*
p.s. Hey. ** rewritedept, Okay, will do: TFS. Oh, gosh, thank you, sir. You really are tripping, aren’t you, haha. I know Black Eyes by name, but I’m not sure if they’ve met my ears. I’ll find out. I don’t think I know the Oakland County child killer. Huh, how could I have missed that? My day is going to be very work-y, but that’s not bad. Still, I hope yours is better. ** Nicholas., Hi. Yeah, I guess I feel gay and safe most of the time, but I look schlumpy, and even when I’m rarely horny in public, it’s kept indoors. But, yeah, it’s great to feel what you felt. And hooray for every context that frees you. ** _Black_Acrylic, Thanks, Ben. Yeah, I think so: the fitting in. ** Vincent, Greetings, Vincent! Is that true about Sebald in Germany? How odd considering his highness. Any theories as to why? ** adrian, Dag! I was supposed to go to Efteling for my birthday in January, but it just never happened. No, I haven’t been there since Danse Macabre came to life or since they expanded the fairytale walk-through area, but I think/hope that my friend Zac and I will get up there in the next few weeks. Efteling is my favorite amusement park on the face of the earth. When Amsterdam plans get sorted, I’ll let you know. Nice about that bookshop. I want to check it out if nothing else. Where is it in Amsterdam? Sucks about the ‘Flunker’ difficulty. Amphetamine Sulphate likes to get their books out in their own particular way, which isn’t always very practical. ** SP, Gay robot in LA? No, that’s the first I’ve heard of it. Huh. I’ll search. Thanks. ** Darby 🦇, Is that a bat? My eyes can’t focus enough. Well, I’m awfully glad that you didn’t get pregnant then. Yikes. It is weird that you have to be really ill or on your death bed or dead before people tell you how much they like you. I guess when you’re feeling okay you get that by radar or you don’t care. But it sucks when you need to hear it, especially because people like to say that kind of stuff as a spontaneous gift and not as a needed reward. Or something. Now I’m rambling. Pal, you don’t need to be forgiven. Perish the thought. Um, I fear that your package may never have arrived to my LA pad. My roommate there swears he didn’t see it, and he looked where he stores the stuff I get when I’m away. Ugh. I’m sorry (for me). Cheese substitute, huh. That’s interesting. I’ll see if they sell it here in France. France is weird about some things. Hugs and magical thinking re: your hopefully happier today. ** Brendan, Hey, Brendan! Yay! How are you, pal? Stuff’s fine here. Love, me. ** Uday, I’m happy the book reached you comprehensively. Cool. ClubChalamet … no, but I assume it’s to do with you-know-who? Is there a reason why I should pursue this Club? ** Steve, I get that with my parents even now. At least mine died about 8 months apart, so it’s maybe less like getting body/brain slammed. It’s NYFF time again already? Guadagnino, ugh. ** lotuseatermachine, Same here in France. Halloween happens but just barely apart from the theme parks putting up ‘scary’ decorations and a few seasonal candies showing up in the supermarket. Sad. STH was precious in its period of existence, for sure. That current STH-like vehicle you’re proposing sounds like a genius idea to me. I think there are a lot of people who would gobble it up. Huh. Almost strange that it hasn’t happened. Yeah, inspired and excellent idea. ** Alice, Hiya to you! Fantastic about the inspired writing spurt and possible novel beginnings! Good old libraries. My friend Zac often goes to libraries to work. Yeah, from what you wrote, I think I can relate to your character building, yes. I’m guessing your friend is a snappy or at least idiosyncratic dresser? Luck with that today. Enjoy the mirror. ‘Malice@Doll’: I’ll take a peek. Great day and costuming to you. ** Carsten, I still love LA a lot. And I spent most of my life there, but I still find completely unknown things and areas all the time. I both like and can see nothing whatsoever amiss with the idea of a poetry chapbook with photos. I mean, why not? I can’t think of a downside. ** Chris Kelso, Writing and casting and shooting and editing a film is so exciting that I am capable of deciding in retrospect that all the awful shit involved in making a film was a fluke at least until it rears itself again, and by then it’s too late. Excited to see what you made and happy that you managed to do it and feel proud. Next summer? I assume I’ll still be here, and