Tales to Astonish!

I’m not the kind of guy that ever has more than one pair of shows at a time. I’m not suggesting that that fact alone is a bizarre indicator of my personality type in any Forrest Gump-ish way, but that’s just the way that I live. I don’t own sneakers, and I only wear comfy dress shoes, so one pair pretty much fits every kind of occasion and outfit that I have. Thus, one pair at a time. Unfortunately, having only one pair tends to increase the wear and tear factor, and my dress kicks usually wear out within a year. Even then, I usually keep wearing them until they completely disintegrate, or until my boss actually tells me that I have to buy new shoes to meet standards of decorum at work.

I used to have this pair, which I recently threw away with a great deal of sadness, that were the best pair of shoes I ever owned. They were comfy black shoes, a tad dressier than sneakers, and nice and plain and simple. They had great treads on the bottom, but the best part was that the top came up past my ankle; both of these things were great when I lived in snowy places, since they kept me from falling and they prevented snow from sneaking in the top. I loved those shoes, but since the soles completely detached from the rest of the show, I figured it was time for a change. I searched and searched for the same pair, and I found some that were pretty similar, although they sold for about $100, which was a lot more than I like to pay for shoes. Luckily, my father treated me to a new pair of $29 shoes, and while they don’t live up to the Best Pair I Ever Had, they’re pretty nice.

The thing is, they have “DynaStep”! I’m not really sure what that means, but it’s printed on the heels inside, and it sounded snazzy and futuristic enough to pique my interest. The inner heel is a Dr. Scholl’s pad, and it slopes oddly upward at the heel. Even though it’s well-padded, I still get the feeling that it’s making me about a half-inch taller, and when I’m standing still I get the impression that I’m going to fall forward. I guess that’s what DynaStep is: the shoe technology that makes you keep moving out of fear that you’ll fall face-forward onto the curb if you stop walking. What an innovation!

Next time, I hope to find shoes with “RocketStep,” or maybe even “Atomic-Motion-Activators.”

What can be said about this study?

CBS Poll That Makes Me Think We’re Losing The Battle

Creationism is somehow creeping into people’s minds again, at the shock and horror of educated people and every single legitimate scientist in the world. We’re talking about the belief that human beings and the world and universe were magically poofed into existence, as is, without the benefit of science, logic, probabilty, proof, facts, evidence, sense, rationalism, or reproducible results of scientific experiments. Poof! A lot of people are supportive of creationism in hopes of appearing religiously tolerant, but the real issue is that saying creationism is a valid scientific belief is exactly the same as saying that the Earth is flat, and that the sun revolves around us. No, the Earth is not flat, and the sun does not revolve around us. Would you like to see photographs?

55% of Americans think that God created human beings in their present form. That’s scary. 67% of Bush voters believe that God created human beings in their present form. That’s scary, but not unexpected. 47% of Kerry voters believe the same thing, which is scary, although not as scary as the 67% of Bush voters.

37% of Americans want Creationism taught in public schools instead of evolution. I was going to copy over the results of the ones that want Creationism taught alongside evolution, but then I saw that 37% want it taught instead of evolution, and that terrifies me. It absolutely terrifies me, in a bone-chilling, real, tangible fear.

I knew that the world was full of ignorance and misguided teachings, but I’ve underestimated the belligerant attachment to ideas; even ones that can be proven wrong beyond a reasonable doubt. People cling to these ideas with passion, mostly because part of the idea is that other people will try to dissuade you from believing in it. Doesn’t that smack of cultism and mind-control? Isn’t that what crazy-ass groups teach? Paranoia and self-righteousness? If all of the evidence of evolution disappeared tomorrow morning, and Jesus himself came down from Heaven and gave me a holy backrub with a cedar Roll-O-Crucifix Massage Master while I was sitting on the can, I can promise you that I’d be first in line at one of those buildings with the crosses come dawn on Sunday. I’d at least like to think that a believer of Creationism would consider evolution when confronted with the proof, but I guess that’s too tall an order.

