Amber Benson's Official Blog

CHALLENGE #2 - MADEMOISELLE CONSUELA and HER ARMY of ONE

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 18:29:00 +0000

So...first of all...Due to popular demand (and for the slower readers out there) I have decided to extend the FIRST CHALLENGE until March 1st...let me reiterate...in order to qualify for a chance at the SKYPE LUNCH with me, you must post a review of my book Serpent's Storm on one of the qualifying sites ( AMAZON US AMAZON CA AMAZON UK AMAZON DE BARNES AND NOBLE or ITUNES ) and you must use the word 'chicken' somewhere in the review!

Now for...THE SECOND CHALLENGE!!

You must answer these three questions by March 21st, 2012:

1.) What is the name of Mademoiselle Consuela's Warbot?

2.) In what type of building is Mademoiselle Consuela a prisoner?

3.) Whose naked "male member" makes an appearance at the end of the story?

To find the answers you need to read: Mademoiselle Consuela and Her Army of One - a new short story from IDW & me for their Zombies Vs. Robots Anthology on Amazon kindle! And the beauty of the whole thing is that it's just 99 cents! It's available tomorrow - but you can pre-order today!

READ ME

You must send the answers to these three questions to: bensonentertainment@hotmail.com

Only emailed entries will be counted, so don't leave your answers in the comments section! I will delete them and they will be disqualified!!

In order to qualify for the SKYPE LUNCH with yours truly you have to complete CHALLENGES #1 and #2!

GOOD LUCK!

Valentine's Day - Shoot An Arrow In My Butt

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 08:02:00 +0000

There is something about this Valentine's holiday that seems false, something that seems tailor made for Hallmark and the flower growers of America and Hershey's.

Corporations - I am not just a consumer. I am a human being. Just because a candy heart says BE MINE doesn't mean I belong to anyone, but myself. And I think that's enough. I think it's alright to not need someone in your life to give you cards and flowers and candy.

I think a smile from a toothless homeless man sitting in front of the grocery store should be enough. Because outside of everything and everyone else...I am okay by myself. We should all be okay by ourselves. We are wonderful and we should love ourselves, as individuals, accordingly.

Happy Valentine's Day to me and to you. You and I are worth a smile and the knowledge that we are loved.

That's enough.

Watch me cut up & read my new book, HOW TO BE DEATH!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 00:30:00 +0000

Watch me Cut Up & Read the first chapter of my new book HOW TO BE DEATH - also a Sir Richard Bitely sighting!

ALL MY DATES AND DUCKS IN A ROW

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 18:44:00 +0000

Here is the completed list of places I will be signing HOW TO BE DEATH - it has all the right addresses and times and if you come, I promise to show you a real good time ;)

Tuesday, February 28th 2012
7:30pm
MYSTERIOUS GALAXY
Redondo Beach Store
2810 Artesia Blvd
Redondo Beach, CA 90278

THIS IS A PARTY. THERE WILL BE CUPCAKES!!

Friday, March 2nd 2012
7:00pm
MIDTOWN COMICS
Grand Central Station
459 Lexington Avenue
New York, NY 10017

Saturday, March 3rd 2012
6:00pm
MURDER BY THE BOOK
2342 Bissonett Street
Houston, TX 77005

Saturday, March 10th 2012
MYSTERIOUS GALAXY
San Diego Store
2:00pm
7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd
Ste 302
San Diego, CA 92111

March 24th, 2012
2:00pm
DARK DELICACIES
w/Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

3512 W. Magnolia Blvd.
Burbank, CA 91505

MAGIC NUMBER/MAGIC WORD

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 19:02:00 +0000

February is always the shortest month––even when it's a Leap Year like 2012.

But not this year. This year I promise to pack so much interesting, weird stuff into February that it will seem like the LONGEST month on the calendar!

I am putting together THREE CHALLENGES––one of them begins today––and at the end of the whole thing (you must complete ALL THREE) some lucky person is going to win something really unique and bizarre:

A DISGUSTING SKYPE LUNCH WITH ME

Now, I know that sounds kinda ho-hum, but believe me, it will be anything but.

Firstly, I will provide you with the lunch. I will give you a bunch of options (I know there are Vegans, Veggies, Gluten Frees, Atkins, Low Carbs, Fruitarians, Pescetarians, Hardcore Carnivores) that you can choose from and that choice will be delivered to your door.

Secondly, I will eat something disgusting, something worthy of Andrew Zimmern - and there will be Chocolate Covered Ants for dessert!

Thirdly, we will toast to your CHALLENGE prowess and your health and to the health of all the people who tried and failed to win this special lunch.

Fourthly, we will video the Chocolate Covered Ant eating (you may choose not to be on camera for this) and post it to youtube so that everyone can make fun of me.

Not so ho hum now, is it? Oh, you naysayers, be quiet! (I'll deal with you later)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So let me lay out the design of the first Challenge and tell you what the MAGIC NUMBER and the MAGIC WORD is!

CHALLENGE #1:

THE SERPENT'S STORM REVIEW

I am looking for at least 77 reviews of Serpent's Storm by 2/17/12 - each review must contain the word CHICKEN in it––now don't be cross, you guys gave me the MAGIC NUMBER and the MAGIC WORD––and it must contain a way to contact you: either your twitter ID, your email, your blog site or your FACEBOOK name.

If I get 77 reviews (distributed among the qualifying sites I will list below) then I will choose the review I think most creatively uses the MAGIC WORD (chicken) and that first challenge winner gets to pick (between two choices) the YOUTUBE video song I will embarrassingly sing for the world.

The two choices are: Wind Beneath My Wings & I Love You Period

How does that sound?

Remember, this is only the FIRST CHALLENGE. And you have to complete it if you want to be in the running to win the SKYPE DISGUSTING LUNCH!!

I will announce the SECOND CHALLENGE on 2/16/12 - be ready!