of course it’d be splendid to meet up. Pencil me in. ** Hugo, Hi, H. Oh, hm, about the Ghent thing. I’ll go check my email archives. Would be cool. No, never been to that park. I’ve only been to Diggerland, and it was the Diggerland in Kent. Um, no, just dive into ‘Giles Goat Boy’ and see what you think. I think it’s one of Barth’s most interesting and non-dated books. If we manage to explore Wailibi, I’ll take notes for you. ** HaRpEr //, Haha, happy to have intro’d you to a possible soulmate. No, it was easy-peasy when entering/leaving the US last time. I didn’t see anything inordinate going on with others either. I don’t think I know anybody who’s doing or did Onlyfans or its equivalent. That I know of, so maybe I mean I don’t know any proprietors who do it secretly and haven’t gone viral. I don’t imagine that you can make a fortune that way, but I really don’t know. Might be worth a test? ** Bill, Hi. You’ve read Jahnn, nice. I know almost no one who has. Oh, send me the post as soon as you’re ready. I’m utterly hungry and wide-eyed about it. Thanks, B. ** Steeqhen, I sort of vaguely remember seeing a fort somewhere during my one brief Cork visit. Oh, wait, on the sea, maybe not. I don’t think I’ve swum in an ocean since I was, like, 16 in Hawaii where there’s almost nothing else to do. I think I was chased by a little shark, which may be why I never did that again. ** Kyler James, Hi, Kyler! It has been quite a while. How’s it, bud? I’ve never listened to an audio book, isn’t that weird? Not even the ‘I Wished’ one. I’m scared to. I’m really picky about how my stuff is read. Best not to know, I think. Cool, excellent to see you, sir! ** Right. Today I’m giving you a really easy post, I think. Not that anything can’t become complicated in its reception, but … See you tomorrow.
Now available in North America 
Hey Dennis! Congrats about your festival!!! I’m so excited to see your film in whatever way it becomes accessible. Meville + Bataille = instantly added to my to-read list. The little guy trapped under the kettle is cool too. I remember a viral video from the early 2010s of an uber-Christian American geriatric couple seeing a wind-up skeleton go haywire while they start trying to exorcise it, so that’s maybe the ultimate wind-up thing in my mind.
That’s interesting about Bataille not being a structural influence on your Cycle. I think it was just the section in Blue of Noon where the description of the revolver/death fetishism in Story of the Eye was sort of off-handedly mentioned as an idle half-formed fantasy that just struck me as very much like your stuff, in terms of being a degraded echo. I do think Guide and Period take up half of my brain though, so I’m probably just seeing them everywhere, haha. Anyway, best of luck to you today, see you!
Hi
Yesterday’s post had me interested. The top picture is enough to draw you in in major way
Did you read any books that you loved during your away from the blog period?
I don’t know which Amsterdam bookshop you guys talk about but remember when we realised the book shop I was telling you about it was the same as the one you bought all the nouveau Roman novels when you were there? I sort of remember this realisation happening and want to go again back to this place and buy many books!
Hi from super heat Chania with me walking with a red amaryllis flower in my hand
Dennis, Welcome back. Though you’ve been back longer than I’ve been. Derp.
So we have to return to the office full time starting on August 4th. We just found out on the 18th. Problem is, they’re lying about why we have to come back. Essentially, our old manager retired and, from what I can glean, the attitude of the new manager is that we have to be in office because the feds are. It’d be nice if they/we could blame Trump’s Executive order like they’re doing, but the Executive order doesn’t at all apply to contractors. None of my contractor friends at other agencies are back in the office. All were told the order doesn’t apply to them and they don’t have to come in. There were other lies, too, and that really pisses me off. But there’s nothing I can do. I will be looking for another job.
I’ll be spending 12 to 13 hours a day with this job now because of the commute. Alex and I will essentially have a weekend relationship now. None of this is acceptable to me. I mean, if I could get there in 30 minutes or less, not a big deal. But I’ll be in my car 2 to 3 hours a day now. Nope.
