A BARSTOOL STEREOTYPE (guest blogger)

Happy New Year to all my 'Basement' buddies... I have a special treat for everyone.This is a guest post from Caleb J Ross, author of the chapbook "Charactered Pieces: stories," as part of his (ridiculously named) Blog Orgy Tour. Visit his website for a full list of blog stops. "Charactered Pieces: stories" is currently available from OW Press or Amazon. For more, check out his web site.__________________________I’ve a secret dream of being a barstool...

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RED FEZ: THE LAST MOMENTS OF PAPA H (poem)

OK. Shameless self-promotion time... My prose poem THE LAST MOMENTS OF PAPA H is now live over at Red Fez, a great online portal. The piece actually started out as a piece of flash fiction at Six Sentences that I eventually went on to rework. Red Fez was founded in 2003 by independent author Leopold McGinnis and concentrates on publishing and promoting non-mainstream, but accessible work by underground and under-recognized artists. The site/zine...

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BUMS CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS (poem & podcast)

Please click play to enjoy an audio reading BUMS CELEBRATE CHRISTMASIn the gutter, you tend tonotice things normalpeople wouldn't dare dream.You notice puddles;And that befriending a hungrypooch can be your biggestmistake or quitefrankly, your only hope;Nerf footballs make theoddest shapes when eachend is chopped off andthey make damn fine pillows;Blended beers from differentbottles don't taste allthat bad once you get usedto the initial warm jolt;If...

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WTF ALERT: DRUNK FOUR YEAR-OLD FOUND WANDERING HIS NEIGHBORHOOD

OK... You can't make this stuff up. Kinda sad. Oddly funny in that demented way... Here's the scoop:April Wright, of Chattanooga, Tenn., is 21 years-old and is divorcing her hubby who's in jail. Her little four-year-old sneaks out of the house in the middle of the night, opens a Bud Light, gets skunk drunk, puts on a dress and steals the neighbors' presents from under their tree."He ran away trying to find his father," she said. "He wanted to get...

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LOTTERY MAN (poem & podcast)

Please click play to enjoy an audio readingLOTTERY MANBack when I worked at the luncheonette,I remember the guy used to comein every day. Sometimes twice.He'd sit at the counter, order his coffee,break out his pad and pencil and beganto jot down numbers. All sortsof fucking numbers.Every page would be dated and undereach day, he would jot down thewinning lottery numbers in pencil.Licking the tip each time before he wrote,he'd mumur to himself, almost...

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OUR KIND OF SOUP...

Dunno where this pic exactly originated online, but I think it might be our kind of place. Right?addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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TWITTERATURE: HAS IT COME TO THIS??

OK... So we're all busy. Most of us can't eke out enough time to write or update our blogs much less READ. Imagine that? Us writers needing more time to READ.In any case, heeding the call of many time-crunched readers (and I assume to the ire of all us scribes), two enterprising University of Chicago students have published "Twitterature: the World's Greatest Books in Twenty Tweets or Less." It's already been released in England and Australia and...

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MY SEARCH FOR CHILI'S PALMER'S JACKET or THE BADNESS OF MOVIE LEATHER...

Something is seriously wrong. It just dawned on me that this is my second post about a coat in a very short time span. In any case, I wrote this for Playboy Online sometime in the late '90s. Being that it's nowhere to be found on the interweb, I figured I would rework it ever so slightly and give it a decent home here in Bukowski's Basement. OK, so what's it about? My humble search for the perfect leather jacket -- a Chili Palmer leather jacket...

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A LETTER TO MY TEENAGE SELF

So there I was the other day, driving, and I heard on the radio station how Elton John wrote a letter to his teenage self for some UK book. The jock went on a little about it and I thought, "Huh, how interesting... What would I say to my teenaged self given the chance?"After thinking about it a small while. This is what came out:____________________________________________Dear lil' Ant: Your parents are doing a pretty good job so I'm gonna concentrate...

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OVER A HAMBURGER (poem & podcast)

Please click play to enjoy an audio readingOVER A HAMBURGERSo here we were.Again.Staring at each other,this time over a hamburgerduring a late lunch.And I can’t drink thisfucking beer fast enough.I need to get out of this zone.The more she doesn’t sayanything, and stares at me orinto space, the more my head pounds.It throbbed the second we got up,partly because I was dreadingthe day that would be coming.She was still pissed aboutour talk which never...

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I WEAR HIS JACKET (poem & podcast)

Please click play to enjoy an audio reading I WEAR HIS JACKET The military jacket was crumpled in a sloppy ball on the floor of the antique show that some chickadee dragged me to. After hours and hours and rows upon rows of beat-to-shit furniture, hat pins and jewelry boxes, I saw it, this gorgeously authentic army jacket. Laying there, musty and crinkled, I tried it on and it was a perfect fit. This was the real deal, not some knockoff shit direct...

