Tuesday, February 2, 2010
5 Second Fiction Eight Hundred and Seventy Two
Bad Dungeon Masters don't go to Hell, but they do have to live in their own campaign worlds.
Monday, February 1, 2010
Drew Daywalt's Short Horror Film 'Suicide Girl'
Very well done I thought. Thank the SCREAMSTRESS for showing us this one.
(Repeat) February: The Month That’s Trying to Kill Me
February: The Month That’s Trying to Kill Me
Most people have adversaries in their daily lives, a snotty co-worker, a shiftless in-law or rude neighbor. I have a whole month that’s out to get me. For some February is the shortest month, for some it’s Black History month and for others it’s the month of Valentine’s Day.
But for me February is the Month That Dripped Blood.
Fact: I was working at Nice Shopper, and it was the coldest day that Albany had seen in a lifetime and a half. It was close to -20 with the wind chill, so naturally I was sent out to get carts. The wind had blown all the carts to the far end of the parking lot and I could only retrieve them in sets of three because anything more would get blown over. By the time I had finished my hair was swept back from my reddened face and I felt like a character from a Robert London story. There were lines at every cash register so I threw off my coat and set to work. It took my cold-addled mind a few moments realize that everyone one was staring at me. Finally one of the cuter cashiers said to me, “Al. Your nose.”
Visions of frostbite filling my head I grabbed for my face- and my fingers brushed the stalactite of frozen boogers dangling from my right nostril. Sure some of you out there might think that was pretty funny but it’s snot.
(…Auuuuugh yourself this is quality material here.)
That was the start of a long week.
Fact: It was my Junior year of high school, and I was trying to play the field, trying to romance both my beloved Lilly as well as a sophomore girl of dubious sanity but considerable cleavage. I figured my brother and father could do it, why not me? And besides if I was going to try and get my friends to call me ‘The Love Machine’ I damn well better be sure to back it up.
Of course I hadn’t actually told either girl that I was playing the field, I guess I was trying to be more or less the stealth bomber of love. It was the afternoon of Valentine’s Day that most of my friends started trying to beat me up. Now with my friends this wasn’t necessarily a rare occurrence but they had never been so organized before. Finally I confronted them, hoping to reassert my position as the Alpha Nerd with a combination of guts and memorized dialogue from Doctor Who. Then I saw each and every one of those sneaky bastards standing around Lily. Now this was too much. They were trying to move in on my main squeeze! I barged in the middle of them and asked what the Hell was going on.
That was when Lily confronted me with her Valentine’s card. Well, actually it wasn’t her Valentine’s Day card, it was the other girl’s but I had accidentally switched them.
Yeah, that the start of a long week.
Fact: My first bout with kidney stones came the same week that my beloved mother-in-law had a heart attack. (And that is no sarcasm, I do love her bunches.) I tried to stick it out, hoping the whole thing would literally pass but no luck there. So I had to have my wife drop me off at the emergency room so I could get better while she took care of our daughter, they were both exhausted by the ordeal.
To this day I am not sure what route my wife took to the Emergency Room but I can only assume somewhere she took a side trip to the Twilight Zone because that night was one of the strangest of my life. It began simply enough with lots of waiting then when they finally admitted me they had me dress in one of those drafty hospital gowns and left me sitting on a bed in the hallway.
Why you might ask? Because it was another cold February and all the local homeless people were checking themselves in for phantom ailments so they could stay warm. The place was packed; it was standing room only, or in my case trying to sleep in the hallway with your ass hanging out room only. The hobo sitting on a bed closest to me decided to strike up a conversation, and if I hadn’t been so tired and miserable I might have asked him what Tom Waits song he had escaped from to torment me.
Instead I just listened to his tale of travel, of his Native American wife he only got to see twice a year or so because she lived in Canada.
And by the way, Canadian women? Between this and all the nerds who say that have girlfriends up there I have to say get some standards for heavens sake.
Apparently my hobo friend took my bleary eyed indifference as a sign of friendship so he tried to give me one of his less filthy hats as a present but that was when the doctor showed up to get me the medical care I so desperately needed. I was never so happy for a painful and invasive prostate exam and yes that includes the one at the Eden Studios Christmas party.