BELOW ARE THE QUALIFYING SITES & the review must be made between today and 2/17/11*:

AMAZON US

AMAZON CA

AMAZON UK

AMAZON DE

BARNES AND NOBLE

ITUNES

*if you already reviewed the book on any of these sites prior to 1/31 then email Benson Entertainment (bensonentertainment@hotmail.com) with the subject line "CHICKEN 77" - include proof of your review (a cut and past copy will suffice) and a paragraph explaining why you love, hate or feel mediocre toward CHICKEN & I will add you to the contest!

Scott Walker: 30 Century Man

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 08:01:00 +0000

Netflix recommended this documentary to me. The algorithms tonight couldn't have been more prescient.

The idea that art is art, outside of self and taste and worth. That is the question I am grappling with tonight. Intellectually, I believe that it doesn't matter what anyone thinks of something I've created. In practice, of course, that's not a truth. I am just as human as anyone else, stymied by negativity.

Then I watch this goddamned documentary 'Scott Walker: 30 Century Man' and am confronted with a man who seems to walk the walk and not just talk the talk (like me). To just create, to just wholly and utterly give birth to what is inside of you, and not disown it or vilify it or praise it, but let it go, unjudged. To be pleased with the process, alone, and unfettered by what anyone thinks...this is the ultimate goal.

Like in Buddhism there is the notion of transcending self.

In art it is the notion of transcending judgement...your own or anyone else's.

Now go create and damn the consequences!

DRIVING THE BUGGY

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 00:26:00 +0000

I was introduced to something last night that, at first, I thought was a joke. I was having dinner with my friends Colleen, Anton, and Maureen, and over the largest bowl of guacamole I'd ever encountered in all my thirty-five years, I was introduced to the romance sub-genre 'The Bonnet Ripper'.

This only came about because I was regaling them with the details of my bizarre train trip across America and how I had seen a number of Mennonite women on the train reading what looked like romance novels.

That's when someone, I forget who, chimed in: Bonnet Rippers!

It looks as if the 'Bodice Ripper' has been co-opted by the religious set. I thought TWILIGHT was the penultimate of all the no kissing, no sex until marriage literature, but apparently I was wrong. It seems that the Amish and Mennonite Bonnet Rippers have all the angst and overheated emotion of the Harlequin universe, but without any of the sex. Totally trumping Twilight - cause they made with the disastrous sexy sex, ya know.

I, for one, am very curious to read one of these books because there is only so much 'throbbing member' action a person can take before they start to feel kind of pervy. I know this for fact because when I was thirteen years old I read one hundred Harlequin Romance books in two very short weeks.

This was the summer my family moved from Orlando, FL to Los Angeles, CA. It took my sister, mother and me two weeks to do it. (We took our time, stopping at all the roadside attractions like we were - unintentionally - retracing Lolita and Humbert Humbert's path across America.) Along the way, we made a pit stop in Huntsville, AL to see my grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins.

That's when I discovered my Aunt Carolyn belonged to the Harlequin Romance Book of The Month Club. Always a voracious reader (of anything I could get my hands on) and my Aunt Carolyn knew this, giving me a black garbage bag full of Harlequin romances to read along the trip. There had to have been over a hundred of those suckers straining to get out of their plastic bag prison and I obliged them all by reading every one of'em.

As we drove across the country, I would read two or three of the books in a sitting, depositing them in the drawers of the motels we stayed in at night - kinda like soft core pornographic Gideon Bibles. It was a strange time in my life...REM's Out Of Time playing through the headphones of the boom box I'd brought with me, the words 'throbbing manhood' swimming on the pages of the books in front of me.

A very odd time, indeed.

I don't know how all of this really ties into Bonnet Ripping, I guess it does somehow because it definitely got the synapses in my brain all fired up.

Heck, the next time you see me I may be wearing a bonnet. I hear those Amish men are pretty amazing at 'driving the buggy'.

Wink, wink.

Triangle Tara Thanks You: Addendum

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 04:49:00 +0000

Triangle Tara wanted to take a moment to send a special thanks to Theresa Grammer who has built the beautiful fundraiser site for her every year and personally puts in a lot of time and effort to help Tara spread the word!

TRIANGLE TARA THANKS YOU AND I THANK YOU

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:05:00 +0000

You guys are amazing! You helped Triangle Tara raise $1000 for the Los Angeles Food Bank - plus that's not even counting the donations some of you made to the food bank in order to be registered for the Doll and Surprise Gift drawing!*

Triangle Tara and I send you big love and hugs for making this happen. You rawk!

Los Angeles Regional Foodbank Customer Receipt/Purchase Confirmation‏

To Amber Benson

Thank you for your order!

Order Information

Merchant:	Los Angeles Regional Foodbank
Description:	Donation to LAFoodBank.org

Invoice Number:

67602

Billing Information
Amber Benson
N/A
Sherman Oaks, CA 91403
US
bensonentertainment@hotmail.com

Shipping Information
N/A

Total:

US $1000.00

Visa

*PS: The Surprise Gift was the actual Justin Bieber T-Shirt (signed) I wore and took about a million pictures in for that Scavenger Hunt Misha Collins put on!

Solitary vs Interconnected

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 17:22:00 +0000

Wow, that last post really seemed to have touched a nerve - my own included.

Why are relationships so hard to make work? Just look at the comments section in that last post and you will see why. So many varied reasons, so many individual stories of heartache and triumph...it blew my mind.

Of course, how can that question not touch a raw nerve? Relationships are what define us. Without the input of other people we have very little framework outside of ourselves to figure out who we are. For example, I spend a lot of time creating things, but without other people to read and see what I make, the effort of creating falls a little flat.

Yes, even if I lived in a vacuum, I would still be moved to write and make stuff, but the thrill of having someone else experience my creation is like nothing else out there...okay, it's probably on par with falling in love, but that happens so, so, so infrequently (like once every trillion years) that I gotta rely on creating stuff to get my jollies off.

But whether it's being creative or falling in love, the common denominator is 'being experienced'. When someone experiences us through our work or through falling in love with us, it's like we become immortal for that moment. We don't just exist in our own heads, we exist in the minds of the people we have touched.

