My Soul Hath Elbow Room!

Posted by John Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2026/03/02/new-cover-valley-winter-song/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=59652

I woke up this morning and there was a whole new blanket of snow on the ground. Which I don’t love! Here in March! But I guess it is still technically winter for another three weeks, and also, it made this particular cover song I was working on more appropriate. The original is from Fountains of Wayne, which is best known for “Stacy’s Mom,” although songs like this one are rather more in line with the songwriting typical of the group. This is one of my favorites, and a little bit of a deep cut. But deep cuts can be good sometimes. Enjoy.

— JS

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2026/03/02/new-cover-valley-winter-song/

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Posted by Athena Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2026/02/27/sampling-some-smackin-sunflower-seeds/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=59640

I used to eat sunflower seeds when I played softball as a kid, and I can’t say I’ve ever eaten them since. For some reason, I was getting advertisements for Smackin’ Sunflower Seeds on Instagram. In that moment, I thought, you know what, sunflower seeds sound kind of good to snack on right now.

I would say in my life I’ve only had regular sunflower seeds, ranch, and BBQ flavored, so when I saw Smackin’s array of flavors, I was certainly intrigued. I am someone who believes variety is the spice of life, so of course I couldn’t choose just one flavor. I went ahead and bought a variety pack that included all their flavors (except the OG Original), and my dad and I gave them all a try.

I let my dad pick the first flavor we tried, and he chose “lemon pepper.” These definitely had a strong flavor, as advertised, and the taste actually reminded me a lot of a steakhouse. The peppery-ness wasn’t overwhelming, and my dad and I gave these ones a 6.5/10.

Up next, we went for a classic: Ranch. The ranch flavor reminded me a lot of a Hidden Valley Ranch seasoning packet, like the kind you mix into dips or salad dressings. Surprisingly, the ranch flavor was very subtle, which is certainly something that ranch never is. You get a Cool Ranch Dorito and that shit is RANCHED UP. In the case of these seeds, I could’ve used more ranch flavor. They were kind of weak, but the flavor that was present was good. These were a 6/10 from both of us.

We switched to a sweet flavor, their Cinnamon Churro. This flavor was actually really nice, it wasn’t just straight cinnamon, it had that nice churro-vanilla sort of flavor. I will say that the flavor wasn’t very long lasting, though. Like it wore off very quickly. The taste, while it lasted, was very nice and not too sweet, with just a little bit of saltiness to have a nice sweet-and-salty factor. This was a 7.5/10 from my dad and a 7/10 from me.

My dad wanted to get the Cheddar Jalapeno out of the way, since he feared it would be really hot and we’re not exactly known for loving spicy stuff. I’m happy to report that while these ones do have a real kick with a heat that lingers just a touch, it has a really nice actual jalapeno flavor and isn’t just hot to be hot. While there’s not so much of the cheddar flavor present, if you’re someone who likes a little bite in their snack, this one would be a great pick for you. I wouldn’t eat a whole bag, but they were pretty tasty. These were a 7/10 from both of us.

Onto Dill Pickle, which was one I was very excited for. Lemme just say, these bad boys were picklelicious. These had a super solid, bold pickle flavor that was very enjoyable and not too acidic, just had that nice dilly briny taste. These ended up being in my top two favorites overall, and we both gave them an 8.5/10.

Over to the Cracked Pepper, I was curious how this would compare to the Lemon Pepper. If you are someone who puts so much pepper on their steak or eggs that people around you are sneezing to high heaven, then this is the flavor for you. These were so peppery, like pretty overwhelmingly so. I honestly didn’t care for them, and gave them a 4/10, but my dad gave them a 6/10.

Next up was the Backyard BBQ. I do love barbecue chips, so I was looking forward to see how these compared flavor-wise. The BBQ was super bold! Just one seed was absolutely packed with BBQ flavor, and it was very tasty! More long-lasting flavor and very strong, these were super good and ended up being another favorite. My dad gave them an 8/10 and I gave them an 8.5/10.

Back to the sweet ones, we tried the Maple Brown Sugar. Like the Cinnamon Churro, they were really nice but not long-lived. They’re a bit subtle, like not a huge amount of maple flavor or anything, but still pretty good. My dad gave them a 7/10 and I went with a 6.5/10. The rating would be a lot higher if the flavor lasted longer or was stronger.

Starting to wrap up our sunflower adventure, Sour Cream and Onion was next. These tasted so classic and recognizable, like if you enjoy sour cream and onion chips, these are for you because they taste absolutely spot on. They honestly reminded me a lot of Philadelphia Cream Cheese Chive and Onion flavor. These were a 7.5/10 from both of us.

The final flavor before trying the mystery flavor was Garlic Parmesan. These were super garlicky, but didn’t offer up a whole lot of parmesan flavor. The garlic really stole the spotlight here, but it was still a tasty flavor, earning it a 7/10 from both of us.

Finally, the mystery flavor! I truly had no idea what to expect. Do you know how DumDums make their mystery flavors? Well, I can only assume that Smackin’ does the same thing, because the mystery flavor tasted exactly like the Cheddar Jalapeno and Ranch mixed together. It was like the Cheddar Jalapeno but less hot, and somehow even better! The mystery flavor earned an 8/10 from both of us.

