Fear of a Ghost Planet is taking a nap until January 1 so that I can work on making 2016 the most successful year of this ongoing project yet. 2015 was a large, complicated year. I adopted a cat. I came out as transgender. I frequently did not have the time or emotional capacity to update this website, or really see, hear, or read all that much, so I’m not going to be doing a 2015 best of for anything because I’d have to admit to things like having a good time at The Last Witchhunter and not seeing virtually every interesting film that came through town. Instead of all of that, I’m leaving 2015 on a self-affirming note, posting all of the things that I managed to publish here and elsewhere. I thought there wouldn’t be a lot to list, but I was wrong.
If you’ve enjoyed this blog or anything I’ve done, there are a few ways to support me. The easiest would be to follow me on Facebook or Twitter. If you want to back Fear of a Ghost Planet monetarily, you can do that by purchasing a PDF copy of my zine You Have to Deal with Me Breathing or by subscribing to my Patreon.
Elsewhere
- The Toast (!) published my essay “Chrysalis: Transitioning and My Trans Identity.”
- The Establishment featured the essay that got me into grad school, “The Strange Tutelage of Truth Martini,” with some amazing original art by Nicole Daddona.
- Pokémon Essays: These ran all over the place. The Mondegreen published Psyduck, Seel, and Vaporeon, nominating Psyduck for a Pushcart Prize. Magnemite was a finalist in Gigantic Sequins‘ 2015 Flash Nonfiction contest and was published in issue 6.2. No Tokens featured Ditto in issue four. The Atlas Review #5 had Jigglypuff, Koffing, and Slowbro. CutBank #83 featured Muk and Ivysaur. Moon City Review‘s 2015 issue saw the publication of Jynx and Raticate. And The Collagist ran Metapod and Magikarp.
- Fanzine published “Mankind’s Tooth,” which is the start of a longer thesis on how to watch professional wrestling in a world where “kayfabe” is a term that belongs to history.
- Entropy began running a column about professional wrestling called SHOOT FIGHT. The first three are about Hulk Hogan fighting Roddy Piper in a cage, John Cena talking about the death of Osama bin Laden, and indie wrestler Joey Ryan’s dick.
- Queen Mob’s Teahouse has another column I’m writing. It is called ADD/MTV and is about the intersection of life, music, and cinema. Christina Aguleria’s “Beautiful” and The Mountain Goats’ “This Year” have been covered so far. A prototype for this column, on Destiny’s Child’s “Say My Name,” appeared in Tinkypuss Zine #3.
- Powder Keg ran three poems of mine—”The Orgiastic Future,” “Unlikely Femme,” and “Problems Only Introverts Will Understand”—which you can hear me read.
- The anthology Working Stiff collected five of my poems: “Channeling Ox Baker,” “In Retrospect, The Fan Who Started the First “You Fucked Up” Chant Feels Pretty Bad About the Whole Thing,” “For Brutus ‘The Barber’ Beefcake, Who Could Not Cut Hair,” “For Jake ‘The Snake’ Roberts, On the Occasion of Making an Unlikely Out in Centerfield During a Charity Softball Game,” and “For Hulk Hogan, Who By His Own Reasonable Estimate Has the Largest Arms in the World.”
- I was interviewed and photographed for the Tumblr Boss Bitches of Athens.
- What Weekly out of Baltimore published the first thing I’ve ever written about my eternal flame John Waters, “It’s Time to Remake Serial Mom,” which argues for a crass school shooting comedy.
- Whiskey Island published my poems “Giant-Size Man-Thing,” “Channeling Ox Baker,” and “Mullet Lake” in Issue 65.
- Hobart published two comic strips written by me and drawn by Scott Stripling. Those comic strips became the webcomic Wrestling School, which ran an additional ten strips.
Tumblr
- Date with a Wrestler: 108 new posts. My favorites were Hulk Hogan lecturing on women and becoming king of the furries, Michael Elgin’s poorly tailored suit, and Rob Van Dam’s job interview.
- Heathcliff Explained: 44 new posts, covering yams, nerd culture, extraterrestrial dining, pre-ordered ham, and gigantic magnets.
Fear of a Ghost Planet
January
- Match Review: Sara Del Rey vs. Cassandro (9/27/08)
- Movie Review: The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014)
- Wrestling Review: New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Wrestle Kingdom 9 (1/4/15)
- Movie Review: Life Itself (2014) (Essential)
- Movie Review: The Interview (2014)
- Song Review: “The Legend of Chavo Guerrero” by The Mountain Goats (2015)
- Movie Review: American Sniper (2014)
February
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s NXT TakeOver: Rival (2/12/2015) (Essential)
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s RAW (2/16/15)
- Movie Review: Jupiter Ascending (2015)
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s NXT (2/18/15)
- Wrestling Review: Lucha Underground’s Lucha Underground (2/18/15)
- Movie Review: John Wick (2014)
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s Fastlane (2/22/15)
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s RAW (2/23/15)
- On #GiveDivasAChance
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s NXT (2/25/15)
- Wrestling Review: Lucha Underground’s Lucha Underground (2/25/15)
May
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s RAW (5/25/15)
- Wrestling Review: WWE’s NXT (5/27/15)
- Movie Review: Fifty Shades of Grey (2015)
- Movie Review: Furious 7 (2015)
- Movie Review: Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) (Essential)
- Movie Review: Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)
June
July
October
- The Danish Girl and Marketing Trans Narratives
- Hasta La Vista, Silver Screen: Arnold Schwarzenegger on The Celebrity Apprentice