It's like being on your computer vs. being on your computer that's connected to the Internet.

I like the idea of being connected, of knowing that as I write this, there will be people out there who will read my words and be affected by them. Negatively or positively, I can't control...just that the act of 'being experienced' is enough.

Why Are Relationships So Hard?

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 22:18:00 +0000

Why are relationships so hard? You like someone, they like you...so why doesn't it work. The whole thing should be easy - what with biological imperatives and the like - but instead this is one of the most complicated and prescient questions out there. It crosses gender, social, economic, religious lines and is applicable to pretty much everyone on the planet. Sure there are still arranged marriages and other situations where people are forced to be together, where they have no say in whether they work as a couple or not, but those examples are getting to be few and far between as the Western notion of picking your own partner becomes standard practice all over the world.

If I had an answer for this question - even a semi-plausible one that sounded kinda good - I would share it with you. But I am as in the dark about this as everyone else.

What do you think? It's not an essay question. No one is being graded. I'm just curious.

Great Expectations

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 03:14:00 +0000

I have romanticized this journey.

Nothing can survive the wrath of great expectations. I think it was the sitting up sleeping that finally broke me. I can handle babies and their poo, a lack of functioning electrical outlets so I can't work on my computer, even paying 2.50 for a tiny pack o'peanuts.

But the sit up sleeping...now that was a killer. That and the stinky feet, farting and snoring that goes along with sleeping in a train car with about eighty or so other people.

I am not a super whiny person, but when I don't get enough sleep and going to the bathroom is a quasi-spectator sport, well, I'm not at my best.

I'm now on the second leg of my journey and there's another whole twenty hours to go. One more night of sit up sleep.

I romanticized this trip - I thought it would be chill and fun. That it was not. It felt like work.

On The Train

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 07:18:00 +0000

There is a little girl in the seat behind me, singing. The songs are all nonsense with a few cannibalized bits of real song repurposed into her own. She has a high, clear little kid voice as she stands at the window looking out at the New Mexican landscape.

There's snow on the ground, something I haven't seen in a long time. It coats the desert floor, the scrub brown and dead underneath its wintery coat.

A guy keeps coming over and telling me that 'he's been noticing me'. It's a train. Not too many places you can disappear to. I just smile and nod, slide my headphones on. He seems harmless, but there's something about traveling alone, the vulnerability I guess, that makes me regard him nervously.

I am on the train with a group of Mennonites. You would think that they would be the ones with Bibles out, but it's really the older Hispanic women and the young charismatic Christian women littered throughout the train that are on Bible watch. The Mennonites are too busy playing with their kids and reading fiction to commune with God.

Writing this, I wonder if my expectations about the Mennonites are solely informed by my lack of any kind of interaction with them. They seem very nice and very self-contained and really only can be marked out as 'religious' because of their dress.

I think there's just something inherently fascinating to me about devout people (of all religions - I am not singling out the nice Mennonites with any of the below). Their adherence to another way of life, another way of interacting and dressing, it's impressive - especially to someone like me who lives a very ambivalent and rootless (as far as religion) life.

I admire their determination. When that determination is applied in a positive way, a lot of good is done - but the reverse is also true. So much suffering has been meted out in the name of God.

Poor God, always the scapegoat. Even on a train, barreling through New Mexico.

Happy New Year's To Me

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 22:40:00 +0000

I am not making any New Year's resolutions this year.

Why, you ask me - why am I not participating in the New Year's spirit like everyone else? Because I know that I'm incapable of holding to any resolutions I might make.

I could resolve to blog everyday...but I know I'll fail to do it one day and that'll blow the whole thing.

I could resolve not to bite my nails...but I know that the first time I'm really stressed out or upset my nails will be back in mouth, drenched in Amber slobber.

I could resolve not to eat gluten (my mom is gluten intolerant)...but invariably I will break down at dinner somewhere and end up stuffing a roll in my mouth.

I appreciate the concept of making resolutions, of wanting to break bad habits and start good ones, but I am also realistic about who I am and what I'm capable of. I don't want to rain on anyone else's parade. If you're a good resolution keeper then by all means do it...but I'm just tired of feeling guilty about the things I can't control.

So I eat my fingers, so I don't exercise as much as I should or eat as well as I ought to...that doesn't mean I should kick the crap outta myself. We are just as much our failures and flaws as we are our successes...and, frankly, I don't think there's anything wrong with celebrating our mess-ups a little bit.

This year I am not resolving to do anything. Instead I am going to celebrate my failures and screw ups. I'm gonna try and learn from them, appreciate them for what they are and study them so I can have a little better insight into myself.

On that note:

Here's to the six Rum and Pineapple drinks I had last night.

Here's to the two hours of hardcore vomiting I did last night.

Here's to the insight I had into myself because of the drinking and vomiting.

And, finally...

Here's to what I learned from the whole lovely experience: Don't f*cking drink so much, idiot.

I Sign Boxes Good

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 22:48:00 +0000

Wanna come see me? Wanna say hi and maybe buy a book––How To Be Death, specifically, because it's the new one I just wrote––and get me to sign your Buffy Box Set? I sign boxes good...

Tuesday, February 28th 2012
7:30pm
MYSTERIOUS GALAXY
Redondo Beach Store
2810 Artesia Blvd
Redondo Beach, CA 90278

Friday, March 2nd 2012
Time TBD
MIDTOWN COMICS
Grand Central Station
459 Lexington Avenue
New York, NY 10017

Saturday, March 3rd 2012
6:00pm
MURDER BY THE BOOK
2342 Bissonett Street
Houston, TX 77005

Saturday, March 10th 2012
MYSTERIOUS GALAXY
San Diego Store
Time TBD
7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd
Ste 302

San Diego, CA 92111

Cal And The Monster From Silent Lake

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 23:45:00 +0000

Here is an excerpt from a new book that I'm writing. It's called CAL AND THE MONSTER FROM SILENT LAKE. It's a YA thingamabob...I thought it might be fun to share it with you guys. It's just the first pass, but I'm having fun with it and I hope it makes you smile.

