Work

Plastic Not So Fantastic

Last weekend, Ken and I took advantage of the warm fall weather and made a lovely barbecued steak dinner, with roast potatoes and Caesar salad. I was almost finished eating when something caught in my throat. I started to cough but no matter what I did, I couldn’t dislodge it. I figured it was a peppercorn from the sauce and that I would swallow it eventually. It was still bothering me later that night and I started to poke around with my toothbrush—luckily I don’t have a sensitive gag reflex—but I couldn’t feel anything. I tried looking in the mirror but I couldn’t see anything either. I woke up the next morning and it still felt like something was stuck in the back of my throat. And to make things worse, I had a terrible headache and my allergies had kicked into high gear. I was super stuffed up and my face felt swollen. This went on all weekend, and then on Monday morning, I was getting ready for work. I felt another terrible tickle in my throat, coughed hard, and then I felt something in my mouth. I reached in, pulled it out…AND IT WAS A PIECE OF PLASTIC. Like, a piece of plastic you might find in the packaging, say, of a Caesar salad kit. I put it on the tip of my finger to better examine it. It was kind of twisted, and weird, and as I simultaneously went to reach for my reading glasses and yelled for Ken, the damn thing fell off the top of my finger and disappeared.

Ken: What’s wrong?
Me: I… there was…aw f*ck! I was going to show you the piece of plastic that was stuck in my throat but it vanished.
Ken: Plastic? Seriously?
Me: Well, I’d show you and prove it but it flew off my finger and disappeared.
Ken: Suuuure, honey. Let me know if you find it. Are you feeling better now?
Me (mentally taking stock of my feelings and being pleasantly surprised): Yes, I am—it doesn’t feel like I have anything in my throat anymore.

And not only that, my allergies began to calm down—by the end of the day, I was completely back to normal. Normal enough, anyway. But having a piece of plastic embedded in the back of your throat isn’t something I recommend.

In other news, Ken and I are toying with the idea of selling our house and downsizing, so we had a real estate friend come through the other night to tell us what we might need to do to get the house ready for showing, i.e. what furniture and objets d’art would have to be removed. It went as well as expected:

Real Estate Agent: The kitchen seems fine, except for that table by the door.
Me: But that’s the table I use for my purse…
REA: Can you use something else? And what about this trunk and random leather doctor’s bag in the corner?
Me: Well, it’s an “arrangement” but I was planning on selling it–it doesn’t serve any real purpose aside from being pretty, I suppose…

In the family room:

Ken: What about this wall of paintings? A little too much?
Me: Shut up, KEN.
REA: No, artwork is fine…are those ALL Paris?
Ken: Sigh. Yes. They’re all Paris.
Me: It’s a “theme”. Just wait until she sees all the Lego in your bathroom, KEN.
REA: Lego in the bathroom?
Ken: I’m not allowed to decorate with plastic anywhere else in the house.
Me: Don’t talk to me about plastic right now, KEN.

Leggo My Lego; Another New Release Announcement!

I can already tell there’s a piece missing.

The other day I realized that we have approximately 547 pounds of Lego in the house. It’s in bins in the attic, bags in the guest room, totes in the closet…and why, I hear you ask, do you have so much goddamn Lego? Because not only is Ken obsessed with it, and has kept all the Lego ever created since he was a child, but Kate also accrued a sizable collection of Lego kits when she was younger. Even I, myself, although I hate to admit it, became a little fixated on Harry Potter Lego in the early 2000s. Wow, I also hear you say—isn’t all of that Lego worth a lot of money? Well, it would be, if it wasn’t all scattered around the house in bins, bags, and totes. I had a plan, a very clever plan I thought, to just put it all in ziplocks and sell it to one of the toy vendors at the market for a flat cost and then give the money to Kate since most of the Lego was either hers or bestowed up her as part of her inheritance to begin with, but when I broached the idea with my 23 year-old boss, he was horrified:

Boss: But you could make so much more money if you just put it together and sold the completed kits!
Me: Do I look like I have twenty-three years to deal with this?
Boss: But you said you had all the manuals—how hard can it be?

