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unless otherwise stated, all content is copyright © 2000
by Jeff VanderMeer

site design by
Garry Nurrish

this site is best viewed with ms internet explorer and a screen res. of 800x600

One of the best side benefits of creating author web sites is the unlimited access to the writer's computer. It's pretty easy to just slip onto their hard drive and read their personal files. For months now, I've been dipping into Jeff's personal diary entries. Most of them are turgid, boring, and practically indecipherable. However, every once in a while something interesting pops up - something that really deserves a wider audience. So I thought I'd post a few from time to time on this tiny little sub-page. Just for kicks...I call this first series "The Black Spot".
- Garry Nurrish, web site designer

12/1/99
The bastards from Service Merchandise didn't deliver the bean bag chair today after all. How am I supposed to get any writing done without a proper chair? The Iron Maiden torture chamber I currently sit on is enough to stifle any creativity. How can you call yourself an artist and not have a comfortable chair? Anyway, I guess today was an okay day, except no one at my day job asked me about my writing, which sucked because I had just sold "Ghost Dancing With Manco Tupac" to an anthology. I even had the contract sitting right there on my desk so someone might feel compelled to ask "What's that", which would be my cue. I thought for sure Scott or Pete might ask, but nope. Nothing. No problem, though - I can always find a way to sneak the subject into a conversation tomorrow. The only blemish - pun intended - on this day, really, is finding this stupid black spot on the inside of my left thumb. Just saw it now, while writing this journal entry. It's about the size of a dot a pen would make if you jabbed a piece of paper. It doesn't hurt or anything, but it does kind of worry me the more I look at it. What if it's a melanoma or something? NOTE TO SELF: Get the spot checked out.

12/2/99
Still no friggin chair. And the Service Merchandise guy acts like its somehow my fault whenever I call to check up on the status. Got Locus in the mail today. They still haven't reviewed The Early History. What the hell's wrong with them? It's been out for almost a month. I know the publisher sent them copies. Instead, they've got a write up on Charles De Lint. Charles De Lint, for chrissakes. I mean, everybody already knows everything there is to know about De Lint. Another wasted review. Not to mention reviews of Silverberg. Silverberg's a fossil. He must be 200 years old. He's Methuselah from a Heinlein novel. Who cares what he's doing? If those reviewers actually read The Early History, could they honestly say that whatever Silverberg came up with was in the least bit original? Worse yet, who's this Jonathan Lethem guy everybody's raving about. It's like you turn your back for five seconds and five new writers pop up that're everybody's favorites. Oh well. At least there was no mention of Ellison for once. That was a relief...That stupid spot, the more I look at it, seems a lot bigger. Ann says I'm seeing things, but I'm not sure. I took a look at it with a magnifying glass. It's black all right. Kind of shiny. And it really does look like it's getting bigger. A lot bigger. NOTE TO SELF: Remember to do something about the damn spot.

12/4/99
Horrendous day at work. I had to take about 20 tech support calls from folks who've never used a computer before. One woman just got a manual, not the actual program, and tried to recreate the screens in Word!! And those tyrants, Scott and Pete, both wanted documentation for various projects from me. If you're so talented, why don't you go produce some documentation, I felt like saying. But when I got home, there was the bean bag chair in all its glory! And in the wrong color! A lovely pea/vomit green. I swear - it looked like the Jolly Green Giant had just dropped a huge pea in our living room. Thus began a feverish series of calls to Service Merchandise. And while I'm dialing, I look at my damn thumb again - and I swear the spot looks even bigger than before. I'm looking at it now, while I write. It's got to be bigger. It's practically the size of a hub cap. What if it is bigger? What if I've got cancer or something? Shit. What if they have cut it off? NOTE TO SELF: GO TO THE DOCTOR! FOR REAL! THIS IS IMPORTANT! Now that I'm looking at it again, the bean bag chair doesn't seem quite so grotesque. Not much in the mail today. No answer yet from any of the five billion editors looking at my work. I hate waiting for editors. I hate this damn bean bag chair - who am I fooling? I hate this damn black spot.

