Artist Benjamin Dewey’s Tragedy Series consists of, quote, “Depictions drawn from regrettable accounts of the less fortunate for purposes of instruction; so that one may avoid similar missteps.” They are wonderful, unlikely, tragedies, all drawn in a vintage style that somehow make the surreal nature of their subject material seem plausible. A few of my favorites are 265, 255, 277, 290, and 48 (also Sassy Yaks is totally going to be the name of my next band).
Fortunately, lest the plight of these multiple tragedies become too overwhelming, he also presents occasional Sadness Reprieves such as this and this.
He sells prints of some of the tragedies on Etsy and you can see examples of his other art (he’s a professional comic book artist) here.
A while back I stumbled upon this link, which details ten unusual eBay purchases. One of the items was what purported to be an 18th-century Vampire Killing Kit. It was more likely a Blomberg Kit (which have a murky and tangled past of their own), but I quite liked the idea of such a project so I decided to take a crack at making one myself. I gave this one to my Secret Pumpkin this year, but my notes are below if you’d like to make one of your own.
Although this project is somewhat on the involved side, no single piece is particularly difficult; there are just a lot of pieces and it takes a while to put everything together. However, I think the results are worth the effort. You can create a stripped-down version to carry around as a prop when you go clubbing, or display a full kit on a bookcase as an decorative object. Plus you can also use it to kill vampires, should you encounter any.
First I had to decide what items to include. A quick canvass of the Internet turned up a surprising number of sites devoted to “vintage” kits; I chose interesting equipment from a variety of sources, and came up with the following list: Read the rest of this entry »
(No prizes, but if you can answer them all without googling you get bragging rights.)
Who was the Demon Barber of Fleet Street?
The Hound of the Baskervilles stalked Baskerville Hall, which was located where?
A) Cornwall
B) Devon
C) Somerset
D) Bristol
E) Kent
Whose ghost appears to Macbeth at his royal feast?
DNA analysis suggests that the Black Death was caused by what bacterium?
A) Moraxella catarrhalis
B) Klebsiella pneumoniae
C) Pseudomonas anguilliseptica
D) Yersinia pestis
E) Escherichia vulneris
What breed of dog is Scooby Doo?
One common theory about the Loch Ness Monster is that it’s a relict population of what prehistoric reptile?
A) Ichthyosaur
B) Mesosaur
C) Plesiosaur
D) Elasmosaur
E) Mosasaur
Mexican legend tells of a woman who drowned her children in order to be with her lover. Regretting her decision, her ghost now wanders forever, weeping and kidnapping children. Name her.
R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps series consists of 62 books. What was the title of the first one?
A) Welcome to Dead House
B) The Girl Who Cried Monster
C) Stay Out of the Basement
D) The Werewolf of Fever Swamp
E) My Best Friend Is Invisible
The 1938 radio adaptation of what science fiction novel frightened many listeners into believing that aliens were invading?
Julian Cope was a member of what post-punk band before embarking on a solo career?
A) Echo & the Bunnymen
B) Icicle Works
C) Sonic Youth
D) Gene Loves Jezebel
E) The Teardrop Explodes
Halloween Scarf – Interesting felted scarf featuring a graveyard and a big spider. There are a number of other unusual felted items on the same site. (via Old Fashion Halloween)
Mythical Beast Travel Posters – Retro-look travel posters which advertise the mythical creatures of various destinations. These are available as prints and are completely wonderful.
I ran into this wreath in a BHG slideshow of outdoor decorating ideas (incidentally, the spider wreath at that link is pretty neat too). Their method involves wrapping styrofoam balls in yarn and then hot-gluing them to a wire wreath form, which strikes me as overly complicated.
An even easier approach would to be to bend some wire (such as from a coathanger) into a circle and thread balls of yarn onto it. Tape the ends of the wire together and cover the join with a pretty ribbon.
If you’re a crafter you probably have leftover yarn laying around which would be perfect for this project. It’d be easy to make several of these as gifts, and the construction is simple enough that kids could help out.
A wall full of wreaths might be an attractive way to store yarn as well; it’d be out of the way and you could find the color you need at a glance.
It could be argued that Andrea of Cupookie has too much time on her hands. Because her blog is full of insanely-detailed cookies like this calavera gingerbread man, cookies whose decorations would make mere mortals cringe in terror at the thought of trying to replicate them.
She’s also got some interesting posts about things like cookies which resemble rocks, which opens up some possibilities in Halloween-party treats.
Mainly, though, you’re going to run into her brush embroidery cookies or the henna-inspired ones and be entirely boggled by the amount of detail work that went into them. Browse her site at the risk of feeling very inadequate in the cookie-decorating department.
She sells pre-made “miniature masterpieces for your mantelpiece” on the site and also does commissions (although a note on that page says that she isn’t accepting new ones right now): Her “Quernus Your Pet” service will render your pet in miniature, and she also does custom wedding cake toppers; a few of those latter provide interesting glimpses into the minds of her customers, since some of her requested couples include a mole and a marmoset, a penguin and a tortoise, and–my favorite–“a girly mole and an army boy T-Rex”.
Her gallery is a lot of fun to browse, and is an excellent source of inspiration if you like to work with polymer clay. If she begins accepting commissions again soon, her prices are quite reasonable and it looks like she’d be a great resource for a one-of-a-kind cake topper or other memento.
GrittyReboots has done a faux trailer for a live-action “Calvin and Hobbes” movie.
While growing up, Calvin’s imagination always kept him sane. He didn’t have many friends, so he created one. As he got older, he tried to leave childish things behind. But his imagination had a different plan.
I don’t know about you guys, but I would watch this so hard. We need a Kickstarter to make this sucker a reality.
Hover Sloth – Illustration by deviantART member bear65. I want a Hover Sloth.
Scar Makeup Tutorial – Fairly easy tutorial for making good-looking fake scars. (Although my personal preference has always been for Rigid Collodion for super-easy gnarly-looking scars.)
Jumping Spider T-shirt – One of those hyper-realistic T-shirts featuring an oversized jumping spider face.
Dinosaur Plant Markers – I quite like the idea of using cheap plastic toys as plant markers; it’d be easy to use spiders, bats, and skulls instead of dinosaurs.
It could be argued that Andrea of 
The cute, I am dying of it.