Joseph Aleo

I’m making chocolate pecan pie for Thanksgiving. Super easy and everyone loves it.

Ingredients

• 10 tablespoons (1 stick plus 2 tablespoons) butter, softened
• 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 3 extra-large eggs
• 1 cup dark corn syrup
• 1 cup pecan halves
• 1 1/2 cups (6 ounces) bittersweet chocolate, chopped into chip-sized pieces
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 9(-inch) frozen pie crust

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.
2. Put the butter in a large bowl and stir in the sugar with a wooden spoon until smooth, about three minutes. Beat the eggs in one at a time, until each is incorporated. Add the remaining ingredients. Pour the filling into the crust.
3. Bake on the center rack of the oven for 10 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350°F and bake for 30 to 35 minutes more, until the pie is set and a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool before serving.

I did not wake this morning intending to acquire near forty volumes by Ursula K. Le Guin, but there it is. A humble bundle laid out by @toddgrotenhuis, tempting as sin and priced to move. One dollar for riches worth $363, though I’d urge you to pay a bit more, for it goes to the keeping of the Literary Arts. One book I wanted didn’t make the list, Le Guin ’s Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching: A Book about the Way and the Power of the Way. No matter. Amazon offered it for a mere 49¢.

I’ve never been a tea drinker. Coffee’s always been my poison. That began to change a decade ago when I had my first cup of light roast coffee. I was stunned at how bright and complex the flavor was. It was almost like drinking tea, making me rethink my tea position. But after trying a few kinds of tea, I was convinced I was mistaken. But then, a few months ago, I came across an recipe for a Lapsang Souchong old-fashioned. I love me an old fashioned, but hold up, what’s this about Lapsang Souchong? I purchased a bag and instantly became a fan of its bold, smokey flavor and now enjoy a cup every day. What other teas should I try?

I just wrote a Facebook post advocating for Mastodon, Micro.blog, and Textcasting, so I thought I’d share it here as well.

Mastodon is where your friends and family can gather, shoot the breeze, and share their moments without the ever-present shadow of yet another creepy billionaire pulling the strings. This place? It’s different. You don’t like the instance you’re on? Cool. Pack your digital bags and move. You’re not shackled to it like Facebook or X.

And here’s the beautiful part: timelines on Mastodon? They run straight, no gimmicks, no sleight of hand. Chronological, like your feed should be, without some algorithm breathing down your neck, deciding what you should see, or trying to shove political posts out of sight. No walled gardens and no invisible penalties just because you dropped a link. Unlike those other platforms where links go to die, Mastodon keeps it raw, open, and real.

Now, I’m everywhere, sure. Name a social media, I’ve got a footprint. But Mastodon? That’s the HQ. It’s home base. And because I’m a Mac and iPhone kind of man, Ivory’s my app of choice. Yeah, it’s got a price tag, but for quality? I’ll pony up. No regrets. Ice Cubes is solid, don’t get me wrong, but when Tapbots dropped Ivory, it was game over.

Then there’s Micro.blog. I’ve been there since day one, and yeah, it’s a subscription deal at five bucks a month, but listen—it keeps the bots and the trolls out. You want a space where people actually think before they post? This is the place. Plus, it plays nice with Bluesky, Mastodon, and Threads—cross-posting made easy.

And here’s the kicker: this is all leading somewhere. Dave Winer—the guy who basically put podcasting on the map with RSS—has a vision. Textcasting. Imagine podcasting but for words. You get the goods no matter the device or app you subscribe to. No middlemen. With ActivityPub and tech like that on the horizon, we’re this close to breaking the chains. All of Facebook, X, will have to up their game or watch their empires crumble. Do you want people to stick around? Offer something worth their damn time.

Like most folk, I scroll through my social feeds on my phone. It’s the third place we spend most of our time, after all. But let me tell you, the last few days I’ve been using Tapbots Ivory app for Mastodon on my desktop and it’s a game changer! Same features as the phone app, but it so much easer and fun to use! I’m really digging their hashtag functionality.

