Welcome to our Super-Deluxe Spooky Halloween Special Issue. Sorry if you missed me last month (yeah, right), but I was on vacation and having way too much fun to write a column that nobody reads. And like I always say, a little white space here and there never hurts anything.

Amazonian pin-up, porn star and scream queen Julie Strain is profiled (and what a nice profile it is) by Randy Prinslow this issue. Rex Breathes tracked down the elusive DeeJay SchmeeJay for an investigative look into Portland’s “pirate radio” station, Subter-radio, operating on the outskirts of the “law” at 104.1 FM. Darklady had a ball (???) reviewing the Cyborgasm CD and it’s new sequel, Cyborgasm 2 (clever that). And Aaron Varhola had some fun with furries–how much fun, I’m not really sure I want to know.

The Alternative Health Center (Portland’s Cannabis Buyer’s Club) which we wrote about last month [“Attack of the 50-foot Stoner” September 1997] got busted right at press time this month.The Portland Police, in a bit of a contradiction, claimed that they were forced to do it because the law currently makes selling marijuana illegal, and that the center was selling the it to people who weren’t really sick. Doesn’t this also imply that, if they were selling only to legitimately sick people, they would let them operate? A tacit endorsement for the legalization of marijuana for legal purposes? Can we get that in writing for the November 1998 elections? Anyway, the center, for the time being, is shut down, and lots of legitimately sick people are left to find their medicine elsewhere.

Hasta la vista, and don’t forget to lock up your grandmothers, the Rolling Stones are on tour again...