As you all know, Austin has the pride of having invented the concept of an interactive, story-based, full contact haunted house, a tradition that has been passed on for over 20 years, since Britannia Manor, The World’s Most Famous Haunted House. Now, as we build SCARE for a CURE on the site of Britannia Manor Mark 2, with the sponsorship of Lord British, himself, Richard Garriott, there’s another haunt that shall not be named that is claiming to be “Austin’s only interactive haunted house.” I don’t want to call them outright liars, so let’s just say that I think they’re a bit fuzzy on the concept. So as a public service to anyone who might be confused, I’ve come up with a helpful definition:

Definition of an Interactive Haunted House: Characters will talk to you, listen to you, react to you (not just scream at you).  If you ask a sensible question, they will answer. If you ask a smartass question, you'll get a smartass answer. You must crawl, sneak, climb, run, figure out clues, touch gross stuff, find essential items, etc. through a 30-45 minute adventure, not just shamble along in the dark for 10 minutes. People and monsters will touch you and scare the wee out of you, but not hurt you. (Please, don’t hurt us.) Your actions determine if you win or lose. Get into it, play along, and you will have an absolute blast, and you might get to save the world! Or, you might fail miserably and get taunted by evil creatures with big teeth, but you’ll still have a blast.

Tickets are selling really well. If you’re planning on seeing the show, don’t wait until the last minute to get tickets, or you either won’t get in when you want to, or you may not get in at all. www.scareforacure.org is where you get them.

For anyone who’d like to help make this all happen:

Building is now going on all day, every day, until run. 10AM to 9PM, someone will be out at the 7400 Coldwater Canyon location, and would love to have help. 

The roof is on and the fun part is going strong. How many opportunities will you have to make Styrofoam look like stone, do faux marble finishes, plaster walls, hang severed heads, sculpt vampire teeth, mold fake chunks of meat, and decorate walls with blood guts and organs? Come out any time you can.  Doesn’t matter your skills or lack thereof, we can use the help. We’ve also got special effects stuff happening in the Lab, and costume sewing happening at the Crippen household, and can definitely use help with that as well.

Rehearsal will be Sunday afternoon around 4. All volunteers who can possibly show up should show up then either to practice your part, or to give us an audience.  We need folks to practice talking to and messing with.  It's an interactive haunted house thing that other haunts might not understand. 

Tags: scare for a cure

Don’t know how much word has slipped out already, but it’s now official: we’re having SCARE for a CURE this year on the site of Britannia Manor Mark 2. Richard Garriott has generously allowed us to build our haunt in the middle of his half finished manor house off City Park Road near the 360 bridge.

For those of you new to the Austin area, Britannia Manor was an interactive haunt hosted by Richard Garriott, aka Lord British, an Austin game designer, and now astronaut. Britannia Manor ran from 1988 to 1994 and was called the most famous haunt in the world. People camped out for over a week for the privilege of going through.

Many of the folks who worked on that legendary haunt, including myself, have continued the tradition for the last 20 years in Wild Basin’s Haunted Trails, and now SCARE for a CURE. We have finally gone full circle, back to Britannia. Lord British won’t be personally hosting this year’s haunt. Jarrett “The Defuser” Crippen is still our director. But LB’s given us full use of his magnificent setting, and is now our number one sponsor. 

Tickets are already on sale on the SCARE for a CURE website, and as suspected, now that the new location has been officially announced, they’re selling fast. If you want one heck of a thrill ride, I suggest you buy them now, before they’re gone.

For folks who want to be a bit more involved,  we’ve got some big shoes to fill. In order to live up to Britannia Manor’s legendary reputation, we’ve got a whole lot of work to do.  We’ll be working out at the Manor site every weekend from now until the performance.

