Zombie Lapdance

Not only was this the first time I voted for a Democrat for president, it’s the first time I voted for a presidential nominee who actually won. A lot of people have been ecstatic about the Obama victory, filled with hope and happiness for the change to come.

So I would like to be the first to burst those bubbles and smack some cynical back into America.

Here are 22 predictions for what will happen in the next 4 to 8 years:

1.) The president will successfully tax the rich. That would just about balance the budget deficit, except-

2.) -we will never really get out of Iraq. Expect major reductions of troops in Iraq, but they will stay on at some level, probably as a "stability force" or somesuch euphemism for occupiers. The troops that do leave will just trounce over to Afghanistan.

3.) Prediction 1 leads to the conservatives hating Obama like nobody’s business. The invective increases steadily in hatred, until the language from the ministers of conservative churches borders on the treasonous. Bolstered by the hate speech, the extreme right wing mounts-

4.) -several serious assassination attempts. But luckily the right wingers with the guns are every bit the screwups as the ones in the Whitehouse these last eight years. Feeling increasingly disempowered, the conservatives turn to-

5.) – Sarah Palin as a role model and ideological figurehead. Becoming as divisive and polarizing as Newt Gingrich and Dick Cheney before her (but without the common sense to shut up and stay out of sight after the country gets sick of her), Palin skirts the accusation that she caused the downfall of the McCain campaign (see my previous post about the trap of identity politics for the right), and instead becomes a righteous martyr. Offensive comments from Palin will make the news every six months. At least once she will be caught saying something truly racist, but America won’t really notice because-

6.) -investment in the tech sector will skyrocket. Even though investors are politically conservative, they only feel comfortable putting their money in the future when there’s a forward-thinking Democrat in power. Because of Obama, the most stodgy moneybags will think that we can remake the shape of industry, and that people will buy books online if given the chance. With the previous administration, all the investors could think about was oil. Now’s the time to invest in the most goof-ball technologies you can find, but be sure to sell before the conservative backlash government.

7.) America will completely fail to get over its race problem. The cops in Austin will still use force on black people at a rate seven times that of whites. School funding will still be tied to the property values of the community, giving poor communities the shaft. The president will just be another celebrity, no more tied to the liberation of black people than the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, except that now when the middle class sees someone from the working class, they won’t think, "Let’s fix the disparity in the access to education," they’ll think, "That loser could have been president." And it won’t help that Obama thinks those Mexicans need to learn English (luckily, he will find a way to phrase that so it sounds perfectly reasonable).

8.) The energy crisis will continue to be a crisis and too little will be done too late. Luckily the economy won’t hit the post-petroleum brick wall until the first term of the conservative backlash president of 2016, so no one will think to blame Obama.

9.) There will be no significant health care reform. Nobody in power wants that to happen. There’s too much money in the health racket. All that time that Obama and Hillary spent debating nuanced differences in their health-care packages? Total waste of freaking time.

10.) At some point I will find myself protesting a "limited bombing campaign" against a nation’s sovereign territory. There will be five other people there. They will all be incredibly ugly. At least one of the signs will be misspelled and that will be the only thing to make it to the nightly news.

11.) There will be no Great Society-style initiative. Do you remember Obama mentioning poor people? Wrack your brain all you want, he hasn’t brought it up and he never will.

12.) Obama will continue to look great on television, and people will continue to feel all warm inside when he sounds reassuring and presidential.

13.) Exciting revelations about the horrible things done by the Bush administration will pop up continually throughout the Obama administration, even if Obama gets two terms.

14.) The environment will continue to degrade, and people will continue to make token and ineffectual gestures to ameliorate the problem.

15.) The liberalization of international trade will continue in the form of the WTO, World Bank, IMF, NAFTA, etc., without slowing down.

16.) The world will suddenly think America is awesome. Except for Venezuela, which will still hate us.

17.) Conservatives in Congress will do everything possible to dig their feet into the ground. There will be no unity and no consensus building. If Obama asks Congress to breath air, they will hold their breath until they die. There will be lawsuits, special investigators, filibustered appointees, and the minute they get a majority (which will happen mid-term elections second term), they will attempt an impeachment. Lieberman will continue to be a putz.

18.) Something as weird and improbable as a black guy with a funny name becoming president will happen, but none of us will get close to predicting what that will be.

19.) Nobody from the Bush administration will be held accountable for their crimes.

20.) George Bush will write his memoirs. In crayon.

21.) President Obama will repeatedly remind us that the Democratic party is also the party of big business.

22.) The next version of Firefox will have a spellchecker that includes both "Obama" and "Barack" in its dictionary.

