Under construction.

This new identity I will be inhabiting for the purposes of progressing in my magickal and creative work (see here) is taking longer to construct than I anticipated. I think you'll like her when she's done, though.

More magick: Have created the Red Book wherein I am to take dictation from an entity rather less kindly than M-L and R-M-L. Like them, its nature is unknown to me (Spirit? Ghost? Figment of my imagination?); unlike them, it is not a well-intentioned friend, or ally. It is the voice that chokes my voice, the thing that freezes me in my tracks and will not let me be, the thing that chases me through my dreams. I mean to fight it and bind it.

Couldn't find a red book with red pages, so had to purchace a book with red covers and dye the paper with ink. The result is appealing: blotchy, organic. It should be in interesting artifact if nothing else. The thought of actually starting it gives me the wiggins, but start it I must. I want my head back. The guides offer me a lot of protection; or rather, they offer me aid in protecting myself.

The guides refer to the entity's words as "the voice of your proof." In other words, by communicating with it I will see some concrete evidence that this aspect of my life isn't just a fantasy or a delusion. This could be big.

Toothless slurs.

Forget when or where I read it, but during some net-squabble or other about some damn thing (I was not involved personally, you understand) this phrase appeared: "the brits are all limeys anyway." I sat there and blinked a few times, trying to work out what they were on about. Yeah, the brits are limeys, the sofa's a couch, the telly's a TV, football is soccer, what's your point? Then I realised: Being called a limey is supposed to hurt my feelings.

Sorry, but, uhhh... before you decided to wield that mighty implement of emotional pain, did you pause to consider the fires in which it was forged? "Limey" was the nickname given to British sailors in Captain Cook's time because they, erm, ate citrus fruit. You know, for the vitamin C. To prevent scurvy, yes? I think you'll agree that as cultural/ethinc slurs go, "You don't have a life threatening vitamin deficiency! You've got most of your teeth! And no weeping sores to speak of!" lacks something.

Just sayin'.

Rectangular circle.

Meme doo jaw: school experiences. I have few, having been removed from school before the age of six. Nyahh, nyahh, nyahh, nyahh nyahh.

My most abiding memory is of the teacher bringing in a bunch of stuff and asking us what shape each bit of stuff was: coin = circle, plastic triangle = erm, triangle, etc chiz moan drone. Then she holds up the inside of a bog-roll and, amidst the tittering, asks what shape it is. I put up my five-and-a-bit year-old-hand.

"Yes, dear?"

"It's a rectangular circle," I announced.

They all laughed.*

That's about it, apart from the time someone mixed the white plasticine with the blue plasticine and we weren't allowed to play with the plasticine anymore for a whole week, and the time Rachel's mum sent her to school with Sellotape in her hair because she couldn't find any hairslides. And the other time that Rachel's mum sent her to school with Sellotape in her hair because she couldn't find any hairslides. Rachel's mum was all messed up.



*Except the teacher, who was a decent sort really. And Lurid says that was actually quite clever, and Lurid's good at sums so who won, eh? WHO WON?

Random brainstorm.

My next few big magickal projects are, in not particular order:

a) A spell to increase my writing output. Requirements: Paper, home-made ink and stylus, some sort of "Ocean" or "Marine" scented candle or incense, a blue rock.

b) A spell to increase my linguistic ability. Requirements: Red flat liquorice or similar, non-toxic ink, incense.

c) Speaking in Tongues. Requirements: A robe of white fabric, cassette recorder, extra tapes.

d) Renwewal/glamour spell. Requirements: Rose candles, matching notebook and pen.

e) The crimson book. Requirements: Notebook, red ink, black pen, ash, blood, something to wrap the sucker in cuz I don NOT want anything icky getting on my stuff, Nerves of Steel.

There's other stuff but I'm not telling you.

Comments and profiles and icons, oh, my.

Oh, how sweet. Blogger wants to be Livejournal when it grows up.

I've enabled the newly-built-in commenting system on here, but I'm not sure whether to lose the enations system coz Blogger doesn't seem to allow anonymous commenting: you need to sign up for a Blogger account before you can post. Anyway, if you want to use the Blogger comments, you have to click on the permalink (you know, the date/time thingy at the bottom of the post).

Nope.

Lesseenow... Sobriety--check, cold light o'day--check... hmm. Still no noticable degree of regret. My only regret is actually trying to engage with these pillocks as if they were regular folk. I'm pretty ashamed of myself there, as it goes. Must show more backbone in future.

Didn't realise how much I've let the frea-speach crowd mess with my head. Tiptoeing round ignorant, prejudiced wankers, oh dear me, mustn't upset the poor dear RACIST BASTARDS, constantly questioning my actions when the only question I should've been asking was "Hmmm. Just how big a new arsehole should I tear this guy?"

I feel sooo much better now.

Vent.

The 15th has came and went without incident. Random paranoia, I spose.

Talking of random paranoia: Oh look. An unusual number of proxy browser hits in my referral log. %Oooo, I wonder why? Let me think about why this might be...%

God, you people are sad. What are you looking for? A post where I accidently let slip that I'm in the pay of the Elders of Z.? Jeeze, if you can't get a clue, will you bigots please get lives?

You know what bugs me? The fact that I let certain events and people Over There affect me so much. The fact that I let myself get so cowed that I wouldn't even stand up and say what needed to be said, in case the heroic guardians of Frea Speach decided to whack me with a sock (puppet) full of sand. Well, I've no responsibilililities over here, except to myself. So...

FUCK YOU, YOU PATHETIC BIGOTS! I SPIT DOWN YOUR THROATS! I wouldn't widdle on you if you were on fire. And no, this isn't passive aggression. This is good old fashioned aggressive aggression.

Does it ever occur to you wankers that the reason you can't find any smart people to have a nice, quiet, dispassionate discussion of fucking Holocaust denial and the International Jewish Conspiracy is because the most cursory glance over the evidence should lay any doubt to rest, unless, that is, you happen be a right-wing nutbar. Does it ever occur to you that people may have come across these ideas, looked into them, and decided they were bullshit?

Give me strength.

No, the PofZ is NOT a fucking historical document! HOW STUPID ARE YOU? What, there's this ultra-powerful bunch of people who've been running the world since the year dot, and for some reason they find it necesary to write a 101 explanation of how well it's all going, and THEN accidently leave a copy lying around for a passing Czarist police officer to pick up? With a Post-It note on the front, no doubt: "Note to self--ultrasecret plans for total world domination--do not accidently leave lying around!"

For the love of Mike, why--why can't you read a damn book? Check facts? You're online, a click or two away from any information source your little hearts desire! How about, instead of sitting back and demanding that the rest of the world run around trying to find the material that might let them SQUEEZE SOME SENSE INTO YOUR HEADS, you do a bit of reading for yourselves? I mean, would that kill you? Are your critical faculties so atrophied through disuse that attempting to engage them would cause organ faliure? No, it's more fun to sit around fiddling with your pocket calculator, "proving" all sorts of shite with arithmetic. Because of course, secret conspiritors like to leave neat little numerological clues as to what they're up to for people like you to read. Because they're so secret, you see.

And then you have the nerve--the brass neck--the immortal crust--to invoke free speech when you aren't allowed to spout your filthy lies whenever and wherever you want. Newsflash, fuckoids. Some people aren't going to sit by and passively suck up your toxic waste. Boo fucking hoo. Look, this is teh intarnet. It's full of morons who'll entertain any damn fool theory if it makes them feel better about their tiny fetid lives.

These are REAL PEOPLE you are attacking. Not some amorphous many-headed hydra--real living people. Does that even occur to you?

Oh, and the phrase "anti-semite" distresses you? Good! Anti-semite! Anti-semite! Anti-semite! ANTI-SEMMMIIIITTTEEE! Look for it next to the image of your DROOLING FACE in your large print picture dictionary, you mephitic SKIDMARK.

Bugger off and, preferably, die.

Ahhh, I'm going to regret posting this. But that's what drunk is for.

(Note to readers who have no earthly clue what this is about: Barbelith. Morons. Bigots. Vent or asplode.)

Been getting a bad feeling about May 15th/16th, and don't know why. Guess we'll find out soon.

On the plus side, the free swimming pool opens again tommorrow. So, well, yay.

Premium content.

Writing's been going a bit better lately, but I haven't had anything accepted for a while. Leafing through the stuff on my hard-drive, I see that I've accumulated quite a chunk of Ericverse stuff. Much of what I've produced is sketchy, flaky, but could with an effort be pressed into service as part of a narrative; spoof ad copy, Ericverse news items, ect.

Trouble is, Ericverse-type stuff seems to leave editors cold (which is why I tend to post it straight to my Lj). So I've been thinking--how hard is it to make an e-book? Something people could download for a small fee (say about a pound a throw, with an option for the more generous to chip in extra). I was thinking of maybe creating some illustrations with GIMP and knocking the whole thing up as a PDF. The stuff on my Lj would stay where it was, but paying punters would get piccys, spellchecking, etc. Don't know anything about putting stuff on the web so people have to pay to look at it. Can't be too hard, though.

This is all just pie in the sky at the moment, but it couldn't hurt to find out more.

Quick heads up.

There's a new wave of the old PayPal scam doing the rounds. For those of you who haven't heard of this, it's called phishing: basically the scammer creates a fake PayPal lookalike site and sends out emails asking people to confirm their details. When you go to the link in the email, you are taken to not to the real PayPal site, but to the fake. If you enter your details they are then recored and stolen by the phisher, who can then rob you blind at his leisure.

