Stephen Mark Rainey's Blog, page 53

Dark Discoveries

Terror of Octobernomicon!
Golden Goblin Press announces the Kickstarter  campaign for a new set of original scenarios for the Call of Cthulhu ® Role-Playing Game from aspiring new authors. Among the stretch goals is a fiction anthology, titled  Dark Discoveries , edited by Brian M. Sammons & Oscar Rios. This will feature new stories by Glynn Owen Barrass, Peter Rawlik, Edward Morris, Andi Newton, Joshua M. Reynolds, and... me. It’s a brand-new tale — completed only last week — titled “The Devil Flies in Strix.” Set in the Old West, the story showcases one of the creatures created for the RPG. No giving away the secrets here.... Not yet!
The cover has been designed, and here is a mockup provided by Golden Goblin Press. The final art will be in color.

Visit the Kickstarter page for the project here .

No Burial Without Permission & Others

Don’t do it.
Geocaching has led me to a number of signs like this over the years. They're kind of disappointing because, sometimes, you just need to dispose of someon—er, something—quickly.
The weekend was busy, productive, mostly enjoyable. Friday evening, Brugger and I went to Martinsville and had friends Stephen & Samaire over for dinner and drinks. Given the agreeably mild weather, we were able to socially distance ourselves on the front porch at Pleasant Hill. We picked up dinner from Third Bay Cafe , which was, as always, first-rate. Yesterday, upon our return to Greensboro (by way of Danville for a couple of geocaches), Ms. B. and I spent the better part of the day working on our kitchen renovation. Tiring, of course, but highly satisfying.
This morning, Mr. Diefenbaker (a.k.a. Scott) and I got together to check out the trails and a number of caches at the Spruce Pine Lodge , along Flat River, just north of Durham. The weather was perfectly splendid for hitting the woods — clear skies and temperatures in the high 50s/low 60s. Prior to coming out here for geocaching, I knew nothing of this lodge, which dates back to the 1940s. It is available for meetings, events, and gatherings of all sorts. The nature trails offer scenic views and easy hiking, although most of the caches ended up taking us pretty far off-trail.
We found some good ones this trip. We discovered one container in the hands of a hopelessly malnourished fellow; a couple of well-stocked ammo cans; and a couple of smaller caches up in trees. Sadly — for me, at least — these did not require climbing but specific tools of the geocaching trade. Scott appears bemused by this chap suffering from extreme malnourishment. My favorite cache of the day, “ Waterfall Overlook ” ( GCQE55 ), took us out to some high ground above one of the rocky, rushing creeks that flow into Flat River. Outbound, we found a narrow stretch with plenty of stepping stones to facilitate our crossing. After claiming the cache, we returned by a different route, which put us high above the stream, at a wide, rocky, and far more treacherous point. However, being the spirited, foolish daredevils we (sometimes) are, rather than detour, we decided to soldier on. Not far downstream, we found a big fallen tree above the deepest, rockiest part of the creek, so one of us (raises hand) unilaterally decided to use it as a handy-dandy footbridge. As we soon discovered, the log had a wee wobble, but neither Scott nor I fell off of it. Well, I didn’t. And it wasn’t so much a fall as a slide, which culminated in a relatively small splash. Not very spectacular, Scott.
On our way home, we stopped for a handful of other caches, including one at a very old church graveyard, where we discovered the sign in the image at the top of the page. Graveyard caches almost always elicit a smile.
Just don’t bury any bodies there without permission. Don’t do it. The Spruce Pine Lodge in Bahama, NC, just north of Durham View of Flat River from the nature trail at Spruce Pine Lodge Outdoor amphitheater near the nature trail One of the scenic little waterfalls we discovered on our hike Our makeshift bridge across the stream. So it was a little wobbly. Scott and I both survived, though one of us
might have ended up a bit wetter than the other.

Ameri-Scares: Georgia: The Haunting of Tate’s Mill

Having put New Hampshire: Ghosts From the Skies to bed, I am currently plotting my next entry in Elizabeth Massie’s Ameri-Scares series. This one will be Georgia: The Haunting of Tate’s Mill.

