Picked up another signed Ray Bradbury Christmas broadsheet off eBay:
Bradbury, Ray. A Christmas Wish 1989: The Bread of Beggars, The Wine of Christ. Privately printed, 1989. First edition broadsheet, a Fine copy, inscribed by the author: “Tim!—Love!—Ray!” Bought off eBay for $34 plus shipping.
The slight shadowing on the left side is a scanner artifact, probably a result of leaving it in the protective plastic while scanning it…
For a little seasonal cheer, enjoy Crocodiles & Dum Dum Girls “Merry Xmas, Baby (Please Don’t Die)”.
Two Michael Swanwick books:
Copies of both of these will be available in the new Lame Excuse Books catalog I’m sending out on Monday.
I blame Dwight.
Evidently there’s a Swedish charity that’s trying to raise goat awareness or some damn thing, and to do so they’ve released a Christmas album.
Sung by goats.
And by “sung,” I mean “torturing you ears.”
Yes, it’s Jingle Cats with goats. If you’re in dire need of finding a way to make guests leave at the end of a Christmas party, I think this will provide the answer…
To celebrate Christmas, here’s The Dropkick Murphys with “The Season’s Upon Us.”
The search for the coolest Christmas tree is officially over. You’re never going to beat the giant, fire-breathing Godzilla Christmas tree of Aqua City Odaiba shopping mall in Tokyo.
Merry Christmas!
In his tomb in upthrust Lapland
Dead Kris Kringle lies dreaming
If you’re looking for a weird Christmas horror movie, you could do a lot worse than the Finnish movie Rare Exports. The son of a reindeer herder/butcher finds out that a team just over the border in Russia are drilling into a mountain they believe to be a tomb.
It quickly becomes apparent that the tomb is that of Santa Claus. And the real Santa Claus is not the jolly fellow of Coke commercials, but a fearsome punisher of the wicked that looks a lot more like Krampus:
What makes the film work is its cold, gritty, unsentimental realism. It really does look like it was filmed in a tiny village in Ass End of Nowhere, Finland. Save an unconvincing CGI helicopter at the end, and the strange coda that gives the film its name, I thought everything about the movie worked pretty well. Of recent Scandinavian horror films, I thought this worked better than Dead Snow, but not as good as Let the Right One In.
Worth viewing, and available on Netflix.
I was going to do a longer review, but I’m running out of Christmas.
Pretty much self-explanatory.
Thanks, Angry Alien!
And a Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!
It’s that time of year. If you haven’t been to the Austin’s 37th Street display of lights, this video from illustrator Doug Potter gives you an idea of what it’s like.
Merry Christmas!
And now that it’s December, enjoy the songs of Nine Inch Nails set to traditional Christmas music.
And as long as we’re on that topic, here’s Bad Kermit’s rendition of “Hurt.”
And here’s a mashup of Nine Inch Nails and The Beatles on “Come Closer Together.”
NSFW warnings apply to all.