#was freaking surreal and bizarre

[ennaih]

Every Film I Watch In 2023:

237. Candy Cane Lane (2023)

[sasoarts]

Just a weird algorithm thing to get more people to find me:

World building

Borderlings

Monsters

Surreal

Fantasy

Horror

Psychological

Body horror

Abstract

Eldritch

Lynchian

Lovecraftian

Ghosts

Spirits

Angels

Demons

Metamorphosis

Transformation

Mutants

Freaks

Trippy

Weird

Magic

Whimsical

Odd

[pretzel-box]

Hallo ●♡●

I got a funny request

So basically Sebastian meets a reader/player with a korblox/headless/troll avatar/ wings or horns/cosplayers (maybe one as Seb)

Ect... (You can describe you own avatar too)

Silly prompt cause what if Sebastian could see we (our avatar) clearly don't look human and why we haven't been captured/experimented on

Aka this whole request is just Seb being confused as fuck-

Tags: Comedy, random apperance for reader, gender neutral reader, headless

Words: 1,4k

Authors Note: As someone with real headless, I can confirm that headless doesn't work ingame.

Sebastian watched in horrified fascination as you emerged from the vent. Your movements were nonchalant, as if clambering through air ducts was as routine as taking a stroll. You dusted off your uniform, a completely unnecessary gesture since the dust was clearly imaginary, and adjusted the peculiar floating accessory hovering over what should have been your shoulders.

It took him a moment to process what he was seeing. His three eyes widened, pupils dilating as they locked onto you. Where your head should have been, there was… nothing. Just a void, an empty space that seemed to defy logic. He could see right through you, catching glimpses of the rusted pipes and wires lining the walls behind.

“What the hell—” Sebastian stuttered, his voice filled with shock and more than a hint of repulsion. His fingers twitched at his sides, and he had to resist the instinctive urge to reach for a weapon—though he knew that, logically, weapons wouldn’t do much good in a situation like this. He continued to stare, his confusion only growing with each passing second.

You turned toward him—or at least, your body did, since there was no face to show any expression. “What?” you asked, your voice eerily calm, completely unaffected by the lack of a mouth. “Is there something on my uniform?”

Sebastian blinked rapidly, as if trying to reset his brain to make sense of this absurd reality. “That's… strangely…” he stammered, searching for the right words. “...Disgusting.”

“Rude,” you shot back, hands going to your hips. His gaze dropped, and he couldn’t help but notice the bright yellow rubber duck bag hanging there, comically out of place in this bleak, industrial environment. As if that weren’t enough, a floating picture of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson hovered just above your shoulders, rotating slowly as if it were on display. It was surreal. Completely, utterly surreal.

Sebastian’s mouth fell open. “You’ve got… a rubber duck bag… and a floating headshot of The Rock,” he managed, pointing weakly at the bizarre ensemble. “And no face. How are you even speaking? How do you see? And why in the world do you have a picture of Dwayne Johnson just… floating there?!”

You tilted your non-existent head, a gesture that would’ve looked quizzical if you had any features to display it. “I see just fine,” you replied with a casual shrug. “As for speaking, that’s just a matter of speaking. And The Rock?” You gestured vaguely toward the picture, which continued its slow, mesmerizing spin. “He’s my emotional support human.”

Sebastian let out a half-snort, half-laugh, though his expression remained one of disbelief. “Why am I freaked out?” he repeated, still staring at the empty space where your head should be. “You look like something out of a fever dream! How have you not been captured or experimented on down here?”

You let out a chuckle—an eerie sound given the circumstances. “Oh, I get that a lot. But I think I blend in just fine with the rest of the… what do you call them? Entities?” You glanced around the room, as if to emphasize your point. “Besides, no one wants to mess with someone who looks like they stepped out of a nightmare.”

Sebastian couldn’t help but grin, despite himself. “Yeah, you’ve got that part nailed,” he muttered, still shaking his head in disbelief. “You probably scare off half the things down here just by existing.”

You did a mock bow, your non-existent head dipping forward with exaggerated grace. “Thank you, thank you. I aim to unsettle.”

Sebastian chuckled, the sound coming out lighter this time, more genuine. “You’re definitely good at that,” he admitted, relaxing slightly. “But seriously, next time, give a guy a heads-up before you pop out of a vent looking like… well, whatever this is.”

