These Undead Bones

Ay, in the very temple of delight
Veil’d melancholy has her sovran shrine. - Keats

So, I’ve been out of touch all week because of work. My alter ego has to pay the bills, so I’ve been busy doing responsible adult things. Yech.

Be sure to check out things over at Tarr and Fether’s Psycho Cinema. They’ve posted my first article over at their ‘S’newsletter’ section! I am sooo looking forward to working with these guys and contributing to their unique and kooky vision!

And watch for more reviews, as I intend on catching up on some long overdue horror movie viewage over the long weekend!

So, Last weekend I had an epiphany. Now that I’m older, more responsible, and otherwise burdened with a mortgage, car payments, the lovely Mrs. Zombie, and the zombie kids (Zombie Boy and Wolf Girl); I really don’t have that much me time. I remedied that some last weekend by going to see Ministry and The Revolting Cocks at the Cleveland House of Blues. Our local House of Blues, by the way, is the single best venue for concerts I’ve ever been to. And, it was at about the point that RevCo was performing ‘Do You Think I’m Sexy’ that I had my epiphany. I was standing there at the edge of the pit and watching some beautiful and very tasty looking Goth girls dancing on stage, and feeling the throbbing and unrelenting waves of music go around and through me. All around me were the pushing and jumping bodies of a hundred or more people dancing to their own orgiastic and pagan rhythms, the primal and sensual feel of our sweat soaked bodies moving like the excited atoms of some strange, polymorphic beast. I inhaled deeply of the smell of sweat, and smoke, and alcohol and I felt myself grabbed by the inevitable certainty that doing what I was at that moment ( i.e.; seeing a hardcore show from this perspective) was one of the few things that bring joy to my cold, undead heart. That moment was an encapsulation of all that is perfect to me. No matter how old I get, I will always love the thrill of an alternative Industrial/Goth show, much to the disdain of Mrs. Z. You see, she doesn’t like that side of me. She hates the part of me that thrives on the darker things in life. And she hates the primal joy such things bring me. I love her more than life itself, and I know she feels the same, but sometimes I think she wishes she’d married a conservative banker who really dug country music and the Backstreet Boys.

And, by the way, I can still hold my own in a mosh pit. Except for the fact that I may have broken or chipped a bone in my elbow falling during Ministry’s set. I can’t touch my elbow it’s so sore; and I have a purple and red and green bruise that looks much like a spiderweb prison tattoo. That’s the first time I’ve ever really fell hard in a pit in all the years I’ve been doing this.

And I can’t tell Mrs. Z about it, either. I’d NEVER hear the end of it… Besides, I have tickets to see Rob Zombie in three weeks…

Some cool links I found:

The first one is this one about a military coffin that was found in the middle of the desert. I’d read a story about it earlier in the week on a major network web site, and thought it was kind of weird. I also thought it might have been somehow terrorist related. The linked article above puts it all into perspective though. It could be nothing BUT zombies.

And there’s nothing better than a good grave robbing story. Thing is, if you’re going to go to the trouble of digging up a casket, lopping the exhumed corpses head off, and making off with it; at least have a plan for afterwards. I’ve stolen my fair share of body parts, believe you me, and I can tell you that it’s all in the details. This kid is an example of how NOT to do it. Dumbass.

Excuse me while I squeal like a teenage girl! This is exactly the reason why my wife wants to take away my credit cards. But I ask you, how could I not buy a CD set with over 50 horror classics on it?!? Impulse buying be damned … it will be a good few weeks at The Midnight Theater of Terror as I indulge in some classic horror goodness. And I guarantee there will be reviews of some of these because, if you’re any kind of horror movie fan, it’s good to go back to the roots of the genre.

That’s all for now, dear reader. I’m off to torture and eat a door to door salesman who made the mistake of knocking on the good Doctor’s door. Foolish, foolish, man…

Things That Go Bump in the Night.

This looks great! I know what you may be thinking. “Great, another remake of Night of the Living Dead. Can’t they let Romero’s masterpiece be? Must these hacks keep digging it up and reworking it in a vain attempt to add to the wonder and legacy that is the greatest horror movie of all time?!?” I know that’s what you’re thinking. I thought it myself. Add to that the fact that it will be in 3-d and it looks like it has the potential to be absolutely crap-tastic. And then I saw the preview they have on the website. And it has Captain Cutter Spaulding himself, Sid Haig, in it and he’s a god. So, needless to say, my curiosity has been sufficiently piqued. We’ll just have to see…

I found this on a forum I frequent and I’ve got to say that this also intrigues the good doctor. It’s an Aussie low budget flick called When Evil Reigns that has a post apocalyptic/zombie armageddon storyline. And, the buzz is that it’s pretty good. I just may shell out the few sheckels to order a copy of it on DVD (plus the whole buttload more sheckels it’ll cost to ship it from Australia., but such is the price one pays when they are an unrepentant horror film freak like your favorite undead genius, Doctor Zombie, is). And, apparently, they made the film for about $5000. That, combined with the fact that they’ve been featured on ABC as the perfect model for low budget fan film production, makes me that much more eager to help these Aussies recoup some of the money they shelled out to make this flick.

Well. Ain’t this a kick in my undead head. This forum is devoted to preparing for the Zombie Armageddon. These guys will be the first on Doctor Zombie’s list when I implement my plans for undead world domination. That I can assure you. They’re just a little too prepared for my tastes. (Actually, this is a great site for survival preparation in general. The Zombie Squadron group is based in St. Louis and the whole ‘zombie’ theme is just a metaphor for any disaster/terrorism preparation. Although I joke about the Zombie Armageddon, in today’s world one needs to think about the possibility of there being a real TEOTWAWKI scenario. Realistically serious threats like Terrorism, Global Warming, Environmental Disasters, Pandemics, Near Earth Object collisions (comets or meteors) and other assorted doomsday scenarios are a very real possibility. Those nutjobs who are preparing for blue helmeted invaders from the UN are now looking – to the Doctor at least – to be not so nutty. I think a little preparation, stockpiling of supplies, and honing of weapons skills may not be such a bad idea. For those who say it can’t happen, look at the cluster fuck that was Hurricane Katrina. I’m just saying…)

And finally, these crazy guys contacted me this week. They’ve asked me to become a regular contributor to their site and I’ve eagerly agreed. Like I told Professor Fether, they are my kind of groovy, spooky cats. I look forward to working with them. I’ve said it many times before, but I think it bears repeating. I know many things about myself, but I know one thing above else; I love horror movies. I love zombies, vampires, werewolves, ghouls, goblins, and all things dark, creepy, and horrific. Like many from my generation, I grew up on a steady diet of Saturday afternoon Hammer Studios classics and Late Night Creature Features hosted by men in mad doctor costumes on creepy sets in the basement of local network affiliate stations. And I mourn the loss of this curious form of entertainment. Much of the 1970’s could be buried away in a mass grave of popular culture, but there is something sad and tragic about no longer being able to stay up late on a Friday or Saturday night and watch The Ghoul, or Dr. Shock’s Chiller X-Ray Theater, or The Big Chuck and Little John Show. My love for horror movies is only the beginning of my eclectic tastes. But it was my introduction at an early age to this genre that helped shape my tastes now that I’ve reached adulthood.
Simply said, I love all things dark.
And so do Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether.

Like I said… my kind of groovy, spooky cats…

Film Review - Room 6

I received an advanced copy of this film from Anchor Bay Entertainment and, to be honest, was a bit apprehensive. Generally, ‘direct to video’ equates to ‘really sucks’. My second thought beyond this was, great cast, but did they just do a low budget horror flick for a paycheck?

Well, after watching Room 6, I’ve got to say that I was reasonably impressed by a well put together horror flick.

Considering that most of the filthy offal that the Hollywood studios is putting out is just badly done, PG-13 rated, unsuccessful rehashes of good horror movies; it’s up to us true horror fans to find good horror anyway we can. The independent market works best, but some of the smaller studios are doing a good job too. I think Anchor Bay is doing some good stuff.

Anyway, on to Room 6. When I received the DVD, the first thing I noticed was no MPAA rating. ‘Uh-oh,’ I thought, ‘Not good.’. Fortunately, this movies is an R-rated flick and I wasn’t forced to wallow through a watered down studio attempt to get some preteens into the seats at a movie theater. Here, let me put it another way in which I’m certain I can assure you it’s not just another teen film… all I need to say is; hot, naked, lesbian nurses making out whilst drizzling blood all over themselves.

But we’ll talk more about that later.

The plot of the movie is pretty straightforward. Amy (played by Christine Taylor from Anchorman, Dodgeball, and The Brady Bunch. You may also know her as Ben Stiller’s wife.) is a schoolteacher with issues. She is living with her boyfriend Nick (Shane Brolly, whom you may remember sulking around in Underworld like a vampire with a case of blue balls for Selene.). Nick seems like a nice enough guy, especially considering he proposes to Amy within the first five or so minutes of the film. Christine immediately blows him off, and at this point I thought I wasn’t going to like her character very much.

After blowing nice Nick off, we see her talking to a student named Melissa (Chloe Moretz). Melissa fills the now common horror movie role of ‘the creepy kid who has some preternatural otherworld connection’. Her sole job is to stand around, act creepy, and try to channel Haley Joel Osmont, Dakota Fanning, and that creepy blond girl from The 4400. It is at this point that things start to go wrong for Amy.

