Dr. Dume ~ The Doctor is In

I've just watched 'Asylum', a film of Gore Factor Five and a decent premise. A crazed doctor tortures patients in his asylum - nothing unusual about that - but this one continues to do so after he's died, and after the asylum has been refitted and put to another use. No Dume would do such a thing. That's just rude.

It was the ending that irked me. Like so many such films, the police are involved in a series of mysterious disappearances throughout but are rarely present for the finale. So how do the surviving characters explain a) how they are the only ones who know where the bodies are and b) why their fingerprints are all over the place?

That lack of resolution at the end of many horror stories annoys me. Surely those characters who survive are going to be number one suspects for the killings? The police are not famed for their acceptance of paranormal antagonists, especially since the main character has vanquished the monster and has no corpse to show for it. They are unlikely to live happily ever after unless they are happy living in a cell. What happens after the demon dies? For the characters its's not the end of the story.

There is room for a story framed within a prison, where an inmate tells their story to a lawyer or visitor or psychiatric assessor. First person or third limited, because the only story you can tell is what the prisoner experienced for themselves.

Start with the prisoner led into the assessor's office and end with the assessor recommending the prisoner be sent to the new secure psychiatric prison. Which is, by pure chance, located in the exact, now refurbished, building where the prisoner fought the demon and won.

When the killings start again, who do you think will get the blame?

There's a sequel in there too.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 11:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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I'm a fan of B movies. Those low-budget horror tales with a cast of unknowns. Usually they are pretty badly done but sometimes you find something interesting.

'The Devil's Chair' is one such. The acting is pretty good although the old doctor overplays to Vincent Price proportions at times. There is a demon, there is a psychotic killer, there is a book of crazed lore, there is fantasy and there is a vision of the workings of a madman's mind. Oh, there's quite a bit of blood too.

It can be confusing. The plot twists come thick and fast towards the end and I can't describe them without ruining the film.

Worth a look. It certainly gave me ideas.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 01:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Senga has broached taboo subjects this week.

She wants to paint the nursery. Paint! No stone in Dume Towers has ever been tainted with paint. No Dume has ever attempted to colour the stones, ever. Paint! Doesn't she realise paint costs money? What is she thinking?

She also wants a holiday. She wants to go somewhere sunny, where people are friendly and there are distractions and activities galore.

No chance. I hate all that. So we're going to Wales. Cloud and boredom and scowling faces, just like home. She also expects this holiday to last two weeks but I'm sure I can curtail it, with a little effort.

I have an article to finish. Well, if I'm honest, I have an article to start. If I start them too early they ramble and get far too long, so I have to leave them to the last minute. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. Besides, I have all this procrastination to get through first. 

Senga is sulking. She has begun one of her three-day stony silences that she thinks is a form of punishment.

So I have three days of peace and quiet to write in.

Sounds good to me.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 09:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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The few who have commented here will notice it takes a while for them to come up. Appy-polly-logies, my droogies, for delaying your horrorshow comments (I believe that's how the young speak nowadays. I read it in a book. The village children still use 'gadzooks' and call each other 'poltroon'. We're a little behind the times here, and they have not the dook of an idea how to comport themselves in public, O my brothers. I, however, am more in tune with modern parlance, as you see).

For every real comment there are at least fifty nonsense ones. If you have commented and it never appeared, it might have gone into the 'junk' folder and been deleted. I can't read them all because whenever I go there I see a few hundred built up and delete them en masse.

So if you commented and it didn't appear, feel free to try again.

Except you spammers. For you, feel free to drive nails into your own heads and then heat the ends with a blowtorch.

If you're unsure quite how to do that, come and visit. I give lessons at reasonable rates. First session free.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 11:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Father's Day happened a few days ago. I forgot about it. Father will be furious. Just because he's dead is no reason to miss out, he says. 

I haven't seen him lately. He's probably sulking. He'll materialise next time I go to take a few pennies from the dungeon hoard. That always gets his attention. It is true that 'you can't take your money with you when you die', so Father has adopted the alternative approach. If he can't take it with him, he's staying here with it.

Senga claims I have no right to expect any kind of Father's Day treatment until the Dumelet emerges. This is unfair. I've done my part. What more can I do? On the other hand, considering that Father's Day presents include home-made explosives, poisons, deadly insects and swords on frayed threads hung delicately over sleeping heads, perhaps I shouldn't be in too much of a hurry. I can sleep easily at the moment. It won't last.