So I thought, what the heck—I’m pretty good at building stuff, and if I could make Kate a lot more cash by completing some of the models, then I’d give it a whirl. And you know what? It was almost f*cking impossible. Every bin I pulled down from the attic contained half a build, and I was running back and forth, trying to find the rest of the pieces, which had magically ended up in a number of completely different bins. Luckily, I had several bags of ‘extra’ parts—at least I hope they’re extra and not part of yet another Lego kit that I’ll never be able to finish. At one point, I spent a literal half hour looking for a long grey piece with 2 rows of 12 little knobs and I never did find it. 60 000 pieces of Lego and not a f*cking sign of it. And it’s not like the old days when I was a kid and the bricks were primary colours and 5 basic shapes—now most of the kits come with like a thousand unique accessory pieces in a variety of colours and if you don’t have them, you can’t substitute anything else to complete a set. Ultimately, I managed to finish a bunch of space alien-type Exoforce (?) kits, some cars and trucks, a few Star Wars spacecraft, and a couple of other things, and then I packed the rest of it up for another day, a day far into the future when Kate is rich and doesn’t need my Lego blood money.

And then there’s this ad for…well, is this what we’re calling them now? But I do love the use of quotation marks:

Mousetrap Update: I didn’t find it in any of the Lego bins. Also, I took apart the skirting around our kitchen island and looked under it, but the mousetrap wasn’t there either. Nor was it in the space between the stove and the counter. We have now looked in every conceivable spot that an errant mousetrap could find itself, and I’m stymied. Also peeved. Also a little freaked out, like did someone break into our house, see the mousetrap on the floor and steal it, along with my second favourite purse and a small makeup bag that were also in that kitchen and that I’m also missing?

One last update: As the Editor of DarkWinter Press, I’m thrilled to announce our release of Cecilia Kennedy’s new short story collection Twenty-Four-Hour Shift: Dark Tales from on and off the Clock! Here’s a synopsis—it’s now available on Amazon and you can purchase either the paperback or Kindle edition by clicking here!

“Punch in your time card to begin the shift. The twenty-four dark tales of short fiction in this collection explore the unsettling things that might linger on and off the clock. Here, you’ll find short stories of work-related haunts and happenings, from the truly sinister (a human-vending machine restaurant), to horror-comedy (a photo shoot with possessed bunnies). But in the hours in between, it can’t be forgotten that the roles played as parents, co-workers, and friends are no ordinary side hustle. That work never ends. And the work shift? Well, that’s the thing that makes you peek over your shoulder and ask, “What just moved?” But you have to clock in to find out.“

“Orange” You Glad The Rock Tumbler Is Done?

First, an update. The rock tumbler has finally stopped its machinations. It hasn’t been quite a week yet since I added the last grit, but we’ve lost power twice in the meantime, which kicks the tumbler off until we restart it, and honestly, I don’t have the patience to wait 5 more days. I took the rocks out and rinsed them in a colander and I think they look really beautiful, although at least half of them are a LOT smaller than they started out to be, and some of the smaller ones have disappeared completely, which I suppose is only natural, or unnatural I suppose, since it’s really an accelerated process, and finally, a lot of them, unexpectedly, are ORANGE. I got a lot of fantastic ideas from the comments in my last post, including using broken vintage wine goblets to make “sea glass”, so that’s next on the agenda if the weather continues charming. Well, it was charming today, but’s it’s been a shitstorm of a week weather-wise here. The west half of the country, which is usually soaking wet, is burning, and in my part of the world, it’s been raining non-stop. Ken and I were looking at videos of Atlas from August two years ago, and the front lawn was crispy and brown; this August, it’s as lush and green. But here are the “fruits” of my labours:

At any rate, I don’t have anything else specific to focus on this week, so here are a few vignettes:

1) I had to work yesterday at the antique market because they were short-staffed. As I went by a booth that sells mostly lamps, I saw a family of four standing in it, surrounded by the lamps. The father was smelling his fingers, and as I watched, he offered them to his wife, who also smelled them somewhat appraisingly and furrowed her brow. Then it was the oldest child’s turn—he pointed at one of the lamps questioningly, and then the dad shrugged. Did I ask what they were doing? No, I DID NOT. Did I go back later and smell the lamps myself? Also, NO, I DID NOT. There are some things you’re better off not knowing.

2) Last week, I was on Facebook Marketplace and I saw this ad:

And I have several things to say about this. First, Jacquie Butler is a strange name for a cat, but I kind of like it, like I can imagine being upstairs and wanting your cat to come and snuggle you and calling out, “Jacquie—get your sweet little Butt-ler up here!”. Second, I’m very impressed that Jacquie the cat has not only mastered the use of a computer keyboard but has her own private messaging service AND a private income. And finally, if you know anything at all about cats, this ad makes total sense. Every cat I’ve ever known has loved boxes and will sit in them whenever the opportunity arises. And not just boxes—I read once that if you created a square on your floor with painter’s tape and your cat saw it, your cat would immediately come over and sit inside the square. I didn’t believe it until we tried it, and our cat at the time, Raven, ran over without any hesitation and sat right in the middle of it. I’ll bet Jacquie would do the same thing, given her penchant for boxes and all.

3) And while I was browsing Marketplace, I saw this ad for a free computer:

My only thought was this: Are they still together, and he’s going to give away her Macbook without telling her? Also, why would you not at least try to get your money back? Macbooks are way too expensive for revenge giveaways. And was she cheating with another man, or did she cheat on a diet, like she ate the birthday cake after she promised to cut down on calories? I’m torn—I kind of want to know the whole back story, while at the same time, I don’t want to know the whole back story. Somehow though, I think his wife is better off without either him or the computer. Maybe she was the one who posted the laughing emoji response.

I also have to work today, so let’s hope there’s no more lamp-smelling shenanigans. Wish me luck.

On The Rocks

When my brother and I were kids, we had a rock tumbler. It was a messy, noisy contraption and I don’t remember if we ever got any decent rocks from it—I just remember dirty water spilling everywhere, and then I never saw it again, which was fine by me. When Kate was little, she, like most small children, loved shiny rocks and would pick up ‘special’ ones from beaches, driveways, gravel pathways, literally anywhere rocks could be found (and when I say ‘most children’ I also mean adults because I’ve been known over the course of decades to randomly slip a pretty stone in my pocket). By the time she was in middle school, Kate had amassed quite a collection and we even had a special shelf for her to display her treasures on. So I bought another rock tumbler. It wasn’t a very expensive one and that soon became obvious, as it created a stunning wall of sound that could be heard all over the house. You may or may not know that I suffer from misophonia (another fun offshoot of OCD), and the racket and my anxiety were so bad that at the end of the first cycle, I gave up. “We’ll get a better rock tumbler,” I said, my ears still ringing.

I didn’t bother for a long time, almost as long as it takes a rock tumbler to actually create smooth, shiny gemstones, then a couple of years ago, I saw a very expensive National Geographic model on Facebook Marketplace but the person selling it was asking a very cheap price (I wonder why?) It came with all the rocks, extra grit, and all kind of accessories, and it promised that the rubberized barrel made it “very quiet”. That was a LIE. We set it up in our back family room, and while it wasn’t as loud as the previous model, I could still hear it rumbling and grumbling all day from anywhere on the main floor. I persevered though (mostly because Ken put a sound-dampening cardboard box over it), and eventually got some very nice rocks that I made into necklaces, and I gave them to people while quoting Jean Jaques Rousseau: The sacrifice which costs us nothing is worth nothing. And the people who received the necklaces looked at me the way you can imagine they looked when I said that, but I think they appreciated the gift.

At any rate, I put the rock tumbler away for a bit. Then Ken, who gets that I have a real issue with loud noises, promised that in the spring, we could put it outside in the new workshop he built for me where I wouldn’t have to listen to it, and that was a great plan except because the rock tumbler was in storage in his workshop, I forgot about it. Until 6 weeks ago, when I was going through my stuff outside and I found it in a corner. And I haven’t told you about this for over 6 weeks, because that’s almost the amount of time it takes to polish a bunch of damn rocks in the tumbler, and there’s only one more week left before I have pretty, shiny jewels! I’m on the last grit now, and they keep looking smoother and smoother, and the best part is that because it’s outside, I can only faintly hear the tumbler if I’m in the back yard, and it’s just background noise along with the birds and wind and whatnot. Everything’s going so well that I spent half an hour on Saturday browsing Amazon for more rock kits, and come Christmas time, everyone’s getting a necklace, and this time, all I have to say is, “I made this for you.”

In other news, I still suck at math. Last week at work, I rang through a customer’s purchases, entered the amount of cash he gave me, then proceeded to start gathering up his change:

Customer (holds out more money): Would it help if I gave you $1.10?
Me: (stares blankly, frozen in horror)
Customer: I said, would it help if I gave you $1.10?
Me: It won’t NOW!
My 27-Year-Old Boss: Suzanne, do you need me to do some math for you?
Me (whispers sadly): Yes.

I’m lucky I’m surrounded by people who understand me so well.

And 2 huge thank yous: First to D. Wallace Peach at Myths Of The Mirror for her terrific review of my humour book What Any Normal Person Would Do and second to Paul Brookes at The Wombwell Rainbow for his lovely review of my newest short story collection At The End Of It All!

Meet Me In Paris

I’m very sad right now, because last night I was surfing Facebook Marketplace in bed and I saw a Paris painting for sale for only $35. My heart leapt and I showed it to Ken. “Look!” I said. “It’s so beautiful!” and then under my breath I whispered, “I really just love it”, hoping beyond all hope that Ken would spring into action and offer to take me there in the morning to buy it. That didn’t happen mostly because Ken looked at it, kind of confused, and then went back to sleep. Which is probably a good thing, because I currently have very many many paintings of Paris. You may or may not know that for a long time, I’ve been obsessed with vintage paintings of Paris. You also may or may not have seen the type I’m referring to, the impressionistic ones that look really drippy and weird from up close, but from far away begin to resemble a street full of shops and cafes, with people strolling along, and the Eiffel Tower or the Arc de Triomphe in the background. I adore them—they’re not expensive and whenever I’m feeling down, I look at one and imagine myself wandering down a rainy Paris rue, and it makes me feel better. The problem is, Ken hates them:

Me: Ooh, look! A Paris painting!
Ken: You already have 16 of the damn things. No more!
Me: But this one would be perfect for my bathroom…

So now, if I see one, I have to promise I’m only buying it to resell it. Which I’ve done a couple of times, but apparently there aren’t many other people as obsessed with Paris paintings as I am, because they tend to sit in my antiques booth for a while. But last weekend, I was in the midst of rearranging furniture in the hope of turning the alcove in our bedroom into a “reading nook”, when it suddenly occurred to me that a Paris painting was exactly what the nook needed, and I knew exactly where to find one. In fact, a painting of the perfect size had been languishing in my booth for several months and I was planning on going there last Sunday afternoon to put some fresh stock in. “This is perfect,” I thought to myself. “I’ll bring it home with me.”

When I arrived, my boss greeted me enthusiastically at the door. “Guess what!” he exclaimed jovially. “You just sold those two Paris paintings, you know, the ones that have been here for months. Literally half an hour ago—you just missed it!”

“No!” I gasped. He looked confused, both of us being in the “selling of things” business, so I had to explain my lack of excitement.

“Never mind,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll find another one.”

The very next day, I did. And it broke my heart.

I was at Goodwill, a charity shop, after work on Monday to drop off some odds and ends from the alcove mentioned above. I was helping the girl unload my car, when suddenly a man sauntered past us through the parking lot. He was CARRYING A PARIS PAINTING. And it was a beautiful one, in an antique frame. I could see the Arc de Triomphe from where I stood, stunned and speechless, box of knick knacks in hand. I cannot accurately convey the sense of horror I felt as I watched him get in his car and drive away, knowing that if I’d been there half an hour earlier AGAIN, the painting would have been mine.

And because I’m a grown-ass woman, I didn’t cry, although I badly wanted to. No, I did what any normal person would do—I called Ken:

Me: The universe hates me! I just missed out on a gorgeous Paris painting by like half an hour!
Ken: Hahahahaha!
Me: Why are you laughing?!