That’s what I like about science; it knows that knowledge is fallible, and allows for that. I don’t trust any faith that tells me that it can’t be wrong. And you shouldn’t either.

I love science:

Facts!

Weird and Unfortunate Fiction!

Enjoy!

Not many people have the slightest idea about who Walter B. Gibson is, and considering that the majority of his work was under a pen name, it’s not entirely surprising. In fact, even had he published under his own name, no one today would likely remember anyway, since the time of the pulp novels ruling the newsstands has long since passed.

Walter B. Gibson was the creator of the most popular pulp character ever created, The Shadow, and most of my friends know just how much I’m into The Shadow. This post is not about The Shadow, nor is it really about pulp novels; it’s about how goddamned much Walter Gibson wrote during that time.

Being a writer myself, I know that I can spend a long, long time staring at an empty page before the juices get flowing in my noggin, and my creativity begins. Even when I’m not called upon to be creative, I still have a hard time plunging into new work, written or otherwise, and I’ve never had anything resembling ‘journalistic’ speed or discipline. Even dashing off short, crappy posts to this blog take forever sometimes, and I can barely imagine writing a novel or having to meet any kind of deadline when writing is required. This is why Walter Gibson rules the typewriter, and should have a golden Remington mounted on his tombstone.

Beginning as a writer of short newspaper articles on magic tricks and puzzles, Gibson started working up to features, and then began a long career as a ghostwriter for the memoirs of popular magicians like Houdini, Blackstone, and Thurston. On one fateful day in 1931, he stopped by the offices of Street & Smith Publishing, and worked his way into writing the first issue of their latest idea, The Shadow Magazine. The first came out well, and Gibson was contracted to do four quarterly pulp-novel-length issues (running around 300 pages each at the start). He hammered out the first four in about a month apiece, and by the time issue three had hit the stands, The Shadow Magazine was so popular that instead of quarterly, it was going to go monthly. By March 1932, it was changing to twice-monthly. Let’s look at that: Walter Gibson had to write two novels a month, every month. Two. I haven’t written any novels this month, and Gibson would’ve had to write two.

It gets better.

After the first year of the hugely successful Shadow Magazine, Street & Smith decided to launch some new titles — two of their own, and one at Gibson’s behest! He wanted to help plan and write one featuring stories of a magician-detective named Norgil, patterned after his famous illusionist friends. Soon after, Street & Smith started prepping the now uber-famous Shadow radio show, which was prepared by…? Anyone? Yep, Walter B. Gibson.

So, at the dawn of 1940, there was only one thing to do: start working on that monthly Shadow Comic book. Gibson scripted that, too, for a good six years, alongside his other projects. He must’ve been getting bored, because he also launched Supermagician Comics, another monthly featuring the fictionalized adventures of Blackstone. Oh, and the Shadow daily comic strip — don’t want to forget that one!

Have I mentioned that he was still writing at least twenty goddamned novels a year, not even counting the eight Norgil novellettes?

He did that for ten years. Ten years!

I think that, in his honor, all computer keyboards should come equipped with a special golden “Gibsonator” key, which when pressed injects the typist’s fingertips with a combination of cocaine, No-Doze, and novacaine.

He was quite a man, that Walter Gibson.

Today celebrates the one-thousandth hit on Tales to Astonish!

This means that nearly one hundred people have accidentally looked at my site since early October of this year, which makes this the most-viewed art project I have ever made. In the coming weeks, I look forward to updating the design, and offering new and exciting features and giveaways! There’s nothing like cheap-o prizes to increase readership! There will be decoder rings, glow-in-the-dark nonsense, and a large dose of Gee! Whiz! Bang!

I’m looking to the future, and I hope that both of you that have been reading the site continue to lure new and naive friends to my blog. Once they’re here, I’ll trap them with stories about my childhood, and you can pull a dark hood over their head and steal their wallets. I pledge to use my cut of the money to make Tales to Astonish as astonishing as it can be!

So, until the next thousand rolls around…enjoy!