That night, after being picked up by nice Nick, they have an argument and as they barrel through an intersection, they are involved in an accident. Nick, and the passenger from the other vehicle are rushed away by paramedics who don’t tell Amy or the other vehicle’s driver where their injured loved ones are being taken. Amy then teams up with the other driver, Lucas (Jerry O’Connell; AKA the fat kid from Stand By Me; and the now grown up dude from Sliders and Crossing Jordan) And they quickly discover that their loved ones have been taken to a hospital named St. Rosemary’s that doesn’t exist - anymore.

So what works about this movie? I think, in a word, it’s the fact that the movie was made by fans of the genre. The way this movie was filmed was done beautifully, but what else could one expect from the same cinematographer who did the original Halloween? As the plot progresses, Amy starts to have flashes of horrific scenes and demons that make her question her sanity. The photography, combined with the excellent makeup effects by Robert Hall, were beautifully jarring and scary. Especially effective were the scenes in the haunted hospital at the climax. Although it was obvious that, due to budget constraints, they used the same section of hospital hallway for all the scenes; the film crew did a great job of making it seem like it was more expansive. In these scenes the lights were constantly flickering and, when between darkness and light things would suddenly appear, it was good for the occasional jump scare. Whether you consider this a cheap trick by the filmmakers or not, you’ve got to give them props for using it, using it well, and going with what works.

Also, and probably the best part of the movie, were the scenes with poor nice Nick as he languished in his hospital bed. The weirdness of the hospital staff, and the escalating realization on his part that he was thigh deep into some unexplained shit were perfectly done. Besides the previously mentioned and gratuitous lesbian bloodlust scene (woo-hoo!), there was a beautiful scene where he is alone in his bed in the dark and he hears disturbing sounds. He flicks on a flashlight to find his roommate being feasted upon by the same evil nurses.

It’s also gratifying to see, like I said before, a film by fans. The documentary on the special features bears this out. The director, writers, and producers gush about the little things that make this a horror fan dream. There’s a great cameo by Kane Hodder, and the boiler room location used in later scenes is the same boiler room that Wes Craven used for Freddy Krueger in Nightmare on Elm Street. And, in the hospital, they threw in a zombie scene. That’s always a great way to worm your way into Doctor Zombie’s cold, undead heart.

What didn’t work for me with this movie though were some smaller things that could easily be overlooked. For instance, there was no gratuitous nude scene with Christine Taylor. I’ll let that slide, but I gotta say I’m disappointed. I also found that the filmmakers made the choice to throw in what I like to call the ‘herky-jerky spooky crawl effect’. You know what one I’m talking about, right? It’s the same effect that was cool in The Ring and The Grudge, but is now becoming de rigeour for any new horror flick. It’s like the bullet time effect from The Matrix, or the morphing cgi from T2. Afterwards, any special effects department with a Macintosh and the new, cool software were using it in every movie. What was cool became blasé.

And the random crazy demon moments with Christine Taylor’s character were a bit overdone. It lost its effectiveness. If the filmmakers had toned it down some, and instead of making everybody she met turn into a demon when nobody else was looking, it would have been more suspenseful. Think Jacob’s Ladder. In that case, you were left with a ‘Did I just see that?’ feeling.

Also, the twists, weren’t that surprising for anyone used to the genre. In fact, they were pretty heavy handed with their foreshadowing, which I find a little insulting. Filmmakers, and horror filmmakers in particular, need to start trusting that their audiences are smart enough and savvy enough to figure things out themselves. And, the final big twist in the movie gave it a very spiritual and uplifting message. According to the documentary in the special features, this was intentional. I don’t know if I’m too jaded or have too dark a sensibility, but I didn’t like this aspect. It detracted from the horror. I do need to say though, that it wasn’t so bad as to ruin an already good horror film.

Finally, I wanted to make a comment about the score for this film. I watched the entire credits and saw that no one was credited for it. I found the soundtrack, combined with the manic scenery, especially good. Whoever did the score deserves credit for it because it was appropriate and pleasingly spooky.

So, I would recommend Room 6 as a good rental movie for a date. It’s not a gore-fest, but it hits all the right notes in terms of the limited gore it does give. Especially with the hot nurses. Mmmm… flesh eating nurses…

Doctor Zombie’s rating: 3 out of 5 Chomped Brains

Barbarians on the Border

So I’ve been working days for the better part of this week and participating in an offsite training conference. I normally work nights (4:30pm - 1:15am) so, needless to say, my system is all messed up. I’m not sleeping right, I can’t stay awake all day, and I’m not eating right.

Any time I'm not eating right and I have any sort of change in my routine, it has a direct consequence on the proper functioning of my bowels. Needless to say, I’m having all kinds of problems with my digestion. What can I say, my colon and waste processing systems are sensitive to environmental and circadian rhythm changes.

Anyway, I get a break today and immediately scurry all stiff-legged to the restroom. As I’m sitting there in the handicap stall (I like the room in the handicap stalls. Evil as it may be, it’s nice to have elbow room when you’re hiking up your kilt, ya’ know?) Anyway, I’m sitting there enjoying a moment of quiet introspection, when someone else comes into the bathroom. Now, I should point out that I am very common sense oriented about my bathroom functions. If I gotta go, I gotta go. I don’t care where I am, and I don’t feel at all self-conscious about any noises, smells, or spontaneous emissions that others might hear or smell. It’s nature, like the Discovery Channel and I’ll be damned if I’m going to be all uptight or uncomfortable about it.

Anyway, I’m sitting there, minding my own business when some other guy comes in… I keep doing what I’m doing. It’s then I hear what is probably one of the most horrifying things I’ve heard in at least a week or so. As the guy in the next stall is crunching, and I know because I heard it, I hear:

Dumbass in next stall: Hey, it’s me. What are you doing.
Muffled female voice: murmer murmer murmer

This clown was on his cell phone, in the bathroom, while duking! He goes on:

Dumbass: So, I wanted to thank you for last night.
Female on other end of his cell phone call (!): murmer murmer murmer
Dumbass: I had a good time too.
Female: murmer murmer murmer
Dumbass: I’d like to go out with you again
Female: murmer murmer murmer
Dumbass (in a quiet and sexy voice taht makes me absolutely shudder): I thought about you when I went to bed last night.

At this point a couple of guys come into the bathroom, talking business talk about computers or something. There is some very loud pissing, flushing, and hand washing. As their conversation changes to the idiot that is Ben Roethlisberger, they leave the bathroom. Dude is still talking.

Dumbass: You looked good in that dress. What are you wearing now?
Female: Muffled giggle, murmer murmer murmer
Dumbass (really turning on the sexy voiced charm): I’m going to get out early tonight. You want to meet at my place for some dinner?

At this point I punched out. I finished what I was doing, flushed loudly three or four times, washed my hands and left. He was still murmuring sexy sweet nothings to his lady when I bolted.

So, I don’t really have any commentary on this. I just wanted to make a few points. First: How fucked up is society that cell phones have become such a part of culture that this assclown couldn’t wait fifteen minutes to call a girl he obviously likes? Second: Has our culture degenerated so much that making a cell phone call from a public restroom is in any way acceptable? And Third: There is NO WAY IMAGINABLE that the chick on the other end couldn’t know what this guy was doing or where he was. And she is STILL probably considering going out with him?

This is how society ends. This is our death knell.

I mean, this is how Rome went. I imagine that there was probably some Roman guy, sitting around in a Roman bath, and minding his own business. Then some other Roman dude came in and farted in the tub. The first Roman guy must have thought to himself, much as I did today, “Bradicus, won’t be long until the Huns and Goths swoop in here, kill us men, rape our women, and salt our fields. It’s time to start planning an exit strategy.”

This weekend I’m going to start looking for a cabin in the woods. Or a bomb shelter. Someone call me when the total decline of Western Civilization’s done. Seriously. I’m going all Ted Kazinsky.

Still venomous...

Is Ann Coulter a an evil, psychotic hatemongering bigot?

You be the judge.

Feeling a little venomous today...

Ann Coulter is a vicious, evil, filthy whore.

I can only hope that someone punches her in her thick, mannish jaw and forces some doctor to sew her mouth shut so we can get a few weeks of silence from her incessant, foul, racist, elitist, derogatory, and exceedingly stupid and uninformed opinions.

I hope she gets assaulted by angry polar bears (according to Nolff, this happens frequently and, in my opinion, couldn’t happen to a dirtier whore than Ann Coulter.)

I hope she develops complications when they try to remove her Adam’s apple (in her quest to further hide the fact that she’s actually a tranny) so that she’ll needs to speak through a poorly built blow hole like the bad guy in Ong-Bak.

Ann Coulter is all that is wrong with the far Right. They are racist. They are evil. They rely on deceit, inveiglement, and villification to push their evil Pro-Christian, anti-American views. Look at it this way; if I was in a tower in Texas and looking at her through a scope on a rifle, I’d have a hard time keeping my booger hook off of the bang switch.

