WRITING ASSIGNMENT #35

For today, translate your favorite English-language poem into wingdings.

Send it to: loganliterary@gmail.com

THE SERPENT'S CUPCAKES - a recipe by Sarina Liri

THE SERPENT'S CUPCAKES

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by Sarina Liri

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It's a satanic twist on an old party favorite! My stupendously dotty great-aunt, Jennifer Kleven, claimed to have served these during Anton LaVey's first Magic Circle gatherings in the mid-sixties. Several relatives have since confirmed that Jen (now deceased) was indeed romantically linked at the time to LaVey's personal tailor, Harris Burton, though no evidence beyond an autographed copy of The Satanic Bible ever emerged to verify her involvement with the Church of Satan. All the same, Jen insisted that these cupcakes grew increasingly popular with LaVey's disciples, eventually becoming a fixture at Satanic wedding receptions as well as wakes and purification ceremonies. Among the devil-worshipers, as Jen never tired of jovially reminding our (otherwise traditional) Roman Catholic family, these cupcakes "were bigger than Jesus."

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INGREDIENTS for MEATLOAF CUPCAKES

1 lb. / ground beef

1 lb. / ground pork

1 cup / chopped fresh basil

2 cups / panko bread crumbs

2 / eggs

2 cloves / minced garlic

1 / diced small onion

1 cup / milk

24 thin slices / prosciutto

1/2 lb. / bleu cheese

1 tsp. / salt

INGREDIENTS for CANDIED SWEET POTATO PUREE

4 tbsp. / butter

2 tbsp. / dark brown sugar

2 / sweet potatoes, skinned and cubed

1 tsp. / salt

1 cup / heavy cream

1 / diced jalapeno

DIRECTIONS

Boil potatoes until they become mushy. Meanwhile, melt butter in a saucepan. Add brown sugar and simmer for two minutes. Next, add potatoes and salt, mashing the mixture in the pan. Stir in cream and continue to mash. If necessary, place mixture in processor or blender and puree thoroughly.

Bountifully grease cupcake tin with butter. Line the circumference of each compartment with a slice of prosciutto. If you have extra prosciutto, you can also line the bottom of each compartment, though this is not strictly necessary.

With your hands, thoroughly combine the pork and beef with the eggs and milk in a large mixing bowl. Gradually fold in panko, basil, garlic and onion. Ideally, these ingredients should be evenly distributed throughout the loaf.

Ball the loaf into cupcake-sized segments. Break your bleu cheese into nuggets about the size of gumballs. Bury a morsel of cheese in the center of each miniloaf. Place cakes in pan compartments. The listed amounts should yield between 26-30 cupcakes. Bake trays at 350 for 35 minutes, or until the juices run clear.

The prosciutto lining and miniloaves should fuse while baking, but remove each cake from the pan carefully. Using a pastry bag -- if you're careful, a knife can suffice -- top each cake with generous swirls of your candied puree. Garnish each cake with a few bits of finely chopped jalapeno.

You now have a delectable batch of prosciutto-wrapped meatloaf cupcakes, each with a cheesy center and topped with candied sweet potato frosting and jalapeno sprinkles. Hail Satan!

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Sarina Liri is an Avondale-based personal trainer, failed restaurateur and avid meatloaf enthusiast. She dreams of returning to school for a degree in hospitality management. She posts anonymous LostBuffy fanfiction all over the internets. and

HEY LETTER 729 - a poem by John Selzner

[Note: In the course of soliciting submissions on Craigslist and other online spaces, we receive an influx of spam in our mailbox. Rather than delete all of these bits, we've decided to commit a few toward honest work. We forwarded a particularly incoherent e-mail from "Miles" to our friend JD Selzner and told him to fashion from it something useful. He replied with the following poem. - PD]

HEY LETTER 729
Between Miles and C.R. Darwin

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by John Drake Selzner

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Two pieces of correspondence, each possessed by the same rarefied air of discovery. They've here been interlaced nearly line by line. The resulting profundities concerning technology and progress seemed at times eerily forethought. Idiosyncrasies of spelling and grammar have, in both cases, been preserved precisely. I consider myself more the discoverer of this conversation, rather than its author. - JDS

Let’s be honest with each other...
Besides a general interest about the Southern lands, I have been now ever since my return engaged in a very presumptuous work &which I know no one individual who wd not say a very foolish one.
Are you sick and tired of not getting traffic and making money online?
I was so struck with distribution of Galapagos organisms &c &c with the character of the American fossil mammifers, &c &c that I determined to collect blindly every sort of fact, which cd bear any way on what are species.

Are you sick and tired of trying every rehashed *old school* technique?
I have reaped heaps of agricultural & horticultural books, & have never ceased collecting facts --
Are you sick and tired of hoping *THIS* could work?
At last gleams of light have come, & I am almost convinced
Well ... for once I couldn't agree with you more.
- (quite contrary to opinion I started with)
So far starters this is what you need to do.
-that species are not
DON'T think anything ...
-(it is like confessing a murder)
Don't think about Google, Yahoo or MSN
Immutable.
Don't think about banner ads, social bookmarking, social networking, Facebook, Adwords, SEO, bloggi ng, article writing...
Heaven forfend me from Larmarck

Forget *EVERYTHING* that has come your way until now.
of a "tendency to progression" "adaptations from the slow willing of animals" &c, -
It's a time for a change!!
But the conclusions I am led to are not widely different from his-
I'm going to show you how to get a lot of traffic and make money online WITHOUT Google.
Though the means of change are wholly so-
YES!! Don't sound alarmed. I'm going to prove it to you.
I think I have found out
By now you must have realized getting traffic from Google just means ...
(here's presumption!)
Stress, more stress and then some MORE stress. Wouldn't you agree?

