Image courtesy of Concorede Pictures.
“Chopping Mall” stars Kelli Maroney as Alison Parks, Tony O’Dell as Ferdy Meisel, Russell Todd as Rick Stanton, Karrie Emerson as Linda Stanton, Barbara Crampton as Suzie Linn, and Nick Segal as Greg Williams. Directed by Jim Wynorski. Rated R… READ MORE
The sadists I work with on the wired desk have a game they play from June 1 to Nov. 30.
They know I am fascinated by hurricanes. They see my tracking charts featuring the scribbled admonition that he who steals this chart will die of earworms.
Worst of all, they know I am always anxious to study the satellite photographs.
We receive three satellite photographs each day. The first is transmitted at about 4 a.m., the second at 4 p.m. and the last at 9:30 p.m. Each has its own idiosyncrasies. The morning photo has poor resolution. The afternoon photo is usually sharp, and more closely represents the extent of the cloud cover. This is the photo we publish in the newspaper. The night photo exaggerates the cloud cover, but it can give you an idea of trends in a storm’s movement.
At any rate, I want to see them all. Enter the sadists.
My desk used to be next to the Laserphoto receiver and I could quickly intercept any photographs entering its collection tray. But now my desk is located across the room. Now I must rely on the good graces of the wire desk to supply me with satellite photos.
Ha ha ha ha ha, boy am I a schmuck. Relying on the good graces of the wire desk is like hiring a 40-foot python to babysit small children.
The game goes like this:
1. I am sitting across the room, minding my own business, when suddenly I hear the telltale click of a Laserphoto being cut and fed into the collection tray. All eyes on the wire desk also turn to the Laserphoto machine, as if were a slot machine that had just rung up four cherries.
2. Somebody on the wire desk leaps up and snares the photo.
3. A triumphant “AH HA!” rings across the newsroom.
4. The satellite photo is held so that everybody on the wire desk may see it, but not I.
5. Suddenly, everybody on the wire desk becomes an expert at interpreting satellite photography. “Looks like a suspicious cloud mass in the Caribbean,” they shout in delight. “Yes sir, I see evidence of a circulation in that cloud mass,” or, “Are those spiral bands beginning to form in that Atlantic disturbance?”
6. They sneak peeks at me and titter like schoolgirls. They want me to get p and come over there and try to beg for the photo, but I know they’d pass it from person to person in a perverse game of keep-away, so I refuse to act like I’m interested.
7. They raise the stakes by saying in loud voices, “Uh oh, this looks like a Category 5 storm to me. I don’t think we better let Del see this. I think we should tear this up and burn it. Del wouldn’t be interested, anyway.”
8. The final act in the game involves my capitulation, where I must prostrate myself and shout, “Come on you slimes, gimme that satellite photo. PLEEEZE?” This always is greeted with malicious merriment, especially if I have to get down on my knees and grovel.
Now isn’t that sick?
This column was published in the Playground Daily News sometime in the 1980s, possibly 1986, and is used with permission.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone's stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra's Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone's comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled "December" for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman's Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone's novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild's award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida's best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn't look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
The sadists I work with on the wired desk have a game they play from June 1 to Nov. 30. They know I am fascinated by hurricanes. They see my tracking charts featuring the scribbled admonition that he who steals… READ MORE
Filmmakers would have you believe every hour of every day is fraught with adventure.
The typical cinematic day begins with an illicit love affair followed by a mysterious telephone call, a car chase and a narrowly averted assassination attempt.
But life rarely imitates art.
This occurred to me recently as I was standing in an office supply store. The clerk had just told me IBM manufactures a ribbon cassette that is compatible with my Royal typewriter.
That made me happy – inordinately happy. And I didn’t know why.
After all, small success stores such as these are not the stuff of which entertainment is made. Had I not been taught by 25 years of watching television and movies that a person could not be truly happy unless he were realizing his most extravagant dreams?
It had been a good day, so far, and as I went over the events that had made it that kind of day, I began to remember something many of us often forget under the barrage of video and celluloid fantasies.
That morning, I finally discovered a place where our writers’ group could meet. I belong to the Redneck Riviera Writers Group. We get together twice a month and compare notes on the business of writing. We had been meeting at people’s homes, or local eateries, but it soon became obvious that if we were to expand beyond our current membership of five people, we would have to find a permanent meeting place.
After a fruitless search, we found a new home at the YMCA, courtesy of Joe Lukaszewski. That made me feel good.
