Predator Press: mark a. rayner

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Thursday

My City is Gone

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Before I do a post on Mark A. Rayner's newest and seminal work -the one starring me- I should probably explain where I've been for the past month.

See, every once in a while the Earth tries to kill me. But the problem is that I'm on Earth, and the Earth is dumb and has pisspoor aim. World War II, Chernobyl, Paris Hilton, September 11, Katrina, … the list of the Earth's inept, bungled efforts to murder me is virtually endless.

But this time the Earth tried something uncharacteristically clever. A month ago, watching Thursday Night Football peacefully from my basement apartment, I heard commotion upstairs. Assuming the couple living above were in a particularly virulent argument, I did what every hero does: I turned the television up to drown it out.

When the door –out of my field of vision- got kicked in, I was annoyed. When four flashlight beams swirled in, I was confused. When the SWAT team captain's boot was suddenly on my neck, I was indignant. “I am the Senior LOBOian Ambassador to the United States! A national treasure. My blog readers will not stand for this! Your badges will be shoved up your asses so far they'll be mistaken as dental work-!”

Clearly they weren't Predator Press readers. When I came to, the bleeding had slowed considerably. Handcuffed to a chair, I wondered furiously why you people hadn't rescued me yet -it was, after all, one measly SWAT team. Some of them weren't even carrying automatic weapons, preferring shotguns instead. Have all the millions and millions Predator Press readers gone soft?

I would not learn until later the Earth was way ahead of us this time. She had distracted you all with a rather diabolic diversion: Superstorm Sandy. Now I love you readers. Seriously. But when a natural disaster occurs, nobody stops to think that maybe it's an elaborate plot to kill LOBO? That's the oldest trick in the book! You people better start thinking these things through.

So I was brought in for questioning. Supposedly, roughly ten pounds of marijuana and twenty guns were found on the premises -all of which I was completely oblivious. I had a separate entrance to the house, through the garage to my basement apartment. I didn't have keys to the upstairs. Utterly unhelpful, they released me to walk twenty two miles home in the freezing cold to a totally trashed apartment. Phil II, obviously rattled by the search and seizure, hissed as I assessed the situation.

The place was sacked. All “recording devices” were confiscated.

This unfortunately included my computers and cellphone.

I had no access to my fantasy football team.

-I had no access to porn!

And things got somehow got worse. I wasn't on the lease, so Phil II and I were technically trespassing. While I desperately searched for an apartment, the homeowner was essentially looting the place of valuable televisions and electronics, and would change the locks while I was at work. So for three weeks I would randomly come “home” locked out. But I had an ID reflecting my address, so the locksmiths would just let me right back in at $75 a pop. The next day I would have to spring Phil II out of the Humane Society at $40 a pop. And indeed I had a visceral joy perplexing the landlord with continued access, and how the evil cat, farmed away, would mysteriously return despite their effort.

I am building a new city now.

Tuesday

I Have Decided to Join a Secret Society

Predator Press

[LOBO]

I know! Isn’t that cool? Now when people see me, they will whisper stuff like:

”Psst ... isn’t that LOBO?”

”That really handsome dude wrestling the grizzly bear?”

“Yes. I heard he is a member of a secret society!”

Man, I am jazzed about joining too. Ever since George Bush Junior got his big break from ‘Skull and Bones,’ all the other cool people are doing it: Kipling had the ‘Freemasons,’ Doctor Tundra has ‘The Cult of the Claw,’ and Charles Watson had the Manson Family -ah the list just goes on and on.

Which one should I join? I don’t know yet. In fact the afore mentioned list pretty much sums up all the secret societies I’m aware of -and by virtue of me being aware of them, these particular societies don't seem very good at keeping themselves secret. And what kind of business model is that?

What I need is a secret society where the members themselves don’t know I’m in it. Even better, so secret even I don’t know if I’m in it ... kinda like the one I have going with actor Michael Dorn and whoever the current guitarist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers is. Whenever Michael Dorn, the current guitarist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers and I cross paths we exchange a series of knowing looks. Mind you I have no idea what Michael Dorn and the current guitarist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers might be up to at the time, but I’m with them 100% whatever it is.

So technically, I suppose, I’m already a member of a secret society; I’ll have to ensure my new one doesn’t have a conflict of interest –or worse, a redundancy- of my first. Secret society juggling can be a tricky endeavor when you don’t know what either secret society is doing ... probably my best bet is to lure the current guitarist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers into a secret society of our own, within the other secret society.