With a prescription in hand I called a cab to take me home and wouldn’t you know it of all the cabbies I could have ended up with I got the one who wanted to try and get me to invest in the television pilot he was trying to film in Vermont. This was not what I needed because I can honestly say as that as a wannabe writer that loves to talk up his latest hopeless project there is nothing more annoying than a wannabe writer trying to talk up his latest hopeless project.
The cab ride ended before he could get into the intricacies of his series bible but when you’ve heard the pitch for one series that combines elements from Lovejoy and GI JOE you’ve heard them all.
So I got home and unlocked the front door, only to find my wife had put the door chain on as well. I chuckled over this and knocked on the door about ten minutes later I remember my wife mentioning that she wanted nothing more than to take a sleeping pill and turn in. After another ten minutes of homeless knocking I started walking to the local 24 hour diner so I could use the payphone and wake my missus up.
It was going to be a long walk.
So, where does that leave us today? First things off I woke up feeling profoundly squishy inside and I spent most of my shift trying not to erupt into a series of farts that would sound like an AMC Hornet drag racing with a tank full of bad gas. Then I had a training seminar in the afternoon, I believe it was focused on budgeting our time more effectively to improve shareholder value… well at least that’s what I think it was about. I fell asleep ten minutes in because I had been up all night writing blog entries.
Somehow I made it through my shift without skidmarking my underwear so I headed home, but first ironically enough, I had to stop for gas. I’d been putting off refueling because it had been so darn cold out the last few days but there was no putting it off any longer. I got to the gas station, popped open the tank and then realized I was on the wrong side of the pump so I spent a few moments dodging other cars and getting my car lined up correctly. Then I went in and bought twenty dollars worth of gas. And I started pumping.
But there was something wrong with all the pumps on that side of the station, and it was pumping gas at about the speed of a penny a second. As I stood there shivering, watching my twenty dollars of gas move like twenty dollars of molasses I thought to myself- it’s gonna be another long February.
But aren’t they all?
But for me February is the Month That Dripped Blood.
Fact: I was working at Nice Shopper, and it was the coldest day that Albany had seen in a lifetime and a half. It was close to -20 with the wind chill, so naturally I was sent out to get carts. The wind had blown all the carts to the far end of the parking lot and I could only retrieve them in sets of three because anything more would get blown over. By the time I had finished my hair was swept back from my reddened face and I felt like a character from a Robert London story. There were lines at every cash register so I threw off my coat and set to work. It took my cold-addled mind a few moments realize that everyone one was staring at me. Finally one of the cuter cashiers said to me, “Al. Your nose.”
Visions of frostbite filling my head I grabbed for my face- and my fingers brushed the stalactite of frozen boogers dangling from my right nostril. Sure some of you out there might think that was pretty funny but it’s snot.
(…Auuuuugh yourself this is quality material here.)
That was the start of a long week.
Fact: It was my Junior year of high school, and I was trying to play the field, trying to romance both my beloved Lilly as well as a sophomore girl of dubious sanity but considerable cleavage. I figured my brother and father could do it, why not me? And besides if I was going to try and get my friends to call me ‘The Love Machine’ I damn well better be sure to back it up.
Of course I hadn’t actually told either girl that I was playing the field, I guess I was trying to be more or less the stealth bomber of love. It was the afternoon of Valentine’s Day that most of my friends started trying to beat me up. Now with my friends this wasn’t necessarily a rare occurrence but they had never been so organized before. Finally I confronted them, hoping to reassert my position as the Alpha Nerd with a combination of guts and memorized dialogue from Doctor Who. Then I saw each and every one of those sneaky bastards standing around Lily. Now this was too much. They were trying to move in on my main squeeze! I barged in the middle of them and asked what the Hell was going on.
That was when Lily confronted me with her Valentine’s card. Well, actually it wasn’t her Valentine’s Day card, it was the other girl’s but I had accidentally switched them.
Yeah, that the start of a long week.
Fact: My first bout with kidney stones came the same week that my beloved mother-in-law had a heart attack. (And that is no sarcasm, I do love her bunches.) I tried to stick it out, hoping the whole thing would literally pass but no luck there. So I had to have my wife drop me off at the emergency room so I could get better while she took care of our daughter, they were both exhausted by the ordeal.
