CHRISTMAS BOOK SALE

 Christmas is the one and only holiday I care about anymore, and I have a deal for you. Good for today and today only. You must order by midnight tonight. Central time. I may be asleep by then, but as long as the time stamp is before midnight, then it's still good.

Five bucks for a book. Limit of one book per household. First come, first serve. No shipping. No strings attached. If you feel like leaving me an honest review on Amazon or Goodreads or even posting on social media about it? Cool. I'd be grateful. But the only price is five bucks. Good only in the US. Sorry, everywhere else, but shipping to you costs an arm, a leg, a firstborn child, etc. If you live in another country, I'll send you something digital for free. Not sure what I have, but I'll figure something out. In the US: Let me know what you want, and I'll send payment info to you. All books come signed. Let me know how you would like them signed.

Here are the books I have.

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF HIERONYMUS ALOYSIS ZIEGE

TALES OF UNSPEAKABLE TASTE

BLOOD

POOR BASTARDS AND RICH FUCKS

TALES OF QUESTIONABLE TASTE

STRIP

GONZO RISING

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #316: WHAT CHRISTMAS MEANS TO ME

I'm a lifelong atheist. More or less. I went on searches for religion over the course of my life (and when I was 12 I got my first blowjob out of it, long story), but even though I thought I found it a few times, I was wrong. Even as a child, I did not believe in God. Maybe it's because I was never taught to. I never really believed in Santa, either. I had my suspicions that it was a lie to get me to just go to fucking sleep, or Santa will never come you little brat. (Mom called me a brat a lot, and I deserved it half the time.) In fact, there is one thing us atheists are asked all the time: if you have no fear of punishment in the afterlife, why be good? I'll answer that by the end of this. Promise. And if you're not an atheist, you might not like what I have to say.

I feel I should also mention that I'm not just talking about the Christian God(s). I'm talking about all gods. I'd sooner believe in Zeus than this crazy shit that people are babbling about now, and Zeus is fucking stupid.

Santa made just as much sense to me at that age that Jesus did. Meaning, NONE. The true meaning of Christmas keeps getting shoved down my throat every fucking year. It's the birth of Jesus and so on et cetera go fuck yourself if you don't believe in Jesus. That's my experience. Yours probably varies.

When I was a kid, I loved holidays. I threw myself into every one of them, even Arbor Day. Now? I don't give a flying fuck at a rolling, still or flying doughnut. I'm a horror author who doesn't give two tugs of a dead dog's cock about Halloween. I don't care about any of them.

But I remember when I was a kid, and after we all opened presents on Christmas Day (this was before I met the person who would abuse me for a good portion of my childhood), I remember that Gramps took out the projector and showed us the ghosts of Christmas Past. I learned how to thread the film through, and we'd watch as my mom and my aunt would, as children, open their presents. Gramps looked like Hunter S. Thompson. Grandma had horn-rimmed glasses and her hair in curlers. I saw the very same tree and decorations that we still used when I was a kid in those films. And then we'd watch past films of us opening presents. We also had these great cartoons on literal film. We didn't get sound, but when you're watching Tom and Jerry or the Three Stooges or even Puss'n'Boots, you didn't need it.

There was this one year that I got a tank that fired a missile that was supposed to be harmless if a kid got hit with it. But a tree ornament? It shattered the fucker. I was guilt ridden about that, not because I expected punishment. I did. But because that was a decoration that was gone forever because I was a stupid fucking kid.

What we never did when I was a kid was go to church. Ever. My dad's side of the family was very religious (read: Catholic), but my mom's side? Nope. We barely set foot in church for weddings and funerals. Certainly not for a fucking Christmas mass. We were too busy with real people stuff.

And today I remain an atheist. And like I said, holidays don't mean anything to me anymore.

But in my vicinity, there is a child in my family. Last year, I was so broke I got no presents for anyone . . . except this kid. Because I know that when you're a child Christmas means everything to you.

But Christmas does mean something to me, regardless of all the things I just said. Fuck the religious side of it. The true meaning of Christmas has nothing to do with the birth of Christ, as far as I'm concerned. If you doubt that, you can talk with some Druids about . . . fuck it. Never mind. I don't want to start a holy war. I don't want to hurt anyone. I don't want any arguments from anyone about anything on this topic. So if you have an opinion, keep it to yourself.

And fuck Santa. He was created by a corporation so that . . . never mind that, either. Fuck that. I'm not here to etc.

And I'm not too pleased with the capitalist side of this so-called holiday. But considering my rants about Black Friday, you should not be surprised.

What does Christmas mean to me? Not much, to be fair. But it does have meaning. For me, it's a time of giving. When I was a kid, unbridled greed got the better of me, but now? I don't care if I get a single Christmas gift. I just like giving. I don't even wait to see the look of happiness on anyone's face. I gave, and that's enough for me. Because I'm kind of a cold person. People thanking me makes me feel weird, so I just ignore it.

