Jeff Carlson's Blog

Recently I passed through San Francisco Int’l Airport, where the main concourse boasts a vast, impressive display of TV memorabilia from the first days of b&w moving pictures to the heyday of 70’s television and my childhood.

My brother and I weren’t lucky enough to own lunchbox sets like this one, which is freaking AWESOME, but we did have “Space: 1999″ toys like the uber cool starcraft gathered near the M*A*S*H* and Star Trek displays. Maybe better, on our annual backpacking trips with our father, we never failed to find a waterfall and float sticks over the plunge while singing: “In the LAND… of… the LOST!!!!”

Anybody else remember this treasure?

Aha ha ha. Watching this spotty YouTube video makes me laugh at the incredibly schlocky special effects, but we didn’t care when we were seven years old. Now I gotta ask, why is the theme song a tub-thumping country jingle? Were Marshall, Will, and Holly good ol’ boys? Did this show eventually spawn “Deliverance”?

Either way, you gotta admit the concept is HIGH CONCEPT, baby.

Back to the Long Eyes collection! Here’s a short afterword for a short short…

Like “Exit,” this short short was conceived for an annual fiction contest, this one held by SLO Nightwriters, a writing group of which I was a member for two years while living on California’s central coast. “Romance” didn’t do as well as “Exit.” As I recall, it placed fifth or sixth, but I’ve always liked it for its compact elegance.

Yes, it’s cliché. But it’s elegant. You won’t be surprised to hear that I was watching a lot of Quentin Tarantino movies at the time.

Short and sweet! More soon!

The Turkey Wars continue at Casa Carlson. Pest-ridden noise-making rats with blubber and feathers!

In better news, I grew up with some super geniuses. Let me introduce you to Troy Corliss, who graced the pages of Plague Year with the fictional Corliss Reservoir as well as the Acknowledgments page, where I thanked him for some awesome ski adventures.

Now he’s a big fat successful artist/sculptor with a thousand half-naked moony-eyed adoring groupies. Plus his fantastic and intelligent wife, Anne. Ah, what a life!

Here’s a story about his latest success.

Or… Invasion Of The Semi-Domesticated, Super Dumb, Superior Decibel Turkeys, aka, SDSDSDTs.

We live in the foothills surrounding Mount Diablo in the east San Francisco Bay Area. The upsides include a bazillion acres of oak-and-grassland hills, good for hiking and biking. We’re also totally cool with the coyotes, quail, and deer. Sometimes the ground squirrels are a bit much. Too many of their natural predators have long since fled, so their population is soaring. Occasionally it’s balanced by wet, warm springs in which the gopher, king, and rattlesnake populations explode and whittle down the mad, digging rodents.

Somebody’s gotta do something about them turkeys! There are no natural predators left to speak of in the asphalt-and-homes suburban jungle. The coyotes very, very rarely get lost in the streets. When they do, I don’t think they’re hunting. They’re just trying to get back out.

But the turkeys! Oh, the turkeys!

Yeah, I know Ben Franklin wanted them to our national emblem instead of the mean, scavenging bald eagle, but these pinheaded, pampered, protected, overplump dumplings are not the cunning wild birds of his day.

Vast crapping flocks of them meander dully up and down the avenues, blocking traffic and gobbling their tiny brains out at the crack of dawn like herds of mutant zombie roosters. Mostly they’ve kept to the street behind ours, which is acceptable. They’re a near-distance nuisance. Lately, though, an albino turkey (yeah, for real) has been strutting up our road and settling down on our front lawn. He’s probably a social pariah cast out from the flock. But I figger he’s really an advance scout.

I work at home, facing the street, so I’m on a hair trigger defense against allowing a turkey invasion.

My poor neighbors have been subjected to war cries from an unshaven writer clad in sweat pants waving a broom or chucking rocks. Aha ha ha. One friend said to me, “Oh, that little bird isn’t bothering anybody.”

That little bird is forty pounds and full of shit! His purpose in life is to spread noise, splatter poop, and carry disease! And I quote!!!