-I don’t know about you, but Michael Dorn plays a Klingon a little too good.

Know what I mean?

Saturday

Predator Press Interviews: Mark A. Rayner

Predator Press

[LOBO]

My devious plot to kill all the good authors so I can get a book deal has suffered a temporary setback: Mark A. Rayner, author of Marvellous Hairy, has been anything but forthright in regards to his actual location.

-Mislead by some rather sophisticated and formidable call-tracing countermeasures, I'm forced to conduct this interview from a payphone in Wyoming.

And let me tell you pal, getting into a phone booth in a ghillie suit made of almond tree branches is no picnic.

LOBO: Mark, you've obviously chosen to try and make monkeys, you know, cool again -like back when "BJ and the Bear" inspired millions and millions of truckers to take them cross-country. But iguanas are cool, and kinda scary too. A book about superintelligent iguanas would be groundbreaking, and a rare victory for cold-blooded animals. Why monkeys? An iguana is an infinitely more practical pet for truckers if you think about it.

MAR: Actually, Marvellous Hairy is about a surrealistic novelist being turned into a monkey-like creature; they regress just some of his DNA back along the evolutionary tree to the point before we split from the chimps; but if you must know the truth, it's because I think we don't keep in touch with our monkey playfulness enough. (Present company excluded. I mean, obviously, with the ghillie suit and all. You know you can get those in Gor-Tex now, with collapsible almond branches?)

LOBO: Don't correct me on my own blog, Mark. What was that fancy thing you just did there?

MAR: What?

LOBO: That thing where you are using the "(" and the ")".

MAR: They are called parentheses. You -of all people- should probably learn how to use them.

LOBO: You think I don't know about parentheses? I once killed a man using parentheses.

MAR: Really?

LOBO: Absolutely. I hated that guy. Watch. "I want the garbage taken out (and everybody dead in five minutes)."

MAR: In five minutes? What did they do?

LOBO: They didn't know about your book!

MAR: Oh, well that's okay then.

LOBO: Is it that you're an atheist Mark? Hm? I mean you could have changed the guy into a praying mantis instead of a monkey. Is it a problem that the mantis thing is always praying? A praying mantis won't rip off your genitalia and throw it at you. I mean you just don't GET more pious than a praying mantis.

MAR: What about Capuchin Monkeys? Eh? They're named after monks. Or the sanctimonious Kneeling Baboons of Rogistan? (Not that I like them very much. Did you know I was once bitten by a radioactive baboon? It's how I got my super-powers.)

LOBO: See, there you go with the parent-things again.

MAR: Parentheses?

LOBO: Forget it. Was the Shute character in Marvellous Hairy based on David Letterman?

MAR: Largely, though I wouldn't want anyone to think that Denny the Lickspittle is based on Paul Shaeffer. No way. I would never disrespect the coolest man on TV. Paul is Canadian, did you know that? Oh, that's right, you don't believe in Canada.

Marvellous Hairy Excerpts
LOBO: Don't get me started on those old hokey legends of Canada. Do you think Canada exists?

MAR: Yes.

LOBO: But you're a teacher! Isn't that, well, kinda irresponsible?

MAR: Let' get back to the books.

LOBO: [exasperated sigh] One of my favorite elements of your writing is the meat of the stories hangs on a skeleton of philosophical poignence. Not to oversimplify, The Amadeus Net had the omnipotent and omniscient computer managing an idyllic utopia, and Marvellous Hairy had the specter of corporate power and greed gone to extreme. A common thread -humans struggling to morally catch up to their own rampant technological achievements- can often be spotted in your shorter works as published on The Skwib as well. Is this formulaic, or a happy byproduct of your writing style?

MAR: I wish I had a formula -- it would be so much easier. But to think that I struggle with each story, agonize over every character, groin myself every day to get the themes to flow with the plot and have it appear as formulaic . . . well, that just makes me want to slit my wrists. So, let's go with 'happy' byproduct.

LOBO: Having read both The Amadeus Net and Marvellous Hairy, they both have a vastly different "feel" from one another: The Amadeus Net seemed darkly serious while Marvellous Hairy seemed more playful. The fun you were having writing Marvellous Hairy was palpable. Would that be an accurate characterization? And if so, were there events between 2005 and 2008 that contributed to this shift?

MAR: Yes. That's quite accurate. Interestingly, you have to push the clock back about nine years for The Amadeus Net and seven years for Marvellous Hairy. I was primarily writing The Amadeus Net when I was an underemployed corporate drone in 1997, living in a small, yet charmingly feculent apartment, and working from notes that I had painted with a child's watercolour set the year I was being a Bohemian Gen-xer in Prague (1993). The first draft of Marvellous Hairy was written in three days in 2001, and was fueled almost entirely by scotch and raw existential anguish, and so, is hilarious.

