga La Migra," which is a lyrical, rhymey way of saying "Eff the Immigration Police."

The elderly lady beside us had a sign she was waving that was probably the most decent and benign thing I saw that day, and I did my best Trump impression of him saying, "One nasty woman was waving a nasty sign that said 'Peace and Dignity For All' on, can you believe that?"

The crowd, despite being dangerously large, was calm and well-behaved, and there were (ring)leaders walking up and down the sidewalk with megaphones, telling us what to chant, and having us sing This Land Is Your Land, the National Anthem, America The Beautiful, and the theme song to Cheers.  Okay, not that last one, but it would've been very welcome.  Oh, and very out-of-keeping with what we were protesting against, there were people walking through the crowd offering free water, flag stickers, and (in one dude's case) Oreo cookies.

Any time someone heckled, gave us the finger, or threatened to make America great again, we were instructed to chant "We are peaceful, We are peaceful, We are peaceful," either to reassure the cops that were walking up and down the street, keeping an eye on everything.

It was a hot day, and my niece was trying her best not to roast in the sun (she vowed to make a sign that said, "It must be bad to make a ginger go outside and protest!" for next time), but people were accommodating and arranged themselves so everyone could get some shade that wanted it.  I saw a girl I work with at the library, but she never acknowledged me, so some things haven't changed.  Even so, it was great to be part of a community, and around so many people passionate about something.

When we were done, we walked around the whole gathering so we could see the signs we had missed (someone had brought a giant Very Hungry Caterpillar that said "Eat the Rich" on it), and then drove around the block so we could honk and wave at the folks just getting there.  In the end, it won't amount to much--those in power are just too powerful, and the groups powerful enough to actually make a difference are either apathetic or complicit.  But it felt good to stand next to others, to sing and shout and not feel alone, not feel like the outrage belonged to few, but to many.

See ya out there.

*Of course I don't mean that everybody hates what he's doing.  There are thousands--if not millions--of people out there all too eager to play Charlie McCarthy to Trump's Edgar Bergen . . . a reference so dated, only his supporters could be old enough to understand it.  And believe me, the crueler he and his policies get, the harder they become.

**Something like "I like presidents without felony convictions."

***"I love Anne Frank," I said, which seemed comprehensive enough.

Rish Outcast 304: A Group Hug Saves The World

After watching Marvel's THE THUNDERBOLTS (spoiler warning), Rish muses about the possibility of solving problems with a hug instead of a fist.

And Fake Sean tries his own squeezin, touchin, and lovin.

Download the episode by Right-Clicking HERE.

Support me on Patreon HERE.

Logo by Gino "Group Slug" Moretto.

Weirdos In My Library

I had two odd experiences today that, because they happened on the same shift, I felt motivated to blog about.

First off, in the computer section, there was a man sitting at one who, as I walked by, gave me a . . . uh, you know . .  a straight-armed salute.  I found that strange, but hey, sometimes people do that.

But then he did it a second time.  Because the guy's a regular, I approached him to suggest that maybe he not wave in that way because it sort of looked like, you know.  But when I went around, I could see he was watching a documentary about Adolf Hitler.  I went back to my desk.

I guess I found it amusing enough to sit down and look for when he did it on the security monitor to put the image into this post.  Scrubbing though the footage, I found him saluting at timestamp 4:46:39  . . . but that wasn't when I was on my rounds.  So I ran it backwards a little.  Turns out, he did it again at 4:43:56, and at 4:43:50.  After five times, I stopped keeping track and closed the program.  It wasn't remotely funny anymore.

But not long later, I saw a young couple come in right before we closed, one with a camera and one with a bag filled with something I thought were ice cubes at first.  But as they went about their "business," I realized the bag held googly eye stickers, and I later learned they had been through the academy building and the parking garage before this, making their mischief.

Before my eyes, they proceeded to walk around, sticking them to posters and displays and worst of all, to the statue of the little boy outside the children's library.*  

It was the first time was ever sad not to be armed on this job.

But I did have pepper spray . . . 

At the end of my shift, I told my boss about the googley-eyed bandits, and he said that he had just spent a few minutes walking through the building, peeling eye stickers off walls and statues and photos of our donors.  Just like the Nazi-saluting library patron, my boss didn't find it remotely funny.