Work days:

Tues. 7PM – 10 PM (depending on need)

Fri. 4 PM – 10 PM

Sat. 9 AM – 10 PM

Sun. 10 AM – 10 PM

This weekend, we will meet Sat morning, Sept 12, at 9 AM at the Comfort Suites near 183 and Anderson Mill Rd. There’s a significant amount of props and such in storage near there from the haunted house CreepShow that now belongs to SCARE and needs to be moved to the new site. Anyone with a truck, SUV, trailer or anything that can haul stuff is especially needed on that Sat. If you arrive later, then just head on out to the manor.

This Sun, Sept 13, will be the second casting call. Auditions are scheduled for 2 – 5 Sun afternoon out at the manor. Several good parts are still available, both speaking and non-speaking roles.

Anyone who wants to work on what promises to be the best haunt in over a decade, be there or be left out.

See you there,

Paige

(Assistant Director, SCARE for a CURE 2009)

Tags: scare for a cure
Current Mood: excited

This Saturday, Aug 29, is a great day to shop at BookPeople. Why? 

 

Well, from 3 to 5 pm some local authors of vampire and other scary fiction will be doing readings and signings. 

 

And if that’s not enough, present the attached flyer, and a portion of whatever you buy will be donated to SCARE for a CURE!

 

Print it out, cut it in half and give one to a friend. Print a dozen out and give them to all your family. If you forget yours, but still shop at BookPeople sometime this coming week, let the guys behind the counter know. They might have some extra copies.

 

SCARE is looking really impressive this year.  The script may be adapted as a graphic novel. Our first auditions had a record turnout, and our next auditions will be Sept 13 2-5pm at the Elk’s Lodge. If you are still interested in helping out in any way, we need all kinds of volunteers, artists, builders, costumers, actors, techies, and anyone who can lift a two by four or wield a paint roller. More info on the http://www.scareforacure.org/volunteers/casting.php site Projects are ongoing at The Lab, and work weekends for general volunteers at the lodge start this Sat.

 

If you can’t come in person, but would like to help support the project, we could totally use donations to help us build this monster. http://www.scareforacure.org/about/donations.php

 

See you there!

Tags: scare for a cure

Space Squid ten minute flash fiction contest entry, 2009:

"Yup, that cow is definitely dead," the sherriff said.
"It's them aliens, I'm tellin ya. I read about cattle mutilation."
"Now, Hank, you're just bein neurotic.  Ain't no cattle mutilations, and ain't no aliens."
At that point, the sherriff was beamed up in a sparkle of light into a really big flyin saucer.
"I told ya!  I said ... Didn't I say ...?" Hank sputtered to a stop as he realized there was no one there to hear him but a field full of dead cows.
Suddenly, all over the field, the cows started to twitch.
The hideous mutilated cow corpses staggered to their hooves, and muttered, "Brains!!"  Except it really sounded more like sort of gurgly, "Mooos!!"
Hank ran for it, but there was dead cows everywhere and they were all out for Hank brains.
Fortunately, Hank was about as paranoid as they come. 
He made it to his pickup. He pumped about 20 rounds of shotgun slugs into cow brains, and dropped zombie cows everywhere.
Finally, he was out of ammo, but there was still one cow left.
"All that steak.  I sure could use a good charcoal grill about now."  That was Hank's last thought...


just before he ran over that last damn heifer with his pickup.

Tags: con, space squid, writer

Well, con's over, and my feet may never speak to me again.

I was on 2 great panels, Paranormal Romance and Vampires, both with Julie Kenner sitting next to me, who is not only a fabulous writer, but witty and fun and generally cool.   She lives about 15 miles north of here. Chatted a bunch with another couple of local writers and we batted around the idea of a little coffee klatch kind of thing where we get together once a month, not so much for a criticque or anything writer work related, but just a writer's chat session.  A lot of the fun and networking and sense of support that you get with a con, but on the local level, and a bit more often.  I think the decision was to revisit the idea after October, when SCARE for a CURE no longer owns me.