Well, there you have it! Eleven flavors of sunflower seeds. The only one I didn’t get to try that I would’ve loved to is Cheeseburger! Honestly, these were pretty solid sunflower seeds. It felt kind of nostalgic to eat them, even if they are kind of tedious to get through. I felt like one of those dogs that has a “slow down” bowl because you can’t just plow through them like chips or crackers.

Anyways, if you’re interested in trying some for yourself, I have a 10% off code for you! Yippee!

Which flavor sounds the best to you? Do you eat sunflower seeds often? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!

-AMS

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2026/02/27/sampling-some-smackin-sunflower-seeds/

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Posted by Athena Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2026/02/26/the-big-idea-bernie-jean-schiebeling/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=59632

Like blue eyes, height, or left-handedness, how much of our temper and ill manners can we contribute to our genetics? Author Bernie Jean Schiebeling explores the breakage of inherited anger, and what it’s like to fall victim to the temperament our parents passed unto us in the Big Idea for their newest novel, House, Body, Bird.

BERNIE JEAN SCHIEBELING:

My great-grandfather was not a good man.

Without getting into too many details, he was angry and abusive, so much so that my great-grandmother was able to divorce him in the late 1920s without too much trouble. After the divorce, my great-grandfather left—possibly fled—and then committed a string of burglaries across Kentucky and Tennessee while working as a door-to-door salesman. Many years later, my father met one of his ex-colleagues, who said the man had been incredible at sales. Less so at stealing, since he kept getting caught. “And,” he said, pointing at my dad’s breakfast plate, “I can tell you that you take your scrambled eggs the same way. So much pepper.”

Dad never met my great-grandfather (even Grandpa hardly knew him, since he was just a toddler during the divorce). But they both liked peppery eggs, and so do I.

Other echoes persisted too. Anger sometimes exploded from my grandfather, though less than the previous generation. My dad is calmer than his father, and I am calmer than him. Still, rage sometimes rises in me with the inevitable force of a king tide. I hear the ocean rushing in my ears—

—And I breathe through the impulse. I don’t have to do this. I don’t have to continue this tradition that—I hope—none of us wanted. 

Inheritance is never clean. We gather too much over the course of a life, too many objects imbued with too many memories, to ever pass on an uncomplicated story to our descendants. In most cases, this is a gift, the last we give to our loved ones. Sometimes, however, it is a weapon, sharp-edged and dangerous to hold, and we have to figure out how to carry it anyway, or how to put it down in a way that hurts no one else. This is the big idea of House, Body, Bird. 

The idea was larger than I expected. I didn’t mean for this to be a novella; I thought it would be a short story too long to sell to most markets, like most of the work I have in my drafts folder. I was about 15,000 words deep by the time I realized I was writing a book. 

In retrospect, I shouldn’t have been that surprised. Stories find their ideal length through their subject matter, and the more I thought about House, Body, Bird’s family and their home-slash-haunted-dollhouse-museum, the more I realized that the sheer amount of stuff in main character Birdie Goodbain’s inheritance—both dollhouses and the history behind those dollhouses—needed to show up on the page. I started including imagery wherever I could: descriptions of dolls, of difficult memories, of how haunted the body becomes from those memories. In the story’s earlier scenes, I wanted to crowd Birdie, make her tuck her elbows in as she navigated the rambling, watchful house.

Of course, this is only the first half of the difficult-inheritance-problem, the “Someone has willed me a weapon” half. I still had to find a good way to explore the second half of “Thanks, I hate it.” Birdie couldn’t stay scared. Thankfully, I had a solution; I just needed to reorganize some clutter.

When I first started writing the would-be short story, I had alternated between two point-of-views for Birdie, third-person limited and first-person. This created emotional whiplash as Birdie went from a meek third-person POV ruminating on the house’s creepiness to a furious first-person POV bashing through the walls with a meat tenderizer. By grouping all the third-person scenes together and following them with the first-person ones, Birdie had much cleaner character development. It’s relevant that the switch in perspective happens once Birdie commits to escaping and seizing her freedom. In that moment, she moves from third-person, where an unseen narrator observes and objectifies her (like a doll!), to first-person, where she narrates her experiences. While imagery had pushed up against the margins in the third-person section, Birdie’s opinions, observations, and memories pepper her own telling of the story. She gets space to breathe. 

In keeping with the novella’s spirit of excess, Birdie’s sections are interspersed with ones from the haunted house’s point of view. Originally, this was useful because it allowed me to reference the previous Goodbain generations with a level of detail that wouldn’t have been possible for Birdie, but the house eventually became the story’s second emotional heart. Although I worried about overwriting throughout the drafting process, a maximalist approach to storytelling was what I needed for House, Body, Bird. 

It’s funny—early on in the story, Birdie’s messed-up dad tells her, “We build, and build, and build.” The Goodbain family built and built and built their house as a way to create a family narrative worth passing on, as an attempt to build livelihoods and lives and love, and I did the same thing. I built and built and built the story to understand how Birdie’s family history loomed over her, and how she could create a new, more loving life in response to it. 

House, Body, Bird: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Books-A-Million

Author socials: Website|Instagram|Bluesky

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2026/02/26/the-big-idea-bernie-jean-schiebeling/

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