The Comet - November 2021

EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE

EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE

everything will be fine

THIS issue

editor: Ron Evans

contributors: Sarah Sims, Cory Calhoun, Dan McConnell, Loni McKenzie, Lindsay Breidenthal, Holly Thorpe, Bill Griffith, Lance Reese, Christopher F. Hart - thecometmagazine@gmail.com

crossword............................PAGE 7

THE WRITERS ISSUE

NOVEMBER 2021

WRITE ON THE RIVER ............. PAGE 12

little bot shop....................PAGE 8 poems on writing......... ....... PAGE 14

lost libraries.................. ... PAGE 16

samantha birch fisher......PAGE 20

faith merz................... ........ PAGE 24

missionary’s position........ PAGE 26

art beat................................... PAGE 28

the typewriter...................PAGE 32

witchy waters....................PAGE 35

FUNNY PAGES.........................PAGE 36

COMET HEADQUARTERS

Greetings,

It has been one of the most autumny autumns in recent memory, has it not? Hopefully you have found time to revel in it, if only from a cozy winda. As November rolls in it seems like a good great stupendous (vocabulary upgrade!) time to focus much of the magazine on writing. It’s NaNoWriMo month after all. More on that from Holly Thorpe on page 12. This issue also boasts a short story from Holly as well as a few poetry showcases and a little write-centric history in the mix. If you have ever wanted to start that Great American novel this may be the best month to kick start you on your way.

I’m putting the call out once again for reader submitted writings. Writings of all sorts but we would especially love to have your movie/album/book/play reviews. There are few things better in life than the feeling of getting someone hooked onto a new obsession, especially when it inspires creativity out of them. But, it’s also just neat to share shit. And you don’t have to be Ray Bradbury with the wordsmithing. If you have read this little paper before, that will likely be quite clear - but it’s worth stating all the same. We just want to hear your opinions in your own style. Send submissions to: thecometmagazine@gmail.com

This Halloween was a bit of an odd one as some things were open in real life. Other things, like our Radar Dames Burlesque Halloween game show Strip For Your Life were once again relegated to streaming only. It was a tough call to make but we just didn’t know where things would be by now. As it turns out, things were hopping. This was one of the going-outiest Halloweens in recent memory and it was fun to see so much life and spooky doings all going on at once. Also frustrating. Why does everything amazing have to happen on the same night of the year!? All we need to do to remedy this common problem irritation snafu is to start having Halloween once a month. Why not? We (mostly) all agree it’s the best holiday with the best themes and events. Just make the last day of every month Halloween. Who’s with me? Then I may be able to go to more than one thing a year. Hell, I’d even settle for just having Halloween in all the months the have 31 days, which is four. I’m good with four Halloweens a year. Ok, I’ll move on. Can you tell I was too busy working to get out and enjoy the festivities? ‘That twitch in my eye comin’ through here is it? I better sign off and get caught up on some horror flicks and candy before I go full Jack Torrance in the third act of The Shining.

Enjoy that autumny autumn air everyone, and try to write something this month. Something for us. Something for yourself. Something for your cat. Please write something for your cat.

Then send it to us.

Happy Trails, Ron Evans Editor of The Comet

The Radar Dames - post 10-hour video shoot for our burlesque game show Strip For Your Life. Ticket links are closed but message The Radar Dames on Facebo...Meta? Fuckin’ billionaires, man. Anyway message us to find out how to stream the show. It’s a good time!

Audience members will be required to be vaccinated for all performances and public events held indoors. Numerica Performing Arts Center will require proof of COVID-19 vaccination (or proof of a negative COVID-19 test for exempted persons) for audience members at all events. People ages 12+ with a medical condition or closely held religious belief that prevents vaccination must provide proof of a negative COVID-19 PCR test taken within 72 hours of the performance start time, or a negative COVID-19 antigen test taken within 12 hours of the performance start time. “Fully vaccinated” means your 2nd dose vaccination was more than 14 days prior to the date of your performance. Self-reported vaccination records that are not verified by a health care provider cannot be accepted. Self-reported negative test results that are not from a test provider, a laboratory, or a health care provider cannot be accepted. Masks are required to be worn at all times while not actively eating or drinking. Go to www.NumericaPAC.org/covid-safety-protocols/ for more info on our Covid-19 protocols.

Officially endorsed by Lucasfilm, Charles Ross single-handedly plays all the character with spot-on voice impressions, sings the music, flies the ships, fights the battles and condenses the plots of the three films into one hilarious production. Suitable for Star Wars fans from ages 6 to Yoda.

WRITTEN & PERFORMED BY CHARLES ROSS

CORY CALHOUN'S PUZZLE CORNER

Crosswords & more made exclusively for The Comet

THE LAST META CROSSWORD CONTEST of 2021!

Enter for a chance to win a cool mystery prize by solving 2021's last meta crossword! HOW TO ENTER: 1. Solve the crossword below. 2. Solve its meta puzzle (instructions at tinyurl.com/corymetas). 3. Email just themetapuzzleanswer for the hint (don't sendthesolvedgrid!) to cscxwords@gmail.com by12amPT, November19, 2021 (One submission per entrant, please.) We'll randomly pick a winner from the correct entries, and announce the winner and puzzle answers in the next issue. Good luck!

MIXEDDRINKS

HINT: The metaanswer is a 1-word brand n a me .

ACROSS

1. Org. at a school

4. Carnaval site

7. Mimic

10. Fix

13. Campaigned

14. F1 neighbor, often

15. PBS benefactor

16. BBC’s Killing

17. Japanese sash

18. Freshman, often [2]

21. Shade of black

22. Racial justice movement since 2013, briefly

23. Ones who postpone 24. Sphere

25. Shepherd's locale

26. Type of hygiene

27. Expert conclusion?

28. Arbor or ether suffix

29. Fixing a hole, with "up" [1]

33. Bamboozle

34. Quads and traps, for two

36. Flow

38. Ben-

39. Physique, slangily

40. Palindromic title

43. Neutral shade

47. "It ___ me, I swear!"

51. Eroded

52. Totally covers with, as light or liquid [1]

55. Part of a trilogy-ender's title, often

56. Punch

58. Inaugural, as a voyage

59. Enough, for some 60. Union member?

62. Surname in a series of Stiller/DeNiro comedies

64. Thickcold-weather layer [2]

69. Complain 72. Diamond Head locale 73. Accounts 77. Caper 78. Loads from lodes

79. Javelin, e.g. 80. Tall order?

81. Sack attachment?

82. Squalid DOWN

1. Hitch

2. Picturesque arrangement

3. Barbarians

4. No longer working: Abbr.

5. "Aha!"

6. Leopardlike cats

ANACROSTICCHALLENGE

CLUES: ANSWERS:

7. Saintly

8. Jury member

9. Canal zones? 10. Jump for joy

11. Former NBA star Allen

12. "Shove it!" 19. D.E.A. agent

Asian nursemaid

Perpendicular

___ Lingus

Pencil stump

Adult

When repeated, a dance

Nutritional abbr.

Physics calculation

Sitting on

Art ___

Flight info,

>>> Instructions @ tinyurl.com/coryanacrostics

CLUES (cont'd): ANSWERS (cont'd):

SambainstrumentsLikedecorativeglass

835271564573472541436111595222

FuriousScrutinize

461720335136496684458

Like"WarandPeace"Decree

652623730531395028

Tennisscore"Gimme!"

182447561623542145293

DazzleCertainfollowers

10674251391962324481438

CornunitsMonopolytoken

12604063316655

QUOTE: ,

12345678910111213141516171819202122

232425262728293031323334353637383940414243444546474849

50515253545556575859606162636465666768

SOLUTIONTO PREVIOUS CROSSWORD

APTLY AIDS SMUT

MARIO FRAU PINE

SHAMU FAWN OATS

PARKINGKERMIT

ODE EUR CITIES

FOZZIEMEMORY

FLOAT LOSE NBA

ECIG ROBOT HEIR

RED XENO COALS

ELMOWEWONTGO

ACACIA EON FEN

BOWLINGGROVER

AREA DELI ICEUP

BEES ENOL CHASE

ASKS DEWY TOKEN

SOLUTIONSTO PREVIOUS DOUBLEANAGRAMCHALLENGE

Theme ofnewwords: Fish PREACH -A= PERCH, SLABS -L= BASS, CRAMP -M= CARP, OINK -N= KOI, SIGNATORY -O= STINGRAY, ELSE -S= EEL Leftover letters A, L,M,N, O and S anagraminto SALMON

I CRAVE FEEDBACK! Thoughts? Suggestions? Lemme have it. CSCXWORDS@GMAIL.COM

FEATURING:@little_bot_shop

Fave Movie: Hook

Fave Book: Either Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone or The Name of the Wind

Fave Band: Muse

Fave Artist: Jim Henson

Fave Quote: “But what is grief, if not love persevering?” ~ WandaVision

Fave Thing: My Bulldog, Auggie

Dream ColLaboration: The stop motion team at Laika. I’m fascinated by the art of bringing inanimate objects to life, particularly through puppetry and stop motion. The Laika team is top notch and I would love to be involved even in the form of Bagel/Coffee Girl.

Fave place: Seattle for so many reasons, but mostly the art and the weather.

by holly thorpe

Write on the River and NCW Libraries are partnering to host NaNoWriMo writing events and create a virtual support group this fall to celebrate NaNoWriMo and connect regional writers.

What is NaNoWriMo?

From nanowrimo.org, “National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) began in 1999 as a daunting but straightforward challenge: to write 50,000 words of a novel in thirty days. Now, each year on November 1, hundreds of thousands of people around the world begin to write, determined to end the month with 50,000 words of a brand new novel. They enter the month as elementary school teachers, mechanics, or stay-at-home parents. They leave novelists.

