Have you ever had a slump that lasted far longer than seems possible? Like for years? And you’re unsure why the passions that meant the world to you for decades became pale and wavering, weary symbols of a better self you feel is dead and gone?

But then you find yourself tearing your office apart to find a roll of sticky dots to affix to the back of a piece of plastic that you press against your shower tiles to hold up your razor but you can’t find them? And as you are digging around in the back of your filing cabinet, you find a stack of old ‘zines that reminded you that once you were a person who constantly found interesting things to share with people? That once the world was a fascinating place full of interesting people with interesting ideas doing interesting things and you somehow forgot? Has that happened to you?

Just me?

Regardless, I never found the sticky glue dots but found a cache of ‘zines, some old, some more recent, and as I was looking through them, I felt something similar to the feeling I had when I launched this site. There is a world of fascinating, interesting people making fascinating, interesting things and I found myself wanting to talk about my stack of ‘zines. I have stacks of interesting things all over this house that I want to share.

It’s kind of weird, how a micro ‘zine about dangerous trees can be the fuel that rekindles your desire to salvage your fifteen-year-old site, but in a way it makes perfect sense.

It’s a piece of paper. It truly is a micro ‘zine. But in that piece of paper, someone organized data, arranged it artfully, folded it carefully and shared their passion for savage trees. It’s a labor of love spurred on by a sort of incredulous awe that we live in a world wherein there are trees that are suicidal. Trees that explode. Trees that can kill you 100 years after they are dead.

Arboreal Nightmares discusses six horrible trees that a city-dweller like me has never encountered and never would have imagined existed. This is the stuff of dark fairy tales. These are the trees that remind you that the world is so much more than it appears to be, and even when it appears to be awful, it’s still very interesting if we pay attention. Interesting and awful beats the numb status quo every time.

My favorite tree in Arboreal Nightmares is hura crepitans, or the “fruit grenade.” Here’s what you need to know about this tree that really should be used in a horror movie sometime soon:

First, the benignly named Sandbox Tree is covered in large, vicious black spikes. Second, it produces fruit grenades. Upon ripening, the fruit of the Sandbox Tree explodes like a hand-grenade. The force of the explosion can send seeds 100 feet away at 150 mph. Anything or anyone in the way will not come away unscathed…

How can I stop writing about the things I read when I now know there are trees that can kill me with their exploding fruit? I realize this sentence may not make sense to a lot of you, but if it does, then you are the target audience for this site and I should create some sort of newsletter.

So I’m going to dig around in my ‘zines and write until October comes when we’ll take a sharp turn into horror territory. I’m worried that I can’t find my copy of Blow My Colon, the shitty convenience store job edition, but I did find my copy of Johnny Marr’s Murder Can Be Fun, the children edition. I’ve got hardcore Q-Anon proclamations, lots of horror movie analyses, old-school artistic shock, and so much more. I also ordered some new ones because I was so delighted at how just seeing this little bit of folded paper reignited my desire to talk to people about the odd stuff that comes across my radar.

I don’t have Arboreal Nightmares‘ author’s name, but if you are interested, you can find your own copy here.

I checked out the other little ‘zines this store offers and am pretty sure I will need to get a copy of the lighthouse murders and the reviews of various pumpkin-flavored foods.

See you here tomorrow when we’ll have a look at cats and horror films!