The waves rose up on the river’s surface like the hair on a frightened body. The air stirred and churned the branches above which fluttered gently and whipped stingingly in turn. Moule turned to his neighbor,

"This breeze bites like winter. Only week or two away now."

His neighbor might have nodded, or it might have been the wind tousling his hair. He said nothing.

"It’s out of the east though, and that’s a wind of fortune; it cuts straight across from the other side." Moule continued smiling earnestly- hopefully. 

Again his friend did not respond. Instead he continued to stare out over the rippling, broken surface. Their boys had crossed the great blue expanse with promises of grain enough to last them through the starving time. They had promised to keep each other safe, had promised to come home. That had been a month ago, and for the last two weeks Moule had followed his friend out to the Willow’s edge.  

The wind rose to a whistling, howl. Moule could feel its nails piercing his jacket and velvety fur, he shivered convulsively. They would have to go before the dark closed in, obscuring their trail and inviting the hunters that day-dreamed of mole morsels to come out and meet them. But Moule would give his friend a few more moments. A few more glances across that stained blue ribbon. A last moment of hope to last until tomorrow evening. 

Story by Russell Lee Nasrallah

Art by Gelrev Ongbico- “The Wind In The Willows”  

Source: http://septagonstudios.tumblr.com/

I awoke to the smell of smoke and lilacs, my nose detecting the latter buried beneath the cloying odor of burning timbers and charred fabric. My body instinctively tried to rise and follow the familiar flowery aroma, but was thwarted by the thick cords which bound my wrists and ankles. I writhed against the bonds, my muscles straining, but the ropes remained knotted around my limbs, smugly nonchalant in their success. This shape did not have nearly the strength required to snap the thick bindings. A glance around the smoke filled room revealed no knife or shard of glass with which to cut the ropes;there was nothing but an flames dancing behind a veil of thickening gray fog. The heat crushed against me, allying with the smoke in an attempt to asphyxiate. I ignored the discomfort, trying hurriedly to piece together what had occurred. My memories, fortunately, were clearer than the room at the very least. Visions of the mob storming the house began to coalesce in my minds eye.The congregation from town whipped into a frothing sea by their ignorance and fear… they had taken her to do god knows what- and in these cases God not only knew what, but had, in fact, been the one to mandate the act. She’d burn soon if I didn't free her. Smart of them to sneak up and knock me out first. Too bad I hadn't stayed unconscious long enough to let the fire do their murder for them. As if on cue, a timber in the far corner of the room failed spectacularly, its fire gnawed length creating a firestorm of debris as it collapsed. I needed the ropes off soon and I could think of only one way of doing so, but it would be risky. Suffocation would likely be the result, but my end seemed to be destined for that end regardless of my decision. I gritted my teeth and prepared for the change.


My body began to flow. Bones swam under my skin like fish rippling the surface of a lake and muscles settled into new shapes. Skin swelled and shrank and twisted. Fur began to erupt from me, making the heat crowd in closer. Some ropes fell away, their knots meant to bind larger appendages; still others strained and snapped, falling to the floor with wet thuds, their coarse fibers streaked with blood and hair. As I changed my senses sharpened and the smell of lilacs bloomed, intensifying like the light before dawn, brighter and brighter until it eventually blinded me. I howled, the noise ragged in my chest. The cry echoed through the house, the woods, and into the village. That sound was a warning to the kidnappers- their only warning. They had taken her and that had been a mistake. The even bigger mistake, though, had been not puncturing me from head to toe with every piece of silver in the town before they took her. I shrugged off the remains of the rope, shook soot out from my fur, and bounded out of the window. Falling through the night, I thought for a moment that my nose sensed the trail splitting, one clear distinct path leading out before me, the other small and modest leading back into the house. I hesitated for only a moment, before speeding of, away from the burning house.