I tell you all of this not to elicit sympathy—in fact, you’re probably thinking Ken was right to laugh, and I really don’t need another painting of a city I’ve never been to—but that’s not the point. The point is, in fact, that the universe is taunting me, and I don’t know why.

Here are some thoughts:

1. The universe hates me.
2. The universe hates Paris.
3. The universe agrees with Ken that I have enough paintings of Paris.
4. The universe doesn’t care about me at all, and things are just random.

But then, the next day, I happened to glance up and realized that in an obscure corner of my office, there was a small Paris painting hanging there, and wouldn’t it be better placed in the new reading nook than tucked away in a spot where Ken can’t see it? See, I’m nothing if not thoughtful, and maybe the universe loves me after all. And if Ken really loved me too, he’d take me to Paris–or at least take me to the city where that $35 Paris painting is waiting…

In other news, things have been incredibly busy around here, what with the Writer-In-Residence role and the launch of the new press. I’ve already signed six authors–3 for the fall and 3 for the spring–and I’ll be making an announcement about that on August 16 so stay tuned!

(Update: Ken read this and because he’s awesome, he immediately said, “If you want the painting so much, we can get it tomorrow.” So later today, it will be mine…mwah hah hah!)

All The Wascally Wabbits

If you’re around the same age as me, or even older or younger, you may be familiar with “Bunnykins” china. This is a pattern made by Royal Doulton featuring adorable anthropomorphized rabbits and it’s been a staple of baby showers, christening gifts, and Christmas presents for decades. I had a Bunnykins bowl, mug, and plate when I was a child, and my daughter also had one. Even today, they’re still popular and I sell a lot of them at the antique market. The other day, I was offered a really good deal on a box of Bunnykins china—plates, bowls, mugs, and egg cups—and I couldn’t say no. I brought the box home and started to unpack it, showing each piece to Ken, until he looked at one carefully and his brow furrowed:

Ken: What the hell is going on HERE?
Me: What are you talking about? It was a really good deal.
Ken: Not that. What are these rabbits DOING?!

It was in that moment that I realized two things. First, that I had never actually looked closely at the rabbits on the china, and second, that the rabbits on the china are INSANE. On one plate, the mother rabbit, who’s dressed like a character from Little House on the Prairie, is apparently trying to hang wallpaper (?) and she’s being swarmed by an assortment of lagamorphic “helpers” who are systematically destroying both the wallpaper and the room she’s trying to redecorate. One bunny has dumped a bucket of paste on another’s head, there’s ripping and tearing and randomly, and a mouse is running away with one of the rolls.

On a different piece, a bowl, the same mother rabbit is losing her sh*t because she’s taken her bunnies shopping and they’ve overturned a vegetable cart and are now rioting like an insurrectionist mob. They’re stomping on cabbages, throwing potatoes, and the same random mouse is part of the mayhem AGAIN. And on a mug, there was a scene of the mother and her horde at the butcher’s shop, only the butcher was a pig dressed in an apron and hat, and he was selling her what LOOKED LIKE PORK while her bunny babies destroyed his shop. Exactly what kind of life lessons is Royal Doulton trying to teach young children? Because it seems very subversive and violent and all the people who buy Bunnykins china because “it’s so cute” have obviously never looked closely at it either because I think the person who created these scenes is an anarchist and I’m surprised that none of this china has hidden messages on it like “Rabbits cannot make the revolution. Rabbits can only be the revolution.” Seriously—if you have any of this stuff in your house, take a good long look at it—and then go vandalize something.

Speaking of taking a good long look at something, the other day, I was on Facebook Marketplace and I saw an ad for a “Leather Reclining Couch” that made me look at it for a very long time, mostly because I was trying to figure out what the hell was going on, like either the guy was completely unaware that his photos were being used for the ad, or it was the most clever marketing ploy since Royal Doulton created their bunnies with an attitude. 

I call this first picture “Paint Me Like One Of Your French Girls” and it’s a very good example of how you can use this couch in a very suggestive way. The second picture I’ve dubbed “The Thinker” because he’s obviously deep in thought, contemplating how to blow up a space station or whatnot.

And in the last picture, he’s obviously emulating the famous painting by Henry Wallis entitled The Death of Chatterton.

