When: Their 4th album, God on the Run, will be released in January 2020. The video for “Men in Grey” is out now.
How: For the last two years, The Hellfreaks have been touring and also working in the studio. Fun Fact: The lyrics for “Men in Grey” were inspired by the fantasy novel Momo by Michael Ende, who also wrote The Neverending Story.
The other night I had a nightmare. One of my neighbors dug up my garden. There was nothing left – not even the fence. I know that I was screaming at him as he drove off with all of the flowers, vegetables and herbs that I grew over the summer. It was traumatizing.
When I woke up, the garden was still there. I was so relieved. Of course, the garden isn’t perfect but it’s still a success. Next year some things will be different. This year was a learning experience for sure.
There are about ten things that I learned about gardening either from making mistakes or Pinterest. Here’s my garden board on Pinterest.
Bugs, etc.
Bees are good. Butterflies will eat the leaves but I can’t deny a butterfly. Locusts and slugs are not that great. I only saw one locust. The slugs were a little sneakier. If you put beer in small containers around the garden, it should take care of the slugs. Slugs like beer.
I made a DIY pesticide with vegetable oil. It worked fairly well and didn’t kill the plants.
Weeds are inevitable. This year I didn’t have any major problems with weeds in the garden. I spent plenty of time pulling weeds when I was digging in the yard to make room for the garden. I didn’t use weed killer in the garden. It kills everything including what you’re trying to grow.
Rabbits
There are rabbits in the area so I fenced in the garden as much as I could. So far they haven’t crawled under it.
Birds
The birds were lurking around the garden. However, I didn’t really have any plants that they wanted. If I had any berries, I would have put a net over the garden.
Mulch/Compost
Since I live in town, I put my compost pile in a big trash can with a lid. It stinks but the garden will benefit from all of the grossness. Did you know that you can put hair in the compost pile?
There’s not a magical portal.
My kids would come out to find me but not see me in the garden. Seriously, there’s no where to hide. I wish I could say that there’s a portal to another world out in the garden. It’s been pretty good for my mental health. Maybe because I’m not stuck in the house with my kids.
Planting things too close
I definitely planted the carrots too close together. I forgot to separate them when putting them in the garden. Lesson learned for next year.
Tomatoes will take over the world starting with your garden.
I had so many tomato plants that I lost count. At one time I had 30 or so. I gave some away and some didn’t make it. There are still so many tomato plants.
Did you know that if you don’t cage them or string them, it will be like urban sprawl but with tomatoes? The tomato plants will be everywhere. I’m pretty sure that they multiply.
The next step is to do something will all of the tomatoes.
When I started planting seeds, there were intentions of labeling. I did label most things. Unfortunately, the cats kept knocking over the containers and the labels fell off.
For the better part of the summer, I thought I was growing peas. They weren’t peas. They were pods for radish seeds. So there will be an abundance of radishes next year.
If you are hanging on to the last bit of summer, then let me suggest an album to send off summer with good music.
Vessel of Love by Hollie Cook feels very tropical – a vacation packed into an hour of playtime. It’s reggae/dubstep. Cook describes her music as “Tropical Pop.” Her description is pretty accurate.
Cook’s hometown is London. She is a former member of a punk/reggae band called The Slits. Her father is Paul Cook, drummer for the Sex Pistols. Her mother, Jeni, was a backup singer for Culture Club. FYI: Boy George is her godfather. How fabulous is that?
I have not been to the Caribbean yet. However, I imagine that Vessel of Love would be suitable to listen to on a trip to the Caribbean Islands. Until I can get away to Jamaica or Barbados, I could drink Pina Coladas and listen to this album in my backyard. My mom has a fake palm tree that she might let me borrow – sounds like the start of a party to me.
One of the next books on the TBR list is Vices/Virtues by Beatrice DeSoprontu. It sounds like a great book for the beach or anywhere that you can steal a few moments of alone time. It be a little bit naughty. Anyone who is not opposed to a more risque, then you can find the book at the link above.
If you would like to know more about Ms. DeSoprontu then the following interview might be for you.
Where would you like to travel next?
