Podcast That Dares 60: 30 Seconds - 30 Days

Rish presents Arthur C. Clarke's 1949 Sci-Fi tale, "30 Seconds - 30 Days" (later known as "Breaking Strain).

After an onboard disaster between Earth and Venus, there's only enough air for one of the two crewmembers onboard.  

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

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

Logo by Gino "Dirty Seconds" Moretto.

Rish Outcast 287: Greetings From The Ninth Sector

Rish presents his 2013 Triple Word Score story "Greetings From The Ninth Sector." Try to ignore the centipedes.

Download the file directly by Right-Clicking HERE.

Support me on Patreon HERE!

Logo by Gino "Undercover Brother" Moretto.

Podcast That Dares 50: The Jaunt

Rish performs Stephen King's 1981 short story "The Jaunt." In this dark Sci-Fi tale, a father tells his nervous family how the Jaunt came to be before they take off to Mars.

Note: This episode has been a long time in coming, longer than you think.

You there, to download this episode, Right-Click HERE. 

To support me over on Patreon, click HERE.  You know you want to.  Nobody will ever know.

 Logo by Gino "The Aunt" Moretto.

Rish Outcast 278: Ten Thousand Coffins 3

Rish presents the third--and longest--chunk of his Sci-Fi/Horror novella "Ten Thousand Coffins."  So, there are now three awakened humans aboard the Dawn Breaks, and one vampire. Or is it two and two?

Afterward, a bit about the Skipper, and is it just me, or is Rish more defensive of this story than usual?

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

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

If you wish to hear the longest Taylor Swift song, you might as well go HERE.

Logo by Gino "No Clever Pun This Week" Moretto.

Marshal & Rish Try X-Ray Specs

And you, what do you want to see?

Here's another Outfield Excursions between Marshal and me, over at his Journey Into... podcast.  

Once again, we've got a Roger Corman-directed Ray Milland film to talk about.  This time, it's THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES, from 1963.  Doctor Xavier uses an experimental formula to improve his range of eyesight . . . but at what cost?   

Check out our review HERE.

Rish Outcast 276: Ten Thousand Coffins II

Rish presents the second section of his novella "Ten Thousand Coffins."

Medtech Brook Lisst has seen the hand of the intruder on the ship . . . a vampire's hand. But vampires don't really exist, do they?

To download the episode, Right-Click HERE.

To support me on Patreon, click HERE.

Logo by Gino "Many Coffins Died To Bring Us This Information" Moretto.

Rish Outcast 274: Ten Thousand Coffins I

At long last, Rish presents the first section of his Sci-Fi/Horror piece "Ten Thousand Coffins."

Onboard her colony ship, Medtech Brook Lisst finds a sleeper pod that has become a coffin . . . but what will find her?

As always, you can download the file by Right-Clicking HERE.

And of course, you can support my Patreon by clicking HERE.  They've already got Part II!

Logo by Gino "Ten Thousand Kiwis" Moretto.

Went To The Ninth Sector, And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt

This week, my buddy Big and I finally got together to talk about cover art--specifically, the bad art I've had on my stories that he's seen fit to improve for me--and we talked so much that we ran out of time and will have to do it again next week.  A lot of time, the images I picked were good, but my text looked unprofessional, or worse, like recently-microwaved walrus dung.*  Other times, it was just bad, top to bottom.

And while we were looking over old covers, I stumbled upon the image Sonny See created for us back in 2014 for my story "Greetings From The Ninth Sector."  That was a story I wrote for a contest where I had to use the words "Squad," "Reports," and "George Lucas" in there somehow.**  In it, Corporal Bruce Otterson, onboard the IFS Lucas, sends messages back to his girlfriend Mandy, as their ship enters the mysterious Ninth Sector, which many onboard think is haunted or cursed. As his transmissions continue, Bruce becomes more and more concerned that his shipmates may be right

Big added the star field and the text.  Not sure why he picked that shade of blue.

Big said he could make the logo on the image look better than what I had done myself (goes without saying), and to my surprise, I discovered I had NEVER put it out on Amazon.***  So, today I remedied that.  The story is available HERE, if you never read the longer version.  I plan on publishing other stories in the next couple of weeks, so I'll keep you posted.