Avian pox: This is an infectious, contagious viral disease, occurring mostly in the southeastern United States, but probably found throughout the eastern turkey’s range. The most important means of transmission is by mosquitoes and other blood-sucking arthropods. This disease was reported in 12 of 13 years in a study in 8 southeastern states.

Salmonellosis: This infectious, contagious, bacterial disease is widespread in domestic and wild birds. Several species of Salmonella may be involved, including those which cause pullorum disease, fowl typhoid, and enteric salmonellosis. Pullorum and fowl typhoid probably do not occur in wild populations of turkeys at this time.

Mycoplasmosis: This disease is transmitted by any of several microorganisms (Mycoplasma), including Mycoplasma gallisepticum and M. synoviae. These diseases are well-known because of their significance in domestic turkeys. The disease is transmitted by contact with infected individuals, or through the egg. At this time, Mycoplasma probably does not occur widely in wild turkeys.

Blackhead Disease: Also called “histomoniasis”, this disease is caused by the protozoan (1-celled animal) Histomonas meleagridis. It is transmitted by the caecal worm Heterakis gallinarum. Both wild and domestic turkeys are quite susceptible. Blackhead may be a relatively important mortality factor, and was diagnosed in 12% of sick or dead turkeys in 8 southeastern states over a 13-year period.

Coccidiosis: Infection with the 1-celled parasite Eimeria is relatively common, although most infections in wild birds are rather mild. Coccidiosis is more severe in domestic turkeys which are raised in large groups.

Blood Parasites: Wild turkeys harbor at least 4 different kinds of blood parasites, all of which are transmitted by mosquitoes, blackflies, and other blood-sucking arthropods. Infections caused by these blood parasites are often sublethal but may be a contributing cause of mortality among stressed birds.

I’m also convinced it’s harboring fleas. Is that possible?

If Ben Franklin was right, a few more days of screaming violent wide-eyed writer in the nude action oughta teach that bird that are better places to peck and poop and gobble gobble gobble… ;P

More from the Long Eyes collection…

“Monsters” must be the most disturbing piece of fiction I’ve ever written, and I say that as someone whose first novel opens with five billion people dead.

The heroes of Plague Year are murdering cannibals — the heroes! — but this story bothers people more. I think that’s because the protagonist of “Monsters” deliberately turns to evil. In the end, he chooses to walk into the darkness, whereas Cam and Sawyer and the other survivors of Plague Year have no other option.

I got this idea from a newspaper article, and, later in the story, the nameless hero reads about other mindless attacks both large and small. A lot of people are unhappy. Some of them try to make everyone else unhappy, too.

Why? What drives them to spread the misery instead of working to reduce it?

Sometimes I think it’s a failure of imagination. Many of us are short-sighted. We can’t see beyond our own immediate needs, and I think that’s incredibly sad. It’s also scary as hell. “Monsters” is upsetting, but it’s probably also the best story to emerge from my horror phase. Too often, life is horrific, and it’s hard to argue that “Monsters” doesn’t capture that feeling.

Ever wonder what would happen if you combined a trio of young rappers with Plague Year?

Met these guys on YouTube. Here's the answer:

As promised, a new afterword from the Long Eyes collection this Friday!

This “short short” is the first piece of writing for which I was ever paid. The second was a spaceships-and-dopplegängers story called “Fellow Travelers” that I didn’t include in this collection because, reading it now, it makes me wince.

“Travelers” had a good, spooky idea, but at the time I hadn’t learned enough craft to execute a larger story. “Exit” avoids that pitfall by holding itself to three characters, three scenes, and one simple if frightening concept.

“Exit” was also among the last entries in a tradition perpetrated by the Moscow Moffia, a writers’ group centered around Moscow, Idaho, where I lived for a year and a half after leaving college. They ran writing challenges and published anthologies of “Rat Tales” — short stories whose conceit was that each story must start with the same sly, opening line, “There were rats in the soufflé again.” After that, you were on your own.