CHAPTER ONE

The best and worst thing that ever happened to Cal began on June 15^th,1999––the second week after school had let out for the summer. That date would forever be etched on his mind as the day his world began to expand.

Of course, it started out just like any other day.

It was summer and shockingly hot outside. Cal woke up with sweat on his upper lip and behind his ears, his t-shirt sticking to his ribs like a second skin. He coughed, hacking up something from deep in his chest and then he sat up, pushing the twisted sheet off his legs. The sun streamed in through the slatted front window casting halos of hazy light around everything it touched. One long, unbroken finger of sunlight had snuck in from beneath the bottom of the plastic blinds and had found its way to Cal’s head, bisecting his face right down the middle.

This was probably what had woken him up, he decided.

He stood up, his bare feet sticking to the warm wooden floorboards, and crossed over to the small bathroom that sat at the side of his room just to the right of his tiny closet. He didn’t know how he’d gotten so lucky, how God had seen fit to give him a bathroom in his room so he (almost) never had to leave his safe space. Occasionally he'd come home from school and sneak out to the long, galley kitchen for food, but usually he filled up as best he could at lunch, or at his best friend Marlo’s house––where the pantry was always brimming with Capri Sun and Sunny Delight and potato chips and cookies for Marlo and his brothers and their friends.

This way he interacted with Daryl and Eugenia (his stepfather and mother) as little as possible.

As the years went by, he got used to his stomach growling. Hunger became his ally––and he knew that if he was hungry then he was being smart and staying out of Daryl’s way.

After Cal had used the bathroom and brushed his teeth, he found the jeans he’d been wearing the day before––crumpled into a ball underneath his bed––and put them on. He took a white T-shirt from a small stack of clean clothes he’d washed at the local coin-op the day before and slid it over his bony chest.

The apartment didn’t have its own washing machine and dryer, so every Tuesday afternoon Eugenia had a standing appointment with the Laundromat down the street––but Cal had learned early on that flying under the radar was the best way to operate, so he’d long ago stopped asking his mom to wash his clothes for him. The less he was seen or heard at home, the better. Once you’d had someone yank your wrist so hard it broke in two places (all because you’d spilled your milk across the kitchen table), you realized fast staying out of the way was the least confrontational course of action.

Since it was summer and there was no school, Cal had to find unique and interesting ways to occupy himself (and keep out of the apartment) during the day. He loved the summer, how the days seemed to stretch out for an eternity, the sun shining over your head until the last drop of light was squeezed out and the fireflies started blinking in the twilight. He had planned to spend his morning at the park reading the book he’d gotten at the library, and then, when it got to be around noon, he would walk over to Marlo’s house and wake him up.

Then things would really get interesting.

Marlo would sleep all day if his parents let him. He spent his nights watching monster movies and usually wasn’t in bed until close to dawn. When Cal spent the night there, he’d conk out around one, only to be rudely awakened by the sound of a woman’s scream coming from the TV at four or five. The screams and howls and chainsaw sounds that came out of Marlo’s small TV/VCR combo never seemed to bother anyone else in the household, but for some reason, Cal couldn’t say why, those movies haunted his dreams when he was there. He never thought about them when he was home alone, snuggled under his own comforter, but at Marlo’s house, he couldn’t shake them. They gave him strange dreams and he always left his friend’s house with dark, bruise-like circles under his eyes.

Cal had never been a fan of horror movies until he’d met Marlo. He’d had enough horror in his own life, so it wasn’t something he sought out in movies. Mostly, he read biographies of famous people, or Historical stuff, especially anything about World War Two. Books about vampires and werewolves seemed silly to him––especially when he had a real life monster already sleeping in the same bed as his mom.

Still, after he’d begun to spend time with Marlo, he’d started to understand the attraction horror films held. They were a way of escaping into another reality, one that was more exciting, more thrilling than your real life. Except, to Cal, those monster-strewn alternate realities weren't more exciting––they were just different than his normal life, safer perhaps, because he knew the monsters weren't real and could never hurt him. With that secret knowledge to protect him, he could enjoy the scary things the monsters did on screen, never letting fear enter the equation.

Without even realizing it, he'd quickly learned the mythology of each monster, their weaknesses and the way to kill them. He knew that Vampires hated garlic and holy water, that Werewolves had a thing against silver bullets, that Frankenstein’s Monster just wanted to be a real man again––instead of a bunch of dead guy parts. He understood the rules of the Slasher film. Was familiar with how to escape a homicidal maniac or serial killer or zombie horde. He took all of it in through osmosis, so that he'd soon become as well versed in horror mythology as his best friend was.

He didn’t know if he’d ever use this vast array of monster lore for anything other than debating with Marlo, but he didn’t care. He just liked having his brain filled with all of it. In fact, tonight, they were going to watch “Night of The Comet” and he was gonna cram his brain with even more useless information.

He was very much looking forward to it.

Cal spent the morning doing exactly what he'd intended to do: reading about Napoleon under the cooling shade of the town park’s one and only weeping willow tree, totally losing himself on the island of Elba with the exiled French Emperor.

He'd set up shop at his favorite spot, a bench bearing a small plaque on its spine that read, "Dedicated To The Memory Of Stan Stanhope". There was no ‘in loving’ part to Stan Stanhope's dedication––which made it singular among all the other memorial plaques that resided in the park. That’s why Cal liked it so much; why he made it his special place: It wasn’t overly sentimental.

The park wasn’t very crowded for such a sunny Thursday morning. Usually there was a horde of mommies and tots overrunning the playground, the moms trying to tire out the tots so they'd nap when they got home, but for some reason they were missing in action that day. His only company seemed to be Lionel, the homeless man––who Cal had decided must live in the park because he was always there. Cal watched as Lionel stood beside the small man made lake, dragging a stick through the muck at the water’s edge. Even though it was sweltering outside, Lionel was wearing his usual attire: Three winter coats over a t-shirt emblazoned with a bright, yellow smiley face.

