I never looked this good even when this picture was taken, but it'll do.
Now, seriously, we're going to get back to the Project with these progress reports!
I never looked this good even when this picture was taken, but it'll do.
FEBRUARY 2010
The Web Site may progress glacially slow, but perhaps I'll move faster on my new blog! There I can type down any passing thoughts or story ideas.
I might as well put in a link to the Bump in the Night newsletter from Troy Taylor's "Ghosts of the Prairie" site, since I send in a short essay for it every few weeks. True, eerie Paranormal Classics for your entertainment and edification.
JANUARY 2010
Well, possibly it's not a new decade yet, as 2000 was not really the start of the new millennium, but it's good enough for a new beginning.
Seems like I've made statements like that before, but I do need to update things in my life -- like my web-presence. Guess I will start a blog. Then, instead of trying to make some sweeping statements once every few months, I can make little observations every day or two. Like:
Don't you hate when you're behind some slowpokes on the highway, and you decide to pass them, and suddenly they decide to speed up when you're not quite past? Maybe they decided they were, indeed, going too slow -- maybe they hope a truck will roar up and smash you off the road. It's just annoying.
Or I can put things here that are scattered across the Internet, like this post from the Classic Horror Message Board, describing a strange night from my 17th year (about when the photo above was taken):
When I was 17 or so, I stayed up late to see the Spanish "Count Dracula" starring Christopher Lee. No, not the Spanish version of Dracula, or Lee's "Horror of Dracula." This early 70s effort was very faithful to Stoker's novel (down to the bushy gray 'stache Lee had), but it was also the slowest and most boring film I ever saw. Still, I lay down in the living room and watched.
But I kept hearing things from the garage. Eventually I thought I heard noises from the attic, overhead, as well. I flipped on the garage light (from inside) and peeked through the little, distorting peephole that happened to be in the door leading to the garage.
The pull-down ladder that led to the attic was down. I didn't recall it being there earlier. I wondered if someone could be in the attic. I think I opened the garage door, but I didn't step out or call "Hello?", thinking, why attract attention? (Though merely turning on the light would have shown that someone downstairs was at least suspicious.) The noises continued, noticeable enough that I peeked out a few more times.
I continue watching Dracula, but instead of stretched out before the tube in proper Monster Kid fashion, I wandered around the living room, bouncing on the balls of my feet, as if I'd have to run. And I kept hearing noises. I turned down the sound during a commercial. The sounds from above were a soft, continuous creeek-crick-crack-creek-tik-crack, which seemed to me the sound something might make if pressure were being put to it until it was ready to break.
I studied the ceiling where I thought the noise was coming from. There were long, tiny cracks in the gypsum drywall (or whatever the ceiling was made of), some running from wall to wall! It looked like something was about to crash through into the house!
My dad was always warning us that only in certain parts of the attic could someone stand safely; step in the wrong area and down you'd go through the drywall. Naturally, I decided that a drooling maniac was in the attic, and, unknowledgeable about the weak spots, he was going to crash in on me!
Yet I stood (off to the side), my attention divided between the TV and the ceiling, rather than calling 911 or something (I was terribly introverted and would have truly had to be in danger to actually bother the cops). "Count Dracula" was long as well as boring, and as the night wore on, the noises faded. I convinced myself that the cracks in the ceiling had always been there, I just never had reason to notice them, and that the ladder had indeed been down earlier. Finally I went to bed -- but with one eye (and ear) alert for any crashing noises.
OCTOBER 2009
Well, I'm in the middle of moving, so there's not much time to devote to the web page. Everyone seems to have a blog these days, and some people manage to write in something every day! Don't know how they find the time.
Looking back on the past few years, it doesn't seem to have been that busy. They have been tense, however, and I found myself unable to concentrate on writing, taking classes, or anything else.
The activity of putting things in storage, disposing of unnecessary items, and packing up gets me going, however, and I'll try to keep going. It's odd that action seems to beget action; you'd think you'd have less time to write, read, study, and network if you have more physical tasks to accomplish. Newton's laws affect more than just objects floating in space, it seems.
Moving to a new (and bigger -- and better-looking) place also feels like a new beginning. A fresh start, a fresh approach, and extra Vitamin D -- look out, world!
SEPTEMBER 2009
I never used the option to have the Project put on search engines because I knew from the beginning it would be very slow in its creation -- and that was back when I was burning with inspiration. However, the links from Troy Taylor's "Ghosts of the Prairie" site have resulted in numerous hits, so I may just have to update the FWP.
Guess I'll transfer a couple of fannish stories from the old "Fantasy and Reality" page to here. Manly Wade Wellman's fantastic tales of Silver John, aka John the Balladeer, have always been favorites of mine. Here are a couple of adventures of the modern wandering minstrel that weren't documented in Wellman's book, Who Fears the Devil?:
JUNE 2009
It's been nearly ten years since I connected to the Internet and created my first crude web-pages. In some ways the time seems to have passed like a snap of the fingers, and in other ways that decade feels more like a century. It was not an enjoyable era in many ways. Almost annually some Life Problem arose that absorbed all my time and energy, tossing me aside after a while like a wrung-out dishrag -- only to be replaced by a new Life Problem ten times worse than the one before. Even if the new disaster didn't roar up immediately, it took months to recover emotionally and spiritually. I believe it is time for me to put a stop to that.