It don’t surprise me none. Spent years with the Tapbots Tweetbot on my phone. When Twitter shut down third-party apps, and I was forced to use their dedicated app, I discovered what Twitter was really like, and how awful it was. Tweetbot was a joy to use and sheltered me from the shitstorm that Twitter had become. Ivory is everything that Tweetbot was and more since they are no longer constrained by Twitter. Go get it for your phone or tablet and your desktop.

Last month, I took to reading one H. P. Lovecraft tale each day. Took to writing afterward too, capturing his voice and style in ways I’d come to appreciate like a ritual—a communion with the page. The pattern of it, predictable, dependable. But now it’s gone, and something’s been taken with it. I still write, sure. VIKINGS vs SAMURAI is about the comic book and everything related to it. My journal is where I capture moments and process my thoughts and feelings. But what will bring that same purpose to the blank screen now? What will drive the words?

This is what I’m left to reckon with in the weeks, or months, ahead.

On this final day of October, this day of Halloween, I find myself compelled to reflect upon the curious rite I have revived—a practice of honoring the master of cosmic horror, H. P. Lovecraft, by immersing myself in one tale each night. Thus did I delve into that vast tome, The Complete Works of H. P. Lovecraft, a volume of heavy presence and arcane import, which, to my astonishment, revealed new realms unknown even to one such as I, who thought himself well-versed in every terror the man had penned.

For many years, I believed I had plumbed every dark depth of Lovecraft’s works. Yet I was gravely mistaken. The tome unveiled secrets undreamed of—strange stories hidden from more familiar collections. Admittedly, there are tales within whose artistry leaves much to be desired, and I suspect it was their very rawness that saw them omitted from more curated assemblages. And yet, there is a strange satisfaction in having read them, as though I have peered into the very soul of the creator himself, unvarnished and unrefined.

In truth, I am far from exhausting this trove of eldritch nightmares. Indeed, I have only begun to explore its dread expanse. Thus, I anticipate, in future Octobers, returning to this rite, delving deeper each year into Lovecraft’s labyrinthine mind.

For this year, I concluded my reading with the elusive fragment, “Azathoth,” a tale weaving the threads of dreams and the dreadful reality beyond mortal comprehension. Permit me, however, to linger upon why this slender story resonates so deeply within me. You see, I am a meticulous keeper of dreams. Each vision that disturbs my slumber I capture upon the page, seeking—as the venerable Jung himself advised—to uncover the recurrent symbols and themes that may shed light upon the buried dimensions of the psyche. Only yesterday, a chance encounter with a stranger stirred memories of a dream from the previous week, though upon closer scrutiny, the connection was but an illusion. And yet, for those few brief minutes, the veil between waking and dreaming thinned, casting the ordinary world in hues strange and wondrous.

But now, to the tale itself!

And one night a mighty gulf was bridged, and the dream-haunted skies swelled down to the lonely watcher’s window to merge with the close air of his room and make him a part of their fabulous wonder.

Lovecraft’s “Azathoth,” intended as an Eastern fable in the antique style inspired by William Thomas Beckford’s Varhek, opens with a lament upon the dreariness of modernity—a world stripped of the old magic, bereft of any glimpse of the numinous. The tale’s nameless protagonist inhabits a dreary, ignoble city, yet each night, he casts his gaze skyward, seeking solace in the stars. Over time, those distant lights reveal unto him vistas hidden from the common eye. One fateful night, the chasm between his soul and those cosmic spheres dissolves, and his mind is loosed from mortal bounds, ascending into a boundless and terrifying infinity.

Today marks the penultimate day of my resurrected ritual—an immersion in the macabre, wherein I partake daily of a tale from that towering harbinger of cosmic horror, H. P. Lovecraft. This humble blogger ensnared within the many toils of earthly existence, found a rare mercy in today’s selection, “What the Moon Brings,” for this potent prose-poem of eldritch insight proved mercifully brief. Yet, despite its brevity, it reverberates with that peculiar chill, leaving an indelible mark upon the soul—a whisper of ancient fears that lingers, unseen and yet unshakable.

I hate the moon—I am afraid of it—for when it shines on certain scenes familiar and loved it sometimes makes them unfamiliar and hideous.