NaNoWriMo officially became a nonprofit organization in 2006, and our programs support writing fluency and education. Our website hosts more than a million writers, serving as a social network with author

profiles, personal project libraries, and writing buddies.”

NCW Writers Group is taking a flexible approach to NaNoWriMo this month. We encourage writers to set their own word goals outside of the traditional 50,000. Some examples include:

• Shorten the word goal (10,000 or 25,000)

•Write 1-3 short stories

•Write 1-5 poems

• Create a daily writing habit - focus on the act of writing every day rather than the words written

• Use November to plot and plan a larger projects: develop characters, timelines, maps or do research

• or whatever else helps you practice your craft!

This month, we will focus on the act of writing, not on the product. This means writers of all genres, forms and skill levels can participate.

What is NCW Writers Group?

Every third Wednesday from 4-5p.m. NCW Libraries and Write on the River host

an inclusive Writers Group for writers of all ages, skill levels, genres and interests. The NCW Writers Group is a virtual writing community created by local writers, for local writers. This group is designed to connect people and artists, discuss the craft, ask for advice and share resources.

The meetings are hosted by Wenatchee librarian Nik Penny and Write on the River board member Holly Thorpe on Zoom. All NCW Libraries virtual events are free and open to the public. Find the Zoom link at ncwlibraries.org

This month, NCW writers are meeting an additional Wednesday on Nov. 17 to do a NaNoWriMo check in and word sprints.

Virtual chat room and check-ins

NCW Writers Group is excited to announce the creation of a Discord channel for local writers to keep tabs on their NaNoWriMo progress and stay in touch this November and beyond. Discord combines voice calls, video calls and private chats. It’s free to create an account and the channel will be managed by Nik and Holly.

Join the channel using this link: https://discord.gg/9c2tyEgK2K

“Write with me” live streams

In addition to the Zoom meetings and Discord channels, NCW Writers Group will be hosting “Write with me” livestreams on the Discord channel and the Write on the River Facebook page. Here, Nik and Holly will stream their writing process and exercises, inviting questions, project updates and external motivation for others to write along with them. Stay tuned on the Write on the River Facebook page for more details.

Have questions about NCW Writers Group or other NaNoWriMo events? Contact Nik Penny at npenny@ncwlibraries.org.

To learn more about Write on the River, become a member, or register for events, visit writeontheriver.org. Membership is $35 per year, and offers free or discounted access to all WOTR events. Questions? Contact info@writeontheriver.org. C

croce plays croce: coming to moses lake

Jim Croce’s son A.J. Croce is keeping his late father’s music alive on the stages of the world with his “Croce Plays Croce” show which will be making a stop in Moses Lake this November, courtesy of Columbia Basin Allied Arts. The show will feature a mixture of Jim’s classics along with his son’s own original tunes.

A.J. Croce has always traveled on his own musical road. For more than twenty years, the creative pop iconoclast has tapped a variety of Americana sounds in crafting his music. Many of Croce’s albums have appeared on Top 40, AAA, Americana, College, and Blues charts and when his breakout sophomore CD That’s Me in the Bar was reissued, it wound up charting in two separate decades.

“Croce Plays Croce,” finds A.J. Croce performing his songs, his father’s tunes and music that influenced both of them.

A.J. was only two years old when Jim Croce died in a tragic airplane crash in 1973, so he didn’t know his father’s music firsthand. Instead, “I came to love it in the same way everyone else did,” he explained, “by listening to the albums.” While he describes his father’s music as “part of me, part of my life,” A.J. never really performed those songs live. As a piano player, his interests tended to favor the blues and jazz-rooted music of musicians like Ray Charles and Allen Toussaint.

A few years ago, however,’ A.J. was digitalizing some of his father’s old tapes and came across a cassette filled with covers of old blues and folk tunes by the likes of Fats Waller, Bessie Smith and Pink Anderson. It was a revelation to him. “He was playing stuff I played myself,” A.J. revealed, adding that “stuff made sense” discovering that his father and he had “all the music common.”

As he started to learn his father’s tunes, A.J. had to do it “the old fashion way, by listening to the recordings” because there were no chord books of Jim Croce music. A.J., who was developing his own guitar playing prowess, was particularly

impressed with the complexities of his father’s compositions, especially in interplay between Croce and his longtime collaborator, lead guitarist Maury Muehleisen, who died with Croce in that fatal plane crash.

Jim Croce found long-overdue success in 1972 following years of struggling to make a name in the music business. That year he released two albums, You Don’t Mess Around With Jim and Life and Times, that spawned the hit singles “You Don’t Mess Around With Jim,” “Operator (That’s Not the Way It Feels),” “Time in a Bottle” and “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown” (the latter two tunes both reached Number #1). His final studio effort, I’ve Got a Name, was released in December of 1973, less than three months after his death. Three more hits (“Workin’ at the Car Wash Blues,” “I’ll Have to Say I Love You in a Song” and the title song) came from that album, which reached #2 in the album charts. A.J. pointed out that these three classic albums amazingly were recorded in just a oneand-a-half-year time period. Jim Croce, who was just thirty when he died, has had his folk-rock music remain popular over the years. His record sales have surpassed the 45 million mark, and his songs have appeared on over 375 compilations.

A.J.’s most recent release is an eclectic new covers album called By Request through Compass Records. Propelled by his spirited, loose-and-easy piano mastery and emotive vocals, Croce revisits these musical memories covering songs by artists including Allen Toussaint, Billy Preston, Tom Waits, Neil Young, Faces, Randy Newman and Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee.

“If Elton John and Leon Russell had a spiritual younger brother, it would be A.J. Croce.” —American Songwriter

Croce Plays Croce

Friday, November 19 at 7pm Moses Lake

High School Theater

TIX: cba-arts.org

FIVE POEMSabout WRITING

Book, Books, Books!

by Amos Russel Wells

Books, books, books, books!

Stuff that is nothing but binding and looks, Guessing and gossiping books of the times, Volumes of poetry (better named rhymes), Volumes of humor terribly strained, “Practical” books from which nothing is gained, Essays regilding the gold of the past, Books of philosophy vacantly vast, Volumes of science revamping the old, Children’s books, anything that can be sold, Novels of incident, stagey, unreal, Novels of sentiment vaguely ideal, Novels historical, clumsy and crude, Novels of passion, the devil’s own food, Counters heaped high, enough books for a town.

“Shop-worn,” “Remainders,” and “Volumes Marked Down.”

“Fifty Cent Table,” and “Twenty-five,” “Ten,” “Bankrupt Stock” offered again and again, Books by the carload and books by the ton, Books that are “Having a Marvellous Run.”

Books that are “Standard” and books “By the Set.” Volumes just published and books hard to get, “Five feet of books” and books by the mile, Volumes forbidding and books that beguile, Stuff that is nothing but binding and looks,— Books, books, books, books!

Merchantmen

by Ruby Archer

Come

in my ships, my letters,—

Kind the sky above,—

On your full sails faring

From the harbor—love.

Ye bring me wine for cargo;—

Bear it safe, I pray,—

Words,—a common vintage, Finer with delay.

A Curl

To A Blank Sheet of Paper

by Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

Wan-visaged thing! thy virgin leaf To me looks more than deadly pale, Unknowing what may stain thee yet,— A poem or a tale.

Who can thy unborn meaning scan? Can Seer or Sibyl read thee now? No,— seek to trace the fate of man Writ on his infant brow.

Love may light on thy snowy cheek, And shake his Eden-breathing plumes; Then shalt thou tell how Lelia smiles, Or Angelina blooms.

Satire may lift his bearded lance, Forestalling Time’s slow-moving scythe, And, scattered on thy little field, Disjointed bards may writhe. Perchance a vision of the night, Some grizzled spectre, gaunt and thin, Or sheeted corpse, may stalk along, Or skeleton may grin!

If it should be in pensive hour Some sorrow-moving theme I try, Ah, maiden, how thy tears will fall, For all I doom to die!

But if in merry mood I touch Thy leaves, then shall the sight of thee Sow smiles as thick on rosy lips As ripples on the sea.

The Weekly press shall gladly stoop To bind thee up among its sheaves; The Daily steal thy shining ore, To gild its leaden leaves.

Thou hast no tongue, yet thou canst speak, Till distant shores shall hear the sound; Thou hast no life, yet thou canst breathe Fresh life on all around.

by Kate Slaughter McKinney

To-night, as I turned back the pages Of a book Time had fingered before, And whose leaves held the odor of ages, And the imprints of much usage wore, A little brown curl I discovered, That fell from the book to the floor. Had I sinned? Heaven grant me its pardon. Did a lover’s sad tear the page spot? Who pressed there that gem of the garden— The sweet flower, “forget-me-not?” It lay as if carved on a grave-stone, And all of its sweetness forgot. I held the curl up to the lamplight, And watching the gleam of its gold, There I heard with the rush of the midnight, A sad little story it told; But I promised the sacred old volume Its secret I would not unfold. But I would that the world knew its sorrow, The story I must not reveal; But go to your book case to-morrow. And each to your own heart appeal; And you’ll know why the tattered old volume The little curl tries to conceal.

Seed Thoughts

by Kate Louise Wheeler

The celebrated Author pens

His thorough thoughts from depths of mind, And they are not in proper place

Until the depths of our’s they find. The wisest reader may perceive, In writings that shall ever live, A reflex of his own wise thoughts

That to the world he did not give; But to the mind of him who learns, They are as seeds of knowledge brought That soon take root and rarefy Into a whole great field of thought.

ava has seen a ghost

A SHORT STORY BY HOLLY THORPE

Ava has seen a ghost. Ask anyone who’s ever met her. They might not remember her, but they’ll remember her ghost. At dinner parties, she has a talent for slipping into the natural pauses between idle chatter and dropping her classic line:

“Did I tell you about the time I saw a ghost?”