Otherwise, onward and upward. I’ve been doing physical therapy for this neck pain. It’s really done nothing. The steroid did nothing. The pain reliever does nothing but make me ill, so I don’t take that. It’s an NSAID and not an opioid, btw. I need an MRI. I see the guy Monday and will request that. He only did an X-ray. Wtf?
But yeah, doing okay/well otherwise.
Glad you’re back in action here.
I think maybe in a way he kinda renounced the country and the country renounced him back.
I wanted to ask, do you know if your film gonna be on mubi at some point? Mubi has a page for it with the message that it’s not currently available but I don’t know if that means they have the rights to distribute it or if they just make a page for any new film.
Little Peggy March – Wind-Up Doll which was on the Scorpio Rising soundtrack. Kenneth Anger always did have an ear for a good tune, I think.
_Black_Acrylic just mentioned what first popped into my mind upon seeing today’s post: the wind-me-up montage in Scorpio Rising. Only on DC’s, that kind of confluence!
I love L.A. too. Had a pretty hard time getting over it. And I still miss it, even after telling myself that it’s unsustainable for a number of reasons: climate, rents, water supply, U.S. politics. I even love what many Europeans (& New Yorkers) usually complain about: its lack of a center, the messiness, the sprawl. And I know what you mean about the constant unforeseen surprises it has in store.
I’ll see how it goes with the poetry chapbook & whether it’ll end up having pictures. Back when I thought about self-publishing it I was bored one night & started messing around with photos, basically “finding” an interesting composition within, say, a holiday photo, & cropping it accordingly. It was a fun method of discovering something new within a shot that wasn’t taken with artistic intent. Then I found that a bunch of those shots worked really well alongside the poems. But we’ll see. I guess I can always pitch the “illustrated” version to a publisher once they accept the collection, right?
Saw something in another comment about Room Temperature getting accepted by a festival? Congratulations! Which one?
*POP* I’m gonna curse cause Ima an adult and You bithces were literally not talking about STH till I was and I don’t recommend you do anything I’m doing…. also isn’t weird to step into a conversation with someone who literally isn’t talking to you?????? Is it not clocking to you???You would truly hate to overlap with me in any context I promise you this irl or online…. I absolutely loathe when that happens like yes public forum but lets stay original and totally separate haha, Im not gonna warn you shit is just gonna get wonky for you in your real life……… and Dennis can’t help you if I have a problem with you he’s chill and nice.(Let’s stay Playful together).
*PooF* Thats interesting cause I do feel gay all the time just not safe and there was this great sense of ease that became apparent even when I began to realize the men were outnumbering the women and children just traveling in the direction of Fire Island. And shulmpy is one like heroine chic was so your doing great! Idk I look really good so I verge into the too gay or like so beautiful people don’t think I’m real category its a superpower really so I’m never upset but I can’t even cruise LOL! I’m autistic and literally a hypochondriac I can’t even fathom random public sex Id literally need a plan to get hard its hilarious. and it’s not that safety lol men are really dangerous creatures its whats so sexually appealing like wow we could really hurt each other to me at least and its the way being on gay boy island kind of makes everyone boyish + High af its great fr. Hum recently ive been really in my collage practice and making an actually honest and less like think tanked brand its been super good blending Your books, S.T.H, modern gay stuff like sniffles, cartoon logic, and fashion together into something thats me organically and not synthetic ya know. Hum LOL actually I can explain why S.T.H doesn’t exist anymore and it’s cause no one trusts anyone anymore I’m a prime example of that LOL. Like I’m truly not intending to share with everyone on your blog but I am but because I’m really tryna talk to you. That basic principle. Most gay stuff doesn’t happen in the dark anymore cause it can happen almost anywhere now and if its in the dark its cause its fun there. And with X(twitter) no one has to share sex stories due to there being no access to cameras or the internet meaning they can post full on porn to monetize instead of free personal dirty stories for the imagination of other disconnected homos to be published much later things happen instantly now. ill be back tonight with my days anecdotes this is pissing me off lol.
This reminds me of that time in September 2022 when I purchased two wind-up “eyeballs with feet” at the Halloween promotional aisle in CVS for a couple of dollars. When you wind them up, not only do they move, but they also have flashing lights. I still have them on the top of my dresser.
