Homer Simpson will pop your cork!

Not very useful for opening Duff beer, this Homer Simpson corkscrew is perfect for the drinking person with a sense of whimsy. Buying one for oneself or a friend, like Homer himself, is a no-brainer.

You can buy one at this site for around $20.

They also feature a Homer Simpson stainless steel hip flask and shot glass set, for the animation fan with a drinking problem and aesthetic pretensions. This is an improvement over standard flasks and shot sets; the steel won't break when dropped by users with a load on or those in the throes of the DTs!

A must-attend film event!

Ethel Mer-man

The male version of a mermaid is a merman. Well, here's a gender-bending singing merman I found on YouTube:





Okay, so he ain't a real MERMAN, but his costuming and singing certainly made me think of Ethel, crossed with King Neptune and Ursula the Sea Witch from The Little Mermaid. This is a Bulgarian singer named Azis. (Not sure how his name's pronounced; I just say "As is.") The similar Arabic name "Aziz" means "powerful" in Arabic, and this guy's big enough to look powerful--but I'm more frightened when he looks like this:

Here he reminds me of Michael Myers with his mask on--if the mask had a Van Dyke mustache and beard.

For "something completely different", as the Monty Pythonites used to say, see these Azis videos (where the pics are taken from):

Ustata

Nikoj ne mozhe

Classic toys of yesteryear: Morticia

A nearly 5' tall Morticia Addams doll, made by Aboriginals Ltd. and sold at F. A. O. Schwartz. Produced in 1962, prior to the ABC television show.

A future equal parts Frankenstein and George Romero

One of the U. S. military's technology contractors is developing a robot that has one of the most horrifying applications of any ever used on a battlefield: the ability TO EAT THE DEAD!

Good lord. Read more about it here.

My childhood innocence has died...

...because I found this photo in a magazine from several years ago:



OOOOOHHHHH, ROOOOOB!

Looks like Mary's got spunk!

THE DRUNKEN SEVERED HEAD SHOW gets its first review!!

Respected film blog HONG KONG AND CULT FILM NEWS has posted the first review of my short film, THE DRUNKEN SEVERED HEAD SHOW. (So much for it staying respected.) I got a glowing notice by singularly-named film critic Porfle. Here's a sample line: "...Even after repeated viewings, I seem to notice something completely different every time. Last time I watched it, I noticed that my toenails needed trimming!"

This is just the kind of nuanced praise I was hoping for (or expecting, anyway.) As New York stage and radio actor Craig Wichman has said of the film, "For people who like this kind of movie, this is the kind of movie they will like."

The full review can be read here. It's even illustrated with a funny picture (made with real pixels) created by Hollywood documentary maker Ted Newsom!

Send off for the film, complete with commentaries, deleted scenes, and stills, by writing to me here!

Goodbye, Michael

The death of the "King of Pop" has had a strong impact on many people; news coverage of memorials to Jackson have been ubiquitous. After avoiding mentioning it here during the all the hoopla, I finally am ready to post on the subject.

I have mixed feelings about the man himself and the amazing amount of grief expressed at his death. He changed pop music. And was an important figure in pop culture for decades. For years now, however, it was for the wrong reason; it was for his ability to generate news for the tabloids.

But, like millions of others, I still have warm memories of seeing the video for the song "Thriller" for the first time. The song replaced "Monster Mash" for the post-Boomer generations as THE anthem of Halloween, my favorite holiday.

I taught Arts and Crafts at an inner-city Boys Club (pre-head-severing, of course) at the time of the album's amazing success, and I remember how in love the kids were with it and videos spawned from it. Kids at the club liked showing me (and everyone else) the dance moves they learned from the videos.




As a child in the monster craze of the 1960s, I was glad to know that many post-Boomer kids were introduced to the talents of director John Landis, makeup artist Rick Baker, and actor Vincent Price for the first time through the "Thriller" video.

Much of Michael Jackson's life was tragic and unpleasant, both for himself and the public. Sadly, he reached a point in his obsession with plastic surgery that he looked less real than wax versions of himself.


A replica of Michael Jackson at Madame Tussaud's:

It's undeniable that Jackson's music was more meaningful to many people than the sordid news that swirled about him, and that the grief fans around the world have expressed was real, and deep.


