I want to have this man's baby

Meet Thomas Kuntz, master automaton artist, with a flair for the dark side and an inspiration for me.  I love automatons, kinetic art, anything that moves and this first piece is well worth selling one's soul for....




This one is creepy in a sort of wonderful sort of way, love the shifty eyes...



An interview with Thomas Kuntz...


Can you imagine what possibilities this man would have if he decorated for Hallowe'en?!  I would freaking MOVE just to live next to him to see what he put in his yard!

Then again, he probably just puts out a pre-carved pumpkin from the WalMarts.

The food of nightmares

Why do I do these things, someone please tell me.  While channel flipping (I'm a guy, I channel flip) I zip by the Travel Channel and watch this guy eat a barbecue sauce with habanero extract in it (he was sweating like a pig, he was insane for doing it!), and then another show he tries to eat an 8 pound hamburger (didn't do it, looked like he was going to throw up) but in between, there was an ad for some guy that eats weird @$$ food, food being a very loose term.

He had a *&*;$#^% big @$$ spider on a stick.

After I crawled down off the ceiling when I had finished screaming, I took my masochistic self to the computer and verified what I thought I had seen...

I'm Southern. As a rule, we fry everything, salt it and then put gravy on it. I haven't heard of any Southern recipes calling for big @$$ spiders and Mazola.

This makes every fiber of my being cringe in abject terror, so naturally I had to share.  The question remains...ranch dressing or honey mustard dipping sauce?

A Confession

I'm coming clean for ya'll.  I have a confession to make and it isn't pretty.  I have to face your rejection, ridicule and ostracization  because of this deep dark secret of mine.  I'm sorry for the hurt that I will have caused you, my dear readers, it was nice knowing you all.

I have a Snuggie and I like my Snuggie.

There, I've said it and I'm proud of it.  My world was grainy black and white as I struggled to answer the phone on the sofa with a regular blanket until my Snuggie from the CVS came into my life.  And yes, I am well aware that I look like a tool when I use it.

This cracks me up (has some naughty words in it so just to let you know)...



Told my dear friend Sausage's husband that I had a Snuggie.   He said that he was embarrassed for me.  Sadly enough, I want the Snuggie 2.0; it's 40% heavier and has a place for your cough drops and Kleenex!

Something tells me I'm going to regret pushing the 'PUBLISH POST' button...

Suckerrrrrrrrrr!

You ever know when you're getting conned and for some reason you just can't stop the train of it for the inertia?  This happened to me yesterday.  Some guy comes up to me in the grocery store parking lot and starts talking to me, the hello, can you help me sort of thing.  This one was interesting because he said he was a videographer for a local TV station and that the van he had ran out of gas with a million dollars worth of television equipment in it.  He knew some names of some of the professors at the University here (I was in broadcast and film eons ago before I switched majors) so I offered to fill his tank up but he said that he had to have 60.00.  I offered 40 and a ride to a parking lot a couple of miles down the road but he begged for 60.  He said that he was only going to borrow the money and was desperate.  I thought about it for a moment, withdrew 60 bucks from my account and gave it to him, I try to do unto others as I would like people to do unto me if indeed I was in his position and had a real emergency. He thanked me as he got out of my van.  Curious, I doubled back just to see where he was going...some seedy cigarette store across the street.  

Yeah, I was had. Big time.  I was scared to death to tell Mrs. Macabre about it but strangely enough, I was told that I did the right thing.  I'm very disappointed in the person for not telling me the truth, (the story was in infinite detail too, it was incredible. The first tip off when someone wants money is a complex scenario that has an element of immediacy or emergency to it and promises of immediate repayment), just be up front with me.

That was just to blow off steam, I'm over it now.   Then two kids came by the house selling stuff for their school...a 12.00 scented candle in a variety of migraine inducing scents and a 25.00 Boston butt roast.  I could have done without the candle in 'Alabama Kudzu' scent (how the &%$# did they come up with that scent?!) but I'm all over a Boston butt roast for barbecue.  If kids come by the house, I always buy something from them, it's just the thing you do.  I bought 14.00 worth of sugar cookie dough a couple of weeks back and it is still staring me in the face. 

Oh well, it's only money.

Celebration of Peace and Coexistence

Traipse on over to Good Mourning, Glory! to read my guest post and thoughts on Christmas/holiday traditions.  More macabreness is in the drafts files to come...actually have had some work for a change!  Yaaah! Money good!  Paying mortgage good!