In short, Obama is going to be what he’s always appeared to be: a moderate Democrat who seems like a wonderful improvement over the last 8 years just because he’s a competent adult. He will be every bit as mediocre and disappointing as Clinton.

That being said, I’ll probably end up voting for the man again in four years, just because he’s the best we can hope for. And I’m getting too old to think that Nader’s a good idea.

While in Chicago, I had a little field trip with the family to the swap meet.

This is the view from the parking lot. You will notice that the mural has pictures of spiders, cactus, skulls, and roosters.

I did not see the first three for sale, but there were chickens in the little pet booth inside.

The swap meet is probably as close as you can get to a third-world marketplace in America.

With a couple hundred vendors on a vast tarmac of pickup trucks and folding tables (and even more in the permanent booths inside the building), it was amazing how little variety in merchandise was at the swap-o-rama. There were lotsa tools, of every possible description. There were socks, DVDs, fruit stands, churrito carts, and kitchen appliances.

And there was a vast amount of porn.

Every stand seemed to have a couple of boxes of porn sitting on the side. $2 each seemed to be the going rate.

There were no books at all. Which was kinda depressing, because that was the only thing I really could have justified fitting into my pitiful allotment of carry-on baggage.

The only things I found that I felt I could put my money down on, were a cock-fighting DVD and a rodeo-injury compilation.

The title of the cock-fighting DVD is "venomous knives of spicy ground" or something like that. It has the look of one of those Indie-media riot-porn compilations: a single shaky consumer-grade video camera, and the extremely literal editing of two roosters cutting themselves to pieces, over and over again. The only thing the producers added to the cockfight was intermittent ear-splitting tejano music.

While watching the cockfighting, I had to turn down the volume, because I didn’t want my housemate to hear the sounds of rooster crows emanating from my room and wonder what the hell I was doing in there.

The other day I saw a guy with a T-shirt that said "More people read this shirt than your blog."

Over the weekend, this blog, Zombie Lapdance, broke the half-million visits mark. I think that deserves a celebratory blog entry, don’t you?

Now, without quibbling about how many of these hits are legitimately counted, or how many are just google spiders (which visit the blog daily), the question is, where are all these people coming from?

500,000 visits is roughly equivalent to the population of Austin (or Alaska for that matter) reading one blog entry each. Or everyone in my hometown of Portage, Wisconsin reading 50 entries each.

Some of the people I know read this blog on a regular basis, but I honestly don’t know thousands of people. Maybe only a couple hundred. And the blog also gets some of the traffic that normally comes through RevSF.

But that doesn’t explain why the article I wrote about the flood in Wisconsin only had 400 visits, but the articles about mechanical television and wolf attacks did over 10,000. And the article about petrified raccoon hands did nearly 13,000.

I know from my google alerts that a few other blogs reference this one. Chris Roberson did it (thanks dude), and during the Space Squid Mushroom Men contest a couple of gamer blogs explicitly linked here. And there are also a couple of sites that reprint my entries verbatim, presumably as a skeezy SEO ploy.

I can only presume that the bulk of Zombie Lapdance readers are search-engine driven. After all, if you wanted highly authoritative information on any particular subject, you would click on the link that mentions zombies, right?

Of course, if one were to visit Chicago, the recognized world Mecca of everything hotdog, one would need to eat a hotdog, wouldn’t one? Here’s a hotdog from:

A totally random kosher manufacturing plant in Chicago

It was pointed out to me that this particular hotdog does not have the celery salt that one normally associates with a Chicago dog, nor does it have the bright green relish that one would expect. But it does have a super-giant pickle that essentially hides the ample quarter pound of Vienna Beef sausage, and it has a bun that rides that fine line between being mooshy but not too mooshy. The pickled jalapenos were nice too.
Random Kosher Dog: Grade B

I just listened to a BBC podcast where they reported that blogs are no longer the cool thing. So, here’s some uncoolness involving my culinary explorations:

A trip to the Asian grocery brought several non-standard ramen-esque products.

The beef-flavor porridge tasted much like instant cream of wheat, but beefier.


The "vermicelli made from beans" produced a tangle of semi-transparent tentaclely noodles.


And the "artificial pickled cabbage fish flavor instant sweet potato thread" had dessicated beans and a green paste in the flavor pouches. There was so much going on flavor-wise that I had to sit on the floor while I chewed.

There are three things that America still does better than anyone else in the world, and one of those things is make rootbeer. If "Hey Song Sarsaparilla" is any indication, there’s no danger of that changing.

The rootbeer flavor was almost completely overwhelmed by the ginger.

I have this theory that good queso is mainly milk and thickener, with cheese only added as flavoring. I have yet to experimentally verify this.

Every now and then, you want to re-create the elementary school cafeteria experience.