You may think I’m being unfair to poor little Ann Coulter. You may think that, because she’s a woman, it may be misogynistic for me to say such things about Ann Coulter. You can feel free to think that. But, since this is my blog and not yours, I don’t care. If you feel sorry for Ann Coulter because myself, Matt Lauer, those evil 911 widows, and all of the liberal press is beating up on her; you’re probably a vicious, evil, filthy whore yourself.

666 - Because you knew I couldn't resist!

6/6/6 Update

Celebrate National Day of Slayer with Doctor Zombie!

Yeah! Crank it up and let the headbanging begin!



And remember, the number address for Dr. Zombie's Midnight Theater of Terror is 665 Evil Lane - I'm the neighbor of the Beast...




Later:

Oh, and by the way... you may notice a new banner ad on the left hand side, under my links. I was contacted by a rep from Anchor Bay Entertainment who apparently liked my review on Haut Tension. They want me to do a review of a new movie entitled Room 6 (written on the posters as: R66m 6). It has Jerry O'Connell, Christine Taylor, and Shane Brolly in it. They're sending me an advanced copy of the film and I'll be doing a review on it as soon as I get it. Whether it's good, or sucks really bad, I promise I'll be honest with you. And I let them know that also. Although this is a great opportunity, I am a horror film purist; if it sucks, I'll say so. I owe you, my readers, that.

Soooo, until I see it, I'll give it the benefit of the doubt and shill for them a little. Hence the banner ad.

Watch for the review!

The Cleveland News Circus

Welcome to my hometown.

Here’s a video clip from our local news that's actually being blogged about nationally. These are the kind of people I deal with on a daily basis. Sigh.

The town where it happened (Berea) is actually on the other side of town - -what we call the West Side. Berea also happens to be the summer training home of the Cleveland Browns.

This video is great, especially at the end. It’s worth the wait.

And for the record - - most of our news is this sensationalist. This channel (WKYC – Channel 3) is considered the ‘respectable’ news team in Cleveland. On the other end of the spectrum you have Channel 19 (WOIO), which is crazy and off the hook. Believe me. It’s like Jerry Springer meets the National Enquirer. Classic! (Springer, by the way, is an Ohio native. Before he got famous herding the unwashed, redneck masses he herded OUR unwashed, redneck masses. He was actually the mayor of Cincinnatti. Cincinnatti, it should be noted, is on the extreme other end of the state. Ohio doesn’t really admit to owning Cincinnatti. It’s down in that whole Cincitucky area. If Kentucky wanted to annex Cinci; Cleveland, Columbus, Youngstown, and Dayton’d probably be okay with it.)

And Channel 19 has the hotter correspondents. Mmmm… Lynna Lai…

Channel 19 also has Catherine Boseley. If you’ve never heard of her, I’ll refer you to this wonderful link at awfulplasticsurgery.com…

I’ve been thinking recently that I might be interested in giving this blog more of a purpose. There’s something to be said for using the power of blogs to root out corruption, or expose hypocrisy, or right wrongs. And I’d like to think I could use this as a forum for greater social consciousness and as a means to fulfill a civic and moral responsibility….

Ahhh, who the hell am I kidding. If I did try to go that route I’d just use it to meet celebrities, or do the sort of stuff in the video clip at the beginning of this entry. It would be cool to go undercover to, say, the Church of Scientology, and blog my experiences, but I’d need to take time off of work. And truthfully, journalism is cool and everything, but the good Doctor’s gotta pay the mortgage and my other bills ain’t gonna pay themselves. It would be cool to go all Bob Woodward, or even better – all Doctor Gonzo, but I doubt I could rise all that much above the caliber of local Cleveland news anyway.

Cool idea though…

Groan

God, I hate summer.

So hot.

This insane heat makes me sooo cranky.

Things I said this last weekend:

• "I'm an evil undead scientist. I don't work in the sun on 95 degree days. I burn easily."
• "If I ever talk about transfering to my company's Florida office again, please kick me square in the nuts."
• "Is it wrong to want to rub a lime popsicle all over my body?"
• "I don't know what you're complaining about... you try living with sweaty, sticky balls.
• "I'm an adult, and I contribute a not insignificant part of my salary to the mortgage...that's why I feel I am perfectly within my rights to sit in front of a box fan, in my underwear and nothing else, while drinking a cold beer. I don't care if your mother is coming over."
• "If these fucking dogs don't stop laying on me or against me, I swear to god I'll give them the needle myself. It's like sitting with a furry, panting, hot pillow on my lap."
• "Don't touch my leg with your leg! It's like I'm sitting against a microwave-warmed slab of meat!"
• "You're not a doctor. How do you know that extreme heat doesn't give me diarrhea?!?"
• "Oh god! I've got sweat in my ass crack!"
• "It's a vast global conspiracy against me! The CIA's targeting Cleveland with a orbitally platformed laser just to get me. And stop looking at me like I've lost my mind!"
• "My brain's melting."

I'll be in my crypt until this heat wave passes. It's cooler there and Mrs. Zombie told me I'm not allowed out until I promise to be nicer.

Like that'll happen anytime soon.

The Same Deep Water As You

It’s trite to comment on how music can teleport one to specific times in one’s life; or that one’s life has a soundtrack. People say it so much that the sense of wonder that hearing a certain song evokes is somehow lost in the banal, the commonplace, the cliché.

I thought about this all afternoon.

Last week I received, in a swooping logo-ed Amazon.com box, a DVD that I’d been dying to get my undead mitts on since I’d first heard about it. You see, part of being an old Goth dinosaur is that I still hold on to certain music and styles that may not necessarily be in vogue anymore. It’s like in the movie Trainspotting, when Diane tells Renton that there are new things in the world besides Iggy Pop and New Order. I feel like Renton at times; wallowing in my past and reveling in the anachronism that is old school Goth and Industrial music. This DVD was just one of those things.

The DVD is The Cure's Trilogy. It is a concert video of The Cure in Berlin playing the ultimate, quintessential, and definitive Cure albums in their original order and back to back. The albums, of course, are Pornography, Disintegration, and Bloodflowers. These three albums, together, define The Cure’s body of work. Additionally, as most Cure fans agree and as Robert Smith confirms in the DVD extras, these three albums are linked ‘spiritually’.

If you were to ask me who my favorite band of all time is – I’d have to say that, undeniably, it is The Cure. Which is funny because, for a long time, I would have probably said it was The Police. Which is true to an extant, but not entirely. As I’ve aged I’ve become more cynical, much darker of mood and temprement, and drawn to the melancholy and world weary gloom of Robert Smith.

And it goes back to high school, as these things inevitably must. I had my first taste of The Cure on a mix tape my friend Jason had made to play in the background while we role-played Call of Cthulhu. And yes, my high school years were spent role-playing in my friend Sean’s attic. Yes, I am a nerd and a geek. Anyway, the tape had an eclectic mix of Peter Gabriel, Sting, Suicidal Tendencies, The Sex Pistols, and Duran Duran. And then there was this one song, stuck in the middle. It had a droning, building, rage and pain and loathing of love that resonated with my young mind. I learned that it was The Cure, and had to hear more. So, after tracking down Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me from our other friend Curtis (we did that often; shared music, books, games, girlfriends), I fell in love with The Cure.

My last year of high school, as I prepared to go off to college, the Cure released Disintegration. I was never the same after that and this album, above all others, would be the soundtrack that most defined my college experience. Yes, there were other albums that resonated, and fill in the spaces. Albums like Peter Gabriel’s Us, or Sting’s Soul Cages, or even Nine Inch Nails Perfect Hate Machine. But none of them reached the depth of resonance that Disintegration did.

I thought of this as I watched Trilogy today. I’ve seen The Cure in concert probably close to a dozen times. I once even followed them as they did shows on three consecutive nights in Cleveland, Dayton, and Fort Wayne Indiana. My own sort of black clad, Gothic, Grateful Dead thing - - as it were. This DVD, though, was the best performance I’ve seen them do.

And as they started the Disintegration set I found myself back in my college apartment.

I imagined myself lying on my bed beside the window, looking down at the blowing, swirling cold and snow of a northern Midwestern winter. The room is dark and flickering with the single light of a mulberry candle given me by my friend, Doctor Michelle. I imagine that, outside of my half open door, I hear my roommates Stephen and Barb arguing about doing the dishes. Or perhaps my other roommate Kimber is downstairs, singing as she does her homework, her voice like a beautiful ghost dancing in the echoes and shadows of the 150 year old house we lived in. Or perhaps my other friends, Sean, Jay, Richie, and Amy Lynn are laughing at something on the TV in the downstairs living room. And I am there, alone amidst all of this activity, absorbing the hiss of the radiator in my corner and feeling the bliss of being with those I love and who are now gone on their own lives’ paths. I look to the candlelight-lapped ceiling and breath deep, hoping that this perfection never ends, but knowing it must.

And in the background, my CD player begins playing The Same Deep Water As You, by The Cure.

All of this came rushing back to me as I half watched and listened to the DVD this afternoon. And I felt that swell of bittersweet remembrance and the coppery-tasting throat constriction that one gets when tears might come.

Robert Smith’s a god, man. A god.

