A Fantastic Fear of Everything

I think my favorite bit is the hedgehog.

The SCP Foundation is one of those wonderful pockets of deep weirdness that the Internet seems to constantly spawn. It is presented on its face with absolute sincerity, and it’s only by digging well down into its depths that you discover its true nature (and also that you can play along).

Its motto is “To Secure, Contain, and Protect” (hence the name), and you know that bit at the end of Indiana Jones where shadowy government agents are shown storing the Ark of the Covenant in some very large and clearly-arcane warehouse? If those guys had a Website, this would be it. The heart of the site is the “SCP Series” links (nav bar at the top of the page), which list, in highly official language, the various things that the Foundation guards.

The series entries are marvelously evocative, hinting at strange and eldritch realms that threaten public safety–and sometimes the world itself–which are kept contained by the SCP. They’ve got what appears to be a Classical Greek vase, with instructions to store it at freezing temperatures…in a room which doubles as an incinerator. Sometimes it spontaneously generates bizarre, hostile little humanoid monsters which fortunately are highly flammable.

They keep tabs on an abandoned school building where unconscious students and faculty who disappeared years previously are sometimes found (sadly, when awakened they die of extreme dehydration, followed by rapid decomposition); and also on a morgue where the dead keep returning to life.

They’ve got a helmet which seems to cause the wearer to become possessed by a Roman infantryman (they hold regular interviews with him) and they’ve got Kali in a cage (and are trying to prevent her followers from murdering enough people to set her free).

Then again, they also have the Tickle Monster.

You’re allowed to play along. Their Guides section (also at the top nav) contains information on how to write and submit a “contained” item of your very own. Their Classes and Library sections discuss object classifications, and also list items that they’re not interested in hearing about any more (stop submitting the Holy Grail and talking dogs).

The site is a marvelous source of inspiration, and a wonderful way to immerse oneself in the spookily plausible.

Eat Your Heart Out – “Deliciously bad-taste cakes.” NSFW. Some graphic but oddly edible images.

PlayFic – BoingBoing mentioned an interesting programming toolset for easily writing your own text adventure games. Some of the comments with other suggestions are also enlightening. If you’ve always wanted to write another sequel to Zork, here’s your chance.

Virginia Cheeseman – UK entomological supplier. Ships to most of Europe, although sadly not worldwide. (It also took me a few minutes to realize that “Virginia Cheeseman” is her name, not a description of her location and occupation.)

MyPhotoStitch – Automatically converts an uploaded photo, sketch, or other image into a cross-stitch pattern.

Vampire Cookies – As xJane puts it, “a use for those gods-awful lip cookie cutters.” (Thanks, xJane!)

Hair Hats – Artist Nagi Noda’s sculptural hair…things. They’re certainly arresting.

Volpin Props – Freelance propmaker who creates some astonishing stuff.

Superhero Wedding Inspiration – Lots of interesting ideas that could be re-themed to darker comic-book heroes.

Lovecraft and Tesla – Illustration of a fictional version of SyFy’s Paranormal Investigators, starring H.P. Lovecraft and Nikola Tesla. I would watch the hell out of this. (Hat tip to pdq)

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark Art – A collection of illustrations from the book that scarred a generation of kids.

One of the grotesques on DC’s Washington National Cathedral is Darth Vader. I’ll give you a moment to boggle before I continue.

In the 1980s the Cathedral sponsored a competition for children to design decorative sculpture for the new West Tower facade. One of the winners was 13-year-old Christopher Rader, who submitted a drawing of “this futuristic representation of evil.” I suppose we can all be deeply grateful that Beavis and Butthead weren’t around in the 80s.

Darth can be found on the northwest tower:

First, bring binoculars! Darth Vader is very difficult to see by the naked eye. Leave the building through the ramp entrance which is through the wooden doors near the standing statue of Abraham Lincoln. Go down the ramp, and step onto the grass on your right. Then, turn around and look back up at the tower closest to you. Start at the top of the tower. There are two large pinnacles, or points, on the corners of the tower and a much smaller one in the center. Follow the center pinnacle down and find the first gablet, or tiny peaked roof. Darth Vader is the grotesque on the right on the north, or right-hand, side.

