A publicly-displayed woodcut of a woman making love to an octopus has caused some controversy. Who woulda thunk it?

Times-Picayune has an interesting article about George Alec Effinger, a science fiction author who died recently. He's another author I've long wished to read, but haven't got around to. His "What Entropy Means to Me" is sitting on my shelf. He was regularly praised by Harlan Ellison and others.

What month is it? Oh, October. It must be time for newspapers to do articles on the horror genre. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel gets a few interesting quotes. Laura Miller writes a self-contradicting column on horror in the New York Times Book Review. And there has been a ton of reviews of Peter Straub's new book "Lost Boy, Lost Girl" and Tananarive Due's "The Good House."

Fantastic Metropolis is offering 10 excerpts from upcoming novels by some of my favorite writers. On the top of the list is The Shadow Year by Jeffrey Ford. But there's also Shrek: An Afterword by Jeff Vandermeer and The Dead of Night: Dusk by great new horror writer Tim Lebbon. There's also a story by Nick Mamatas, who I've been meaning to check out for a while. If you are at all interested in any of the things I am, then check out some of these.

Ooh, here's some fun, it's the Zombie Infection Simulation v2.3. The little pink dots are humans, the slow grey dots are zombies (you won't notice the gray dots at first until suddenly whole blocks seem to become gray.) Watch as the humans get infected and spread the disease. It's fun.

And while we're on the subject of jellyfish, here's the newest species of jellyfish, called Big Red.

Here you go, an excellent picture of a massive jellyfish. Imagine rubbing up against one of these suckers. Eww.

Giant jellyfish are turning up along the coast of Japan. Apparently this happened last year as well. I'm diligently searching for a picture, but have yet to find one. If you look at Underwater Times, they have a small picture up, but I have no idea where they got it from.

This is an interesting idea, Continuum - 33 1/3 is doing a series of small books about people's favorite albums. They have a great list of albums up, although I don't recognize most of the writers' names. I'm going to keep an eye on it.
Side note: The introduction says this "By turns obsessive, passionate, creative, and informed, the books in this series demonstrate many different ways of writing about music. (A task which can be, as Elvis Costello famously observed, as tricky as dancing about architecture.)"
That quote about "write about music is like dancing about architecture" has been attributed to every smart musician from the '30s to the present. I think it has been traced back to Thelonius Monk, but who knows. I was hoping Snopes would have something on it, but no such luck.

Well, I don't have much time at the computer today. I have to wait for a utility man to show up anytime between noon and 4 p.m. There doesn't seem to be any giant squid news of import today anyway.
I'm finally starting to get excited about Nanowrimo again. I feel like writing. I still don't have many more ideas for my story than I had on Oct. 1. But that's all right. Flying by the seat of one's pants is what Nanowrimo is all about. Last year, I had a plot that completely changed by Nov. 2, so it's not like I haven't done it before.
The Connecticut wrimos are holding a get-together on Sunday. I've said I'll be there. It's probably one of the only events I'll be able to attend. My wonky schedule doesn't allow for many night events.
We have a municipal liaison this year and she really seems to be on top of things. She's already got a whole list of events for November. I half-heartedly started that kind of thing last year, but gave up rather quickly. It's a lot of work and I wish her the best.
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I saw Kill Bill Vol. 1 Friday. It was exactly as I expected, a good ride with lots of blood. There's almost no dialogue, but when they do speak (as in Lucy Liu's marvelous speech), it's pure Tarantino. I think there's more depth to be found in this movie, but we won't know until the second "volume" is released. I'm probably going to see it again in another week, so we'll see if my impressions change.
This week I hope to see Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Which reminds me. This Slate review of the original Massacre annoys me. It's written by somebody who obviously is written by somebody who knows nothing about horror and decided to write about Texas Chainsaw Massacre as a way to show how hip they are. The writer says: "But the new film is a cynical exercise in fright and disgust, where the original had a deep resonance to it."
Yeah, maybe so, I don't know. But I bet if it was 1974, this writer would be telling us how horrible Massacre is and pointing out what a magnificent movie "The Wolf Man" is.
The writer also doesn't what they're talking about. "Chainsaw gave birth to the multipart horror franchises that have filled multiplexes for the last two decades and may have convinced Hollywood that good money lay in bloodwork" Um, no. Chainsaw was an inspiration many, many films. However, Chainsaw followed in the path of other multipart franchises. Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 didn't come out until after Halloween 2 and 3 and well into the Friday the 13th series.
I like that the article praises Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but I just feel it's kind of hollow.

Prozac is found in Texas fish: "'It's very early, but the implications are potentially serious.'" No kidding. Who knew they suffered from depression too?

Giant squid news is becoming more and more rare lately. I don't think I can resort to San Matias' record catch for squid news. It's just not interesting. I'm sorry. I'll endeavor to do better in the future.

This is not a political blog and will never be. However, this story, Senate Turns Half of Iraq Aid Into Loans, disturbs me. I don't care whether you're against the war or for it, who really thinks making Iraq a debtor nation before they even get on their feet is a good idea? Let's bomb the crap out of a country, invade, take over, replace the government and then ask that government to pay for half of what you did to it. This isn't moral or well-thought-out lawmaking no matter what side of the fence you're on.

The idea of a space elevator is now being taken seriously by NASA. This would be such a technological achievement, it boggles the mind. Skyscrapers twist and shake in the wind, how is this miles-high creation going to hold up? It's bizarre, but I'd really like to see it. With this and the Chinese space flight, there seems to be a renewed space race going on, globally.

Also in that article, the writer makes the comment: "In journalism since the mid-ninetheenth century, barriers to entry have been high." I just don't see that. Nearly every town in this country has a weekly newspaper. Weekly newspapers are always looking for stringers (if they have a budget). You need to be able to do very few things to become a stringer: 1. Be able to write. 2. Know the basic journalism form (the inverted pyramid style). 3. Not be crazy, at least outwardly so. That's really it. Whether you move up in the field, well that depends on your abilities, but becoming a journalist is not so hard. If there are barriers, they're pretty low.

Interesting article about PressThink: What's Radical About the Weblog Form in Journalism? A "Bryant" in the comments section makes a good point that is missed by the article: "Weblogs are a technology. Journalism is a process. As the sidebar here demonstrates, the process of journalism can use the technology of weblogs to good effect."
I've yet to see much journalism done on blogs. I see two things: essays and commentary. I guess that's journalism in a sense, but it's not all that you look for in a newspaper or a television news show.
The blog has unlimited possibilities in journalism. For instance, some person in West Haven, upset about the administration, could start attending meetings and reporting on what he sees in his blog. This would be journalism (although, most likely tinged with commentary, but that's no different than say The New Haven Advocate.) Actually, I'm hoping to see more of that kind of thing.

Scientists have discovered a prehistoric frog that is still living. And, man, is it ugly.

I want to spend more time looking at The High Hat, which has a special Sam Peckinpah edition. It also has interesting reviews and interviews. Looks good.

Pterosaurs (you know, pteranadons, pteradactyls, Rodan) are stranger than scientists believed in the past. Apparently they walked on four legs and had big crests. Apparently a University of Bridgeport professor is jealous:
"'I know if I had one of those, women would be throwing themselves at me, convinced of my sexual prowess and reproductive fitness, and men would shrink from me, sure that my strength greatly exceeded theirs.'"

You should all be reading one of the funniest blogs out there: dong resin's joint. Here's part of his entry on fake bullet holes:
"Guess what Capone, I come across a car with fake bullet hole stickers on it, I'm throwing a rock through the motherfucking window with a note on it that says 'soon.' "