To this day I am not sure what route my wife took to the Emergency Room but I can only assume somewhere she took a side trip to the Twilight Zone because that night was one of the strangest of my life. It began simply enough with lots of waiting then when they finally admitted me they had me dress in one of those drafty hospital gowns and left me sitting on a bed in the hallway.
Why you might ask? Because it was another cold February and all the local homeless people were checking themselves in for phantom ailments so they could stay warm. The place was packed; it was standing room only, or in my case trying to sleep in the hallway with your ass hanging out room only. The hobo sitting on a bed closest to me decided to strike up a conversation, and if I hadn’t been so tired and miserable I might have asked him what Tom Waits song he had escaped from to torment me.
Instead I just listened to his tale of travel, of his Native American wife he only got to see twice a year or so because she lived in Canada.
And by the way, Canadian women? Between this and all the nerds who say that have girlfriends up there I have to say get some standards for heavens sake.
Apparently my hobo friend took my bleary eyed indifference as a sign of friendship so he tried to give me one of his less filthy hats as a present but that was when the doctor showed up to get me the medical care I so desperately needed. I was never so happy for a painful and invasive prostate exam and yes that includes the one at the Eden Studios Christmas party.
With a prescription in hand I called a cab to take me home and wouldn’t you know it of all the cabbies I could have ended up with I got the one who wanted to try and get me to invest in the television pilot he was trying to film in Vermont. This was not what I needed because I can honestly say as that as a wannabe writer that loves to talk up his latest hopeless project there is nothing more annoying than a wannabe writer trying to talk up his latest hopeless project.
The cab ride ended before he could get into the intricacies of his series bible but when you’ve heard the pitch for one series that combines elements from Lovejoy and GI JOE you’ve heard them all.
So I got home and unlocked the front door, only to find my wife had put the door chain on as well. I chuckled over this and knocked on the door about ten minutes later I remember my wife mentioning that she wanted nothing more than to take a sleeping pill and turn in. After another ten minutes of homeless knocking I started walking to the local 24 hour diner so I could use the payphone and wake my missus up.
It was going to be a long walk.
So, where does that leave us today? First things off I woke up feeling profoundly squishy inside and I spent most of my shift trying not to erupt into a series of farts that would sound like an AMC Hornet drag racing with a tank full of bad gas. Then I had a training seminar in the afternoon, I believe it was focused on budgeting our time more effectively to improve shareholder value… well at least that’s what I think it was about. I fell asleep ten minutes in because I had been up all night writing blog entries.
Somehow I made it through my shift without skidmarking my underwear so I headed home, but first ironically enough, I had to stop for gas. I’d been putting off refueling because it had been so darn cold out the last few days but there was no putting it off any longer. I got to the gas station, popped open the tank and then realized I was on the wrong side of the pump so I spent a few moments dodging other cars and getting my car lined up correctly. Then I went in and bought twenty dollars worth of gas. And I started pumping.
But there was something wrong with all the pumps on that side of the station, and it was pumping gas at about the speed of a penny a second. As I stood there shivering, watching my twenty dollars of gas move like twenty dollars of molasses I thought to myself- it’s gonna be another long February.
But aren’t they all?
Sunday, January 31, 2010
As always Aeron Alfrey's MONSTER BRAINS has something to like totally blow my mind...
and as you can see today's post was no exception.
Stop by MONSTER BRAINS and wish Aeron Happy Birthday!
(Recommended Reads) "Merrick Tree" by Donald Conrad
None of Merrick Chelsworthy’s victims were ever recovered and that alone should be enough to make him the most memorable case I’ve ever had.
Those hunters came into the station with a story about a stone altar. And then they started in about all those faces carved into the trees; it made Archie and me wonder. So we went out there...
click here to read the rest
Those hunters came into the station with a story about a stone altar. And then they started in about all those faces carved into the trees; it made Archie and me wonder. So we went out there...
click here to read the rest
(Recommended Reads) "The Family Business" by Dana
Miranda did tarot readings Tuesday and Thursday afternoons at a coffee shop near the downtown campus. It was a good location. She got students coming in looking for love life and exam advice. She also got a lot of businessmen and bankers seeking advice in their love lives and the markets...
click here to read the rest
click here to read the rest
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Shillin' like a Villain Awwww yeah...