Behold, salisbury steak, with mashed potatoes, string beans, fruit-cocktail jello, and chocolate milk. It tasted just like being small and afraid.

Tequiza: It tastes a bit like malt liquor and a bit like tequilla. On a 100-degree day there’s nothing better.

From El Chilitos on Manor: A tamerind and chili-flavored popsicle and a watermelon-flavored aqua-fresca. El Chilitos also has a popsicle flavor called "luca" which is apparently the flavor of salt. Also, very good on a 100-degree day.

Haven’t you wished that you could have a Thai tea with artificial creamer instead of actual cream?


A bit gross, but it’s awfully convenient.

Chorizo: for that breakfast taco taste at home.

I had no idea that chorizo was 80% grease.

If ever you’re near the HEB in the morning, the steam-tray section offers a variety of breakfast tacos. Some of the cheapest breakfast tacos in town (by weight), and they offer chicharrones, which are greasy and rubbery and gravy-soaked wonders of breakfast taco deliciousness.

These snack sticks are made in Houston. There are six sticks per styrofoam tray, each one hand-wrapped in cellophane with a single clove of garlic and a slice of jalapeno, which is just too precious for words.

Unfortunately I have no idea how to cook them. The sticks themselves appear to be some kind of head-cheesy substance with rubbery flecks of pig skin suspended inside. When fried the suspension medium blackens and turns into a nasty gelatinous paste. And the garlic and jalapeno invariably fall off and burn.

But even when thoroughly cooked, the snack sticks have a crisply-chewy texture.

"Red Bean Jelly Mix (oriental dessert mix)". Is there anything I can say about this that wasn’t said in the title?

The good news is, the folks in Hyde Park with the Confederate flag have replaced it with another American flag.

The bad news is, that apparently the Book of Revelation (misspelled in this chain email as "Revelations") has predicted that the world will come to an end because of a male Muslim who is almost certainly currently running for President. This is a neat trick, because Islam wasn’t founded for more than five-hundred years after the Book of Revelation was written.

Or, as my co-worker Jeremiah put it, Christians can see into the future, silly.

I’ll try and replicate the assertive giant blue font of the original chain letter.

According to The Book of Revelations:

The Anti-Christ will be a man, in his 40’s, of MUSLIM descent, who will deceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal….the prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace, and when he is in power, he will destroy everything.

And Now:
For the award winning20Act of Stupidity Of all times the People of America want to elect, to the most Powerful position on the face of the Planet — The Presidency of the United states of America .. A Male of Muslim descent who is the most extremely liberal Senator in Congress (in other words an extremist) and in his 40’s.

Have the American People completely lost their Minds, or just their Power of Reason ???

I’m sorry but I refuse to take a chance on the ‘unknown’ candidate Obama…

Let’s send this to as many people as we can so that the Gloria Aldreds and other stupid attorneys along with Federal Justices that want to thwart common sense, feel ashamed of themselves — if they have any such sense.

As the writer of the award winning story ‘Forest Gump’ so aptly put it,
‘Stupid Is As Stupid Does’

Each opportunity that you have to send it to a friend or media outlet..do it!
Or again. . . Just delete if you disagree.

Hey, I found a batch-resize macro for GIMP, so there’s going to be hardly any turnaround time, and hardly any commentary, on photos from Maker Faire!

As exhibitors, the SPACE SQUID team was there at the crack of dawn, setting up our little both and watching as all the other makers transform an open-air stock pavilion that still smelled quite strongly of stock, into a place of wonders.

Soon the people came to admire the SPACE SQUID stage show.

Of course there were one or two other people exhibiting. SPACE SQUID was sandwiched between the people getting splorched by the gore-cannon, and the Hungry Scientist booth, where engineers made icecream right in front of you with ingredients you choose, using liquid nitrogen and a cordless drill.


The flavor that I chose was BBQ sauce, tomatoes, olive oil, chili, and garlic.

Yum!!!

If I had my choice, I would have spent the entire weekend watching the robot battles and eating funnel cake.


There’s nothing more exciting than watching a 300lb robot flip into the air and slam into bullet-proof lexan. I’ve never been so exhilarated by a violent sport, not even hockey.

Of course the Sterling engine people had to show up.

I remember the ornate train model from last year, and I don’t think the little electric train worked then either.

The "Sashimi Tabernacle Choir" with its intricately synchronized singing fish was even more impressive at night, when the LEDs in the mouths lit in synch with the moving mouthparts and the music.

Who knew that the great worm of the desert was just a bunch of folks on bikes?

After long deliberation, we chose a pair of Squid Grrrls for our special Maker Faire supplemental issue of SPACE SQUID. Their model names are (from left to right) Regina Falangi and Baluka Pasty.