Marvellous Hairy Podcasts
LOBO: The Amadeus Net juxtaposes a sexually-taut cast of characters in a clinical, computerized world. Cripes ... everybody is sleeping with everybody! Can you just leave out the computers next time? The computers create too much space between the sex scenes.

MAR: In my next book, the computers get in on it too.

LOBO: Have you repented to your clergy for all the sex in The Amadeus Net yet? I tried to get my penance reduced by ratting you out about it, but the church was skeptical: rather than take my word for it, they ordered a case of the books to be distributed among the congregation for review. Now they are all blind, and their palms smell like Gillette. All of this could have been avoided with the simple use of a praying mantis. Are you an atheist Mark?

MAR: If you mean, do I believe in a "Magic Sky Father", then yes. If you mean, do you believe in a "Cosmic Unconscious Fun Monkey," then the answer is: maybe.

LOBO: Yeah, well, I'll try to put in a good word for you with Jesus. But I've got a feelin I know where He stands on the whole "Cosmic Unconscious Fun Monkey" thing.

MAR: Thanks.

LOBO: Why do my favorite characters always get killed in your stories? Are you doing that on purpose? And how do you know who my favorite characters are in the first place? Are you clairvoyant?

MAR: Yes. And by the way, don't get to attached to Suzie in my next book. Really, just save yourself the heartache. Oh, and you might want to get that mole checked.

LOBO: Thag is among my favorite of your characters. Was Thag based on someone or something in particular? And because I like him, how soon will you be killing him if you haven't already?

MAR: Thag is loosely based on the Gary Larson cartoon. Since then, he has become the proto-typical everyman. But he will not be taking the Big Dirt Nap anytime soon. Or will he? We will see how sales of Marvellous Hairy spike after this interview goes live to decide . . .

LOBO: While far from a professional author, I'll get something under my skin and scrawl it on the grocery receipt on my way home -more or less helpless against the urge. This annoys the other drivers, and their excessive use of the horn and graphic profanity makes it hard to concentrate. How does a Mark A. Rayner pour stories? Do you have a formal method -for example, a set time and space for writing?

MAR: I have a word count that I aim for every day. I usually miss it. This makes me feel bad. However, even if I am tortured by my under-achieving slacker Gen-X attitude towards work, the words eventually add up to something and then there is a manuscript that can be edited. This is how I have produced two novels in roughly seventeen years.

LOBO: There seem to be two methods of getting published. The first, self-publishing, requires around $30,000 and necessitates doing all your own promotion. The second is the 'traditional' method -the one where you essentially "get discovered" by a publisher. Because I'm short about $29,995 for the self-publication route, I endlessly submit manuscripts to publishers that are returned weeks later scribbled with profanity and smelling suspiciously of urine. Do you know of any particularly stupid publishers I should try? Like maybe one that buys a lot of scratch-off lottery tickets and extended warrantees?

MAR: I think you've described the entire publishing industry quite accurately. Enjoy.

LOBO: You claim to be a teacher in Canada. This has put me in the uncomfortable position of acknowledging that Canada possibly does exist, despite my numerous assertions to the contrary. Why would you jeopardize my credibility -right smack on my own blog- when you could have simply claimed to live in North Montana? Extremely North Dakota would also have been acceptable.

MAR: I always thought that Minnesota was pretty much like Canada. How about if I'm from Minnesota?

Marvellous Hairy Reviews
LOBO: How did you get out of playing hockey? Did they give you an academic waiver? I would have thought knocking out one of Mario Lemieux's teeth to be a Canadian rite of passage. Do other Canadians pick on you as a result?

MAR: I got out of it the old-fashioned way -- I broke my arm the first time I played. Crying like a little girl helped too. BTW, Mario Lemieux has almost all of his teeth. Nowadays the goal in hockey (ice hockey for all your British readers) is not to knock out a player's teeth, but to cause the rapid brain movement of a player's brain inside his (or her) skull. Much more civilized. (Especially now that women's hockey is so big.)

LOBO: There you go with those parentheses again. I'm starting to think I should consider them a form of attack.

MAR: (You would be a fool to think so.)

LOBO: In Marvellous Hairy, there was a thinly-veiled streak of dislike toward the college where the story is set. Was this a reflection of personal frustration with your own institution, or more an articulation of how people justifiably hate school in general?