The email I got came from "John Crossman" services@ssl2-paypal.com. Note the domain name; real PayPal emails will originate from Paypal.com, not somethingfake-paypal.com.

If you're suspicious, check the real paypal site. If think you've already given your details to a fake site, log on and change your password to be on the safe side. Don't forget to let PayPal know about the dodgy email.

Binkety.

Sweet cuppin' cakes, did I really just lower myself to getting in a squabble over whether the Protocols of the L. E. of Z. are fake or not? I have got to elevate my sights. Arguing over the Protocons is such a big fat waste of time. They're one of those things where you either look at it and think: "Holy cats, what a pile of dingleberries!" or you scratch the rash around your tinfoil beanie, sip your distilled water and pure grain alcohol, and nod thoughtfully. No middle ground. No point arguing, because Tinfoil Beanie will immediately file you under "Muggle" or, worse yet, decide that you're in league with the Elders and try to beat you to death with his sock puppets.

I would never have got involved but there was this one guy in the discussion who hadn't heard of the Protocons and seemed in danger of taking it all seriously; I sudenly wanted to cone the mess off in case any n00bs got wank on their tiny red wellies. I got all protective. It happens.

These anti-semite conspiracy theorists may be royally irritating, but if I take time out to tear every single one of them a new arsehole I'll be here all life. And probably several future lives.

Man, that would suck. I'm really looking forward to my cockroach incarnation. Ever since I can remember, people have been threatening me with the cockroach incarnation. What's so bad about being a cockroach? You can eat anything, you have so much ferrous material in your shell and so little fluid in your body that you can take a stroll round a microwave oven while it's on, you can survive nuclear wars... damn, the more I think about it, the more being cockroach sounds like the Karmic equivalent of a fortnight in Tenerife. Don't want to waste it bouncing around on the keyboard like Archy.

Anyway. My obsessive word of the moment is "binkety" and it is driving me nuts. I mean. "Binkety." I preferred the "fish people" episode, or even "sockiput in the ockiput" month. But it's been "binkety" for the last week.

I need to be de-binketied.


Update: Turns out this fool has form--he's all over the GNN boards with this drivel, and worse. Ho, hum. Sometimes it'd be nice to be wrong about people.

How are things in Gilead?

Hope you laydeez enjoy your new role as Handmaidens when Bush gets re-elected.

Paper.

Okay, so today I got my certificate--finally. I was elated for a couple of hours; kept on taking it out of the envelope and admiring it in all its naff yellowish glory. Then reality started to set in and I realised that the thin sliver of dead tree I had clutched in my hand was pretty much the only concrete thing I have to show for four years of my life.

Ah, the great taste of self-loathing.

Anyway, I shall doubtless reach some form of equilibrium eventually. I've already updated my CVs to include the information that I am the proud posessor of a Certificate of Higher Education.

Just one question: What the hell is a Certificate of Higher Education? Is it good? Does it actually mean anything? Can I have a job now?


In other news: Wouldn't you just love to send someone an "EVOLVE or DIE" greetings card?

Sold out.

Wow. Logged onto Zazzle just now and someone's actually bought one of the products in my Emporium of Negativity. I have $1.66 in my account. A whole shiny dollar and some pennies! What can I buy for $1.66, Mummy?

But there's a sting in the tail. For though I know that someone has bought something it is unclear what they purchaced. A handsome t-shirt? A poster? A greetings card? Was it one of my witty slogans, or a picture of a purple pepper? Oh, the uncertainty! I want to know what got bought so I can make more of it!

(Update: I located the product. I'm utterly perplexed. I mean, it's a t-shirt with two words on it. I don't expect people to buy this stuff, it's just fun to make.)

Lurid has a new anti-war piece up, with some very disturbing links.

Looking at those pictures of the humiliated and tortured Iraqi prisoners and their grinning American captors, two things came to mind. One was images of hunters and their kills: celebratory smiles, triumphant poses, anonymous, nonhuman flesh.

The other was the Stanford prison experiment.

These are not isolated incidents, the regrettable work of a few bad apples. These are snapshots of ongoing, insitutional brutality. They are happening in the context of a structure and heirachy that is giving its permission, even encouragement, to torture, sexual assault, and murder. And these are just the incidents that we get to hear about, remember. Imagine how many more stories go untold, how many more pictures don't get taken.

"Hey, crackhead!"

Via Cruel Site of the Day.

Book.

Regular stalkers will be aware that a few weeks back, I decided to write a fantasy novel for the online outfit. I came up with an idea, and a 30-point outline which I fleshed out. The outline now runs to about six A4 pages (it's handwritten with lots of crossing out, so I'm estimating here). I also have about 10,000 words written (most of which I will re-read in a month and then delete with a cry of horror, but still).

So. Uhhhh.... this novel-writing thing... how exactly do you go about it?


I mean, I have my outline, I'm 10,000+ words into my pile-o-shite first draft... and I'm sort of flapping about in the breeze. I feel like a five-year-old trying to steer a Harley. You sort of get writing, and it's chugging along fine, and then you read back everything you've done today in the context of everything you wrote on Tuesday, and the bits just don't match somehow. And you've spent 1000 words describing a tree or a table or a fish or summink, and then somewhere else you've had someone have their village destroyed by Dire Tapirs, find out they're the sole survivour of the F'Koop Clan and heir to their magic Stick O Doom ect, climb a big mountain, meet the party of rag-tag rebels who are going to Save The World At The Last Minute, and all that's happened in half a fucking page.

How do you write about climbing a mountain anyway? "There were rocks and they got cold and nearly fell off a couple of times. The end."

I suck.

Progress.

Good day yesterday. Went out to a nearby town and actually managed to get signed up with a temp agency. Untill quite recently, I'd been getting very short shrift from agencies, so I'm quite pleased. My Spanish remians pretty retarded but I suppose I'm making some progress.

So a big thanks to my floaty disembodied friends for helping me out. Yes, I'll do my LBRP more regularly in future. Yeeess, I promise to update your blog soon. Honest.

AUUGH! No, seriously, AUUUUUUUGGGGGGGHHHH

I am a huge moron and my brain is a big bowl of pudding. Like strawberry Instant Whip, something pink and wobbly like that.

Was just re-reading a story of mine, and discovered that this scene in it was basically identical to something I read online. I man, Iread the online story about two years or so back, and I've just re-read it recently. Then I read my story just now, and I realised that this scene was basically the same as the one in this online story. It's only a little thing, about two lines long, and it's not word for word or anything but still... AUGGGH. Mortified!

See, I fucking hate plagarists. They get on my tits. Fucking no-imagination-having, selfish, egotistical, Tarantino-invoking wankers who think that reading somethingis the same as writing it... killkillkill. And then I find I'm one of them. One of the pudding-brain leechzombies. Even though it was completely by accident, I'm now a gibbering paranoid wreck in case I've doen the same thing in any of my other pieces. And I can't check, because all my books are in London.

At least it's not a story I've submitted anywhere; no-one but me has even read it. Even so, I want the Earth to open up and swallow me.

Bruce Castor.

Because fridgemagent said so.

Work (again).

Okay. I really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really REALLY want a job now.

I'm used to sucky jobs so I guess I don't mind if I got something sucky, but I'd prefer something that tied in with my life in some way: writing, healing, electronics, arts, crafts, magick, books... that kind of thing. I need discarnate floaty help.

Spooky pervert Mah El: I promise to do like you suggested and vibrate your moniker as part of my tweaked LRPB. Will you fix me up with some non-insane-making work? Spooky pervert Rah May El... not quite sure how you'd like to be included in my rituals, but could you help me with my art and craftiness? I know that's your bag. Both of you guys: I need confidence to proceed. Lots of confidence. Please confidencify me forthwith.

Oh, and thanks for helping me contact my Uni today. I swear, those guys must be allergic to the telephone...

Shallow.

Okay, now this is odd.

Since the download which prompted that last entry, I've been visualizing my skull as a jewelled cup full of some viscous golden fluid, like nectar in a flower. During trancework using this visualization, I have percived entities sipping from the cup with long, curled butterfly tongues. They were unaffected by my shield, and I sensed no malignancy from them. "Benign" seems too small a word, as does "indifferent." They seemed vast, containing both creation and destruction as potentials. I get the feeling that they were well pleased with the offering.

The level of fluid in the skull-cup never falls, no matter what. In my trance-state I was surprised; they seemed amused that I would imagine that the level would fall, letting me know that the resource was infinite so long as I continued to offer it to the world. I do not yet know what the fluid represents, exactly.

In myself, I feel good. I had a low-energy thing at the beginning of the week, before I started the visualisations, but now I feel very peppy and invigorated.

That's not the odd part. The odd part is that I'm suddenly being poked to do a youth-spell. I've never had any real desire to do this in the past; whenever I've experienced anxiety about the effect of time on the ol' mortal coil, I've done workings for the acceptance of age. Apart from the occasional glamour to boost my confidence and workings to improve my health, I've never tried very hard to fight time or aging--it always seemed a little shallow to me. But now I find myself being given very clear signals that a youth working is my next step, along with detailed instructions as to how I should go about the working, what items I'll need and what I should do to prepare. There's no sense of pressure, more a sort of "come and play!" vibe.

I'll ask my guides and see what the pre-spell scry says. If it's favourable then I'm gonna go for it.

Resonances.