*The statue is constantly being used for selfies or photo ops, or kids will hug it or climb on it or kiss it.  But one time, there were a pair of ten year old boys who dared one another to rub their butts on it.  

P.S. I asked the janitor how often she cleans the statue.  And she told me, "The statue?  I've never cleaned it."

Lighten Up While You Still Can

I was bummed out earlier today when I heard that the townspeople of Bozeman, Montana are not fond of Star Trek fans who travel there to mark the (future) site of mankind's first contact with aliens.  Anecdotally, they have been known to brandish rake handles and corn cobs and suggest that Trekkies "shove long and prosper."

It made me sad because, just like Metropolis, Illinois, which proclaims itself the home of Superman, and Riverside, Iowa, which calls itself the future birthplace of James T. Kirk*, you'd think any town would welcome the kind of tourists that would come there for the day, buy mugs and t-shirts, take pictures, then scatter (of course, Bozeman is literally a hundred and eighteen times the size of my hometown, so maybe they don't need that kind of thing).

But then I found out that Winslow, Arizona, a little town that used to be on the famous Route 66 but lost all of its industry and tourism when the historical highway was relocated, has thoroughly embraced its minor bit of fandom.  You see, in 1972, the Eagles released the song Take It Easy, which includes the line:

         Well, I'm standin' on a corner in Winslow, Arizona,
         Such a fine sight to see;
         It's a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford,
        Slowin' down to take a look at me.

. . . and the lovely folks of Winslow (a little burg only nine times the size of my hometown) decided to honor the song by building a park (Standin' On The Corner Park) and tribute, where Eagles fans can go and, I dunno, imagine that a girl is slowing to look at them too.  Because wouldn't that be great?

There's a mural, a painting, a prop vehicle, and a statue of "The Troubadour," which folks say looks like Jackson Browne, who wrote the song.

In 2016, after Glenn Frey (singer and cowriter of the song) died, another statue was put up to honor him . . . all in an attempt to draw tourists to their little corner of the globe.  

People can go there, take a picture, buy a souvenir, and remember a great song.  And maybe they fill up at the Maverik gas station or Circle K, or have lunch at the McDonalds on Park Drive or the Brown Mug Cafe on Second Street.  And then, everybody wins. 

It's difficult to explain how much joy I got from reading about it and seeing the various photos people have taken over the years (it opened in 1999), because it doesn't really do anything, you know what I mean, and yet it somehow manages to mean something.

Would it kill you, Bozeman, to put up a statue too?

*Oh, and I just learned that Vulcan, Alberta in Canada has an annual Spock Day celebration, complete with a bust of Leonard Nimoy and a statue of the Enterprise.  All in an effort to lessen my sadness at Bozeman's (alleged) assholery.

Nice To See A Familiar Face

C-3PO figures tend to be plentiful.  He's a popular, perennial character that requires few paint applications (especially if you're doing a die-cast figure).  His design isn't quite as useful for customs, since other protocol-type droids had different style heads, but the figures are cheap and plentiful.  So I grabbed one and took a picture of it to send to Big, warning him I was going to do something unholy to it.

He seemed excited to see what I'd do with it, and I decided to play it safe and pattern it after the blue droid in the worst-ever episode of "The Mandalorian."  It was an unbelievably beautiful repaint, in a decidedly less-than-beautiful hour of television.

Amazingly, in the more than two years since the series ended, I couldn't find any other photos of it, except the one I grabbed in 2023.

And speaking of lack of photos, I forgot to take some of the work-in-progress.  Which pretty much leaves us with:

I might need to ask Big to send me a better photo, since I gave the repainted Artoo and Threepio to him when he last visited.

Podcast That Dares 58: Notebook Found In A Deserted House

I guess it's been enough time to do another Robert Bloch story . . . hasn't it?

This one is the 1951 Lovecraft homage, "Notebook Found In A Deserted House," about a twelve year old boy who discovers that the only thing worse than a mystery is the answer behind said mystery.

If you wish to download the episode, Right-Click HERE.

If you wish to support me on Patreon, click HERE.

Logo by Gino "Perverted House" Moretto.