An additional note on the DVD, besides the fact that I obviously loved it. They only did two songs as an encore and they were both from Kiss Me…. Remember that droning, angst-ridden song I mentioned earlier? On Jay Jay’s role-playing mix tape? It was 'The Kiss', and it was how they ended the concert. This wild idea of playing albums back to back, that Robert himself called The Cure’s greatest accomplishment, ended with the very song that made me fall in love with them.

Nostalgia can be a bitch, ya’ know?

Eep! I may have been wrong when I said...

So with all of the political posting I’ve been doing lately, I’ve gotten a couple emails I wanted to address:

The first was from my good friend Chrissy. She said she likes it better when I post about “…dogs. or flowers. or sunshine and cotton candy.”. And I here what she’s screaming. I like when I post about dogs also. (I’ll NEVER ‘fess up to the other stuff. I’m far too dark and brooding to even entertain the thought of such happy, cheery stuff. No sir. Nope. No way.) Anyway, part of my recent rants against the vast right wing, executive branch, fundamental Christian conspiracy can be partly blamed on my mood. I’ve been in an especially ogre-like mood lately; as Mrs Zombie, the Boy Zombie, and Wolfgirl will readily attest to. And I don’t really know why. I’ve just been kind of mad at the world lately and – unfortunately - when this sort of mood strikes me, my tolerance for bullshit goes way down. So, Chrissy - - I promise I’ll try to post more funny stuff. Really.

Just not today.

A second email I got mentioned that my political party (The Zombie Party! Join today and live through TEOTWAWKI tomorrow!) may already be out there. He said that, politically, I might find myself more in line with the Libertarians. I found this odd because I know that I am very much a liberal Democrat. That's how I've always thought of myself, anyway. Besides, the Libertarians have that whacko Lyndon Larouche. In fact, I’d always thought the Libertarian party was always slightly more conservative than the Republicans. Sort of like George W. mixed in with some Adolph Hitler, with a splash of Pol Pot for color. The thing is, I just spent about an hour scouring the internet for political affiliation quizzes.

And, for every one I took, I found myself falling squarely into the Libertarian camp. It was scary.

The first political quiz I found and took was this one. It turns out that this is, according to everything I read, probably one of the most accurate indicators of your political leanings out there. Which is funny, because it comes from a Libertarian website. This fact set off quite a few strident and klaxon-like warning bells in my skeptical skull, so I decided to see if it always gave a Libertarian skewed result.

So, I tried to answer like my friend, Doctor Michelle (who’s a real doctor, BTW. She just got her Doctorate in Psychology. Which is cool, but not as cool as my Doctorate in Evil Genius Sciences. Yeah, she can analyze people’s dreams and do Rohrshach Tests, blah blah blah… but can she put together an oscillating, multiphasic, fission powered death ray to take over the world? I don’t think so.) Anyway, she’s the most liberal person I can think of. (Which I love her for. She is one of the purest, most socially conscious people I know. And she’s kinda hot- - but don’t tell Mrs. Zombie!) Anyway, I answered like I thought she might have and it came back with a very liberal Democrat response.

Next I answered like my father would. My father is the bane of my existence. He is so goddamned conservative it makes my whale eye pucker. He has an autographed picture of George W. and Laura Bush hanging in a place of honor in his basement. (He got it because he gave SOOO much money to the Republican presidential campaign. Sigh.) He and I fight so bad about politics that we’re not even allowed to mention it at ANY family function because we end up screaming at each other. We are banned from political discussion under warning of death by my mother and Mrs. Zombie. To give you an idea of how inconsistent my father’s views are with mine; if I were to run for political office my father would NOT VOTE FOR ME. His own son. The fruit of his loins. And do you know why? Because I’m a Democrat. He’s a Bush apologist and a Republican who would never, ever dream of breaking from the party line on any conservative issue. So I answered like he would.

As my dad would have answered:

• "Death to gays!"
• “Death to the dark ghetto people who are suckling at the teat of the working man!”
• “Give more money to subsidize big business because Ronald Reagan was right about Trickle Down Economics!” (“Hey, when do we knock FDR off of Mt. Rushmore and put Reagan up there?!?”
• “Iraq needed to be invaded because they have weapons of mass destruction. What? No WMD? Well, then we needed to do it because Saddam was an oppressor. What? The UN sanctions were working and Saddam was coming around? Well, dammit! They…uh…ummm…they helped…Al Quaeda! Yeah, that’s it!”
• “If Kerry or Al Gore was president, we’d all be speaking Arabic right now!”
• “George W. is soooo dreamy!!! Waitaminute! That sounded kinda like one of those fags! That’’s not what I meant…”

And so on…

So, after this nauseating exercise of trying to think like a Conservative, I found that the test still seemed accurate. Take it and let me know where you fall….

Another good one I found was this one. Although I have to say that, seeing where you are politically while simultaneosuly taking the test tended to make me want to answer to make myself seem liberal. Honesty works best on this one….

So, that’s all for tonight. I need to go and replenish my undead minion zombies (a small accident whilst assembling the oscillating, multiphasic, fission powered death ray to take over the world. A few undead zombie minions may have been accidentally imploded.) A minor setback, really…

Unpleasant dreams, dear reader…

Conspiracy Theory?

So, once again, Bush has been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. This time, it’s been learned that he has been keeping track of who we call. The official party line? “Don’t worry, we’re just tracking the terrorists! American citizens don’t need to worry, we’re protecting their privacy.”

Excuse me if I don’t trust that in any way shape or form.

This administration feels it can do whatever it wants, and it’s all being done under the auspices of protecting us in our ‘War on Terror’. Well, do you know what? The government has done this in the past. Hoover kept files on those who might have been threats to America. McCarthy blacklisted and deported Americans because they might have been Communists. Need I mention how we treated the Japanese during World War II? Trite as it may be, the saying “Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it” is appropriate here. It wasn’t right then, and it isn’t right now. And if you don’t think the government doesn’t have their analysts dissecting YOUR call patterns and contacts, you are woefully naïve. The Bush Administration has this information now? Do you think they WON’T use it?

Case in point: The grotesqueries of the current administration, as led by King George II, have made clear their conservative Christian agenda. It has made clear their flagrant disregard for the rights and civil liberties of their own constituency. For the love of Pete, they are showing more respect for the mythical rights of illegal immigrants than for those of eUS born citizens! As it pertains to the wire taps and call tracing, consider this: the Bush Administration has made it exceedingly clear that they hate leaks of any kind. They are notoriously tight lipped. And any leaks that have occurred have been squashed with an iron fist. Do you think perhaps they are using the call records to track leaks, or ‘national security risks’ as they are wont to call them?

And think about it this way. What DON’T we know? Blogger and Myspace are the internet crossroads for individual self expression. The gods know I’ve railed against the Bush Administration repeatedly from my little internet soapbox. Do you think it’s never crossed some Republican, boot-licking, mid-level bureaucrat’s conniving, conspiracy theoried, conservative little mind to start looking for any dissent in this forum? It would be stupid to think they haven’t dissected the blogs of some of us and started Homeland Security files on us.

It’s been determined that especially outspoken anti-war activists have been ‘inadvertantly’ added to the TSA No-Fly list. How are they terrorists? Their only crime was to openly disagree with the Administration, so they’ve been lumped in with the Earth Liberation Front, Hamas, and Al-Quaeda. Don’t think for a minute that someone close to that drawling, big-eared, underachiever at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue wasn’t responsible for that.

And I’m so tired of the knee jerk conservative response to anti-war rhetoric as unpatriotic. I’m a member of several Jeep forums and firearms forums and I’m a minority in both incidences in that I’m a liberal. I’ve seen open calls to shoot traitors who disagree with the President and deport anyone who doesn’t support the war in Iraq. There have been calls for a reissuance of the Treason and Sedition act, and apply it to all war protestors and the ‘liberal’ media (which is patently moronic – the press is a constitutionally protected entity. Dumasses.) And, I’ve heard Conservatives spout out that, regardless of what a liberal says – we hate our troops because we don’t support Bush’s war of aggression against Iraq.

Bullshit.

Newsflash – I love my country. I would die for my country if called on to serve. And I would do so willingly. I would do it regardless of the current administration, or the rightness or wrongness of the conflict. That being said, how am I unpatriotic?

I would argue the opposite, in fact. I am being a patriot for voicing my opposition to a corrupt government that has damaged our domestic agenda, damaged our foreign relations with Western Europe, and killed 2500+ American soldiers in a war that was started under false pretenses.

And I’m what a Christian, Conservative, Bush loving fuck knob would call his worst nightmare. I’m an angry liberal with guns. So, when they make Atheism and Liberalism illegal, I will not go quietly. I’ll take a few with me.

Which leads me, rather circuitously, back to a point I was trying to make before. I’m certain that this blog, and the divisive, anti-American (rolling eyes) views I’ve been spouting here have gotten me on a watch list of some sort. My response to that is…good.

Worry about me. I won’t shut up, and I won’t back down to the bullshit and bluster of the fundamentalist right wing.

Here’s some more fodder for my FBI file if you haven’t already gotten it, assholes. I, in a round about way, have supported terrorism. You see, I am a firm believer in reunification of Northern Ireland with the Republic of Ireland. I have extensively studied my own Irish heritage and I sympathize with the Irish Republican Army. In fact, I feel that violence is sometimes the only response to oppression and intimidation; such as the oppression and anti-Irish attacks by Ian Paisley’s Ulster Loyalists on Irish Catholic children.