All this is severely curtailing my writing. What with Senga's constant requirements for attention, her unreasonable demands for money to buy food (we haven't had a visitor in ages), the agitation of the Ferals at the light nights, the Slimy Swamp Thing calling for a mate all night (it's Swamp Thing breeding season. No matter what's on the ground - diamonds, gold, anything - don't bend over), and the villagers having practise marches with pitchforks and torches, there's no time to think of anything to write about.

Ah well. Best go and apologise to Father again. He can't seem to grasp that the reason I've stopped trying to kill him for Father's Day is that he's already dead. It does seem futile to go to all the trouble for a present he already has. Perhaps I should just give him a card.

With a scorpion inside. That might cheer him up.

I wonder... would the ghost of a scorpion sting the ghost of a human? It has to be worth a try. He'd really love that.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 01:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

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Senga and I have spent a romantic evening watching '30 days of night', a film filled with delight, blood and untimely and unpleasant demise. It had an interesting version of vampires.

No Counts, no aristocracy, no frilled shirts, capes or canes, These vampires were more like Edward from the Local Shop than like Dracula.

Well worth seeing. A nice version of vampires as a creature with really only one drive.

If only ours were the same. Here, they aspire to politics as well as sucking blood.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 02:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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The Day is tomorrow, or rather later today. Senga is preened and washed down with paintstripper and Jeyes fluid, coated with rustproofing and whitewashed. So she's nearly ready but she smells like a garden centre next to a garage. I suppose the final coat of bleach will sort that out in the morning, just before I bolt the veil to her head.

I have spent the last couple of nights submitting a novel. I know, it's not very weddingy or whatever the word is but it's the first time in weeks she's let me alone long enough to do it. Besides, the publisher Sergeant Shelsky mentioned only accepts submissions during set months and submissions close the day after tomorrow. So I had to hurry. I have therefore been busy putting together a synopsis and other details for 'Jessica's Trap'. I was delighted to find that this publisher has very specific and very simple requirements for submissions. It's done, so I can relax a little, although there is another one to send out. 'Samuel's Girl' is ready to go and 'Norman's House' is in rewrite. 'Victor's Will' is a mess. I might have to do that one over from scratch. 'Demdike's Ambition' is only in notes and 'The Apocalypse Show' has an out-of-kilter title.

Plenty of time. Response time for submissions runs into months. I could have the second book out there before I hear about the first. I know, I said I'd only submit to agents but I'm bored with trying that. I can see the problem. Authors get maybe 10-15% of the cover price in royalties. Agents get a percentage of that percentage and that's where all their income comes from. They have to take on authors who will keep going, who aren't one-book-wonders. So, as the Sergeant said, prove you have more than one book in you and then talk to an agent. I like the way he thinks. Military precision. I should have expected that.

What, though, if there are no more in me? What if I'm played out? It's the terror of the writer, an irony of epic proportions in a horror writer but a terror nonetheless. What if Writer's Block hits? What is it, anyway?

I think I know.

Writers are, by nature, mad. They have to be. Who but a lunatic would sit and type out a whole novel, decide they don't like it and type it all out again? How crazy do you have to be to imagine stories whose sole purpose is to scare people senseless? When a writer goes mainstream, they earn respect and respect is what kills the muse, The muse doesn't want respect. The muse is a reprobate and a libertine and likes it that way. The muse does not want to be associated with suit-and-tie types, with cocktail parties and fast cars. The muse wants to hitch a ride on a tractor driven by a banjo-playing toothless maniac with webbed fingers. The muse wants to hit the booze and party. The muse wants to wake up under a bridge and have no recollection of how they arrived there. The muse wants madness, not sanity.

Sane people don't make up wild stories. Sane people work eight hours, sleep eight hours, play eight hours. Sane people care what the neighbours think.Sane people mow the lawn and wash the car and plant rows of pointless flowers and discuss the problem of lilacs with the neighbours. Sane people think along sane lines.

Writer's block, therefore, is sanity. When you are afflicted with sanity you can no longer drift into another world, you can no longer wonder why the Mr. Universe contest is only ever won by people from Earth, whether ghosts change their clothes or who found out that hemlock was poisonous. Sane people think along rigidly defined and logical lines.

It sounds disgusting. I hope it never happens to me.