To her credit, it’s a great line. Without fail, the folks around her will raise their eyebrows, chuckle, shoot each other amused looks. Often, a few people will offer up their own ghost stories or the ghost stories they’ve been handed down by family and friends. Based on the informal research I’ve done at bars, birthday parties and family reunions, it seems like a majority of people have been visited by a specter or spirit. The stories run the gamut: creepy Victorian children, tall black figures, glowing eyes, cold spots, disembodied voices, women in white, and, of course, the late family members checking in.

Ava’s story doesn’t fit neatly into any of those boxes. Ava says she had never met her ghost before – alive or dead. And she says her ghost was not ominous, or even subtle. One day, Ava says, a ghost walked in through her front door (yes, through) and sat down at her dining room table. She watched the whole thing.

“I saw him sitting there, and I just stared at first. He glanced at me, and he seemed uncomfortable. I honestly felt rude.”

This always solicits a laugh. And Ava is smiling when she says it, but she’s serious. Although she was a college student at the time – broke and using a card table and folding chairs for her dining room table – she was raised to be courteous. So, when a ghost walked into her apartment and sat down, she did what her mother would have expected, and said, “Hello.”

The ghost blinked at her and then nodded his head in greeting.

“It was like he didn’t know why I was talking to him,” Ava says. “As though I’d walked up to him in a park and introduced myself out of the blue.”

She said the ghost appeared to be a man in his 60s or 70s. He was dressed in working clothes – heavy boots, thick pants and a buttoned-up flannel shirt. They were worn, but clean. They’d been patched in places. The man had a brimmed hat and a sizable gray beard.

“He looked like he belonged in some old Western movie. He was handsome in an old-timey kind of way.”

The ghost went back to staring straight ahead. She said the silence felt polite. The way someone on the bus will say “good morning” and then look away to end the conversation. Ava continued to stare, and she saw she was making the man uncomfortable. Embarrassed, she offered him a cup of coffee.

“Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Taken aback, the man blinked at her again, and said, “No, thank you, miss. I’ll be going soon.”

About now, someone interrupts the story.

“You mean he talked back to you?”

“In plain English,” Ava would say.

Most people have never heard a ghost story where the ghost responds out loud. At this point, her audience splits down the middle. Half the group sip their drinks and grin at each other. Some of those who have heard the story already and didn’t

believe it then either will roll their eyes a little, as though saying “let’s indulge her.” The other half are holding very still, drinks half raised. They are listening closely.

“So, I asked him where he was going,” she’d say. “And he said he was going back home.”

“Oh. Are you just taking a break here, then?” Ava asked the ghost.

For the first time, the ghost turned to face her. She saw then that he was not as old as he appeared – but he was well-worn. Even pallid as he was — she said it was like he was painted into the air like watercolor – she saw his eyes were sharp and blue. He examined her more closely now. She saw him look her up and down, and his brow furrowed. She felt as though she had asked a very stupid question. Even then, his voice was kind.

“I’m waiting for the train, miss,” he said. “If you don’t mind my asking, where is it you are from?”

“I’m from here,” Ava said. “Washington.”

His brow furrowed again and examined her once more. “You must be from a different part of Washington. I have family here out West, but they don’t dress like you.”

Ava looked down. She was in faux fur slippers, sweatpants and a tank top with a cat wearing sunglasses on it.

“Well, I just woke up,” she said, a little indignantly.

“I meant no offense by it, miss,” he said, then, seeming to want to change the subject, “Are you also waiting for the train?”

Ava looked around her apartment, as though a train station might have appeared while they were chatting. She turned back to the ghost.

“The train doesn’t usually come through here,” she said.

He frowned and looked around the room for the first time. It was a studio apartment, littered with stained coffee cups, crumbled papers and the occasional takeout box. Fairy lights were strung across the windows and a half-dead houseplant sat in the center of the table the ghost was sitting at.

“Wait,” someone would always interrupt. “You mean he somehow didn’t realize he was sitting in a college dorm room?”

Usually, this person was a skeptic jumping to poke a hole in Ava’s story. But Ava plunges ahead.

“Not a dorm, an apartment. And no, he didn’t seem to realize at all,” she says. “He seemed disappointed actually.”

The ghost scanned the kitchen and his frown deepened. For the first time, he seemed to notice that he was sitting in a second story studio apartment. He was silent for what felt like a long time. And then he turned to Ava, nodded and began to stand up.

“Seems you’re right. I must be in the wrong place,” he said. “I’m sorry to bother you, miss.”

“It’s okay – I mean, you haven’t been bothering me. I don’t have class until later, and I could actually miss it if I needed to,” Ava stumbled. As the man straightened his shirt, she took a breath and tried again. “You can wait here a little longer, if you want.”

He glanced at her and paused.

“I’ve got a train to catch,” he said.

“How long have you been waiting?” Ava asked.

“I can’t say. My watch stopped without my noticing before I arrived. If I had to guess I’d say a couple hours,” he said. Then he sighed. “I’ve probably missed it for the day sittin’ around here. I’ve caught the train home dozens of times. Not sure how I got mixed up this time…”

“What’s your name?” Ava asked as he trailed off. “Jeremiah.”

“Jeremiah, I hope this isn’t an inappropriate question, but, are you a ghost?”

He paused, staring straight into her eyes. He cocked his head cocked slightly to the left and then he smiled for the first time since he’d arrived. And then let out a low, soft chuckle.

“Miss, I am not sure what you mean by that,” he said, still smiling. “It’s an awfully strange question.”

One time, when it was just Ava and I, she asked me what I would have done at that moment.

“Would you have told him the truth? That he was dead?”

It wasn’t a question I’d considered before. It seemed strange to me that someone might not realize they’re dead. I said as much.

Ava frowned, and said “I suppose it’s different for everyone.”

“But to answer your question,” I went on, “I do think I’d tell him. I think you did the right thing.”

I was trying to be comforting. Ava had been plagued by the visit after it happened. I didn’t hear about it until later, after she’d already thoroughly considered all the “should’ves” and the self doubt had taken hold.

“Did you ever wonder if it was just your imagination?”

“What? Jeremiah?”

“Yeah. Did you ever wonder if he was real?”

“Oh,” Ava said. “Never. I knew from the moment he walked in he was real.”

She paused, then added, “It felt like another living, breathing person was in the room with me. It was clear he wasn’t alive like I was, but I was sure he was real.”

Since then, I’ve heard the story dozens of times. I liked to watch her tell it. Once she got to this part, people were usually stumped. They liked to hypothesize about what they would do if they were in her shoes. Many said they’d tell Jeremiah he was dead. But when pressed on how they’d deliver the news they stumbled. How do you explain that death is just a film negative of life? Some said they couldn’t bear to do it. They were afraid he’d be devastated. Or that he’d become upset and lash out.

Eventually, someone would grow impatient and butt in: “Well? What did you tell him?”

Ava says she paused for a moment, unsure whether she should return his smile and laugh it off as a joke. But she couldn’t do it.

“Jeremiah, I watched you walk through my door,” Ava said. “Like, through it. And you’re not very...solid.”

Jeremiah looked taken aback. And slightly angry. Ava pointed to his hands, urging him to look. He held one hand in front of his face and examined it. Then he turned and peered at Ava through his palm. His eyes widened.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know you didn’t know…” Ava began. But Jeremiah wasn’t listening. He was peering through his other hand now. Suddenly, he stood, walked up to the closed front door, paused, and then stepped through it.

Ava moved to say something, or stop him, but she was frozen watching him vanish as quickly as he’d arrived. No one is going to believe me, Ava thought. And then Jeremiah reappeared. This time through the wall. He was still wide eyed.

“I think you might be right, miss.”

“I’m sorry, Jeremiah. I thought you knew.”

“I reckon it’s not your fault… I don’t know when it happened, though.”

“You don’t have any memory of...well, you know…”

“Dying? No. I can’t say I do. I wonder how long it’s been. Say, what year is it?”

“2018, almost 2019,” Ava said.

Jeremiah looked at her again like he couldn’t tell if she was joking. And then shook his head in disbelief.

“Can’t be. I haven’t been gone that long,” he said. “If it’s been that long then my wife and kids, well, they’d be dead, too.”

As he said it he realized it might be true. He sat down at her table once more staring at the floor.

“I’m sorry,” Ava said again.

“I always thought I’d go to heaven, Lord willing. Maybe that’s where my family is,” Jeremiah said.

Ava isn’t a religious type. When prompted she usually calls herself agnostic. But she nodded then.

“How many kids did you have?” Ava ventured. She was trying desperately to say the right thing. She could hear Jeremiah’s voice trembling. He was sad, sure, but he also sounded afraid.

“Three. One baby girl, and two boys. Twins,” he said. “God bless Mary for raising them without me.”

Those who are still listening at this point start wondering — sometimes out loud — if you could find a record of the family. They ask about last names. Ages. Birth records. But Ava wasn’t thinking about any of that at the time.

“You know, I had a twin, too,” she said.

Jeremiah looked up at her, and she could see he felt sympathy for her.

“I wasn’t the first of my siblings to go,” he said. “I know what it’s like to lose them. I’m awfully sorry, miss.”

“It’s okay,” she said automatically.