In the mid-1950s, the US Army Corps of Engineers built the Buford Dam on the Chattahoochee River and created Lake Sidney Lanier, which covers portions of Hall, Forsyth, Dawson, Gwinnett, and Lumpkin counties. Upon the dam’s completion, 625 billion gallons — give or take an ounce or two — of water submerged 56,000 acres of land, which consisted of several small communities, hundreds of farms, an auto racetrack, and innumerable graveyards. No one knows for sure how many dead bodies lie in those dark depths. In the intervening years, hundreds of people have drowned, died in boating accidents, or simply vanished in Lake Lanier’s waters. In 1958, a car plunged off a bridge into the lake, killing two young women. Since then, there have been hundreds of reported sightings of “The Lady of the Lake” — supposedly, one of the women who died, who now wanders the roadways and bridges along the lake. In its six and a half decades of existence, Lake Lanier has earned its reputation as the setting for grim happenings.

From the 19th century until the lake’s creation, my mom’s family — the Bell family of Gainesville, GA — owned a mill, called Bell’s Mill, just outside of Gainesville. Mom spent much of her childhood at the mill and frequently told my brother and me many stories about her happy times there. And me, I experienced the best days of my youth in Gainesville at my grandparents’ place. We often went to Lake Lanier, sometimes to swim, sometimes for family reunions, and, on occasion, to visit the site of the old mill — or as close to it as we could get, since the lake had long since claimed that land. Several years ago, on a visit to Gainesville, Ms. B. and I hunted a geocache, aptly titled “Old Bell’s Mill,” close to the mill site. Plus I spent a couple of years at the University of Georgia in Athens, less than an hour from Gainesville. Indeed, I do have a long personal history in this area.

In the 1960s and early 1970s, a family named Tate lived across the street from my grandparents, and my brother and I enjoyed playing with the Tate kids whenever we visited Gainesville. They were a fun, quirky bunch, and it seems only proper that the Tate name should be woven into my upcoming novel. And thus, Tate’s Mill it is.

While the events of the book will be completely fictitious, they are very much inspired by the spooky legends that have arisen around the lake, as well as my decades of personal experience here. As of this writing, I have contributed four novels to the Ameri-Scares series, and I really, really look forward to developing this new one.

Do stay tuned.

Old author at the site of Old Bell’s Mill at Lake Lanier, Gainesville, GA

“It Can Only Kill Us Once....”

First thing this morning, The Socially Distant No-Dead-Weight Irregulars, today relegated to only friend Diefenbaker (a.k.a. Scott) and me, headed out to the Horton Grove Nature Preserve, just north of Durham, NC. About twenty geocaches are hidden along the preserve trails, and we figured they would make for us a good day’s work. As it turned out, another cache, relatively nearby — “On the Face of It” (GC9742F) — was brand new, just published in the past couple of days. As yet, no one had logged a find on it. However, after some discussion, Scott and I decided to stick to the original plan of hunting the older caches in the preserve rather than go after the new one, which lay to the east, across the Flat River. The recommended parking for that one was a couple of miles south of the cache, and we rightly felt, for that much hiking, we could find considerably more caches in the preserve.

We made it several miles through the preserve on its well-traveled trails. Once we reached the northernmost cache within its borders, we paused and pondered the feasibility of getting to the new cache across the river. We knew there was about a 90% chance such an endeavor would fail, but that reality could hardly dissuade the likes of us, being so brave, dedicated, and foolish, don’t you know. I told Scott we might as well give the journey a shot. “It can only kill us once,” I said. Happily, one other cache — “Ceilidh’s Delight” (GC8MQA7) — lay along this most arduous route, so we stopped for it along the way (and it turned out to be our favorite of the day). At last, we discovered a small utility road, which led eastward through the dense forest, so we followed it — straight to the dam on the river that creates Michie Lake.

Here, though, our suspicions were confirmed. Massive torrents of water roared over the top of the dam, feeding a rushing, raging river. Given such prodigious rainfall over the past few weeks, this came as no surprise. Ever hopeful, we trudged a considerable distance downriver, looking for any potential crossing that didn’t involve being swept away to the Atlantic. Alas, no reasonably safe passage presented itself. So, we decided we would have to forgo that oh-so-tantalizing first-to-find opportunity, return to the preserve, and snag a few more caches along the trails before packing it in for the day. Frustrating, yes, especially in that, at one point, we stood only 85 feet from the cache; regardless, that trek through the thickest of woods out to the dam made for the day’s most enjoyable and stimulating experience. And we ended our outing with nineteen cache finds under our belts.