MAR: It was more a reflection of how people can dislike something in general. And you'll note that all of the friends are quite fond of their undergraduate school (The Good University).

LOBO: Once again I'll remind you not to correct me on my own blog, Mark. So at what point did you realize you hated kids enough to be a teacher? And would you call it a vacuous rage against today's youth, or is it simple sadism?

MAR: Um, I teach at a university, so I only deal with adults.

Marvellous Hairy Freaky Adult Sex Stories
LOBO: C'mon Mark ... don't mince about. Those punks deserve nothing less than every ounce of your venom. And once all six of the people in Canada get their degrees from you, you'll be of no further use to the university either: they will force you to hastily pack your abacus, chalk, and all those Twisted Sister pins you confiscated. Then what? POW ... it's straight back to hockey. And how do you think Mario Lemieux is going to react when you come wandering in to practice after all these decades? Not too favorably I would guess. No sir ... not too favorably at all. Unless you think you've still got a Stanley Cup in you.

MAR: I don't have one in me. But I've been IN it, if you catch my drift.

LOBO: I would imagine there aren't a lot of monkeys in Canada. Wouldn't your life be simpler if you wrote about companies changing people into cocker spaniels?

MAR: Well, I'll tell you now the radioactive baboon that bit me was a resident of Elgin County, Province of Ontario, Dominion of Canada. (I know 'cause the cop showed me the Incident Report afterwards.) In fact, most of Southwestern Ontario is plagued by roaming bands of baboons -- and not just the red-assed, blue-nosed, Perfidia variety you're used to, no. There is the Souwesto Skint Baboon, always asking for spare change at the corner of major intersections, the White-Throated Hypocraboon, commonly found in churches and you really don't want to leave your children unattended with them. And don't get me started on the Ice Baboons.

LOBO: You know I've read the Travels of Marco Polo, and you know how many times Marco mentions Canada in it? Zero. Zilch. You know, I don't think I'm buying this Canada thing anymore. Fess up, Mark.

MAR: I don't think he mentions the United States of America either. Just sayin'.

LOBO: We probably just didn't want Polo takin the spotlight off of the Godless Yellow Hoard. In fact, we might have asked Polo not to talk about us, you know, until we could at least get some cool fast food and electronics. What can we be expecting next? I know it isn't going to the swimming pool -not the way you trash-talk Marco Polo. Are you working on another book? Tease us with some details. I'm warning you however: if it's a story about a busload of nymphomaniac cheerleaders exacting revenge on an evil corporation for turning a praying mantis into a cocker spaniel, we will all know you stole it from me.

MAR: I'm working on two projects: One is the heartwarming story about how a cocker spaniel saves a busload of nymphomaniac cheerleaders from the predations of gigantic evil praying mantis, who happens to be the CEO of a major bio-tech corporation. The other is mostly about a busload of robots having sex with cheerleaders pretending to be cocker spaniels (The Furries, they're called in the book), though there is something in there about bloggers being executed for the capital crime of plagiarism.

No, THIS is Like a Metaphor-Thingy

Predator Press

[LOBO]

You know on one hand I want to thank Dr. Tundra for the great title, and on the other I'm furious with him for almost making me look up what "metaphor" means.

I shouldn't be too angry. I mean it's not like I actually bothered looking up what “metaphor” means, right?

No harm, no foul.

Plus I think I can fake my way through this. Sure maybe I couldn't tell a metaphor from a migraine headache waiting to happen -but I am the World’s Leading Authority on ”Thingys." Heck I probably have more “Thingys” in my garage than most people have altogether.

Anywho, we cannot wax on and on about my expertise on “Thingys,” for that is merely a byproduct of my radiant braniosity.

My radiant braniosity is what we should be waxing on and on about.

***

It has yet to be explained to me what these "problems" are America is so worried about. I mean if you can get past the fact that you can't get plain white toothpaste anymore, the rest of the place is pretty cool, right? Just today in the news is an Associated Press story about how Half of US Doctors Use Placebo Treatments. Heck ten years ago I'll bet one tenth of doctors didn't have decent placebo technology!

So when I went to the debate where John Nobody presumably smeared Don Lewis into a thick paste over on Radioactive Liberty, there was a full two hours or so where I had to pretend I was paying attention to "issues" -and oh man if I heard any more "Legislate This" or "Subsidize That" blah blah, I woulda been snorin right there in the front row.

I thought a "debate" was like a cage match or something. You know, like a "Two Men In, One President Out!" kinda thing? ... But all these guys did was talk at each other!

