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The Scratching Post: Cleaning Up Scratch Magazine Before I Clean My Actual House

After publishing Call of the Minotaur, I found myself in a strange place.

Mortimer Vanterpool - In Front of Bingham's Mansion.

Bingham's Notebook: Mortimer Vanterpool’s Powers Explained

Welcome back to Bingham’s Notebook, where we explore the hidden corners of The Midas Files.

For this entry, I wanted to take a closer look at Mortimer Vanterpool, one of the strangest and most dangerous figures in The Midas Protocol. This may not be the flashiest topic for longtime readers, but clarifying Vanterpool’s abilities helps me understand how he works as a character — and how best to use him as the series continues.

Hank Raglan haggard, eating in the "Caves of Baghdad". AI generated image.

Bingham's Notebook: Building the Caves of Baghdad

Creating a fictional world is one of the most thrilling parts of writing a novel. It allows a writer to construct places, societies, secret histories, and hidden ecosystems that never existed — but still need to feel real enough for readers to believe in them.

Bingham's Notebook: Time Travel in The Midas Files — The Foggy Room Theory

In The Midas Protocol: Midas Files Book One, I introduced time travel with a certain amount of deliberate fuzziness.

Cool Filmz: I am watching Star Wars in Machete Order and It Changes Everything

I still remember sitting in a dark movie theater in the summer of 1977, clutching my popcorn as the words “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” appeared on the screen.

Bruce Willis In Die Hard Action Screen Grap

CoolFilmz: Is Die Hard A Christmas Movie? Yes—It's Home Alone for Grownups

“Ho. Ho. Ho. Now I have a machine gun.”

That is not exactly the kind of line you expect from a cozy holiday classic. It is not Bing Crosby by the fireplace. It is not Jimmy Stewart rediscovering the meaning of life in Bedford Falls. It is Hans Gruber reading a message scrawled on the body of one of his henchmen after John McClane has officially begun ruining the Nakatomi Plaza Christmas party.

Cool Filmz: Terminator 2: Judgment Day — An Action Sci-Fi Ace

Sometimes you turn on an old movie expecting a comfortable nostalgia watch, only to remember that the movie is not merely good.

It is great.

Funny Newz: Did Stonehenge Suffer A Y0K Problem?

SALISBURY, ENGLAND — World-renowned scientist Dr. Frederick Diffendorfer of the Archaeological Institute for the Preservation of Pedantic Study plans to publish a groundbreaking paper this summer on Stonehenge, shortly after resolving what his legal team continues to call “an unfortunate plagiarism misunderstanding.”

Rarf Nangork: Alien Real Estate Developer

The Funny Newz: Space Aliens Buying Up U.S. Beachfront Property — Officials Say Everything Is Fine

CLEARWATER, FLORIDA — Interstellar aliens are rapidly buying up U.S. real estate and business holdings at what critics are calling an alarming rate, The Funny Newz has learned.

Alien shoddy particle board pyramid graphic.

The Funny Newz: Mojave Officials Crack Down on Cheap Alien Monuments

MOJAVE DESERT, CALIFORNIA — Adrian Covarrubias of the Mojave Desert Resource Conservation and Development Council was rattling across the desert Thursday in a government-leased Jeep Commander when he spotted yet another suspicious alien artifact on the distant horizon.

Chattering Chompers Robot. AI Generated Image.

The Funny Newz: Chattering Teeth Robot Wins $1 Billion Defense Contract

BLACKSBURG, VIRGINIA — Dr. Emilio Disaronno, a one-armed senior robotics researcher at the Virginia Polytechnic School of Robotics, says the 2024 International Robotics Competition was rigged after a novelty chattering-teeth robot beat his highly advanced killing machine for a major defense contract.

The Funny Newz: Space SUVs Here - 2024 "Abductors" Sighted

PEYOTE, ARIZONA — In a bizarre twist of fate, extreme sports enthusiast Wayne “Goose” Peterson, 25, of Chicago, says he was paragliding over the Arizona desert when he spotted what he initially believed to be oversized AirPods screaming across the sky at impossible speeds.

Uncover the Secrets of The Midas Files Book Series