My copy of Joanna Vaught’s new zine arrived yesterday and I give it 2 soygan thumbstitutes up. A bunch of excellent-looking Thanksgiving recipes to try, plus some other mind-blowing stuff mixed in (BREAKFAST CRISP: the name alone whispers kiss me kiss me).

Plus Joanna is super funny, so it doesn’t read like a cookbook, at all. Like, don’t keep a copy of this in the kitchen, keep a copy in the bathroom. And then your guests will come out of your bathroom like “OK I couldn’t stop myself it just looked so interesting!” And you know it’s something special when your guests will admit to reading it in the bathroom.

I encourage you to check it out.

Also: Magcloud! Interesting.

So as I alluded to earlier I think I want to have an email newsletter thing. I tried 6 different options before I found one that didn’t feel like it was hassling me. I wanted to make it seamless and be all beautifully integrated with the rest of my site, but with the php and mysql, forget it. It’s a mess but it’s working.

Anyways you can see it hopefully doing its thing here at kevinfanning.com.

I set it up so that I don’t know if people subscribe or unsubscribe, so come and go, or don’t, as you please.

I know that a lot of people make their scrip on the internet complaining about how much email they have, but that’s never been something that kept me up nights. Maybe there are others like me, who knows.

And besides, anyways, this will be for EVENTS, like if I have a new book out. Actually that’s really the only thing I’m likely to use this for. Maybe if someday I was giving a reading? I might announce that? But I’m not, and those are the only situations I envision. I see this being used 4 times/year, tops.* Certainly not for “I have a new blog post!” situations. God. Who cares. Not me.

*Although honestly I do have this fantasy where I delete all my websites and then whenever I write something new I just send it out to the 20 people on this list and that’s it, the end, just our little thing, forget the whole rest of the internet.

Every year Jasper County has a huge hot-air balloon festival. People come from all over to see the balloons soar across the sky. It is a wondrous and magical sight.

You don’t have to just stay on the ground and watch the balloons, however. It’s also possible to go for a ride! That’s why Gilpin and Marigold had traveled to Jasper County from the city. They had always wanted to go for a ride in a hot-air balloon.

They were in for a shock once they got to the fair, though: the prices were outlandish!

“Sweet Mary McGillicuddy!” Gilpin exclaimed. “$350 for a half-hour? What chicanery is afoot here in Jasper County? Would these mountebanks deprive the common people of the joys of floating delicately above the treetops, enjoying the countryside’s patchwork quilt of farmlands? Rarely have I encountered such a loathsome coalition of blackguards!”

Marigold totally agreed.

“It’s good that we came here today, Marigold,” Gilpin continued. “Let us mete out sweet justice, and help the citizens of Jasper County loose the financial chains that keep them bound to the soil!”

The two cats spied a group of balloons tethered to the ground nearby, and leapt into action at once. Gilpin and Marigold pounced on the owners, pinning them to the ground.

“Free balloon rides for the proletariat!” Gilpin bellowed in a mighty roar. “In rising up against the oppressor, the soul takes flight!”

The crowd, stirred on by Gilpin’s words, surged forward and climbed into the baskets in orderly groups of two or three. As the baskets filled, the cats used their razor-sharp claws to slash the tethers, releasing the balloons up into the great blue sky.

Gilpin and Marigold jumped into the last basket, just as an angry mob of balloon owners was amassing. They sneered and shook their fists as the cats sailed up over their heads, into the safety of the clouds.

“History books will tell of the wrongs righted this day,” Gilpin said as they wafted gently toward the horizon. Marigold made a very happy purring sound and tried to steer the balloon closer to some birds that were flying by.

(Story from sometime in 2003, but found on an old disc today. Image by Maggie.)