I understand that sometimes you just can't give. Like last year for me? I couldn't give. So I didn't. But if you can, I'd take the advice that Craig Ferguson offers in his book BETWEEN THE BRIDGE AND THE RIVER: "Help others." A weird thing to come from a late night host on regular TV, right? But I'll be damned if that hasn't stuck with me. It's one of my top five favorite books of all time. Help others. Just do it. Not for you. If you think it'll get you into Heaven, you're doing it for the wrong reason.

So. Why be good if I have no fear of punishment in the afterlife? First, I can't claim to be always good. I'm selfish a lot of the time, and I've hurt a lot of people in my life, but I've tried to be good. Not to earn Brownie points with the Great Whatever. But if you're being good because you're afraid of getting a red pitchfork up your ass in the fiery depths of Hell, then you aren't really good. You're acting in self interest.

We're all in this together. It sucks. We don't like each other most of the time. But WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER. Why make life miserable when you can help ease someone else's suffering? That's why I try to be good. This is all we have. When you die, you're dead. That sucks, but we do have this time. Behave (more or less). Be good (if you can). Help others. Merry Christmas.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #241: THE GHOSTS OF CHRISTMAS PAST

When I was a kid, and I mean a teeny-tiny kid, my family was fairly well off. Upper middle class in the early 'Eighties. I'd place us somewhere in the upper lower class now. I have a roof over my head, but it's slowly falling apart (every time it rains, I get nervous because my ceiling has a bunch of soft spots which I have covered with duct tape). My electrical system is breaking down. I can't afford to repair the broken garage door. I can't even fix the plumbing. But back then times were different. Back then we could actually have those awesome Christmas parties like you see only in movies these days. We would not have looked out of place at Kevin McCallister's house.


One of our traditions was for my grandfather to break out the projector and play films of Christmases past, when it was just him, Grandma, my mom and my aunt. Some of these 8 mm films were shot in Arizona, where they all lived for a while, but quite a few were shot around Chicago and then in Elmhurst, at the home we inhabited at the time. It was a grand place. Two stories, an attic, a basement and a backyard big enough to play baseball in. It was weird seeing my mom as a kid and teenager. Parents never grew up. They were born fully grown, and they had full dominion over their kids. The very idea that my grandfather wanted to keep track of these memories was kind of odd, too. He only ever kept track of Christmas. Never any other moments. That was left up to Grandma and a Kodiak camera. Or sometimes a Polaroid. Back then she smoked Golden Lights. She had a leather pouch for her cigarettes and her lighter. She hasn't smoked in decades, which makes this fact even crazier.


Christmas belonged to Gramps, though. He relished recording every moment with his video camera. This tradition continued with my arrival on the scene, as well as my cousin's birth. When Gramps showed those on this roll-down screen, it always fascinated us. That's footage of us when we didn't even know who we were! There was a kind of magic to that.


After that, Gramps, wearing his rainbow colored shirt that said, over and over, WORLD'S GREATEST GRANDPA, would screen a few other short films. We had PUSS-N-BOOTS and a couple of Three Stooges shorts. It was great. I remember laughing at each reel as if it was the first time I'd ever seen it.


About a decade or so ago, I was scrounging around in the basement when I uncovered not just the old reels of film, but also the projector. The screen was nowhere to be found, unfortunately, but we had a white wall and plenty of space to watch. First the ones of my mom and aunt in their childhood, whether under the hot Arizona sun or in the frosty wasteland of Chicago. Then out to the suburbs. To them growing up. To me and my cousin as children. Building snowmen. Unwrapping presents. It was a window in time.


And then the projector melted down the film, rendering the machine unusable. It was nice to get that one last look into a past that will be forgotten when I'm no longer here. When my cousin is no longer here.


I spent Christmas today with the few remaining. My cousin lives off in Colorado now, so it was Gramps, Grandma, my aunt and another cousin. No one recorded anything. But I remember talking with my grandfather, and I have a sneaking suspicion this is his last Christmas. He can't walk anymore. He's confined to the living room, where he spends his time watching TV and doing not much else. He no longer shaves or cuts his hair. And he's been like that so long that he no longer knows the layout of his own home. He's forgotten quite a lot. He still knows my name, but he's uncertain about a lot of other stuff.


Maybe someday I can figure out a way to clean out that burnt film, maybe replace the bulb, if they make 'em anymore. Maybe just put the old reels on DVD, or something. In my youth I was convinced that I was going to die at the age of 40. That's an article for another day. I've recently decided that I hope I can squeeze out at least another decade. Maybe two. But no more than that. Getting old sucks. I've seen it first hand. My grandfather will be 90 in a few weeks. I don't ever want to reach that age.


But I keep thinking back to the time of those 8 mm reels, and I miss it. That was before I had any brothers, meaning that was before my mom met the creature who--eh, forget it. I've gone on about that before. Suffice it to say, the John Bruni in those films was someone who had yet to get the shit kicked out of him by the world, and everyone around him was young and alive and full of hope.


To quote a great series of books, "O, Discordia!"