Drabblecast 136 - The Great Old Pumpkin

[Kevin Anderson]

Feature: The Great Old Pumpkin by John Aegard
Drabble: And Then the Whole Town Gets Their Brains Eaten by Ayn Sauer
Genres: Comedy Horror Mystery



Saturday, October 31st, 2009
You must know, Doctor, that I did not choose to seek psychiatric help. I have no faith that I shall exit this room a healed man; I know now that I have been destined for the asylum since childhood. No mere conversation with you can steer me clear of that fate. That said, let us proceed with this court-compelled farce before my mad prattle provokes your crabbiness further..

Music by: Eskit
Episode Art: Bo Kaier
The story originally appeared in Strange Horizons, 25 October 2004.
The drabble originally appeared in Necrotic Tissue # 2, April 2008.

No twabble for this episode.

[strawman]

And Then the Whole Town Gets Their Brains Eaten by Ayn Sauer
Congratulations, Ayn.
Must have been some bachelorette party.

Why Norm has not made Kendall his Igorbeatch before this is clearly an oversight.
Bo's artwork was awesome. Made me so hungry for Pumpkin calamari. As for the story, it was cute. It was well done. It reminded me of an old joke whose punchline is, "You've just been *****ed by grandma."
It was certainly lovecraftian, as advertised. But in more ways than one, it was also meatloaf.

[Richmazzer]

Yes congrats to both Kevin and Ayn. Sad to not have a story by Mr. Anderson this year, but Ayn's Drabble was certainly swell. One of my favorite all-time drabbles, if anything just for the title.

Cryptkeeper Norm's terrible but oh-so-tales-from-the-crypt horror puns cracks me up every year. The running gag of scolding hunchback Kendall for cackling at them will also never get old to me.

The story: I LOVED IT. Someone here said it before and I totally agree that Norm does great with taking silly things totally serious, building a mythology around it and approaching it all completely in earnest. In that regard, this story almost seemed written for him.
Aegard REALLY nails that lovecrafty language and it makes for great parody. Brilliant how hints are dropped gradually until you realize you are listening to the Peanuts characters. I realized this just as the background music seemlessly morphed from evil piano music to a malevolant, slow tempo version of the Linus and Lucy song. So fun! Big thanks to John Aegard and the Drabblecast team for a really hilarious and fun production.

[tbaker2500]

Hee hee.. fun stuff with Kendall. Good story- where have I heard it before? Maybe an early EP? Great production. I listened to this while walking through an awesome old cemetery today getting a geocache. Nice setting.

Hey Kevin, when are you going to write a story that Kendall and Luke won't reject?
Hey Kendall and Luke- when are you going to stop rejecting Kevin's stuff?

[myke_deschain]

Good story, very much liked the lovecrafty stuff... and very much liked the bizzare peanuts spin off...



and Norm i don't know how much real life seeps into the show but I in fact did wake up to someone peeing on the carpet in a drunken rage this weekend, cackling like a madman....

and happy late Halloween everyone.... http://twitpic.com/ns4mb" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false

[F5iver]

I listened to this while walking through an awesome old cemetery today getting a geocache. Nice setting.

I was going through a graveyard yesterday for a geocache, too!
Of course, this graveyard was a hobo graveyard.
So we had to leave coins.
And gloves.

[ROU Killing Time]

This was a jolly fun story. One of those tales where predictability is a virtue, not a flaw. It wasn't long until I was wondering when they would bring Snoopy into the picture, and lo and behold, he showed up right on cue. I liked the aboriginal squeeks from Woodstock too.

The only thing missing (unless I missed it) was the "Waah Waaahh Wah Wah Waaah Waaaaaaa" from the teacher.

(Also, a very good study in how to toe the copyrighted character infringement, line.)

[tbaker2500]

I listened to this while walking through an awesome old cemetery today getting a geocache. Nice setting.

I was going through a graveyard yesterday for a geocache, too!
Of course, this graveyard was a hobo graveyard.
So we had to leave coins.
And gloves.

This one was a letterbox hybrid. Took about an hour, in with beautiful mausoleums and stonework all around. Newest graves were about 1920. Quite nice.

[ROU Killing Time]

The one near my wife's gramps house has colonial era gravestones. There's one family plot with markers for seven sons who were all sea captains lost in various parts of the world. Made me think there's a good story to be written there.

[eric_marsh]

Good story - very entertaining

[Praxis]

Good story- where have I heard it before? Maybe an early EP?

Yep, Episode 025
(I didn't remember the story at all and only found the EP one when my downloader was hit by gremlins and saved this episode in the random wilderness of my computer, so had to search for the filename itself. I'm assuming that this Drabble version is the more atmospheric of the two.)

[StalinSays]

Yep, Episode 025

Yup, we're on a roll 'covering' Escape Artist classics. But in case anyone is worried DC is becoming the EA Remix podcast, I've seen the line up for November, it's a return to largely first run material.

A neat story - the final Halloween story choice wasn't made until mid week, but I had started work on the cover the weekend before. Tentacles are kind of a DC 'thing' so I figured working them in to a pumpkin was a safe bet for proper holiday special imagery. When I sent it over to Norm to preview, he remembered the Grand Ole' episode from "Old School EP," I re-listened, and we both thought pumpkinopus made for a good Grand Old Pumpkin. The solicit went out, and so it came to be.

[strawman]

And Then the Whole Town Gets Their Brains Eaten by Ayn Sauer
Congratulations, Ayn.
Must have been some bachelorette party.

Why Norm has not made Kendall his Igorbeatch before this is clearly an oversight.
Bo's artwork was awesome. Made me so hungry for Pumpkin calamari. As for the story, it was cute. It was well done. It reminded me of an old joke whose punchline is, "You've just been *****ed by grandma."
It was certainly lovecraftian, as advertised. But in more ways than one, it was also meatloaf.

No one seems to have "gotten" the quirk in the drabble title, so I'm back to highlight the lol:
Ayn Sauer, (on the night before her wedding, yet) ate an entire town's brains.
Now COME ON!

[tbaker2500]

No one seems to have "gotten" the quirk in the drabble title, so I'm back to highlight the lol:
Ayn Sauer, (on the night before her wedding, yet) ate an entire town's brains.
Now COME ON!

LOL! Ok, that is pretty funny. Anything else you want to hit us over the head with?

[strawman]

Thank you very much.
Ayn is presumably preoccupied on her honeymoon this week. One wonders if she has told her husband.

[tbaker2500]

It may indeed be too late for him.

[zZzacha]

Thank you very much.
Ayn is presumably preoccupied on her honeymoon this week. One wonders if she has told her husband.

Sure she did. Who would go on their honeymoon without telling their new husband? That would be weird.

[strawman]

Remember, zZzacha, Ayn has lost her marbles. Surely it would have been an awkward moment. "Honey", Redmond has had a brain-drain", she might have said. "Funny", her new husband might have replied. "Isn't that where you and your friends went for your bachelorette party?"
"Yeah, we went to Microsoft HQ for desert."

[Talia]

Well, Ayn could have at LEAST saved some leftover brains for ME. The whole town, well, that's just greedy! :p

GREAT main story. I really should have seen the end coming, but I didn't - definitely made me giggle. Good stuff.

[tbaker2500]

Thank you very much.
Ayn is presumably preoccupied on her honeymoon this week. One wonders if she has told her husband.

Sure she did. Who would go on their honeymoon without telling their new husband? That would be weird.

I'm thinking that strawman missed this one. I believe the joke to be that Ayn went on the honeymoon without telling her husband that she was going on a honeymoon.