“Hut by the River,” Stepan Fedorovich Kolesnikov, early 20th Century

Gouache on paper.

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“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels.”

“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”

― Rob Siltanen

 

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A pal of mine actually ate this last night.

Because there is no god, and because life is a stupefying, interminable Kafkaesque nocturnal hellscape.

Hey, I generally love Ben & Jerry’s.  It’s an awesome brand.  But Pumpkin Cheesecake ice cream combines two of the very worst things in the universe — into a new and confusing amalgam of horror.  (Anyone who knows me will tell you that I abhor all things pumpkin-flavored.  And I’ve harbored a private loathing of cheesecake since college — there’s a weird story behind that.)

So, for me, this is like taking two things that cannot possibly be worse, and yet somehow making them worse via cruel combination.  Like maybe a giant spider that also has gonorrhea.  Or maybe Donald Trump singing an entire Whitney Houston album.

Remember that fish entree I showed you that looked like “Pumpkinhead?”  I would rather eat that than this.

My friend gave me a permission to post this picture only if I said it was delicious.  I lied to her.

 

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Cover to “Zatanna” #13, Adam Hughes, 2006

DC Comics.

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“Double, double toil and trouble;/ Fire burn and cauldron bubble.”

Round about the cauldron go:
In the poisoned entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights has thirty-one
Sweated venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot.

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing.
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witch’s mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg’d i’ the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew;
Gall of goat; and slips of yew
Sliver’d in the moon’s eclipse;
Nose of Turk, and Tartar’s lips;
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver’d by a drab,
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron.

Double, double toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.

—  “Song of the Witches,” from William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Act IV, Scene 1

 

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Cover to “International Iron Man” #1, Alex Maleev, 2016

Marvel Comics.

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“What stands if Freedom fall? Who dies if England live?”

“For All We Have And Are,” by Rudyard Kipling

For all we have and are,
For all our children’s fate,
Stand up and take the war.
The Hun is at the gate!
Our world has passed away,
In wantonness o’erthrown.
There is nothing left to-day
But steel and fire and stone!
Though all we knew depart,
The old Commandments stand:—
“In courage keep your heart,
In strength lift up your hand.”

Once more we hear the word
That sickened earth of old:—
“No law except the Sword
Unsheathed and uncontrolled.”
Once more it knits mankind,
Once more the nations go
To meet and break and bind
A crazed and driven foe.

Comfort, content, delight,
The ages’ slow-bought gain,
They shrivelled in a night.
Only ourselves remain
To face the naked days
In silent fortitude,
Through perils and dismays
Renewed and re-renewed.
Though all we made depart,
The old Commandments stand:—
“In patience keep your heart,
In strength lift up your hand.”

No easy hope or lies
Shall bring us to our goal,
But iron sacrifice
Of body, will, and soul.
There is but one task for all—
One life for each to give.
What stands if Freedom fall?
Who dies if England live?

— 1914

 

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Throwback Thursday: Vintage Godzilla!!!

This is just a smattering of the early “Godzilla” movies that thrilled me as a kid.  They played on television in the late 1970’s and the early 1980’s.  Hot damn, was I happy when these came on.  It was the next best thing to a holiday.

The first trailer that you see (and the photo below) is for the original “Godzilla” in 1954.  That scene where he tears through the high-tension powerlines made a big impression on me as a little boy.  I never forgot it.  I should point out that I (like most of the world) saw the Americanized version of the movie, which was heavily re-edited and released in 1956.  (That is indeed Raymond Burr that you see in the trailer.)

“Godzilla vs. Megalon” (1976) is another that I remember well — probably because I saw it as an older child.

Am I crazy, or does the “Son of Godzilla” trailer from 1969 mention “Frankenstein” for some reason?  Something got lost in translation.

 

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Detail from Alfons Mucha’s “Spring,” 1900

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“You shall love your crooked neighbour/ With your crooked heart.”

‘O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.

‘O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.’

— excerpt, “As I Walked Out One Evening,” W. H. Auden

 

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Photo credit: By Johan Hansson from Gävle, Sweden – Scary lake, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40576835

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