Let me up the ante for you…in the 80’s and 90’s, I was active in and donated money to Irish Northern Aid; an organization that is an American money raising branch of Sinn Fein – which is the political arm of the IRA. Some of my money, I’m sure was used to buy weapons or finance Republican operations in Ulster. I’ve supported terrorism.

So there.

If you don’t hear from me, assume that the Secret Service has put a bullet into my brain or I’ve been detained as a ‘person of national security interest’. Either way, I did it for a good cause.

Freedom.

Ask and you shall receive...

(Second post tonight, but I couldn't let this go without writing it down - Dr. Z)

Dear dark pagan gods, I hate Ohio sometimes.

So I put a Darwin Fish on the back of my Jeep about a week ago. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you? Those little fish things that the Christians use to let the world know that they’re devout? Well, I got one that says ‘Darwin’ because a) I am an evil, atheist bastard, b) I feel it necessary to let Intelligent Design proponents know that they’re fucking stupid, and c) I feel it’s my duty to piss off the fundies.

So I just ran out at lunch to pick up a prescription (I work nights). I’m merging onto I-271, and some guy in a blinged out Mustang speeds up as I’m merging and starts waving at me and giving me a thumbs up. Not recognizing him, and thinking it’s probably just some nutjob, I wave back and get up to highway speed. As he passes me, I see that he has a fish sticker, with ‘Jesus’ on it. ‘Ahhhh,’ I think, ‘it’s raining like hell, and he can’t see that my sticker says ‘Darwin’”. I shrug, thinking nothing of it, and pass him to go two exits up to the pharmacy.

When I passed him, he must have seen my decal more clearly.

So, some ten minutes later, I park my Jeep at the local Giant Eagle Grocery store and begin pulling the collar of my trench coat up to brave the torrential downpour. Just as I’m about to step out of my Jeep, the guy in the Mustang comes whipping into the spot next to me. I crack my door as he gets out of his car to better hear him over the thumping bass of his "killa system".

My first glance at the moron tells me a lot about him. He is a skinny, white guy with a manicured goatee and frosted hair. He probably weighs all of about 150 pounds, soaking wet (which he is, standing in a grocery store parking lot during a thunderstorm as he is.) He’s also wearing a FUBU coat, size 60 something jeans, and an angry look. ("Yo! Icy Cold Stunnaz for Jesus, Boyyyy! Whitey D and his Suburban Posse! {Insert some gay gang signs you made up in study hall here.}"

This is how our conversation goes:

Moron/Fundie/Kevin Federline Worshipper: You think that sticker’s fucking funny?
Dr. Z: Yeah. Actually I do.
Moron: You’re an asshole!
Dr. Z: I know that. So you followed me ten miles down the interstate and 2 miles through the suburbs to tell me something I already know?
Moron: I should key your car.
Dr. Z: It’s a Jeep. They don’t like being called cars. And if you even breath on my Jeep I will kill you.
Moron: I'm serious!
Dr. Z: And so am I. I'll seriously kill you. And eat your liver.
Moron: You’re an asshole!
Dr. Z: And I’ve already acknowledged that. Go away.
Moron: I should kick your ass.

At this point I open my Jeep door and step all the way out. I’m wearing my black trench coat, black boots, and a baseball cap. I take off my hat to reveal my shaved head and shrug out of my trench coat. Dude quickly realizes that I am about 3 inches taller than he is, that I have about 75 or so pounds on him, and that I am not going to back down to his gangsta blustering.

Dr. Z: Do what you have to do, but do you think your Christ would approve of what you’re doing?
Moron(as he scurries back into his Mustang): Fuck you.
Dr. Z: And thank you for showing me the milk of Christian kindness.

So – just in case the coward swung back and really did try to key my Jeep, I had to forego picking up my prescription tonight.

Dammit.

Addiction

So, I've mentioned before how much of a SciFi/Horror movie junkie I am, right? With the biblical rains we received all weekend, I had some time to indulge my addiction. And I heard some great news (this may be old news to some, but I still feel it's important to let the world know...)

Han shoots first. About fucking time! The love I have for the Star Wars movies knows almost no limits. That said, even my love is not enough for me to stop hate George Lucas for tampering with the original three. For a time there it seemed that Ole George was never going to release the original movies in their original, unaltered, un-digitally remastered states. This weighed heavily upon Doctor Zombie’s sci-fi loving heart. Especially when I started having little zombies of my own. I felt anguish that The Zombie Boy (who is a chip of the old man’s sci-fi block!) would never get to see the original Star Wars movies in the version I did when I was his age. He’d never get to see Han get the drop on Greedo like the bastard he is, or to hear the original “Chub Chub” song the ewoks sing at the end of Return.

Now though, he will. And it is good.

Speaking of The Zombie kids, The Zombie Girl is not a sci-fi geek like her dad. She’s my little horror movie fan. I suspect that, when she hits high school, she'll become my little vampire Goth princess. She has this fascination with vampires and, while her friends want to play dolls and dress up, she always wants to play superheroes. Her unsuspecting playmates agree and say things like, “I want to be Wonder Woman,” or “I want to be Starfire from Teen Titans,” or “I want to be Lavagirl!” My daughter smiles sweetly; says, “Fine”; and then howls, pouncing on them with snarls and chomping teeth. You see, my 5 year old daughter is convinced that she is a werewolf superhero named Wolfgirl(!). We’ve had a few parent teacher conferences, and a few complaints from other kids’ parents about this; but I say it’s just Zombie Girl being creative and expressing herself. My wife blames me and says that I’m an evil, sociopathic bastard who’s turned her once lovely children into little monsters.

MY response is: “You knew what you were getting when you married an evil, undead scientist with plans for total world domination. This surprises you?!?”

BTW – it was a great weekend of further child corruption as it rained nonstop. Wolfgirl watched The Lost Boys with me. It was on the SciFi channel and it was pretty heavily edited so her fragile 5 year old mind won’t be damaged by bad words or excessive violence. There will be plenty of time for that later in life. She loved it and I fear for the two little girls who live behind us because I heard her telling her favorite doll (Sally, from The Nightmare Before Christmas) that she was going to be just like Star with the pretty brown hair from Lost Boys. You know, I forgot how much I loved this movie. I know, it has the Coreys in it, and I know it is soooo a late 80’s thing, but damn if this movie isn’t a snapshot of my high school years. I wanted so badly to get a mullet, a dirt bike, and an earring like David, or Michael in this movie. My friend Kristin and I watched this movie endlessly when we were in high school, and played the soundtrack everywhere. I actually went out later that day and bought the soundtrack on CD because I’m that much of a geek. You should have seen the weird looks the pimply faced, seventeen year old, minimum wager at the used CD shop gave me when I bought it. Yes, I’m an old geek, minimum wager! Careful or I’ll bite you…

Also, my new latest SciFi fixation has been Doctor Who. I LOVE THIS SHOW. I cannot begin to tell you how much I love it. If you haven’t had time to catch it, do so at your earliest chance. This is a great filler for the lapse between new episodes of Battlestar Galactica. Sure, the BBC still uses special effects that would have been at home in an original Star Trek episode (I’m exaggerating, but not by much). But that doesn’t matter. You know, it’s funny really - - being an American, Doctor Who wasn’t part of my Sci Fi education like other shows. At least not like it is across the pond. Doctor Who is Britain’s favorite sci fi show and is a cultural phenomenon over there. This depresses me because it is such a great concept and great show. I remember the first time I saw Doctor Who and it left an indelible impression on me. I was at a kid named Vince Barwidi’s house when I was 8 or so. I was there for a cub scout meeting that was eventually cancelled because of a snow storm. I remember sitting in his living room, on a couch beneath – I swear to god – a velvet Elvis painting, and watching tv with Vince and another kid. Vince’s dad was watching WVIZ (our local PBS channel) and this show came on. I remember being fascinated by the English accents, the special effects, and these wickedly cool and inexplicably terrifying garbage cans with lasers that buzzed “EXTERMINATE!”. Mostly though, I was struck by the really, really cool theme. It resonanted with me. It was haunting. I was hooked then and there, but the only problem was, I was only able to catch the Doctor once or twice a year because it was so sporadically shown in the 70’s and 80’s in the U.S. Midwest.

Flash forward to college - - and my roommate Stephen trots out video tapes of his favorite television show. I had since forgotten about Doctor Who (besides getting the Timelord’s Doctorin’ the Tardis. It was a one hit dance wonder that mixed the haunting Doctor Who theme with Gary Glitter’s Rock n’ Roll II.). But, Stephen was a Doctor Who fanatic. (His bank, school, and computer PIN’s were all the Gallafreyen Presidential Code.) I suddenly rediscovered the Doctor and it was cool.

Funny coincidence by the way. My roommate Stephen’s middle name was actually Elvis. Believe it or not…

Now, the Doctor’s back on and I am much pleased. And I especially like Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor. And I REALLY like Billie Piper, who plays the Doctor’s companion Rose. I have such a soft spot for hot British chicks.

So, if you like the SciFi as Doctor Zombie does, I would highly recommend the Doctor.