In that twilight realm of dreams beyond mortal understanding, an unnamed soul, trembling yet drawn forth, wanders through a garden of spectral beauty, veiled in pallid moonlight and the haze of unreal visions. Like specters frozen in eternal dread, eerie stone idols loom from the shadows, silent custodians of a forgotten age. From a meandering stream he ventures forth, compelled toward an endless, unnatural river whose ghastly shores beckon with a horror veiled in darkness.

As he nears the river’s dismal banks, the outline of a city—ruins borne of unutterable antiquity—emerges from the mist. Here lies a city of the dead, its crumbling towers and skeletal archways faintly visible beneath the oppressive cloak of the heavens. A sensation of something titanic and grotesque stirs within the abyssal depths, an abominable watcher whose presence seeps into the marrow with chilling certainty. The murky waters heave with slow ripples, the vile and eldritch writhing of creatures unseen—sea worms, he suspects, though they bear a loathsome implication beyond mortal comprehension.

Terror mounts, yet his mind, on the precipice of madness, perceives this monstrous sight as a portal to a fate more dreadful than death itself. In a final, fevered surge of defiance, he chooses oblivion, preferring the cold embrace of the depths to the inexorable dread that looms above. Casting himself toward the submerged ruins, his fate hangs in shadow, uncertain and terrible—a whispered legend lost to the blackened tide.

I have rekindled a hallowed ritual in this spectral October—a ritual devoted to imbibing, daily, a single tale drawn from the ominous corpus of H. P. Lovecraft, the master of cosmic horror. Today, I partook of “Hypnos,” a tale whose dark currents struck deeply within me, for I myself am a diligent chronicler of dreams. Of late, a torrent of visions has visited my slumber, compelling me to inscribe them with a meticulousness borrowed from Jung’s own technique—capturing not only the echoes of feeling but also the symbols and archetypes, the nebulous associations and strange, recurrent themes that float in shadowed patterns across my nights. Though many dreams are mundane, there are others that, upon awakening, draw me into long hours of contemplation, teasing at mysteries I cannot quite grasp. Yet none—none—approach the dread majesty or monstrous awe of those Lovecraft has conjured forth.

Death is merciful, for there is no return therefrom, but with him who has come back out of the nethermost chambers of night, haggard and knowing, peace rests nevermore.

In “Hypnos,” a sculptor reveals the tale of his strange and sinister bond with a mysterious figure encountered in the shadowed corridors of a railway station. From the first glimpse of the stranger’s “immense, luminous eyes”—those piercing orbs which seemed to harbor secrets beyond mortal comprehension—the narrator felt an unearthly kinship, an alliance with one whose presence stirred the latent mysteries of his soul. Together, they embarked upon dream-like voyages, traversing surreal and otherworldly realms that defied all human understanding, venturing ever closer to the edge of cosmic truth.

Yet, over time, the stranger’s ambitions grew monstrous, as he became possessed by the idea of wielding these hidden powers to rule over all existence. The narrator, though drawn to the abyss, recoiled from this dread aspiration. Through the use of strange potions and drugs, they evaded sleep, clinging to the waking world with fevered desperation. But each journey left them increasingly haggard, haunted by visions that lurked beyond description. One fateful night, the stranger fell into an unbreakable slumber. In horror, the sculptor found himself alone, surrounded by police, who informed him that his companion was nothing more than a statue, a bust inscribed with the name ΥΠΝΟΣ (Hypnos).

Today, as a gift unto myself, I have granted leave from my daily labors to observe the passage of another year—a brief suspension of toil that I might ponder the strange, winding course of life. I awakened late, indulging in restful slumber, and turned then to meditation, sinking deep into the realms of my own mind. Later, I shall embark on a journey to Nuclear Comics, a peculiar temple of knowledge where I hope to unearth the haunting works of Bernie Wrightson, that celebrated architect of the macabre, whose imagination has sculpted unforgettable horrors—the tragic monstrosity of Frankenstein, the melancholy Swamp Thing, and countless grim illustrations, all rendered with Wrightson’s distinct, meticulous penwork. Truly, his visions capture the essence of dark genius, and I, a humble seeker, am eager to lay my hands upon them.