To briefly get back to Wes Anderson, one thing I forgot to mention a few days ago is that one issue I had with THE FRENCH DISPATCH and also ASTEROID CITY is I felt they were a bit too celebrity casted, if you know what I mean. It’s like almost every single character was played by some Hollywood star, even the most minor ones, and while I can see why a lot of people in Hollywood want to work with Anderson, I found it a bit distracting after awhile. Anyway, I feel like his new film kind of cut back on that trend a tad, so I appreciated it.
Actually, while on the subject, another thing about Anderson’s casting that interests me are those rare cases of actors who are “one and dones.” Maybe that’s one reason why I’ve long been intrigued by TENENBAUMS, in that many of its main cast, that’s pretty much the only Anderson film they’ve done.
I just went online and purchased a copy of the Atlas Editions (they never do wrong) of a novella by Hans Henny Jahnn. Thanks for suggesting this author. “The Living Are Few, the Dead Many: Selected Works of Hans Henny Jahnn.” Have you read this?
Yeah, I’m always disappointed when I happen to go to Disneyland around Halloween/Christmas. I remember crying one year as a little kid because of it. Getting a tour of Paris from you would be a dream come true. I’ve never been to Rome before. When I was 17, my science teacher organized a 10 day summer trip to Europe that I went on and we went to Como and Cinque Terre in northern Italy for part of the trip. I really loved Italy and I’ve been wanting to go back for longer ever since.
The other day I was surprised to find copies of Frisk and The Sluts at Barnes and Noble. I always look for your books whenever I’m there and I never find them, so I had kind of just assumed that you were too “out there” for a big chain store like that. Guess I was wrong. For the first time, I saw the 120 Days of Sodom there too, so maybe they’re stocking up on more “transgressive” literature for some reason. I also watched The Devil, Probably the other night, which has been on my watchlist for a while because of you. I really liked it. What other Bresson films should I watch next? I was trying to research Antoine Monnier and found very little information about him online, like how old he was at the time of filming or what he’s been up to since. I only found one recent photo of him. I did see that you wrote a pornographic adaptation of The Devil, Probably, which makes a lot of sense to me. The cast were all very attractive, though I’m sure you had more intellectual motivations too.
Love wind-up toys! When I was a really small kid I used to wonder if switching the keys would mean switching the movements because switching the direction of the keys would reverse the movements on some toys. Going to try to get some use out of that peanut gif. Did you have a favourite one growing up?
Also I brought up ClubChalamet not because of her subject but because of her. There’s something oddly delicious about her singular, focused attention on the guy.
Here’s a short, no-nonsense beat down:
https://graziadaily.co.uk/celebrity/news/club-chalamet/
Here’s a sample post from the Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DHWMPQkyK4z/
The deeper you go, the more bizarre she gets. There’s ominous threats, accusations of stalking against his girlfriends, vague tweets that say things like “one month” with pictures of him. It’s awesome in the way and within the limits that pop culture can be.
Hi Dennis.
Well, the Ghent thing has thrown me in a loop then. idk, guy telling me seemed quite certain about it happening or whatever, I got “Flunker” from that place though. Thanks for being straightforward on Barth. I remember enjoying “Lost in the Funhouse,” but I found flipping through “Coming Soon” made me ask if I had to do some prior reading of all his work before getting into the novels. “The Sot-weed-factor” seems up my alley too (from what I saw of it from your post when I first came to this website.)
Speaking of books, I might be applying for a grant or job sometime soon from a bookshop/foundation in Brussels. Nothing confirmed yet. The grant is 5000 euros or so, I think it would be nice to have that money just to write about anything, dunno if I’ll get it, but I’ll tell you the good news if I do. It’s odd, because I really didn’t think I was gonna try and become an author or whatever in high school or anything, but now all I do is try to write and find an excuse to write more stuff. I guess I just kinda throw myself around these things or whatever, I’m never certain, you might already know that about me. Hope the script you’re working on is going well.
Plenty of hugs from me to you and to Zac (who I have never spoken to but who seems like a cool guy to talk to) — I might watch a horror film with Alice later, will tell you about that if it happens tomorrow.