Did a bit of shilling for SCARE and finally got to meet Gabrielle Faust in the flesh again.  Met first at the Nebulas, I think, but had mostly just had email contact after that.  She DID make it onto the Vampire panel, and we both plugged SCARE a bit.  Was glad to see that, but I met another writer of Vampire and zombie stories at the autographing table, Joe McKinney, who was also not on the vampire panel.  Not sure how they decided who was going to be on that panel. Joe is also a San Antonio PD detective, and is interested in helping out with SCARE, maybe donating some books for a fundraiser.

Had a few good writer advice takaways from the panels I attended on marketing my work, and various topics.  Don't know how I'm ever going to find enough time to do any decent marketing and also actually write.

Found out my friend Iolo is within spitting distance of a 3 book graphic novel contract with Lerner press.  Go, Iolo!

I chatted with my friend, Dan, who is a fabulous artist, about possibly doing a few pages with me for the beginning of my superhero/vampire story so we could shop it around to possible graphic novel publishers together.  He seemed pretty excited about the idea, and we're going to get together in a week or so, and look at coming up with something.

Chatted with Kim K., who moderated the Vampire panel, and who is in charge of Apollocon next year.  She was really interested in SCARE, and thought about maybe having us come and do a spook house panel, or some kind of demo.  She also seemed open to my idea of teaching a class on writing sex scenes at the writer's workshop.

Also, chatted with the nice writer sitting next to me at the autograph table, who is a former teacher like me, about a writing prompt I did with my students where we looked at a book full of really cool illustrations, and then the kids picked a picture they liked and wrote a story to go with it.  I'd love to do an anthology like that.  Just have a good artist who has some nice images that aren't already committed to be cover art or some other use, and just show them on a website with a call for submissions.  Tell everyone to choose an image, and write a story to go with it.  Then, choose the best story for each pic, and publish the already illustrated anthology.  I mentioned the possibility to John Picacio who is a magnificent sci fi cover artist.  He said he'd consider it and gave me his email, but didn't seem all that thrilled at the concept, and didn't think he had much in the way of art work that wasn't already committed.  If I decide to puruse it, might try it with someone who isn't already so successful, although a name artist could go a long way toward making the anthology more sellable.  In any case, that's back burner.  I know how much work it is to edit an anthology.  Would rather focus on my own work for a while.

I did not win the Space Squid flash fiction contest, because I dragged a friend with me to the con who is also a writer.  Danged if he didn't beat me.  He came in first with a story about Texas heat, road construction, and the Chubacabra, and I came in second with my zombie cow centered paranoid mystery.  That is one heck of a lot of fun.  I wish more cons had contests like that.  I think I'll post the zombie cow story (that I wrote in ten minutes flat, with 30 secs to spare) in a separate post.

Lots to think about, lots to do. Cons always get me fired up and raring to do more with the writing career.  They're also just plain fun, hanging out with some of the coolest folks on earth and chatting about some of my favorite topics for hours on end.

Tags: con, writer

The weekend of August 14th-16th is ArmadilloCon, the literary SF convention held right here in Austin, TX. The one con I absolutely could not skip this year.

I’ll be on a couple of panels, signing and doing a reading.

Here's my schedule:

Friday, August 14th
9:00pm – 10:pm – I’ll be participating in the annual Space Squid flash fiction contest. Look out Matthew. I just hope I don’t get stuck with writing a story about Frodo again.

10:00pm - 10:30pm - Reading (Beginning of “PeaceMaker” from Bare Throat, Naked Hunger) Looks like the room is empty after I read, so if anyone’s up for it, I might read a sexy scene after my “official” reading.

Saturday, August 15th
12:00pm - 1:00pm - Panel: Vampires – Hmm, wonder what that panel might be about. I’ll be the one sporting her own fangs.

4:00pm - 5:00pm - Panel: Putting the Romance into the Paranormal – Also, not a tough panel to figure out. I’m on two panels with Julie Kenner! Talk about good company. If you haven’t read her Carpe Demon series, you are clearly deprived.