The cathedral offers tours of their grotesques, and photos of many of the gargoyles can be seen here.

Here’s an easy weekend project: Turn a mundane outfit into something The Bride of Frankenstein might wear to go dancing. (It’d work with a man’s shirt or trousers too.)

This was inspired by an upcycled slip made by SmarmyClothes (I disagree with the “zombie” label; stitches are much more Frankensteinian). It appears that her garment was actually cut and stitched back together; my method uses a faux seam that’s a little more forgiving of mistakes: You can rip out stitches and re-do them until you get the look you’re after.

If you’d like to try your hand at something similar, I’ve posted a tutorial here.

…because this will be available in September.

Although there are lots of Lego “haunted houses” custom-built by hobbyists, this is the first “official” version. I have to say, it sounds rather splendid.

• Includes 6 minifigures: 2 glow-in-the-dark ghosts, Vampyre, Vampyre’s Bride, Zombie chef and butler
• Features unique ‘crooked’ design featuring boarded up windows and working front gate.
• Haunted House opens to reveal detailed interior with 3 floors.
• First floor features fireplace that swings open and displays a ship in a bottle on the mantle.
• Cook up a ghoulish meal with the Zombie chef in the kitchen complete with old-style stove, jars and table.
• Write letters from the Vampyre’s haunted office.
• Pull the lever hidden in the chimney to release the drop down staircase and access the top floor.
• Top floor features gramophone, records and newspaper LEGO® elements.
• Customize the Haunted House with new stickers for wall hangings, spider webs and curtains.

Kotaku has a closeup look at the included minifigures, and here’s the official walkthrough video:

The kit includes over 2,000 pieces and suggested retail is US $179.99. Sounds like a holiday wishlist item to me.

(Hat tip to SpookyBeth)

Okay, this backstory is going to take some time to explain, so buckle up.

John Scalzi is a noted science fiction author (let me recommend his Old Man’s War, which is a conscious and spot-on homage to Robert A. Heinlein, and The Android’s Dream, which is hilarious) who also runs a popular and well-worth-reading blog.

Last year on April 1 he unveiled his “secret fantasy project,” a trilogy of novels called The Shadow War of the Night Dragons. His publisher posted an excerpt of the purported first novel, this being the first sentence:

Night had come to the city of Skalandarharia, the sort of night with such a quality of black to it that it was as if black coal had been wrapped in blackest velvet, bathed in the purple-black ink of the demon squid Drindel and flung down a black well that descended toward the deepest, blackest crevasses of Drindelthengen, the netherworld ruled by Drindel, in which the sinful were punished, the black of which was so legendarily black that when the dreaded Drindelthengenflagen, the ravenous blind black badger trolls of Drindelthengen, would feast upon the uselessly dilated eyes of damned, the abandoned would cry out in joy as the Drindelthengenflagenmorden, the feared Black Spoons of the Drindelthengenflagen, pressed against their optic nerves, giving them one last sensation of light before the most absolute blackness fell upon them, made yet even blacker by the injury sustained from a falling lump of ink-bathed, velvet-wrapped coal.

And, of course, after letting his readers stew in their own outraged juices for a few days, he announced that the whole thing was, of course, an April Fool’s joke.

But here’s the thing: That stupid story has taken on a life of its own. It was nominated for, and won, Tor’s 2011 Reader’s Choice Award. This year, on April 1, Tor announced that they were launching a manga version of the series (which Scalzi then threatened to actually write). And then the “excerpt” was nominated for a Hugo Award and I’ll be surprised if it doesn’t win.

And now, the newest twist in the tale.

Mark Oshiro started his Mark Reads project by reading–and commenting copiously and hilariously upon–Twilight. Then he moved on to Harry Potter and a number of other works. His shtick was that he read all of these things “cold,” with no prior knowledge of the books, so all of his commentary was wonderfully unencumbered by spoilers. His latest project is Mark Does Stuff, where for a mere $25 he will make a video of himself reading anything you want.

One of Scalzi’s fans sponsored a reading of that same silly Shadow War of the Night Dragons excerpt, and it pretty much broke Mark’s brain.

It’s just so…beautiful.

Absinthe-Flavored Coffee – I object to the product description, in that I don’t think anything flavored with absinthe could properly be called a “cup of Joe.” (Hat tip to Linda)

Cristoforo Font Kickstarter – Something something Lovecraft font something. Honestly, the attempt to juxtapose font recreation and Cthulhu had me cocking my head like the RCA dalmatian.

Death Week – A roundup of death-related topics from io9.

Ectoplasm – The cutest little needle-felted hunk of supernatural goo that you will ever see. There’s a second view here.

Victoria Lounge Chair – This has just become the top item on my furniture wish list.

Haunted Fabric – Custom fabric printer Spoonflower’s “haunted” tag turns up a number of lovely patterns, including several riffs on the Disney Haunted Mansion wallpaper. (I would suspect those get copyright takedown notices occasionally, so order while you can.) Also check tags like “spooky” and “monster.”

iPhone Charging Station – From Reddit, a splendid Kubrick-esque phone charger made from Legos.

Robocop Remake – The ThinkGeek blog puts it better than I could: “Robocop remake? Maybe okay. Starring Hugh Laurie, Gary Oldman, Joel Kinnaman & Samuel L Jackson? WELL THEN.”

she didn’t float – Photoblog of odd old photos. Some are creepy. Some are NSFW, so beware. (via Mr. Macabre)

Bat Hat – The expression on the face of this fleece “bat” hat just cracks me up. The seller also has a cute Cthulhu version.

p.s. – I’m going to be dragged, kicking and shrieking, away from the computer for a week. Due to the magic of advance scheduling posting will continue as usual, but if you email and I don’t respond I’m not ignoring you. (Or…am I? Muwahahahaha.)

Long ago, when I worked for a video store–I had bills to pay and some karma from a past life to work off–one of my colleagues was a guy named Pat. Pat was one of those slyly humorous slacker geeks with an encyclopedic knowledge of everything from D&D arcana to obscure comic book characters.*

One day he told me that he’d once successfully convinced a PE teacher to excuse him from running laps by claiming to have been stung by a triffid. The best part was when the teacher said sympathetically, “Yeah, that can be painful.”

I really miss Pat.

*In fact, one of the first times I was made to literally fall down laughing was when I was trying to remember the name of that monster that sits outside of Egyptian Hell and eats peoples’ hearts (it’s Ammit, so you don’t have to look it up**), and I asked Pat if he knew. Without missing a beat, he said, “Phil.” I said, “Phil?” He said, “Yeah. I don’t remember his last name; you work with a guy for a couple thousand years, you get friendly.” I asked, “You used to work with Phil? What did you do?” He smiled and replied, “I used to oil the little scales.” As I was leaning against the wall, cackling, he continued, “I had to quit, though. There were union talks, and they said that I’d have to wear the head of an animal. And that wasn’t so bad, but all they had left was a budgie.” Which is when I fell down. But I digress.

**Which would take you 0.5 seconds. But I was asking before the Internet existed, so my only other option was to go to the library and look it up. And also get off of my lawn.

I’m not entirely sure what the name means, but the concept is certainly intriguing.

Among the Sleep is a first-person horror game in which you play the role of a two-year-old child. After being tucked into bed one evening, nightmarish things begin to happen. Accompanied only by your faithful teddy bear, you have to fight your way through a surreal world to survive and return home.

Krillbrite Studio, the game’s indie developer, recently released a gameplay teaser video:

I really like the conceit of playing as a toddler. Not only would it make routine tasks interestingly complicated, the idea of being so small and vulnerable makes the threat extra-spooky. (Of course, as a commenter pointed out on BoingBoing, you can easily win the game by just hiding under the covers until morning.)

The game will be available for PC and Mac next year. You can follow its progress on the Krillbrite blog, where they have some neat time-lapse videos of concept art creation.

(via Super Punch)