And the Squid Grrrl runner-ups, who coincidentally had the exact same model names.

Okay, here’s some pictures, taken from the somber and dignified Austin Chronicle "Best of Austin Issue" awards party. Most of these pictures are SPACE SQUID staff posing with some of the other celebrities who shared our honor.

This is Uno, the beagle who won the Westminster "Best of Show." I remember riding in the car, and listening to the NPR correspondent waxing enthusiastic about this beagle who clearly embodied everything that was wonderful about dogs.

Uno has got to be the biggest celebrity whose ears I have ruffled.

Below is a picture of Carmadillo. It’s hard to describe how awesome it was to ride around in this vehicle. It’s an armor-plated armadillo that shoots flames . . . OUT OF ITS EYES!!!

The builder/operator Avi insisted that we would have to flash the devil horns in the photos just to show how rocking it is.

I think I’ve mentioned previously on this blog the greatest newspaper in Austin, and probably the greatest newspaper in the world to have the word "Chronicle" in its name. That’s right, that paradigm of journalistic excellence, The Austin Chronicle.

Well, in their "Best of Austin" issue out on the stands right now, they recognized SPACE SQUID with a critics pick. The blurb isn’t out on their website yet, but here’s a re-creation of the highly flattering, yet nevertheless mostly accurate, honor bestowed upon us:

Best Sci-Fi Chum
‘SPACE SQUID’
Squishy, the official mascot of Austin’s only hybrid science-fiction and humor zine, wants to know: Got chum? If you’re lacking in the chum department (who isn’t), getting your fix — along with a healthy helping of Squid Grrrls, comics, and short stories — can be done by getting your tentacles on a copy of this ultra-nerdy and oh-so-smart and -funny zine, sold for the bargain price of $1 (which is now incorrect, it’s free -ed.) at BookPeople, MonkeyWrench Books, and the Dragon’s Lair.

And then they were kind enough to include our website and our editorial email address both.

So what that means is, I’m now going to have to actually stock the places that they mentioned.

On a side note, the slushpile is now clear, and I’ve even contacted most of those poor souls who’ve had stories on hold forever. If you want to try out the SPACE SQUID with your sci-fi wares, now would be an excellent time. Get your subs in before the huge rush following our high-profile award.

Also, don’t forget that Makers Faire is in Austin this weekend, and SPACE SQUID will have a booth. I’m hoping to give away the rest of the print run of #6, so hop on out there to get your collector’s item award-winning SPACE SQUID issue.

It’s an odd feeling to pick up an anthology and realize that about a third of its volume is stories that you have personally published.

Such was my experience as I read the new Derek J. Goodman anthology Things of Loose Reality.

Some of these stories might be familiar to those of you who are slavish readers of RevSF and SPACE SQUID. There’s "The All-night One-Stop Apocalypse Shop" (one of my all-time favorite stories), the Clarion-Schmarion contest winning "A Case of Yellow Bricks and Emerald Towers", "Power Pastry" from SPACE SQUID #3, and "Crossover Event" which appeared in SPACE SQUID #4.

For those of us who are Derek J. Goodman fans, this anthology brings us the Apocalypse shift cycle in its current entirety, as well as a shotgun peppering of stories that would be hard to scrape together into one place.

Things of Loose Reality sets off the proper mood with its opening story "Sequin Man" (previously published in Hungur #1), a quirky horror story about a bunch of vampires who are hunted by a shadowy yet somehow familiar figure.

I felt that the highpoint of the book came with the semi-autobiographical stories of magic realism. "Deus ex Machina" (originally in Gods and Monsters) and "Flora and Fauna of the Heartland" (Seasons in the Night #4) both are about blue-collar jobs and the transformative powers that trap you in their monotony.

And even if you’ve already read most of these stories, it’s worth getting the anthology just for the informative afterword where Goodman talks about his inspirations for each entry in the compilation.

Having read Goodman’s shorts, I was pleasantly surprised to find that his long-form efforts are just as compelling. When I picked up Goodman’s book Beliel Rose

I thought to myself, "great, a self-published epic fantasy."

Well, this one is a good read. It’s a horror-tinged sword and sorcery story that takes place in the socially progressive kingdom of Daliroor.

Yes, there are vampire/zombies. Yes, there’s a cursed sword. Yes, there are lesbians. But the whole lesbian thing is tackled with far more empathy and sophistication than, say, I personally have brought to bear under similar circumstances.

Beliel Rose sat on the toilet tank as my primary bathroom reading for a while. My housemate probably thought something terrible had happened to my bowels, for all the time I spent in there reading, eager to find out what happened next.