Of course, October draws me, as always, to the spectral works of H. P. Lovecraft himself. Today, I indulged in “Herbert West—Reanimator,” the tale of grim reanimation and hubris that ensnares the reader in morbid fascination. The narrative, serialized initially for Lovecraft’s friend George Julian Houtain’s Home Brew, marks one of Lovecraft’s earlier forays into the themes of ghastly resurrection, a motif that has since permeated popular culture as a precursor to the modern zombie—a creature neither fully dead nor alive, a vessel of horror distilled. Though admittedly pulpy in tone, the work is no less deliciously macabre, an archetype of Lovecraftian depravity and eerie speculation.

The ghastly tale of “Herbert West—Reanimator” found, decades hence, a strange new life beyond the printed page. In the year 1985, it served as the foundation for the film Re-Animator, a chilling and grotesque interpretation that would birth a series of sequels and adaptations across various media—a testament to the tale’s enduring, morbid allure. Indeed, this cinematic incarnation brought forth a remarkable thespian, one Jeffrey Combs, whose portrayal of the titular West has since become iconic. Combs, I confess, I have watched with a fascinated eye through the years as his career has woven through realms of horror and the uncanny, an actor bound—whether by fate or by providence—to the shadowed legacy of Lovecraft’s own making.

Come, let us recount today’s tale, “Herbert West–Reanimator.”

It is uncommon to fire all six shots of a revolver with great suddenness when one would probably be sufficient, but many things in the life of Herbert West were uncommon.

“Herbert West—Reanimator” chronicles the dread-infused exploits of Dr. Herbert West, a man driven by an insatiable lust to conquer death itself. West, a student of medicine at the shadowy Miskatonic University, envisions the human body as naught but a sophisticated machine, susceptible to “restarting” if only the proper key could be found. Thus, his dark obsession leads him to concoct a bizarre serum—a blend of science and sorcery—to restore life to dead tissue. Yet his ambitions falter in the face of reality, for his serum’s efficacy must be proven on human subjects. Lacking access to the cadavers necessary for his work, West resorts to grotesque methods, accompanied always by the unnamed narrator—a reluctant partner in these morbid ventures.

In an isolated farmhouse, far from prying eyes, West and his companion commence their grisly undertakings. Corpses are exhumed from fresh graves by hired hands, only for each experiment to result in grotesque failure. Driven by desperation, West and the narrator take to the graves themselves, retrieving the body of a recently killed laborer, only for the unholy concoction to unleash an ear-splitting scream from the lifeless form before flames devour the farmhouse—a fitting end to such profane deeds. Yet, West, undeterred, pursues his dread mission.

When access to corpses proves scarce, fate deals West with a grimly serendipitous boon: a typhoid outbreak. With a steady stream of freshly deceased bodies, West escalates his experimentation, injecting victims of the pestilence with an improved serum. Most prove unresponsive, displaying only the faintest hints of reanimation—save for Dr. Allen Halsey, West’s mentor and adversary, whom West, in a perverse homage, chooses as his latest subject. Halsey rises once more, but as a ferocious, degraded mockery of his former self, brutalizing those in his path before finally succumbing to madness and incarceration. West laments that Halsey’s deterioration was due to his delay—a rueful reminder of the delicate balance his work demands.

Relocating to Bolton, West and his now equally damned companion resume their experiments, settling near a cemetery to ensure a steady supply of bodies. The story reaches new heights of horror with the acquisition of a prize specimen—a boxer felled in an illicit brawl. When their serum fails, they bury the cadaver, only to later encounter it at their very doorstep, its decayed form clasping the severed limb of a child. Overcome with revulsion and dread, West destroys the abomination, cursing the monstrous path his work has carved.

In time, West develops a preservation serum, allowing him to delay decay at the precise moment of death. He preserves a traveling salesman who perishes unexpectedly, awaiting his partner’s return to continue the blasphemous rites. Reanimated, the corpse implicates West in his own death—a haunting whisper that sparks terror and suspicion in the narrator, whose trust in his companion begins to fray.