India, though that is a pretty big subcontinent, so perhaps I should narrow that down. Maybe Mumbai, I could change careers and become a Bollywood star. (see question #4)
What was the first thing that you remember writing?
Like all small children I wrote pictorial books, aka graffiti on my living room walls. It wasn’t my late teens that I tried writing short stories. One called “The Kaleidoscope Hurts My Eyes” is about three different mixed-race people living intersecting lives.
Do you have a bucket list?
No, I like to live without thinking about death too much.
Should there be an age limit on changing careers?
Absolutely not! People are always growing and in doing so are apt to follow new careers.
What are the top 5 things people should do when visiting New York City?
Go to the Bronx to the more authentic “Little Italy” (and “Little Albania”) on Arthur Ave.
Go to Queens to feast on the best Chinese food in New York in Flushing Queens.
Go to Brooklyn, check out Grand Army Plaza and Lebanese cuisine on Atlantic
Go to Staten Island to visit the Richmond Town Village.
Go to Manhattan and check out a little known place called Times Square
Is there a secret to writing good erotica?
Avoid the word “throbbing” at all costs!
How did you decide to write erotica?
VICES/VIRTUES is literary fiction, that delves into issues of race, class and religion, like all literary fiction the story is character driven. Of course, there is quite a bit of the erotic thrown in mix (the main character is a professional dominatrix after all) but that is just the icing on the cake, so to speak. (See chapter 1 “Gluttony”)
What is your favorite movie?
Lawrence of Arabia – that man liked to put out fires with his fingers, very odd!
What do you want people to know about you?
My artistic goal is to write entertaining stories that leave the reader pondering issues in new ways.
A Soul Reclaimed by Shayna Grissom is literally set in Hell. The main characters, Nora and Aegis, visited every circle of Hell. In Dante’s Inferno, there are 9 circles of Hell (Limbo. Lust. Gluttony. Greed. Anger. Heresy. Violence. Fraud. Treachery.) In A Soul Reclaimed, there are 7 levels that are similar to Dante’s circles but not exactly the same. I try not to think about Hell too much but I might think about it more than I want. I do like shows that talk about Hell in small doses – “Good Omens” and “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.”
Nora is at the very least the step-daughter of the steward of hell. She has some untapped powers that the reader will find out about later. She’s smart and stubborn. Her relationship with her mother is strained. Her mother, Bella, focuses more on her husband, Vinicio, than on her daughter. For whatever reason, Bella sends Nora’s tutor away. After the tutor is sent away, weird things begin to happen to Nora. She is drugged, kidnapped and left in the Starry Wood. Unfortunately, the Starry Wood is scarier than it sounds. I mean, it is a forest in hell.
I imagine her to look sort of like Bailee Madison.
The vampire, Aegis, is fairly interesting. I wonder what his secrets are but unfortunately, he is having some problems with his memory. I picture him as resembling Ewan McGregor. Aegis just seems to have that kind of vibe – charming with a dash of brooding.
So after Nora is left in the woods, the monsters start chasing her. Aegis comes out of nowhere to save her. Later in the book, you will find out why. Aegis and Nora travel to all of the levels of hell. They are looking for clues about what happened to Nora and also hiding from her stepfather. Aegis and Nora are pretty sure that the stepfather is trying to kill Nora but they aren’t sure why.
There’s some humor but it’s not really a funny book. Regardless of the lack of jokes, A Soul Reclaimed is still worth reading.
If you like fantasy, then there’s a chance that you might like this book. If you are worried that you will go to hell for reading a book that is set in hell, then the book might not be for you.
I received this ebook from the author in exchange for doing a review. Thanks to Violeta. All opinions are my own. Obviously.
The band High Moonlight began their work in the late 90’s. At first it had a first name which was Evil Side and then Boots Goblins. The sound was more heavily encased in blues than metal itself, but they would soon begin to develop more precise and objective ideas.
If at the beginning the idea was to play covers of bands such as Sabbath, Dio, Purple and others, the focus now is also to focus on their own songs.
