Brazen Hearts, Fresh, On Sticks Robert Thomas Northrup

"Lupo's on Cherry Street is your standard tavern. The ale's flat, but at least the serving wenches have thick heads of foam. If you hold still at the bar long enough, you'll get propositioned by some group of adventurers who just met each other for the first time. They'll invite you along to raid the Tombs of Atuan or the Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth. I turn 'em down politely. Then I send word by carrier pigeon to my old friend Sally who lives in the Lost Caverns. Let her know a fresh bunch of humanoids is on its way. "Even though it's in the human settlement of Korndale, Lupo's is the kind of place where a legless, shrivelled goblin witch can pull herself through the doorway hand over fist, and not really stand out in the crowd. That would be me, the goblin witch, Sadie. . . ." Aunt Sadie tells about confronting her ancient rival, an unspeakable force of bitchiness named Francine. Hilarity and hijinx and bloodloss are sure to follow in Aunt Sadie's Greens. [Run time: 13 minutes, 41 seconds. The link above points to a VBR (hi-fi), 13.1 MB mp3 file. Click here to see other file formats for downloading or streaming.] Featuring Melinda as "Georgia Lupo," and Rob as Aunt Sadie, Francine, Kreegak and the unnamed character who says "Poke him in the other eye." Written and plastered by Rob Northrup. Intro music was "Nightmare" by The Artie Shaw Orchestra circa 193X, and "Flaming Youth" by Duke Ellington, both in the public domain as far as I know and available on archive.org. Music at the end of chapter 12 was "Åse's Death" from Peer Gynt, composed by Edvard Grieg. “Aunt Sadie's Greens” radio play audio file uses the following sound files from Freesound (http://freesound.iua.upf.edu) according to the Creative Commons Sampling Plus 1.0 license: * "Rooster chicken calls_2" from AGFX * "Grunts.wav" by Sruddi1 Other s/fx include: * Door opening and creaking sound from the intro of CBS Radio Mystery Theater. (Brief enough to count as "fair use", I hope.) * Slaps and grunts from "Pete Kelly's Blues - Gus Trudeau." (Public domain and/or brief enough to count as "fair use." Check out all six known existing episodes of PKB posted on archive.org. * A few seconds of cheesy organ incidental music from "The Sealed Book - King of the World". Fair use and/or public domain. * A few seconds of the Godzilla theme, which I hope is brief enough to count as "fair use." Correction: At the end of the audio file, I mention a sound sample that I had planned to use, "Chicken_house2" by digifish music. During editing, I went with a rooster sample instead.

"The good news is your crush finally speaks to you. And it's not just hi. He actually knows your name and he starts the conversation. "The bad news is: he's dangling from the claws of a gargoyle at the time, being flown West to stand trial as a treasonous vegecarrion organizer. And then all he says to you is, 'Josie, save me!'" What chance does Josie have of rescuing her hunky hobgoblin from an ampitheater overflowing with hundreds of his kin, as they debate which method would be most amusing to dispatch him? Click here to download Chapter Eleven: The Emperor's Bib. Warning: This chapter is pretty gory. You might not want to play it at work, or around kids, or for yourself. For everyone else, enjoy. I don't have a good sense of where they draw the lines for movies or video games, but I would personally rate this as PG-13 or maybe Rated R. [Run time: 15 minutes, 42 seconds. The link above points to a VBR (hi-fi), 15.1 MB mp3 file. Click here to see other file formats for downloading or streaming.] Featuring Melinda as "SreHAAg," Matt as "Chango" (mixed into a crowd scene) and Rob as all other characters. Written and plastered by Rob Northrup. "In the Hall of the Mountain King" is the opening theme and "Åses Death" from Peer Gynt, Op. 23: Suite No. 1: 2 (whatever that means) is the music at the end of each episode, both composed by Edvard Grieg. "The Emperor's Bib" radio play audio file uses the following sound files from Freesound (http://freesound.iua.upf.edu): "horse walking on paving stones" from dobroide. http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/download/38764/38764_dobroide_20070808.horse.wav "pura kehen cockfight" from alchemical. (Crowd at a cockfight in Bali ????) http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/samplesViewSingle.php?id=26334 "Crowd cheering football 01" from wanna73 http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/samplesViewSingle.php?id=20784 Also included are clips of Michael Palin saying "crucifixion," Sterling Holloway saying, "Oh bother," and the famous Wilhelm scream. I hope these brief clips qualify as fair use.

"I drew my knife, lunged to the side of the bed and pressed it against his neck. 'Feel this blade? I will have you or no one will!'" Josie finally reaches SreHAAg, only to see him arrested and carried away to stand trial. What crime could be so horrible that even hobgoblins would outlaw it? Click here to download Chapter Ten: His Terrible Secret. [Run time: 5 minutes, 17 seconds. The link above points to a VBR (hi-fi), 5.1 MB mp3 file. Click here to see other file formats for downloading or streaming.]

"Oooo! Why are you so mean to me? We used to be best friends! I used to sleepover at your mom’s pit all the time, and we’d stay up all night braiding bones into each other’s hair, making humans sing their funny dirges for us, talking about boys. I looked up to you like an older sister. You were always so stylish and brash and sassy. Mom wouldn’t let me dress provocatively like you did, wearing eyeballs pinned to your frocks, because she said the smell of them rotting would turn on the boys too much. You kissed your first boy before I did, and killed your first boy before I did. You learned to drive before me. I mean, drive slaves to the market. "What happened? Why did it all have to change?" On her way to seduce SreHAAg in the Cathouse Dinner Theatre, Josie is confronted by Nadia. They have a tiff. Nadia expresses herself in song. [Run time: 12 minutes, 7 seconds. The link above points to 128kbps, 11.6 MB mp3 file. Click here to see other file formats for downloading or streaming.]

I've launched a Dungeons & Dayjobs podcast to spread the stories in different format and maybe rustle up some new paying customers for the paper version. First up is "Almost Always, Somebody Lost an Eye." There's even a promo from the old Dungeons & Dayjobs cartoon, circa 1983!

Have you heard of the Cathouse Dinner Theatre? You go in there, see a show, have a bite to eat, or you can get up on stage and become part of the show, or eat the show. Or if you don't get eaten, you can get a room to continue with your eating or your performance. It's kind of weird because some of the species on stage are there to perform and some are there to be eaten. That's part of the variety. Whichever you want to perform on, there you go. Whichever ones you want to eat, you can butcher them yourself and have it cooked to order. Josie slips into the Cathouse Dinner Theatre where she hopes to catch the eye of that hobgoblin she has a crush on. Or catch his tusk or anything else. First she'll have to get past the Madame and Chango the bouncer. [Run time: 9 minutes, 19 seconds. The link above points to 128kbps, 9 MB mp3 file. Click here to see other file formats for downloading or streaming.]