There isn't much of a risk, really. If I was afflicted with sanity I wouldn't be marrying Senga and if I ever feel it coming on, there's an instant cure.

All I'd have to do is lift her veil.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 02:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

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I slept right through Halloween! And the Fifth of November, when in the UK it's traditional to poke some guy with a fork until he burns...I never did get the hang of it but it involves effigies and fire so I always go along.

It's Senga's fault. She was supposed to set my alarm for October 31st and she insists she did, but it made no sound at all. I am distraught.

Well, I suppose the next thing will be Christmas and the ceremonies to invoke the guy in the red suit who likes fireplaces. That's never worked before either.

Senga is still on about having the place monitored. I fitted new eyes into Great-Uncle Caligula and hung him on a bush outside, but I don't think that's going to be enough to satisfy her. Cameras, she says. Cameras. I hate cameras.

They cost money.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 02:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Yesterday, I had a visitor. Apparently he came from the local council and was investigating a report that I might have committed a bin crime.

I raised my eyebrows at that. I had no idea there was such a crime. “What,” I asked him, “is a bin crime?”

He coughed, an action that caused the Adam’s apple in his scrawny throat to bounce as if it were connected to his jaw by elastic. “The council have noticed that no waste is ever collected from here and some of the locals suspect you of dumping your rubbish illegally. I am authorised to enter your premises and inspect your waste disposal facility.”

“Really?” My waste disposal facility, if you can call it that, is a chute into the deeper recesses of the swamp. I prefer to think of it as a form of oubliette, similar in function to the ones in the lower reaches of the dungeons.

“Yes,” he said. “Really. If you prevent me entering your premises, I can impose a fine and return with the police.”

A fine. One of those maniacal ideas where they take money from you but provide nothing in return. Well, I had no real objection to him entering anyway and had no intention of parting with money, so I let him in. Once I had shown him the way to the chute, I settled in front of the computer to find more about this law.

He returned just as I noticed something very interesting indeed.

“I’m afraid, Mr. Dume, that your waste disposal facility contravenes Health and Safety regulations and is an environmental hazard. You are polluting the swamp.”

“It’s Dr. Dume,” I said. “Health and safety? This castle contains neither of those things. Never has. And I am not polluting the swamp. I am feeding it. It likes bones.”

“Well, I’ll have to make a full report to my superiors.” He folded his little book and pursed his little lips. “I can assure you, this will result in a prosecution.”

“Just a moment.” I rose from my chair and palmed one of the sedative darts I keep in strategic places all over the castle. You never know when a Feral might get in. “As you said, the law does state that I have to allow you entry on demand. In fact, I found over four hundred laws that allow such a thing.”

“That’s right.” He puffed out his chest as far as it would go. Not very far. “You cannot deny entry to the officers of the Council.”

“Correct.” I moved between him and the door. “However, not one of those laws states that, once inside, I have to let you leave.”

It was impressive to note the speed of his brain. Comprehension only dawned on him after the dart landed in his neck. Not one of my brightest subjects but what the heck. There are four hundred laws that say I have to let these people in and I will be more than happy to comply in each and every case. There’ll be more.

I put him in the cell opposite the training cell. My new assistant has stopped screaming now so he’ll sleep well. Tomorrow, I’ll show him the laboratory.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 08:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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When I was fresh from the chrysalis, I heard the tale of an elderly uncle, Dorian Dume.

He had come across a magical recipe. Using this, he could arrange for a portrait of himself to age while he stayed the same forever. Overexcited, he rushed the spell without reading the guidelines properly.

He messed it up and performed the spell the wrong way round. The picture stayed the same and he grew older. Many, it seems, have made this same mistake, judging by the plethora of portraits in galleries nowadays.

Let that be a cautionary tale to all. Guidelines are important.

If Uncle Dorian had read them properly, he wouldn't be dead now.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 06:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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I haven't laughed so hard since the last time.

The Professor put up a post on UFO's to explain why he doesn't study them and within hours, the loonies descended upon him.

He's trying to use logic on them and it's not working. That last comment is so far out he's never going to be able to find an answer. He's speechless, and that's a rare occurrence!

He doesn't see that many of these people are attracted to fringe science simply because it's fringe. They don't want it brought into the mainstream. They don't want scientists to pick apart their pet subjects. They want it left as 'fringe' so they can keep it to themselves.