By the way – I still love the Doctor Who theme, especially in its current incarnation. If anybody has the capability of copying it and getting it to me, I’ll remember you when I take over the world. How does President of Australia sound? At the very least, I’ll send you your choice of a Doctor Zombie shirt from my new Café Press shop. (I was bored at work the other night and threw it together. I don’t expect to make any money off of it, but I do like being able to bribe people with my own swag.)

Unpleasant dreams, dear readers...

First my own religion, now...

I’m starting my OWN political party! That’s it! I’ve had it with the duplicity and cronyism rampant in the Republican party, and the wishy-washy PC, anti-everything Democratic stance. My party will appeal to Generation X and Generation Y. Yeah, we’re all apathetic and don’t really vote like we should, but what we need is a party that appeals to our apathy.

Let’s see. Here’s what I think my political party should do:

- We should say to hell with these old guys and beltway careerists who are only concerned with lobbyist money and don’t care about their constituents. I like California’s ballot initiative idea. If enough people feel strongly enough that you’re doing a shitty job, and they get enough signatures, they can vote you out. And, being a member of my party, you will go gracefully and willingly. Those who don’t will get a taser to the balls or girly bits, whichever is appropriate. True democracy at work baby…

- Since Republicans are generally Christian fundamentalists in nice suits, and Democrats are godless, atheistic heathens, my political party will have a generalized religious stereotype also. We will subscribe to one simple religious and philosophical credo – My great, great uncle Aleister Crowley’s concept of ‘Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.’ What does this mean? It means that free will and individuality shall reign. Does this mean you can’t be a Christian, or an Atheist, or a Muslim, or a Buddhist, or am Orion slave girl, or whatever and not be in my party? No, of course it doesn’t . It just means that you do what you want, and govern based on your principles. It also means you shut the fuck up about your beliefs because nobody wants to hear them. The commands or tenets of your faith have no place in governing. Sure, our country was founded by white Christians; but those Christians left Europe because of religious persecution. We are not a Christian country, don’t make it one. Religion has no place in politics or government. “Do what thou wilt…” and “the STFU Principle” – live ‘em, learn ‘em, love ‘em.

- Term Limits are essential to a fluid, dynamic democracy. One should get into politics to affect change and make a difference. If you’ve only got a finite amount of time to do so, you’ll work harder at making a difference.

- Acceptance of all others. My party will have people of all religions, ideologies, socioeconomic strata, and educational experience. We will understand this and accept that we will disagree. In fact, we encourage diversity. Diversity of culture will allow us to be better citizens and better Americans. Extreme views will not be discarded, but they will be marginalized. By working together, we will ‘stick it to the man’!

- Death to lobbyists! Lobbyists are sucking our country dry. They are using their agenda and money to do what we as citizens can’t – mainly, affect change to their benefit. In a true representative government, the people’s voices should be the loudest. This belief is inviolable. Lobbyists account for several of the other planks of our platform, so all lobbyists should be sent to labor and internment camps in Death Valley.

- Electronic Freedom is a priority – We live in a new electronic age. Freedom of expression, freedom to disseminate our ideas, and freedom to download what we want - when we want to - is of paramount importance. We will work to thwart the work of those like the RIAA, or intolerant jerks who would censor our thoughts or writing in the electronic world.

- Preservation of the Constitution – We live in the greatest country in the world, and the majority of what makes America that way can be found in the Constitution. We will work to support any and all legislation or politician who works to protect that document. And that means ALL of the amendments to the constitution. The Bill of Rights is inviolable and, that means ALL the amendments – including the second. Guns kick ass and every American should have 2 or 3.

- Here’s my foreign policy piece: Fuck the Middle East. Let them kill each other off. We will immediately push to remove all troops, pull all aid, and pull all money we send to the Middle East. This includes Israel. Look - - it’s real simple. The Muslim hate us because we’re rich, free, and support Israel. And Israel continues to give the Arabs the middle finger because their big, badass brother is standing behind them. Let Israel take care of their own problems. If this were the case, and Israel was alone against the endless stretch of swarthy, angry Islamo-Fundies, they’d be a lot nicer to the rest of the Mideast and their own indigenous Arab populace. We’ll buy oil from whoever gives us the best price, and say to hell with the rest of them.

- And while we’re cutting ties to the Middle East, let’s mess with France some. Those snotty, Eurotrash bastards need a kick in their snooty, French asses. The one thing that chafes the French asses the most seems to be the ‘Americanization’ of their (allegedly) superior culture. So - - if EuroDisney pisses them off, I imagine that Euro-Branson, or Euro-Dollywood would send them into apopleptic, twitching fits. Vive la mullet!

- We will lobby to make December 12th a national holiday. Besides the fact that it is my birthday, it will be official Science Fiction Appreciation Day. All malls and businesses will close, with the exception of video stores, bookstores, and movie theatres so we can watch or read Sci Fi. The day will be spent watching Star Wars, Star Trek, Blade Runner, BattleStar Galactica reruns or any other appropriate Sci Fi movie or show. This plank of the platform will henceforth be known as the “The Geeks shall inherit the world plank.”

Wacky Celebrities

So, I spent a great part of my lunch at the gym. Whilst sweating my fat ass off on an elliptical I read about 4 issues of Us Weekly. Yeah, I know. Trashy tabloid and sleazy stalkerazzi fare - - but damn if I can help it. I hate the gym, can’t stand to watch television while I’m there, and need to do something to occupy my time. Besides, truthfully, reading is one of the only thing I do that gives me pure pleasure. It’s been like that since I was a kid. I taught myself to read watching Sesame Street and Electric Company when I was 4. While the other kids in first grade were learning hw to read, I was in the back reading Tom Sawyer. (My parents had the belief that it would be somehow traumatic to skip me over several grades when I was in elementary school. It’s probably a good thing because, although I was a scary intelligent kid when I was in elmentary and high school, everyone seemed to catch up to me after high school. I grew dumber. Which is interesting really in that I sometimes fear that I may be the exception to Natural Selection - - but I digress… )

Anyway, I was reading all about Tara Reid’s botched boob job, Lindsay Lohan’s endless, halcyonic partying, Brangelina’s scurrying retreat to some blighted, third-world African country, and the fact that Nick still desperately loves that conniving, evil, pout-trouty Jessica; when I came across several articles about Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes.

I gotta say, I’m horrified for this poor girl. Part of it may be that she’s from Toledo, here in Ohio, and I know the neighborhood where she grew up (I went to college near Toledo and worked there for a year and a half later in life). I just feel for her as she seemed like a normal, young, pretty, Midwestern girl. I empathize with her. And I find it damned disturbing that she was seduced by that nutjob Tom Cruise; with his perfect smile and million dollar good looks. I mean, dude’s twice her age. He could be her father - - and that’s just creepy. I’m still of the opinion that she was swept up by the romance of dating Tom “Top Gun” Cruise and she got knocked up before she could see the loathsome evil that lurked behind his blue eyes.

I seriously think that she got knocked up before she had even worked up the courage to shit in his house. You know what I’m talking about, right? That time in the beginning of a relationship when you’re still embarassed by anything that may let the person you are trying to woo know you may not be perfect? You know how it is – no farting, of running the risk of jamming up their toilet like you had lunch at Dirty Sanchez’s All You Can Eat Taco and Tequila Bar?

Add to the fact that it’s Tom Freakin’ Cruise! Can you imagine the pressure that must have put on poor dear Katie?

‘Geez!,’ Katie must have thought, ‘I’m cramping from having to crap here. But I can’t! I mean, what if he smells it? What if he realizes I just crunched in his master bathroom? I mean it’s Tom Cruise! I can’t let him know that tofu gives me farts like the septic’s backed up! He probably doesn’t even know what septic is! Christ!’

Then, suddenly, BAM! Katie’s pregnant.

And then the real Tom comes shambling into the room like some noxious, vile, foul beast from the nether reaches of hell. Trailing behind him are endless throngs of Scientologists spouting nonsense about Thetans who were destroyed by a volcano millions of years ago, Subversive Individuals who will try to steer you away from the true path of L. Ron Hubbards vision (like her own parents), and silent births.

One comment on this silent birth thing - - I observed both of my children born and it is insane and damn impossible to expect a woman NOT to make noise while giving birth. Doctor Zombie has tattoos, had a pierced nipple, and subsequently had said piercing RIPPED out on a fence (Remind me to tell you THAT story sometime). It could be said I have a high threshold for pain. Childbirth is like another planet of pain.

All of that, and now - - the latest news is that Tom told Katie on the day their daughter was born that, if she leaves him or they split up, he guarantees he will have full custody. Like the baby’s a piece of property, or the spoils of war. Are you fucking kidding me?!?

And this whole Scientology thing - - how do I start my own religion? And how do I get celebrities like Tom Cruise. John Travolta, or Kirstie Alley to tout it and give me money? I need to think about starting my own religion. The good Doctor needs to start his own church! That’s it! Doctor Zombie’s Church of the Divine Orgasm. Wait... Doctor Zombie sounds too sinister for a church.

