Tinhuviel Artanis

I just finished the first story for The Harming Tree. Combined, the prologue and "Taking Isobel" gives me a word count of 10,195. I have an idea for the next tale, but I'm gonna let it percolate for a while. Stu sent me the new Jen Olive tunes and wants me to review them, so I need to focus on that. I also need to create a fan page on Facebook for Restaurant for Dogs and The Caretakers. Bruce gave me some tunes and pictures for that project, so I need to get cracking on that. Sometimes I wonder what I've gotten myself into. Ha!

I've begun the song-by-song review of the new Shriekback release, even though I don't have all the songs yet. Carl Marsh is contributing to this album and he's using different methods and instruments from Barry's sojourn into Shriek-land. I wonder if Stuart has those and is waiting on permission from Carl to pass them on to me? Perhaps I should write them all three and explain what I need, that I'm in the process of proofing, and my brain is mush at the moment. I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, 'cos I'm not. I'm just really eager to get this done for them and build up some excitement over the new album, whatever its name turns out to be.

Can you imagine what an amusement theme park based on All Things Shriek would be like? Dark places would abound from which glitches (more than one) of Mothmen would flutter about whispering your doom. We'd have the Bog of Eternal Tench where people had to sing "Sexthinkone" to get the stones to come up to allow them passage over. There could be the lair of the Lupine/Vampires where you must dodge heads on pikes to make it through to the end, all the time being chased by Vampires and various other frightening Beasts. The ultimate roller-coaster would, of course, be Glory Bumps, where passengers would get shaken, shimmied, jellied, and maybe even saved before being dumped in a big vat of holy water (or so we say). If you need to rest, you can take a spinning cup filled with eels and feathers for a brief siesta, then move on to fellow earthling habitat area, ingeniously entitled Naked Apes and Pond Life. The place would be lush with gardens, questionable topiary, and metallic sculptures. One may also visit the library on gardens and their importance in the history of...history. Here folks can get hip to the Hypnerotomachia de Polyphilo and Parc Stic.

Any other ideas for this worthy and wholly impossible project? I'm sure I'd come up with more if I gave it some thought, but I want to work on this song-by-song, so I'm leaving it to the Shriekers. When you're done brainstorming, I'm sending this to Barry, just so's you know. And maybe even Carl, too.

If Harry Potter can have a park, then so can our Shrieks. Just sayin'.

Al Salaam