MARTIAN CHRONICLES (How else do you follow vampires?)
In 1990 I published a novel titled Mars, The Red Planet. And in it, I made one of the worst errors of my science fiction career. I assumed that the Soviet Union (as in "Red" geddit?) would survive well into the twenty first century, whereas it collapsed pretty much before the book even hit the stores. All in all, through, it was a cute read, and the Mars Society voted it "Best Noirish Mars Book: ("You want more when your finished with this one.") I wish someone would republished the sucker along with so much of my neglected back catalogue.
http://www.newmars.com/archives/000012.shtml

And this week, as Mars passes the closest point to Earth on its orbit, I have a snappy discourse in LA CityBeat on H.G. Wells’ place in the modern world. http://lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=2829&IssueNum=126

Also our pal hipspinster bogs about the nearness of Mars.
http://hipspinster.blogspot.com/

The secret word is Thuvia

THIS WOULD SEEM TO NAIL IT
From MrMT. In yesterday’s Washington Post, E. J. Dionne Jr. seen to drive a stake to the heart of the White House conspiracy...
Has anyone noticed that the coverup worked?
In his impressive presentation of the indictment of Lewis "Scooter" Libby last week, Patrick Fitzgerald expressed the wish that witnesses had testified when subpoenas were issued in August 2004, and "we would have been here in October 2004 instead of October 2005."
Note the significance of the two dates: October 2004, before President Bush was reelected, and October 2005, after the president was reelected. Those dates make clear why Libby threw sand in the eyes of prosecutors, in the special counsel's apt metaphor, and helped drag out the investigation. (For the full story...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/31/AR2005103101386.html

VAMPIRES OF THE BLOGOSPHERE
Thank heavens there’s still some fun to be had in this world, as at the crazy blog that has been publishing Bram Stoker's Dracula for the last six months. Individual pieces of the novel have appeared on the calendar dates indicated in the text, starting with Jonathan Harker's May 3rd Bistriz journal entry, and will finishing up on November 6 and the Final Note. I came to this a little late, but what’s a few months to the undead.
http://infocult.typepad.com/dracula/

In related news, it seem that Anne Rice has become a born again Catholic and is writing books about Jesus.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9785289/site/newsweek/

Now everybody go and buy a Victor Renquist novel and save me from dying in poverty.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/browse/-/6556/ref%3Dpd%5Fsl%5Faw%5Ftops-1%5Fstripbooks%5F8143964%5F2/103-7583784-7925458

The secret word is Hammer

SEX, LIES, AND LITERATURE
To write fictional sex is unavoidably self revealing, and if you can’t handle the revelation, don’t go join the game in the first place. Advice Scooter Libby might well have taken before embarking on his 1996 novel "The Apprentice" which is now being scrutinized in this week’s edition of The New Yorker for its sex scenes and what they demonstrate about the indicted Bush cohort. Comment was solicited from Nancy Sladek, editor of Britain’s Literary Review, which, each year, holds a contest for bad sex writing in fiction. (In 1998, someone nominated the Starr Report.) Sladek agreed to review a few passages from Libby. "That’s a bit depraved, isn’t it, this kind of thing about bears and young girls? That’s particularly nasty, and the other ones are just boring," she said. "God, they’re an odd bunch, these Republicans." For decidedly odd excerpts...
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/articles/051107ta_talk_collins

LESBIAN VAMPIRES
In related news, Miss Templeton has blogged on 19th century lesbian vampires. I can only hope that she eventually moves on to 20th and 21st century examples, and that my own former- Nazi starlet, occasional (in-so-far-as) lesbian vampire Julia Aschenbach – the constant irritant to Victor Renquist – will be included. I do so hate to be overlooked.
http://horslipsmusic.blogspot.com/

AND HERE IS SOMETHING I WOULDN’T WALK ON WITH MY WORST ENEMY...
http://www.snopes.com/photos/architecture/skywalk.asp

The secret word is Count

HCB DOES NOT AGREE
"To paraphrase an old lawyer joke...Q: What’s the indictment of one Bush henchman? A: A good start." But from our pal HCB...
"It's a total pussy indictment--the least charges to the least important player--one that completely ignores even a hint of the real crimes. Libby was always the goat, and losing him in this way and to these charges was not an amputation nor any kind of grievous wound. Unless Fitz comes forward with something else here, I'm going to assume that this indictment is just another GOP CYA."

(The email here, by the way, is byron4d@msn.com)

LAST NIGHT IN AMERICA, WE WERE SUPPOSED TO PUT OUR CLOCKS SOMEWHERE. I PUT MINE IN THE MICROWAVE.

MARS IS VISIBLE
http://www.space.com/spacewatch/051028_mars_close.html

"Reality, I suggested, might be merely what each one of us says it is. Does that idea make you feel lonely, Mr. Cornelius?" - Michael Moorcock

ALL OUR YESTERDAYS 1
I had said that I would shut up about the fate of the alternative press for the moment but synchronicity don’t play that. In my web wanderings I discover this feature from Playboy, August 1967, when the bunnymag discovered the underground press and marveled at it.
http://www.trussel.com/lyman/brackman.htm

ALL OUR YESTERDAY’S 2
Feeling that I should be even au courant on coming plagues and pestilence, I was reading up on chicken flu and learned there was a "pandemic" in 1968. Damn me, but I didn’t notice. I mean, I recall the shootings of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and the Chicago riots, and even the Deviants making disposable, but I somehow missed the pandemic. Too loaded? Or maybe a combo of meth, reefer, whiskey and cigarettes are just the perfect innoculation?

A BRACE OF MUSIC RELATED BLOGS/SITES PRESENTED WITHOUT COMMENT...
http://theworldsamess.blogspot.com/
http://thepiratebay.org/details.php?id=3375718

The secret word is Unnatural