I also thought I would sit down one evening this month and video myself performing the story, then make it available on my Patreon.  And if people like that, do it again.  And again.  What do you think?

*Looking forward to the episode yet?  I know I am, and I haven't even started editing it.

**I figured I could just go look up the words on the Dunesteef page . . . but the Dunesteef page is long gone.  :(

***That's not technically true; it was part of a collection that's no longer available.  I really ought to put together five or eight story collections in case somebody somewhere wants to buy them.  But I probably won't.

Podcast That Dares 46: Night Call, Collect

Rish shares Ray Bradbury's 1969 tale "Night Call, Collect."  Just let it go to voicemail, kids.

Warning: Some sound quality issues.

If downloading the episode appeals to you, Right-Click HERE.

If supporting me on Patreon would please you, click HERE.

As always, the logo was created by Gino "Night Call . . . Erect" Moretto.

Podcast That Dares 44: Weeds

 Rish presents the uncollected Jordy Verrill story "Weeds," by Stephen King.  Happy Fourth of July!

Download by Right-Clicking  HERE..

Support me on Patreon right about HERE.

Logo by Gino "Meteor S**t!" Moretto.

I Talk about Robert Sheckley's "The Store of the Worlds"

The other day, I took advantage of the children being gone to talk about (and more) Robert Sheckley's short story "The Store of the Worlds."  Enjoy.

Marshal and I Review BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS

Over on the Outfield Excursions show (part of the Journey Into... channel), Marshal Latham and I talk about BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS, a Roger Corman-produced Sci-Fi adventure starring Johnboy Walton and John Saxon, from 1980.  Is it a rip-off of STAR WARS or a rip-off of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN?  Can it be both?

Check it out HERE!

Rish Outcast 200: Dying Is Easy

Rish and special guest Big Anklevich present Rish's story "Dying Is Easy."  

This really should've been split across two episodes, but ah well.  Happy 200th show, kids!

Downloading the show is easy--just Right-Click HERE.

Supporting me on Patreon is easy too--just go HERE.

Logo by Gino "All Too Easy" Moretto.

Note: For some reason, the file took almost fifteen minutes to upload to Archive.org.  I'd like to think that it was the spirits of the noble dead doing their best to keep you from listening to it.  Darn spirits.

September Sweeps - Day 224

I was a bit blue today, can't really explain why*, but hung out with my uncle and my cousin from Vegas for part of the afternoon.  Their lives seem more exciting than mine, but I suppose everyone's does.

While my uncle was over he talked about an idea that came to him in a dream for a story and he wanted me to write it for him.  I told him I 'd pass because I don't manage to write half the stories I come up with myself, and I know that bothered him.  Non-writers are always so surprised when they come up with story ideas, and they want them to get out there, and we've all heard the "I have a great idea for a movie, why don't you write it and we'll split the proceeds?" pitch a time or two, but it's hard to explain that the real accomplishment is the writing, not the coming up with an idea.

"Hey, they should make a machine that records your dreams, so you can go back, if you choose, and experience them again.  You build it, and we'll split the money 50/50."

They had a get-together they were going to, and I hoped they would invite me to come along (despite me not knowing any of the people there), but they took off, and my sister's family took off for the cabin, leaving me pretty much alone.  I decided to head over to the library again today, just to force myself to write a little more. Yesterday wasn't much, but I often (not always, but often) feel like I've accomplished something when I write, so I tried it again today.

Sit-ups Today: 150
Sit-ups In September: 1662

Push-ups Today: 36
Push-ups In September: 400 (nice, but my Uncle John probably does that much in one sitting . . . during a funeral)

I veered suddenly left yesterday while I was writing the Natalie story, and wrote a scene showing what Mason was doing.  It probably doesn't belong--if the story's from her POV, she should get all the scenes, right?--but I wanted to explore what was happening to the rest of the staff while Natalie is having her adventure (I set up a future story telling where Meeshelle is in between my first story and Marshal Latham's story), and I also wanted a scene to explain why Mason isn't in those two stories (I had honestly figured he was dead by this point, but the stories keep on surprising me).