As Lionel fished around in the muddy water, Cal stared at his round, sunburned face. In the bright summer light, it looked as if Lionel had sewn strips of faded leather onto his real skin then capped his creation off with a white, Mad Scientist wig. For some reason, Cal thought he remembered Lionel's hair being dark with streaks of grey running through it like the marbled veins of fat in a hefty cut of meat––but maybe he'd been mistaken.

The homeless man ignored Cal’s gaze, fixated on whatever he was trying to dredge up out of the water, so Cal ignored him in return. Sometimes Lionel got chatty and would come over and sit on the bench beside Cal and mumble at him, but that obviously wasn’t on the agenda for today. Instead, the two of them seemed to exist within the same space, but remained utterly separate as they focused their attentions on their individual activities.

Which meant that Cal stuck his nose back in his library book, and within a few minutes was totally engrossed in what he was reading.

When Lionel screamed, it took a moment for Cal to leave his imagination and return to reality. Instinctively, he dropped his book and stood up, his eyes seeking out the spot where he'd last seen the homeless man…but Lionel was gone. The stick he'd been using to stir the lake water was lying on the grass, pointing toward the water, where a few dissipating ripples gave Cal the only clue as to where Lionel must have gone.

Cal jogged over to the edge of the lake and peered down into the murky depths of the water. The lake water was so opaque that he could see nothing but his own reflection mirrored back at him. He squatted down and grabbed the stick, thrusting it into the water. Upon contact, the water around the stick began to seethe with an avalanche of flailing fish, their enormous silvery bodies glistening in the sunlight. Cal took an unconscious step backward, his gaze riveted to the ballet of fish as they danced in front of him, their gaping maws opening and closing in time to some inaudible score.

He felt something grasp the other end of the stick and yank him forward, dragging him closer and closer to the swarm of ecstatic fish as they pirouetted in the water. Cal dug in his heels, pulling back on his end as he refused to let go. Whatever had a grip on on the other end of the stick was inhumanly strong––and it took everything Cal had to keep himself from plunging headfirst into the lake.

Without any warning, the fish suddenly stopped their frantic thrashing, sinking back into the watery depths as abruptly as they had first appeared. The pull on the other end of the stick lessened and Cal fell backwards, landing hard on his left hip, the stick sliding out of the water after him. He lay there in the grass, panting from the unexpected exertion––and it wasn’t until he’d caught his breath and his heart had stopped racing in his chest that he noticed the something protruding from the end of the stick.

Cal squinted hard, but the bright morning light made it impossible for him to deny what his eyes were telegraphing to his brain. There, embedded in the pale wood, was the sharpest looking incisor that Cal had ever seen. Unconsciously, he scooted even further away from the water’s edge, pulling his feet in toward his torso.

With a trembling hand, he reached out and touched the tooth. It was three inches long and impossibly smooth, the edge tapering down to a lethal point.

He had seen a tooth like this one once before, at the Natural History Museum. His grandfather, Bill #1, (both of his grandfather's were coincidentally named Bill) had taken him there for his birthday when he was nine and it'd been heaven. They'd roamed the hallways for hours, disappearing inside every hidden nook and cranny they came to, their minds dazzled by the bizarre dioramas and odd exhibits full of strange and long dead creatures that they discovered.

The other tooth––it could've been this one's twin––was in a square glass case tucked away in a small, forgotten exhibit near the second floor Women's Restroom. There were other teeth in the case with it, but it was by far the largest and most evil looking. Cal had been fascinated by it; so much so that he'd even committed the name of the creature it came from to his young and eager memory.

Acanthostega.

The little placard beside the tooth bore a two line paragraph explaining what exactly an Acanthostega was: an extinct Tetrapod Genus from the late Devonian Period (365 Million Years Ago). Possessing both gills and lungs, it is considered to be one of the first ‘fish with legs’.

Standing in the air-conditioned darkness of the Natural History Museum with Bill #1, Cal had felt a strange, eerie sensation crawl up the back of his spine and wrap itself around his brain.

And now he felt that exact same sensation steal over him again as he sat, staring into the murky waters of the silent lake, the elongated tooth a pale reminder that something was terribly wrong.

Blue Jean Baby Queen Issues

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 23:56:00 +0000

I hate my jeans. Every pair I own drives me up the wall.

When I'm jonesin' for a little 'un-sex me here' time (thank you, lady Macbeth), all I want to do is put on a comfortable pair of jeans and zone out. But then I start trying on one pair after another in my closet and when none of them fit right, I totally lose my sh*t. I want to tear my hair out...and have been known to snivel upon occasion.

Which is the exact opposite of zoning out, thankyouverymuch.

And, seriously, all the body issue related hysteria that the search for a non-threatening pair of jeans brings up makes me feel more like a female than any dress ever could.

It sucks.

If you are a woman then you may already know my pain (and maybe some men out there identify, too - but you guys don't have to say anything, I know complaining about jeans isn't the most macho of pastimes - though I do have to say that I have a soft spot for men who are comfortable enough in their own masculinity to bitch about this kind of stuff with me):

I have two pairs of gray jeans (full disclosure: I am wearing one pair now) that I bought at Anthropologie. They are by a company called Adriano Goldschmied (AG for short) and I liked them for about the first two months that I owned them. They are very lightweight and soft with threads of metallic-looking material running through them.

I bought two pairs at the same time because I find that if there's an item of clothing I like, I will wear it until it dies. Until it literally curls up, falls off and dies. I've been chided by peeps for wearing the same thing two (or maybe three if we're being honest) days in a row. I think it's fine to do this so long as you change your underwear every day and the clothes don't stink too much after the first wear. That's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.

I didn't try on both pairs of these gray jeans at the time of purchase and when I got home I discovered that not all jeans are created equally - even when they're the supposed to be the same. One of the pairs fit differently and was not as comfortable, but it wasn't horrible, so I kept them both.

