I swear when I told Pretty-boy Pete
this, he nearly lost his shit.
My dad’s all stern—he’s got those
frown lines pronounced so you know he’s
serious—and he says to me, “What happened to you? You were at the top of your
class in high school. You were always on honor roll. You were always on the
dean’s list. And now here you are, drinking, drugging, driving drunk. What
happened to your brain?”
I smile—I can’t help but smile—and I say, “It drowned in bourbon.” And I just
laugh my ass off. My dad keeps trying to lecture me and I just laugh louder and
louder.
So when I tell my buddy Pete this—I
always do—he busts a big old gut and he says, “Ain’t that a fuckin’ hoot.”
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That’s what it was—our catch phrase.
Any time we found something entertaining, the phrase ‘Ain’t that a fuckin’
hoot’ was sure to follow. It had such a dirty twang to it. It sounded like one
of those phrases that some greaseball says in some old-time seventies or
eighties movie. So it just kind of stuck. You know those little inside jokes
among friends. Try to explain it to someone else, and people will look at you
all mouth agape and stupid; but say it to your best buddy, well, you two will
be rolling on the floor.
You see, we were able to see what
nobody else could see. Pete ain’t too bright, but he at least accepted this
truth: the world’s a fucking joke. Nothing more. It’s just a joke, and if
you’re not laughing, then why the hell even come to the comedy club. You stop
laughing for more than a day: well, you oughta end it right there. Slit your
wrists and exit stage right.
You see, Pretty-boy Pete got his
nickname for his looks, if you’re too stupid to figure that out on your own. He
ain’t got a lot upstairs, but his looks were enough to get his dick wet. And
that’s where he got his laughs. Find one slut, do what you need, then move onto
the next. I swear, he went through more cases of chlamydia than one of those sniveling
twerps with bad allergies goes through tissues. He used to have the nickname
‘Penicillin Pete’ for a while, but he didn’t like it. So I had my laughs and
then backed off.
See, I wasn’t so lucky. Sure, I
wasn’t fuck-ugly or anything, but I had to work for it. I’ve had a couple of
fine pieces of tail, but I really had to work the game. It’s hard, but a little
manipulation goes a long way.
So another night I come home so
shitfaced that I bump into my pop’s car. Rich schmuck paid for a brand new one,
so you bet your ass he’s fuming. He’s shouting at me, “What the hell is wrong
with you?! Are you fucking dense?!” It took all I could muster to stifle my
laughter.
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So then he calms down, and begins
his old lecture again. “What happened to you?” He’s all nauseatingly sincere
about it too. I can’t decide whether I should bust a gut or spew. “You were at
the top of your class in high school…” You know where this is going. He must
have given me this speech about a hundred times, so I zone out until it’s my
turn. Then he says my cue, “What happened to your brain?”
“It got lost on its last acid trip,”
I belt out and roar another round of laughter. Man, I had a new response for
every time.
Then he starts slapping me, but I
can’t help it. I can’t stop laughing. And his feeble attempt to stop me only
adds to the hilarity.
I tell Pretty-boy Pete that one and
he laughs so hard, the bourbon shoots straight out of his nose. Then he says,
“Ain’t that a fuckin’ hoot.” And we laugh some more.
I’m twenty-four and I see what
nobody else sees. Everyone’s breaking their backs trying to put food on the table.
Dipshits who forgot to wear a rubber have children to feed. Everyone’s wasting
their time working and growing up, when they miss out on the fun. Meanwhile,
I’m cruising down the road with a bottle in my hand laughing my ass off.
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So this one time I’m in the car with
Pete. He’s got one spliff in his mouth and one tucked behind his ear, and he’s
taking huge rips off it. The road’s hard to see with the smoke accumulating on
the dashboard. So I roll down the window, take a swig of Jim Beam, and press
down on the pedal.
“Hey,” I say to Pete, “hold this and
give me a hit.” I hand him the bottle and he gives me the joint.
I take a good long rip. Then I take
another. Then another.
“Quit fuckin’ hoggin’ it,” Pete
complains.
“You got one tucked behind your
ear,” I tell him.
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“Yeah, but it’s my weed,” he says.
“Oh, who gives a shit?” I say.
“Give it, man,” he says.
I blow out a cloud and concede,
“Fine, you fucking fiend,” then I hand him back the joint.
We drive a bit longer and I feel the
cold wind whip my sweaty scalp. The pot blows in my face as if Pretty-boy Pete
is trying to tempt me with it. Fucking asshole. I take another swig of bourbon.
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“Say, know what we should do?” I say
to Pete.
“What?” he says.
“Let’s go fuck up Ron’s car,” I say.
You see, Ron’s this asshole we used
to know. He always used to pick fights with me for no reason at all. He just
had some grudge against me. I don’t know why he singled me out, but I ain’t
somebody who forgives easy.
“Ron?” Pete asks and I nod. “Why Ron?
I haven’t heard from him in years.”
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“You got something better to do?” I
raise an eyebrow.
He shrugs and says, “Whatever.”
He didn’t seem too enthusiastic at
first, but the moment we took the baseball bats out of the trunk, he looked
like a kid in a candy shop. We fucked that car up: broke his tail lights,
busted his hood, shattered his windows; ain’t nothing in that piece of shit
mobile was untouched.
We start driving back fast, fleeing
the scene, just cracking up. “Ain’t that a fuckin’ hoot,” Pete says, and we
laugh some more. We haven’t laughed that hard in a long time. So then the
laughter dies down, and Pete says, “You sure that was Ron’s car?”
I look at him, then start to grin,
then we both start laughing louder than ever. Was it? I thought it was. But I
haven’t seen or heard from him in almost five years, so maybe he moved. God
damn. Ain’t that a fuckin’ hoot.
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So we’re feeling that nice
crossfaded buzz—just cruising with the pedal down—and damned if we didn’t
finish that entire fucking bottle of Jim Beam. We must have also killed an
eighth of bud too. We’re all numb and tingly and warm and fuzzy and not entirely
sure if we’ve pissed ourselves or not. But one thing was for sure: we were
laughing our asses off. That’s the way we were: always laughing.
So then my song comes on: it’s “Blinded
by the Light”. God, I love that song.
So I turn to Pete and I say, “Roll
another joint; this is my smoking song.”
“We’re out of bud,” he says.
“What do you mean we’re out of bud?”
I ask.
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“I mean just what I said,” he says.
“We smoked damn-near an eighth.”
“Well give me a cigarette,” I say. “I
need to smoke something.”
So he hands me a cigarette,
and—you’re gonna love this—I’m so fucked up I light the filter. What a fuckin’
riot.
So I get another one and succeed
this time. I tell you, lighting a smoke while driving when you’re seeing double
is no small feat. So I spark the square and keep driving with my eyelids at
half-mast.
Right when we get to my favorite
part of the song, it happens. Right after Paul Jones tells his momma where the
fun is for the last time, and Manfred Mann starts his iconic keyboard solo, our
car comes to a violent halt.
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We smash right into another car; I
have no idea how many miles per hour we were going. Pete wasn’t wearing a
seatbelt—I told you he ain’t got a lot upstairs—and he goes flying right
through the windshield. Can you imagine that? Just broke through the glass
headfirst and flew through the air.
The airbag explodes in my face, and
the car crumples and shatters my leg in three places, and the empty bourbon
bottle shatters and imbeds itself all throughout my busted up leg. I mean, what
are the fucking chances, right?
So when I finally am able to drag
myself out of the car, I see Pete lying twenty feet in front of the car dead as
a fucking doorknob. I walk up to him, crying my eyes out, dragging my bum leg,
and he smells rank. And—get this—he literally shit himself. I’m not making this
stuff up! A complete bowel discharge! I’m screaming in tears. I’m devastated. My
only friend is lying there stone-dead. I mean, what are the chances?
So now I’m sitting in a courtroom
before a judge. I’m facing vehicular manslaughter, reckless endangerment,
driving under the influence, and the prosecutor is pushing for life. You see,
the car that I crashed into was carrying a husband and wife and their only son.
The mother is still in a coma, the father only suffered a few broken bones, and
their son died in the accident.
And—this is the real kicker—they
were celebrating their son making honor roll again. Get a load of that! He was
honor role, dean’s list, top of his class, just like I used to be. What are the
fucking chances?
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My mother is clinging to my father,
and in both of their eyes it’s Niagara Falls. They’re sobbing and holding each
other for support. My only real friend is now being turned into soil by hungry
worms.
And then—get this—the judge, he
leans over and asks me, “What happened to your brain?”
Now ain’t that a fuckin’ hoot.
Liam Moran has been published in Coffin Bell Journal and Ripples in Space and his novels, ‘Saving Fiction’ and ‘Love is Delusional’, are available on Amazon. Originally from Levittown, New York, he now resides in the suburbs of Chicago. He invites fans to follow him on his Facebook page @LiamMoranAuthor or on his website at amazon.com/author/liammoran.
The outfit is made up of really fancy thick black lace leftover from a skirt I decorated for a party and an old translucent black handkerchief. It really reminds me of the table dancers in the music video but black instead of white (though it also alludes to some of the other outfits too, and Wednesday’s dress from the TikTok remake).
I love the detail on the eyes on these Liv dolls, which are embedded and not painted on.
The Liv dolls’ eyes are just so lifelike. I think this is what attracts me to the Rainbow High dolls too, and why I had to turn the Makeover Failfix 2Dreami into Lady Amalthea of The Last Unicorn…
If you want to check out more of my altered dolls, I have posted several to Haunted MTL here:
So, as you may have noticed, we have a special fondness for spiders here on Nightmarish Nature. Well, they are kind of the spokes-critters for horrifying animalia, perhaps because they are so freakishly different from us. Or maybe it’s because I find them a little disconcerting for all that I try to take the “you mind your business, I’ll mind mine” approach, at least if they stay outdoors. Or just because I really like to draw spiders for all that I prefer not to find them sharing my home (though I’ll gladly take spiders over other bugs or mice or larger critters who didn’t get an invite).
Anyway, this segment is devoted to the largest Giants Among Spiders, as if you didn’t have enough to worry about already. And the top place is contested based upon body mass or leg length. Most of these are tarantulas, which globally take top place among the large arachnids.
Goliath Birdeater Tarantula
The Goliath Birdeater Tarantula of South America is the biggest brute of spiderdom, weighing in at over 6 ounces. They build funnel burrows and are known to eat birds (although rarely), mice, lizards, frogs, and snakes, but largely any big insects including other species of spiders. They have urticating barbed hairs that they fling at would-be attackers as an irritant to escape. And people even eat them after they singe the bristles off. Here’s a National Geographic video showing this spider in action, in case you wanted to see a giant spider take out a mouse.
Giant Huntsman Spider
And with the longest legs, we have the Giant Huntsman Spider of Laos, with a leg-span of 12 inches. Their legs have twisted joints and they move in a crab-like manner, which furthers their impressive appearance. ‘Cause they’ve got legs, and know how to use ’em. They prefer to live in underbrush and cave entrances. These are like the big relatives of their Australian cousins, which we’ve all seen online and developed a healthy aversion to.
Brazilian Salmon Pink Birdeater & Brazilian Giant Tawny Red Tarantulas
Next we have two more South American species: the Brazilian Salmon Pink Birdeater, which boasts one-inch fangs, and the Brazilian Giant Tawny Red, believed to be the longest-lived spider with a lifespan of up to thirty years. Both are in the tarantula family and have urticating hairs, a word you probably never read much before today unless you are in the hobby. So apparently South America is not the best travel destination for you if you struggle with arachnophobia, though I suspect you’d figured that out already. (I wouldn’t recommend Australia or Southeast Asia either.)
Face Size Tarantula
And finally the Face Size Tarantula, which has a very terror-inducing name reminiscent of the Face Huggers of Alien-glory. Anyway, these spiders have an 8-inch leg-span and live in India and Sri Lanka. They look kind of like big hairy wolf spiders with stripey legs, sometimes with pink and daffodil coloring.
If you enjoyed this eight-legged segment of Nightmarish Nature on Giants Among Spiders and their larger than life kin, please check out past segments:
So here is our last installment of our AI journey exploring the idea of Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad wolf being one and the same. All of these are based upon the AI generated art and prompts using NightCafe and then created as posters in Canva. Feel free to check out Part 1 and Part 2 of this exploration if you missed them.
A non sequitur I know, but I couldn’t resist. If you picked up where we left off you’ll get it.
Seriously?! Again with the cropped off head cop out…
Finally! That was a journey. And not even worth the result, in my opinion.
Anyway, here is a bonus montage I made out of a bunch of additional Red Riding Hood prompts for an article that never happened…
Prompts for Montage:
1.) What if Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf were one and the same being? 2.) Her wolf face peering out of her red cloak, fangs dripping with the blood of another victim, lost in the forest and never found. 3.) Little Red Riding Hood closes in for the kill, lunging from her red cloak, her wolf fangs dripping with blood. 4.) I am Little Red Riding Hood. I am the Big Bad Wolf. I am coming for you. 5.) Howling within, the rage sears forth from the red cloak, discarded in the deep woods. Red Riding Hood succumbs to the lycanthropy. 6.) Heaving breaths. Dripping blood. Red Riding Hood is not what she appears. She is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. 7.) Her red cloak masks the fangs hidden below the surface. 8.) It starts with a long sighing breath. Waiting. The wolf within stirs. 9.) Red Riding Hood trembles. She succumbs to the lycanthropy. 10.) The wolf bursts forth from within. It takes over Little Red Riding Hood’s mind, her body, her being. 11.) Red Riding Hood howls. She is ravenous with hunger for blood. The wolf within has taken over. Mind, spirit, body. She feasts on the blood of the moon. 12.) Big Bad Wolf Red Riding Hood ravenous blood moon feast 13.) Blood moon beckons. I. Little Red Big Bad Riding Hood Wolf. Freedom howling night curse. 14.) Beware. Bewolf. BeRedRidingHood. Betwixt. Beyond. 15.) I pad quietly as the forest dissolves around me. Red Riding Hood and Wolf, one and the same. 16.) Wolf within howling dark recesses of the mind, Red Riding Hood lost 17.) Red Riding Hood HOWL wolf bane true existence polymorph within-and-without. 18.) Red howl Riding Wolf dark existence brooding within