Hmm. Haven't done a proper magickal braindump for a while. Here's a message that's been slowly taking shape this week this week, as recorded in one of my magickal journals.



Clear and present:

I was complaining, as I do, about the lack of life in my mind; my state of drouth; my sense of senslessness; emotional unconsciousness.

Not quite ready to dare the cards, I retreated to the safety of the internet. I shifted up one level, wandered. Sure enough, the answer appears: Kapala, a skull-cup.

"To recieve one must have one's hands open." I seek always to drink, yet remain parched. The answer: I am not dessicated, merely stagnant. I attempt to be a sealed vessel, and no living thing is a sealed vessel. We are rivers. We must permit the flow of ourselves. I must offer up something; I must make of my skull a cup for Gods to sup from.

One must not fear hollowness. One shall be made new. One shall be filled anew, and be adorned with gold and brass and bronze. One shall be filled anew and made bright with precious stones. One shall be made very fine and a little terrible, like a gilded skull-cup.

Uppers.

Ramping up my excerciseousness and writey goodness, I find my energy levels could do with a boost. The obvious thing to do in a city just swimming with dance drugs would be to purchace some of said recreational pharmeceuticals and ingest, with hilarious consequences, yet I am loth to do this. I'm not getting any younger and I'd like to preserve a little of my fragile bone density (not to mention my fragile grip on reality).

No, I'm looking for something a bit less toxic, like ephedra or whatever. So far I've drawn a blank, though I've yet to hit the Chinese herbalists. There's always pseudoephedrine, but the most popular brand of pseudoephedrine-containting pills also has paracetamol, which I don't take unless I really need to.

Spain seems on the whole to take a much more relaxed attitude than the UK: shrooms seem to be legal here which is nice. I'm wondering if I couldn't get something a bit more efficacious that Sudafed over the counter here, but the internet is proving unhelpful. I can't very well stride into the pharmacy, collar the dude behind the counter and yell: "Déme las drogas del estimulante! Ahora! Déme LAS DROGAS!"

Or can I?

Volcano.

Had an excellent day Sunday. LA's work laid on an excursion for employees and parteners, so I went along. First we saw Besalú, a beautiful small town with some interestin historical features. Then we headed out to climb extinct volcanoes, which rocked. Jet-black and rust-red soil, pale trees and grasses clinging to dark cliffs. After that, we went to visit the Santuari del Far, which is right at the top of a mountain and commands some stunning views. It was awesome. This is an incredibly beautiful part of the world and I feel so, so lucky to be here.

The rest of this week has been a touch sucky, which is my own fault. I got a couple of rejections, and for some reason I allowed them to floor me. Ended up all mopey and lethargic and why-botherish. Things looked up when the University of Canned Fish sent me a note saying they'd got my money, but they haven't sent the bloody certificate so now I have to phone them up a-sodding-GAIN to find out what the hell they're playing at.

I realise this is my fault, I realise I should've sorted all this mess out back in the UK, but I just didn't have the stomach to write a cheque out to an organization that had shafted me so vigourously and so recently. I literally felt sick at the thought of giving them money. Funds were pretty damn tight back then, too.

Getting the cert. will be good for my head, I think. I mean, don't get me wrong, I appreciate what I have. I'm living in this wonderful place with a great bloke, and I know how lucky I am. But... the thing is, it's just that: Luck. Sheer dumb luck. Nothing I have right now was actually earned. I'm here because of Lurid's career, his hard work; I didn't do anything to earn it, it was just handed to me on a plate. I want to achieve something. I want to do something myself, ya know? I want one thing in my life that I can look at and say: "I made that."

And it's close, that success, that thing I'm reaching for. I can feel it. It gets closer every day.

Worlds.

Spent a sizeable chunk of this afternoon doing a heavy character exercise. I decided to write in the voice of a psychotic male supremacist, just as an excercise, just to see if I could "be" someone with a mindset so far from my own. I started out okay with some routine Sim-ian dissing of 'Feminazis' etc, but then the next thing I knew I'd written 600 words of this pretend psycho guy's manifesto, including paragraphs on the decriminalisation of rape and the re-introduction of Magdelen laundries. At that point I had to stop and go away and be me again. I'll finish it though: it'll do for my Lj.

One day I'm going to get so far into a character I won't come back. Hope it's someone awesome.

Been thinking a lot about something that happened on Thurs. Myself and LA were seeing LA's brother off at the bus station around midnight. About half an hour before his bus was due, we were approached by a sketchy bus station person. At first I thought the guy was begging for change, but it turned out he wanted coffee and didn't know how to work the machine. Not sure if he was illiterate or just had poor eyesight. Lurid helped him get a coffee, then he tried to give it to Lurid, and then he started talking to me in really mumbly Spanish. Only he kept calling me Theresa. I kept telling him my name, and telling him I couldn't understand Spanish very well, but he kept calling me Theresa and going on about other people, people this Theresa person knew. It was so sad, so eerie. In his world, I was Theresa; some freind or a family member playing this cruel mind game where she pretended not to understand him, not even to be Theresa.

We left him there, lost in that other world, alone.

WOW! moment.

And so we are indeed guided, are we? Sent wandering through the electric texts, reading on until the all the tumblers drop into place and the door swings open at a touch.

Obvious, really; but when on is distracted by something yet more obvious, even the obvious becomes occult.

However, I digress. This is the solution: If I can't do it, I have to find someone who can; if I can't find anyone, I must create them; and this achieved I must be them for a while.

Bingo. Thanks, guys.

Hmmm...

Bit of a hiatus these last couple of days. I'm working, of course, but I've been doing outlines and research and stuff rather than completing anything. Must get something finished over the weekend. I've been really productive lately, but don't want to fall back into bad habits. Submitting something soon would be good for my head, too: had a rather mopey day yesterday, thinking about the no-job thing, all the stuff I want to do and can't because I have no money. Blargh. Feels like I'm in the same place I was last year; I mean, I know, rationally, that this is incorrect, that I have made progress. In fact I have made, on the whole, excellent use of my time, ramping up the writing output and improving other areas.

The magick, though, I've been letting that slide lately and that's not good. I'm on a very basic level of functionality there: meditate, ground, cleanse, shield, journal, moisturize. Been letting the meatier bits slide. Bad, very bad; from past experience, if I slack off then the Universe Space dumps some big magickal challenge into my ample lap, then stands there grinning and going "Bet you wish you'd worked a bit harder now, don't you?" I need to recover the kind of enthusiasm for magick that I had when I was a kid, the WOW! factor. I need a boost.

Yo! Spooky people! BOOST me!

More ranting.

I've had people visiting/stopping over and stuff. Was fun, and a much-needed distraction from the continuing bloodbath in Iraq.

Here's a piece on Falluja from today's Grauniad.

It's unbelivable. I keep expecting to wake up, like this is all a nightmare. What the hell is going on? Who the FUCK is running this show, Judge Death? "The crimmee isss lifffeee... the sssenntencce issss DEAAAATHHHH!"

There's ten thousand civilians dead now. Ten thousand. We're blowing up SCOOLS AND HOSPITALS. Why? We're told that this has to be done n the hopes of picking off a few terrorists. Yeah, right. These are punitive attacks, group punishment inflicted by an increasingly dehumanised occupying force.

Maybe I'm not a military tactician but it seems to me that this is not how you get rid of a terrorist militia. Look, when you turn someone's fucking family into a bloody pile of dismembered limbs, you CREATE MORE TERRORISTS. Get that?

When you destroy all the things that keep people alive inside, that keep them hopeful, all the things that make a future: home, family, freinds, community--what the hell do you think that does? How the hell do you expect them to react? You think they're going to roll over and play dead? No! They're going to pick up a gun, strap on a dynamite vest, and take as many of you with them as they can.

And no, before you start, this is not a defence of terrorism. There is no defence for terrorism, whether perpetrated by small groups or by superpowers.

Aaa-HA!

Thought you could hide from me, did you? Thought to conceal your true identity behind a mask of dissemblance! But no-one hides from Sherlock Carnival--no one! Especially not Ophrys Fusca!

Mystery.

Can't find my orchids' name anywhere! I found some in my Spanish flora book that looked a lot like them, but not quite the same ones. I'm well chuffed tho', I love having little projects like this. It's going to be fun Sherlocking around flower sites.

On the writing front, I have little news. Another of my stories got rejected, but I just punted it out again somewhere else. My approach at the moment is to always be looking for the next market I'm going to submit a story to. Send a piece off to zine A, then go and look for zine B, so that when zine A gives you the cold shoulder you just shunt the work off to zine B--and immediately start shopping for zine C. That way I can keep my turn-around as short as possible (and stay positive).

I also had an idea for a killer short today and did quite a bit of work on it. So I'm in a pretty good mood, all in all. (I'd be in an even better mood if a certain pair of disembodied types would fix it for me to actually sell summink. Like, soon, please?)

PS: Ever wanted to install Linux on a dead badger? Here's how! Installing Linux on a Dead Badger: User's Notes

I wish I could write stuff like that.

Flowers.

Dammit, frikken frakken Holy Week has caught me on the hop again. Everything shuts down for Holy Week here. I have no beer, nor any way of getting beer that doesn't involve taking a train. Really. Everything is shut round here: the bar, the shops, the caff, everything.

However, I am not as whiny and bad-moody as I might be, coz yesterday I discovered--ORCHIDS! Yes! Real live wild orchids, growing along the road down to the station. I'm so happy! Not quite sure what species they are yet. They were sooo pretty and exotic, with dark purple and green petals.