It’s what she always said to well wishers. But it wasn’t okay. Her brother had died only a few months prior, right before she moved back to Seattle for school. Her parents were devastated, of course, but Ava felt as though a part of her had died with him. He would have moved back to Montana for school that fall as well. They’d always been extremely close, and that summer before the accident was

spent making up for the lost time they’d spent apart at school. They played Scrabble, took the family dog on nightly walks, hiked on the weekends. Their parents were happy to have them home. The time apart had made everyone a little kinder.

But a drunk driver plowed through a red light one evening while Alex was on his way home from the store. The last thing he saw as he slammed on the brakes were the headlights from the other car coming through the drivers side window. He heard and smelled the tires screeching, but it all suddenly cut out. He’d died on impact.

She told this all to her therapist back home. It would be a while later before she told me what happened.

“I miss him,” Ava said simply. “I bet your family missed you, too.”

Jeremiah nodded, then shook his head, then stared at his boots. They were silent for a minute or so. Both wondering how they ended up there.

“Do you have any ideas on how to get back to your family?” Ava asked finally.

Jeremiah sighed and she knew that he was as lost as she was. Then, before he could answer, she added: “Maybe you still need to catch that train.”

They looked at each other. It was an absurd idea. Ava knew this and Jeremiah suspected it. But it felt like a good idea. It felt right somehow.

Ava gave him directions to the bus station, and told him a bus could take him to the train station. There, someone could probably help him catch the train back home.

“Are ghosts allowed on trains?” Jeremiah asked. His sincerity made Ava laugh. She shrugged.

“They’re not not allowed on trains.”

Jeremiah stood and thanked her.

“You’ve been a kind host, miss.”

“I’ve enjoyed meeting you,” she said. It felt strangely formal and intimate at the same time. “Maybe we’ll see each other again.”

They smiled at one another, but they both seemed to know that this was likely their first and last time meeting.

Jeremiah thanked her again, then turned and walked through her front door. Everyone hates this ending.

“He just leaves?! That’s it??”

Ava can only shrug.

“No explanation of how he died or how he got to your apartment? No happy ending where he reunites with his family?”

Ava shrugs again, “I am telling you what actually happened.”

Some leave satisfied with the story. They mostly think it’s a fun party story with a bad ending. Some take the anticlimactic conclusion personally and pout over it or propose endings they’d have liked to have happened.

Ava never saw Jeremiah again. We speculate sometimes about what happened to him. We both like to believe he found his family again. And we like to imagine his train ride through the 21st century. He must have marveled at some of the buildings and highways.

Jeremiah was the first ghost Ava ever saw. I like to watch her tell the story to people for the first time. You can learn a lot about a person by the way they listen to a good ghost story.

I’ve asked her before why she only tells the story about Jeremiah and not the other ghosts she’s seen since. She laughs at me.

“Alex, if I told people I was having conversations with my dead brother, they’d think I was losing my mind.”

We both laugh. C

cbaa

A.J. Croce performs Croce Plays Croce: a special

of music featuring a complete set of classics by his late father Jim Croce, his own tunes, and songs that influenced them both.

it’s not me...it’s you

BY LONI MCKENZIE

Attention has become quite the hot commodity. Capitalism still wants my hard-earned dollars, but more and more companies are vying for me to pay them with my attention. I know it, you know it. Algorithms and AI curate our social media, search engines, and let me know that those glass snap lock containers I looked at last year are 15% OFF!! FOR A LIMITED TIME!!

It’s fine. There are plenty of things I don’t agree with, like using human attention spans as a tool for wealth building, but here we are. I’ve long had the daydream of living totally off grid and away from the capitalist, extractive mindset that dominates corporate and political America…

but in practice, it’s very hard to do. Instead, I’m exploring where I want to put my attention. It’s mine to spend however I please and knowing how valuable it is has made it more precious to me. The time, energy and emotional suck of social media pushed me over the edge. I’m too sensitive to find out that a favorite cousin is actually an intolerant jerk. I don’t engage, but I get all worked up and find that my attention is still being eaten up when I’m not even ON social media, as I compose clever retorts hours later, lying in bed.

I cut the social media cord. That freed up an embarrassing amount of my attention.

Life was just so quiet without everyone yelling online. I found myself rattling around the house, not sure what to do with myself. Picking my phone up and

dejectedly setting it back down when I remembered I’d deleted all the apps. I’m old enough to remember a pre-internet childhood, with parents whose answer was “if you’re bored, I’ll give you something to do”. So, with mom’s voice in my head, I deep cleaned the bathroom. Got ALL my laundry washed, folded and put away. Still bored. I took a blanket outside and spent a good long while cloud watching. Then tree watching. I’d forgotten that maple trees sway in the wind but poplars, with their sideways leaves, rattle. Then I sat very still with a honeysuckle blossom, to see if the hummingbird would come drink from it. No. But I did learn a lot about hummingbirds.

I got bored enough to start to remember who I am. I’m someone who watches

clouds. It took weeks for the chatter to calm down and the cravings to stop. Over the years I’ve done several ‘social media breaks’, but I finally just had to break up with them.

It’s not me, it’s you.

My attention is too valuable to give away to the highest bidder. I’m no longer for sale.

Ok, I’m a little bit for sale. 6 months later, I’m enjoying a solid breakup with FB, but I find myself occasionally flirting with IG. Mostly late at night when I’m lonely. It happens. Nobody’s perfect. C

Wish You Were Here

Ellensburg painter, Samantha Birks Fisher brings her new collection of works to Collapse Gallery in Wenatchee this Friday. The show, titled “Wish You Were Here” features a dozen large scale oil and acrylic paintings in a unique collage-eqsue composition style. There will also be some art prints available for the show which will be on display through November. Here’s what the artist has to say about this exhibit:

“Nostalgia is, in essence, a bittersweet yearning for the past. Restorative nostalgia looks back longingly on the past, sometimes in unhealthy ways, (think “Make America Great Again”) wanting to relive and revive the past, whereas reflective nostalgia knows the past cannot be relived but savors the memories. Reflective nostalgia can appreciate the aesthetic and sentiment of the past but knows that it is not the same for

everyone and what they experienced. It looks to the future by studying the past. While my work is not a longing for times gone by, it is looking to the past for clues to our current climate. How did the American Experience get here and what can we do to change the trajectory? The things that have happened to an individual or a community shape their lives and each person’s memory of the things that have happened can be both similar and wildly different depending on their age, privilege, gender, or race. Memories have a way of changing depending on the lens being used to view them. Nostalgia was once considered a mental disorder. It was demonized for taking soldiers out of the present battle, in their intense longing for their country and their homes. In this sense, it can be viewed as a coping mechanism to treat trauma in an individual or a community. There is a reason when you are anxious or not feeling great that you fall back on

your favorite Netflix show or old movie; it is a salve to an anxious heart.

My paintings rely on nostalgia, a collage sensibility, and a pure appreciation of marks and brushstrokes on surfaces. The familiar images of our collective memories of pop culture America serve as hieroglyphs in an evolving language. The paintings start off extremely intuitive and slowly take shape as the layers are built up like an old wall that has been graffitied, painted over, scrawled on, stained, stickered and painted over again. The history of the painting is laid bare on the canvas, as well as the historical context of the images create a language that is both personal to me and hopefully relevant to the viewer as well.”

Opening Reception: Friday Nov. 5 at 4pm at Collapse Gallery - 115 S. Wenatchee Ave.

Samantha Birks Fisher

WHAT ART IS: FIGHT THE BEIGE GOES TO THE LIBRARY

BY RON EVANS

Local muralist duo Heather Dappen and Ellen Smith, aka Fight

The Beige, have struck again with their colorful magic paintbrushes. This time tackling a large exterior wall on the Wenatchee Public Library building at 310 Douglas St. in Wenatchee. I reached out to these busy artists about this project and the process of large scale composition.

Talk about how this mural came to be and share some of the early logistical phases of plotting out something this large.

Way back in Fall of 2019, we went on a walkabout looking for big blank walls. The library wall called to us in all of its glorious, boring beigeness. The higherups at the library were stoked on the idea of sprucing up the space and we started discussions pretty quickly. The library reached out to their private donors and raised the funds for the project. We were slated to start painting in the Spring of 2020, but as with most things, COVID put a slowdown to that plan. Fast forward to spring 2021, we got the green light again and started the design process.

The logistics of a public project this large was a lengthy process. We met with the team at the library for four rounds of design edits over the course of about four months before landing on the final design and we had numerous planning meetings before the design process started. We sketched nearly a hundred different possibilities and from there we presented about 25% of them as more refined directions.

What were some of the thoughts concerning this particular design?

When working in creative endeavors, it’s actually nice to be given parameters because otherwise, the possibilities are boundless. The wall at the library offered some particular constraints that gave us a fairly clear direction. NCW Libraries had recently rebranded, so the first requisite was to match the mural to their brand colors (see the color swatches already painted along the east side of the building). The second requisite was form. The building itself already had an interesting architectural element of these large swoops both inside and outside. We wanted to continue the motif of this wave form through the design. The third requisite was subject. Our clients wanted something more on the

non-representational side, but shapes that still evoked feelings of our area’s natural landscape. And finally, we had to think about our primary audience. We figured that adults are established in their patterns of whether they visit the library or not, but children still may need to be incentivized. Thus, our clients wanted the design to be playful, bright, and whimsical to target a young audience.

The library posted a few options for the public to vote on. Talk about that public input experience, for better or worse. Ha! Yes, they did post a few options. Because the library is such a public-oriented building with free access for all, it made sense to invite the public to have a say in what they wanted. By the end of the voting period, we had over 2,000 votes cast, which was really exciting. But in the meantime, lots of people took “voting” to mean “give feedback.” The comment sections were going wild with mixed, and passionate, and interesting reactions! There were so many people excited to cast their vote, be part of the process, and celebrate more art and color in public spaces. On the other hand, there were just as many who were apparently outraged by the design,

or falsely assumed their tax dollars were paying for the mural or thought we were trying to urbanize Wenatchee too much, etc. It was really quite invigorating for us to have public “haters” for the first time in our muraling career. The whole process of opening it up to the public showed us how many people have a narrow view of what art is or can be. It made us want to talk more with anyone and everyone about art appreciation and how meaning can be communicated and interpreted without literal representation.