I don't dry my jeans...I wash them in the washing machine then hang them up to drip dry. I am messy and klutzy and I spill crap on my clothes all day long, every day, and this is not ever going to change. I am incapable of keeping myself food and dirt free. Needless to say, this means that I have to wash my jeans on a semi-regular basis - or else I look like I'm wearing the household composting. Flecks of food and other junk stick to me like glue and it's just embarrassing after a while.

Anyhow, I have these jeans for two months and I love them...and then, after a few washes, I find that they just don't fit like they used to. They sag in the wrong places and they're tight at the waist which is awful and gives me a muffin top - and I like muffins so this shouldn't be the end of the world...but it kind of is for like two seconds.

I have another twin pair of jeans that I got off the sale rack at Macy's. They, like the gray ones, are twins, but they're dark blue and have the name 'jeggings' attached to them - which frightened me when I bought them and still frightens me to this day. They are from J Brand and I liked them a lot when I bought them because they were soft and not too tight...but after a few washes they started fading hardcore at the butt and now when I wear them, it looks like I pooed white stuff all over myself. Which is not a pleasant look for anyone - and I apologize to anyone I might have accidentally white poo flashed while wearing them.

I have some singletons in my closet. Jeans without a twin, lonely one offs that I very rarely go near, so I'm not even going to mention their flaws.

What I want to know is: Am I jaded? Do I fall out of love with these jeans too fast, am I too hard on them, expect too much from a bit of fabric? Or is what I'm really responding to the bill of false goods we're being sold when we slap all that money down on the counter: that this transaction will make us happy - when all it really does is make us financially poorer.

And then I get a hold of myself and stop being a nincompoop. There are people starving out there, so I can just shut my trap about ill-fitting jeans. They're not magic for God's sake - they're blue jeans.

Can You Catch Athelete's Foot On The Chin?

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 19:24:00 +0000

SIDEBAR: I can now blog on my phone. It's amazing. I can talk about hair or toilets or baby poo while on the go! Yippee!
__________________

Is it wrong that I fell asleep in the tub this morning?

I know that I could (maybe) have drowned - I write this as if it's a joke, but I have a strange feeling that someone is going to hit up the comments section with a really sad comment about how their friend (family member, partner, grandmother's roommate at the Home For The Aged) actually did this thing I joke about. I know that the water got really cold and that's what woke me up. I know that my fingers and toes got awfully prune-y. I know that letting the tap drip really hot water until the tub was filled to the brim wasn't the smartest of choices...especially when the water sloshes out the back of Old Clawfoot (that's what I call the tub) and puddles on the floor where I will eventually step in it while wearing only socks.

The alarm just went off so damn early and it was already freezing in the house...ice cube like, really, so I went and did my snooze time (about fifteen) minutes in a very warm tub of water. I didn't mean to fall asleep - I was thinking more of a groggy tub-in with Old Clawfoot, not a snore-a-thon. It just happened.

I know that someone (probably more than just a some 'one') is going to chide me for taking baths. They are going to tell me that if I took a shower then I wouldn't have fallen asleep and woken up with prune-y toes.

Well, hold your tongue...because I can one-up you on that. I've fallen asleep in the shower, too, and, frankly, it's nowhere near as comfortable an experience.

But at least said shower was my own, so I didn't have to get all paranoid about catching Athlete's Foot on my chin.

Hair, the Antichrist

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:58:00 +0000

I have a real problem with hair. Not the stuff on your head, just its peers - who, yes, did originate on your head - but can now be found free floating in the ether, attaching to whatever will have them and, generally, making a nuisance out of themselves.

I went into my bathroom the other day - which I share with roommates - and had to hold back my horror when I saw a short, curly red hair (the short, or severed hair, is sometimes worse than the long one) curled up around the base of my electric toothbrush.

I didn't know what to do. Should I grin and bear it, reach out and pluck the wettish, stubby hair away? Should I ignore it and just brush my teeth? I was stumped - and feeling slightly queasy. Finally, I decided to get some toilet paper (I did say on twitter that I'm the queen of the toilet paper buying, imagine eight rolls all in a neat row waiting to be called into action) and used that to wipe the springy hair away.

Then there was the long hair in the sink full of dishes (it was of indiscriminate color because it had been soaking in soapy dishwater) that got all intertwined with the dish sponge - it was almost sexual, the way it was wrapped around that green and yellow artificial sponge - and I was disgusted enough by it that I couldn't do the dishes until I had removed the sponge from the sink, taken it to the trash and untwined the lascivious hair like the soapy whore it was. Of course then the hair stuck to my hand - for some reason the idea that soap was involved made it ok to touch the hair with my bare skin - and it took a protracted battle, and the help of a can of tuna from the recycling bin, to finally put it down (as in euthanize it).

I know it sounds OCD, or worse, but I can't help how I feel about stray hair.

The worst, and final, hair story I will impart to you, makes the sink/dish stories seem benign - and what is even more horrible is the fact that it is not an isolated event.

I ate a hair.

It was in a peanut butter sandwich I was eating. I didn't know it was there until it was halfway down my gullet and when I noticed it, I knew I was screwed. I reached in and grabbed ahold of the bottom of the hair and started pulling. But the hair was all mixed in with the bread and peanut butter and would not budge, no matter how hard I pulled. I yanked and yanked and yanked and yanked and do you know what happened?

I gave my myself a damned throat paper cut with that hair.

Sweat, Sh*t and Stuffing Brown Paper Towels Down Your Armpits

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 21:38:00 +0000

So I've been taking 'Hollywood' meetings for my Calliope Reaper-Jones book series. People that might (but probably don't) want to turn my prose into a TV show. It's been a real learning experience...mostly I've learned that no one wants a book author involved in the process of turning said book series into a movie and/or TV show. They just want to take the books, give you a little cash (or the promise of a little cash) and then tell you to piss off.

For me, the whole point of this hope exsanguinating process is to get my foot in the door of the TV show making machine (as a neophyte TVwriter/producer/someday Showrunner) and to keep a little of the original tone of the books intact...but even that (the tone part) is negotiable. I really just want to make stuff and this seemed (at least in the beginning) like a good way to get myself in the game.