In its heyday, the Moffia and other writers included in the “Rat Tales” anthologies included such giants as Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Katheryn Rusch, Kevin J. Anderson, and John Brunner. Most of them had moved to higher circles by the time I arrived on-scene, but one of the prime movers behind the group was writer, editor, and superfan Jon Gustafson.

Jon died several years ago, but he was among my first friends in sci fi. I’d never heard of science fiction conventions. Jon worked as one of the prime movers behind MosCon, which drew people from all over the Northwest for twenty-two years in a row.

I fell in with Jon and his crazy friends not long after settling in town, entered that year’s writing challenge, won first place, and was paid $5 to have “Exit” included in the MosCon XVI program guide book. I was also awarded a free membership to the con.

Next year, he paid me $60 for “Fellow Travelers” and ran it in the guide book, too.

Maybe that doesn’t sound like much to call home about, but MosCon’s guests of honor that year and the next included legends like Roger Zelazny, Gregory Benford, and Phil Folgio. Even better, in a small twist of fate, “Exit” ran alongside a reprint of a story by Doc E.E. Smith, and “Fellow Travelers” appeared with an exclusive, advance excerpt of a novel called The Tides of Tiber written by Buzz Aldrin and John Barnes. The publisher, Tor, granted Jon the right to run this excerpt purely based on his reputation in the field. I was included in the same pages. That was heady stuff for a young, would-be writer, and I’ve always been grateful to Jon for his encouragement.

Since then, “Exit” has been translated into five languages worldwide, reprinted twice in English (not including this collection), and appeared twice as podcasts.

Not bad for five hundred words and a tasty breakfast.

As promised, a new afterword from the Long Eyes collection this Friday!

This "short short" is the first piece of writing for which I was ever paid. The second was a spaceships-and-dopplegängers story called "Fellow Travelers" that I didn't include in this collection because, reading it now, it makes me wince.

"Travelers" had a good, spooky idea, but at the time I hadn't learned enough craft to execute a larger story. "Exit" avoids that pitfall by holding itself to three characters, three scenes, and one simple if frightening concept.

"Exit" was also among the last entries in a tradition perpetrated by the Moscow Moffia, a writers' group centered around Moscow, Idaho, where I lived for a year and a half after leaving college. They ran writing challenges and published anthologies of "Rat Tales" — short stories whose conceit was that each story must start with the same sly, opening line, "There were rats in the soufflé again." After that, you were on your own.

In its heyday, the Moffia and other writers included in the "Rat Tales" anthologies included such giants as Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Katheryn Rusch, Kevin J. Anderson, and John Brunner. Most of them had moved to higher circles by the time I arrived on-scene, but one of the prime movers behind the group was writer, editor, and superfan Jon Gustafson.

Jon died several years ago, but he was among my first friends in sci fi. I'd never heard of science fiction conventions. Jon worked as one of the prime movers behind MosCon, which drew people from all over the Northwest for twenty-two years in a row.

I fell in with Jon and his crazy friends not long after settling in town, entered that year's writing challenge, won first place, and was paid $5 to have "Exit" included in the MosCon XVI program guide book. I was also awarded a free membership to the con.

Next year, he paid me $60 for "Fellow Travelers" and ran it in the guide book, too.

Maybe that doesn't sound like much to call home about, but MosCon's guests of honor that year and the next included legends like Roger Zelazny, Gregory Benford, and Phil Folgio. Even better, in a small twist of fate, "Exit" ran alongside a reprint of a story by Doc E.E. Smith, and "Fellow Travelers" appeared with an exclusive, advance excerpt of a novel called The Tides of Tiber written by Buzz Aldrin and John Barnes. The publisher, Tor, granted Jon the right to run this excerpt purely based on his reputation in the field. I was included in the same pages. That was heady stuff for a young, would-be writer, and I've always been grateful to Jon for his encouragement.

Since then, "Exit" has been translated into five languages worldwide, reprinted twice in English (not including this collection), and appeared twice as podcasts.

Not bad for five hundred words and a tasty breakfast.

I am such a slug

It's embarrassing to me

Lovely distractions