Bad math

I played around with my calculator and came up with these Word Riot submission stats for April 2008:

Submissions: 195
Rejected: 144
Accepted: 25
Pending/Withdrawn/Jackie’s bad math: 26

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I updated a bunch of pages on this site, including Articles/Interviews, Now (which existed in a state of suspended animation for like a year), Readings, Reviews/Blurbs and Writing.

Also, all posted news on The Suburban Swindle has been tagged and has it’s own page here.

But can I get a coffee mug?

Columbia College Chicago has this pretty impressive Publishing Lab to help their students get a feel for fiction and poetry markets, both print and online.

Students research the lit mags and write up market sheets rating them. If you’re new to the writing/publishing game, it’s an invaluable resource.

Dire Reading Series

I’ll be reading in Massachusetts next month:

Timothy Gager’s Dire Literary Series
THE OUT OF THE BLUE ART GALLERY
106 PROSPECT STREET,
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS

5, 15 minute open mic slots at 8 p.m., sign-up at 7 p.m. followed by features

Dire #82 January 4, 2008
Rusty Barnes, Jackie Corley and poet Harris Gardner

Once more with the fever

James Stegall of So New Media has a new essay up at Nerve.com: Personal Inventory: The Erotic Appeal of the Lands’ End Catalogue

This is a pornography of regret, and the longer you stare, the more seductive it becomes. These sixty pages are a self-pity trap; any sane lonely man would do well to avoid them.

That’s so Bateman!

Scott Bateman has a DVD out. Onward with the promotional details:

Scott Bateman: Re-Animator is a compilation of the very best of Bateman’s work from 2006 and 2007, and includes work from his hit TV show Scott Bateman Presents Scott Bateman Presents and his regular web gig at Salon.com. This DVD contains over 60 minutes of animation and includes guest voices like Kristen Schaal, Andrea Rosen, Reggie Watts and more!

Pre-order now; starts shipping the TODAY. Scott Bateman: Re-Animator is perfect for holiday gift-giving!

I don’t hate Amazon Kindle

Everybody’s lighting a torch to Amazon’s new e-reader before it even gets its bearings. I don’t get the fury against the thing. If I had the money, I’d be snatching up the Kindle in a second.

In the mean time, I’m converting Word Riot Press books into HTML format, putting the files through Amazon’s digital text platform and making them available for sale on the Amazon Kindle store. I’m going to try to get Word Riot’s monthly issues available through the Kindle store (for like a dime an issue or whatever the lowest price is that I can list them for).

A lot of folks seem to read Word Riot when they’re taking a breather at work. Think of other period of downtime when readers might be up for losing themselves in a short story — while commuting, for example. I like the idea that an online magazine could be made available on a hand held machine and read any time, anywhere on a screen that looks like paper. Maybe this can be a means to spread the reach of online lit mags. Or maybe I’m thinking all crazy-like while I’m jonesing for Turkey Day.

New ‘puter

Behold the glory of the bitchin new laptop I’ll be getting in the mail next week:

An HP Compaq 6820s. Hot. Very hot.

Bye bye, black sheep

Another one of my computers has reached its two-year lifespan.

At least this time the computer’s hardware isn’t going nuts on me. The plastic casing has chipped off one of the hinges that link the keyboard to the screen.  I can’t close my laptop anymore but it’s still performing fine.

I use my computer for work. I need something durable with a lot of memory. Disk space doesn’t matter to me all that much.

Jonathan Ames and Fiona Apple? Jonathan Ames and Fiona Apple!

Greatest celeb couple ever. Period.

And “Never is a Promise” is the best song ever. That is all.

Thank you muchly

I just wanted to thank the readers at last night’s launch party for The Flash. Nathan Tyree, Paul Blaney and Andrew Lewis Conn each did an incredible job.

Thanks also to everyone who came out to the KGB Bar. I was pleasantly surprised by the turn-out and the interest level in the anthology.

Copies of  The Flash are now available for purchase at Word Riot. All proceeds go to Amnesty International.