Twilight Zone Nightmares: A Diary of Magecraft Contest!

Picture this: You're in your bed. It's late at night. Suddenly, you're inexplicably caught in a world somewhere between the realms of wakefulness and sleep. You see and sense things that neither you or anyone else can explain, including visions of your own afterlife. And somehow, as you battle these unexpected emotions and sensations, you soon find yourself faced with a minor (or major) migraine; and all you want to do now is to put ice cubes on top of your forehead.....

You've just experienced an example of what your Dragonmaster often calls his "Twilight Zone Nightmares." Rod Serling always liked to tell people that, as he wrote, "The most important fear is the fear of the unknown working on you, which you cannot share with others." Well, this being Halloween, I'd like to do something to hopefully change all that; and, to that end, I am launching my first-ever contest, here in the pages of my Diary of Magecraft! Harken ye, then, to the deal:

Using between 80 to 150 words or more, describe your personal Twilight Zone Nightmares. Please e-mail your submissions to my pirate1_power@hotmail.com address; deadline for submissions is, naturally, October 31st, 2005. The five best descriptions will be posted in the Diary of Magecraft, and will receive e-mail greetings from me. My apologies for the short notice, by the way; your Dragonmaster has long believed in striking while ye iron is hot! The only rule, by the way, is this: don't make your descriptions too sick; those that don't meet my standards will be deleted!

Good luck, and I look forward to reading your responses!

He's the Cutest!

I watched 20/20 and Nightline last night. Both shows featured Barbara Walters going one-on-one with the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, His Majesty King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. My verdict: Like the title of the post says, King Abdullah is cute!

Look, call me an infidel all you want; the point is, like my Mortal-born alter ego Master Richard, your humble Dragonmaster sees beauty in all things and in all people, regardless of whether they sit on a throne or whether they sit on a common cardboard box. And don't deny it, ladies: if you watched the segments, too (and you know who you are!), chances are you were sitting there, wishing that King Abdullah could sweep you off of your feet and take you away from your boring, miserable lives [if not necessarily your equally boring, miserable husbands!].

And if I may, a brief rebuttal to Cindy Adams at the New York Post: I don't know about you, Cindy, but I think it would be quite cool if King Abdullah were in fact a fan of The View! Keep in mind, dear lady, that he is royalty; don't you think that even a King would want to keep tabs out on the hottest topics of the world? I mean, hey, when you've got a wall packed with 37 television sets, you sure as Merlin better keep up with what's going on in the world; and King Abdullah, at least in that respect, has the market cornered!

And the fact that this guy is pushing 80 ain't too bad, either! The Village Voice, in its annual Best of NYC issue, out this week, alerted your Dragonmaster to an 80-year-old punk singer named Zak who fronts a band called Team Spider, whose melodies seem interesting (for a bunch of angry punk rockers, anyway)! Now, this Zak fella may not look like King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia --- but I'll lay ye Mortals odds that, were I to confront him in person, I'd call him cute, too!

Of course, these be your Dragonmaster's humble opinions. As ever, I could be wrong.