A very moving tribute to Jackson's impact can be found at Cameron McCasland's blog The Red Headed Revolution. Another post I recommend on the subject can be found at Daydreaming in Darkness. My favorite line: "It was the fact that he was so abnormal, so outside of the norm, that he became unique, even if he looked like some kind of musical Bizarro Superman. And how refreshing that was in a media landscape progressively possessed by the vacuous reality-show sameness of everybody in it."

Still, comedy and satire can tell the truth about a subject in ways straight reporting and personal testimony can't, and has its place even in times of mourning. The Onion has certainly told a form of truth about Jackson in this faux news obit.

More pointedly, Jackson's deterioration was satirized in a caricature mask (that you can buy here):


I won't be buying it. But if YOU do, be careful who you wear it around. You might get hurt.

The grief of his fans has restored some measure of dignity to the subject of the talented-but-strange "King of Pop," although the news of his passing sparked some weirdness, such as the headline "CELEBS TWEET FINAL RESPECTS TO MICHAEL JACKSON", and his public memorial, attended by thousands, had some elements of the bizarre, according to this report at Salon.com:

Inside the biggest, weirdest funeral ever

An unconventional, passionately angry reaction to Jackson's memorials can be read at this novelist's blog.

I remember the death of Elvis Presley. I think the death of "the King of Pop", has caused an even bigger reaction than the death of "the King", although it will be many years before we know whose life had a bigger impact on music history.

Rest in peace in the true Neverland, Michael.

Rest in Peace, Oscar Mayer

Oscar G. Mayer Jr., former chairman of the Oscar Mayer meat company, has gone to the great hot dog stand in the sky.

His company made products I associate with happy summer days and carnival concessions.

I wonder if he ever drove this car--and if he did it with relish...

July 18th: Help Dr. Creep!

A benefit concert to help long-time Ohio horror host Dr. CREEP (Barry Hobart) will be held July 18th, from noon to 10 p.m. at the Snyder Park Band Shell in Springfield Ohio. The free event--donations gratefully accepted--promises to be a blast; there will TEN bands on the bill, as well as "games, food and fun!"

Dr. Creep was the host of the show Shock Theater, broadcast from Dayton's WKEF from 1972 to 1985. It was revived as a public access program from 1999 to 2005. Dr. Creep is featured in the recently released documentary on horror hosts, American Scary.

Well, the Dr. is having hospital trouble--as mad scientists often do--but this time he's incurred heavy bills due to serious health issues, and his friends are organizing a fun fundraiser for him.

Here's one of his friends, G. Howie Bledsoe, Embalmer (a/k/a Art Bausman, who in real is noted for his charitable work, and as the organizer of annual party called "Frank-en-Fest", where many different kinds of food, frankfurters and Frankenstein films are served up outdoors.).

Bledsoe and Creep at Horror-Fest:

Hobart, like Bausman, is also known for his charity work, having co-founded Project Smiles, an organization "which collects toys for needy children in the Dayton area around the holidays."



The Benefit Concert to Help Dr. Creep is organized by A. Ghastlee Ghoul (Bob Hinton) a public access horror host whose program The Ghastlee Movie Show has been airing since 1989!

What do you do with a drunken badger?

A real news item today:

BERLIN (Reuters) – A badger in Germany got so drunk on over-ripe cherries it staggered into the middle of a road and refused to budge, police said Wednesday. A motorist called police near the central town of Goslar to report a dead badger on a road -- only for officers to turn up and discover the animal alive and well, but drunk.

Police discovered the nocturnal beast had eaten cherries from a nearby tree which had turned to alcohol and given the badger diarrhea. Having failed to scare the animal away, officers eventually chased it from the road with a broom.

(Reporting by Dave Graham; editing by Myra MacDonald)

Happy-looking badger statues are not uncommon in Japan. Here's one with a sign attached inviting everyone to "drink sake with him":

drunk badger
Originally uploaded to Flickr by jendubin

A NSFW photo of a topless badger Furry drinking a brew can be seen here.

A picture of a badger that might be drunk can be seen here.

This cake's hysterical

I've posted pics of odd cakes before (like here, here, here, and here), but this post at the blog Cake Wrecks takes the cake. She's posted pics of cakes made to commemorate hysterectomies! The most creative design, IMHO, is this one:


Cake Wrecks is a fantastic, funny blog, with photos of vasectomy cakes, Transformers cakes, tree stump cakes, Michael Jackson cakes, and much, much more! Go take a look.You'll spend waaay too much time there!












Since I've mentioned the word "hysterectomy", I'll pass on two really bad, insensitive, surgery-related puns I know, just 'cause I love puns:

What do you call a male-to-female sex change operation? A lopitoffomy!

What do you call a female-to male sex change operation? An adadictomy!

Sometimes, when you meet a star...

...you get all choked up.

Frankenstein's Monster has been a hero of mine since I was little, and being embraced by the old guy at Monster Bash 2009 really got to me, you know?

Whatta Bash!

Pictures from last week's MONSTER BASH con in Butler PA will be posted this week. First off, making friends at the Bash:

O Happy 4th

Okay, it's July Fourth, and the USA is celebrating its national birthday. I've started the partying early, having had 3 kegs of Sam Adams already, and I can't remember if today is "Triple Trivia Thursday" or "My Stuff Saturday". So I'll cover both ends. First some relevant trivia:


Although most people now believe that George Washington's wooden false teeth were an invention of folklore, he in fact DID have wooden teeth. Unfortunately for the Father of Our Country, they were carved from a log in the petrified forest, making his jaw hang low from the weight. People used to say, "Why the long face, George?" and then snicker. He hated it. In fact, when all of Washington's slaves one day laughed openly at his stone choppers, George had all their teeth pulled in revenge, and made them all his indentured servants.

Reese Witherspoon is a direct descendant of Declaration of Independence signer Rev. John Witherspoon. (Witherspoon is not the original family name, which was Wiltfork. But soft 'r'- speaking New Englanders say "Wiltfork" as it were a command for some guy named Wilt to do the nasty, which embarrassed the good Reverend.)

The first copy of the Declaration of Independence printed in Salem, Massachusetts was printed on human skin, taken from a confessed witch. Her body was later tied to the pull-rope of the Liberty Bell, so patriotic folks in Philadelphia could enjoy the fun of a public execution. Ironically, her name was Belle Clapper.

Now here's a pic of an item from My Stuff--well, I should say OUR stuff, since my wife made it:

It's a dried-apple-head mummy doll, made by my wife Jane, with crude photoshopped patriotic stripes, added by yours truly!

I think his face kinda looks like George Washington's, if George lived to be 103 and really wrinkled.

The right to share this with YOU is a facet of the liberties I enjoy. Happy 4th to everyone living in a democracy everywhere!

Edited to add: One of the trivia facts in bold above IS actually and for really real true!

Sites to see

Recommended blogs is what's on offer today here at TDSH.

See and read more like this--



"I’m sorry, but Italian horror has never really done it for me. If I was spoiling for a fight (and I usually am) I’d say that Italian horror consists solely of big shiny knives, garish colours and ‘sexy’ women who actually aren’t sexy at all and look like drag queens."

at Igloo of the Uncanny, a blog of twisted movie reviews and strange ponderings.


See more like this


at The Cobwebbed Room, the blog of classic British monster pop culture.

Get to know this film/tv actor and author, Shane Briant (l)

at his blog, Worst Nightmares , which covers both his new psychothriller novel WORST NIGHTMARES and his daily life. He'll keep an eye out for you!

Hello, Kali!

The Hindu goddess was the first being to "multi-task," as can be seen here.



The Venus de Milo must have been awfully jealous...

RELATED IMAGE DEPT.:

Here's a Reuters news pic of Tai Lihua, art director of a theater troupe for disabled people in China, along with many deaf performers, portraying the "Thousand-Hand Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva."



A handy being that ought to be in an army!

THE DRUNKEN SEVERED HEAD SHOW

THE DRUNKEN SEVERED HEAD SHOW, a ten minute film that seems much longer, debuted at a private gathering held at the Monster Bash convention, and actors Janet Ann Gallow (The Ghost of Frankenstein), Jonathon Haze (the original Little Shop of Horrors) and Mark Redfield and Jennifer Rouse (The Death of Poe) were among the those in attendance. The poor saps.

Reviews were mixed.

Ms. Gallow said it was cute and funny, and reminded her of a recent comic indie film she had a part in.

My friend Rob Tullo said, "Four copies would make a nice set of coasters."

My friend Robert Taylor said it was "A horror pun-fest that only Max could have created. My prediction is that he will be up for an Academy nomination OR an atomic wedgie!"

Here, judge for yourself!




Copies of this film with deleted scenes, commentary tracks by a famous person or two, and a stills gallery are available on request!