Years later, in the carnage of World War I, West plumbs even darker depths. In a wartime medic tent, he befriends Major Clapham-Lee, a fellow physician intrigued by West’s grotesque experiments. When Clapham-Lee perishes, his head nearly severed by a crash, West seizes the opportunity. The reanimated trunk spasms violently, Clapham-Lee’s head screaming out in undying agony—a manifestation of death defied. A well-timed bomb obliterates the laboratory, though West remains haunted by the specter of a vengeful, headless medic.

Upon returning to civilian life, West grows increasingly paranoid, haunted by thoughts of his past sins returning to claim him. One fateful night, news reaches them of an attempted break-in at the asylum where Halsey was held—a raid led by none other than a wax-headed figure that could only be Clapham-Lee himself. Shortly thereafter, West receives a sinister visitation: an entourage bearing a sealed box. Filled with dread, West commands that the box be burned, but the conflagration summons an unspeakable fate. Figures emerge from the shadows—once-men, victims of West’s cruel ambitions—tearing through the house as they descend upon their creator. With grim resolve, West accepts his doom; his life ends in the jaws of his own unnatural children.

Our narrator, left alone in the aftermath, offers his tale in fragmented whispers, for no soul shall believe the horrors he has witnessed. The walls have been rebuilt; the catacombs sealed. Yet, in the narrator’s fevered mind, the knowledge of what truly transpired lingers—a dissonant echo in the dark corridors of sanity.

Twenty-seven days into my rekindled habit of delving, with dread and reverence, into the arcane works of the master of cosmic horror, H. P. Lovecraft, I find myself at last arriving at one of the most sublime and unsettling tales ever penned by that mad scribe of unfathomable terrors: “The Music of Erich Zann.”

What is it, I muse, that draws me with such fearful admiration to this particular tale and lifts it above the shadow-haunted corpus I have consumed thus far? It is a question I had not fully pondered until today’s reading, as the eldritch tones of Zann’s viol once again filled my soul with disquiet. Perhaps it is the setting, that strange and nameless street—Rue d’Auseil—with its claustrophobic, ancient buildings huddled together beneath a brooding, oppressive sky. Or maybe it is the squalid, forlorn chamber where Zann, a mute German of strange and haunted countenance, plies his ungodly trade. How curious that, no matter how fervently the narrator seeks, the cursed Rue d’Auseil can never again be found on any earthly map. Yet I know that neither the place nor the isolation of the reclusive Zann truly grips my imagination, what sinks its talons into my very mind.

No, the truth is far more insidious. It lies in the dreadful mystery of what unspeakable visions lurk beyond Zann’s accursed window, concealed behind heavy, shrouded drapery that quivers in the night as though straining to contain a hideous, otherworldly force. And it is the sound—the alien, maddening strains of Zann’s viol—emanating not from a mere instrument but some cosmic gateway to that which should not be known. What arcane melodies, what ghastly harmonies, did Zann conjure from beyond the veil of human understanding? My mind reels with the horror of it as I realize I am far from his modern Laundry Files series; Charles Stross invoked this same sinister motif—a testament to the enduring terror of Zann’s music, which resonates even in the most blasphemous of contemporary minds.

It would be useless to describe the playing of Erich Zann on that dreadful night. It was more horrible than anything I had ever overheard, because I could now see the expression of his face, and could realise that this time the motive was stark fear.

In “The Music of Erich Zann,” we follow the fateful descent of a nameless student of metaphysics, destitute and weary, who seeks shelter in the dilapidated Rue d’Auseil—a steep, cobbled street seemingly forgotten by both time and the sane world. Zann, a mute viol player of unnerving reclusion, dwells atop the highest floor of a decaying edifice among its meager and shadowy inhabitants. Night after night, the student hears the unearthly, nerve-shattering music emanating from the old man’s quarters—melodies that scrape the soul, beckoning the student with their unholy allure.

When the student finally gains entry to Zann’s inner sanctum, what he finds defies rational explanation. Frantic and wild-eyed, Zann plays with fevered intensity, as though his music alone holds back some invisible, malevolent presence from beyond the window. And then, in that final, unspeakable moment—the window shatters, the night outside devours the papers that might have explained the abominable truth, and through the gaping void, the student sees not the city below but a vast, black infinity—an abyss where no man’s gaze should ever fall.