The smell of her drew me like an iron filing to a lodestone. The trees whispered with the velocity of my passing, a cloud of fallen autumn leaves creating a tail of fire behind me. The nearer I grew to the city the more powerfully the scent compelled me. I blew through the city like a dark squall and followed the scent to the church in empty town square. The lilac path up to the window below the steeple couldn't have been more obvious to me if it had been painted in gold. Ignoring the stairs, I bounded up from the lower roof to the second floor and in through the window, shutters banging open upon my impact, drowning out a shout of fright. I scanned the room, ready to tear the throats from any defenders that thought to bar my way. My vision fell over a form stretched upon a bed.


It was not her.

The room swam with her perfume, its source a familiar bottle spilled upon the a nearby table. My head clouded, the animal in me struggling with the obvious dichotomy. I smelled her all around me, but in the bed lay a stranger. She gripped a crucifix in one hand and was shackled to a bedpost by the other. I had been tricked, and this pathetic creature had been left as a sacrifice.




“Puh-puhlease don’t…,” she said but could not finish and was forced to averted her eyes, such dreadful sight I was to behold.



It was in this moment of rage and confusion, with the smell of lilacs- the smell of her- swimming in my head, that I heard the scream. It rent the night like a black satin curtain, coming from the direction of the house, burning now as second sunrise in the distance. As ghastly as the sound was, there was a quality about it which I recognized. A quality which drew me towards it… like iron filings to a lodestone.

Art by Jon Foster

Story by Russell Lee Nasrallah

*Edited 11/16/2014

Short stories to come!

I am going to start posting my excellent fiction on here at some undisclosed date in the future.
I'm excited, I hope you are too, Oh might internet consciousness that views my page.

Russ and Suzi go to Asheville!

Last night as I was driving two hours into Asheville, North Carolina, to go let strange women invade my personal space and judge me I began to wonder, why exactly do I enjoy this so much? No, no It wasn't my annual proctology appointment at the local health department! Although Dr. Shemibarugh is a doll. No, I'm talking dancing! Yes, the bane of white men everywhere! I drive all this distance, on my night off from work just to put myself in uncomfortable situations that may or may not lead to a substantially deflated ego.
This does not sound something people do on a regular basis for fun, does it?
Yet here we are (Suzi and I that is), swiftly heading towards the hippy mecca of the east coast, on the hunt for swing dancing! As Suzi gets in touch with her inner "Little engine that could" I am left to ponder what exactly motivates me to go this far to engage in an activity that, by my above description, doesn't sound very appealing. Well I came up with a few conclusions on the trip down and on the trip back.

(if you've got the time)

First and foremost, it looks absolutely fantastic. The way these people have trained their bodies to move is a feat I yearn to mimic. If you have never seen any swing dancing (aside from that one scene in The Mask) then you should definitely look up some videos because it is, inarguably, and art form. The fact that one person can be so coordinated alone astounds me, now you add another compeltely free thinking individual to the mix and, contrary to what one would expect, the dance becomes more mezmerizing. This blows my mind. Two people, often time strangers, can meet and for two or three minutes be completely in tune with each other. They feel the rhythm of the music and use their bodies as a medium of expression like an sculpter might manipulate clay or a musician might improve a melody. Even more astound is, while they are creating this beautiful art, they are learning about each other. More is "said" in a three minute dance than can related over an hour of conversation. It's speaking with your entire body, not just your mouth. I want to learn how to express myself with nothing but the dynamic movments of my body. These people can make art anywhere and with virtually anyone and that is a skill I envy. But you can't create the art with another person if you don't trust them enough to respect you.

(classic) 