All I know is that the couch is “Pending” which means someone is planning on buying it, and I really hope for their sake that this guy comes with it.

The Cleaner Part Deux

You may remember a few weeks ago, I wrote about how the owner of the antique market where I work had hired a cleaner, and he looked exactly like a ‘cleaner’, which is to say, someone who cleans up after assassins and whatnot. He’s been cleaning one day a week ever since, and he does a very thorough job, almost like he’s used to a VERY DEMANDING CLIENTELE, if you know what I mean. He doesn’t speak much, just the normal good morning, or “where do you keep the Windex” and up until now, I haven’t had any actual conversations with him, which I realized last week was probably a good thing.

I usually take my lunch around 1:30 in the small breakroom we have for staff, and last week, as I was beginning my lunch, The Cleaner was finishing his. I sat down at the table and we exchanged pleasantries. I started eating. And then he started talking:

The Cleaner: So do you think Covid is over?
Me: Huh? Oh. I don’t think so—I know a lot of people are still getting it.
The Cleaner: Do you believe that it was created in a lab overseas by the governments of the world so that they could kill off a lot of the world’s population? Because the world is very overpopulated.
Me (chewing food): Uh…no…
The Cleaner: There’s a large proportion of the world’s population who are old, and this way the government could kill them and then they wouldn’t have to pay them their pensions.
Me: That sounds like a very complicated and strange conspiracy theory.
The Cleaner: It was definitely created by the world’s governments.
Me: I don’t believe that. Anyway, do you think it’s going to rain later?

And while the conversation was bizarre, the weirdest thing was that the whole time he was talking, he was staring out the window, like he was lost in thought and musing, almost wistful. And then he smiled, and he only had four teeth.

In other news, right before Ken and I went away, I needed to buy more underwear, so I went to Winners, a fairly big department store, and wasn’t I thrilled to find not only a 6 pack of really nice underwear but the brand was LUCKY BRAND and every pair has a 4 LEAF CLOVER embroidered on it, so now every day is a lucky day.

And in other, other news, I guess the lucky underwear panned out, because I’ve just accepted the position of ‘Summer Writer-In-Residence’ for our local county library system, dividing my time between four different branches this summer, running writing workshops, hosting guests, and mentoring other writers. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do, and it really is a dream come true. Thanks, Lucky Brand.

Driving Cats And Demon Dolls

I was driving home from work one day last week, and I called Ken. This is a feat unto itself, as I have to yell “Kenneth” into my steering wheel and then contend with the voice-calling woman who inevitably says “Did you say ‘Kenneth’?” and it doesn’t matter how many times or how loud I say it, I always have to reassure her that I did, indeed, mean Kenneth. So while I was waiting for the phone to connect, I was stopped at a red light and I happened to glance over at the car next to me just as Ken picked up.

Ken: Hey, are you on your way home?
Me: OH MY GOD!

Because in the driver’s seat of the car next to me, there was A CAT. And it was the cutest cat, a little orange tabby, and it was sitting on the lap of the woman driving the car, but the way she and the cat were sitting, it looked like the cat was DRIVING. The cat was staring straight ahead like it was waiting for the light to change and whatnot, and as I was staring at it in full worship mode, the cat turned to look at me out the driver’s side window. So I did what any normal person would do—I smiled my best smile and waved to the cat. The cat smiled back, although it didn’t wave, which is normal because everyone knows how important it is to keep both hands/paws on the steering wheel at all times, a rule that I don’t always adhere to when there ARE CATS. But the woman upon whose lap the cat was sat DID smile and wave back, which confused me because I wasn’t waving TO HER. But then I realized that she was obviously friends with the cat and if I wanted to get in good with the cat, I should probably be nice to her, so I nodded to her in a congenial way then turned my attention back to the cat and mouthed, “Hey!” And then the cat kind of meowed in response, at which point I realized that Ken was talking to me and was very worried that I wasn’t answering. Because I was TALKING TO THE CAT, KEN.

Then the light turned green and we drove off, and then I was really sad.

Me: I’ll never see that cat again.
Ken: But you made a good impression.
Me: I hope so.

My aunt’s cat, Rupert. He would drive if you let him.

