Don Hall 10/26/20 Don Hall 10/26/20

I Believe… [Clean Your Room!]

I believe… that being excited that Americans are voting in record numbers is like that feeling when your fat, lazy, angry teenager finally cleans his stinky room.

Jenni Thurston 10/26/20 Jenni Thurston 10/26/20

The House on Deer Creek Road: Part 4

This was not my mother’s house anymore. But with every room full of her memories, it would always feel that way. I had to shake whatever imprints she’d left behind. I had to remove her from the atmosphere.

Don Hall 10/25/20 Don Hall 10/25/20

Indefatigable Is a Goal in a Overly Exhausted World

To be truly indefatigable one needs to see beyond the eye’s gaze. To envision a next Thursday when things are no longer assaulting your sense of place, your sense of security, your sense of reality.

Jenni Thurston 10/24/20 Jenni Thurston 10/24/20

The House on Deer Creek Road: Part 3

I couldn’t look at Nyla. I couldn’t feel anything but cold all over. The shadow person stopped pacing and stood just behind us. It bent down, long arms spreading wide, resting its clawed hands on the back of the couch.

David Himmel 10/23/20 David Himmel 10/23/20

Notes from the Post-it Wall | Week of October 18, 2020

Man’s worst invention was the wife.

Woman’s biggest mistake was thinking changing her husband would end well.

Jenni Thurston 10/22/20 Jenni Thurston 10/22/20

The House on Deer Creek Road: Part 2

He told me he was worried about the old guy inside the house. I felt my stomach start to harden as I told him I was the only one who lived there. “Ma’am, I don’t want to alarm you,” he said. “But there’s someone inside. I can see him moving around through the window. Tall, thin, hard of hearing? He was walking sort of hunched over.”

Joe Janes 10/21/20 Joe Janes 10/21/20

The Minutes of Our Last Meeting - Hammer Time! with Hammer T. Dick

We are obligated by law to use “air quotes” around “news”.

Don Hall 10/20/20 Don Hall 10/20/20

Clean Your Room

You gingerly reach over to your smartphone to see what time it is and the shock splashes across your instantly awake mind: four years? You’ve been asleep for four fucking YEARS?

Don Hall 10/19/20 Don Hall 10/19/20

I Believe… [Skipping Halloween?]

I believe… that maybe we can skip Halloween this year given that the entire year has already been a bath of horror?

Jenni Thurston 10/19/20 Jenni Thurston 10/19/20

The House on Deer Creek Road: Part 1

It was the best and the worst three days of my life. It was the best because I felt like a good mother for the first time. It was the best because I was falling in love for the first time. It was the worst because, well, you know why. That’s why you’re here. To know the worst of it.

Don Hall 10/18/20 Don Hall 10/18/20

If Yogi Bear Were God, I’d Have This Thing Wrapped Up

Like Scientology, the Branch Davidians, the Aetherius Society,the Gentle Wind Project, and the Reformed Druids of North America, it seems so many are looking for answers in cults so cults are born on the flimsiest of reasons with nonexistent means to verify their connection to truth.

David Himmel 10/16/20 David Himmel 10/16/20

Notes from the Post-it Wall | Week of October 11, 2020

Most of the drunks I’ve come to know are really fun and funny people. I miss carousing with and observing with their kind. It’s not COVID’s fault—it’s the fault of age, responsibility, and domestication. The silver lining is that my two-year-old son often acts and talks like a drunkard, which quenches my thirst for being among fun lunatics with bad habits.

Don Hall 10/15/20 Don Hall 10/15/20

Paving That Well-Intentioned Road (or Make Sure You Have Plenty of Milk)

Decades later, I comprehend my anger in a way that I was too close to before. My well intentioned sharing was transactional. I gave the guy a bagel and wanted in return gratitude and a sense of my own virtue.

Joe Janes 10/14/20 Joe Janes 10/14/20

The Minutes of Our Last Meeting | Reasons Not To Go To Your Small-Town High School Reunion

You have a conflict on that date. A moral conflict.

Don Hall 10/14/20 Don Hall 10/14/20

"A Valley of Light and Shadow" | Las Vegas Writes Book Launch

This year, it seems Dana and I can be considered Las Vegans in at least some sense as we are featured in this year’s anthology. No live book launch—COVID sits in wait for those community gatherings like the Mask of the Red Death of Poe’s imagination—but there is a digital launch coming up this Thursday, October 22 at 7 p.m. PDT and you, oh readers of the Ape, are invited.

Don Hall 10/13/20 Don Hall 10/13/20

Our Cultural Institutions Must Die

Ethan Hawke and John Cusack are playing grandfathers now.
Madonna acts like the new stereotypical Karen.
Ferris Bueller is now a representation of white male privilege.

Don Hall 10/12/20 Don Hall 10/12/20

I Believe… [Yelp Gets Woke…Finally]

I believe… that, in light of Yelp’s new racist business category, I guess now was a bad time for me to open my new “Racism Bistro & Culturally Appropriated Taco Stand.” At least, Brian Sweeney will be a regular. In other news, the state of Alabama bans Yelp.

Don Hall 10/11/20 Don Hall 10/11/20

Uncertainty of Purpose in 2020 Las Vegas

The world at this point has been in pandemic for 205 days with 215,000 Americans dead from the virus. This is over 1,000 COVID deaths per day. This is just slightly worse than if two fully-loaded 747’s crashed into the sea or a mountain every day for 205 days.

Don Hall 10/10/20 Don Hall 10/10/20

The Cost of Entertainment in the Streaming World

I finger-banged a girl I met in the lobby during my first (partial) viewing of The Empire Strikes Back and stayed for the next showing because I missed all that “I am your father” stuff.

David Himmel 10/9/20 David Himmel 10/9/20

Notes from the Post-it Wall | Week of October 4, 2020

Mike Pence is a virgin. I know he has kids—it doesn’t matter. Mike Pence is a virgin.