Something else nice happened that morning. I found a book of Ramsey Campbell short stories I hadn’t known existed. I’m a student of the short story and Campbell is a bona fide master. The book should be fascinating.
I also picked up what I think will be the perfect gift for a friend. It, too, is a book of short stories, but these are special. I had never seen the book outside of the one copy I’d been hoarding for myself. Now she can enjoy it too.
Pop artist Andy Warhol died recently. In one of his obituaries I came across a reference to a movie of his titled “Sleep.” The movie depicted a person sleeping. That’s it. Two hours of a person sleeping. The entertainment virtues of the film are less than debatable, but I think I understand what Warhol might have been saying.
The small, mundane successes and failures – things that would end up on the cutting room floor – are the body and texture of life. They are what make life an endlessly fascinating experience. Spilling coffee on the living room carpet. Finding a letter from a friend in your mailbox. The thousand things that you forget a day after they’ve happened. They are what get us through accomplishments to crises.
So it was a pretty good day.
This column was previously published in the Playground Daily News in the 1980s and is reprinted here with permission.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone's stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra's Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone's comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled "December" for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman's Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone's novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild's award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida's best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn't look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
Filmmakers would have you believe every hour of every day is fraught with adventure. The typical cinematic day begins with an illicit love affair followed by a mysterious telephone call, a car chase and a narrowly averted assassination attempt. But… READ MORE
As Rosanne Rosannadanna said many times, I thought I was gonna die.
The alarm clock ticked off the remaining moments of my peace and then it buzzed; my second thought – the first being that I had passed away in my sleep – was that I had awakened into some unhealthy person’s body.
I hurt everywhere. My back hurt. My throat, my ears, my chest – they all hurt. This wasn’t the body I had fallen asleep in. This was a boy on the verge of going belly up.
I had a cold.
A cold leaves me just sick enough to make life miserable, but no so sick that I feel I have to stay in bed. It seems a shame to lounge around in bed when I could be getting work done, but when I actually do those things I begin to wish I’d lounged around in bed.
I don’t know why I hadn’t foreseen this cold. Everybody in the office was sick, and relatives who were visiting were similarly smitten. When you are surrounded by people who are breeding germs faster than you can kill them, your chances of surviving unaffected are slim.
This cold was shaping up into a real barn-burner. My throat felt like Patton and his boys had chased Rommel through it. My head was stopped up and I could bells ringing – symptoms of a fever. And though the temperature outside was a balmy 73 degrees, I was freezing.
The thought of sweating it out at the office – and I use the term “sweating it out” purely in the abstract – was about as palatable as having a tooth pulled, so I phoned in sick. The building at work is usually 40 below zero, what with out overzealous air-conditioning system. I always go to work unless I’m not ambulatory, but since I felt SO bad, and since I’m OVER 30, I decided age has hits perks and this was one of them.
I lay in bed the entire day. The minutes were like hours. I would doze, look at my watch, doze a while longer, look at my watch, see that only 10 minutes had passed, doze again, knock off another five minutes. I did manage to stay awake long enough to watch “Jeopardy.”
The radio made no sense that day. I remember hearing an endless series of weather forecasts. You’d be amazed how many times radio stations give the weather forecast. I found myself comparing the weather forecast to my internal weather forecast: “Cloudy with a chance of showers today; severe thunderstorms tonight, with locally heavy rainfall possible.” Yep. That was about right.
Being sick all day means that you are awake all night and sicker still. I remember looking at the alarm clock and thinking it said 1 a.m. Then the living room clock began to toll and I counted 12 gongs.
As I write this, I am sick. I don’t feel like going back through and cleaning it up. It is freezing in here. I’m counting the minutes until 6 p.m. so I can get to the break room and eat one of those moon pie things and take more drugs.
I think I’m gonna die.
This column was originally published in the Playground Daily News in 1986 and is reprinted with permission.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone's stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra's Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone's comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled "December" for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman's Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone's novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild's award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida's best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn't look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
As Rosanne Rosannadanna said many times, I thought I was gonna die. The alarm clock ticked off the remaining moments of my peace and then it buzzed; my second thought – the first being that I had passed away in… READ MORE
Alas, I will be leaving for Los Angeles soon, though you’ll be sorry to hear I should be back in a week. At least that’s the plan. Since my flight was booked by the Cerritos Travel Agency, I may be dropping unexpectedly on some California suburb and staying there for all eternity.
I am of two minds about his trip. I’ve always wanted to visit Los Angeles because the film industry would have you believe you can’t belch there without background music and klieg lights. But to get there one must fly on a heavier-than-air object that is traveling at 500 mph at an altitude God never meant for men to violate.
This is not an hour-long petting-zoo ride to Atlanta or Orlando. Five hours, buddy. Count ’em. Five hours of terror. Five hours of sweaty palms and heart spasms every time the plane changes altitude by more than a few inches. I’ll be sitting next to one of the androgynous pin-striped creatures who won’t even hold my hand, and when we land at LAX they’ll take me to the Farmers Market and sell me at 49 cents a pound.
The airport is, of course, across town from Santa Ana, my intended destination, so after these five hours of terror I can drive right into two more on the Los Angeles freeways. My sister says they’re no worse than the freeways in Detroit, and I seem to remember careening along the Freeway of Love (as those sick individuals call it), trucks roaring past at a shade under the sound barrier and, to paraphrase Robert Frost, thinking that I had miles of concrete to go before I could pass out.
Ah, but once I am there …Hollywood? Sunset Boulevard? Beverly Hills? Universal Studios?
Naah. Work.
Ostensibly, that’s why I’m going there, and the newspaper is giving me only enough money to ensure that I don’t spend all my time at Malibu or trying out for game shows.
But yes, I intended to see the giant sign that is always in the process of falling down over Hollywood, and I expect to see the sidewalk where the movie stars have gotten their feet muddy in concrete. I want to see the piers that extend into the ocean and don’t collapse during storms, the movie and television studios that I vilify regularly in this column. I also hope to visit one of those malls that has its own city council.
I’ll be looking for Randy Newman cruising the freeways singing, “I Love L.A.” or the Beach Boys talking about those “California Girls.” I’ll be waiting to see those who are “California Dreamin’” or whether “It Never Rains in California.”
And then – Oh, boy! – another five hours of terror as we head back east. We go to Memphis and then to the Okaloosa County Air Terminal, so I get the added bonus of taking off and landing twice in one day.
At least on the return leg, I should be able to drink my lunch.
This column was published in the Playground Daily News in 1986 and is used with permission.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone's stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra's Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone's comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled "December" for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman's Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone's novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild's award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida's best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn't look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
Alas, I will be leaving for Los Angeles soon, though you’ll be sorry to hear I should be back in a week. At least that’s the plan. Since my flight was booked by the Cerritos Travel Agency, I may be… READ MORE
I was told home ownership would teach me many new skills. That is true. I have learned many new ways to injure myself.
Lesson 1. You cannot make snow angels in the attic insulation. This fact has been scientifically validated by thousands of new homeowners who have gone into their parents’ attics to retrieve lost boxes of pots and pans and have accidentally slipped off beams that would’ve put the Flying Walendas to shame and have fallen into the treacherous sea of fiberglass beneath them.
Fiberglass is the earthly equivalent of “the earwig that ate its way through the man’s brain” in that episode of “Night Gallery.” First, it eats its way into your flesh, then it lays eggs, and then you die.
Lesson 2. Do not reach around a live iron unless you enjoy excruciating pain and disfigurement. The iron, as many homeowners already knew but didn’t tell the rest of us, is a torture device that happens to take wrinkles out of clothes. Most irons have four settings: “Wash and Wear,” “Cotton,” “Chernobyl” and “Hell.” Keep it on the lowest setting, even when it is unplugged, or you will char yourself and probably burn down the house.
Lesson 3: Do not shoot pool in your bare feet.
What does this have to do with home ownership? It so happens that after carting 20 carloads of junk across town in 95-degree heat, breaking his back to haul them into the house, dropping them on various appendages and causing permanent bone damage, the new homeowner is likely to say to heck with it and go off to the pool hall, where he may lose 19 games in a row and thump his cue stick to the floor in anger, missing the thousands of square feet of floor but striking perfectly the two square centimeters of his little toe, causing it to swell to the dimensions of a record-setting eggplant.
Lesson 4. Do not carry objects that might invalidate the warranty on your lower back.
File cabinets are notorious back-breakers. They enthusiastically obey the laws of gravity. They have drawers that slide open without warning and rend flesh unless you tilt them the OTHER way, which results in so many different kinds of back injuries that names have not been invented for some of them.
Lesson 5. Always vacuum – or better, mow – the shag carpeting before you walk barefoot in it.