In other news, I was recently searching online for a floor lamp (they are literally impossible to find, and I have this giant stained-glass lampshade that I got for free so if I can find a lamp base for it, I’d be so thrilled) when I came upon this bizarre ad.

The owner of the doll is definitely not too old for dolls, considering that the spelling and grammar are those of a six-year-old—in fact, I think the problem is that the doll is too old for HER because it looks like it’s lived a very long and complex life. And the pictures—seriously, isn’t this the kind of doll that would murder you in your sleep just for sh*ts and giggles?

“What’s that hiding in the tree?”

“Oh, that’s Marnie—she wants to cut out your tongue and eat your liver, but don’t worry—she can’t run very fast, so you can get a good head start.”

Of course, I’ve been watching that show Yellowjackets, so now I’m suspicious of anything that looks like a teenaged girl, and Marnie reminds me of ALL OF THEM. And although I’ve dubbed her ‘Marnie’, her name, according to the ad, is Ginger Hair Baby Doll, which is kind of a stripper name when you think about it, like “Please welcome to the stage—Ginger-Hair Baby Doll! And remember folks, she possesses demon powers so make sure you tip big!”

And now that I’ve posted this, I have to get ready to take Kate to a city several hours away where she’ll be moving in with her boyfriend and starting her new career as a veterinary technician. We have a 15-foot U-Haul and two cars full of stuff–I just wish we had a cat who could help with the driving.

Who Ya Gonna Call?

Last week, the building where I work was visited by a couple of ghost hunters who have a Youtube channel. They did a walkthrough and pointed out several areas that they felt were haunted. For example, one of the women pointed to the freight elevator and claimed that it was haunted by a worker who had fallen down the shaft. Now, I’m no skeptic, but as someone who is terrified of elevators and who is forced, on occasion, to run the freight elevator, I did extensive research on whether or not this was actually possible, and it’s not. The elevator won’t move if any of the doors are open, and you can’t open any of the doors unless the elevator is right there. So sorry, ghostbusters—that one was just your imagination. They also claimed that a vase in a booth on the second floor was haunted—they speculated that the person who had owned the vase was super-pissed off because her possessions had been sold and left to languish in a dusty old factory, BUT…she was also thrilled to be noticed. I can’t prove that one wrong, except to say that if anything IS haunted in the building, it’s the life-sized animatronic Hallowe’en character Michael Myers who, when plugged in, swivels around in time to the movie’s music and slashes the arm carrying his knife up and down. But that’s not the scary part. Even when he’s not plugged in, his eyes follow you EVERYWHERE, and I regularly hang a pink handbag from his arm and put a Barbie tank top on him, but the next time I see him, THEY’RE GONE. And he looks even madder than when Laurie poked out his eye with a coat hanger, because he likes to be pretty in pink.

But the best part of the whole spooky ghost adventure was they claimed one of the most haunted spots was on the second floor, in a booth called Fox and Feather Vintage. And do you know why I believe THAT? Because that used to be MY booth before I moved downstairs to the main floor! And that explains why I never sold anything out of there—too many bad vibes, I guess. And the bad vibes have continued because I was talking to the vendor who rents it now and she said her sales have been terrible. Not surprising. But now that my suspicions have been confirmed, I want that booth back, if only to sell stuff like this that I found on Facebook Marketplace:

Haunted frame? Why not? In fact, my only question is why is there a brown Crayola marker next to it? Is it for scale? Or is there a more insidious reason, like that ghost lady enjoys arts and crafts? I know—arts and crafts are not necessarily insidious—depending on what exactly the ghost is drawing. And the condition–“Used-Fair”? Not “Used-Possibly Dangerous”? I really want to buy it just to find out whether or not it’s really haunted, because it seems like the person who owns it isn’t sure, like they’re hedging their bets with “possibly” haunted, instead of “goddamn right it’s haunted house down boots”.