No wonder John Nobody seemed puzzled when I recommended he wear an athletic cup.

Just as I was about to look up the definition for "Debate," The Question hit me: Has my radiant brainiosity ever been quantified?

I immediately closed some of my porn windows and Googled "Radiant + Brainiosity + Calculator + LOBO."

Nothing.

“Hey Buddy,” whispers Trent Lott as he taps my shoulder. “What was the name of that site?”

“What? Google?"

“No,” he says, tugging on his collar. "The one with the, eh,-"

Eyebrows furrowed, he cups his hands in front of his chest.

“This is no time for shenanigans," I exclaim with reproach. "This is a presidential debate, and the worst kind possible: the kind without a cage match or monster trucks! I would've expected some decorum from you, President Lott.”

“Actually I was a Senator.”

“You were never a president?”

“No.”

Puzzled, I look to the guy next to me. “But you are a president, right?”

“No,” says Dick Durbin.

“So what, they just let any kind of losers into these things now?”

“Apparently,” says Durbin.

"Well, at least that explains the glaring absence of monster trucks."

“Say," says Durbin. "Can you email me a copy of your bookmarks?”

“Not right now,” I says. “I’m doin’ something for Science.”

“So was I,” says Lott.

This Message Brought to You By:

Tuesday

Slightly Off the Mark

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Jazzed by having received my copy of The Amadeus Net by Mark A. Rayner in the mail today, I started to think, “You know, why should I prevent my own radiant brainiosity from being studied and enjoyed by generations upon generations in the annals of future history?”

I've been trying to root out my own book deal, but that's a difficult thing to accomplish when I haven't actually written the book yet.

Or the draft.

Or the outline.

Or have a clear idea of what it will be about.

... But I do like the title.

Thursday

Shenanigans

Predator Press

[LOBO]

It can't be true.

It just can't.

... It's been almost two weeks since I've tried to infuriate It's a Funny Thing's brilliant author Don Lewis!

Long ago, I concluded that the internet is utterly useless aside from infuriating Don Lewis.

I've sought high and low for some decent SEOs so my search engines are optimized.

And how I yearn for the remotest hope of penis enlargement.

Please don't get me started on the futility of finding porn.

Will no one reveal to me the secrets of Internet Marketing or Making Money Online?

Doesn't anyone accept VISA Platinum anymore?

[*sigh*]

All there is is Don.

Don Lewis.

Even as I type this, the sole recipient of the Predator Press Temporary Lifetime Achievement Award is probably all tucked in, sleeping soundly, and thinking of genuinely funny and unique crap ... crap that will doubtlessly distract countless blog readers from the wholesome Wisdom, Purity, Hope and Truth which Predator Press strives only to promote.

Well, I won't stand for it.

Not for a second.

Not even for a nanosecond.

In a fit of jealousy, I'm stripping Don of his monopoly on the coveted and highly sought-after honor that I will one day actually create: the Predator Press Lifetime Achievement Award.

Today, the subtle and unobtrusive Predator Press Temporary Lifetime Achievement Award -currently recognized as the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval- is being bestowed upon the following blogs as well:

.45 Caliber Headspace

Angry Seafood

Average Dudes

Bee's Musings

Blogs We Luv

DEAD ROOSTER

ettarose-edgeofsanity

From the Roads

LadyTerri

Lord Likely

My Interesting Files

neOnbubble

OMYWORD!

Speedcat Hollydale

The Cult of Qelqoth

The Offended Blogger

The Ominous Comma

The Skwib

When Things Get Dark

-:¦:-•:*'""* -:¦:- NICE -:¦:- WORK -:¦:- *'""*:•.-:¦:-

The bearer of this -The Predator Press Temporary Lifetime Achievement Award- has demonstrated such a fantastic aptitude for comedy that Predator Press nearly created an award to commemorate their momentous achievement. Predator Press is not affiliated with the Good Housekeeping Seal's fine services or products. In fact, Predator Press is locked in a fierce legal battle with them ... however, this statement can only be characterized as accurate if you replace the words 'locked in a fierce legal battle with' with the words 'being sued by.' Please do not lick, eat, snort, swallow, drop, smoke, or otherwise ingest award. Not valid unless placed on title page of blog. Or tattooed.

Hah!

Now "Don Lewis" -if in fact that is your real name- every time you surf the funniest sites on the internet, you will see your own award prominently displayed smack on every one of them!

Jerk.

Eat Humor Blogs. Poop kittens.