Dave's Fiction Warehouse

I 'm happy Pope Francis was named Time magazine’s “Person of the Year.” As popes go, he’s not bad. It says something about the Vatican that when somebody who works there actually walks the walk in regard to Christianity, it’s quite amazing and newsworthy. So: Good job, Frank. But don’t get all prideful, because look at your competition: Ted Cruz? Are you kidding me? Bashir Assad? I know, Time always qualifies its annual award by saying it’s all about influence — good or bad — as opposed to making the world a better place. But still. When the name of the award is “Person of the Year,” it always sounds like an honor. And it always seems like smarmy equivocation to short-list people who are, arguably, nothing more than headline-whores and amoral assholes. It’s worth noting that Time‘s annual honor was called “Man of the Year” until 1999. Women were not considered very influential until that date. Oops. Sorry, Maggie! Sorry, Indira! Past winners include Hitler, Stalin, Khrushchev and K...

Give us a kiss. W e all have our guilty pleasures, and mine at the moment is " The Strain ," the TV adaptation of the books by Guillermo del Toro. It's all about vampires taking over New York City. It's like "The Walking Dead," except, you know, with vampires. And an evil presence orchestrating the whole thing. You can see why it's a guilty pleasure. But bear with me. These aren't the glamorous, simpering vampires we've become used to through certain young-adult novels. Yes, they feast on human blood, but they lurch around like zombies and attack via a snake-like appendage that erupts from the mouth, like a frog nailing a fly. Much more efficient than fangs. The appendage is a two-way conduit: while delivering blood to the vampire, it delivers the little white parasitic worms that eventually turn the victim into yet another vampire.  Disgusting, yes. And a refreshing departure from the canon. Vampires are supposed to elicit horror, as opposed to ...

S arah Palin has come out of seclusion to demand that President Obama be impeached .  Obama should take some comfort from that, since Palin's support on any issue, historically, has been a pretty sure sign that the opposite will happen.  Part of me wants to believe that Palin's "blistering op-ed" on Breitbart was written  by someone else, since she rarely communicates in complete sentences. But her lede (journalism lingo there) makes me think she wrote at least this much: "Enough is enough of the years of abuse from this president. His unsecured border crisis is the last straw that makes the battered wife say, 'no mas.'" Here we have three distinct metaphors in one sentence: the overburdened camel, the abusive husband, and welterweight boxer Roberto Duran. A hat trick! Too bad it won't all fit on a bumper sticker. She also includes herself among "we average Americans" and derides the president's "friendly wealthy bipartisan eli...

O nce again, I was summoned for jury duty. Once again, I was dismissed after spending half a day at court, shivering in the hyperactive AC. I'm beginning to think lawyers mistake my naturally shifty look for a vengeful nature. Maybe it's just as well. You only get paid $40 a day. And after the judge explained the facts of the civil case in question, I was already thinking it sounded way too complicated:  A young woman and her pre-teen daughter were going down I-75 in a minivan when some jerk in a pickup forced her off to the shoulder; she over-corrected and the van crossed traffic to collide with the guard rail. The two were unhurt; the pickup driver never  bothered to stop. But then a semi came up and rear-ended the van, injuring both the woman and the little girl. She was seeking around $200k for medical bills and whatnot. The only thing I could think of was the asshole in the pickup -- surely the proximate cause of the accident. He was caught and charged. But I don't sup...

W ho among us has not spent 15 minutes perusing Facebook without at some point concluding that life could be better? Show of hands. Now we know why. It's not that life sucks, per se; it's just that the geniuses at Facebook were messing with us. They wanted to know if small variations in the number of cat videos and dinner entrees and vacation sunsets could have an effect on one's mood. They fixed it so that instead of yet another hilarious meme or Buzzfeed quiz, one might see one of those pathetic posts from someone complaining about their neighbors or contemplating suicide. Turns out it makes a difference! According to the data, plaintive cries for help are kind of depressing, while getting 10 likes on an Instagram photo induces a euphoria akin to orgasm. If the research can be trusted, we may now conclude that positive things make people happy, and negative things don't!  This has profound implications.  Of course, a number of people immediately got on Facebook to bit...