Hodgepodge

This section of my site is an assortment of things I’ve created over the past few decades, with no unifying theme. (Plus a few pieces created by other people, as noted.)

I created and posted a lot of this material in the 1990s, with the general idea that if I had written something fun and/or entertaining and/or useful, I might as well post it. In 2023, I moved these pieces from being standalone web pages to being part of my WordPress site; in most cases, I didn’t make any changes other than cosmetic ones.

So some of this material is dated or otherwise no longer relevant. In most cases, I’m leaving it up anyway, mostly just because I hate to see stuff that has appeared online go away.

Fiction

Some short fiction I’ve written.

  • The Flood

    An erotica story, set in the 1930s, first published in Wet: More Aqua Erotica in 2002.

  • The Last of the Zeppelins

    A pulse-pounding red-blooded two-fisted World War II tale of American hero Hugh Betcha and his trusty ferret Scraps, first published in All-Star Zeppelin Adventure Stories in 2004.

  • The Secret Life of Humphrey Milquer

    An erotica story—a pastiche of “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”—first published in Clean Sheets in 2000.

  • All Through the Night

    A short-short story about predators at a kind of a never-ending party, first published in BEM in 1990.

  • Playing Hearts

    A brief unpublished piece, written in 1996.

  • The Crystal Terraces of Sanfra Nabisco

    A surreal and odd brief piece, first published in the APA SWAPA in 1990.

  • A Rose on Lincoln’s Grave

    An offbeat fragment in a free-associating, malapropping style. First published in the APA Eyeheart in 1993.

Code

Assorted pieces of software and software-related material.

Nonfiction

Essays, math, humor, and other pieces of nonfiction.

Verse

Poems and filks and such.

Tall Tales

Three “tall tales” that I wrote for the alt.callahans newsgroup.

Fiction exercises

Brief pieces I’ve written as writing exercises.

  • Fishers

    A ten-minute timed writing exercise about fisherfolk.

  • Small and Cold

    A ten-minute timed writing exercise about small cold beings.

  • Let There Be Darkness

    A ten-minute timed writing exercise about the end of the world.

  • Screaming Clay

    A ten-minute timed writing exercise about kids being cruel to their toys.

  • Louise

    A ten-minute timed writing about the aftermath of a relationship. (Content warning for ominous hints at domestic violence.)

Work by others

Pieces that I didn’t create, but am hosting.