Sunday, August 16th
12:00pm - 1:00pm - Signing – I’ll be sitting at a table in the dealer room with some books and a pen. Come by and chat.
 

Tags: writer
Current Mood: excited

Some other snapshots of IGDA:

I painted so many faces I lost track.  Arrived to find folks already waiting before I had the new brushes out of a bag.  Sent folks away for about 15 mins around 6 so I could eat, and finally stopped about the time it started to get dark.  Got almost zero pics out of it.  Lots of folks took pics, but I was way to busy painting faces to photograph them.  It was a serious blast.  The most interesting had to be the first one of the day.  A couple brought over a baby in a stroller, maybe 6 months old.  She wanted him painted like a skull, he wanted flames.  Being a Ghost Rider fan, I went for a flaming skull.  But no one consulted the baby.  He was convinced that the paint brush must be something to eat. And when the brush tickled his nose, he saw no reason not to smear his hand across it.  I managed a very sketchy flaming skull on a seriously moving target, but the results were unbelievably cute.  I think someone eventually got a pic, but not until most of it had been thoroughly baby removed.

I missed most of the actual picnic, barely looked up all day.  I heard Dr. Cat's voice at some point, but never got a chance to say hi.  I did run into one of the Space Squid editors later, and showed them the photo room we'd set up with stocks and scary body parts and such.  He said he's interested in doing some joint advertising.  I told him I'd buy an ad in the next issue for Scare.

Swam all alone in the little inlet as the sun was setting.  Glorious.  Zen.  I love that place.  Years ago, I started to write a story about a naiad that lived there, but never finished it.  Makes me want to go back and finish.  In my copious free time.

Mutual admiration society: Richard sits down next to me, with Jarrett -The Defuser - Crippen's beautiful wife Norma on the other side of me.  Richard leans across and asks Norma, what's The Defuser's weakness?  I said something about rats, but I doubt those really bother Jarrett much.  He's just easily startled at times.  The real question is, why does Lord British want to know The Defuser's weakness?  Because he's a bit intimidated by him.  What's Norma's response to Richard?  That's okay, you intimidate the heck out of Jarrett, too.  Two men with ridiculously overflowing amounts of charisma, each very much used to being the center of attention, both in the same room with a bunch of gamers and geeks, each somewhat in awe of the other.  With the swirl of people around them both, and them sort of circling each other, one of the guys sitting with me referred to it as resembling a binary star system.  I could see that.

So, I'm helping clean up the next day.  I'm not much help, really.  Can't do anything but fold a little cloth and put some stuff in boxes with my dodgy back.  Kept trying to run away, because I wanted to help.  It was frustrating having to watch everyone else work.  Mr. Mike, the madman who organized this event, needed some help getting lined up to hitch a trailer full of garbage to his land rover, so he could take it to the dumpster and ditch it.  I am fully capable of waving my arms around to direct someone to a hitch, and have had lots of practice with my baby.  But, when it comes time to actually pitch the heavy bags of nasty smelly drippy trash, mostly stale beer, bottles, and melted spoiled ice cream, only Mr. Mike can heave the bags while I am once again a fifth wheel.  However, there's some empty cardboard boxes and styrofoam mixed in with the bagged trash, so I get a chance to at least contribute something.  I pick up a chunk of styrofoam off the bottom of the trailer, lift it over my head to throw it in the dumpster, and pour a stream of nasty smelly liquid garbage right square into the middle of my chest.  YUCK!  Next, we go to hose out the trailer and I had Mr. Mike turn the hose on me, square in the chest.  Instant wet t-shirt contest, which I assume since Mr. Mike was my only competition, I won.  It was rather silly and embarrassing, but it was a great blessing to no longer feel filthy, not to mention the cold wet shirt was refreshing in the 100 degree heat.

Long talk with Jarrett on the role of assistant director I've agreed to take this year and what that entails, while driving equipment back to "The Lab."  The Lab is a mad scientist's dream location with tons of space, tools, and all our Scare junk neatly organized.  Very nice.