That, I would say, is far better than being killed even once.

A wee, trickling stream through the Horton Grove Preserve — far less violent than the nearby Flat River A coupla old farts on the prowl for geocaches

High Haw, High Haw

A few new geocaches along the Haw River, just north of Burlington, came out this week, so the Haw River Trail looked like the perfect destination for a relatively lengthy hike today. Sadly, of the Socially Distant No-Dead-Weight Irregulars, only friend Diefenbaker (a.k.a. Scott) was available, though he did bring his faithful cache hound Tink with him. After ungodly amounts of water dumping from the sky for two weeks or more, the trail might have been a little muddy. Tink particularly enjoyed the myriad temporary pools and ponds; by the time we were done for the day, the Diefenbaker duo was in need of a good scrubbing.
The morning started out foggy and chilly, but in short order, the fog broke and the temperature rose. There are several older caches along the trail, which I had already found but Scott had not, so we stopped for those as well as the new. As is often the case along the Haw, the cache hunts took us to some cool locations, including a set of massive concrete supports for a couple of long-gone propane tanks, now overtaken by woods. That is the kind of stuff I love finding in the woods. Along the way, we ran into friend tbbiker (a.k.a. Todd) heading in the opposite direction, so we enjoyed chatting for a spell before going our separate ways. Then — shades of last Sunday at the Cane Creek Mountains (see “ Rusty Wreck & Others ”) — as we made our way back to our vehicles, friends David & Diana (a.k.a. David & Diana) came along, intent on hitting the trail themselves.   At the end of it all, we found four caches (a handful of extras for Scott), put in a good four miles in messy, mucky terrain, and burned a few hundred calories. Plus I did a good deed and repaired one of friend Yoda Rob’s caches, which needed some serious TLC.

Not at all a bad day’s effort.
The morning started out foggy and chilly. It didn’t stay that way very long.
Concrete supports for old propane tanks, now swallowed by woods
Clearly, this is an antique Confederate rocketship, all set to take off for the moon.
It doesn’t pay to go speeding through the woods in one of these things!
Scott trying not to be seen
Tink, the very muddy cache hound
Old Rodan and the very muddy Haw

Darrell, the Bigfoot of Eden

Behind me. THAT is Darrell the Bigfoot. I do not have the big feetz. Nor am I so two-dimensional. Well, that’s what I say, anyway.
Darrell resides in the town of Eden, the outskirts of which I pass through regularly when traveling between Greensboro and Martinsville.. I rarely go into Eden’s downtown (it actually has three, but that’s whole ’nuther story), but geocaching led me there today. A recently published  Adventure Lab  cache sends hunters to five separate locations in Eden that feature noteworthy works by local artists. Last night, I had to head to the old hometown for an appointment this morning, so on my way up — despite a torrential rainstorm — I stopped at three of the cache’s five stages (yes, I got wet; yes, I had fun). The weather turned out considerably better this morning, so on my way back home, I stopped at Darrell’s place — a shop called Sophisticated Rubbish — to make his acquaintance.

Previous caches have drawn me to this location, but those were prior to Darrell taking up residence. He is, indeed, flat — a near-life-size piece of sheet metal attached to a mural on the side of the shop building. This little corner of Eden has really undergone an agreeable transition, with numerous shops and places to dine. The pandemic certainly does not have impacted local businesses too negatively.
Any town that welcomes Bigfoot as a resident is all right by me. Thanks, Eden. Just across the way from Darrell’s residence, you will find a little park with a mural promoting the town. There have been a handful of different caches placed here over the years.  An earlier mural here, called “River Boat Men: Dan River Trading, 1792–1892,” depicted black men rowing batteaux on the Dan River. It was changed in 2020, when some members of the community objected to it for glorifying of a part of history they felt best relegated to the past.

Coming Soon: Ameri-Scares: New Hampshire: Ghosts from the Skies

A little while back, I finished my newest Ameri-Scares novel — New Hampshire: Ghosts from the Skies — and turned it in to Crossroad Press. Since I have provided images for the covers of each of my novels in the series to date, I’ve been toying with a few visuals that felt appropriate for this book. Last night, I made up a composite image, which you can see here. I reckon it might make a striking cover image, should Crossroad wish to use it.