Shag carpeting is preferred by bachelor homeowners because it conceals dirt so well you don’t have to clean it until you see signs of visible growth. Other shag-carpet treasures awaiting the adventuresome homeowner are slivers of glass that cannot be seen with the naked eye but can certainly be found with the naked foot, with only minimal blood loss.
These lessons precede the big-ticket injury items, such as power tools, but that’s another column.
This column was originally published in the Playground Daily News in 1986 and is used with permission.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone's stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra's Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone's comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled "December" for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman's Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone's novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild's award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida's best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn't look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
I was told home ownership would teach me many new skills. That is true. I have learned many new ways to injure myself. Lesson 1. You cannot make snow angels in the attic insulation. This fact has been scientifically validated… READ MORE
Guess what I read?
I read that someday in the future, an asteroid might hit Earth.
I was munching peanuts and swigging a glass of apple juice, and when my brain got hold of those words the peanuts and apple juice sort of mixed together the wrong way and clogged in my throat, and I thought the asteroid had landed on my head.
It’s true, folks. It has to be true because I read it in a national science magazine, although I can’t recall which one it was. An asteroid may pass very close to or strike Earth, and I am now looking into the possibility of buying waterfront property in Kansas.
If this sucker hits, it’s supposed to make Krakatoa look like a cap gun. Odds are it will impact in the water, which means a huge explosion, cubic miles of vaporized water, tidal waves, earthquakes, storms, floods – all those fun things we look forward to on weekends.
To give you a sense of perspective, some experts believe the Gulf of Mexico was formed by just such an asteroid strike.
Another theory currently in vogue is that an asteroid struck Earth long ago, and wiped out the dinosaurs. As everyone should know from watching “One Million Years B.C.,” dinosaurs are very tough characters. You can shoot them, spear them, drop rocks on them and shove them into volcanoes and they bounce back every time, annoyed and ready to eat Raquel Welch.
What’s even scarier is that the dinosaurs didn’t have a TV cable system that goes off the air when it rains, or cars that break down if you presume to drive them. An asteroid hits now and you can forget about “Miami Vice” … or even Miami.
OK. So it might hit. The question that first comes to my mind is: Why should I worry about it? In 150 years I will have been dead for 149 years, unless somebody figures out an easier way for me to work quadratic equations, which as I write this are driving me to the edge of insanity.
In 150 years my grandchildren will not be worrying about an asteroid striking Earth because I have no intention of having any grandchildren, since I wouldn’t want to bother them with the worry of buying waterfront property in Kansas.
A lot of things could change in 150 years. Look how far we’ve come since 150 years ago. Now we have purple hair, TV dinners, plastic vomit, farmers who are paid not to grow anything and tinfoil Christmas trees. Who knows what wondrous advancements will take place between now and then?
The people of the future probably will get their hands on this asteroid and turn it into a cheap tourist attraction. It’ll have its own McDonald’s, one of those miniature golf courses populated with cement dinosaurs who survived all previous asteroid strikes, a water slide, a few thousand T-shirt shops and a couple of greasy taco stands.
The prophet, Chicken “Nostradamus” Little, warned us about all this centuries ago, but we wouldn’t listen.
Now, all the choice waterfront property in Kansas is bought up.
But it’s still not too late for a greasy taco stand.
This column was originally published in the Playground Daily News in 1985 and is used with permission.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone's stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra's Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone's comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled "December" for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman's Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone's novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild's award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida's best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn't look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
Guess what I read? I read that someday in the future, an asteroid might hit Earth. I was munching peanuts and swigging a glass of apple juice, and when my brain got hold of those words the peanuts and apple… READ MORE
Image courtesy of De Paolis In.Co.R. Studio.
“The House by the Cemetery” Starring Catriona MacColl, Paola Malco and Ania Pieroni. Directed by Lucio Fulci. 86 minutes. Not rated. Del’s take “The House by the Cemetery” is a film only a horror purist could love, and love it… READ MORE
Image courtesy of Karolina Grabowska of Pexels by way of a Creative Commons license. https://www.pexels.com/@karolina-grabowska/
To watch Mom iron is to watch a carpenter join pieces of wood into something that ill be handed down, parent to child, for generations. It is watching an artist imbue blank canvas with timelessness. It is watching a craftsman… READ MORE
Image by Flickr user Greg Virtucio by way of a Creative Commons license. https://www.flickr.com/photos/gregvirtucio/
I opened into my personal computer file the other day and there, at the top of the list, was a short story with a message especially for me written above it. The message read: “Good news, Del.” A little farther… READ MORE