Originally posted on K.M. Allan:
The holidays are a time for relaxing and taking a break, even Stephen King doesn’t write on Christmas day! But writers like to make ourselves feel guilty if we aren’t penning down words, even when it’s time for a well-earned break, so here are some tips for maintaining a creative output during the holidays. Make A To-Do List Even Santa makes a list at Christmas. You don’t need to check yours twice, but at least have something to look at that’ll keep you on track. There are a million things to think of and do this time of year, so list writing tasks and non-writing tasks, work out a plan for getting them all achieved, and then tick off each task. It’ll keep you motivated, organized, and get things done. That might sound like a lot for one little list to do, but hey, it’s Christmas, the season of miracles. Balance Things Avoid an all-or-nothing approach. Trying to do all writing or all other things usually doesn’t work and…

Originally posted on Cross, Massachusetts:
Disease and disaster are never easy to overcome. Invariably, we lose something of ourselves. In 1912, this was driven home when a strange illness afflicted residents of Elm Street and only Elm Street. Seven people came down with the disease. Rather, seven young men between the ages of 18 and 23. The young men lived in a pair of boarding houses, each across the street from the other. On Saturday, the men woke up, prepared to go to work, and ate their morning meals. They were, by all accounts, hale and hearty at seven in the morning. By 7:30, all were struck low, screaming and clawing at their faces. Of the seven men, only one of them, Alexander Keel, survived the experience. While his unfortunate co-victims died screaming in agony, Alexander took the drastic step of cutting his entire face off. Surprisingly, he survived the massive shock to his system through the valiant efforts of the local Red Cross and a pair of doctors who had learned their trade fighting…

Whether they’re foreshadowing a possession or heralding the arrival of the anti-Christ, insect hordes are usually a sign that something bad is going to happen in a horror movie. But what do you do if you find a real life one in your mailbox? That was the situation I faced when I went to grab my after work a few weeks ago. Everything seemed normal when I reached in, but when I pulled out my mail I realized it was covered in ants, and a clump of what I assume were either eggs or larve. I dropped the handful of envelopes on the pavement, and looked up to see an army of small ants franticly scurrying over every inch of the mailbox, the post, the surrounding ground, and spilling onto the street. I picked up my mail and retreated to the driveway, where I had to bang each envelope on the cement to get the ants off, and opened each one, shaking ants out of the contents. Retrieving some Raid from my garage, I doused the inside of the mailbox, killing …