As with almost every band at the beginning of their journey, it was never easy to maintain a solid lineup at the beginning, so the hardest thing was having members committed to serious and focused work.
In the early 2000s the band had to cease activities returning years later with a new lineup.
In 2016 comes the first major opportunity for the band in their journey so far, which was to participate in the compilation Roadie Metal-volume 8 (Brazilian Heavy Metal Bands). Big names in national metal have already gone through this collection, Torture Squad, Claustophobia, Heaven’s Guardian, Fatal Scream are some of them.
High Moonlight’s main feature is its authentic, punctual, striking and creative guitar riffs (something that most bands have put aside a bit these days). Adding to that beautiful (and heavy) vocal melodies and inspirational solos, that’s it! This is the formula that composes and defines the band’s sound, without any obligation to the big bands of the world metal genre.
The lyrics cover conspiratorial subjects (aliens, occult government, existentialism), epic or intergalactic battles, and sometimes themes of contemporary pop culture as superheroes.
Currently the HML has been reformulated and has Robert Wagner and Robert Veck on electric guitars, Chris dos Anjos on vocals, Luciano on bass, Barreira on drums.
When: Their album, unSound, was released on August 23rd.
How:
“It’s been a wild ride, we really wanted to leave a mark and we worked hard on developing our unique sound everyone was so fond of with our debut album ‘Noise Pollution’, we wanted to do a more organic and open sound on the new album, we believe Rock and Metal music is to pumped these days, and it ruins the listening experience for the fans,” singer Henrik Thrane says.
Although JoJo Striker’s story had quite a bit of press in 2017, the case has not been solved yet. Striker was the third transgender woman of color murdered in the United States during 2017.
She was 23 years old and living in Toledo, Ohio. Striker was found in a parking garage after being shot. No one has said whether she was shot somewhere else. The police didn’t have many leads at the time and even fewer now.
Her mother believes that Striker’s murder is a hate crime. She’s not wrong. Any number of hate-filled circumstances could have led to someone shooting her. Maybe the situation didn’t start out with evil intentions but it ended that way.
Some of the articles about Striker mention that her gender was misidentified by the media. Someone may have witnessed something that could give the police a clue but didn’t know that Striker was transgender. The possible witness could have heard about the case of a man being killed and doesn’t make the connection to what they saw. Even her obituary is under her old name. It could be very confusing to any witness.
Striker is not listed on the Ohio Attorney General’s website which lists unsolved homicides. Is it possible that they aren’t listing every transgender homicide? Maybe. So far I’ve only seen one unsolved transgender victim listed on the website. Whoever is in charge of the website has some work to do on inclusion.
There’s nothing else written about this homicide after 2018. No one has been arrested. The trail has gone extremely cold.
Anyone with information should call the Crime Stopper program at 419-255-1111. Striker’s mother is still waiting for anyone to come forward with information that could solve the case.
Moonlocket by Peter Bunzl is about two kids, Lily and Robert, who get involved in trying to solve a mystery involved a criminal mastermind, Jack of Diamonds.
The book is Fantasy/Steampunk/Science Fiction. It is suitable for children who are 10 and up. There’s no cursing and nothing inappropriate.
Overview:
Lily is the daughter of a scientist, who made a cogheart for her so that she could live. They also have a houseful of creatures, like Malkin the mechanical fox that are bigger wind up toys. They aren’t toys though.
Robert is an orphan who lives with Lily and her father. His father has recently passed away and his mother left years ago. When Robert goes to visit the house that he used to live in, he meets Jack of Diamonds. Jack is looking for a clue to where the Blood Moon Diamond is located.
Lily is ready for an adventure. She’s been stuck at her house because of her artificial heart. She talks Robert and Malkin into looking for clues too.
The characters are likeable, except for Jack of Diamonds. He’s a villain and truly despicable.
I hope that it gets made into a movie because it would be great to see all of the steampunk things and mechanical characters. If you like fantasy or steampunk then you will love Moonlocket.
It didn’t take very long to read the book. Although the ending was cool, I was sad that it ended.
I received the ebook from NetGalley in exchange for a review. All opinions are mine. Obviously.