New Hampshire: Ghosts from the Skies goes something like this....

Thirteen-year-old Heath Sutton invites his friend Patrick Brady over for a sleepover at his house in Exeter, NH. In the middle of the night, they wake up to see a cluster of brilliant lights hovering above the nearby woods. To their shock, the boys realize the lights are part of some gigantic flying object, which appears to leave something in the woods before it zooms away into the star-filled sky.

The next morning, Heath goes out to the woods to see if he can find what the mysterious object might have left behind. He discovers a weird, metal rod jutting from the trunk of a broken tree. Suddenly, the rod emits a strange musical sound, and Heath feels as if insects are crawling all over his body. In terror, he runs out of the woods, convinced that the weird sound must have been some kind of alien signal.

Heath tells Patrick about what has happened, and the boys decide to learn all they can about Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs). Heath recalls that, in 1965, large numbers of people—including Heath’s Grandpa Dan, then a young boy—reported seeing flying saucers in and around Exeter. In fact, on that same night, Grandpa Dan’s younger brother, Gene, disappeared without a trace. Heath feels certain that, all these years later, there must be some connection to that tragic event. Hoping to learn what that connection might be, he goes to see his grandfather. While there, he glimpses a shadowy figure lurking around the house, seemingly spying on them. Nervous about this strange visitor, he returns home, only to find his parents and sister gone for the day.

However, he quickly discovers is not alone in the house. He hears footsteps coming down the stairs from the second floor. And to his shock and horror, the figure that appears to him turns out to be something unexpected. Something not human.

An alien.

To his relief, Patrick appears at the door, and the weird, alien figure vanishes. But Heath’s relief is short-lived, for something about Patrick seems different. It takes only a short time for Heath to realize that his friend is no longer his friend. In fact, Patrick, it appears, is no longer even human....

To get the rest, you’ll need to get the book. It’ll be coming soon from Crossroad Press, and you can be certain that I will announce it to the high heavens as soon as it’s here.

Last Night, the Stars Fell All Apart

Although my brother didn’t professionally record many of his tunes, he did release a few songs on vinyl, CD, and MP3. His best-known song would probably be “Orange Kid,” which goes back to his Industrial Soldier days, mid- to late-1980s. In the early 1990s, he recorded it and released it as an orange vinyl 45 rpm record, with a superb tune on side B called “A Smash” (the lyrics to which I shall endeavor to transcribe when I can). In more recent years, he recorded and most frequently performed “Last Night, the Stars Fell All Apart,” another moody, melodic ballad that speaks of his personal experiences and feelings. His vocals on this one are particularly heart-rending.

You can listen to the audio file of “Last Night, the Stars Fell All Apart” here.

Last Night, the Stars Fell All Apart
©Phred Rainey/Joe the Fireman

Honeysuckle came and went
Faraway evenings spent
In my castle without a moat
Smelled just like May-times do
And midnight lovers do
When they’re lucky enough to have and hold

Couldn't send a message far enough
Just waiting around for you to call my bluff

Last night, the stars fell all apart
It means a man don’t dream
It means man will cry
For stars to fill an evening sky
If only just to break your heart

Back then when pigs could fly
I rose above that other guy
I was willing to flash and burn
Like Red River fireworks fly
I stole a kiss and let it ride
Before I lost my nerve and lost my turn

There’s no better time to feel like a winning man
Could it be to cheat myself was part of my plan?

That night, the stars fell all apart
It means a man don’t dream
It means man will cry
For stars to fill an evening sky
If only just to break your heart

Then on the beach your pleasant hand
Told me that I’m the man
To make or break or take you home
Then I sang a September song
But the names and dates were wrong
Too much, too soon, and all alone

There’s no more waiting now, my cover’s blown
Twelve hundred miles away, I guess you're on your own

Last night, the stars fell all apart
It means a man don’t dream
It means man will cry
For stars to fill an evening sky
If only just to break your heart

Rusty Wreck & Others

It’s almost a pity the geocache wasn’t way up yonder on that fire tower. Well, emphasis on “almost.” I’m always keen on a good physical challenge, and I’ve been up a rickety-ass fire tower before (see “ Beating the Devil and Haw, Haw, Haw ,” 12/22/2013 ), but with four flights of stairs missing and only a bit of rust holding the girders together, this one might have been a little dangerous.