But the more I delve into this world, the odder I find it. There are soooooooooooo many people making decisions about development. Not just some big mucky-muck (like Orson Welles at the end of the original - and much better than The Muppets - Muppet Movie) sitting behind a giant desk, sucking on a cigar and pronouncing things like "I...like it!" and "Get this girl a standard contract!"

Instead, there are small fish Development Executives (that give you notes which ultimately conflict completely with the notes their boss will eventually give you), Mid-Level Development Executives, Vice-Presidents in Charge of Development, Presidents in Charge of Development...it just seems like there is an endless supply of people and hoops you have to jump through in order to get anything done.

Of course, everyone is very nice during the process. They offer you water, coffee, tea...Advil. They direct you down movie poster-covered hallways to waiting offices and smile benignly when you ask for the ladies room. It's a sterile and serene experience with no real interactions to speak of (except the one time I pitched the books to my friend, Stacey, which was a fun and much less stressful experience).

Everyone seems to like what you're saying - even if they really don't - and then you're done and dazedly heading to the parking lot with an hour long validation on your parking ticket.

Now I have to admit that the pitch process scares the crap out of me...I get nervous, start sweating profusely from every sweat gland on my body - I once sweat so badly I had to go to the bathroom and stuff scratchy, brown paper towels down into my armpits to soak up the salty sludge - and, finally, just before I go in and start talking, my stomach begins to cramp like a son-of-a-bitch.

So all of the above makes me predispositioned not to enjoy the whole thing anyway...but it's more than just the fight or flight body responses that make me dislike the pitch process.

What bugs me is the fact that everyone just wants a goddamned procedural...a body of the week to keep them satisfied and, frankly, they don't care how they get it.

My books...they're not procedurals...yes, there are some mystery aspects to the plotting, but no body of the week. My books, if they were to be a TV show, would be like Ugly Betty crossed with Bewitched. Silly, funny, New Girl-like, really. (And, yes, I am listening to She and Him as I write this, so bite me.)

Instead, everyone I meet in Hollyweird wants me to rehash Dead Like Me, a show that I loved and that Bryan Fuller already did - and did REALLY WELL. They want my Death's Daughter chasing dead people all around Manhattan, parceling out wisdom and solving body issues...dead body issues.

And they don't want me involved in doing any of it...well, I can watch the show when it's done...help out with the Nielsen numbers.

Ugh.

Baby Partay!¿!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 03:18:00 +0000

I have hit that point in my life where I have become part of the minority. I'm not talking race or gender or sexual orientation...I'm talking something far, far worse.

I'm talking babies.

This year of newly found singleness has been ridiculous. I have like seven friends with kids when last year I just had, like, one.

I thought it was bad enough that I was now one of the 'single females' of the world. Part of the cat-sitting, puppy-watching brigade that is called upon by pet-owner friends to baby-sit their tiny mammals because, ostensibly, we don't have anything better to do with our time. (FYI: I'm not knocking being a free pet sitter, but apparently it's like blood in the water: your friends scent your single-y, female-ness as if they were in possession of shark-like powers.)

But then it got tougher. My friends started to 'seriously' pair off and then - horror! - get married. I felt like a wallflower at the Homecoming Dance, sitting on the bleachers in my orthodontic headgear, hoping someone would take pity on me and ask me to dance.

But no one did.

So I sucked it up and set out to just embrace my singleness. This included working, enjoying time with my (quickly dwindling pool of) single girlfriends and gay, male friends, working, working some more and eating out...a lot. And when I was finally getting used to being the third or fifth or seventh wheel at dinner parties, those married bitches went and did something far worse then ask me to pet sit during the holiday season or try to set me up with inappropriate, single men their husbands knew from work.

They had babies!!

I can't escape them. They are everywhere. And believe me when I tell you that they are taking over the world one live birth at a time.

I went to a Holiday Party last night - thrown by two friends that I adore - but I knew I was in for it when the babies in attendance almost outnumbered the adults. Now, of course, I'm exaggerating - there weren't THAT many babies - but, goddamnit, there really was a whole lot of nursing going on. I found myself starting to crave a milkshake instead of the previously yummy-looking Christmas cookies I'd already put on my plate... and it was frightening. As the night wore on, I became THAT girl, the one catering to the babies, goo-gooing at them, holding them.

I felt my ovaries contract in envy and it made me nauseous.

Now - just on general principle - I've never been a huge fan of parties, but baby parties are even more unsettling. They are bastions of ambivalence: on one hand I am resentful that there are babies there, but, on the other hand, I'm resentful that I don't have my own doula/stroller/burpcloth/carseat/baby.

It's very confusing.

And the lack of single, available guys at a baby party is pathetic...you just find yourself at the mercy of horny, divorced dads who only like you because your car doesn't have a car seat in it.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this post, but I guess I can sum it all up with one word:

CONTRACEPTION

I'm for it.

The Importance Of Kicking The Crap Outta Being Earnest

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 17:33:00 +0000

I'm tired of being the Earnest Girl.

Earnest Girl is my default when I'm in a public forum. It's the 'go to' facet of my personality, the mature, thoughtful part of me who (tries) to say all the right things and make people happy. It's great to trot Earnest Girl out and just click into autopilot, letting her charm people, win over critics - or make them even more insistent if they're so inclined - all with the assurance that she won't get me into any serious kind of trouble.

She's a great gal and I love her dearly, but she's safe and she's easy (not like that!) and she's only a sliver of who I am, really. Earnest Girl gets shelved when I'm relaxed and just being myself because like everyone else out there in the world, I'm a contradiction in terms. I have Earnest Girl all tied up with Silly Girl and Obnoxious Girl and Bitchy Girl...and that's just the tip of the iceberg: it's like Multiple Personality Ping Pong.

With that said, the reason I'm telling you all of this, giving you a little insight into myself, if you will, is that I'd like to retire Earnest Girl from this blog. Maybe every now and then she will make a guest appearance and ask you to do something serious or help out with some charitable cause or get up on a soapbox and preach at you a little bit - but for the most part she will be busy doing other things while Silly, Obnoxious and Bitchy take over the running of this space.

