It seems, throughout his life, that numbers played a vital role in his day to day. By counting to 1,357, he could awaken from a catatonic framework to find the entire downstairs completely spotless.  By counting to 254, a clockwise motion of his tongue (matched precisely to the metronomic seconds) could bring his wife to climax without extra rigmarole and only cause minor aches and pains in his aging jaw line.

The first time I saw the word “Pontypool,” I was in the bathroom at Chicago’s Music Box – a famous, old movie palace – attending the annual 24-hour horror-fest known as The Massacre.  A slanted poster with the complete running order of the festival was taped to the tile wall.  Though I knew most of the fest’s schedule, I had overlooked one film…

The one that was next.  The one that had the prime slot.

Pontypool.

Mr. January is at least 43 now. He is the face of clean living and resolutions kept. In his fireman’s suspenders, he has the kind of muscled, but not overly muscled chest that reveals a good year of conscientious workouts at the gym. He’s acquiring that barrel-shape very strong men get as they age. His chest hair, blond of course, has become wiry and coarse. There’s more of it now.

EDITOR’S NOTE:  John Hay was one of two secretaries who were like adopted sons to Abraham Lincoln.  He and John J. Nicolay assisted Lincoln, kept visitors at bay, and were always available as the 16th President managed the country’s greatest crisis. Together, Hay and Nicolay wrote an authoritative Lincoln biography, based on access to the presidential papers.

In the end, it wasn’t the knights in shining armor or the friendly dragons that did it:  it was the pink bunnies that made my wife divorce me.  I write children’s books, you see, and so I’m always coming home with something new to put in a story.  At first she thought it was cute:  “Oh,” she’d say, “look at the little-biddy-friendly hedgehog!  Come over here and give me a kiss.”  And at night, after  eating a steak dinner with snow peas and Pepsi, we’d all sit around the fire and cuddle while I’d write about how even hedgehogs need love.  Or why hedgehogs should listen to their parents.  Or

We were strangers on the train, staring blankly at the dark glass, reflected in ebony sheets of remembrance. If I pressed my face to the pane, I could tell we were rushing by. But apart from a pale, flickering shadow on the window, we were nowhere.

“The earworms are the worst part,” she was saying.

Ivan looked up from his beer.  She was staring at him with a nervous half-smile, her eyes wide black holes in the dim of the bar.  Her fingers interlocked around a glass of cranberry juice that she still hadn’t brought to her lips.  “What?” he asked.

He did not covet gold or jewels, though he had won them.  He traveled only with the whetstone needed to sharpen his spear, and punished anyone who came near it.  He slept soundly, and when he dreamed of the faces he had killed they were all turned away.

Preparing her dinner the other night, my wife was disappointed to notice that the “Sausage Rolls” she’d purchased from Zehrs contained “spicy chicken” filler. Apparently “Sausage Rolls” wasn’t meant to be read as an adjective modifying a noun but as a complete proper noun pertaining to a certain style or genre of substance-filled pastry. Because even though any type of animal may be ground up and stuffed into its own (or another’s too, I suppose) intestines, I believe the sausage default, as in when not otherwise specified, is pork.

It’s a warm summer evening, the kind that radio loves. Down at Rochambo the tv is on the fritz, vanquishing CNN, ESPN, and a whole slew of letters. Lou, the regular, can be heard saying, “the way things are going these days, I don’t know whether to laugh or shit or go blind,” as bartender Marty futzes with a radio. It crackles to analog life. Old school country, and Brady (semi-regular) applauds. “This is a different station,” says Marty. Then the DJ mentions “Abilene” and Lou slurs, “shit, this is coming all the way from Kansas.” A beautiful anomaly, Brady thinks.