Gonna go and look at pix of orchids now, see if I can find out what they're called so I can brag properly.

!!!!1!!

Went out last night w/Lurid A. Stopped off in Gracia for falafels etc. and then on to a bar. Our intention was to go to the Intercambio they hold there, but by the time we got to the pub everyone had gone. There'd been a crowd of British soccer fans in, apparently, and everyone had been scared off.

I hate the British. Loud, obnoxious, rude, aggressive boozehounds, the lot of them. And we have the nerve to have a go at American tourists! When's the last time you saw an American barfing Special Brew into a wheely-bin at two o'clock on a Sunday lunchtime?

Feeling a little bleak today. The writing was going badly, and then the laptop started playing up so badly that myself and Lurid decided to do a clean install. I wanted Linux, but for some reason the laptop wouldn't boot from the Red Hat CDs so I'm stuck with bloody Windoze 98.

I want a proper operating system! Raggghhh!

And I was in one of those foul moods where every little hitch is a Sign from Above that you are rubbish and should just pack it in. And I'm still writing tosh. And my legs hurt because I strained them defrosting the fridge (don't ask). And there's no mixer left. And... Well, I've run out of stuff to complain about for now.

As a bit of contrast to my whining, I'd like to call your attention to Cancergiggles, which turned up in my comments the other day along with some much-appreciated encouragement. It's a blog about living with cancer, really well-written and genuinely funny.

Scribble scribble scribble, tappety tappety tap.

Just over 5000 words into the Other Novel. One small problem: they are 5000 words of SUCK. Suckitude doesn't cover it. It's a suckgasm. A tornado of suction. Waahh. Re-reading it today, I got so depressed. It was so bad I took most of the day off and defrosted the fridge.

All I want is to make the same amount of money out of writing that I could make mopping floors. That's all I'm trying for at the moment. I don't have fantasies about walking into FNAC and seeing shelvesful of the latest Mordant Carnival; I don't dream of signing autographs or Being Famous. I don't even give a shit if I have to work 16 hour days to make the same money I was getting for 8 hours as a cleaning lady. I just want to do what I do, this one thing that I reckon I'm good at. That's all.

It's not a big ask.

The ringleader of the Madrid attacks is dead.

He and three other suicide bombers died yesterday morning, when they blew themselves up as police closed in on their lair.

They had other explosives all set up for future attacks.

You'd think I'd be glad that at least now those people won't be planting any more bombs, but all I can think is: Why? How does someone do that? What processes does someone have to go through in hir mind to make it okay to inflict the horrible carnage we saw in March? What the hell did they hope to achieve?

I will never understand terrorism any more than I understand war. Any more than I properly understand how other people made it okay in their minds to invade Iraq, when they knew, or might reasonably be expected to know, what the consequences of that would be.

I have increasingly little hope for this species.

Breath.

I am an asthmatic. Have been, since I was five. A quarter of a century later, I am still fighting for breath.

It's funny: whenever you read a book or watch a film with an asthmatic character, the asthmo always has some kind of emotional problem. They're never really sick; they just have parents who're over-protective, or abusive, or whatever. They take pills or inhalers to feel better, and it's this whole big thing until someone comes along and shows them that all their problems are In Their Mind (TM), and then they get better.

I beg to differ. I do so in a very sarcastic tone of voice, just so's you know.

One of these days, I'll explain what "asthmatic" actually means in very little words so's you made-for-TV-film making chowderbrains can get it right.

Right now: I can still breath. It's not easy. I have to fight. I can't forget about it and just let it happen. I have to do breathing. Like writing; like painting in oils; like having a baby; like baking a cake. Like making love. Some are easier than others, but all of them have this in common: They don't just happen. You have to do them. Right here, right now, I have to do breathing.

Breathing in is easy. The problem with ashtma is breathing out. That's an effort. Your lungs suck in air easily; it's pushing it out that takes effort. Masseurs note that asthmatics have a signiature: a roll of muscle across their back.

I'm fighting. Demons. PHLEGM DEMONS!

Linky.

eBooks'n'Bytes list of featured ePublishers currently accepting submissions.

I've been reading some sample chapters (where available) to get a feel of what 's likely to go down well, and I'm pretty optimistic. I have one outline and a first chapter that would fit the bill of a couple of e-publishers perfectly. Mind you, I can't use this as an excuse to slack off on my short stories.

Potboiler.

Have begun conducting a feasibility study into writing novel-lenth pieces for the online market. Got a couple of promising fantasy outlines worked out already, and I think I could easily stay the course if I decided to sit down and write a novel. Not The Dreaded Novel, of course (I doubt I'll finish that this side of 2012) but something more unassuming, a straightforward sword'n'sworcery bosh.

Could I work on a novel and keep my short fiction output up to a reasonable level (bearing in mind that until I find work, my short fics are my sole source of income)? Yes, I think I could. I've been slowly ramping my output up over the months, and tho' I have dry spots they are of short duration and frequency. If I worked on the novel in the mornings, say, and focused on the short fic in the afternoons and evenings, I could have a first draft done by autumn/winter.

Could I produce a work of acceptable quality? Again, yes, I belive I could. My writing has improved dramatically in the last year, largely because I've had bugger all else to do all day.

So I'm casing the e-book joint: looking to see where they keep the silverware and if key gets left the back door while they're out shopping. What's the market like, who's paying well, etc. I'll bung up some links when I have more info.

MaxSpeak, You Listen!

This is good. This is going in my sidebar, next time I get round to futzing with it.

Resubmitted that rejected story to another mag. I'm trying to keep my resubmission times as low as I can right now; a day or two, long enough to reassess the story and make any necessary alterations before finding it another market. In the past there's been a tendency for me to bury anything that got rejected and never even look at it again for months. That's bad. It's negative, self-defeating and... well, fucking wet, frankly. So I'm getting back on the proverbial equine quadroped as rapidly as I can.

Anyhow, I need to finish some more stuff to send out before the weekend. My brain is not in fiction mode right now so I'm going to dig around my poetry files and see if I don't have anything worth punting out.

My immediate goal is keep it so that I have a minimum of five pieces under consideration at all times. I want to raise that to ten pieces before July; a modest goal.

Beef stew.

My imagination is broken.

Look, this is ridiculous. My stupid infection won't go away and it's stopping me from doing anything to write about on my blog.

Why am I sick anyway? I haven't done anything sickmaking. No going out clubbing with an insufficiently insulated chest, no persian rugs; I haven't cursed anyone for years, so it's not that.

My sleep is shot and it's taken my frikking writing with it. I mean, my output hasn't gone down (much), but it's just not as good. Maybe I shouldn't have kept plugging away at that stupid story the way I did. I got it finished but now I'm all fed up of writing because I got so bored. Blargh. Anyway it's finished now. Trouble is, none of my other writing projects is any healthier: gawdawful sword'n'sorcery short, couple of Forteany things, some lukewarm SMUT and this thing about people from another world living in London, which is never going to work in a million years but which I can't get out of my stupid head.

Stupid writing. Words are evil.

Oh, and I got a rejection today for a story I was really hopeful about, and which is utterly unsuitable for anywhere exept the ezine that rejected it. Blargh.

Yuuuck.

Man, this is no fun at all, but I'm on the mend. Well enough to go into a nearby town to do a bit of shopping, anyhoo, which was a relief. I get stir-crazy if I have to stay indoors. Gonna go out running tommorow, if the weather's okay.

Asked the guides what the heck was going on with this whole grotty infection business; apparently it's some sort of house-cleaning, and I'll be fitter afterwards, and blah blah blah. They also gave me a pi-jaw about my diet.

I have another big rant brewing about the increasingly hysterical and braindead comment in the blogosphere regarding the Spanish election result and the new regime's decision to pull out their troops from Iraq, but I just don't have the energy today.

Instead I've got this stupid short story to finish. It sucks--the ideas weak and the pace is off, but I have to get it finished. If I get it finished I'll be able to go back in a week and panel-beat the damn thing into some kind of shape, whereas if I can it now and work on something else, I'll probably never get around to sorting it out. God, I'm sick of it though.

I'm still sick.

And I blame you. Seriously, this is no fun at all. I'm missing my healer's meet today because of my cruddy chest (Oh, the irony). I was sick as a dog yesterday and got no bloody sleep.

Fix me. Fix me or I will harm you.

Coat.

Man, you people. It's just not working out, you know? As you Supreme Dark Ruler I need my acolytes to be actively involved in promoting my reign of terror, and you petty mortals just aren't pulling your weight. You aren't traking down gems of power, magicial rings, wands, or even volumes of forbidden lore for me; you aren't even making sacrifices to the Forces of Darkness for my greater power. Oh, don't try to deny it. If you were making even tiny sacrifices to the Forces of Darkness have been coughing up this yechhy stuff for the last two days.

Now shape up, or I'll feed you to the mutant cyborg piranahs.

I need to fix my coat again. It's still cool enough in the evenings that I can sweep about in a trenchie--or rather I could, were my trenchie not so fucked. The last lot of repairs caved in and have left me bereft of my big ol' PVC coat. *sob!*
I've given up trying to restore it to something like its former condition. I can't duplicate the original surface, no matter how I try, and am instead planning to settle for a more varied texture.

I was in La Bosc de Fades the other night with Lurid, and they had these wicked floor to ceiling curtains mae of--check this out--CHAIN MAIL! How cool is that? It wasn't ring-mail, then links were more like Z-shaped. It was gorgeous. I kept playing with it all the time I was sat there, and now I am consumed with an unrequietable desire to have a coat made out of the same stuff. Course, I'm never going to be able to afford something like that... but I'm wondering if I couldn't at least suggest a similar effect in places on my trenchie, for example on the front corners and places where the plastic has worn off. I'm thinking a kind of applìque, but with chains, fine ones but not too fine. Dunno where I'm going to find the right kind of chain. Will check out some hardware places later.

Chomsk's new blog

Fantastic! Noam Chomsky has joined the blogosphere.

Damn.

It's half-eleven, I'm already shagged out, and I've really got to finish this damn story by the morning. Got got got. Or I will cordially hate myself all day tomorrow.

Why do I respect self-imposed deadlines more than the externally imposed variety? I mean, I can certainly work to externally imposed deadlines, even blatanly ludicrous, pulled-out-of-a-manager's-earhole deadlines. I just don't get all emotional about it.

Random linkies...

TRAPPED BY UNDEAD, NEED HELP
(Via Flowers)

The Killer Gerbil
(Via blogger's "recently updated" list)

Poetryfox.com
(Via Ralan.com)

Run.

Started running again today, for the 3rd time this year. The last couple of times I got thwarted by a bashed toe and then a yuckky chest. I felt okay while I was doing it, but now I'm coughing up... you don't want to know. I reckon I have a week or so of coughing up this goo and then I'll be clear, and things will get easier. Doing the Breath of Fire excercise to help things along a bit.

I have to keep moving. When I stop moving, I get aches and pains and sundry annoyances: my right side cramps, my lungs fill up with crap. When I stop moving, things break down.

I'm having some trouble placing one of my fics. It's a light fantasy piece about a dad dragon giving a pi-jaw to his dragon son, and I just can't seem to settle it anywhere. I'm only submitting to pro markets at the moment, on principle.

Finished a poem last night; God knows who'll buy it, it's pretty bleak. No new stories tho'. I hate it when I don't finish a story for a couple of days coz I feel like I'm losing momentum, winding down. Falling behind. Rolling back to where I was a couple of years ago, when I was finishing one piece every few months, if that. I must finish something tomorrow. I have to keep on finishing, submitting, revising, rewriting, resubmitting.

I have to keep moving, or things break down.

Gnarrgh.

Bunnies. Fluffy bunnies.

Goddammit--why isn't there a 12-step programme for giving up passive-aggression? Specifically, that form of passive aggression which involves going off into one on your weblog about something someone said on a message board.

Miniature goats. Teeny little miniature goats, the ones that only come up to your knees.

I used to do that all the time, but I've been sober from it for about a year (I think), because I realised just how hurtful (not to mention bloody irritating) it can be.

Tapirs! Yay for tapirs! Exotic wuffles.

But I am sooo tempted to fall off the wagon right now, because an unwitting finger has poinked one of my buttons. And the worst of it is, I genuinely like the person doing the poinking and would bitterly regret tearing hir a new one.

Kittens. Of course.

I don't know why that makes it harder.

Tiny Shetland pony foals with weebly-woobly legs. Ring-tailed lemurs. Pipistrelles. Hedgehogs. Leeetle baby fox-cubs.

God, I'm so fucking petty.

Oi! Spooky perverts!

I've been cracking the keyboard all day, but I seem to have run out of ideas. Zap me, please.

Also: When the current stack of cats-in-a-box collapse their precious little waveforms, could there be just one or two kitties still feet-down instead of feet up? Ta.

No a la guerra

Piled out to the manifestación yesterday with Lurid A. It was pretty big; the Beeb say 200,000 but I'm betting it was more. Great atmosphere, as usual: floats, lavish home-made banners, samba music, kiddies in face-paint. It's really cute to see a whole family marching together, parents, grandparents, kids, all chanting in unison.
My fave costume? The seven-foot tall blue alien with the "PAZ UNIVERSALE" placard.

It was a festive atmosphere, but there was an edge of sorrow there too. Many people had added black ribbons to their anti-war banners; one man carried a placard that simply showed the black memorial ribbon with MADRID written below it and BAGDAD above. There was a great deal of anger, too, much of it directed to the recently-ousted Aznar.

I'm impressed by the peaceful nature of Spanish protests, as well as the high turn-outs. The police prescence was microscopic, not like back home. (Honestly, I've been on marches where the protesters were outnumbered two to one by the old Bill.)

Later we met a couple of friends for a meal in Barceloneta and then walked along the beach. There were a few protesters camped out in sleeping bags and tents, votive candles burning next to a placard remembering the dead of Madrid.

I found the culprit.

It was Wordpad. Eeeeeevil Wordpad.

Amongst other annoying glitches, wordpad is possessed by the Demons of 10ptyness. When you open your file in Wordpad it is automatically downsized from 10 to 12, which you don't notice because you're on the laptop and so inadvertantly piss off good and deserving editors with your teenytiny letters.

I say FIE unto Wordpad. How much FIE? Enough FIE that I have banished it from my toolbar in favour of a freeware wordprocessor called AbiWord. It's as shaky as Heck, tries to load a nonexistant dictionary every time you open a file, and crashes altogether if you try to use the Help... and yet strangely it still sux0rz less than bloody Wordpad. I'm running Star Office over on the big 'puter, of course, but Lurid needs that to shoot Klingons.

Edit: I've just resubmitted the story that got rejected yesterday to a different market. The ed. of the rejecting zine was right: the ending was too weak. I've altered it, and I think the story as a whole works way better now.

Dealing with rejection.

Okay, make that four bits in the post. Just got a rejection from one of the places I sent stuff off to yesterday.

I am sooooo pissed off. Not with the rejection, I mean, that's fair enough. But somewhere along the line, my attachment got reformatted down from 12 to 10 pt. font. 10 pt? What the fuck? I KNOW I formatted that bastard properly! I've been doing this since I was a kid! Double line space, single side, TWELVE POINT COURIER! How could this happen to me? Oh, the shame! The indignity! The helpful little note from the asst. ed. with a link to a writer's help site! AUUUUUUUUUUGHHHH!

How will I ever live this down?

Okay. Calm now.

Well, no, I'm not even a tiny bit calm, I'm still pissed off, but I'm all ranted out for now so I'll just whine about how hard it is to be a writahhhh for a bit.

Except that I can't, coz right now things are coming pretty well. I've been working pretty hard this past week, finished three new stories, and tarted up four old storys that I wrote some years back but never submitted anywhere. I submitted three pieces of short fiction to 3 zines, two pro and one semi-pro, which makes 4 bits in the post if you count my entry for the McSweeny prize. I also have a piece ready to send out to TSR (finally!) which I should do tomorrow. That'll clear the decks, leaving me to finish some more works which I've outlined but haven't filled in yet. Two high fantasy, one sorta Fortean-y thing. They shouldn't really take me longer than a week to finish, barring the tedious proofreading etc.

Realistically I need to keep that kind of pace up every week if I want to get anywhere with this. I want to be selling a piece to a pro market, a market that pays 3 cents a word minimum, every week. That's not so crazy. There are a lot of markets out there nowadays and I am writing faster and better than I ever have in my life.

Rummaging around the wonderful Ralan.com I've turned up some promising pro markets. Check it out.

Edit: Make that five bits in the post. It's all quality stuff too. You can hate me now, that's what I'm here for.

Roll over.

It looks a lot like Aznar and friends played up ETA's involvement for political gain, but then "Aznar is a complete git who'd sell his own granny to keep the PP in power" is hardly news round here.

I think we've all worked out by now that ETA was not soley responsible for last Thursday's atrocity (tho' not for want of trying). Most of the evidence now points to Al Qaeda, with maybe a side order of ETA. TBH, I didn't want to belive it myself, because I know damn well that out head honchos will most likely use this as an excuse to clamp down even more harshly on our civil rights.

But that's not what I want to talk about right now. Right now I have a very special message for the (largely) right-wing pro-war lobby, in respect of their comments on the Spanish election result. Obviously this is a complex issue, one which needs a sensitive and even handed approach, showing due regard to both sides, but then there's this whole part where the r-w, p-w all suck and need to be sworn at a very lot.

FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU YOU POINTLESS, POINTLESS, POINTLESS FUCKING BASTARDS! YOU KNOW NOTHING! YOU ARE NOTHING! YOU INSULT THE LIVING AND THE DEAD WITH YOUR WORTHLESS BITCHING! SO YOU DIDN'T GET THE ELECTION RESULT YOU WANTED -- BOO FUCKING HOO! CHOKE ON PROPER DEMOCRACY! HARRRGH!

That doesn't mean you get to attack the people of Spain, you ignorant, souless gits. Oh, I'm so terribly sorry that having FUCKING BOMBS GO OFF IN THEIR CAPITAL made more people turn out to vote than might otherwise have done so. I'm so fucking sorry you saw a guy in a 'Palestine scarf' in one of the photos. Jeeze, that must have been hard on you. I'm so fucking sorry that Spain as a whole decided it was sick of the taste of DUBYA'S RIM, and decided that Hey, maybe we should vote in someone with less of an appetite for bushmeat.

Oh, yeah. The Spanish voted in someone you didn't like, so they must have been "scared." I suppose they were also scared when they took to the streets to tell the terrorists to fuck off. I suppose they were scared when they piled, man and boy, woman and girl, into easily bombable public spaces. I suppose they were scared when they chanted anti-terrorist slogans.

I suppose, right, they were fucking scared when they buried their kids and then stumbled weeping from the graveside to vote in the election. I guess they were scared then, yeah?

God, you unfeeling, spiteful, ignorant, self-satisfied, pompous, narcisstic WANKERS. I hope you never lose anyone to a terroist attack. You lack anything like the emotional maturity to deal with it. These people have more fucking guts in there little fingers that you Tory hack SCUM WILL EVER HAVE in your ENTIRE BODIES.

I love Spain. I really love Catalunya. I'd raise a kid here, and that's saying something.

ps: "Appeasement" is not a magic word. Saying "appeasement" a lot does not make you be suddenly be right.

PPS: Democracy's a bitch when it ain't your democracy, innit?

Bleh.

Had a fit last night. First one for ages, so it came as a bit of a surprize. Hell if I know what brought it on; I was working pretty hard yesterday so maybe it was that.

Bleh.

The PP lost.

Spain's ruling PP has been ousted by the PSOE, the leading left-wing party over here. There was a bit more pot-banging tonight, this time in celebration. People cheered, sang, waved Catalan flags. Something like three-quarters of Spain's population turned out to vote, which rips the piss out of the UK's usual 50-odd percent.

I've just watched footage of a family who'd just buried a son killed in the bombing drag themselves weeping from the funeral to the polling booth, and I think I need to cry now.

This post over at Instapundit has many relevant links.

The vigil

Went to the anti-terrorism demo last night. It was massive; I think extra trains had been laid on but even so the train in was packed solid.

The Placa Catalunya was seething. I don't know how many people turned out to show their grief, their solidarity, their defiance, but there must have been tens, maybe hundreds of thousands. Mostly they were ordinary people, the kind of people who wouldn't normally demonstrate: there were far more salon perms than bleached dreds, more short-back-and-sides than pink fauxhawks. People painted their faces with peace signs, slogans, and loops to represent the little twist of black ribbon that has come to symbolise mourning here. That same image was repeated everywhere: real ribbons and painted; printed and photocopied, stuck on walls, windows, doors, coats, and bags.

Home-made banners were brandished above the heads of the crowd. Some of the slogans seemed inspired by the rumours of Islamic terrorism, attacking Bush, Blair and Aznar for provoking the bombings. Mostly though, it was peace that people were thinking of. PAU! PAZ! Terrorism No! ETA NO! said the signs; We won't forget you, Madrid. No more bombs. No more deaths. They flung their white-painted hands* in the air, or clutched votive candles that cast flickering shadows on painted faces.

There was some chanting: "ETA no! ETA no!" and "Hijo de puta!" (son of a whore). Mostly, though, people were subdued, talking quietly amongst themselves or calling to friends in the crowd. There was sorrow in the air, and anger, and fear, but also a kind of grave joy in their unity. Here in Barcelona and all across Spain, millions of people are turning out to say the same thing: We don't want your bombs. What we want is peace.




*"Manos blancos, " a symbol of peace and defiance against ETA and the name of a Spanish peace organisation.

Just got back from a small demo in the main plaça of the campus. No chanting, no banners, no hubbub, just a show of solidarity. Sort of brings home to you how useless you are in the face of something like this. Me, I can't even give blood.

Going into town for the big demo at 7:30 tonight. See if there's any volunteer-type stuff that an ex-cleaning lady with bad Spanish could do. I wish Madrid weren't so far away.

"In one hospital, a doctor answered the mobile phone of a critically injured woman to find it was the patient's cousin, desperately trying to trace her."

God, imagine it; trying to reach a loved one after a calamity like that, and hearing a stranger's voice on the other end of the phone... Or worse, getting no answer.

There's an anti-terrorism demo tomorrow night. I'm going. Fucking futile, of course; the people who plant the bombs don't give a shit what anyone thinks. But sometimes you just need to be around other people who feel the same way, you need to get together just to say This is wrong.

Tonight the balconies of my neighbourhood have erupted into a fury of protest: pots and pans are being banged together, airhorns are blasting, people are shouting, screaming, whooping, whistling, stamping, banging on doors and windows. They are angry and they need to be heard, even if it's only by one another.

"When Eta attacks, the Basque heart breaks into a thousand pieces."

ETA massacre in Madrid

Christ. When I went out this morning the death toll was around 60, 70; now it's up to 180+ and just keeps rising.

I can't fucking belive it. All those people. They hadn't done anything, nothing; just a bunch of ordinary people. All they wanted to do was get to work. People here are talking about it in the streets, on the train, in the bar, in this cybercafe. Impromptu banners and ribbons hang from the balconies: PAU, says a hand-lettered sign in one window: the Catalan word for peace. ETA NO, says another. Everyone's stunned.

Well done ETA, you gutless, mindless, worthless pack of scumfucks.

Madrid blasts: Who is to blame?

Who are Eta?

Free money.

Right. Now, when I entered the contest I promised myself that I wouldn't think about the contest at all until they announce the winner. But in my current state of penuriousness, I can't help it. Which is bad. I keep thinking about all the things I could do with that dough, and if (well, when, really) I don't win, I'm going to feel even more gutted about not being able to do those things than I did before I even knew there was a contest.

So here it is, once and never again, just to get it out of my system: the big fat list of Things I Could Do With That Money

Sign up for a TEFL course.
Get my Reiki 2 attunement.
Get on an advanced Spanish course.
Get some new clothes. Shiny shiny black clothes mmMMMmmm shiny.
Buy sword lessons. Big sword. Big pointy sword.
Go and see my folks.
Toys for Lurid.
Books on how to write more betterer.

Dearly beloved Spooky Perverts: Please fix it for me to win this contest, or if not this ontest, some other contest with a big wodge of prize money. Please help me to sort out my grubby little life. Thankyou.

In other news...

I sold another story. w00t! It's only ten bucks but what the hey. It's for this nifty fantasy & spec. fic. webzine and it'll be out at the end of March. That poem I sold will probably be in the same ish. Wow.

Suicide Note Generator

Dear Ungrateful World;


Although everyone on Earth has failed to give me even half the accolades and adulation that should go with me, Mordant Carnival, being the 3rd coming of christ, I will still fulfill my destiny. For you insolent pukes, I will shed my blood to once again open the gates of heaven.

Start erecting statues, singing songs, scoring touchdowns and doing other shit for my glory, because you fuckers owe me big,



Jesus Christ III
a.k.a. Mordant Carnival


P.S. Tell everyone I'm not psychotic.

Lies, damn lies, and GM spin

Champion article by George Monbiot, detailing exactly how the "GM will solve world hunger!" line is bullshit. I mean, we already knew that, but it's nice to see it all written down properly.

Ouch.

Punitiveshoes.com

Like I say, Ouch.

In other news: I've updated Leftover Parfait for the first time in fucking forever. I haven't got around to it for a while because I was focused on the more saleable, less sectionable side of my work, but I've been such a busy little wannabee lately that I thought I'd treat myself to some disposable fun. I think I may use the premise of this new piece for something, someday, but it isn't really strong enough to carry a whole story by itself.

Trees.

Had a good day today. Crawled home from Nocturna at around 7am (fun night, cute little Spanish Gothlings, and a pretty good set to boot) and fell into bed for a few hours. It was really sunny today so I took advantage of the fine weather to go for a walk in the woods with Lurid. We played catch.

Walking in the woods makes me happy.

earthbounddog.com

In case of alien abduction these dog tags may save
your life. The crucial data an alien will need to get
you back to Earth is die stamped into these dog tags.

And all for only $12.99!

Meanwhile, in Romania, they're gearing up for entry into the EU by getting rid of the vampires:

Haunted by "strigoi" - the undead - villagers on the slopes of the Carpathian mountains exhume a corpse from the graveyard and drive a stake through its heart to banish the evil spirit. They burn the remains of the heart, mix the ashes with water from the local well and drink it, to complete the macabre ritual.

1804? No, 2004. This February just gone, to be exact. Jeeze Louise.

Okayer...

Frisky little darling of a day today: Punted out a new short fic in the afternoon, then topped things off by entering for the Van Zorn prize. (the deadline's the 10th, BTW, so if you haven't entered yet you should get your skates on. They accept emails with a Word.doc attachment, so you've still got time. Go on, I know you freaks can come up with summat.)

So I'm jolly pleased with myself and am inspired to keep up the pace. I should have the D&D-style thing punted out by midweek; I reluctantly abandoned my original idea as being too grim for that particular market and am polishing off a rather lighter piece to send instead.

The fly in the ointment is that my entry for the Van Zorn prize has already been rejected (or rather pointedly ignored until I went away) by no less than two webzines. Don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. The other fly in the ointment is that I was planning on sending it to Interzone, and now I'll have to work like a demon to get something as good together in time for my self-imposed Sending Something To A Magazine That Pays More Than £20 A Pop deadline of this coming Friday. Fortunately I have something on the hard drive that fits the bill; unfortunately I wrote it when I was 24. Everything that I wrote around that time is either a) a not-very-thinly veiled attack on exploitative work practices in the UK, or b) incoherent due to sleep dep. The latter can be fun, the former less so.

Either way, it's going to take work.

Okay...

So I've done the working, with the help of the spooks, a map of Barcelona, a marker pen, and a plakky bottle of water from the fountain in town. Just going to let that stew now. I've done all I can, I think.

On to the next thing. I need more spook help for this, but it's for them as much as me.

Guys, you keep on at me to do this book of drawings and stuff. You keep dropping all these images in my head. Which is all well and good but in case you hadn't noticed, my drawing is really sucky at the moment. And being me, I get stressed out by the suckiness and that makes my drawing suck even more, which makes me more sucky, etc.

Deliver me from the Suck Loop. I'll work hard, I'll persist, I'll stick with it, but right now there is no IT to stick with. I need you guys to get me started, please. Inspire me, point me to a really good How To Draw site, or anything that'll help me address my particular set of problems.

Meanwhile, here's someone who can really create: Kurt Wenner, master street painter.

The Silent Healing CD

"The CD contains over 34,000 different bio-energetic and Homoeopathic resonance patterns, which have been sampled and stored on the CD. When played on a Hi Fi or other CD player it releases the bio-energetic and Homoeopathic type patterns to harmonise imbalances. Every imbalance in the body has a complementary energetic pattern that will bring it back to optimum health, the body knows best and responds through resonance and accepts the patterns it needs..."

Uh, yeah.

There's also the usual bunch of testimonials from people who sound like they've been eating paint since childhood, extolling the virtues of the Silent Healing CD.

The website neglects to point out that that same effect ould be acheived with a fucking blank CD and a random selection of gullible whackjobs.

Things are hotting up around here.

(Nah, not the weather.)

Last night I had one of the oddest nights in years. Went to be early, slept really erratically, and had loads of peculiar dreams. (I wrote them down, of course, but I'm not going to blog them until I work out what the hell my head was on about.) Woke up many times with sleep paralysis, something I'm accustomed to but still find irksome. The sleep paralysis was associated with difficulty in breathing and a very loud buzzing in my ears, like a giant insect.

Woke up feeling all drifty and weird. This better be something magick happening. If it's not magick it's probably 'flu, and I hate 'flu.

Oh, and today's the day I do that spell to get L.A. the Spanish grant. All good vibes appreciated.

RVTargets.com
Online Magical Library
Sacred-texts.com

Just added these to the ever-expanding beast that is my sidebar.

Into the Dead Zone

Lena gives us a tour of Chernobyl. Haunting.

Update on the nutbar side of my life.

Still keeping up with the RPK. Results variable, but graaaadually improving.

Developed a visualization to help with the thought intrusions (you know, the brain gangrene thing). Not sure whether to blog that or not tho'.

Decided to start working a bit harder on my RV. I'll be using the guess-the-tarot-card game from Liber 9. Obviously I've doen this sort of thing before but TBH I've never really stuck with it for long, nor have I kept very detailed records.

Oh, FFS...

Be more uptight. Maybe you'll implode. That'd be funny.

I'm hot.

I'm hot and I want an ice-cream.

It's all sunny out and the little studenty people are sprawling on the lawns. And on Sunday, it was snowing.

It's not hugely hot -- most of my ice-cream hankerings were generated by walking uphill -- but I confidently predict MAJOR heat soon. I reckon we'll be properly baking in a couple of weeks, and in a month I'll be splashing happily around in the Med.

This is bizzarre.

So, awhile ago this guy commented on my Lj and friended me, right? Which is nice, you know, friends are good. I visited his Lj and there were no entries. Well, he must be new, I shrugged. But the thing is... I've just gone back and he still has no entries. None.

So it looks as if this guy signed up with Lj just to comment on one of my fics. And to join Lj, you need a code which you must either purchace or beg from a friend who's already got an accont. It's not like just anyone can sgn up, you have to make a bit of an effort.

Which is flattering but... Dammit, I hate the idea of being important enough to make any kind of an effort. My only defence in this wicked world is the complete indifference of the vast majority of people.

(PS: talking of indifference, I've updated the green book.)

Why?

Why must you do this? WHY must you be such an INCREDIBLE bunch of FUCKBUBBLES? I'm coasting along, right as rain, happy as a sandboy, thinking nice calm thoughts, ready to wrap the whole world in the Joy of the Divine, and you! You come along with your stupid ideas and your smug, deluded self-aggrandisment and you TRASH MY MOOD to the point where I must ABANDON THE PATH OF LIGHT and go all EVIIIILLLLL. Again.

I pop open my blog so I can get at the sidebar links, and what should be advertised in the banner across the top of the page but this?

Apparently the author of the website, one Jhershierra, is going to show us the path to Immortality. Which is nice.
Of course, she was born with her gifts, which include astral travel and lucid dreaming. (Funny, coz everyone I know who claims to be able to do that shit had to work their arses off. Not saying it couldn't happen, just saying "hmmmm.")

She has also, and I quote, "been visited by Jesus, Immortals,Ascended Massters, Extraterrestrials, and other Spiritual Beings since childhood." Nice of old J.C. to drop by, eh? Not to mention those Ascended Massters. (According to the website, these include St. Germain and, uh, a "dark-skinned Indian woman." So spiritual, these dark-skinned folk, donchaknow.)

Of course there's a bit of a catch. In order to find out how we too can be immortal, we've got to buy her book and, location permitting, attend her classes. But it's a sweet deal -- these Ascended types pop up all the time to tell her what great classes she's giving and how super she is.

How come I never thought of doing this? Why am I boshing away with the green book when I could just invent invent a big pile of crap and imagine myself a nice friendly Ascended Master to shill for me? I'm so in the wrong job.

Shout out for magickal aid.

Okay. So after due consultation with Lurid Archive, I'm going to be doing a medium-sized working to get him the 5-year postdoc he's got his eye on. It's not just the best chance we have of staying in Spain, it's also the best chance Lurid has of getting a good solid job. (As opposed to more of this year here, year there stuff, which quite frankly we could both do without.)

I'm going into town tomorrow to do some stuff, so I'll probably go and score some agua from this fountain that if you drink it you're supposed to not leave Barca, which I will use in the ritual. (Also there's this thing where you light a candle in the Cathederal to similar effect.) Ritual will most likely take place on the 5th, when the proposal has to be in.

Any good vibes would be appreciated.

Also, if spooky perverts ML and RML are reading this: guys, help me out here. I promise to update your blog more if you would please please please help LA to get this grant. I'll update and I'll draw your weird little pictures and write your book and everything.

Wow.

It's snowing out. Big and small flakes, fast and slow, coming and going in waves. White petals drifting past the deep green conifers. The sky is yellow-grey, lit by the occasional lightning flash. The distant mountains are hidden by cloud; the woods are a mystery. An afternoon to dream on, all right.

Blah.

Which is odd, you know, because I had a pretty good night last night. Went out with L.A. and one of his work buddies, who's a cool guy. Went to Gracia and had Lebanese food, then flicks. (Monster.)

Turns out there's this 5-year postdoc going here in Spain, which L.A. is going to apply for. Man, I'd really love that. Well, I'd love to be anywhere for a whole five years, but being able to stay in Barca would be awesome. Might actually be able to get some teaching quals., and hence a job.

Which brings us to the thing that's really bothering me, as it always bothers me: the writing. Seeing my story up there made me feel grand for about 2 seconds. Then I actually re-read the horrid little abortion and wondered if maybe I shouldn't just chuck it all in and learn to love hosing down public toilets for a living.

I don't know. I mean, I write, I submit, and I get... not very much, frankly. I know this was always going to be hard. I know about the grinding persistance required. I know about Phillip K. Dick papering his study with rejection letters and blah blah blah. But I've been trying, really trying for the past 3 years. And I've been trying in a half-arsed way for far longer-- half my life, if anyone's counting. I submitted my first story when I was 15. Paper my study? Hell, if I was the kind of person who hoarded rejection letters, I could BUILD a flaming study.

The thought of quitting fucking slaughters me. When I think about giving up writing, I feel like I'm contemplating the amputation of all my limbs with a blunt breadknife. I feel sick, dizzy, breathless. It literally, physically, hurts just to contemplate the idea. But on another level, this is a huge drain on my time and resources. I'm pouring hour after hour into something which brings hardly any money into my household, while my partener is forced to support us both. Is this the way a responsible adult would behave? Sure, I'm still trying hard to find work, but maybe if I wasn't spending so much time at the wordprocessor I could try a little bit harder. Maybe I'd already have a job by now.

I need to write. Fall-back positions and sidelines and all that aside, I need writing to be my career. I need this, all right, but do I have to have to have it? More to the point, do I deserve to have it? Or am I just one of those no-talent losers that real writers bitch about, the nobodies who keep on banging their heads against a brick wall of rejection and never seem to get a clue?

Toiiz

Forgot to tell you guys-- one of my stories is up. Thanks to all the lovely people at Bloodlust-UK :)

I want to get abducted by aliens again, again.

And by "again" I do not mean "I have previously been abducted by aliens and wish to repeat the experience," but "I have previously wished to be abducted by aliens, and now find myself experiencing a resurgence of that desire." And by again, I mean that I wrote a post exactly like this one a few months back.

Aliens, ghosts, moving stuff by the power of my mind-- anything really. I'm easy. I want ET to phone. Or Mothman. I just want something to happen. I don't want to do any more donkeywork in my magickal life. I want a sudden, dramatic paradigm shift, with loads of smoke and a blue filter and flashy lights. And I want to be played by some hot chick.

Stuff has been happening since last Spring, of course, but it's too slow. You know what it's like? Puberty, that's what. Weird changes, mood swings, tons of diarys, odd stuff popping into my head that I can't really talk about without a sense of acute embarrassment-- puberty. My wisdom teeth have even started growing again. Stupid magick.