So if you laugh when you read what's on display here then you are on the right track. Once in a blue moon there will be something serious said, but really stop and think about the ridiculousness of the subject matter before you decide to lump it into the Earnest Girl column.*

Ah, I feel better. You can go back to your regularly scheduled life now.

-amber

*For the record I like my face as it is and I could give a crap about automatic faucets vs. manual toilets (okay, I do give a crap, but only in the more literal turn of the phrase)

Bringing Sexy Back - Sorry JT, But This Kicks Your Ass

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 21:19:00 +0000

I have something very serious to address here in this post. Something that should not be taken lightly, nor should it make you laugh:

And this serious issue is the disparity between manual flush toilets and their automatic faucet brethren.

We, as a society, are being overrun by automatic appliances: computers, washing machines, parking meters, coffee makers, self-check out stations at the grocery store...and it seems that this evolution, this continuation in 'progress' is here to stay - whether we like it or not.

But if you are going to automate the world then, please, for God's sake, have a little consistency. If you are going to install an automatic faucet - one whose heat/cold/pressure output cannot be controlled by the user, mind you* - then you better damn well have an automatic toilet, too.

An automatic faucet in a public or semi-public restroom connotes that there will be an automatic toilet in the stall. It's just plain logic, folks...or, at least you think it would be plain logic.*

I cannot tell you how many times I have humiliated myself in front of strangers when they enter a stall after I've 'relieved' myself only to see them recoil in disgust at my failure to manually flush (yes, I know it's a shocker, but I do sometimes go number two), nor can I make you understand just how many tears of frustration I have shed at the discovery that, while in the middle of washing my hands, (which is already a skin drying process because of the low grade soap one consistently finds in a public or semi-public restroom - but that's a whole other blog post) I have forgotten to manually flush the toilet - and will have to return to the scene of the crime, flush, and wash my hands all over again.

This ridiculous disparity must be stopped. It's a travesty - it might very well be spreading e coli and salmonella - and it is seriously making me doubt my powers of observation.

Please, if you agree then tell the world...disseminate your anger on twitter and facebook...spread the word that #automaticfaucet/manualtoiletdisparity will not be tolerated!

-amber

*Although I must go on record that I don't have a problem with automatic toilets and manual faucets working in conjunction. There is no false advertising when you enter a public or semi-public bathroom and find a manual faucet...only a happy surprise when you enter the stall and find an automatic flush toilet in its manual brother's stead!

*This may well be the perfect solution!

How to Wash Your Face After A Face-Lift

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 02:40:00 +0000

There was such an air of neglect in the house this morning that I was more than happy to head over to Culver City and pretend to be a corpse for the day. Apparently, I have a knack for playing dead people. Pretty amazing that a girl with hard core thanatophobia issues is always lying on her back (or front), dead and/or dying. Do I look like I want to be dead? Because it seems that that's the vibe I'm giving off.

It used to be nerdy, shy girls...that was my 'go to' place...but somehow, over the years, this has morphed into blue-lipped dead ladies. Maybe it's the wrinkles on my forehead? When you get wrinkles, does that mean you're only good to play dead people? I watched Charlize Theron in Young Adult and, I swear to God, no matter what horror she inflicted or had inflicted on her, her forehead never creased. Never moved once. I was so fascinated by this wonderment that I spent the entire movie on forehead watch.

Now, I love Charlize Theron, she's a great actress - and maybe she's just genetically predispositioned not to be a forehead wrinkler - but Goddamnit, it was unnerving and it made it really hard for me to focus on the movie.

And it made me start to wonder if I was playing deadies because I had forehead wrinkles.

I started thinking about how to get rid of my dead girl tell. It began to obsess me. So I looked online...

Holy crapola!! They want me to inject things in myself...cut myself at the edge of my scalp and pull my face over my head...ugh...not interested...not because it's gross (it is)...but because I am scared of sharp things - pretty ridiculous coming from a girl who's been shot, stabbed, strangled and bludgeoned for money.

Then I found the thing that was for me.* Something I could do at home. It was ironic that the information came via a woman who looked like she'd blown off the 'thing you could do at home' in favor of one of the injecting/cutting options, but oh, well...

Just FYI: I started doing the exercises right here in the coffee shop I'm sitting in writing this...and I think it's already working, if the stares of adulation I'm getting are any indicator.

So, peeps, when you think of me, think of me fondly and think of me doing my at home deep forehead wrinkle exercises...and pray that if I do them well enough and long enough, the powers that be will let me play a MILF instead of a soulless corpse - hallelujah!

*Uhm, this is the very next video in the cue and it scared me.

Triangle Tara Is Baaaaaaaaack!!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 20:03:00 +0000

Yes, folks, it's that time of year again. When Triangle Tara comes out to play...and raise money for charity! She's been cooped up at my house all year long and now she's itching to make the holiday rounds!

(Get your Triangle Tara right here.)

From December 9th thru December 16th Triangle Tara can be yours for $100 (shipping is free worldwide) - with 100% of the proceeds going directly to the LA Food Bank.

From Dec. 17th thru December 31st Triangle Tara can be yours for $125 (shipping is free worldwide) - with 50% of the proceeds going directly to the LA Food Bank.

Each doll will be signed, personalized (specify how you'd like it personalized in the comment box provided by Paypal) and popped in the mail to the address of your choice!

And if your purse is feeling a little light this year then you can help Triangle Tara in other ways, too:

1. Donate $10 or more directly to the LA Food Bank and send your receipt to Taraforcharity@hotmail.com to be entered in a drawing to win a Triangle Tara or a mystery prize!

2. Share this fundraising event with your peeps on Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Live Journal, and other web/social networking sites then send an email to taraforcharity@hotmail.com and let us know where you posted the news. You'll be entered in a random drawing to win a signed pic!

NOW just sit back and relax in the knowledge that you've helped Triangle Tara feed some hungry peeps this year!