I live for memories like this weekend.  It's this sort of thing that keeps me doing spook houses year after year.  Great people, great fun, a great sense of accomplishment.

Scare for a Cure volunteer kickoff party and casting tryouts are Sun Aug 2, 2:00 in the afternoon at the Elk's lodge.  All are welcome.  I know I'm nuts, but I really can't wait for the madness to start in full swing.

Looks like my little sexy space opera story, "Caught," is in the finals for "Best Erotic Fantasy and Science Fiction."  I got an honorable mention in the previous version of that anthology contest, Best Fantastic Erotica, but didn't make it into the anthology.  Will find out next month if I made it in this time.

Fingers crossed.

And toes.

I'd cross my eyes, but not sure I could hold that for a month without going blind.

It's a fundamental truth of my life that when its extremely interesting, I have no time to write about it, and when I have time to write, nothing much interesting is happening.  Hence, the spottiness of my blogging efforts.  However, this weekend was supremely interesting, and being utterly exhausted gives me a bit of time to rest and recover, and write. There's a bunch of stuff I could write about, but my baby did a little Facebook status thing that said essentially the title above, and I decided to elaborate on that bit.

This weekend, I went out to the IGDA picnic at Richard Garriott's land. to help promote Scare for a Cure.  For those who have been living under a rock for the last 25 years, Richard, aka Lord British, is a genius game designer who's first company, Origin Systems, almost single-handedly jump started the game industry in Austin.  He's also the inventor of the interactive adventure game/spook house concept that has owned my fall most years for the past 21.  Most importantly to me, he was someone I would call a dear friend for about half that time, and a fond acquaintance for the rest.  I was delighted to spend a bit of time with him and some Origin folks talking about old times with much alcohol imbibed, some of it 109 year old port served in dixie cups. 

One particularly interesting moment was when Richard, a recent resident of the International Space Station and founding father of the private space industry discussed where he (and Buz Aldrin) thinks we should go next.  To mars.  Not just to explore, to colonize, permanently.  One way trips.  Human beings living in robot created bubble habitats off the martian resources. Terrifying, yet exciting and fascinating concept.  "Making humanity multi-world."  Extraordinary food for thought from an extraordinary man.

There are a lot of things about Richard that I admire, some serious, some frivolous, from the way he fills out a pair of jeans to the way he thinks about the world; he has never lost the sense of wonder.  He's fun-loving and a great conversationalist, which would be enough alone to make me enjoy his company, but he's also a wonderfully good-hearted person, which has won my loyalty again and again over the years.  I was delighted to finally have the chance to give him a hug and kiss on the cheek and welcome him back to earth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWlkGblVWKo&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gamesetwatch.com%2F2009%2F07%2Fman_on_a_mission_trailer_for_g.php&feature=player_embedded

On a far less serious note, the Fat Man, a well-known game musician, told a good story that I have to share.  He sent an email to Richard,  something to the effect of, "So, how is the astronaut training going in Russia?" and got a reply from Richard's blackberry, "Not in Russia right now.  I'm having tea with Stephen Hawking!"

How often does anyone, even Richard, get the chance to send that kind of text! 

What was even better was the reply from the Fat Man.  "You should tickle him, and tell him you won't stop until he types, "Ha, ha, ha."

The funniest part was imagining Richard's face when he read that text, in front of Stephen Hawking and family.

Tags: richard, scare for a cure

So, it's not like much is going on. (Yes, that's sarcasm.)  Just got back from a business trip to Boston, while simultaneously trying to launch the website I've been working on for six months.  My mother calls me up and says, "I want you to marry me."  Well, not sure that's exactly legal, Mother.  Oh.  You want me to officiate at your wedding.  Wow!  Congrats!  I'd be honored to.  When?  June?  Next year?

Next week.  Saturday.

Yikes.

Apparently, when you pass 70, you're not real big on wasting time.