At night I dream of coastlines: mostly rocky shores and stormy seas. The significance is not lost on me. Interfaces, places between places-- I've had a foot in two worlds for so long, I think I'm getting groinstrain.

Hunting.

Still don't have a job, by the way. I'm still trying; emailing, writing, phoning, pounding the streets. No dice. I can't even get a cleaning job. Why can't I get a fucking cleaning job?

I'm trying not to get too frantic about this, but to be honest it's really kind of getting to me. I've never had anything other than menial, casual, minimum-wage type jobs and now I'll also have a big chunk of unemployment glaring out from my CV, which doesn't look good.

Then there's the writing, which frankly isn't going well. I mean, I'm writing tons and submitting like mad, but all I'm getting is rejection, rejection, rejection, punctuating the deadly silence of those editors who don't even bother to write back. I know this was always going to take time, but I'd hoped to be selling stuff more regularly by now.

I'm becoming increasingly afraid that sweeping streets and mopping floors is all I'll ever have. I don't know how I'd cope with that.



(Of course, if a certain pair of spooky perverts would help me out here, none of this would be an issue...)

A state of uncertainty.

Well, my remote viewing is still an utter shambles but the micro PK is going a lot better.

But I'm anxious. What is actually happening here? See, when I'm going to have a good day, I have this sort of sense of peace and clarity. I just know that the pointer is going to move the right way.

And there lies the rub. See, whilst my precog is utterly weak, I can't rule out the idea that what i'm actually doing is looking at the data with my mind rather than letting it arrive unknown. In that scenario I would be basically 'fixing' the results because observing the data in any way means that it becomes fixed rather than being in a state of quantumy uncertainty (a la Schrodinger's Cat, doncherknow). Apparently this is a real consideration for people trying to design micro-pk experiments.

I'm trying to avoid this possibility by selecting the same goal over a number of experiments, but I'm not sure that's the best way to safeguard against the sort of thing I'm describing. Perhaps I should alternate, aim for ones, then zeros, then ones...

Or maybe this whole thing is baloney and I'll give it up in a week or two. Whatever.

Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not. Killlllllll.

(The only possible silver lining in all this is the faint hope that people aren't as narrow-minded, pig-headed and reactionary as I sometime belive, and that Dubya may have shot himself in the foot with this worthless bigot-snogging.)

You see what I mean?

Camera strap. Camera. Strap. CAMERA. STRAP!!!

Make plans. Eris likes a laugh.

Yes! Finally! I've finally spoken to someone at canned fish U. who was able to tell me how much I owed and where to send the cheque. I'm so relived. Of course, I'm not out of the woods yet, since they could still screw up (lose cheque, send stuff to the wrong flat, etc). I won't be entirely happy until I have that goddamn certificate in my hot little hands.

Of course, after the initial rush wore off I was immediately plunged into a dirty great slough of despond, coz even when I get my certificate I still won't be able to sign up with the OU since I'm flat broke. It looks like I'm going to need at least another year or so to get the money together, which depressed the hell out of me until a tiny fragment of sanity surfacedin my brain and pointed out that, look, you don't even know for sure what you want to do your course in yet.

Which is true. I mean, my initial plan was to do, well, electronics. But then I thought: why? Why not try a new direction? Broaden your net, sort of thing. So then I'm thinking, hmm, maths... Eng. Lit... jounalism... physics... engineering... hmmm. But then at the back of my mind there was this little voice saying that none of those was quite right.

"Hello! Strengths, playing to! What's a subject that we've been interested in since we were ten?"
"Ummm... writing?"
"Not that, dufus! We're already doing that. We can do that just fine without studying at all."
"Ummm... maths?"
"Well, we're good at maths but we have an unfortunate tendency to FREEZE LIKE A LEEEETLE BABY RABBIT IN THE FUCKING HEADLIGHTS OF AN SUV when we're asked to actually do any. Think again."
"I dunno... art?"
"We failed the A-level. Twice. Don't even go there."
"Ummm..."
"LOOK! We're buggering about with micro PK experiments! We're studying energy manipulation! We're trying to become a Reiki master! We're always hanging around magick and paranormal sites on the net! HELLLOOOO!"
"Ummmm... Ohhh... you mean parapsychology."
"YES! BINGO! God, we're an idiot sometimes."

And so here I am, thinking seriously about becoming an academically certified, professional wacko (instead of just an amature wacko of Olympic standard). I don't know, but the idea has some things to recommend it. Parapsychology would be a way to tie some of the disparate strands of my life together. It's a subject which I know quite a lot about, and which interests me. It's a qualification which would help in a career as a complemetary therapist. But I don't know, I mean there's reasons why I shouldn't do it too. But like I say it's a long way off. I'm going to have plenty of time to weigh up my options.

"Climate change will destroy us"--Pentagon

Full story here.

Key Pentagon findings here.

A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world...

'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes the Pentagon analysis. 'Once again, warfare would define human life...

Climate change 'should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a US national security concern', say the authors, Peter Schwartz, CIA consultant and former head of planning at Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and Doug Randall of the California-based Global Business Network...

In short, we're all fucked.

Changes

Got rid of the tag board. It was generating pop-ups whenever I logged on form the laptop. Use the comments system if you simply must pollute my mindspace with your hideous drivel.

I'm bitter.

And fed up of things. Moreso that usual, I mean. I've been downloading and listening to some of the songs over at diepunyhumans.com, and it's making me all teared-up and frustrated.

I want my voice back. Year on year, it's been eroded. Every time I try to sing I feel the hand of memory rising to squeeze me into silence. The more I fight, the worse it gets. The other day I woke up with total laryngitis; I could hardly speak. I feel like I'm choking, like there's an arm round my neck and I don't know where my attacker's nads are to kick'em.

Not worksafe.

I've got this uneasy fascination for reading the websites of online Dommes. My favourite by far is the terrifying evil genius known as Princess Sierra. I began by thinking she was way too extreme, but over time I've come to realise that dude, there are just some guys out there who have an honest-to-goodness Having Their Lives Trashed fetish. Who am I to say that the object or facilitator of said fetish is somehow wrong?

I guess it's always going to be a contentious area: where does informed consent stop, and coercion begin? Is there an inherent sexism in the use of feminization to humiliate, to say nothing of the homophobic aspect of said feminization when it includes sexual interactions with other men, these being presented as inherantly humiliating acts. And what of the fetishization of the financial transaction, the sexualization of Capitalism itself? It's a vast, tangled moral briar in which we could meander for hours, hopelessly lost.

In the meantime, here's a grown man simulating sex with an inflatable toy alien.

Heavy psi.

Yesterday's z-score was pretty good (for me), but I had an off-day today and trashed it. Again. Also, I made the mistake of googling for psionics sites.

Stuff me with a wombat and call me Gertrude, what a load of tosh. Most psionics sites fall into one of two categories.

Type one: SheriLynn's Faerie Psionic Realme. SheriLynn's Faerie Psionic Realme will have loads of crappy animated gifs of rainbows, bunnies, doves, twinkle-stars and shit, with either a baby-blue or magenta background. The page will be so full of crap it will take like half an hour to load, and there'll be about three lines of text o it. The text will be crap. The text will be about how FifiTrixieBelle, SheriLynn's Faerie Guide, taught SheriLynn to move a compass needle with the power of her mind.

Type two will be called Lorde RavenGrimm LeDarque'z Castille of Psionic Myght. It will be done out in tasteful red'n'black with day-glo green text. There will be roughly four million lines of text, relating how Lorde RavenGrimm discovered his psionic powers when he came into his Vampyre Heritage whilst live roleplaying. Lorde RavenGrimm will eschew animated gifs, preferring instead to personalise his site with his Vampire: The Masquerade clan badge and a song of his own composition, entitled Glory of the Undead Psi Lord's Might.

You'll be hoping against hope that these two are teenagers, but no. Both will freely admit to being in their early forties. They'll even put up pictures. With their cats.

I need some decent psi links please. Oh, and I also need to move some bodies. Bring a shovel.

Ragggh!

So I've finally finished that stupid story I was stupidly hoping to send to stupid TSR, and it sucks, and I'm going to have to do half a ton of stupid re-writing before I can send it anywhere, and I hate it, and I hate you.

I'm just going to leave it alone for a few days. Maybe if I come back to it with fresh eyes... something.

Had an idea for a vampire thing which I might be able to sell to one of my fave fanzines. I'm getting pretty fed up of the way that the only goddamn things I can sell are vamipre stories. I don't even like vampire stories that much. They're really, really boring. Got an idea for a vampire story? It's been done, pal. Vampirism is a disease? Been done. Vampirism as an addiction? been done. Priest vampires, detective vampires, mafia vampires... mafia priest detective vampires... been done. Everything has been done to death. It's boring. Boooorrrrring! And it's the only freaking thing that anyone will buy off of me! Even Anne bloody RICE has quit writing vampire stories! It's not fair!

What about my amputee sex robot stories, huh? What's wrong with amputee sex robots? Who will buy my amputee sex ro-o-bots? Nice ripe amputee sex robots!

213.234.225.182

This looks like the next wave of spambotage, doesn't it? Seems that a vast number of wikis have been trashed and replaced with porn links, and all the damage has been done from a Russian IP address. I can't really imagine anyone being sad enough to sit down and go through thousands of wikis this way, so it must be a bot.

How vexatious. I wonder how you could stop this kind of thing? Short of declaring open season on spammers, that is.