My punk rock pal Leech passed me a duped cassette of Singles Going Steady as a token of our new-forged friendship in October 1991. Back in those pre-Altsplosion days, being a punk rocker often meant existing as a scene unto oneself — isolated holdouts or latecomers going through the motions in small local clusters or […]

During the opening weeks of 2008, the long overdue consequences of my lackadaisical oral hygiene manifested as a raging abscess on an incisor which had been reconstructed after shattering a few years prior. It was the first time I’d experienced such a thing, and so I ignored the escalating levels of pain until they bloomed […]

Christmas is less than a month away, which means the slew of hot takes about That One Problematic Holiday Standard should start arriving at any moment. In previous years, I’ve striven to keep above this circular debate, but the sheer number of wrong-headed reads of the subject matter had compelled my to weigh in on […]

I’ve written about the “death of Disco” more than a few times over the course of Armagideon Time’s lifespan. Though not as flashy a topic as z-list funnybook characters or Atomic Age anxieties, that fad’s late Seventies flameout touches upon several points of retrological interest. Disco bubbled up from the fringes of pop culture, steamrolled […]

I have always been an early riser. No matter how late I turned in the night before, my body is incapable of staying in bed past 7:30 AM and anything beyond a quarter past six is spent in a state of fidgety restlessness. These behaviors have persisted despite a lifetime spent in the company of […]

For all the time spent showcasing the scars of past psychic traumas here, I still tread lightly when it comes to the “High Eighties” period. That block of time — roughly spanning 1984 to 1988 — is such a tangle of regret, embarrassment, and pain that anything associated with it dredges up muck better left […]

All Hallows Eve has arrived, and with it comes the end of this year’s spooky season festivities. This is normally the part where I’d indulge in an apologetic post-mortem, but I think this year’s countdown did well enough considering the personal distractions which accompanied it. A big thanks to all you fiends and friends who […]

When I embarked on AT’s first Halloween Countdown, I used to this day to commemorate Maura’s and my second wedding anniversary. This post commemorates our fourteenth. Time goes by so rapidly, but the love is eternal. Recommended listening:

Because I am old and jaded and the old bag of tricks doesn’t cut it for me anymore, I have to find my horrific thrills from fresher venues — like running a search for “Halloween” on the Bradford Exchange’s online portal. Let’s face it, no existential terror Lovecraft ever dreamed up could possibly compete with […]

Wish a most happy birthday to the Queen of Animals, who is not only a spooky season enthusiast but has also been putting up with my nonsense since I was a surly teenager. Recommended listening: