Hi, Everybody!
Choose-Your-Own-"Jen"venture, Chapter the second ("SCOTCH"):As you begin your descent down the side of this stupid mountain, you flip the bird over your shoulder to the mysterious individual standing outside the temple. American Whisky. That's all the help you need in life right now...You think there may have been a hole-in-the-wall bar back in the town at the base of this mountain. And if not, the AMOC credit card in your pocket will buy a first class ticket to Ireland (you think it was Ireland where Jen first did her one woman show...) where there may not be a DiGiacomo, but there is definitely lots and lots of Whisky.As you round a bend in the road you suddenly remember the mountain climbing bit from Jack Kerouac's Dharma Bums. Jack & Co. got down their mountain by jumping from boulder to boulder. You can probably shave half an hour or more off this trip by trying that...The first six jumps hurt your legs on the landings, but nothing too terrible. But on that seventh landing, it turns out the light was playing tricks on you, and that flat rock thirty feet below you was actually at a twenty-seven degree angle. And covered in loose grit and sand. As you flail off the edge of the boulder into wide open space, you just have time to curse Jennifer DiGiacomo one last time before your life, and the sight of the side of a mountain, flash before your eyes.(You'll probably wanna listen to this before you read on...)THE END.Choose-Your-Own-"Jen"venture, Chapter the second ("HELP") (ya might wanna click this to open a new window. If you're reading on your phone and it won't let you do that, then no ambiance for you...) :You turn to look where the voice was coming from and see nothing but a recess in the wall of the temple. There's one of these things every thirty or so feet.
"Come. I can help you find Zhēn xiǎojiě." As you approach the recess, you realize that the shadows here go deeper. The recess is actually a hidden ingress to the lower levels of the temple. Standing just inside a long hallway is a berobed Asian man of about twenty-five. You're not sure if he's Chinese or Korean or Japanese."Come, come. I can show you where she stayed." The man begins to move away from you down the hall. You hurry after him.After a few dozen yards, he quickly shifts left down an offshoot of the hallway. After that, you struggle to keep up with him as he turns left then right then left then left then left. The twists and turns start to make it hard to remember which direction you came from and where the exit you entered from lies.Finally, after more twists, including a series of turns that your pretty sure led in a complete circle, he stops at a wooden door."This was Zhēn xiǎojiě's room," he pulls up his robe sleeve to reveal a key, which he uses to unlock the door. As he pushes it open, a strong smell like...peppermint patchouli... hits your nostrils. And below that another smell that you can't quite place, "the Master never leaves the main chamber of the temple. His rooms are off of the hall where you met him. He never comes down to the lower levels, so he never saw Zhēn xiǎojiě except when she came to lessons. She was not the prodigy he claims she was. She showed promise, but would have required decades of training and discipline before she would have been able to master the abilities she sought."The room is dark as you enter. You pull a flashlight from your pocket and begin to play it over the chamber. The walls are thirty feet high, at least. There are small ventilation ducts cut into the rock on three of the four walls near the ceiling. The room is divided into two sections. A third of the room is raised fifteen feet with carved steps leading down to the lower lever where the door is. On the lower level is a small table with a single chair. A small sink with a hand pump and a small section of counter. Next to that is a smelly wooden box that is probably a toilet of some kind. Above the table is a small shelf with something on it. Up the stairs is what appears to be the sleeping quarters. From the doorway, you can't tell what's up there. As you take a few tentative steps in, your guide continues:"Zhēn xiǎojiě is the one who wrote all that," he's referring to semi-legible scribblings that cover the walls on all four sides, "she was fine for the first few weeks she was with us, then she changed. Became withdrawn and obsessive. She never left her room. And when anyone visited her, she would just scream and cry until they left." As you move to the center of the room, you start to make out some of the scribblings. "Monkey's Paw." Written over and over again. Even with the changes in size, you can tell they were all written by the same hand. Some are black ink, sometimes it's written in a dark red that you think might be blood. You start up the steps to the upper level."Zhēn xiǎojiě became incoherent. Finally one day we came to bring her sustenance, and she was gone. Along with all her things."Definitely a sleeping area. There's a small mattress with a thin blanket. You decide you'd rather not figure out what's causing the smell from it... Next to the mattress is a small bedside cabinet with a drawer and a door. "Do you know what she meant by 'Monkey's Paw'? your guide asks. "I think I have an inkling..." you say as you think back to those pages from SDOAR Manly ran on the blog months ago..."Well you'll have plenty of time to try and figure it out! HAHAHA!" your guide says as he slams and locks the door. You can hear his laughter fade as he hurries away down the hall."Oh fuck me running." you say as you realize how screwed you are. "There HAS to be a way out." you think to yourself as you begin to assess just how royally screwed you are.If you want to see if there are any clues as to what happened to Jen in here, comment "Research".
If you'd rather try and find an escape route, comment "Monte Cristo"Whichever gets the most votes by 4pm(CST) next Tuesday determines the next chapter...
Uh...okay then. You heard the mysterious voice. You (the audience) gets to decide where this goes from here... Anyway, Big Board:
- 135 pages released so far as mocked up and/or drawn by Dave Sim through 7 March 2022
- $22,045.00 raised to date from 423 donations
- $155 away from unlocking page 136.
- If you have not donated, a $5+ donation gets you access to all 135 pages and all future unlocked pages. Donate once or set up monthly donations here https://www.gofundme.com/f/sdoar-2023
- If you have donated, why not donate again! All money goes to Dave Sim to continue his work on The Strange Death of Alex Raymond.
SDOAR GoFundMe -->> https://www.gofundme.com/f/sdoar-2023
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| An UNREADABLE copy of glamourpuss #10! |
A 9.8 SLABBED gp #10. Which, according to the CGC Census is the ONLY copy they've slabbed. So it's the HIGHEST graded copy they've dealt with (also: the lowest...).
AND, I'll include cheap-o printouts of the interior so you CAN read the issue while you stare at your prized collectable...
RULES (gotta have RULES...otherwise it's all Anarchy, and people going cannibal and and other signs of the Apocalypse...):
- $5 per entry. The only money that counts is money donated to the GoFundMe SINCE July 1st, 2026. All that money you've been throwing at Dave via Jen for the past how long won't help you here...
- No limit on the number of entries you can have. As long as you remember it's only NEW money that counts. While Dave (and Jen) deeply appreciate all the money you've donated over the years (I don't give an aardvark's taint sweat...), it's just money that comes in NOW that gets you unreadable glamourpuss...
- Raffle ends on Labor Day (that's September 7th 2026 for the "calendar challenged"). That gives Everybody! time to donate, and Jen and I time to determine who wins.
- International winners might be asked to kick in for shipping (it cost me $43 to ship a VIEWMASTER Reel to Canada... the USPS ain't what it used to be...)
- Bonus entries will be made available to the winners of the swimsuit/private interview/talent/health & fitness/evening gown/& on-stage conversation categories. So choose your outfits and performances wisely...
- Having read the minutes for the Graft: Boon or Blessing Panel, bribery will NOT be tolerated if it messes up my taxes...
- "And remember, your answers must be in the form of a question..."
- Margaret, if you win, this counts as both PTO AND year end bonus...
- Good luck! (How and Why this is a Rule is a mystery to Everybody!...)
This, then:
