Well, I’ve conducted my annual reviews of Dirty Dancing and Thelma & Louise (the latter augmented by news of Michael Madsen’s recent death), so it must be summer. What summer rituals do you partake of? What do you eat this time of year? Watermelon salad with feta, black olives, and sunflower greens has featured heavily in the past few weeks.

Less a ritual and more of a habit rebuilt—over the last two years I’ve been steadily submitting short fiction again, which of course means my rejection callus has also been rebuilt. A newish resource I’ve been using both to track and find submission opportunities is Chill Subs. They also have a Discord server, because everyone does these days, and lurking around in it has taught me that poets’ expectations for mags and journals are a lot different than the ones I’ve internalized in my time sending short fiction around. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s outlasting truly bonkers response periods.

What’s the oldest outstanding sub in your Grinder, Submittable, Chill Subs, etc. queue? You deserve a cat picture regardless.

And now for your links:

• My local writing group created a zine themed around color, specifically fugitive pigments, and you can grab a copy here! We’re sending proceeds to a local arts charity. All my zines with print rewards are half-off during July for International Zine Month, and locals can also get physical zines at the Albany Center Gallery Art Fest on July 19. Come say hi!

• I have a lot of friends from other places within the US and I’m always grilling them on what they learned in their public school history classes about their own states. This week I’m reading a book about a part of Florida history I wasn’t familiar with.

• For someone not particularly invested in the franchise or in zombie films as a genre, I have many thoughts about 28 Years Later. Many of them dovetail with Rowan Lee’s very thorough essay here.

• Traveling this summer? Prep for unexpected orgies in glamorous locales with this humor piece by Lindsay Merbaum, DIS/MEMBER’s first foray into original fiction.

• Sludge music for sludge artists during the sludgiest weather.