I Narrate "The Sin Eater's Chrysalis" on Tales To Terrify

If you like, check out last week's Tales To Terrify podcast, where you can hear me perform the story "The Sin Eater's Chrysalis" by Matt Hollingsworth.

It tells the story of a lonely, bitter man who, like his father before him, is able to consume the sins of the recently-dead so that they can go to Heaven, using some pretty disgusting supernatural methods.  But every consumption takes its mental and spiritual toll on the sin-eater, so he determines that nobody will follow in his footsteps.  It's a dark one, more so than . . . gee, any story in memory I've been asked to do, and way more so than anything I've written.  Sound fun?

I suppose this could be considered a cursed production, because I recorded and edited the story, sent it in, and only heard back the next year to learn that the podcast didn't have my audio.  Not a huge deal, since I always keep my file until the show is released . . . except this time, apparently.  Not sure why I had deleted it, because now we were both a bit scragged.*  Even so, I sat down and re-recorded the story, transferred it, and re-edited the sucker.  This is the ONLY time I've ever done this, in the, what, fifteen years I've put in narrating stories for podcasts.  

Was it worth it?  Go TO THIS LINK to find out.

*Of course, about a month later, I did find the original recording on my back-up SD Card, though far, far too late.

Firewalk With Me (and Marshal)

One of the subgenres we like to visit on our Outfield Excursions podcast is the Indiana Jones knockoff, and strangely, I seem to enjoy these more than Marshal does.  So I was happy to sit down with him and watch FIREWALKER, a Cannon Films adventure starring Chuck Norris, Louise Gossett Junior, and the girl from FLASH AhAhhhhhh GORDON.

But if he ever finds an Indy Jones KO with Jean Claude Van Damme in it . . . that's a bridge too far.

Rish Outcast 303: Reply Hazy

Rish shares an old story, "Reply Hazy," about a young man named Rafael, whose Magic 8 Ball really is magic.

If you wish to download the episode, Right-Click HERE.

If you wish to support me on Patreon, click HERE.

Logo by Gino "Reply Crazy" Moretto.

Rish Performs "The Window Boy" on Cast of Wonders

The last time "Cast of Wonders" asked me to narrate a story was "My Hilt Itches" in May of 2022.  Seems like longer, but hey, better late(ish) than never.

Every writer has his or her strengths and weaknesses.  There are naturally subjects and scenarios I am drawn to, and some I tend to stay as far away from as I can.  One of those that I've struggled with is the dystopian future of Science Fiction or Horror.  

This story, "Window Boy" by Thomas Ha, is a pretty masterful attempt at the age-old idea of a utopian future story . . . where it becomes clear that it's not a utopia at all.  It's also a fanciful Sci-Fi tale about an innocent child that becomes a truly chilling Horror piece by the end.*

Jakey lives with his parents in a world where you don't go outside, but there are TV shows about cybernetic mailmen that protect the outside world from the monsters that roam its streets.  And pretty much every night, Jakey has a conversation with the boy who comes to the window, shares a sandwich with him, and asks him questions about the house he lives in.

Dang, this was a good one--in fact, I'm going to interrupt this blog post and write the author an email about it.  Well, that felt good.  I suggest you do the same, if there's a writer you know of that could use a word of appreciation for their work.  In the meantime, check out my performance of "Window Boy" HERE.  But don't get too close.

*That is, if I interpreted it the way the author intended.  Maybe I didn't.  But if that's the case, well, that would mean the story was much less than the sum of its parts.  And I don't think so.

Big 'n Rish Finally Confront The Elephant In The Room

 For the past few months, Big Anklevich has been running his beefy novella, "The Elefante in the Room," on his podcast.  I wasn't really involved, except to talk about his brief Eurotrip*.  But now, the story is finished, and it's time for us to talk about it.  So, you might as well listen to the whole darn thing (that's what I did).

A teen boy discovers some kind of alien-looking egg about to hatch in his room and uncovers a conspiracy that goes all the way to Selena Gomez.  Oh, and the President.  What is going on, and who will be next, and how can he possibly stop it?  

Anyhow, he had me on for the last episode.  We talk about the source of the idea, whether it's about what you think it's about, and would Big end it in the traditional Anklevich way?  Find out the answers HERE.

*R.I.P. Michelle Trachtenberg.