@gruber Oh noes! IMy #iPad Pro never seemed to be slow for anything... This is unexpected. (I probably thought this about my original Fat Mac in 1985.)
Speaking of which, the image is a B&W of the interior of my original Fat Mac (MacIntosh 512K: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_512K). Taken with a iPhone 14 Pro Max 1 second exposure.
Enlarge the image and look at the signatures of the original staff that made the MacIntosh a product.
I bought in 1985. While I do most of my writing on the iPad Pro, I wrote my early novels on this machine and thought it would last forever. I wrote my first novel on an Apple ].
Our May/June 2023 issue is reaching mailboxes and select newsstands now. With important coverage of #ReproductiveRights and #Healthcare, as well as the continuation of @delger's river series.
Digital subscribers: look out for a new, easier format for this month's issue, available soon.
The title of this film is very misleading. It makes it sound like a low-budget 50s scifi, but this is actually a very well made movie. I think it's on par with The Day the Earth Stood Still (1952), except this film had a lot more special effects. They used a combination of stop action and other practical effects as well as post processing techniques.
The guy who did the special effects on this film, Ray Harryhauser, invented a technique called Dynamation, a special type of stop action effect. He went on to work on the 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1956) which is probably one of the most well-known stop action/live action films of the era. But this film uses a wide variety of techniques as well as stop action.
The writing and acting are also top-notch. The actors weren't big stars but they were accomplished character actors. It has a fully developed plot and the dialogue was well written. Also, they got a lot of the science facts right on this one, at least more than usual for a Hollywood scifi. They even tried to explain special relativity, incorrectly of course, but they tried.
I highly recommend this film to anyone who likes old science fiction movies.
It’s just unfortunate that they gave this film such a cheap-sounding name. They even released it as a double-feature with The Werewolf. (I guess film marketing has improved since then as well as special effects. 😆 )
an ugly movie poster with orange and white headlines, muted colors, with images of flying saucers that are shooting rays to the ground and robot creatures walking around, the large headlines say flying saucers attack! warning! take cover! earth vs the flying saucers, small headlines say flying saucers invade our planet: washington, london, paris, moscow, take cover!, a smaller inset image of a man and woman looking scared and holding each other.
In this week's story, an actuary-turned-field-biologist begins to notice strange occurrences in the uncanny landscape of Nieux Swamp, a man-made climate mitigation project funded by a multibillion-dollar corporation.
Today in Labor History May 26, 1755: The French authorities caught and executed Louis Mandrin, the French Robin Hood. He had led an army of 300 smugglers in a rebellion against the Fermiers, or tax collectors. This made him incredibly popular with the masses because the Fermiers would tax them far more than the king required and pocket the extra. Furthermore, he would buy products in Switzerland and sell them in France without paying any taxes, making them much less expensive. However, when he was caught, the authorities publicly tortured him and left his body on display to teach the masses a lesson. The people left sympathetic notes beside his body and a legend was born.
Mandrin was referenced in Victor Hugo’s “Les Miserables.” Books and films were made about his life, including the 1924 silent film, “Mandrin” and the book, “Captain Mandrin.”
Today in LGBTQ History May 25, 1895: The authorities imprisoned socialist author Oscar Wilde for two years for “indecency” for having sex with men. Many potential witnesses refused to testify against him. However, he was still convicted. The judge said “It is the worst case I have ever tried. I shall pass the severest sentence that the law allows. In my judgment it is totally inadequate for such a case as this. The sentence of the Court is that you be imprisoned and kept to hard labor for two years.” The terrible prison conditions caused Wilde serious health problems and contributed to his early death.
I need to do an updated #introduction post, since my pinned posts are now out of date. I'm #RaimaLarter an Assistant Fiction Editor at Utopia Science Fiction Magazine @UtopiaScienceFiction and we are interested in reading your work!
Sneak peek at my next short story, “Blank Sheet”. It’s story no.2 in my composite novel, “Distant Stars”.
I'm planning to publish it soon.
You can subscribe to my #Substack to get it in your inbox: https://elizabethtai.substack.com/
Today in Writing History May 13, 1944: Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin was born. Maupin wrote the novels over the course of nearly forty years, (1978-2014). He was one of the first writers to incorporate the AIDS epidemic into his novels.
Today in Writing History May 22, 1927: Author Peter Matthiessen was born. Matthiessen was an environmental activist and a CIA officer who wrote short stories, novels and nonfiction. He’s the only writer to have won the National Book award in both nonfiction, for The Snow Leopard (1979), and in fiction, for Shadow Country (2008). His story Travelin’ Man was made into the film The Young One (1960) by Luis Bunuel. Perhaps his most famous book was, In the Spirit of Crazy Horse (1983), which tells the story of Leonard Peltier and the FBI’s war on the American Indian Movement. Peltier is still in prison (over 43 years so far) for a crime he most likely did not commit. The former governor of South Dakota, Bill Janklow, and David Price, an FBI agent who was at the Wounded Knee assault, both sued Viking Press for libel because of statements in the book. Both lawsuits threatened to undermine free speech and further stifle indigenous rights activism. Fortunately, both lawsuits were dismissed.
Today in Writing History May 21, 1703: The authorities imprisoned writer Daniel Defoe for seditious libel. Defoe was most famous for his novels Robinson Crusoe, published in 1719, and Moll Flanders (1722). However, he also wrote political pamphlets, including The Shortest Way with the Dissenters, which satirized how Tories handled religious dissenters by proposing that they all be exterminated. As a result, the authorities arrested and imprisoned him for seditious libel.
Started a novel last night. "Hell Followed with Us" by Andrew White.
It's post apocalyptic. About a trans youth, trapped in a terrorist group of christian extremists, who are responsible for the bioterror which destroyed the world.
The first few chapters were creepy as fuck.
I don't usually go in for a lot of young adult stuff and post apocalyptic isn't usually my jam. Typically I'd think the subject matter would cut a little close to home right now. However the amazing cover really caught my eye, and some of the blurbs seemed to make me think it would be .. cathartic?
"A furious, queer debut novel about embracing the monster within and unleashing its power against your oppressors."
Important full fictional names:
Barbie - Barbara Millicent Roberts
Callie Torres - Calliope Iphegenia Torres
Chuck E. Cheese - Charles Entertainment Cheese
Oz, the Wizard - Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs
Today in Writing History May 27, 1884: Writer Max Brod was born. He is most famous as Franz Kafka’s friend and biographer. Kafka had asked him to burn his unpublished manuscripts. Instead, he famously published them. However, Brod was also an accomplished writer himself, well-known in Germany. He also mentored other writers. His endorsement of Juroslav Hasek’s hilarious anti-war satire, The Good Soldier Svejk, was crucial to its success. He was also a Zionist disciple of Martin Buber. And in 1939, he and his wife fled to Palestine to escape the Nazis, who burned his books in the book burning of 1933.
Today in Writing History May 27, 1894: Author Dashiell Hammett was born. From the age of 21-23, he worked as a Pinkerton detective and then joined the army. But he developed tuberculosis and was discharged shortly after joining. In 1920, he moved to Spokane, again to work for the Pinkertons. There, he served as a strikebreaker in the Anaconda miners’ strike. However, when the Pinkertons enlisted him to assassinate Native American IWW organizer Frank Little, he refused, and quit the agency. His first stories were published in the early 1920s. And his 1929 novel, “Red Harvest,” was inspired by the Anaconda Road massacre, a 1920 labor dispute in the mining town of Butte, Montana, when company guards fired on striking IWW miners, killing one and injuring 16 others. Vigilantes also lynched Frank Little. André Gide called the book “the last word in atrocity, cynicism, and horror." However, Hammett was most famous for The Maltese Falcon (1930) and The Thin Man (1934). Both were later made into films. In 1937, he supported the Anti-Nazi League and the Western Writers Congress. He also donated to the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, fighting the fascists in Spain. He was a socialist and served as president of the Communist-sponsored Civil Rights Congress of New York. In 1953, he was subpoenaed by McCarthy’s anti-Communist witch hunt. And again, in 1955, he was celled to testify bout his role in the Civil Rights Congress. He was also convicted in absentia in 1932 of battery and attempted rape. He died in 1961, of lung cancer.
If anything, I love a good social commentary piece. This one put a smile on my face this morning. Most probably because I feel exactly the same about human race.
Looking for a writing friend. Someone I can chat with about writing, projects, and stuff like that. I write horror and weird fiction, but I'll talk to anyone from any genre. Let me know if you're interested. #fiction#writing#horror#weird#WritingCommunity#Writers#books