The horror, once glimpsed, cannot be forgotten. And though the student fled that cursed room, that malignant street, he is haunted still by what he saw—or rather, by what he could never fully comprehend. For Rue d’Auseil, the truth of Zann’s music is lost to him forever. No map bears the street’s name, and no inquiry will bring it to light. It is as though the whole place—like the awful music itself—existed only on the threshold of reality, a whisper of madness on the brink of oblivion.

And thus, the mystery lingers, unresolved, lurking in the shadowy corners of the mind, as one asks: What horrors did Erich Zann see? What unspeakable melodies did he play to keep the darkness at bay? The answers are lost, perhaps mercifully so, in the eternal void beyond the window.

Five days remain in this most hallowed tradition I have rekindled—this dark ritual of reading one tale each day during the sinister month of October, drawn from the dread corpus of that ineffable master of cosmic horror, H. P. Lovecraft. It is no small coincidence, then, that today’s reading, “The Other Gods,” should coincide with the gathering known, in euphemism, as my grandson’s so-called “Harvest Festival.” Oh, how they attempt to mask its true nature beneath pastoral pretense, but none are deceived! For the air is thick with the revelry of costumed children—those harbingers of something far older, far darker, than they know. Ghosts, vampires, and creatures of unspeakable eldritch ancestry scuttle across the fields, playing games for tributes of sugary indulgence and venturing into what they believe is a mere “haunted castle.”

Yet the disguises are not perfect. Among the specters of folklore wander apparitions clothed in the garb of anime and superheroes, modern-day idols of a distracted age. No matter that the air hangs heavy at 77 degrees, and that beneath masks and layers of fabric some may fall prey to the sun’s cruel heat. I gaze upon mothers who have taken on the mantle of witches and fathers—foolishly—adorning themselves with the logos of death metal bands like Entombed. The laughter, the merriment—it is all but a mask. They call it a “Harvest Festival,” yet we, who have delved into the forbidden lore, know better. We gather here for darker reasons, unspoken but understood by those who dare to see beyond the veil.

Now, I turn to today’s reading, whose lines tremble with the names of long-forbidden places: Ulthar, where no man may kill a cat; unknown Kadath, that dread, unreachable city of the gods; and the ominous Pnakotic Manuscripts, those repositories of knowledge mankind was not meant to possess. Ah, how the tendrils of these eldritch realms weave through Lovecraft’s many tales, binding us closer to the great and terrible unknown that lurks just beyond the fragile shell of our world!

The wisdom of Barzai hath made him greater than earth’s gods, and against his will their spells and barriers are as naught; Barzai will behold the gods, the proud gods, the secret gods, the gods of earth who spurn the sight of men!

Barzai the Wise, high priest of Hatheg-Kla and prophet of unutterable mysteries, stood as one accursed with knowledge, for in his veins ran the eldritch blood of antiquity, and his mind was haunted by the forgotten lore of the Great Ones—the “gods of earth,” beings revered by mortals but ever elusive. His quest, driven by a mad thirst to behold these celestial powers face to face, led him to the accursed slopes of Hatheg-Kla. Accompanied by the trembling Atal, his youthful disciple, Barzai’s ascent was filled with a sense of dark destiny, as the winds whispered secrets known only to those doomed to blasphemous revelations.

Upon reaching the dread summit, Barzai’s countenance shifted from triumph to terror, for the air grew thick with the presence of something far more terrible than the Great Ones themselves. The “gods of earth,” frail and ephemeral, were not alone in their dominion, for they were but puppets, mere playthings of an older, far darker pantheon—the “Other Gods,” nameless entities from the outer hells, watchers over the feeble earthbound deities, their malice unspeakable, their gaze upon Barzai a curse of eternal madness.

With a shriek that echoed through the aeons, Atal fled in terror down the mountainside, his soul forever scarred by the glimpse of unholy truth. Of Barzai, nothing remained but an emptiness more profound than the void between stars. No mortal eye ever beheld him again, and it is whispered in forgotten corners of the world that his doom was woven into the very fabric of the abyss, claimed by powers too vast and too hideous for the frail mind of man to comprehend.