This is another aspect of dancing (any partner dancing that is) that impresses me to no end. You walk into a room filled with strangers, you pick one, often at random, and you almost guarentee that, if you show then trust and respect, you will get the same reciprocated. If a lead does not respect a follow, you will not be able to created anything together. The opposite is also true. This is an aspect I had never ecountered until I started socially dancing with strangers. When one learns to dance in a small group of people like I did, one tends to fall into the bad habit of learning your partners style and forgetting about your partner all together. I understand that there is a time and a place for this sort of compatability but for the purposes of social dancing, I think it was detrimental to me. I know plenty of moves but I never learned how to truly LEAD the moves. It's like trying to get directions from Ohio to California from someone who knows all the roads, has all the maps, but speaks a different language or no language at all for that matter. I lost my ability to communicate, bodily, what I needed my follow to do. These social dances help me improve this ability to communicate which is a foundation of partnered dances and, if you really break it down, life in general. Nothing here is restricted only to dancing.
One can learn to trust, communicate, respect and create in any circumstance by learning how to dance. The skills one learns in any given activity should never be restricted that that activity alone. In fact, I think it's impossible to expect that kind of behavior. The fact that educational systems stress interdiciplinary studies is just one example of the usefullness of being able to apply learning universally.
Basically I'm saying that learning to dance has made me a better person, and after noticing this I want to do it even more, regardless of the distance Suzi and I have to drive.

(P.S.) Suzi is my car! She's a trooper!
(P.P.S.) sorry about falling into the sexist convention of implying ownership of an object by imply it's female.

I feel in love with a girl on the internet, Her name was Mis-information

Chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken

chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken     chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken   chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken ....

Okay, so here's the point I'm trying to make. For some reason, on certain occasions, a word will sometimes suddenly appear foreign to me. I have seen it, written it, and spoke it nearly all my life but suddenly I experience this surreal disconnect and the word no long seems... right. Sometimes this is cause by repetition, the word seems to lose it's value when it is rewritten ad nauseam. It may potentially be because the word has been removed from it's context and thereby loses much if its meaning, that the sentence is what truly gives meaning to it's individual words. However; this train of thought seems illogical considering that would mean words  would constantly rely on each other for literacy and relevance. But hey, wait a minute, that doesn't seem to illogical does it?

build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build   build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build    build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build     build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build build

Bet you never noticed that "build" was such a strange word? Me neither, one day it just slapped me in the face. I sat, staring slack jawed at it, wondering if I had actually spelled it right or, as I assumed wrongly, actually written some Finnish profanity (i.e. paska = shit).  (Continue)

Baladeo 34G Superlight Locking Knife w/ clip review... in case you were wondering (3 out of 5)

I'm currently typing this review without the use of my left index finger, the reason for this I will reveal a bit later. 
I bought this knife after seeing its 22g cousin favorably reviewed on a website I frequent. The high praise they gave to it was more than enough to convince me that it should replace my old worn out Gerber which worked great but was bulky and impossible to sharpen. When I received it in the mail the first thing I noticed was its very tasteful packaging, no vacuum sealed, steal proof plastic container here, just a very sleek black box with some silver lettering embossed on the outside. once you open the box you are again amazed by the this sleek knife, sitting in it's foam case with the same sleek beauty that you might associate with a highly tuned German automobiles. As I mustered up the courage to actual remove this gorgeous knife from its packaging, again I was awestruck, it was incredibly light and felt fantastic in my hand. 34 grams is an ethereal number, hard to really understand until you actually get the product in your hands. I became more and more excited, looking for new tasks to test drive this new tool of mine on! But as the days went by, my love for it began to wane. It's beauty was still unphased but I began to notice a major design flaw. The Locking Mechanism. 
This being the single piece of metal that keeps the knife cutting whatever you want it to be cutting, not yourself, it was vitally important that it work without any error. First thing I noticed wrong is that when you over extend the knife but putting to much pressure on the blade you end up releasing the locking mechanism all together and leaving the knife free to swing open or closed on its hinge like a smooth silver guillotine. 
The second flaw I encountered was that if you grip the knife to tight you actually pinch the locking mechanism closed, thereby closing the knife. Generally, you only grip the knife to tightly if you are applying a reasonable amount of force onto something and when the mechanism fails that same force slams the knife shut onto your fingers. This is why I am typing without my beloved index finger today. I mistook its beauty for perfection of form AND function and was taught a lesson very quickly. 
It still earns three stars from me because of the great craftsmanship (other than the lock) that went into it. My suggestion is that if you are actually looking to put this knife to some moderate/serious work, think about looking else where, because like most things this pretty, it's just meant for looks.