So, I skipped the main ghost scene with Natalie and wrote what happens after, and went on through until "the end."  The story's not done--I have to go back and write the ghost scene (or not, I could be a cheater and just skip it)--but it's still super close now to being finished.

I went on my full run tonight--something I hadn't managed much this week--my sore foot be damned.  And it only really bothered me for the first block or so (and going down stairs).  As a reward, I looked on the free On Demand section on TV, to pick a movie, and noticed AD ASTRA on there.  It was a heady Sci-Fi movie starring Brad Pitt that I remember saying wouldn't make a dime because the title was in Latin.

It ended up being a tremendously boring future Drama about a guy with father issues, with two or three pointless action scenes jammed in there, perhaps after the first disastrous test screening, where the entire audience fell asleep.  The action scenes, as inappropriate to the story as they are, were the only entertaining bits of the movie (especially one with a space baboon), and I almost wish they'd stick to their (absence of) guns, because I could at least admire them for it.

In the middle of the movie, I got an idea for a horror story, about an ex-soldier (or policeman) who, due to a brain injury, is the perfect candidate for a mission to save the world.  I focused on that idea during the super boring parts (as opposed to the simply dull parts), but then worried that I was stealing my idea from EVENT HORIZON, a movie I went to in 1997, and only vaguely remember.

Was the premise of that movie that this crew finds a spaceship with a portal in it that causes peoples' worst fears to manifest?  Seems like something like that.

So, when ED ASNER ended, I did a search for EVENT HORIZON and, wouldn't you know it, it was available for free too (with commercials, though).  I went ahead and watched it.  Holy smoke, the CG in the movie was shite . . . not quite BIRDEMIC bad, but close.  

It was a little bit worse than I remembered (and I've never quite gotten over my loathing for Kathleen Quinlan--can't really explain that), but it was better than AD ASTRA because it delivered on what it promised, and wasn't trying to be something artsy, just a Haunted House movie in space.  Lots of jumpscares, a couple of eerie sequences, and hey, it had really first-rate set design.

It was directed by Paul Anderson (the RESIDENT EVIL guy), who now goes by Paul W.S. Anderson because the Paul Thomas Anderson who directed BOOGIE NIGHTS was registered with the Writers Guild as "Paul Anderson" and this one was registered with the Directors Guild as "Paul Anderson," and that was apparently a huge headache.  He's the video game director who was married to Milla Jovavich, and also did ALIEN VERSUS PREDATOR (which you may say sucked, but was better than anything from ALIEN: RESURRECTION on).  I saw that he did that movie about the fall of Pompeii, and I may bug Marshal about watching that with me for our movie podcast.

Apparently, they shot a scene for the movie with a bunch of porno actors and amputees that was so disturbing to test audiences that they dropped it, and that footage is now lost.  A shame they didn't jam that into the middle of the Brad Pitt movie.

I also read that somebody is trying to turn EVENT HORIZON into a television series, and believe it or not, I'm all over that.  It's not the idea behind the movie that's flawed, just the dumbness of the movie itself.

Afterward, I was a bit disappointed in myself, that I could've used the time to record audio or write, and I didn't do it.  I'm 96% done with my "Delusions of Grandeur" episode, and I could've done that too.

I did sit down and jot down some notes for the story (I will never write) that was inspired by AD ASSMAT, that I feared was the premise of EVENT HORIZON, but it's pretty derivative, and I don't usually write Sci-Fi anyway, because it just becomes Horror set in space (see "Ten Thousand Coffins").

I did the math, just to see, and two-thirds of a year is 243 days.  So, I'm a couple weeks away from having written every day for two-thirds of 2020.  Remarkable?  Sure.  Meaningful?  Not so much.

Words Today: 804
Words In September: 14,571 (I'm still ahead!)

*Okay, I could explain, I consider myself a writer, after all.  

Twilight Groan 2: To Serve Man

Rish Outfield and his ginger niece Cathexis talk about the classic Twilight Zone episode "To Serve Man."  

Anyone else hungry?



If you'd like to download the episode, just Right-Click HERE.

If you'd like to support us on Patreon, just Left-Click HERE.

Next up, Bill Shatner is too Shat to fly!