In other news, I’ve decided to start my own press, as an extension of DarkWinter Literary Magazine. It’s going to be called DarkWinter Press. I won’t be publishing my own work, but as soon as I get it set up, I’ll be looking for some projects. First though—if anyone on here has some experience with how to format things for Kindle Direct Publishing (eg: what program to use, how to do covers and images etc.) I’d be happy to touch base. I already managed to set up my account thanks to D. Wallace Peach of Myths of the Mirror and her support, but I know there’s still a ton to learn. Regardless, I’m as excited as a ghost in a vase or Michael Myers in a Barbie t-shirt.

Also, I recently competed in The Evil Squirrel’s Nest Annual Contest of Whatever and the Squirrel has posted all the entries prior to the final judgement. You can read them here!

Also, also–Happy Easter to those who celebrate it!

The Cleaner

A couple of weeks ago, the owner of the antique market where I work came in. I was with a customer, and when I finished, he called me over. “Come here, Susan,” he said. “I need to talk to you.” I immediately went into panic mode, thinking I was going to get fired for writing a short story about the antique market (it’s called ‘Revenge of the Juggernaut’ and you can read it in At The End Of It All, which is a totally shameless plug for my new short story collection) and he must have realized that I looked like I was about to run out of the building, because he followed up with, “Don’t worry, it’s good news.”

Good news? Was I about to get a raise whilst at the same time my hours were being reduced so that I could work less and make more? Was there a secret office hockey pool that I hadn’t known I’d entered that I had just won? And if you know anything about me at all, you know that I know nothing about hockey at all, but I still managed to do incredibly well in my last office hockey pool, even though I picked my players solely on the basis of them having cool last names (I’m looking at you, William Nylander, whose name rhymes with Highlander, and as legend tells us, there can be only one). But no, I hadn’t won anything, and then I got even more nervous when he told me the news.

Owner: I wanted to tell you that we hired a cleaner.
Me: (air quotes) A ‘cleaner’?…What kind of ‘cleaner’?
Owner (befuddled): Someone to clean.
Me: Clean WHAT exactly?

Maybe I’ve watched too many mob films, TV dramas, and John Wick movies, because to ME, a cleaner is someone who cleans up, like, dead bodies and whatnot. And I was pretty sure that we only sold antiques at work, but maybe THAT was just a front for something much more insidious, which would explain why my young boss quite often gets hedgy when I ask him questions like, “What happened to that vendor on the third floor?” or “What were you doing here so early this morning?”

But the owner quickly (maybe TOO quickly, which is exactly what a mob boss would do) clarified that he had hired a person to clean the bathrooms, vacuum, mop the floors, sweep the stairs and so on, and he would be coming every Wednesday. “Isn’t that wonderful?” he said. “Now you don’t have to do it any more. Of course, there will still be weekly maintenance but the majority of the cleaning will be done on Wednesday, so you don’t have to mop the floors or scrub the toilets any more.” And he said this like he honestly thought I had EVER scrubbed the toilets. I have, however, probably once a week, mopped the floors in the bathrooms, so it was a pleasant surprise, even though I had literally just finished mopping the floors and now all I could think was “Damn, if I’d only waited until Tuesday.”

Nevertheless, on Wednesday, we were all very excited for the cleaner to arrive. Which he did. And almost immediately, one of my co-workers leaned over and whispered to me:

Co-Worker: THAT’S the cleaner?
Me: Apparently. He looks like…a cleaner.
Co-Worker: I know, right?! What do you think he cleans, when he’s not cleaning here?
Me: I couldn’t begin to say, but he definitely looks like…a cleaner.

And what we meant was, we had never seen a person who looked more like a person who cleaned up murder scenes and mob hits in our lives. If there was an epitome of someone who ‘cleaned’ for a living, that was this guy, who looks kind of like Chazz Palminteri’s cousin. We spent the morning expecting to see large white trash bags, or at least rolled-up carpets being hurried out of the building by a team of his henchman, but sadly, all he did was wash down the toilets, vacuum up all the rock salt from the carpets, mop the floors, and sweep the stairs. And he did an amazing job–almost like he was a…PROFESSIONAL.

In other news, my Canadian publisher recently sent me the cover mock-up for my new novel, the sequel to The Seventh Devil, called The Devil You Know. And I couldn’t be happier about it. The book won’t be out for a while–I just got the printer’s proofs to check, but here’s the cover if you haven’t seen it on Facebook or whatever: