The Goth Calendar has been ported to a nicer platform with better export/subscription capability, and lots more events have been added. w00t.

Enfants Perdus – Purveyor of upscale, gothy jewelry.

Top 25 Halloween Makeup Tutorials – Roundup of video tutorials for various makeup effects. Most of them seem to be in the medium-to-hard range, but it’s worth taking a look for the leopard-print lipstick alone. (Hat tip to MaDonna)

The Witch’s House – Some great photos of the Spadena House in Beverly Hills.

Orange Cineday Ad – Clever “movie trailer” (who is that other guy?)

Dork Tower – This “Calthulhu” cracks me up.

Frida Kahlo Cake – An astoundingly detailed Day of the Dead-themed cake. The whole photostream consists of this artist’s custom cakes, and they are just astonishing. (Hat tip to Empress Pam)

BoneLust – Etsy store offering all sorts of bone-related goodness.

H.R. Giger Furniture – I know I’ve mentioned Giger’s store before, but holy smokes, did you see these chairs?

“Always” Needlework – Lovely hoop embroidery featuring a touching Harry Potter quote.

Periodic Table of Heavy Metals – Amusing “periodic table” chart. Prints are available.

Here’s a fun little time-waster: A Flash-based game wherein you play a ghost trying to rid your house of noisy party guests.

There are 30 guests scattered around a multi-floor house. Use the arrow keys to maneuver your ghost around the house. You can “possess” various objects (furnishings, toys, etc.) by hovering near them and hitting the spacebar, then use the arrow keys to cause various actions: The bathtub walks across the floor, portraits scream, a teddy bear growls, and so on. If you do spooky things in front of guests you can frighten them out of the room and (eventually) out of the house; the goal is to scare all 30 people away.

Scaring people will increase your haunting abilities and allow you to do more powerful things, but if you frighten anyone too badly you run the risk of causing them to panic and accidentally kill themselves. Also, children and a few of the giddier adults tend to take your paranormal activities in stride, so there’s some skill involved in being juuuust scary enough.

The game is whimsical and cartoony instead of creepy, so there’s no risk of causing nightmares in small children.* Whether you’re trying to set a record for the fastest time chasing everybody away or just wandering around and seeing what you can cause various objects to do when you possess them, it’s certainly worth a play or two.

*Shadowboy loves this game, and is much better at clearing the house than I am. Being pwned by a seven-year-old is humbling.

Once you understand that your success doesn’t depend upon the failure of others you’ll become less of an asshole.
— capricecrane

Mowing would be more fun if grass screamed a little.
— yoyoha

My favourite part of a restaurant visit is when the waiter comes over with the peppermill like it was found in the Ark of the Covenant.
— Beerhaze

If one pig would just get off his lazy ass and attempt to fly, a lot of people would have to do some really embarassing stuff.
— JordyHamrick

They never talk about the bad stuff in an obituary. Like “Devoted husband and father. Loved to laugh. Stabbed a guy once.”
— YUCKYBOT

Japan also has Amish people; they drive around in cars instead of teleporting in giant robots.
— OuterJohn

“What? Why am I a part of this?” – the horse you rode in on
— mikeleffingwell

Ghosts probably roll their eyes a lot.
— sween

In a coffee shop, surrounded by hipsters. Don’t worry, if they capture me I won’t tell them where we keep the shampoo.
— badbanana

All those punk rock girls who started ironically knitting in the 90s are now just ladies who knit.
— BarrettChase

Oooh…pretty.

The Nefertem shawl is a lace-knitting pattern by Kristen Kapur of Through the Loops Designs. It’s currently only available as part of a pattern/yarn kit through The Loopy Ewe, but the pattern will be available by itself in October.

There’s a little more information about it in the Ravelry library, plus a photoset on Flickr where it’s also shown being worn as a scarf. Red Pepper Quilts has a review of the pattern and some more photos.

I love the delicate, spiderwebby look of this piece, and have to say that I think I like it better in the dark purply-grey yarn of the kit than I would in plain black. This would be a perfect light wrap for an evening out or, as Hinkenhook suggests, a bridesmaid’s gift to be worn in a Hallowedding.

Billing itself as, “The World’s Only Dating Website for the Living-impaired,” Gravedate is currently just a shell, but it’s got a dynamite promotional ad:

(Hat tip to pdq)

Amazing Quilt by Katrin Rodegast – Astonishingly intricate quilt combining 270 images from “social reality.”

Darkfin Gloves – Gloves that give you “webbed fingers” which supposedly improve your swimming. I don’t care about that; I just want a pair to wear around and make people nervous.

Friday the 13th – This little illustration of various horror villains is adorable.

Locke & Key – Interesting set of graphic novels with a “dark supernatural” theme. There’s a very positive review at BoingBoing.

Kitty in a Casket – “Pop punk” band with highly entertaining lyrics. (Hat tip to Kitten Herder)

HearseWorks – Sells new and pre-owned hearses.

Two from Cracked: The 6 Creepiest Places on Earth and The 6 Creepiest Places on Earth (Part 2). They are indeed creepy.

GroovyBruce – Bruce Campbell’s Twitter feed.

20 Alcoholic Beverages Inspired By The Harry Potter Series – A roundup. The Avada Kedavra is particularly well-named.

Scary Maze – Now that’s a reaction.

I recently ran across an EMF Detector app which purports to detect the same “ghostly” energies that paranormal investigators look for, and wondered what other smartphone apps might be available for the gothier amongst us. As it turns out, there’s a bunch of ’em.

There are several other flavors of EMF apps, including iEMF (which seems to have a more detailed readout), EMF Meter + (appears to be aimed more at scientists than ghost hunters), and Paranormal State EMF Reader (associated with A&E’s Paranormal State program ; I don’t know how much useful data it collects but the interface is well-suited to costume parties).

Other ghost-hunting tools include:

Ghost Recorder – Claims to record ghostly sounds beyond the range of human hearing.

Paranormal Recorder – Another EVP recorder, this one triggered by unusual EMF readings.

iOvilus – The description of this recorder is sort of vague, but it appears to function(?) on the theory that external forces can cause changes to the phone’s sensors,

Ghost Words – An EVP recorder that is triggered by motion or infrared.

Ghost Radar – Offers a variety of sensors (EMF, vibrations, sounds, etc.) and some interesting management capabilities.

Ghost Hunter – Another multi-function ghost hunting toolkit.

Ghost Detector Pro – Claims to use the phone’s environmental sensors to track ghosts on a radar-like screen. I like that the tagline is, “Protect yourself from the ghosts in 2011!”

Read the rest of this entry »

That right there is some Grade-A Nightmare Fuel, y’all.

Artist Tracy Ann Lister creates “Reborns:” Eerily-lifelike dolls that resemble real babies. She’s currently got a whole series of Harry Potter-inspired babies in her eBay store, and although Harry, Ron, and Hermione are all reasonably cute, baby Dobby, Lupin and most particularly Voldemort look like the sort of thing you’d hit with a stick if you found it lurking in the cellar.

They aren’t cheap, but if you simply can’t live without your very own baby Tonks or Snape, now’s your chance.

(via io9)

The Fine Brothers, who somehow managed to explain 47 years of Dr. Who in 6 minutes, are back with a (spoileriffic, obvs) recap of all 7 Harry Potter movies in 7 minutes. I think what’s most impressive about these is they actually manage to be comprehensible.

(via Blame it On the Voices)