The simple way by which species become more exquisitely adapted to various ends.
How frustrated are you lately?

You will now groan, & think to yourself 'on what a man have I been wasting my time in writing to.'
In recession, endless bills to pay, loans piling up, job's a nightmare and the money ... well that's the BIGGEST problem...
I shd five years ago, have thought so. -
... and for years, that's exactly what happened to Mo Latif

I fear you will also groan at the length of this letter
For four long years ... that's 48 months, 1,461 days, 35,064 hours or 2,103,840 minutes...
Excuse me, I did not begin with malice prepense.
... and I bet, now he's glad he's out of that tortuorous cycle.

Believe me my dear Sir
But that's not all ... he wasted over $100,000 learning how to get instant traffic. That's $2,083 every month spent on learning.

Very truly your's
We don't have that kind of time or that kind of money lying around, as I know I surely don't!
Regards

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John Drake Selzner is a native of Oak Park, Illinois. He is currently pursuing an MFA from Northwestern University. He has previously published poetry in Help Quarterly and Read Words! Review. He cites John Cale's lyrics, the poetry of Emily Dickinson and the cinema of Luis Bunuel as his primary literary influences. He is currently working on a "biography in verse" exploring the life of painter Francis Bacon. He lives in Logan Square with his fiancee, Brenna, and their dog, Jasper Johns. This is his first work composed on a computer.

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #34

For today, compose a work of free verse. Each line should contain at least one split infinitive, but you'll get bonus points for three or more per line.

We're taking back basic grammar. (Happy Thanksgiving.)

Send it to: loganliterary@gmail.com

RECEPTION FOR ISSUE IV

When: Tuesday, Nov. 30, 2010. 7-10PM. (The last day of the last full month of fall.... yup, we made it by the skin of our teeth.)

Where: Cole's Bar (2338 N. Milwaukee)

What: RECEPTION for LSLR #4: Autumn 2010

We'll have issues of the journal for sale alongside t-shirts and buttons and friendly smiles. Come support a great, exceedingly supportive local venue and a burgeoning local venture.

Bring your friends (21+), your cousins, your parents, your landlord, your barber, your librarian, your 4th grade English teacher or anybody else who'd enjoy a good time with a good read among great people in a great venue.

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #33

For today, you're given the potentially grisly task of detailing a day in the life of Terminator, one of Michael Vick's favorite fighting dogs. Terminator was present during the police raid on Vick's estate, and remains the record-holder for victories at Bad Newz Kennels. Your job is to describe his life, assuming his perspective, as it is today, a few years after his fighting career was abruptly ended. It'd be great if you'd give him a happy ending (it's looking like his former owner is getting one), but we understand if you want to cast the story in an entirely tragic (and probably more realistic) light.

Send it to: loganliterary@gmail.com

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #32

For today, set a short story in a single-bed motel room over the course of three hours. You have five characters. Each has, at one point or another, slept with each of the others. Two are currently in a long-term relationship with one another. One has recently escaped from prison. Three are former members of the same erotic dance ensemble. One of them has a knife. Four of them are current members of the same fringe political organization. There is vomit in the toilet and blood on the bathroom tile. They are not ghosts or the alternate personalities of a mentally disturbed person.

This is not a comedy.

Send your story to: loganliterary@gmail.com

ISSUE IV IS NOW AVAILABLE! NOW!

LSLR IV: AUTUMN 2010 is NOW AVAILABLE at these FINE RETAILERS:

Quimby's Bookstore
1854 West North Avenue, Chicago, IL (Wicker Park)

Wolfbait & B-Girls
3131 West Logan Boulevard (Logan Square)

Myopic Books
1564 North Milwaukee Avenue (Wicker Park)

G-Mart Comics
2641 North Kedzie Avenue, Chicago, IL (Logan Square)

Also available on this very website: look for the Paypal button to your right ----------->

The pieces in this month's issue transport you to Nicaragua, the inner sanctum of a failing marriage, Abu Ghraib, Chicago's city corners, the top of a Ferris wheel, and a Logan Square rooftop.

A very sincere thanks to all of our contributors. A very talented group.

Details on our reception to be announced shortly....... stay with us.

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #31

For today..... write a last will and testament for a long-running (this detail is key) character in children's literature/television/film/entertainment.

Where will his or her money go? What shall be done with his or her likeness? What revelatory acknowledgments could be made only after death? What reflections might this character have on its creator? Regrets?

Send it to: loganliterary@gmail.com

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #30

For today, write a 200-word proposal for a brand new social networking site. Be careful to distinguish it from competitors. Describe in detail what the user will experience after joining. You'll need some sort of hook.

This might be your last opportunity to submit a proposal to a wealthy investor. Your inheritance is running perilously low. You dropped out of Stanford. You simply can't afford to fuck this up.

Send it to: loganliterary@gmail.com

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #29

For today, imagine a new beauty/hygiene product called "IMALGINUS" as its being developed by Procter and Gamble.

You work in P&G's design department, and it's fallen on you to draft copy for IMALGINUS' label. They pay you a lot of money to do this. You love the work. You're the best they've got. In the past you've drafted award-winning labels for PHELLONI, SCOREX, MELLA, HERBENTA, ALTEGIN and SUTUQ.

For IMALGINUS, you must cover a few bases with your label:

1. Directions for use.
2. What to do if ingestion.
3. Possible side effects.
4. A description of what results the consumer may expect after using IMALGINUS for X number of days.
5. A brief description of your exotic ingredients

.... but feel free to add whatever other content you think may be helpful in persuading consumers to give it a try. Also, feel free to propose a list of potential spokesman or spokeswomen.

Send it to loganliterary@gmail.com

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #28

For today, write an autobiographical history (from birth to present) using only pronouns, verbs and articles.


Send it to loganliterary@gmail.com