Celebration of Peace and Coexistence

Diane of Good Mourning Glory is hosting a week of the Celebration of Peace and Coexistence.  In this day and age, what the h e doublehockeysticks is that?! The answer is something that we all need in abundance right dang well now!  As we come into the holiday season, she has asked some (including yours truly) to reflect on the traditions that we have held and any thoughts that we may have on holiday season. 

Go take a look all this week, mine is on Wednesday and see how others have celebrated the holidays with their friends and families. 

Let the battle begin!

Me: "I'm putting up a tree this year"

Mrs. Macabre: "That's nice, it's about time you got in a holiday mood"

Me: "Yep, I cleaned Michael's out of all their LED lights last week when they went on sale"

Mrs. Macabre: "Wait, Christmas lights are going on sale this early?!"

Me: "Orange Hallowe'en lights, what do you think I meant?"

Mrs. Macabre: "You are not putting up a Halloween tree for Christmas."

Me: "...then I'll pull out the papier mache' and work in the kitchen again"

Mrs. Macabre: "It goes in the back of the house, away from the front windows then.  You play dirty."

You want some of this?

Come get some, but first you'll have to get past my friends.
These are from House of the Unusual, a MOST unusual webstore that specialized in all the stuff that we border-baby-boomers (yes, I was born on the cutoff year to be considered a baby boomer) saw in the backs of comic books.
Eddie, the owner, has taken the time and effort to bring all this back to us and I can say from personal experience, he does indeed care about his customers.   From bugs in ice cubes, remote control flying ghosts, fake blood, dirty soap, x-ray specs, all the stuff mother wouldn't buy you because she knew how much trouble you would get into with it is here.

This is a second review of their products, as you may (or may not) remember, I was shipped a Boney the Skeleton of lesser quality which turned out that the printer was at fault, not House of the Unusual.  These bad boys are printed on heavy paper and the ink is consistent and deep. 

Did I mention that they are HUGE? The image themselves are 7 feet tall at least!

The Whole Thing..,

Found the rest of it, a beautiful little movie...

Happy Dia de los Muertos

I don't know what she's singing about but I have a feeling it's something sad...beautiful animation and music...

 WHERE HAS VOLTAIRE BEEN ALL MY LIFE?!  THESE GUYS ARE GREAT!!!  Love the animation too!


via Tiny Sepuku (This person is a great cartoonist and has a blog, he finds the coolest stuff out there and posts it to which I promptly steal! Just kidding, I always try to give credit where credit is due.)

Halloween 2009

Despite my whining and the rains, Hallowe'en wasn't so bad after all.  We didn't have that many trick-or-treaters (probably less than 25) but I placed about 2 dozen pumpkins in the yard and for some reason, it gave a magical feel to it.  And we were given 2 HOMEMADE caramel apples!  I was stoked!  A dear friend came over and wanted to help give out candy...

Would you take candy from this woman?

We ate pizza, drank wine and watched the Addams Family marathon.  Everything considering, it wasn't that bad and the cleanup was a lot easier.  Mrs. Macabre knew that this year was a disappointment to me so while at Lowe's yesterday, I saw a deep fryer that I had my eye on in the buggy.

I smiled, nothing says love like deep fried food.

For My Last Couple of Days...

Have been on pins and needles lately...literally.  I was working on my corpse head and the knife blade snapped...through my thumb.  I traipsed myself to the doc-in-da-box and got stitches.

It wasn't bad...except for the anesthesia...that HURT LIKE A MUTHA! The nurse brings in a quart Mason jar syringe with a steel turkey baster needle tip on it and says so cheerfully, "It's just going to be a little bug bite." Her 'little bug bite' must have meant sticking my hand into a hornet's nest and flipping them off!  My thumb in the picture isn't that size normally, I have slender fingers, that's the quart of fluid she pumped into it!  I got feeling back 15 HOURS later this morning!

Before then, I went to the Pig...with the iPhone...

You're welcome.

And WTF does anyone use chicken feet for?!  Ms. M tried to dry some in a dehydrator a few years back for a Hallowe'en costume and they never would go rigor mortise, they just kind of turned a gray and rubbery.  She threw away the dehydrator after that.

I had to go to Birmingham on some errands today and while driving, I ran across this house...

I hope that they were used to people staring because I stayed there for several minutes just snapping away and admiring their work.  Actually I was stalking but we will let that be our little secret.

Happy Hallowe'en Ya'll!

What Would The Frog Queen Do With A Custom Banner?

Just ask her because she's the recipient for one!  Thanks to the generosity of UPrinting.com, she can put up her custom "WARNING, ZOMBIE AHEAD" banner and leave it up until the police or HOA (Home Owner's Association) makes her take it down!

Congratulations Frog Queen from UPrinting.com and Mr. Macabre!

No Hallowe'en For Me...

I have been watching the weather flip flop for the past several days from partly cloudy and nice to nasty.

Nasty won, meaning that I can't decorate the yard because all of my props are weather-sensitive (in other words, very non-UL listed for outdoor use and would probably fry you if you got too close in the rain, and everything would more or less be destroyed if they got soaked).



Pootie!  Oh well, there's always next year. 

No Shame

Give me a couple of glue sticks and watch me go! This was before art class the other day.  Sausage got her camera as I permanently elongated my nostrils.

Why?  I often ask myself this question.

Sad, so, so so sad.

Weep for the future, weep bitter tears...
For some reason this looks like a soul's awakening or something. Again, this is a cry for help.

Post Cards Galore! A Fantastic Giveaway from UPrinting!

Postcards are fun.  Face it, you probably go and buy some cheesy cards on vacation, usually they're corny or just doesn't say what you want.  How about if you could make 100 of your own CUSTOM 4 x 6 post cards in  full color printing...ON BOTH SIDES!  You could make invitations, thank you's, note cards, reminders, anything that you want...for free!  What will I do with my 100 cards that I receive from UPrinting for hosting this giveaway?  I'm going to make promotional cards to send to local businesses in hopes to get a haunt sponsor for next year (this haunting thing is killer on the budget, I need someone to share the love [or at least the cold hard cash] with!).  How would you use a set?  To enter, just tell me in the comments section by October 28 and you're entered!  How easy is that?!  Don't forget and do it now before you forget, you can't win if you don't enter!

• Giveaway Prize: 100 Postcards for One Lucky Winner

• Size:  4x6; Paper:  14pt Cardstock Gloss; Printing: Full color both sides  

• Shipping: FREE UPS Ground Shipping in the US (Canadian residents pay only shipping and taxes)

• Winner will receive a coupon code by email on November 6 2009 (plenty of time to make holiday postcards if you'd like!!!)

To get an idea of all the options, head on over to UPrinting's Postcard Site and see all the different things you can do! 

The great people of UPrinting.com graciously allow me to make these giveaways available to you, so please give them a chance if you have any printing needs.  I have received several custom courtesy products from them and I can attest that they are the highest quality and quick turn around time!

Good luck!!!

My First Blog Rant--a revisitation of Trunk or Treat

I saw it the other day, a sign promoting Trunk or Treat.  I blew a fuse, again.  I looked back and found my first blog rant and I can say that my feelings have only grown stronger...In case you might not know what Trunk or &$%@# Treat is, or my thoughts on it, here you go...