What’s up next for you two?

We have an indoor mural coming up at Pinnacles Prep and are in talks with a building owner downtown. We’re currently booking indoor murals for the winter and outdoor murals for spring and fall, 2022.

When we last spoke you both had your dream walls you’d love to gain access to. Heather’s was on the lower East end of 5th Ave near Apple Valley Petroleum and Ellen’s was on the Lineage building on Orondo and Columbia. Any progress being made toward either of those? Or any other dream walls you are eyeing? We don’t have a specific wall in mind at the

Fresh paint at Wenatchee Public Library.

moment, but it’s more about content. The three large murals we’ve done thus far have ended up being similar in style and color, but that’s just been totally random that the clients wanted similar things. Now, we’re hoping to utilize different color palettes and try a design that’s either more narrative or representational.

H: The dream wall near Apple Valley Petroleum now has a vinyl mural on the wall perpendicular to it, so trying to paint something that goes with what’s already there would be quite a challenge. Although the location is still very enticing, I think that a design on the adjacent wall now would feel pretty busy.

E: The Lineage building is still a cool idea but at this time I’m more interested in smaller walls that can be planned and executed with a quicker turnaround than what we’ve done recently.

Follow the advetures of Fight The Beige @fightthebeige on Instagram. C

HEATHER

ARTIST STATS:

FAVORITE ARTIST: Franz Marc or Peter Doig

FAVORITE WRITER/BOOK: Milan Kundera or Isabel Allende

FAVORITE BAND: Fela Kuti or Goat Rodeo

FAVORITE MOVIE: Jennifer’s Body or What About Bob?

DREAM COLLABORATION: Working with Ellen Smith LITERALLY is a dream collab

ITEM YOU CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT: Duct Tape

FAVORITE DESTINATION: The Cloakroom

FAVORITE QUOTE: “Find out what makes you kinder, what opens you up and brings you out the most loving, generous, and unafraid version of you, and go after those things as if nothing else matters.” – George Saunders

ELLEN

FAVORITE ARTIST: Impossible to answer! But I do really dig Helen Frankenthaler

FAVORITE WRITER/BOOK: Another impossible one to answer! The most recent book I rated 5 stars was The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

FAVORITE BAND: All-time favorite: The Avett Brothers; currently on repeat: Marina

FAVORITE MOVIE: The Jungle Book (1967 - not the live action) or The Count of Monte Cristo

DREAM COLLABORATION: Me + Heather Dappen. I don’t think it can get any better! We work really well together

ITEM YOU CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT: My glasses

FAVORITE DESTINATION: Lake Michigan

FAVORITE QUOTE: “And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.” - Kurt Vonnegut

Beige doesn’t stand a chance. Color warriors Ellen Smith and Heather Dappen on location.

the stained glass work of faith merz

By Ron Evans

Ifirst met Faith Merz at an open mic night at RadarStation a few years back and it was immediately clear that she was a passionate and highly-creative kook. Our kind of people. It was quite a bit later on that I found out Merz was also a prolific artist in many visual mediums — most recently I discovered her stained glass creations. I was impressed with the work and curious about the process, so I reached out to her for a chat about that, and her history concerning making all sorts of shit.

Tell us about your history concerning making all sorts of shit. Answering questions about yourself is always an interesting endeavor, especially when it comes to art. I’ve been making shit ever since I can remember to be quite honest. When I was a kid I would write and illustrate my own makeshift picture books. I’d paint or doodle anything I could get my hands on; filmmaking, writing, spoken word and competitive improv were outlets that took up most of my time.

Are you from this area?

I grew up in Southern California and moved to Wenatchee in the summer of 2018. I’ve been local to the area for almost 3 years now, give or take

What is this kind of glass work called? And how did you get into it?

The medium that I’ve been obsessed with for a while now is known as stained glass. Coupled into the same category as knitting and crocheting, the artform was pretty much seen as an older generation’s hobby. But, there’s been quite a resurgence in these older artforms where the techniques have been used to create more modern and stylized results. I think stained glass found me more than I found it because I really don’t recall a moment that I said “this is it!” 2020, like for most people, was a really turbulent and difficult year. I moved back to the valley in a very funky headspace and needed something to fixate and obsess over. Stained glass was something I had virtually no experience in and the challenge to teach myself seemed like a perfect outlet.

Walk us through the process from start to finish. Is there a template you draw out ahead of time?

Each piece I make starts out with a design that I draw from hand, photocopy, then trace onto glass using a lightbox. I then cut the glass and grind the pieces down using a glass grinder, making sure that each piece fits the design (stained glass is a really exact artform). The glass pieces are then washed, the edges are lined with a copper tape foil, and a chemical called flux is applied to the pieces. I then use 60/40 Lead Tin solder that I heat up using a soldering iron. The solder then becomes molten, allowing me to manipulate it to where I want it to go. Once cooled it adheres each glass piece together. I then line each piece with a lead hobby came to ensure the structural integrity of the piece. Each piece is then washed again, scrubbed with steel wool, varnished, and buffed for the most optimal outcome. The whole process is very time intensive and requires a lot of patience.

Judging from your social media posts it seems you have a bit of a focus on elements of nature for the most part. Talk about your inspirations when crafting a new piece.

Nature definitely inspires me when I’m designing. Natural shapes or images when they interact with light are always beautiful in my mind. I’m also incredibly inspired by 1970’s textiles and color waves as well as 1960’s psychedelic patterns. I use a lot of old vintage textile and wallpaper references to help in picking out my color choices. I keep a myriad of vintage art books that I’ve thrifted over the years to help whenever I need more inspiration.

Are you selling your work in any shops, fairs or galleries? If not, do you have anything like that planned?

Currently I am not, although I am in the process of creating an inventory for The Plant Ally in Leavenworth to display soon! The holidays are coming and I would love to establish a presence in local shops around town to create more of an interactive feel.

You also have a passion, and a great talent, for writing. Your work has been featured in The Comet several times -

do you publish any of your writings elsewhere?

Why thank you! Writing has always been something that has come very easily to me. There is a certain vulnerability in sharing poetry and written word that is hard to find elsewhere. I’ve been performing spoken word for almost 10 years now and am consistently drawn to the community that it provides. Having someone come up to you to tell you how your poem touched them is a feeling that is really hard to describe. There have been times in my life that feelings I cannot convey or fully understand verbally come out whilst writing and that is pretty rad. I have poetry published in the local Whispers of Wenatchee anthology and have been featured in a collection of poems from Philosopher’s Stone Poetry based out of Mar Vista, California. I would like to one day publish my own collection of poems, my gut tells me it will happen when the time is right.

Aside from the glass work (and your writing) are there any other creative mediums you currently dabble in?

Aside from glass and poetry, I am an avid painter and love to create large abstract paintings through mixed mediums of acrylic and oil pastels. I love painting with found objects like credit cards, squeegees and used bits of metal. I also dabble in making indoor fixtures that mimic nature, whether it be preserving wood or creating things out of clay.

Where can people follow you online? Any online shops to link to?

You can follow my stained glass on Instagram at Lady.LuckStudio, as well as on Etsy at LadyLuckCoStudio.

ARTIST STATS

Favorite artist: Hilma Af Klint & Moebius

Favorite Author/Book: Charles Bukowski/ Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Favorite Band: A close tie between Hiatus Kaiyote, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard and Aldous Harding.

Favorite Movie: There Will Be Blood Dream Collaboration: None that I can think of, but if I could resurrect the dead I would love to pick at Willem De Kooning’s brain!

Favorite Destination: I currently have an obsession with Montana, so let’s go with that.

Favorite Quote: “If your nerve, deny you - go above your nerve.” - Emily Dickinson

THE LOST LIBRARIES: and the mysterious musaeum clausum

By Claire Preston

NOTE: This article was written in Europe so different spellings and grammar rules apply. Probably.

-The Comet

In the latter half of the 17th century the English polymath Thomas Browne wrote Musaeum Clausum, an imagined inventory of ‘remarkable books, antiquities, pictures and rarities of several kinds, scarce or never seen by any man now living’. Claire Preston explores Browne’s extraordinary catalogue amid the wider context of a Renaissance preoccupation with lost intellectual treasures.

In an age of data retrieval, when just about anything ever printed can be seen online and is eternally preserved there, and when modern anxiety is fuelled by too much information, we would do well to remember that the loss of books

and artefacts was catastrophic until very recently in human history. The great library of the Ptolemies at Alexandria was burnt by the Romans in the first century AD, a legendary collection of ancient wisdom whose loss haunted Renaissance scholarship. European savants of the 15th and 16th centuries were, in the midst of their astonishing revival of classical writing, all too aware of what was irrecoverable and even unknown to them.

Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682) was such a scholar. His vast expertise in areas as diverse as embryology, anatomy, ornithology, ancient history and literature, etymology, local archaeology, and pharmacy, and his participation in the Baconian programme to rescue learning from the misapprehensions and erasures that had accumulated since the fall of man, made him especially sensitive to such losses. Musaeum Clausum, a small tract both playful

and melancholy, seems to coalesce earlymodern feelings about the unavailability of precious intellectual treasure.

