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A Glass of Cabernet.

March 23, 2018 by Exangel

by Darren Payne.

If you go down to the Windwhistle of a Friday evening, you’ll see him there, always at the same table to the right of the fireplace, with his back to the big picture of King George V that hangs on the wall. He’s always alone.

You might find once in a while somebody will stop by to say hello and enquire as to his health, but generally he sits there alone, George does, with his pint of Tetley’s set before him on the table. He only ever has one. It’ll last him all night.

But, here’s what’s curious about old George. Set there on the other side of the table is a glass of Cabernet.

If you ask him who it’s for, he won’t tell. He’ll order it up from the bar along with his Tetley’s. Then he’ll saunter on over, place the Tetley’s and the wine on the table, pull out the chair at an angle and then slide it back in again as if there’s a lady-friend and he’s helping her sit down.

Old Joe, the landlord, hasn’t a clue. He said he used to ask George about the wine, but gave up in the end. George would just look at him blankly, take his drinks and head off into his corner. After the ritual with the chair, he slides in behind the table and plops himself down onto the faded oak bench. He rubs his hands together as if washing them and then takes a long swig from his pint.

What’s that you say? Anybody know who the wine is for? Not a soul. At least none that I’ve talked to and that’s everybody in the village and for several miles around. Nobody knows. Old Joe said he doesn’t care either. George can buy wine for whomever he wants, whether they exist or not.

But I’ll tell you something now that’ll stand your neck-hairs on end. By the time old Joe rings that bell come eleven o’clock of an evening, that wine glass is empty.

Yes, empty, I say. Don’t believe me do you?

Drinks it himself you say? Well, that’s as maybe, but nobody has seen him do it. Not even old Joe. He gets asked all the time too, but Joe swears up and down that he’s never seen him touch that glass from the moment he puts it on the table to the moment he walks out the door.

Once last year, a young lass from over Sydling way-Gillian I think her name is-came into the Windwhistle. Wild young thing she is. Well, she’d heard about George and the mysterious glass of wine. She went right on over, sat down opposite George and took a swig from the wine glass. There was a gale outside that night. Bitter cold it was, and Joe had stacked up a nice blaze in the fireplace so as would warm the blood of a judge. Well, Gillian lifted that glass and took a swig. Then her giggling stopped. She went white as a sheet and started shivering and quaking like she was out in the gale naked. Joe and I helped her out of that chair, but it took all the hot tea, blankets and a chair by the fire to get her warmed up again.

George just sat there. He didn’t utter a word, but calmly walked up to the bar and ordered another Cabernet.

Filed Under: EAP: The Magazine, Spring 2018: Coloring., Uncategorized

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In This Issue.

  • Who Was Dorothy?
  • Those Evil Spirits.
  • The Screaming Baboon.
  • Her.
  • A Tale of Persistence.
  • A Conversation with Steve Hugh Westenra.
  • Person Number Twelve.
  • Dream Shapes.
  • Cannon Beach.
  • The Muse.
  • Spring.
  • The Greatness that was Greece.
  • 1966, NYC; nothing like it.
  • Sun Shower.
  • The Withering Weight of Being Perceived.
  • Broken Clock.
  • Confession.
  • Francis Coppola’s Apocalypse.
  • Sometimes you die, I mean that people do.
  • True (from “My Life with Dogs”).
  • Fragmentary musings on birds and bees.
  • 12 Baking Essentials to Always Have in Your Poetry.
  • Broad Street.
  • A Death in Alexandria.
  • My Forked Tongue.
  • Swan Lake.
  • Long Division.
  • Singing against the muses.
  • Aphorisms from “What Remains to Be Said”.

In The News.

That cult classic pirate/sci fi mash up GREENBEARD, by Richard James Bentley, is now a rollicking audiobook, available from Audible.com. Narrated and acted by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio, you’ll be overwhelmed by the riches and hilarity within.

“Captain Sylvestre de Greybagges is your typical seventeenth-century Cambridge-educated lawyer turned Caribbean pirate, as comfortable debating the virtues of William Shakespeare, Isaac Newton, and compound interest as he is wielding a cutlass, needling archrival Henry Morgan, and parsing rum-soaked gossip for his next target. When a pepper monger’s loose tongue lets out a rumor about a fleet loaded with silver, the Captain sets sail only to find himself in a close encounter of a very different kind.

After escaping with his sanity barely intact and his beard transformed an alarming bright green, Greybagges rallies The Ark de Triomphe crew for a revenge-fueled, thrill-a-minute adventure to the ends of the earth and beyond.

This frolicsome tale of skullduggery, jiggery-pokery, and chicanery upon Ye High Seas is brimming with hilarious puns, masterful historical allusions, and nonstop literary hijinks. Including sly references to Thomas Pynchon, Treasure Island, 1940s cinema, and notable historical figures, this mélange of delights will captivate readers with its rollicking adventure, rich descriptions of food and fashion, and learned asides into scientific, philosophical, and colonial history.”

THE SUPERGIRLS is back, revised and updated!

supergirls-take-1

In The News.

Newport Public Library hosted a three part Zoom series on Visionary Fiction, led by Tod.  

And we love them for it, too.

The first discussion was a lively blast. You can watch it here. The second, Looking Back to Look Forward can be seen here.

The third was the best of all. Visions of the Future, with a cast of characters including poets, audiobook artists, historians, Starhawk, and Mary Shelley. Among others. Link is here.

In the News.

SNOTTY SAVES THE DAY is now an audiobook, narrated by Last Word Audio’s mellifluous Colby Elliott. It launched May 10th, but for a limited time, you can listen for free with an Audible trial membership. So what are you waiting for? Start listening to the wonders of how Arcadia was born from the worst section of the worst neighborhood in the worst empire of all the worlds since the universe began.

In The News.

If you love audio books, don’t miss the new release of REPORT TO MEGALOPOLIS, by Tod Davies, narrated by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio. The tortured Aspern Grayling tries to rise above the truth of his own story, fighting with reality every step of the way, and Colby’s voice is the perfect match for our modern day Dr. Frankenstein.

In The News.

Mike Madrid dishes on Miss Fury to the BBC . . .

Tod on the Importance of Visionary Fiction

Check out this video of “Beyond Utopia: The Importance of Fantasy,” Tod’s recent talk at the tenth World-Ecology Research Network Conference, June 2019, in San Francisco. She covers everything from Wind in the Willows to the work of Kim Stanley Robinson, with a look at The History of Arcadia along the way. As usual, she’s going on about how visionary fiction has an important place in the formation of a world we want and need to have.

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