I know... The Resurrected's Church of the Divine Orgasm. We will begin services this weekend. There will be an orgy in the field behind the church after the 10am service. Bring a dish for the potluck lunch afterwards. And we’ll need to talk more about this tithing thing. Doctor Zombie needs cash. Cold, hard cash. And the the only way to get cash is through embezzlement, politics, or religion. And I'm going the nonprofit, giving-it-because-the-good-book-says-you-gotta, religious route!

Hot damn!

Big News

Just a quick update – more to follow later.

I just got in from out of town as I was in the woods of Southern Ohio, hunting turkey. I didn’t kill any turkeys, and I most probably did some permanent damage to my liver with the amount of heavy drinking I did. I will take some time to type up some accounts of the weekend, because some funny stuff happened, but it’ll probably have to wait a day or two.

So – I’ve got some big news. Doctor Zombie’s Midnight Theater of Terror has been added to a list of local blogs at Cleveland.com. How cool is that?!? Of course, there’s a lot of other blogs on the list, but at least I’ll be getting some serious local exposure. Good or bad, it’ll get my writing out there. You can check out the listing here. It’s right down the list alphabetically…

I’ll try to post some more tonight, if it slows down enough for me to log on. I’ve got this whole schtick about my straight laced, conservative wife and her current exasperation with my out of control Sci-fi addiction…

Evil tidings, my undead minions!

Blue

I've been preoccupied with working on my new novel and also getting short stories out to various zines and literary mags, so I haven't had time to devote to the blog like I'd like to. And, truthfully, the novel is a piece of survival horror/science fiction and it's not put me in a funny sort of mood. As such, I don't want to break the creative energy I'm devoting to that work. BUT - -I've also promised myself that I would try to contribute something...anything... to this blog as a means of self-discipline. That said - - I've decided to post up a piece of creative nonfiction I wrote a few years back to deal with the loss of a family friend. I pulled it out recently to submit to some literary magazines and done some brush up work on it. So, here it is...


John was my father’s best friend. My earliest memories of him are inextricably linked with that of my father. Almost like an old snapshot, my memory of them is sepia-toned and dog-eared. They were these larger than life figures in blue uniforms with black leather belts, shiny badges, and big black guns that hung high on their waists.

John was my father’s partner and they rode together for fifteen years. Eventually, my dad quit the force and accepted the idea that it was impossible to raise two children on the criminally low salary that they paid cops in the seventies and eighties. My father took a job as the Service Director in my hometown and John went on to become a sergeant with another local police department.

“Everything I know about being a good sergeant and a cop, I learned from your dad,” he told me once while we sat around a campfire at deer camp, sharing a beer and a quiet moment. The ground was covered with a crunchy, gravel-like snow and it was about twenty numbing degrees outside.

John was a short, thick-chested man. He had an intensity about him that served him well in his job. I most remember his smile. He had tiny, white teeth and a smile that was impossibly large. It could go from warm and friendly to shark-like and predatory in an instant. When he smiled at a joke, you couldn’t help smiling with him. Often his jokes would be about people he had met as a cop, and he would grin devilishly as he would relate a story about an exceptionally dumb criminal. He could be a prick to someone he busted, but fiercely loyal to those he cared about personally.

One of the first things you were struck with, when meeting him, was his right hand. His middle finger was short, amputated at the first knuckle. Weirder still, his index finger was permanently stiff at the same knuckle and slightly bent.

One night, while camping, he pulled out his service 9mm and we took turns emptying magazines at empty cans in the hills of southern Ohio. The deformity never caused him any trouble. That same night, I asked him how he hurt his hand. My father, sitting nearby, groaned as John’s face lit with his famous smile.

“Ask your dad,” he said, throwing a stone at my father across the crackling and jumping campfire.

“Why?” Dad said, “You’ll only contradict me and twist it around, you degenerate.”

John laughed and flexed his ruined hand, “We got a call late one night and responded with lights to a domestic. It was raining and had been a really slow night when the call came in. Your dad jumped on it and we tore off. Thing is, neither of us knew where the place was. So, I’m trying to get directions off the dispatcher, and your dad’s bombing through the night. I had my hand outside the window, holding the top of the door frame.”

John lifted up his hand to demonstrate - the image of someone resting their arm on the door frame and grasping the top of a car door where it met the roof. He went on, “So, we came to the street and I told him, ‘This is it, Sarge,’. Well, your dad never touched the brakes. He let off the gas and wrenched the wheel. We hydroplaned and the cruiser slid to the far side of the road, hitting a ditch at about forty-five miles per hour. The cruiser rolled three times, twice on my hand.”

John held up his hand again, “They never found the tip of my ‘Fuck you!’ finger, and I still have a steel pin in my shooting finger. All because your dad can’t drive.”

He laughed uproariously and my father gave him a murderous look.

“Isn’t that when you broke your jaw?” I asked my father. I vaguely remember my father once coming home from work in a sling and with his jaw wired shut. He had had to eat through a straw for three weeks and lost thirty-five pounds.

“Yeah,” Dad said, grabbing another beer from the cooler, “and I’m not the moron who had to ride with his hand out the window.”

Growing up, John had spent every fall and winter of his life in the woods. He and my father passed this love of the outdoors to me. He taught me how to stalk game, how to track a wounded animal, and - most importantly - how to gauge the weather and decide if the game is going to cooperate or if it’s time to call it a day and go get a beer. This was more than an uncle’s tutelage. His own son never wanted to hunt or spend time with his old man; so I became the willing and open pitcher into which John and my father poured their accumulative backwoods knowledge.
Take something so simple as shooting a rifle. I remember looking through the scope of my first .22 with John standing behind me and my father looking on. I was ten and it was a crisp, sunny autumn day.

“It’s all about the little things,” John said, “Little things like taking a deep breath when you look through the scope. You put the cross hairs where you want them, take a breath, and let it out slowly. When you have nothing left to inhale, you focus and wait. The cross hairs will stop moving and you’ll reach a point of stillness where you can almost feel your heartbeat. That’s when you slowly squeeze the trigger. Never jerk it, or pull it. It should be a slow, steady, gentle squeeze until the trigger clicks.”

He looked me in the eyes and spoke as confidently and as calmly as a man who had studied Zen, “It’ll be like a tube of glass breaking and, if you’ve done it right, you’ll hear the firing pin hit before the explosive roar of the gun barks out. That’s the key to never, ever missing. It’s all in that split second when you hear the click of the firing pin.”


John had a bad marriage. His wife was a petty, manipulative, controlling woman who John, unfortunately, loved too much. I didn’t realize this until I was older.

She hated hunting. Perhaps because it was something he loved so much, or something in which he could find joy independent from her. Inevitably, the day came when she gave out an ultimatum; it was her, or hunting. For her sake, and for the sake of his marriage, he gave in to her demands. The same sense of right and wrong that made him a good cop dictated his sense of ‘doing right’ by his marriage, so he relinquished time spent with his friends and his brothers.
As the seasons changed, and the air grew crisper and colder, John’s presence at the annual deer trip was sorely missed.

“Do you think John’ll divorce her, Dad?” I asked.

“I don’t know, son. He should have, years ago. But, love makes you do stupid things.”


I received the call the day after Memorial Day. I was at work and my mother called, saying my father was too upset to call himself.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, alarmed. Never in my life had I ever seen or heard my Dad cry.

“It’s John,” Mom said, too grieved to soften the blow, “He ate his gun. The funeral’s this week.”
I couldn’t have been more shocked if my mother had told me my own father had killed himself.


It is very hard to observe a cop’s funeral. At all times there is a police officer, his badge covered with black tape, standing guard at the edge of the coffin. The fallen officer’s brethren will take turns throughout the night, standing watch in this fashion. Later, at the church, the eerie silence as the coffin passed the hundreds of assembled police officers was absolute. My father was a pallbearer, the only one not in a uniform but accepted by all of the other cops there as John’s ex-partner.

Oddly, the weather was beautiful when they buried John. In the movies, it always seems that these sort of affairs are portrayed as taking place under dark, raining skies. The dreary weather serves as a meteorological metaphor; the weeping skies symbolizing the accumulative sorrow of the assembled mourners. It seems an incongruity to be in a cemetery, on a warm, beautiful, and sunny spring day.

This contradiction went on. A bagpipe played Amazing Grace as swans and geese floated lazily on a nearby pond. In another part of the cemetery, a groundskeeper was cutting the lawn and I remember the fresh cut grass irritating my allergies above and beyond the itchy, snuffling result of my own tears. Then there was the vision of policemen - men I’d grown up around and always admired for their strength and self-assuredness - inconsolable in their very public grief. Cops, as a culture, are supposed to be stoic and always strong. Not so at a funeral for one of their own.
Beyond my own grief, there is one moment that stands out above everything else. Before they lowered John into the ground, his widow wailed in grief and kissed the top of the casket.
I’ve never hated someone so much in my life.


We’ll never really know what transpired in that last day of John’s life. We do know that he and his wife had spent Memorial Day Weekend arguing. His new partner, closer to the situation than my father or I, speculated that John had reached the breaking point because she had told him she had been seeing someone else, that she wanted a divorce. That was too much for John. He had gone back to their bedroom, gotten his service pistol, walked back out, and put it into his mouth. He pulled the trigger without another word.

Like my father said, love makes you do strange things.