Hey Dennis! Super pleasing wind-up lineup. I’ve got a couple of cute Halloween y wind-ups – Dracula and a skeleton somewhere. I should hunt them out and have them as mascots on my
writing desk.
I’m in Paris soon – 3rd – 8th August. Needless to say it’d be delightful to see you.
Love
Thomas xoxo
Hello how are you? Today was rainy. I really like automatons, and the diy winding mechanisms at the bottom are so cool, like the one of the guy tortured by boiling water. I always wanted to make one maybe one day. Oh also that person who mentioned the Christians freaking out over the rapidly shaking wind up skeleton, what a throwback ,it’s a funny clip to think of.
Your right what u said, although I don’t know why I put it that way, though I don’t remember what I had said specifically. I suppose it’s struggle, maybe something needs to be filled, which is probably why I care less about giving my body to some stranger. I don’t care what others think of me, but you must admit, most people have at least one person who silently appreciates them. I don’t have that in my radar. If there was a radar I would be undetectable. I would be happy if i meant something to someone, like as a human being, one person, in real life. It would have been nice to have someone a week ago when I was so torn, and I always give the benefit of the doubt but I see everyone else has actual “present” friends and they seem so grateful of them in their lifes. . everytime I talk to new people in outings or whatever it’s like they have their friends already, anyways you cant build friendship in a day and it’s even harder without any effective support system and I struggle everyday. I’m just complaining sorry but maybe in a week or month I can just shut up once I’m hopefully happy. I’m just trying to think of the next month, I really am trying. I just need to distract myself. I don’t know. I’m just talking to myself and it’s less useless than crying. Barf.
That’s all this is. Tomorrow might be good because I’ll be talking to my guardian and this lady will be advocating for me since my guardian doesn’t do anything. It really frustres me.
Do u enjoy cooking? So if you have any tofu in the house you should use tumeric and then nutritional yeast and it’s an epic combo + add some black salt I don’t have black salt but u might.
I finished a book today so I feel very hopeful to start a new one. I want to read some experimental science fiction books I picked from this video about psychedelic science fiction which is a fun name
https://youtu.be/Ft90IW6Tb-4?si=KUCoj2c-91EbBAaL
You don’t have to click it unless your interested. I’m really intrigued by Fritz Leiber’sThe Green Millennium as well as Roadside Picnic which is what the movie stalker and the S.T.A.L.K.E.R games are based on. Oh and the “Night Picnic” by Izumi Suzuki about aliens trying to imitate the actions and social expectations of humans by a “night picnic”, and how that goes, which is more a science fiction satire novel.
That’s unfortunate about the package. Did you know Louis Wain had his ceramic cats blown down by a torpedo en route? Maybe that’s what happened. I suppose the elephant is lost media. Could I possibly show a picture of the burlap handmade doll I made that was supposed to get sent aswell? Wait I’ll get back to you on that because I might not reply until next week. Have a good weekend. I will be seeing Primus this Saturday!
Hey. Feeling a lot more relaxed after hiding out at my parents, I’m in a better headspace to figure everything out, anyway. But God, my parents argue about the stupidest things imaginable and my dad in particular will never let anything go. He’s difficult to be around sometimes, my guess is that I’ll leave when his questioning gets worse and worse. Basically every conversation with him leads to him trying to get me to consider a desk job and says ‘you can push your little writing thing to the side for a while and come back to it later’, when I know that he just wants me to give up but doesn’t have the guts to say it. But anyway, there’s that thing John Waters says about how it’s good if your parents aren’t into what you’re doing. It gives you a kick. I realise as I get older that I am sort of in a state of arrested development when it comes to certain things, and that I want to protect that part of myself at all costs because I think that is what keeps me from being my parents.
Yeah, I don’t think OnlyFans is a guaranteed moneymaker, hence my apprehension in putting in the effort. I already did one photo shoot a while ago but have been erring over how I’d plan everything out. I’ve come up with a niche which is DIY, punkish, dingy and sort of low res. I came up with a name too. The surname is Canterel because I opened a book at random for an idea and it’s the name of the guy who owns the house in ‘Locus Solus’.
