Enough of the ketchup puns.  We’re going to war.

It turns out that what happened to me earlier wasn’t a fluke.  We’re seeing alerts from the folks at Horror World and the esteemed Shocklines.  A certain social networking website is mailbombing a significant chunk of the online horror community.

Ticking off horror fans with net access.  Does that sound like a smart move to you?

Here’s a chance to tell these crypto-spammers what you think of them.  Be polite but direct.  Let’s give ’em Afterhell.

mark@idatecorp.com
glen@idatecorp.com
audreyr@idatecorp.com
paul@idatecorp.com
justin@idatecorp.com

Normally we upload new podcast episodes in time for the start of every week, usually uploading over the weekend.  Circumstances have forced us to break from that pattern — more on that in a later posting.

With luck, Giallo Part 5 will be out by Friday, September 7th.  Please be patient whilst we mete out unholy retribution.

A quick message to all and sundry.  It’s an apology…with a little grumbling thrown in.

Everyone I know — and several people I don’t — just got an automated invite to Quechup, a social networking website.  This happened without my knowledge or consent.  I’m very sorry.

Long story short:  I found a Quechup invite this morning in my e-mail.  It was marked as coming from an acquaintance I rather liked, so I figured I’d join.  When I registered on the website (wonky as it was), it offered to scan my address book and find this person for me.  Like a doofus, I thought, “Gosh, how convenient,” and clicked ok. 

The fineprint didn’t load onto the page until much later.  Nice trick.

I can grumble till the sun explodes, but I’m still the one who clicked on it.

Feel free to disregard the Quechup invite.  No hard feelings from me… unless your name is Quechup.

Don’t get me wrong.  For all I know, it could be a great website.  It doesn’t load completely 90 percent of the time, its privacy policy and its webcode are two completely different things, and it acts like a damn computer virus.  But hey, it could be a great website.

And yet I’m not linking to it.  Maybe when I calm down….

After a summer break, new episodes of “Afterhell: Bloodbath at the Giallo Hotel” are now being posted to the Afterhell podcast feed. If you haven’t subscribed yet, this is a great time to get in on a story of mobsters and zombies in a casino that’s going straight to the Afterhell.

You can go to our iTunes page or grab the RSS feed from the Afterhell audio page.

If you are already subscribed to the podcast, well, you already know we’re posting new episodes — and we want to thank you so much for your support.

Bless me, Father, it’s been 15 weeks since my last confession.

Oh, hey.  Yup, it’s me– sticking my head out of the dark, tarry abyss I’d fallen into.  I’m still working myself out of it, so I can’t give you all the details right away.  With luck, I’ll be able to fill you in on all the details over time.

So…where have I been?  What have I been up to?  And has my snarky, shellshocked demeanor lightened up much?

Take a wild guess.  Anyway….

First, I’ve been chained to my Macbook for a few months, learning by doing sound work on my own.  The results have been the current mixes of Afterhell Vol 3 “Bloodbath at the Giallo Hotel.”  The folks at Transdimensional Media and the Willamette Radio Workshop have helped me a lot, giving me advice and feedback.  It’s still in work.  Watch that space.

Second…  Jamie started her sabbatical away from the day job in late June.  Now, on the surface, this fact flies in the face of common sense.  A sabbatical usually means more free time, not less.

Ah, but most people don’t make the mistake we did.  We told our relatives.  What’s been the real time-sink of late?  Them.

Simple reason why.  Best encapsulation:  “Free time?  Great, then you guys can drop everything and travel hundreds of miles to see us!  All of us!  Every last freakin’ one of us.  Y’know, before we all die.”

So except for a few weeks where we took a break and came home for this year’s WRW Writers-On-the-air Workshop, Jamie and I have been traveling.  Lots.  Driving for hundreds of miles, up and down the west coast of North America, dipping a little bit into Canada as well as the usual scouring of the western US (but not before enduring some bigoted US Customs officers who ought to be pelted with oily anchovies and shoved into large vats of rancid goat’s milk every time they ever say “Oh, one of those,”) schlepping laptops, luggage, and suntan lotion –when we have it — until every other part of our bodies ached like an all-over tetanus shot.

Thus, if any of our relations are reading this, and if you bugged us to go out all that way to see you… you owe us.  Big.  And you will not know the day.  You will not know the hour.

Anyway, I’m hoping to post more details and less snark as time passes.  We even have pictures that might be fun to post for everyone’s perusal.

That brings me to an interesting question for all and sundry.  Is there a decent image editor for OSX that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg?

First off, we wanted to give our podcast listeners a heads up that Part 4 of “Bloodbath at the Giallo Hotel” may be delayed for a few days — but only a very few, at worst.

In the meantime, I thought I’d share this picture:

Those of you who play “The Sims 2” probably recognize this as a screenshot from the game. It’s a picture of one of my Sims who is a vampire, and she is indeed wearing an Afterhell t-shirt! It is similar to the real Afterhell shirts designed by and available for sale in our CafePress store.

It’s my first effort at making some custom content for the game, so it’s not perfect … but if any of you are Sims2 players and would like the Afterhell shirt for your Sims, send me a message and I’ll send you the files. There’s a men’s version as well as ladies’.

Every so often, little bits of synchronicity happen around Afterhell. One such happened yesterday, when we made the big announcement about “Bloodbath at the Giallo Hotel” going out on our podcast feed.

The Ask Yahoo! question for the day was “Who invented zombies?”

We certainly can’t claim to have invented them, but we hope you enjoy what we’re doing with ’em, anyway.

In case you haven’t already, you can check it out here (if you have iTunes) or here (the direct RSS link).

New installments to come through the summer!

Born defeated, died in vain
Super-destructive, you were hooked on pain
And though your music lingers on
All of us are glad you’re gone
If I could live my life half as worthlessly as you
I’m convinced that I’d wind up burning too

Paul Williams
“The Hell of It”
The Phantom of the Paradise

Ladies and gentlemen, behold the most succinct and intelligent comment I’ve seen about Cinco De Mayo and the whole immigration flap.  Just follow the link:

Lalo Alcaraz’s “La Cucaracha” for May 3 2007

Maybe it’s a tenuous horror/dark fantasy connection.  A tie to Cinco De Mayo is just plain weak.

Know whut?  We’re posting it anyway.

Mexican Wrestler Goes to the Mat for Endangered Sea Turtles

Hijo del Santo!  I-am-glad-you’re-here!

Oh bite me, it’s fun.