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WTF ALERT: WHO SAYS BOOKS ARE DEAD?

Blockbuster Video is selling books now... I know times are rough for the video retailer but selling books?? And they're not even movie tie-ins ala the Harry Potter or Twilight franchises. Oh well, chalk another one up to us hard-workin' scribes...Thanks to Gizmodo for posting the pic above.addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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DRILLING FOR ... SCOTCH??

A team of Antarctic adventurers will soon set off on a mission to drill through Antarctic ice to find crates of whiskey that were abandoned during a 1909 polar expedition.British polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton had two crates of the now-defunct McKinlay and Co. whiskey shipped to his Antarctic base near Cape Royds 100 years ago. They were stashed under the floorboards - presumably to hide them from inquisitive penguins - and somehow abandoned,...

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THE BEST BOOKS OF THE DECADE (Part Deux)

Last week, The Basement gave you the top books of the decade, courtesy of The Times Online. This week, comes a more mainstream Stateside version direct from pseudo-intellectuals at The A.V. Club (sister site of The Onion).* Beware, a certain book about a boy wizard is on it...To check it out, click HERE.addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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GOBBLE GOBBLE!!

Bukowski's Basement wants all of our bloggin' buddies and visitors to have a happy Turkey Day!!addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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BEER AND THANKSGIVING, PERFECT TOGETHER

While my uppity family ponders which uppity wine to bring out from their uppity cellar, I'll be salivating about the hearty beer that I should be drinking with my Thanksgiving feast... For more tips about beer and Thanksgiving, head on over to Gunaxin (Stuff for Guys...) for lots of great tidbits.addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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THE BOOTLEGGER (poem & podcast)

Please click play to enjoy an audio recording THE BOOTLEGGER His outfit was buried deep within the foothills of the North Carolina Appalachian mountains and his potent clear liquid made him a local legend. They called his hooch White Lightnin; Who Shot Sally and even Brown Mule. But Popcorn Sutton knew you were The Law if you came around askin' for that 'White Liquor.' Descendant from a long line of moonshiners, Popcorn took his art seriously...

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NO MORE CRAPPY SCOTCH

New guidelines to protect whisky from foreign imitation, including new rules on labelling and bottling, are coming into force in Scotland. Some of the provisions: * Five categories of Scotch Whisky are defined for the first time; Single Malt Scotch Whisky, Single Grain Scotch Whisky, Blended Malt Scotch Whisky, Blended Grain Scotch Whisky, and Blended Scotch Whisky. * These compulsory category sales terms will be required to appear clearly and...

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GETTING HITCHED IN VEGAS ON 777

Two years ago, I got hitched in Sin City on 7 7 7 and was lucky enough to have a pic snapped by an Associated Press shutterbug. Here's the magazine piece I wrote for Casino Player that went along with it. The notion of whisking a bride to Sin City and deciding to take the plunge on a whim has always been the stuff of pop culture fodder. For pulp's sake, throw in a boozy visit to a local tattoo parlor and you have yourself a bonafide Sin City elopement. Like...

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THE 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE DECADE (NINE YEARS IN)

I'm usually not one for lists -- they're usually either populated with fan favorites or slanted towards critical darlings. Seriously... It's hard to find a true "best of" list that encapsulates a decent middle ground. That said, however, I figured this list was interesting enough to pass along. Check it out here.addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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IRISH WRITER WINS NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION

Last night, The National Book Award for fiction for 2009 went to scribe Colum McCann for his book "Let the Great World Spin."Set in New York in 1974, the book centers on French tightrope walker Philippe Petit who walked between the Twin Towers, creating a massive publicity stunt.The author examined life in the Big Apple using Petit's stunt as a backdrop.Considered to be one of literature's most prestigious honors, it certainly will catapult the Irish...

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MICKEY MOUSE is 82 TODAY...

Image via WikipediaFunny enough, Bukowski hated Mickey Mouse with a passion and often referred to him as "A three-fingered son-of-a-bitch who has no soul, for Christ's sake..."For those who care, Mickey Mouse made his debut on November 18, 1928, in a black and white cartoon called "Steamboat Willie." The cartoon was written and directed by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks. The title is a parody of the Buster Keaton film "Steamboat Bill Jr.""Steamboat Willie"...

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MY INNER BUKOWSKI SAYS...

People love her. People hate her. Politics aside, she looks pretty damn hot to me.Is the Newsweek cover (her second in a year) as sexist as Ms. Palin claims? Perhaps... Maybe... Who cares?She looks hot.There. I said it.Back to our regularly scheduled program....