I think I still need to do more reading before I fully decide. I should probably try and contact someone who does it for a living and ask some questions. I do think that if it were to become a feasible option for some amount of money then I would much prefer it to retail jobs or whatever. Somewhere down the line when I really get my shit together, I think it would be really cool to do some sort of journalism for music or movies or something and that be how I make money, but I really don’t know how I’ll get to the point where I can do that. I guess if I get more of my writing published full stop, options might open up for me in different places. I don’t know.
Hi there Dennis! Yes, I’m thrilled with the progress I made yesterday. I quite liked being able to keep myself in isolation. It helps me when there are fewer people around so I can settle into a certain head-space for my work. I’ll keep you updated with how things develop. I’m not particularly, so I might make some time this weekend to continue with it.
The meet-up with my friend today was lovely. We ended up just hanging out at my place. Got to converse about our dissertations. She studied graphic design and was telling me about the exhibition she created. Cameras were used to record those walking in. Images of them would then be converted into ASCII text and projected onto a screen. She also did this with photographs she took of herself, specifically the areas she feels most dysphoric about. It was fascinating to hear about. I kept thinking about the transformation of images and the sentimental association that accompanies that process.
She was largely inspired by the anime Serial Experiments Lain. It’s one of my favourite works of art. Have you seen the show?
Beyond that, she brought up her limited interactions with literature. In her early teens, she had to undergo speech therapy due to problems with vocalisation. Something that helped her was reading passages from The Picture of Dorian Gray. It was quite a beautiful experience that she described. Hearing about how art contributed to someone’s reconstruction of identity resonated with me. I lent her a copy of Burroughs’ Queer as I’m interested in what she’d make of it. I don’t have many connections in person where I can explore my interest in literature. It’s nice to meet someone so enthusiastic about learning more.
Hope your day has been well! Take care.
I used to get those cheap plastic + fur wind-up chickens for easter every year. My cousin stole me away to go fishing today. I hate fishing, it was nearly 100 degrees and I only caught a catfish and several turtles. The snapping turtles are assholes. They’ll hang on whether they’re hooked or not. About the concert, I guess I just meant because there’s so many people. Maybe it was because I wasn’t very close to the stage, but I could hardly hear the band over the crowd singing. Maybe that is supposed to be part of the experience? Have you seen the Corning Museum of Glass? I think I’d like to visit before college is back in. Specifically I’d like to see Carroña by Javier Pérez. It’s one of my favorite works of art.
Hey Dennis,
Very late comment as I’m only now in bed (at 4:47am) but I guess that’s a sign of a good night.
I’m sure the fort you’re thinking of is Elizabeth Fort, the big one in the city near St Fin Barres’ Cathedral (the one with the golden angel on top) and only a 10 minute walk from me! I tend to walk past it daily, and my friend had a garden that was right underneath it, which was a very surreal sight when drinking or getting high. There’s a lot of forts across Cork and Ireland in general, with basically all of them being built by the British, though the real old ones would date back to Viking or Celtic times.
I think the fact that Cork is such a nautical city, with the port being the second biggest natural port in the world (unless im mistaken) makes me feel enticed and connected to the water, yet I’m not living in the places out further that actually get to enjoy the water and beaches and swims. Instead I just have to see water everywhere and not get to be a part of it. Probably could come up with some dee analysis on my psyche, my need to feel connected, addictive tendencies, what have you… but honestly I think I just really like to swim hahah.
I finally went back to Silent Hill 3 today, got all the way to the final boss but had to leave before I could finish. I think that SH3 may be my favourite of the bunch so far, for its locations, themes, aesthetic, ambience, and for Heather Mason being a far superior main character to Harry and James. I went to see 7 with my friend, and the whole experience was other-worldly. The opener did a set of drone and noise that felt like an airplane crash, and then the main set had me deep into an almost meditative trance, I was conjuring images and sensations that flowed with the sounds, and I think the hours of SH3 today really through me into the mindset. Spoke to them afterwards, incredibly sweet and humble. We shared a few good words about you too!
Anyway, I’m just gonna cut it here instead of doing a deep recap of my night, let me save that for the diary!