A few days after the funeral, my father and I went back to the cemetery. We stood over John’s grave and split half a bottle of whiskey, pouring the other half on John’s grave. I’d like to say that I’ve come to some understanding of what happened or that maybe I’d found some sort of closure. But, I’d be lying. To this day, I don’t know why he did it. It was such a stupid, tragic, and selfish thing to do. I do know that it must take big balls to put the black, cold barrel of a Beretta 9mm into your mouth and pull the trigger. Bigger balls than I have, certainly. It’s not something I could do.

But, in terms of selfishness, I guess I’m just as guilty. When I received that call from my Mom, my first thought was for my newborn son, whom John had never met. He would grow up, never having the opportunity to hunt with John, like I did. Or love the man as an uncle. Or get drunk on whiskey and laugh around a campfire. The only way he would ever know John would be in what I had learned from John and will pass on to him. That was the most tragic part of the sorry mess.

Of course my second thought upon learning of John’s death was much more morbid. I still have nightmares about it and I’m certain I will spend the rest of my life wondering. I wonder about that final instant, in that pregnant moment of absolute stillness when he looked at his wife and made his choice. In that millisecond before the explosion - did he hear the click of the firing pin?

Nothing in Particular...

I am constantly amazed at how old I’ve gotten. I frequently find myself having to look things up that I’m certain many of my fellow bloggers probably know because they are, quite simply, more current on these sort of things than myself. What can I say, I’m an aging goth dinosaur who likes to think he’s young. The truth is, I’m not as in touch as I’d like to be, and I find I have those occasional ‘what the fuck…?’ moments more and more often.

For example, I’ve been hearing the word ‘emo’ quite a bit recently. Now, I had an understanding of the term ‘emo’ from my misspent youth. It was mostly applied to a branch of punk/ska music from the east coast. The main emo band out there was Fugazi. (Who, by the way, was on the bill at my first punk concert way back in the mid 80’s. It was Fugazi, Knifedance, Soundgarden, and Einsturzende Neubaten at the Phantasy Nightclub in Lakewood OH. I was 15 going on 16, and I fell in love with raw, pounding punk/alternative music right then. It probably helped that I met and made out with a 19 year old girl who had six-inch liberty mohawk. Ahhhh, teen lust and positive reinforcement… And, btw, yes it was THAT Soundgarden – about 8 to 10 years before they became ‘just another grunge band from Seattle’.)

So, I’d seen the term thrown around a few times on the internet and on other blogs, so I was confused. I did a wikipedia search and found that, in fact, the term did initially apply to the music I was referring to. However,the terms usage has changed considerably over the years and is now considered derogatory. It refers to bands that have a mainstream corporate alternative sound (Jimmy Eat World, or any of the other endless corporate alterna rock bands), or the people who subscribe to this same form of evil. That and the way they dress. Who’d a thunk that something I thought meant one thing, could mean something completely different now. Essentially - emo means sellout or fag, depending on the situation.

It sucks growing old! Especially considering that I share some of those fashion preferences. My excuse is that I was dressing like a skater and a punk before many of these high school kids were born. These kids today...

Other things I’ve recently seen that I had no idea about:

Find Sarah Connor – I’ve mentioned this before, but I still love it. Skynet will go on line soon, and then it’ll be time to run from the Terminator units. Seriously.

Goatse – I found this wonderful example of human depravity quite by accident. If you’ve never heard the term – boy are you in for a surprise! I saw Goatse mentioned in a forum, with the warning that it was absolutely not work safe - under any circumstances. So, a quick search turned up what the Goatse picture was. Apparently it’s been around the internet for years. I will not post a link to it, because a few quick clicks through a search engine will take you to the picture itself and, truthfully, searching for it is half the fun. Warning: This is one of the foulest, filthiest pictures you will EVER see. Considering the endless acts of perversion and depravity that internet porn is capable of – this picture surpasses them all and goes to new, unexplored, and unplumbed depths. I know I’m setting the bar pretty high (or pretty low – however you choose to look at it), but believe me when I say that this is a whole different planet of human perversion and degradation. Ick.

Some other links I felt I needed to share

I’m ashamed to admit that I’m a Joss Whedon fan. I can’t help it - - it comes with being a nerd. And, besides the fact that I’d like to do filthy, unimaginable things to Allison Hannigan; there was always another actress on the show who caught my eye – Charisma Carpenter. She played Cordelia; first on Buffy, and then on Angel. I have a weak spot for brunettes and this woman is damn near perfect. You can imagine my delight when I found out that she wants to play Wonder Woman in an upcoming movie. She’d be perfect in the role. And, BTW - Linda Carter IS the reason I like brunettes. I remember being 8 or 9 and getting my first tingly twinges in my naughty bits watching her run around in her red, white, and blue underwear. I’m thinking – after Mrs. Zombie divorces me because of my childishness, and after I’ve stalked Kate Beckinsale for a sufficient period of time, I’m going to have to pay Charisma Carpenter a visit. Mmmm…. Cordelia….

Finally, I found a great new comic that I will be checking on a regular basis. Check it out. And, Lest I run the risk of over paraphrasing Homer Simpsons – Mmmm…Zombie hunter chick…

In The Darkness of Night...

"Easy is the descent to hell; Death's dark door stand open day and night..." Virgil

So, for most of my life, I’ve suffered from various sleep disorders. When I was a kid, my parents used to have to tie me to the bed because I would sleepwalk so badly. It got so bad that I once awoke on a tree lawn four streets away from my house. It was especially freaky because, growing up in the ‘burbs like I did, all of the streets in my neighborhood had identical, post war bungalows. I woke up, scared and in my underwear with no idea where I was. I had to walk to the end of the street, onto the main business district drag, to find a street sign to figure out where I was.

The sleep walking still sometimes happens, but the real fun began when I turned 10 or 11. That’s when the night terrors started. If you’ve never had night terrors, you can’t understand how bad they can really be. Imagine your worst nightmare. And I mean the absolutely most terrifying, wake up in cold sweats and don’t move because the monsters might see you nightmare. Now multiply it by a hundred. True night terrors are so terrifying that you blank them out. You wake up in mortal terror and your mind, to cope with the horror, represses the memory of the dream. All you know is that you have just been through the most terrifying, panic inducing dream you’ve ever had - - until the next one.

The thing with my night terrors is that I can feel them coming. I know that they are triggered by outside things, like stress or anxiety. But often they just come in cycles. I can tell they’re coming because I start to have nightmares. The nightmares build and build, getting worse and worse, until I’m not having normal dreams at all. Just nightmares. Heartstopping, agonizingly horrible nightmares. So, I become sleep deprived, my stress levels go through the roof, and they get worse and worse until they shift into full blown night terrors.

When I was in college, I would sleep in my car because my roommates threatened to throw me out if I woke them up with my screaming again. I used to try self medicating. That and drinking a lot of liquor when I knew the night terrors were coming. The only problem with that was that I would sometimes fall so deeply asleep I couldn’t wake up and I’d descend deeper and deeper into the twisted darkness that is my dreamworld.

My nightmares and night terrors are compounded by a rare disorder that makes them that much more jolly. I inherited it from my mother, who suffers as much as I do. You see, I have a rare form of epilepsy that is directly connected to my sleep disorders.

I'll tryto explain. When you're in deep REM sleep, the nerves and receptors in your eyes vibrate at a certain pitch. What happens is that, when your mind is dreaming, your eyes and optic nerve are still working as though they’re seeing what your mind is projecting. That’s why your eyes bob around in REM. Makes sense, right?

So, when you come out of REM, your eyes shift into normal sight mode and you go on with your waking life.

Not so in my case.

What happens is, the nightmares and night terrors cause an overload of this function and they cause a small seizure in my nerves and receptors. Hence, when I wake up, my eyes don’t shift into 'normal mode'; they stay in REM. This results in a juxtaposition of my dream world with my waking world.

Let me give you an example. Say you, the average person, has a nightmare where you are being chased by a serial killer with a stereotypically sharp and pointy instrument of death. The nightmare awakens you and you sit up; gasping for air, terrified, and covered in a cold sweat. After a few seconds you realize that you’re awake and it was only a dream. You calm down and eventually fall back to sleep. That’s how it works for most people. For me, though, it goes to a whole different level. I wake up from the same dream, screaming and in terror. Unfortunately at this point, my condition kicks in and my eyes stay in REM sleep. So where you might wake up to a darkened room; I wake up and my mind superimposes my dream.

I wake to find a serial killer standing at the end of my bed.

So why am I telling you all of this? No reason, other than I can feel my night terrors coming on. I’ve had some really bad dreams lately and they’re getting worse. Soooo, I may be doing some late night posting because I’ve found that not going to sleep is sometimes the easier way to go. Sleep deprivation and the resultant loss of sanity is better than the ghastly hell that is my own mind.

The funny thing is, people always ask me why I’m the way I am when they find out about my dreams. And it does seem counter intuitive that I’m such a horror movie and gore hound, especially considering the obvious effect they have on my psyche and dreams. Short answer; I dunno…

Maybe I’ll start a short dream journal and give some glimpses into the dark corners of Doctor Zombie’s mind. I’ll share the wealth so to speak…

Truly unpleasant dreams, dear friends…