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BUKOWSKI'S BASEMENT PODCASTS

Taking a cue from the great Barry Northern and his ridiculously professional Friday Fables, I've decided to throw my hat into the podcasting ring (Although, unlike Barry's, mine are not available on iTunes yet and I don't have that soothing voice of his either).My goal is to eventually get to as many prose poems and flash fiction entries on the site as possible. But boy, did Barry make it look easy. Putting together one of these bad boys ain't exactly...

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WHAT SHE SAID (poem & podcast)

Please click play to enjoy an audio reading WHAT SHE SAID She told him that he’d eventually harness a gift, which in all honesty had come to scare him. From the second he left that tiny boardwalk booth, freaky premonitions streamed into his consciousness. It got so bad that after a while he'd have to ask himself if they were just silly mind tricks. But then some of them started to come true - little things that actually happened and it only made...

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THE CATCHIEST TUNE IN A LONG WHILE...

"The idea of two people vocalizing their relationship through duets...I always thought of it as just a small project between friends. It perfectly captured where I was in my life at the time," says actress Scarlett Johansson of her new album with fellow Jerseyan Pete Yorn entitled "Break Up." We can forgive the actress for her earlier solo effort, "Anywhere I Lay My Head," in which she covered all of Tom Waits tunes. Easy to try, tough to pull...

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JIM THOMPSON'S 'THE KILLER INSIDE ME' COMING SOON

If you dug film version of Jim Thompson's "The Grifters," "The Getaway" and "After Dark, My Sweet" get ready because the tough guy scribe's 1952 pulpy novel "The Killer Inside Me" is heading towards movie screens in a 2010 film starring Casey Affleck, Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson and directed by Michael Winterbottom.Affleck stars as a seemingly vapid small-town sheriff deputy Lou Ford with Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson as the women in his life. Also...

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DOESN'T THIS LOOK FAMILIAR?

I love this piece... Here's the skinny on it:ARTIST: Joseph FerrisTITLE: Charles Bukowski with his Girlfriend Cupcake, Panel 2MEDIUM: Acrylic on canvas, 24" x 48"DATE: 1999addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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FROM HIPSTERS TO BEATNIKS TO HIPSTERS AGAIN

If you're into Kerouac or Bukowski or even Tom Waits, you may have a little 50s beatnik or 40s hipster in you. Who knows, you may even have some hippie or neo-hipster sensibilities floating around. Whatever the case, enjoy Zana Faulkner's pretty well-researched piece that explores 'Hipster countercultures through the decades.'And when you're done, check out this hipster beatnik blog Like... Dreamsvilleaddthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pu...

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SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION: SHOOTS AND VINES

If you like, check out my piece "The Well" in the new print issue of Shoots and Vin...

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A WRITER YOU NEED TO KNOW: WALLACE STROBY

Jersey Shore-based crime writer Wallace Stroby, a former newspaper colleague of mine, is about to get "Gone 'Til November," his third book published. Even though the work isn't available until January, I stumbled across a mini review of it on Publishers Weekly and decided to let my basement fans know about this underrated scribe. Seriously... Why his books aren't made into big screen features is still a mystery to me. In any case, check out this...

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RAYMOND CARVER MEETS THE ONION

I'll be the first to admit that I sometimes don't get "The Onion." Or, better yet, maybe I "get it" but just don't care for that kind of elitist humor that smacks of posturing that seems to say, "We're so smart and you're not..."Americans have this sickening way mocking news to parody. Call me a news snob. I'm a member of The Fourth Estate and think that while I can easily poke fun at my profession, I don't want to get my news from tongue-in-cheek...

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IF BUKOWSKI WERE A HALLOWEEN PUMPKIN...

... This is what he'd look like. Happy Halloween to all of my peeps...Seriously... How hilarious is this?addthis_url=''; addthis_title=''; addthis_pub='avenutol...

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HOSPITALITY IN THE GARDEN STATE (flash)

OK... I couldn't help it. Born and bred in The Garden State, this is prolly what would go down if you got directions in any large New Jersey city... Thanks to Michael S. for the spark... Also check out the New England version.Who's this guy walkin' towards my car? Whats he want?He don't look like a beggar and if he carjacks me, I got my Club and'll knock him on his ass.What'd he say? Do I know how to get where??"Yo Pal, what don't you go to the gas...

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Mr. P (flash fiction)

Every Halloween season I remember this quirky English substitute named 'Mr. P' who replaced Ms. Clemm after she caught a mysterious ailment.He was an odd chap who'd slam down his dusty books every morning, tinker with an unkempt mustache and speak in an formalized and grand English we never really heard before.Unconventional and odd, he ignored our given text and asked us kids for help in his own compositions, thereby illustrating to us the ins and...

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