Musaeum Clausum (the hidden library) is a fake catalogue of a collection that contained books, pictures, and artefacts. Such collections (and their elaborate indices) were a common phenomenon from about 1500 to 1700 and after. Gentlemen and the nobility collected as a matter of polite engagement with knowledge and as a way of displaying wealth and learning; savants made arrays of plants, animals, and minerals as museums or ‘thesauruses’ of the natural world to record and organise their findings; imperial and monarchical collections were princely in their glamour, rarity, and sheer expenditure: these might contain natural-historical specimens but also trinkets and souvenirs from far-flung places, curiosities of nature and art, and historically significant items.

For example, taxidermically preserved basilisks shared room with a thorn from Christ’s crown and feathered headdresses and weapons belonging to native American tribes. Browne takes these traditions of assemblage and makes a catalogue of marvellous things that have disappeared.

The catalogue of Browne’s lost museum speaks of fragmentation, scattering, and loss, but also of eccentricity and comedy. Among its documents are letters and works by Aristotle, Ovid, and Cicero, and an account of Hannibal’s expedition through Alps ‘far more particular than that of Livy’ that purports to tell what sort of vinegar he used to split the stones in his way. Perhaps the most significant item among these is Seneca’s epistles to St Paul, a correspondence which, if it existed, would answer the yearning of Christian Stoics. The pictures in this collection either display tremendous technical skill

Thomas Browne as depicted in the frontispiece to his posthumously published Certain Miscellany Tracts (1684)

or depict remarkable events. One picture is a ‘large submarine piece’ showing the bottom of the Mediterranean and the seagrass growing there; another describes a moonlight battle between the Florentines and the Turks; others are snow or ice ‘pieces’ that show a remarkable and alien landscape populated by exotic arctic animals; still others show the great fire of Constantinople, the siege of Vienna, the sack of Fundi, and the Treaty of Cologne, as well as portraits, caricatures, and even the dogs of Sultan Achmet. The curiosities are probably the most peculiar and random group in the collection, everything from an ostrich’s egg engraved with a scene from the battle of Alcazar, to a moist stone that cures fevers, to a ring found in the belly of a fish (reputed to be the ring of the Doge of Venice with which he annually weds the sea), the mummified body of one Father Crispin of Toulouse, and ‘Batrachomyomachia, or the Homerican battle between frogs and mice, neatly described upon the

chizel bone of a large pike’s jaw’.

Browne’s is one of many examples of this form, the fake catalogue. Donne wrote one; Rabelais included one in Gargantua and Pantagruel. More typically such works were outright spoofs of learned curiosity, send-ups of random assemblages that John Evelyn judged to be no more than ‘indigested chaos’. But Browne, although he recognises the absurdity of some of his own items and is obviously trying for comic effect with certain ones, is probably more interested in a philosophy of antiquities, of the past and of existing knowledge as resurrected and preserved from the ravages of time and forgetfulness. Browne’s aim, like that of the early-modern Baconians, was reparation and restoration of truth, and Musaeum Clausum reads like a wistful evocation of what might have existed in a legendary collection like the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. Perhaps the most powerful rendition of that wistfulness is

not in specific works or memorials of the great, but rather in the pitiful remains of Father Crispin, ‘buried long ago in the vaults of the Cordeliers at Toulouse, where the skins of the dead so dry and parch up without corruption that their persons may be known very long after, with this inscription, Ecce iterum Crispinus [behold Crispin again]’. The otherwise anonymous Father Crispin, an unremarkable monk whose name is his only chronicle, is immortalised by the strange atmosphere of the vault rather than for any accomplishment or quality; his survival as a physiognomy that can be ‘known very long after’ is merely a scientific phenomenon, not an intended memorial to an individual. The imperious inscription pathetically asks us with its commanding injunction to behold anew that which was never remarkable or memorable in the first place. Browne’s favourite theme, here and elsewhere, is the randomness of recollection, and Father Crispin, a random survival of the past, is

preserved only to be lost again with the collection that contains him.

Twenty years earlier Browne had written the astonishing Urne-Buriall, a discussion of mortuary customs. There he asked why it should be that we have record of the epitaph of Hadrian’s horse but not of Hadrian himself, or whether the best men are even remembered ‘or whether there be not more remarkable persons forgot than any that stand remembered in the known account of time?’ That abiding sense of so much forgotten, so little still recalled, animated Browne and other early-modern savants who were conducting a salvage operation for intellectual recovery.

This article was originally published in The Public Domain Review under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0. If you wish to reuse it please see:

https://publicdomainreview.org/legal/ C

Engraving from the Dell’Historia Naturale (1599) showing Naples apothecary Ferrante Imperato’s cabinet of curiosities, the first pictorial representation of such a collection.

Cabinet of Curiosities (ca.1695) by Domenico Remps, held in the Opificio delle Pietre Dure, Florence

Missionary’s Position

bright, clean cutting sound. The more they played together, the grittier Jake got, now the two guitars dance off each other, able to come through in similar space.

“Man that guy can work a Wah pedal,” comments someone in the crowd. Jeremy’s singing a song he wrote while stationed in Iraq and being alone away from his wife. As he sings about love and loneliness in comes Jake, Wah half cocked, the fuzzy tone a little distant. A sound that squeezes the heart and feels like every time a loves been lost, looking at a last picture and the hurt that goes along with it.

By Lance Reese

It’s dark outside when Cashmere’s best kept secret, Devil’s Gulch and the Missionaries, takes the stage. They rarely play outside the Wenatchee Valley area, but tonight, a cold October evening, they travel to play their first live set in Yakima. Fog rolls across the stage, the band silhouetted against green light that saturates the haze behind them.

“This is a song about fighting,” declares singer Jessica Tritt – “Fighting when you’re married.” The explanation seems fitting as her husband Jeremy kicks off vocals on the song, and everyone knows a fight is about to begin as the gritty guitar kicks in to tell the real story. While Jeremy and Jessica trade verses pleading their case, their beautiful harmonies tell us they’re in this journey together and they’re going to make it through. No, to be sure it’s the guitar of Jake Simms that tells the true battle of this story.

Jeremy calls out “You stand there –passing down your judgment” and Jake’s guitar retorts in quick anger, sometimes growling in-between the lyrics, sometimes arguing alongside them.

As the fight continues, Jake and his guitar become the argument. He grabs every gritty note, bending, twisting –squeezing the strings under his fingers. The argument gets louder, the distorted

discord tells there’s finger pointing, spit and tears fly back and forth, a stack of dishes crashes against the floor.

Jake’s face is tense, eyes closed as his hand throttles the neck of the guitar, shaking and persuading each anguished note down from the ledge.

It’s a special contrast Jake provides to Devil’s Gulch and the Missionaries. Made up of husband-and-wife couples Jeremy (vocals/rhythm guitar) and Jessica (vocals) and Bre and Pete Hinkle locking the beat down on drums and bass. Bre sings as well. The only one who doesn’t take a turn on the mic is Pete. Everyone else takes turns trading lead and back up – all their voices are in different places in the mix creating great harmonies.

Listening to Jake’s guitar, it’s hard to believe he was new to playing lead when he joined the band a few years ago. It’s worth the journey to listen to how his playing has evolved from older recordings. It’s said that there’s two ways to learn the guitar; practice for ten thousand hours (suck!) or take the Robert Johnson approach and meet the devil at the crossroads at midnight. For Jake, he met the Devil in Cashmere.

Listening back, his early leads were hesitant and notey. The more he played with the band he sculpted his sound and style. He used to play his guitar clean, only starting to add grit and distortion to help separate his tone from Jeremy’s

By now it’s late and the crowd’s way past inebriated and Devil’s Gulch is into the meat of their extensive set, saving their raunchous party anthems for precisely this moment. Not that there’s a dull moment in their music. Devil’s Gulch writes great original songs and carefully curates eclectic covers they enjoy performing. While traditionally Jeremy has handled much of the song writing responsibility, Jake has been writing his own music since he was a teenager, mostly as a solo acoustic arrangement. Bringing these songs to the creative powerhouse that is Devil’s Gulch has turned them into classics. It’s physically impossible not to get up and shout and dance during “Stagger, Stagger, Crawl” or the sleazy roadhouse ballad “More, More, More”

With all this momentum it’s shocking to learn at the end of the year Jake will be leaving Devil’s Gulch and the Missionaries. This isn’t a falling out, it’s been in the works for most of the year, really it boils down to scheduling and lifestyle. The core four members of Devil’s Gulch have family and 9-5 jobs which impacts when and how often they can play. Jake has his sights set on being a full time musician, and although Devil’s Gulch has played over 20 shows this year it’s nowhere close to the 200 plus times Jake plans to play moving forward. He explains, “It’s not fair to them for me to split my time between multiple projects. It would only dilute the quality and create conflicts in booking shows.”

The rest of the band understands and although they’re sad to lose him they’re

excited for what comes next to the band. “We’ve always been set up to have people join and leave,” explains Jeremy. “Devil’s Gulch is Me, Jessica, Bre and Pete. The Missionaries are the musicians we bring in to be part of and play with us. Everyone we bring in adds a different element and can influence how we play our songs, so bringing in someone new is always exciting.”

Because the band communicates so well, once Jake started looking at the potential of leaving they started coming up with ideas on how to fill his place. When the final decision to leave was made they already had a fresh face lined up. Jake approves. “I feel good with who they’ve picked. He’s more charismatic than me, people will love him. And I feel good knowing my spot on stage will be well taken care of.”

Devil’s Gulch and the Missionaries brings it every time they take the stage, so it will be exciting to see what they put together for next spring, they always take the winter off. As for Jake, well the band says it best when they hand him a solo –“Do it one more time Jake.” C

Jake Simms - one more for the road.