This web site is called the Fantasy World Project. I expected it to develop in private, away from my old page (Fiction and Reality), but Geocities' decision to shut down their free hosting spurred me on to updating/improving/transferring everything here. Not every file and page from F&R will make the jump, but what does ought to look a bit more professional.
Obviously, I'm dedicating a large part of my bandwidth to "The Fantasy World Project." After years of writing SF and fantasy, it struck me (on June 10, 2006, to be precise) that I could trace almost every character, creature, fantasy name, and storyline back to its original inspiration. I've seen other authors' maps, fantasy histories, and indices of people and things, but nothing on the scale of which I was thinking. Why not? The Project took up a lot of time, but it was fun and inspiring in its own right. Of course, I labored under the belief that the Bad Times were over at last -- when in fact the next few years would get even worse.
I've decided that I have to make conscious decisions to get out of life's little quicksand pits. One of these decisions is to re-boot the FWP. I worked on it in 2006, created the web site in 2008, and in 2009 -- well, third time's the charm.
Besides, charting the old inspirations will bring to the public's eye the titles of many authors, books, and journals that languish in old libraries. Perhaps others will dig them out, even in this Twitter and i-Phone world, and find inspirations of their own.
More thoughts along these lines will be found in the Fantasy World Project proper. I started off a bit coy, not revealing my identity on those pages, and I still think the dialog between the mysterious "M" and the interviewer Chester Monday works to emphasize the growth of my fantasy milieu and the details that went into it. As it continues, I believe "M" and Chester will continue their conversations:
Page One of the FWP.
Meanwhile, I'll start polishing up my old pages, such as the Eyrie (gryphon newsletter), the Mothman Annotations, the Kolchak: the Night Stalker page, and others. In the real world, I'm also writing more legitimate stories, taking night classes, and working full-time, but -- hey, it's fun!
The author, circa 1976 at the Dinosaur Park in Arkansas. One of the fellows on my right is my brother.
Summer, 2002
That's a nice broad title. I could add updates here for months.
AUGUST: I watched the old SF film X -- The Unknown a couple of years ago and saw bits that had to have inspired Monty Python's Flying Circus. When people are shown facing the camera (and the radioactive blob from the earth's core), they scream and sink out of view (melted by the monster). If you ever see the movie, be sure to yell, "AAAH! The Blancmange!" at these parts -- referring, of course, to the "Blancmanges of Andromeda" in the "Science Fiction Sketch." Another scene, of a scientist being lowered into a fissure in the earth's crust reminds me of a scene in which some stuffy British Secretary for something-or-other falls through the earth's crust. . .
I bought a video of Hammer Film's The Lost Continent, which came out only a year or two before the first season of MPFC. The video contains the original theatrical previews, and the previews alone seem to be the major inspiration for "Scott of the Antarctic," with the bizarre Sargasso Sea monsters menacing the beautiful women aboard the stranded ship. The slobbering, blocky giant crab is a dead-ringer for the Man-Eating Roll-Top Writing Desk.
There is another major influence in the movie: The ship gets trapped in the Sargasso Sea, the crew sees funky monsters and man-eating sea-weed, and at the center of this unearthly realm, what do they find? THE SPANISH INQUISITION!
And only a couple of weeks ago I found any number of Pythonic influences in a single episode of The Avengers, an early one featuring Honor Blackman as Cathy Gale, entitled "The Little Wonders." It's about an organization of criminals who masquerade as priests. A padre caught at an airport with guns, knives, secret compartments in his luggage and stolen pearls in his clerical collar reminded me of Eric Idle as a priest at an airport in MPFC. A thug in a "doll hospital" looks exactly like Michael Palin's Mr. Liugi Vercotti, down to the wrap-around sunglasses and ever-present cigarette. And the muscular, scarred, thug-like ministers are very reminiscent of the ones seen in "The Bishop," and indeed one fellow is called simply "Da Bishop" throughout the episode.
Some may wonder why people bother to give lists of their favorite books, movies, etc. I admit that I sometimes use such lists to screen sites. If I agree with just a few items on the favorites lists, I'm likely to continue clicking through. On the other hand, I'm even more likely to decide that a site isn't worth my while if I see a lot of books, authors, whatever, I don't care about. Hey -- my time is valuable!
I'll probably devote a page to lists of ten or twelve of my favorite books, movies, etc., soon, but for now:
Once again, Page One of the FWP.
And there you may encounter Wandering Monsters.
And, all right, a counter:
We welcome your comments and observations. E-mail the FWP!