Afternoon Shorts: "Smile"

Coming Soon...

...Tainted Tea fliers!

If anyone is interested is posting fliers in their area, please shoot us an email at TaintedTea.Editors@gmail.com.

Recommended Reading II: Shane's Picks

This list took a bit to compile. I've read a lot of short horror stories, but here are a few that I love and could read (and actually have read) numerous times.

• "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" by Robert Louis Stevenson
• "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" by Washington Irving
• "Dracula's Guest" by Bram Stoker
• "A Ghost's Story" by Mark Twain
• "Genesis and Catastrophe: A True Story" by Roald Dahl
• "I'm Not Martin" by R.L. Stine
• "The Professor's Teddy Bear" by Theodore Sturgeon
• "The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe
• "Kittens" by Dean Koontz
• "Mirriam" by Truman Capote
• "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson

Kickass Trailer: "The Gingerdead Man"

It's pretty much Child's Play with a gingerbread man. To boot, IMDb.com shows that there are two sequels one of which is called The Gingerdead Man: The Passion of the Crust. Seriously...

Afternoon Shorts: "Little Red"

Read. And a Variety, too.

I highly enjoy stories that pull from everything: mythology, folklore, religion, literature, etc. It's just so much more refreshing than reading something where the writer just makes shit up about demons and ghosts and other various things. It seems more legitimate. More erudite, if you will.

Here's something to do in between (or let's face it, instead of) (and creators, you know the days I'm talking about) writing or drawing or whatever you do: Read a piece of folklore, mythology, or even a fairy tale each day. Just one story from someone's culture.

And who knows. Maybe you'll get inspired and create something of your own.

Troublesome City Folk?

I'm reading House by Frank Peretti and Ted Dekker. To be honest, I bought it solely on the basis of it's cover (mostly black, with a few bits of green thrown in, with a dark, gloomy house as the central image). It's your standard "couple (or in this case, couples) get stranded in the backwoods of the American south, find a seemingly conforting inn, only to get tortured by the demented Christians that run the inn."

And honestly, I'm a little weary of reading horror stories about demented Christians living in the backwoods of the American south torturing the shit out of scared city folk.

So, Tainted Tea readers, here's your challenge: Reverse it. Write a story about nice, smart country folk who get lost in the middle of the city, get seemingly saved by liberal, athesistic city folk, with trouble ensuing later.

Until then, I'm going to finish reading House.

Kickass Trailer: "Daybreakers"

Edward Dalton is a researcher in the year 2019, in which an unknown plague has transformed the world's population into vampires. As the human population nears extinction, vampires must capture and farm every remaining human, or find a blood substitute before time runs out.

However, a covert group of vampires makes a remarkable discovery, one which has the power to save the human race.

Source: FilmCentralHD YouTube Channel

Ancient Energy

There is something sensual, eerie and tantalizing about a lighthouse. They exude a vintage, gothic vibe from the way their lights pulsate like they're breathing. In, out, in, out...

Dominating even! Thrived and nourished by sailors. Without the lighthouse, their ships would be lured by the Siren's song, crashing onto the rocks.

As we wrap up the summer (what, three/four weeks?), what better theme than these candles on the water?

When I think of a lighthouse, I think of them as ghost houses: a wispy-haired woman standing over the edge as the spinning light casts her weeping silhouette on the humid, soggy sky; her white, ever-flowing dress is drenched from pelting rain as she waits for her sailor-lover to reuturn. (They were to be married.)

There a many stories of haunted lighthouses from the Yaquina Bay Lighthouse in Oregon to the ghost inhabiting both the Old Baldy and Cape Hatteras lighthouses. Do you know of any haunted lighthouses? Make one up if you don't.