IN THIS TWILIGHT tales of lost gods and fragile transformations
This collection of 13 stories transports you to a world where both dreams and monsters lurk in the shadows, where love and forgotten rituals fight for control of the human heart, and where the madness of eternity can be glimpsed in a single segmented eye. This anthology collects some of the best stories from Al Bruno III's website and includes the novellas 'Chad's Oracles', 'Fully Vested' and 'The Mask Collector', available for the first time anywhere. 
IN THE MIDNIGHT OF HIS HEART a novel of horror and obsession
In The Pit
This is the comic book I wrote, that sadly it never made it past the first issue. Too bad I had envisioned a fantastic tale of serial killers, Canadian pro wrestlers and exploding toilets. Still though I think you might enjoying reading the first issue, it is still available as a PDF file. There are also some preview pages at the sight below. Order away and weep for what might have been. Some of my best work is available from the fine folks at Eden Studios. My contribution to their game lines has been mainly in the area of fiction. The rules and setting information was written by other very capable folks like Richard Dakan, CJ Carella, Jack Emmert, George Vasilakos and M. Alexander Jurkat. Believe me, they did all the hard work. If you are a fan of role-playing games or a fan of zombie movies then the books below are going to be right up your alley. ALL FLESH MUST BE EATEN main rulebook
Enter the dark world of survival horror. The Dead walk among us. This role-playing game allows you to play in a world infested by the walking dead. The main rulebook includes rules for character creation, combat and everything else you need to play in a world of survival horror. Also detailed are the multiple campaign settings so you can customize the type of "deadworld" you wish to explore.232 pages.Hardcover.Cover Art by Christopher Shy. Click here for ordering information ZOMBIE MASTER SCREEN
A must-have reference for All Flesh Must Be Eaten, the Zombie Master's Screen is filled with charts and tables. From fear to weapons to outcomes, every reference that a prepared Zombie Master needs is packed onto a four-panel screen. The flip side of the screen scares and delights the players with full-color zombie images. The Screen is packed with a 48-page booklet, including a ready-to-run adventure introducing the Cast Member to the horrors of a zombie plague, and pregenerated characters with complete bios, statistics and resource information. Cover Art by Christopher Shy and George Vasilakos. Click here for ordering information ENTER THE ZOMBIE
Written by Richard DakanThe first supplement to All Flesh Must Be Eaten opens whole new vistas for a walking dead campaign. This tome brings together the thrills of Hong Kong action films and the excitement of flesh-craving horror. The match of these two genres may not have seemed obvious at first, but the pleasures that arise from it are undeniable. After all, zombies and Hong Kong style action make a perfect fit. What better match is there for a relentless series of lightning kicks and a hurricane of bullets than a target that can’t die? The pulse-pounding danger just never stops. Besides, what martial arts master worth his salt doesn't ache for the ability to use his own intestines as a deadly whip? For the undead, no problem!Softcover.Cover Art by Christopher Shy. Click here for ordering information TERRA PRIMATE
Written by Al Bruno III, CJ Carella, David F. Chapman, Patrick SweenyBased on the original concept by George Vasilakos and Ross IsaacsEdited by M. Alexander Jurkat, David F. ChapmanCover art by Jeff ReitzInterior Art by Storn Cook, Thomas Denmark, Talon Dunning, DW Gross, Jon Hodgson, Chris Keefe, Jason Millet, Matt Morrow, James Powers, Gregory Price, George Vasilakos From the creators of All Flesh Must Be Eaten, similar in style but this time . . . with apes! Terra Primate has no specific setting. The only constant is the concept of intelligent apes. Planet of the Apes is a movie about intelligent apes, but then again so is Congo. As long as the characters are interacting with intelligent apes -- or are intelligent apes themselves! -- the game could be set in the pulp era of adventure, on a post-apocalyptic Earth, on a faraway alien planet, or downtown on Main Street. The main rulebook includes rules for character creation, combat and everything else you need to play in a world where man is the missing link! Also detailed are the multiple campaign settings so you can customize the type of "Apeworld" you wish to explore. Click here for ordering information
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