With the weather blessedly again conducive to a geocaching outing (a tad warmer than yesterday, at that), the Socially Distant No-Dead-Weight Irregulars — Diefenbaker (a.k.a. Scott), Fishdownthestair (a.k.a. Natalie), and I — decided to go after three relatively new geocaches at the Cane Creek Mountains Natural Area, not far south of Burlington. We rendezvoused at the parking area at 10:00 this morning, where we discovered friends David & Diana (a.k.a. David & Diana), NCBiscuit (a.k.a. Linda), and Ms. Biscuit’s cache hound Dotty on site. Their caching plans turned out to be identical to ours, so we resolved to combine forces and attack the trail with guns a-blazing. At two of the three caches, all those guns came in handy. Sadly, not at the first of them, which has, by all indications, flown the coop. Happily, we did find the other two, and those, at least, took us to a couple of interesting locations. See the fire tower image above.
The most fun one was “ Rusty Wreck ” GC95K2D (which wasn’t actually the fire tower). Since I started geocaching in 2008, I have marveled at the sheer number of cars and trucks that appear to have spontaneously grown in the deep woods. The one we found today must have been there a long, long time, as it appeared to be 1950s vintage. The cache itself proved quite a challenge, but find it we did, and we loved the hunt. Nearby, there was a ramshackle shelter, no doubt for the drunken-most set, given the massive number of beer cans congregating around it. It’s literally right next to the trail, so I hope it is not regularly inhabited.
And all that made for another much-needed, very welcome outing in the woods. We put in something between four and five miles in rather rugged terrain (particularly on our way to the fire tower, which required a very long, very steep ascent), so this old not-quite-a-geezer has the sore feets and wee bit of tired.
Laters. One guess where this guy got his driver’s license.... Somewhat less than five-star accommodations here A view from high atop the ridge Back down in the lowlands Still Life with Old Fart and Fire Tower

I Axed for It!

Many days of nasty weather has about had me going stir crazy, so it was nice to have a beautiful, if cold, Saturday morning. It was just right for heading up to Fairy Stone Park to hunt a relatively new geocache. After so much rainfall, I was surprised to find the trail as dry as it was. In a few low-lying areas, it was waterlogged — or, in many places, ice-logged. The temperature hovered right at freezing, so the wind made for a very brisk walk, but I needed to get back out on the trail. The cache lurks at one of the familiar overlooks above the lake, so I didn’t need to pull out the GPS. A quick look around, and I had the cache in hand. After a helluva week, an enjoyable morning on the trail was just the ticket.
Not just the ticket was another of those annoying first-world problems that have been hitting me non-stop over the past couple of weeks. I needed to head to the old homestead in Martinsville last night, so I figured I’d just order dinner from one of the nice local restaurants and have Doordash deliver it. In most cases, in recent days, Doordash has been a godsend; I have had very few problems and some excellent experiences. Not so much last night. I placed an order, the delivery person picked it up, and the GPS map showed him approaching my (very well lit) house. So the dude drives slowly by, clearly not sure where he is. Drives past the house, turns around, comes back, drives slowly past the house again, goes down to end of road, comes back yet again. By now I’m out in the yard waving at the driver, who passes slowly by, starts checking out other houses, eventually gives up, and drives away. Pleasant Hill is not a goddamn difficult place to find — particularly when it’s lit up like a fucking Christmas tree — and if you’re working for Doordash, you hopefully have a GPS, and/or a phone by which one can communicate. Nope; this chap provided no contact info. Above and beyond my personal inconvenience, this kind of stupidity hurts Doordash, since I’m less likely to use them in the future. Pity they can’t really give the drivers a test to determine whether they are morons. Fortunately, Doordash does give immediate cash credit, which I’ve received, but for the love of god... this particular driver clearly ought not be working as a driver.
I ended up ordering dinner — an excellent ribeye steak — from The Third Bay up the street and picked it up. At least it proved fantastic. And there was enough left for me to have a trail snack this morning. Better than the typical beef jerky, I must say!
Cin-cin. After so much rainfall, I was surprised to find the trail mostly dry. I did encounter icy patches here and there.  One of my favorite and most familiar views of Fairy Stone Lake from the trail overlook