12/5/99
Played a few good games of racquetball tonight. Almost had to break up a fight between Chris and Mike again, but that always happens. Had a great idea for a story on the way home, too: This guy is a meticulous gardener, only he lives next door to a nuclear plant and his garden gets infested with these genetically-scrambled "super gophers" and the whole plot of the story is this guy trying ever more desperate means to get rid of the gophers. And the gophers begin to learn to speak from watching television through the window and since he watches John Wayne movies, they taunt him every night in voices that sound like dozens of John Waynes, and he slowly begins to go mad. Tentative title: "Like a Gopher Stuck in a Hole"...I wonder if the black spot is due to some kind of radiation poisoning? I remember back in Gainesville, when I worked for IFAS, seeing a two-tailed skink one day when I was walking near the chemistry building. Could it be something from when I went to college. Some kind of residual poisoning? NOTE TO SELF: GET IT CHECKED OUT. I measured it today and it seems bigger than it was (although, to be fair, this is the first time I ever measured it). Which reminds me - I still have to decide on what story rough drafts I should keep and which not. I really ought to keep everything just in case. I just remember horror stories about writers who tossed all their drafts and then got famous and had nothing to give all the universities that came calling for all their old crap. Of course, I could probably forge a few pages if it came to that. The bean bag chair's color has grown on me, but I have to say it is not as comfortable to use while writing as I thought it would be. I keep feeling like I'm rolling off the stomach of a giant that just ate a lot of cottage cheese. It's hard to keep the laptop straight, too, balancing it on my knees.

12/6/99
I'm fucked. I'm going to die. I haven't told Ann yet because I don't want her to worry, but I'm dead. The black spot has got to be at least TWICE the size it was before. It's got to be the size of a spot of ink on a piece of paper if you let a felt-tip pen touch the paper for a second or two. Tomorrow I'll schedule an appointment. This bean bag chair is really hard on the ass. Who would have guessed? At work today I tried not to spoil things for my co-workers Michelle, Leigh, Paul, and Gwen by being too down. Why should they have to share in my pain if they don't have to? I saw them laughing in the hallway and said to myself: that was me once. Today I got my 225th rejection from the New Yorker. However, it was kind of balanced out by an acceptance from The Hopscotch Quarterly, a crafts magazine out of Hoboken, New Jersey. I sold them a poem on quilting. Don't know how long I can keep the truth from Ann. She usually picks up on these things.

12/7/99
I've got to return this fucking bean bag chair. Like I thought, I couldn't hold back from telling Ann, but I was pretty brave about it, I think. I didn't cry. I told her about the spot, about the cancer, about my trip to the doctor tomorrow. Was she sympathetic? No. She just RUBBED AT THE DAMN SPOT UNTIL IT CAME RIGHT OFF!!!!!! "There," she said. "It was just a bit of grit. Maybe you ought to wash your hands a little more thoroughly." I was aghast - outraged! "You've removed the only marker of the disease that is eating right through me!" I said. "How am I supposed to know how fast it is spreading now?!?!" That's when she told me to snap out of it and slapped me. Sometimes I just don't understand women at all. Won't she be sorry when the doctor tells me I'm right. NOTE TO SELF: START THINKING ABOUT WRITING A WILL.

12/11/99
Am chagrined to report that the doctor agreed with Ann. I'm not sure I agree with either of them. Damn store wouldn't take the bean bag chair back. No one at work has asked about my work in weeks. There's this brown discoloration on one of my toes that kind of worries me. NOTE TO SELF: SELL THE CHAIR AND CHECK YOUR TOES OUT - THOROUGHLY!

7/1/00
Well, VanderMeer still hasn't sent his check - his latest excuse being that a bunch of 8 year-old Israeli terrorists disguised as pumpkins fire-bombed his local post office (does he really expect anyone to believe this?).

So, are you sick of this VanderMeer guy yet? You should be. Why not check out this site instead:

www.redsine.com

You still here? What are you? A glutton for punishment or something? Just to make it a little easier for you, here's some fiction - forget VanderFiction, this is REAL fiction:

There was a man. He ate a sausage. Slowly. Later, he died. Quietly.

See? Short, straight to the point, no huge words that make you reach for your arm-numbing over-size dictionary, and - of course - brilliant!