I know that some of the folks who follow this blog are into the paganism, wicca, kemetism, and other old time religions, so I thought I would ask if anyone knows how to invite a household deity into your home. Our poor house really needs a helping hand.
...Or the life and works of David Firth. Anyone who has been online for a span is likely to have encountered the work of David Firth, particularly his "Salad Fingers" series of cartoons. Firth's work have an unnerving, dream-like quality, surreal in the truest sense of the word. They are filled with images of bodily corruption, the madness of contemporary social mores, and the latent perverseness of human temperament. None of it makes any sense, but there is something chillingly relatable, in it. Firth's work is like a mish-mash of Edgar Allan Poe, Tim Burton, and William S. Burroughs.
I invite you to experience some of Firth's choicest bits:
Evening folks. Well the day has come and gone once again. I've taken down the haunt for the evening, and tomorrow I'll pack everything away again for another year.
Class of 2013
I was thinking back this evening to a summer afternoon when I was 8 or 9 years old, sitting at the drafting table in my father's studio. I was looking over a mask catalog, and calculating how many Halloweens I could have in my lifetime. 80, I thought, 80 is the average, probably somewhat less than that now, for my generation. 80 Halloweens. It seemed like such a meager number. I wonder how many Halloweens I have left now?
I was working out on a slip of paper what I would be for Halloween each year. Corpse, ghoul, alien, etcetera, trying to make it all fit.
Now, I don't know, sometimes I feel like I'm sleepwalking through that oh so ephemeral life time. The season comes, but I barely notice it, my senses are dulled to it. There is no time for it, or will to enjoy it properly.
Every so often I get a snitch of the old season, in the taste of a candy bar on a crisp day, in the familiar cadence of a well loved cartoon. But these are but reminiscences. It seems I am always chasing nostalgia.
But am I forging new memories? Do I sincerely enjoy each of these precious new Halloweens? Do I cherish individual moments from them, as I did when it was all new to me, when the shape of life, and indeed this Halloween thing itself was still a mystery?
Yeh, I know the equinox hit about a month ago, but yesterday the trees started dropping their leaves, so that, for me, is the official start of Fall. Just in time for Halloween.
I've been doing a little decorating, much more conservatively than in previous years.
Only my most absolute favorite of the paper decorations for the big front window.
I made this thing and hanged it in the tree out front. Here's a closeup of the face and noose.
A years worth of arboreal neglect makes for the perfect cemetery plot.
We don't have a lot of spare storage space at the house, so I have some of the boglights and movie props stowed in the carport. Soon this space will be cleared out and haunted.
I caught this thing lounging in the living room the other evening. It was gone by the morning.
Good evening, boys and ghouls. I'm sorry that I haven't posted an update in a while. I was trying to put together a little October treat for you, but alack, YouTube has not been cooperating with me. In the meantime, you may enjoy my haunt video again, heh heh.
Anyhow, this season is thick with content to follow as it is. We are the October people, this is when we are most active. Maybe it's a blessing to have one fewer blog cluttering up your blog roll with posts!
It's been a strange season. We're half way through October. It seems I'm always waiting for Halloween, and then it's here, and it doesn't seem real somehow. I'm so busy, I scarcely have time to acknowledge the passing of the season. More's the pity.
Sometimes one must simply slow down, and savor the season. To that end, I find there's no better way to slow oneself down and appreciate the moment, than to enjoy a cigar.
I know, I know, smoking is awful and bad for you, and all that, but a treat once in a while can't do me much harm, and might do a lot of good.
There is something, specifically, about good tobacco that forces one to be quiet, still, and observant. There is something inherently meditative about cultivating the ash on ones cigar, or tending the ember of the briar bowl; and the rhythmic breathing involved in the act of smoking. I urge you to try it! It's simple finding a good cigar, just visit your local tobacconist, the cigars will usually be sequestered in a climate controlled room. Just wander around, and when your eye falls on an interesting looking cigar, hold it up to your nose and sniff. When you find one that's really special, that's the one to pick!
I'm also enjoying a good apple cider, an appropriate beverage for the harvest tide. I usually go for Ace Hard Cider, as it's the tastiest and most affordable cider of my acquaintance. I am an epicure, rather than a connoisseur, I enjoy the simple pleasures. Tonight, however, I've found another equally affordable and very enjoyable cider, Crispin hard apple cider. Specifically, their "The Saint" which is sweetened with maple syrup.
And to occupy my auditory senses, I'm enjoying this wonderful recording of Vincent Price, relating the history and intricacies of witchcraft.
Witchcraft~Magic - An Adventure in Demonology
Anyhow, if I don't see you again before the big day, I wish you a happy haunting season, and a magickal Halloween!
Here it is at last! In 2011 the director of our film "Blackbird Pie" shot footage of our yard haunt at Halloween. I didn't have access to any video editing software at the time, and so the footage languished on my external hard drive.
But I have resurrected that footage! Using our editing suite I have dissected the corpus, and assembled the sundry gobs and snippets into the creature that rests on the slab before you! And so, to celebrate the start of October, and Halloween to come, I give to you: "Return of the Boglights"!
Happy Autumn everybody and everybody. All of you bodies, the ones with blood still pumping, and the ones slowly cooling in preparation of the grave.
It is Autumn now! And boy does it feel like it. I crave a chorizo burrito on a crisp day.
~X~☠~X~
So Halloween is fast approaching, and I know everyone will be scrambling to finish their props, set up haunts, plan for parties, and stock up on treats for The Day. I thought I would share a quick and dirty guide to organic and fair trade candy for the trick r' treaters.
Why organic and fair trade? Well, for one, the quality of conventional products has been declining steadily for a while, and a lot of the treats that were desirable when we were tots just don't cut the mustard these days. In addition to declining quality, one cannot help but note the decline in value as well. Them "fun size" candies seem to get a little more "fun" sized every year. That ain't fair to you, nor to the brave kids that journey out for trick or treats.
In addition to those economical concerns, there are also health and wellbeing concerns. That high-fructose corn syrup stuff is in everything these days, and if a candy company is cheap enough to sweeten their product with corn syrup, you'd better believe they have no compunction about using cornsyrup from genetically modified corn. Blech. You know why they modify it? They're making the plant itself insecticidal! Makes the bugs just swell up and die. What's it do to kids? Well, I keep hearing this stuff about an "obesity epidemic". I don't put no stock in that though.
Anyway, enough horror stories, whatayagonnado? Well thankfully there are quite a few alternatives to traditional candies on the market today, that are organic and fair trade, and here are a few of the better ones.
Well, I usually hand out FULLSIZED bars to the kiddies, so I'll start with those:
Justin's Organic Peanut-Butter Cups
Just like a Reese's only 10X better than Reese's ever were. Quality chocolate, AND in both milk chocolate and dark. Om nom.
Oskri Bars
Oskri choco-coconut bars! They're not a traditional candy bar really, more like a chocolate covered vehicle for nutritious candybar-esque fillings like coconut and almonds. If you love Mounds or Almond Joys, you will love these more. Heck, I used to have these for breakfast, the coconut is a massive boost of brain food in the morning. I have yet to try their dark sesame bars, but they sound delicious.
Equal Exchange Chocolate Minis
Ifyou're looking for a fun size bar, these are the ones to go for. Real basic dark and milk chocolate mini-bars, and for $25 smackers you can get like 150 bars! Plus these are fair trade chocolates, ensuring that the folks who picked those luscious chocolate beans get a fair share of the profit.
So those are my recommendations for this year. If you didn't find any of those options appropriate, well here's a website that offers a whole range of organic Halloween candies! It's a candy-cornucopeia already.