Devil’s Gulch and the Missionaries on stage at Bearded Monkey in Yakima. Photos by Cheryl Reese

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 6 AT 5 PM Wenatchee Wine & Food Festival 2021

Town Toyota Center

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2021 AT 6:30 PM – 9:30 PM O&W LIVE!!!

@ Badger Mountain Brewing

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2021 AT 8 PM – 10:30 PM

Laugh Riot 2021 Featuring comedians TY Barnett and Auggie Smith.

Wenatchee Convention Center - TIX: From $24 - See Facebook Event for ticket

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2021 AT 12 PM – 10 PM Krampuslauf Leavenworth

2021 Leavenworth Front street park in Leavenworth

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2021 AT 7 PM Holiday Dreams-A Spectacular

Cirque Show

TIX: towntoyotacenter.com

Wanna plug your kickass event? Send it our way at thecometmagazine@gmail.com

Greetings!

Welcome to the first version of the Arts Alliance column. Efforts to build a supportive arts network in NCW began to gain traction over the summer, and has since grown into a real, live, non profit organization. The Arts Alliance is certainly a WORK IN PROGRESS, including the name and branding, so please bear with us during this ugly duckling stage while the newsletter is purely utilitarian.

Under the guidance of consultant Andy Fife, whose services are made possible to us as a result of a NCW Community Foundation grant (thank you!) the steering committee for the Arts Alliance has begun to form an organization.

Much work has been done behind-thescenes. So far, the steering committee for the Arts Alliance has: 1)sent out a community-wide survey and 2) conducted three focus groups in October with the intention of listening even more deeply to the community about how you envision the Arts in our area and what might support that vision. Feedback has been awesome and this newsletter is in direct response to requests for more connectivity and arts-related information. A need for equity and diversity in this new organization were also echoed throughout. We couldn’t agree more, and this is driving active efforts to seek board members that represent our community and whose voices and visions will be a central part of the Arts Alliance as it continues to form. Wenatchee’s First Fridays Art walk has been missed but the venues who continue to host new artists each month have been listed below. A push to ‘officially’ resume the art walk, and print flyers is planned for early 2022. The Arts Alliance has

also secured fiscal sponsorship through Shunpike (a non profit arts org. based in Seattle) while they wait for their non profit application to process. In the meantime, bylaws are being written & grants are in the crosshairs.

If you or someone you know would like to make an active contribution of time and energy as a board member, or in any other capacity, please contact us at: Wenatchee.arts.alliance @gmail.comagain, not the forever name but we had to pick something!

NOVEMBER EVENTS

11/1:

-WVMCC (Wenatchee) - Dia de los Muertos drive-thru event, 4-6 pm

-MAC on WVCC campus (Wenatchee)Paintings by Henry Stinson ‘Toys in the Attic and Other Curiosities’ (throughout Nov./Dec.)

-Confluence Gallery (Twisp) - ‘Something in the Wind’ group exhibit (ends 11/13) 11/2:

-WRI (Leavenworth)- Red Barn Event, ‘What They Found-stories of people in NCW’, with Rod Molzahn, 7-8:30pm

11/4:

-WVMCC - Environmental Film Series, ‘Why Bears?’, 7-9pm

11/5: FIRST FRIDAY

-WVMCC - NCW Juried Art Exhibit & Sale, 10am-8pm with reception at 6:30 Historic Wells House Tours, 2-7pm

-Collapse - Art of Samantha Fisher, 4-9pm

-Cafe Mela - Encaustic paintings by Alessandra Piro, and ceramics & felted forms by karen dawn dean, with live music by Brian Ohme, 4-8pm

-Gallery One (Ellensburg) - Annual Holiday Gift Show opening, 5-7pm

Patty Yates paintings (both close Nov.13th)

-WVMCC - Book release and talk, ‘Sunset and Moonrise on the Great Chief’ by Randy Lewis and Bill Layman, 7pm

11/6:

-Mighty Tieton Warehouse (Tieton)

- Kristen Millares Young, ‘Tell Your Story: The Power of the Personal Essay’ presented in Spanish, 2-3:30pm

-PAC- Wenatchee Valley Symphony Orchestra, ‘Fire and Blood’ , 7pm

11/10:

-PAC - ‘One Man Star Wars Trilogy’, 7:30pm

11/13:

-WVMCC - Maker’s Space, ‘Automatons’ 10:30-3:30pm

-Mighty Tieton Warehouse - Jake Prendez, ‘The Art of Rebellion: Social Justice and Chicana/Chicano Visual Arts’, 1:00-2:30pm

11/14:

-WVMCC - ‘GladSong’ choir concert, 4-5pm

11/16:

-WRI - Red Barn Event,‘Orca-shared waters,shared home’ Lynda V. Mapes

7-8:30pm

-PAC - Festival of Trees public viewing, 10am-8pm

11/17:

-Collapse - Life Drawing Session (no instruction), contact nenahowell@ gmail.com or register on Collapse Gallery website, 5:30-7:30pm

-PAC - Festival of Trees public viewing, 10am-8pm

11/18-19:

-PAC - Festival of Trees public viewing,

10am-8pm

11/20:

-PAC - Festival of Trees public viewing, 10am-4pm

-Methow Arts (Winthrop) - Atomic Bombshells Burlesque, 7pm

-Confluence Gallery (Twisp) - 10x10” Holiday Gift Show, ‘A Riot of Color’ 11/21:

-PAC - Festival of Trees public viewing, 10am-12pm

11/24:

-Collapse - Shrub Steppe Poetry Podium, 4:30-6pm

LINKS TO VENUES AND RESOURCES

*MAC- Music and Arts Center on the campus of Wenatchee Valley Community College https://ad-wb-wvc01.wvc. edu/academics/art/macgallery.html

*Collapse- Collapse Contemporary Gallery https://www.collapsegallery.com/ *Gallery One- https://www.gallery-one. org/

*WVMCC - Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center https://www. wenatcheevalleymuseum.org/events/ *Icicle Center For the Arts https://icicle. org/find-events/

*Confluence Gallery - https://www.confluencegallery.org/ , *Methow Arts - http://www.methowarts.org/

*Cafe Mela- https://melacoffee.com/ *Mighty Tieton Warehouse - https:// www.tietonarts.org/events *PACNumerica Performing Arts Center https://numericapac.org/about/ news/ *Two Rivers Art Galleryhttps://2riversgallery.org/

*Wenatchee Valley Symphony Orchestra- https://wenatcheesymphony.org/

THREE food poems.

Untitled

By Mery Smith

Divorce smells of overcooked eggs. Child turned, cook. Turning the skillet on too high, lack of time lack of teaching.

Burnt egg skin protein-paper.

The end is marked by senses.

children begin to eat first with their eyes.

Is it done yet?

Sorry About That

By Lizzy M.

It was no accident. The gravy thing. I totally meant to spill it. I don’t even like gravy on my mashed potatoes.

I meant to spill it.

Maybe you knew that. Maybe you didn’t. In any case... thanks for having the correct response of taking your pants off.

I’ll Eat To That

By Lizzy M.

He loves me! I’ll eat to that.

Oh...he’s gone. I’ll really fucking eat to that.

He’s in love with her now. I’ll have seconds to that.

He’s dead. Damn.

I need to go to the store.

Through An Ink-Soaked Ribbon

A Brief History Of The Typewriter

By Ron Evans

It’s hard to imagine a time before typewriters — partly because everyone that’s alive today was born long after its invention, and partly because these devices have slipped into that foggy-grey area of history that we have little reason to think about at all, like the cassette telephone answering machine or the fountain pen. Collectors and hipsters aside, these once revolutionary aids to our society are now mostly relegated to museum exhibits and the occasional quirky home decorative display. Mostly. More on that in a bit.

Since the dawn of writing itself there were attempts at engineering a way to streamline and mechanize the process. It wasn’t until the late 1800’s that things really got punched in. Experts have a hard time truly nailing down the very first conception of what we later came to call a typewriter — there were over 50 patents that were filed for machines that typed before we got to the real winning design.

Many of these attempts looked more like pianos or pinball machines, often with

relatively few keys on the board. One key would sometimes represent 3 or 4 letters and you’d have to click through a dial to select which letter you were going for, then punch the key to stamp in your choice. Wouldn’t you like to see some “purist” kid attempting NaNoWriMo with that kind of work flow? 20 words a day would be a win, son.

By most accounts the earliest crack at something like a typewriter was likely the scrittura tattile, invented in Italy by typographer Francesco Rampazetto in 1575. This device was more about creating a braille-like system as a means for blind people to read and communicate through correspondence. It never really took hold but the mechanism and concept was a seed for a tree that would take a few hundred years to fully grow.

In 1829, American inventor William Austin Burt patented a machine called the “Typographer” in hopes of speeding up his work as a surveyor. This was one of those table-sized doohickeys with a dial rigged to stampers that were armed with typeface blocks that Burt “borrowed” from the local newspaper print shop. And while it did the trick of putting ink to paper, the operation

was so tedious and physically demanding it ultimately provided zero timesaving qualities and the patent was pushed to the back rows of the dusty shelves of history.

Looking back on the evolution of these seemingly ancient patents you can see the fuzzy picture of the typewriter coming more and more into focus with each filing, and it’s fair to say that it took a galldurn village to figure out something as complex, yet simple, as a writing machine.

That said, there are a few stars in the time line that get a bit more of history’s gaze. One such star is Rasmus Malling-Hansen of Denmark, who in 1865 invented the Hansen Writing Ball. Looking more like a space-age lamp from Frank Sinatra’s Palm Springs bachelor pad, the Writing Ball had a half-sphere of keys that essentially punched straight down through the letter assembly and onto the paper cradle underneath. This is historically thought to be the first commercially available typewriter.