Ok, I'm strong, I can do this without cussing. No I can't.
Trunk or treat is a fairly new concept in which people go to a parking lot either in a church or a shopping center and open the trunks to their cars, decorate them, usually cute or (shudder) educational, and provide a safe, well-lit area for children to come, heavily supervised, to get candy.
Whew, I did it, I really got through an explanation of THAT @$%&# ABOMINATION THAT IS AS STUPID AS IT IS LAME!!!
Looks like I didn't get through it after all but I don't care!  I despise the concept and the underlying watering down of Hallowe'en, I have seen one where everyone's cars were lined up and each trunk was an educational thing on different countries.  You learned about the country and got a treat that was respresentative of the country.  GOOD LORD PEOPLE, THESE KIDS GO TO SCHOOL ALL THE TIME, AT LEAST LET THEM HAVE A LITTLE INANE FUN FOR A #@%&# CHANGE!!!  I would have had Australia and given the little nippers Vegemite (being a terribly salty and yeasty spread from Australia, had it once, tasted like boiled down brown beer) and told them, "Now, you learn from this, trick or treating means sugar and chocolate, trick or @$#^%& trunking or whatever the #@&*$ this is, means learning more crap and getting lousy crap to eat.  Now go be a little @%#$% until your mom and dad lets you go to a couple of doors and get something to rot out your teeth and don't let me catch you near a car trunk again. Happy *%#@$% Hallowe'en kid".
Do I make myself crystal clear?  I don't like Trunk or Treat.
The other thing is Fall Festivals, Harvest Festivals, Family Festivals, and the like. I grew up going to a Hallowe'en Carnival at my elementary school, Crestmont Elementary.  You could tell when it was October 1, advertisement signs were hung in the lunchroom from strings like garland. We got to wear our Hallowe'en costumes on Hallowe'en and I believe the Friday night before we had the Halloween carnival. Every classroom had an event and you bought tickets to each event. You could go fishing in which you cast your line over a movable blackboard with cutout fish adorning the front and when your line gave a tug, you reeled in a toy!  Or you could visit the witches' house and feel a bowlful of worms (cold spaghetti), dead men's eyes (peeled grapes) or bowl of blood (ketchup).  Maybe you had the hankering to find out what the future held by visiting the fortune teller (who looked suspiciously like one of the fourth grade teachers) or walk through the haunted house (ignoring the Patch the Pony posters and desks lined up to make a path through horrors of volunteers jumping out with rubber masks in the blacklight).  I fail to see where I am, or anyone else that went to our school has been mentally scarred or turned out to be a Satanic priest because of Hallowe'en carnivals.
Then came the 80's where suddenly Hallowe'en was suddenly the devil's birthday and the grand and glorious crusade of imposed rightousness stripped us of Scream in the Dark put on by Campus Life Ministries, Savage House Haunted Hayride hosted by Gordo Methodist Youth and a host of other VERY good quality haunted houses.  Lies permeated about Hallowe'en and the deep evil that it imposed on our children that we must protect.  And I bought into it, for about 1 year and I was miserable that year.
Never, ever, ever again.

Countdown To Hallowe'en--Sweet Potato Bread Recipe

This recipe was the first one that I posted on the blog nearly a year ago.   I made a loaf of this breakfast/coffee time/pig-out time bread last night and it simply tastes like fall. 

Sweet Potato Pecan Bread (Courtesy Martha White Flour, with my alterations)
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 tablespoon vanilla
2 tablespoons milk
1 cup cooked and mashed sweet potatoes
1 1/2 cups chopped pecans
1 cup golden raisins
Preheat oven to 325.  Spray Pam into bottom of a bread pan liberally.  Combine all dry ingredients.  Combine oil, eggs, milk and vanilla and stir into dry ingredients. Stir in sweet potatoes, pecans and raisins, mix well.   Pour into loaf pan and bake until toothpick comes clean, around an hour or so.  Cool in pan for at least 15 minutes before removing and cooling on wire rack.  Bread is moist but crumbly but oh so good.

Closeup of the crumbly goodness.

Hallowe'en Countdown--15 Days and Counting....

I...I...I'm speechless...They're all so...beautiful....

 

 

 

 

via Geekologie.com

This Is Going To Be An Uber Cool Giveaway--250 Custom Stickers!!!

Howdy Fiends!

Stickers are cool.  Personalized stickers are uber cool.  How would you like to have 250 custom stickers that are unique as you are?  Well, thanks to UPrinting.com and me, Mr. Macabre, one lucky winner is going to have that chance!  What will you do with yours?  Promote a business?  Announce or promote an event?  Say what's on your mind?  Whatever you can dream up, UPrinting.com can do it for you (within reason of course; they as well as I would frown upon copyright infringement or anything that might be considered obscene).  As a host of this giveaway, I will be receiving a set in which I will promote my graveyard, The Final Unresting Place Cemetery to give out to promote my haunted attraction.  Head on over to see the many different  sticker printing options that are available to you!

Giveaway Prize Details
250 Stickers/Labels for One (1) lucky winner
Sizes:  2” x 3.5”, 2” x 4”, or 3” x 3”
Paper:  70 lb Label Matte
Specifications: Full color front, blank back; 4 Business Day printing

How do you go about getting your own set of stickers?  Very easy!

• Tell me in the comments how you would use the stickers.  UPrinting.com is interested in how people use their products in creative and diverse ways.

• Want an extra chance?  Just blog about this giveaway in your blog and you have another chance!

• Drawing by Random.org will be held October 29, coupon code will be sent via email November 6

• Drawing is open to US and Canadian residents; Free UPS Ground shipping in the USA (Canadian residents only pay shipping and taxes)

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Good Luck from UPrinting.com and Mr. Macabre!