I Narrate "Deep Water" On StarShipSofa

Know that between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis, and the years of the rise of the Sons of Aryas, there was an age when Big Anklevich and I were young, wide-eyed podcasters, and we did a few readings for StarShipSofa, the Audio Science Fiction Magazine.  This was one of the big boys, producing works from top-notch writers, and winning a Hugo Award as Best Fanzine.

They went on to many great things, but their greatest impact on me was introducing us to Jason Sanford, who enjoyed our reading of "When Thorns Are The Tips Of Trees" enough to let us start doing his stories on the Dunesteef.*

But many years have passed since we worked with StarShipSofa, and those days, like being a regular podcast, are long behind us.  Except for a month ago, when new editor (and holder of the answer to the Riddle of Steel) Gary Dowell sent me an email and asked if I'd like to do a story for them.  Of course I said yes . . . and now you can hear me perform "Deep Water" by Steven Fischer.

It's a short piece, about a man attempting a rescue mission in a spacecraft damaged by an asteroid collision.  Check it out at THIS LINK.

We shall see if more stories come my way.  If so, then let me tell you of the days of high adventure!

*There's still one more Sanford story out there that I think about from time to time, and in a moment of ambition, I will produce it for the show.

Rish Outcast 143: Eight O'Clock In The Morning (By Ray Nelson)

It's a tale with a very familiar premise, but how about the opposite one?


You can Right-Click HERE to download the episode directly . . .

. . . aww, it's not for you.  It's more of a Shelbyville idea.

Logo by Gino "They Live" Moretto.

Rish Outcast 138: Anybody Wanna Buy Some Coffins?

Okay, finally.

Here is the episode where I cart out my salespitch for the oft-delayed "Ten Thousand Coffins" novella/audiobook. I talk about its inspiration, the frustrations in getting it out there, and dance around the central conceit of the story.  Hey, could you just buy it so we can move on?

You can't always get what you want, after all.

Oh, I heard 10,000 Maniacs' cover of Because The Night yesterday on the radio (yes, I still listen to the radio.  I am THAT old), and was reminded of where their name came from* and wondered if that's where my title came from.  I recall toying with calling it "A Thousand Coffins" and then upping it to various numbers, depending on how the title sounded.  I think I picked 10,000 because it sounded the best spoken aloud (better than 50,000 or 20,000, anyway), but it could have sounded good because there was a band years ago called Ten Thousand Maniacs.

Here's a link to the TEXT VERSION.

And here's one for the AUDIO VERSION. This one has the WhisperSync option available, and I'm curious, have any of you ever read/listened to one of those WhisperSync books? How does it work, exactly?

Thanks to Austin "Danger!" Douglas and Gino "Bridge Out!" Moretto for the cover art!

To download the episode, just Right-Click HERE.

To support me on Patreon, just Left-Click HERE.

*There was a gory B-movie (I think by Herschel Gordon Lewis) called 2,000 MANIACS, and the band misremembered the title as 10,000 MANIACS.  When they learned of their mistake, they had already gotten used to the band name.

Rish Performs "Relationship Breakdown" On StarShip Sofa

Holy Handgrenade of Antioch, I've got another narration on Star Ship Sofa, the multiple award-winning story podcast! This time, it's "Breakdown of the Parasite/Host Relationship" by Paul R. Hardy. It's about the struggles between an alien symbiote and its human carrier onboard a spaceship, and is pretty amusing.

This was a bit of a challenge for me. I was given absolutely no direction on how to tackle the story* as far as accents, sound effects, transitions, or editing, and it was all pretty complicated when I thought about it.

Like my pieces "Outgoing Transmissions" and "Greetings From the Ninth Sector," this is a Sci-Fi story told in an epistolary format, except that this one was transcripts of chats between characters. I sort of had to translate that into audio format by presenting it as though these are voicemails we're hearing between characters, and that actually works way better (since some of the interactions beggar credibility when you imagine that people are TYPING all this stuff rather than saying it).

Check out the results of all my choices HERE.

Rish "Breakdown Of Any Relationship" Outfield

*On the contrary, I got an email asking if I would read the story and determine whether it would work in audio before the editor even decided whether to purchase it for the show. Certainly more power than I've ever wielded on a podcast that isn't mine.