Malling-Hansen’s view from the top would be short-lived though. In 1868, Sholes and Glidden (comprised of Americans Christopher Latham Sholes, Frank Haven Hall, Carlos Glidden and Samuel W. Soule) filed

the patent for their landmark typewriter simply known as the Sholes and Glidden. One major adjustment was this machine had a curious and seemingly arbitrary alphabetical layout. Instead of the letter “A” being the first key on the board, the Sholes and Glidden model started with “Q.” The top row read “QWERTYUIOP.” That was super easy and fun to type just now. More on that in a bit.

The clever minds of the engineers that crafted the machine, led by clocksmith Matthias Schwalbach, noticed that the mechanisms would often jam when the adjacent keys (in alphabetical order) were two letters that are often used together, such as S and T. So they remapped the entire board to minimize the occurrence of punching two keys into each other en route to the ink ribbon. Neat huh? As for that top row...you may notice that every letter needed to spell out “TYPEWRITER” is all right there, and this was often the word salespersons would punch in to demonstrate the ease of use to a potential buyer. As to whether that was the plan all along or a serendipitous bonus discovered later is debated by historians. Either way, this arrangement is still used to this day — even on our phones. There have been a few well-meaning attempts at

Early Sholes and Glidden model with piano style keys.

Patent sketch for the The Burt Typographer filed in 1830.

Sinatra’s lamp? Nay. The Hansen Writing Ball of 1870. Prototype of the seminal Sholes and Glidden.

updating the arrangement with ergonomics in mind in the electronic age, but after 100 years, old dogs say “bite me” to your new tricks, and the QWERTY keyboard lives on.

This version of the typewriter became so popular that demand was far outpacing the speed at which a machine could be hand assembled, so Sholes and Glidden sold the device to E.Remington & Sons. Yes, that Remington. There was brief hesitation on their part because they weren’t sure there would really be much demand for a typing machine, and they had already made a killing (terrible or perfect word choice?) on selling their firearms to the US Government for use in The Civil War. But they ultimately picked the patent up and began to sell their Remington Typewriter. A lot of Remington Typewriters. But, it wasn’t instant. They needed some sort of endorsement to sell the world on the typewriter. They typed a letter to Mark Twain.

Twain wrote a comedic and smartassy essay on why he hated the typewriter, which at first didn’t land well with the machinemakers. But he also bragged about being the first author to submit a manuscript to his publisher that had been typed by ma-

chine. A little folksy novel called Tom Sawyer. Sales skyrocketed.

There was still a lot of pushback from some writers, publishers and the public at large. Many felt it was an insult to receive a letter that was written by some cold, lifeless machine rather than the more personalized touch of a message handwritten in pen and ink. Still, in the end...convenience and speed won out. Don’t they always?

Other companies soon started selling their own versions (opting to license the popular QWERTY layout from Remington) and advancements like Shift keys, numbers, case-options, quieter and smoother operation, then eventually electric and automatic functions came down the road at a rapid pace. But it was all based around the solid design of the original — the Sholes and Glidden. Collectors are always on the hunt for these valuable machines as there are less than 200 known to be in existence these days.

On the topic of collectors, typewriter hounds are a passionate (ravenous?) counter-culture, out shopping trade shows, yard sales, antique malls and obsessively looking for deals on eBay. One famous story

involved a rare machine that was found online for well below the going rate. The reason? The seller had a typo in the header of his auction.

Actor, and proud typewriter nut, Tom Hanks (he owns almost 300 models) appeared in a 2016 documentary called California Typewriter which celebrates the craftsmanship and history of these writing machines and the people that collect, use and in some cases damn near fetishize the typewriter. This critically acclaimed doc has pushed this type-mania even further along and has caused countless curious collectors to get their paws on a typewriter for one reason or another. Many of them simply want to use them...to write. For these people the glaring lack of things like a delete button, the ability to make backup copies or do any processing or editing (save for the trusty X key pounded repeatedly in anger) only adds to the attention and respect the machine demands of the process of writing.

There has also been a new-market demand for devices that pair the uni-task nature of the typewriter with some (but not many) of the conveniences of the modern age. The Hemingway Freewrite ($600) is one

such device geared toward writing without the distraction of modern...distractions. Nothing more than a tiny screen with a faux ink and paper texture, a few switches to toggle through your story folders and wifi that only connects to a storage site for backing up your work. Many wouldbe and award-winning authors alike swear by their boosted productivity when using these simple typewriter-esqe machines. And while you could essentially achieve the same effect with a cheap laptop in airplane mode, I do get the romantic longing to connect to something more simple, more elegant. Even the mechanical keys are meant to be a closer feel (and sound) to the analog keyboards of yore.

It’s really a storied and complex past for a machine that now appears to be such a simple concept. Call the resurgence of interest and appreciation for the typewriter a retro hipster fad if you will (skeptics have been saying that about the vinyl resurgence for years now in spite of its continued growth) but there is probably something else happening here as well, and it’s likely something hazy and romantic and ethereal that couldn’t even properly be put onto paper — unless of course, it first traveled through an ink-soaked ribbon.

The latter model of Sholes and Glidden, preRemington buyout.

One of many Remington Typewriter adverts from the 1940’s featuring Mark Twain.

New meets old. The Hemingway Freewrite. No word on how many daiquiris it can handle.

All images Creative Commons.

SINK OR FLOAT: WITCHY WATERS

Locals gathered for a magical afternoon of paddling the Columbia in full witch garb this past Halloween Sunday. Why? We reached out to co-organizer Janie Noviello to find out.

By Ron EVans

How did the witch paddle event come together? How many people showed up?

Noviello: I had shared a picture last Halloween from Portland Stand Up Paddleboard Witches on the Willamette. My friend Beth Marotta saw it and texted me a couple of weeks ago and said let’s do it. She had a few friends lined up. I volunteered to make a Facebook event page. We ended up with 17 participants that showed up for the event and we recruited 3 more at the park.

What was the idea behind a collection of witches on the water?

Plagiarism. I mean, if you believe the Wizard of Oz narrative, witches and water is not a great idea. Essentially, it just looked like a blast. It turns out that floating down the river dressed as a witch is as fun as it looks, especially when the whole coven shows up.

Was it all women that participated? We had two warlocks representing, and due to their larger than life personalities it felt like more.

Why do you think witches and witchery things have become so ubiquitous in the past decade or so?

Has it just been the last 10 years? I grew up watching Bewitched, so... Okay, that response dated me. I don’t know, maybe it’s fun to believe in magic when so many things seem outside our control. Or maybe the idea of sage nature goddesses is the hip fairytale we need for a modern era.

Was there any Stevie Nicks being played through a boombox?

No boomboxes were activated during the witch flotilla. Maybe next year we can

recruit paddleboarding musical witch accompanists.

So there’s a plan for more of this in the future?

Yes! Beth Marotta immediately designated the last Sunday in October as the official date. So mark your calendars for October 30, 2022, leaving Confluence Park at 2 pm and alighting at Pybus. C

The bewitching Janie Noviello and a river of trouble makers. Photos by Douglas Anderson.

THE FUNNY PAGES COMICS AND NOVELTIES

I was going to serve sweet potatoes with Thanksgiving dinner, but I sat on them. Now I’m serving squash. DAD JOKE OF THE MONTH

1) WIlliam H. Macy has had quite an acting career. Most notably to some, he’s starred in 11 seasons of the award winning show, Shameless. People describe him as a polite man who is enthusiastic about art of all kinds. In an article with The San Francisco Gate, it was revealed that for many years now, William H. Macy brings THIS on sets with him to play with on a daily basis.

A) A ukulele

B) A classic Gameboy

C) A pocket chess board

D) A Rubik’s Cube

2) An Australian Olympian went viral during the Olympics when she took some damage to her kayak but still managed to take home a bronze medal in the Canoe Slalom... She went viral because she was able to fix her canoe quickly with THIS...

A) Duct tape

B) A set of Legos

C) A mixture of play-dough and Elmer’s Glue

D) A condom

3) A website called IFLScience recently did a story about a 28 year old man who just died. The man had been in and out of a coma for nearly 8 years and recently died from his illness. It turns out all of his problems started because he ate THIS on a dare:

A) A cactus

B) A silica Gel “do not eat” pouch

C) A small raw fish

D) A slug

4) Sports Handle, a sports betting and informational site, did a study of all the NFL teams fan bases this year. After all was said and done, it ranked Seattle Seahawks fans NUMBER ONE at this:

A) Being the biggest bandwagon fans

B) Sleeping during their team’s football games the most

C) Being the biggest lightweight drinkers

D) Not knowing the names of their players beyond Russel Wilson

5) Elon Musk held a press conference recently where he talked about the success of SpaceX’s very first all-civilian mission, “Inspiration 4”. Musk said while the mission was a big success, that the civilians on board had a problem with one major thing that they would need more training on before they send the next group of civilians out.

What was the one issue they had on their voyage?

A) Drinking liquids

B) G-force motion sickness

C) Eye retina damage from sun exposure

D) Using the toilet

6) Dave Grohl recently did an interview with Rolling Stone to promote his new autobiography that is being released. In his interview he mentioned that back before he was in Nirvana, he nearly joined THIS band as a drummer:

A) Judas Priest

B) Motorhead

C) Ratt

D) Gwar

1. Breathless (1960) 2. His Girl Friday (1940) 3. The Hustler (1961) 4. The Third Man (1949) 5. It’s A Wonderful Life (1946) 6. Double Indemnity (1944) 7. Duck Soup (1933) 8. The Thin man (1934) 9. The Maltese Falcon (1941) 10. King Kong (1933) 11. Some Like It Hot (1959)

12. Whatever Happened To Baby Jane? (1962)