Romulus keeps trying to put a serious face on the paranormal but he's beating his head on a wall. Which reminds me - I haven't beat Stumpy's head against a wall for a while. Maybe later.

He's between a rock and a hard place. On one side are the mainstream scientists who won't even look at his subject. On the other are the lunatics (you just have to believe, man) who don't want him taking their toys away.

I once worried that he might succeed in proving the afterlife. My worries were unfounded. Mainstream science will never accept any evidence because the lunatic fringe will always pop up to destroy his credibility. No matter how careful he is, no matter how precise his experiments, the nuts will pop out of the woodwork to mess it up every time.

I'll have to tell this story to Death on his next visit. He'll be laughing until Judgement Day.

Anyway, back to that article. Only a few days left. I've decided on a Frankenstein approach because I haven't touched on that in a long time, and because Stumpy opened an overstuffed storage cupboard and gave me the idea.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 11:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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I did make New Year Resolutions, but as my record of keeping such resolutions can best be described as 'abysmal', I hold out little hope.

it occurred to me that if I make them public I might be more inclined to actually do something about them. On the other hand, six months from now I could just delete this entry so it's not as fixed as it might be.

So here they are.

1. Find an agent, or failing that, find a publisher for Samuel's Girl. Revise it as much as necessary to achieve this.

2. Lose some weight.

3. Spend less (my personal favourite).

Now, you would think that losing weight and spending less should work together, surely? Losing weight means eating less food, therefore buying less food. The principle to weight loss is actually extremely simple.

1. Eat less food.

2. Repeat until thin.

3. If you are offered a job as a catwalk model, you've gone too far.

Therefore eating less should save money, yes? Yet it seems the world is full of diets that involve eating less but spending more! It makes no sense at all. Rather like those energy-efficient systems that cost more than they save.

I'm not spending money on nutrition-free 'bulking up' powders that work, as far as I can tell, in the same way as cement. I'm just going to eat less. Logic tells me that will work. I'll soon find out.

Unfortunately logic doesn't help me with resolution one. That's pretty much down to a combination of chance and bloody-minded persistence. The first isn't under my control but the second one is. Bloody-minded persistence it is then. I can do that.

And it might take my mind off food.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 04:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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I concede that, on this occasion, Stumpy was right. Sword fighting is not as easy as it looks.

When my arm grows back, I'll give him a thrashing. 

In the meantime, this is going to severely affect my typing speed for the next few days.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 02:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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The Spammers are at the gate. So comment moderation is on. I hope that doesn't cause a glitch.

On a separate note, Stumpy insists that sword-fighting is difficult. Ridiculous, I said. It's a long blade you swing around. How hard can it be?

He says he's going to demonstrate over the weekend. Shouldn't be a problem. He can't reach too far.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 05:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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I've noticed a tendency in American films for the bad guy to always be English. Not just English, but upper-class, what-ho, by-jingo English.

Not being English myself, and having met a few of them, I can see why that might be, but once in a while Hollywood take it just that little bit too far.

I watched 'Dreamcatcher' recently. An excellent film, featuring the sort of mouth dentists dream about. The heroes are American, naturally, since it's an American film, and the bad guy is, once more, English. The trouble is that this time, the bad guy is from another planet.

Now, the English did indeed have an empire once, but I honestly don't think it was that big.

Posted by Dr. Dume at 02:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

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Canada has a new serial killer (time to die, eh?).

Robert Pickton stands accused of the murder and expert butchery of 26 women. He claims to have killed 49, and wanted one more to make a neat round number before he was arrested.

Oh, we all say that. 30 is a neat round number, but then nobody arrests you, so you do one more and then you have to get to 40. Still no arrest, so you're on your way to 50.

Nobody wants to be arrested on an untidy number. Bad luck, Bob. Perhaps you should have given yourself up at 10. Or maybe you should have been more careful.

It seems his freezer contained two heads, sawn in half vertically and the brains removed. Can't say I care for brains myself. Too much fat. Texture like scrambled eggs but no real taste. And no, it doesn't make you smarter. That should be obvious, since if you're eating someone's brains then they can't have been smarter than you - or they'd be eating yours. So there won't be any improvement.

I wonder what he did with them, and with all the others? Perhaps he had them with fava beans and a nice chianti, eh?

Posted by Dr. Dume at 01:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

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