I Couldn’t Decide What To Focus On.

For someone who didn’t do all that well in High School Chemistry, I sure have taken up a lot of it in recent years. As I may have mentioned before, Wednesday is not only Substack day, but it is also the day I take care of the balancing the hot tub and the pool (in season). This is because no matter where I may be for a convention, Wednesday is usually a day that I am home. It is also the day I take certain weekly medications, so I am also altering my own chemistry.

Well today I had an additional bit of chemical alteration, I added some nutrients to the batch of mead I have fermenting downstairs. More on that below.

My other big event of the week was to attend the Wednesday 13 show at the Machine Shop. I’ve been a big fan of Wednesday’s mix of metal and horror references for years. This was my sixth of seventh time seeing him, including one time I upgraded to the VIP. More on this below as well.

Listening To: Book of Night by Holly Black. This one has an interesting magic system and creative world building with more than a touch of crime fiction.

Currently Reading: Proof copies.

Current Obsession: Making the mead!

When this goes live you will have a few hours to preorder Dark Workings of Wild Women. Donna J.W. Munro’s collection of short stories will be released on 1 May. We will have links for the ebook and paperback on the website tomorrow!

On deck for May will be the Kickstarter for Nightmerica and preorders for Some People I Have Killed. Look for more information on that soon.

We have a bit of bad news in the convention department. Due to an unfortunate scheduling situation, Dragon’s Roost Press will be unable to participate in this year’s Frankenfest. However, we still highly recommend that head out to Historic Fort Wayne in Detroit on 13 September. There will be an amazing bunch of Halloween and horror themed vendors, food trucks, entertainment, and more.

To balance out the bad news, we are pleased to announce that we have been accepted as a vendor for Horror on Main in Harrisburg, PA this coming 27 - 29 June. If you are in the area, swing on by. And if you are not in the area, I hear it’s not too far from Hershey’s Chocolate World so there’s another reason to come out.

While we are on the topic of appearances, we are only a week and a half away from our next show: the Halfway to Halloween Expo in Ann Arbor MI. Visit the Washtenaw Farm Council Grounds next Saturday (10 May) for SIX buildings full of vendors, a hearse show, and a collaborative haunted house featuring some of the best haunted attractions in the area.

I couldn’t decide what should get the “What I Did This Week” spot and what the “Weekly Rant” spot, so I just decided to talk about both of this week’s exciting things in both areas. Yeah, I may be a little over-caffeinated.

Let’s start with the booze:

Yes, that’s right, after a year and a half of studying and accumulating equipment, I finally started my first batch of mead yesterday. For those who may not know, we found some interesting things in The New House™. There was a whole storage area filled with various pool supplies (makes sense), bunch of knives in various places (three so far), some fireplace stuff (again, makes sense), what appears to be the broken axle of a wooden trailer (this is still in the woods as we have no clue what to do with it). Most interesting, however, was a variety of wine making material. There were boxes of bottles in numerous places — probably 8 boxes holding a dozen bottles each. There was a spinning rack for drying the bottles. There were a couple of carboys and other fermenting paraphernalia. The big find was a kick-ass corker (which I can’t wait to use).

Why these items were left behind, I have no idea. The previous owners (or the ones before them, not sure), left a useful booklet of places to call for different services like plumbing, electrical, etc. Included in there is the name of a wine supply store in Livonia.

Now making wine didn’t really strike my fancy, despite it being The Mrs’ imbibing liquid of choice. The first thing that my mind went to was mead. Between the Polish mead drinkers on one side of the family and the Vikings on the other (one of the books I bought is titled Make Mead Like a Viking: Traditional Techniques for Brewing Natural, Wild-Fermented, Honey-Based Wines and Beers) this was a natural choice. Not being one to jump into anything, I did as much research as I thought necessary, then got nervous and put off the idea a little longer.

This week I started my first batch. I just made a small batch, should be about a gallon when done. I’m hoping it comes out OK. I’m also looking forward to trying a bigger batch.

The other big fun event was the Wednesday 13 show. I first started listening to his music over a decade ago when a friend who knew my love of horror thought I might like some of the songs. I was particularly drawn to the ones with humorous references to horror movies like “American Werewolves in London” and “Haddonfield.”

Seeing Wednesday in person is quite the experience. The whole band has the make-up and leather look of many a scary metal band, but the music has both an edge and a crazy sense of humor. You simply can’t not smile when the singer is telling you to raise your middle finger in the air for the song “I Love To Say Fuck” (the perennial encore/show closer) while he flashes an umbrella…well, just look at the picture.

This year marks 20 years since Wednesday 13’s first album as a solo artist, so the set-list had a lot of old favorites including two of mine: “I Walked with a Zombie” and “Bad Things”. There were also some oldies from previous acts like Frankenstein Drag Queens from Planet 13 and Murderdolls, but nothing like the previous tour which was essentially a Murderdolls tribute. It was surprising to see how many people were able to sing along with the songs from the new album Mid Death Crisis considering it had dropped just the day before.

I was one of those singing along, as I played it while mowing the lawn.

As usual, their was an interesting mix of opening acts. I Ya Toyah provided the modern version of a one person bad with a mix of synth, guitar, electronic drum tracks, and amazing vocal. Dead Rabbits provided one of the creepiest stage presences I’ve seen in a while with their masks that looked like…well, like dead rabbits. My favorite of the openers was Stitched Up Heart featuring Mixi Demner’s incredible vocals.