“I’ll consider it,” you replied with a teasing tone, the rubber duck on your bag giving a little bounce as you shifted your weight. “But where’s the fun in that?”

The tension in the room seemed to dissolve, replaced by an odd sense of camaraderie. Sebastian shook his head, a small smile tugging at his lips as he tried to make sense of the strange being standing before him.

“Only in this place,” he muttered, “could I end up with a faceless, rubber duck-toting, Rock-fanatic as a companion.”

And somehow, despite the absurdity of it all, that was exactly what made it feel… right.

Sebastian was still trying to wrap his head around the sight of you when the sound of frantic scrambling echoed from the vent behind him. He turned just in time to see another figure tumble through the duct opening—a short, pudgy man with wild hair and a permanent look of bewilderment on his face. Berry. One of Sebastian’s more frequent, and certainly clumsier, customers.

Berry landed awkwardly on his feet, nearly toppling over before catching himself against a nearby shelf. His eyes were wide, darting around nervously as if he’d been followed. “Sebastian! AHHHHH—” he began, his voice high-pitched and breathless, but then his gaze shifted to you.

The moment he saw your faceless form with the floating Rock photo and rubber duck bag, Berry’s jaw dropped, his face going pale. He froze, staring at you with a mixture of terror and confusion. “AHHHHHHhhh?!” he squeaked, pointing a shaky finger in your direction.

You raised a hand in a casual wave, the kind that might say “hello” if you had a face to go with it. “Hi,” you said cheerfully, as if your appearance wasn’t the least bit disturbing. “Nice to meet you!”

Berry’s eyes bulged even wider. “Ahhhhhhhh?!” he stammered, taking a stumbling step backward. In his panic, his foot caught on a loose piece of metal on the floor. He tried to catch his balance, but instead, he lurched into a nearby shelf.

The impact was enough to send the precariously stacked items on the shelf cascading down. Jars of strange glowing liquids, bits of rusted machinery, and a few well-loved trinkets that Sebastian had collected over the years came crashing to the ground with a series of loud clatters and splashes.

“Berry, watch it!” Sebastian shouted, rushing forward to try to steady the shelf, but it was too late. One of the jars rolled off the edge and shattered on the floor, sending a bright green substance oozing across the metal surface.

Berry’s eyes darted between you and the mess he’d just created, his panic only increasing. “Ahhhhaheee!” he babbled, his voice shrill with fear. “AHhhhhheeee!”

Before Sebastian could say another word, Berry spun around and bolted for the vent he’d come through. He scrambled up, his limbs flailing as he tried to pull himself back inside. “AHHHH!” he yelled over his shoulder, his voice echoing from within the duct. “AHHHHHHH.”

And with that, he disappeared back into the darkness of the vent, his panicked scrambling fading into the distance.

Sebastian sighed, rubbing a hand over his face as he looked at the chaos left behind. “Great. Another mess,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Berry’s going to scare himself to death one of these days.”

You watched the whole scene unfold with a sort of bemused curiosity. “Is he always like that?” you asked, turning your headless gaze back toward Sebastian.

Sebastian chuckled softly, bending down to pick up one of the trinkets that had survived the fall. “Pretty much,” he said, setting the item back onto the now-empty shelf. “He’s harmless, though. Just a bit… high-strung.”

You nodded—or at least made a nodding motion. “Can’t blame him, I suppose. I do have that effect on people.”

Sebastian glanced over at you, a small smile playing on his lips. “Yeah, well, you’re definitely unique,” he said. “But hey, you scared him off without even trying. Maybe you should hang around more often. Could help keep the riffraff out.”

You gave a mock bow again, this time with an exaggerated flourish. “Always happy to help,” you replied with a hint of playful sarcasm. “Though next time, I’ll try not to make someone pee their pants.”

Sebastian laughed, a genuine sound that echoed warmly through the cluttered shop. “Yeah, let’s keep the cleanup to a minimum,” he agreed, still smiling. “But, hey, thanks. For… whatever this is. It’s been a while since I’ve had a good laugh.”

“Anytime,” you said, your tone light and cheerful. “And if you ever need an unsettling presence to keep things lively, you know where to find me.”

Sebastian nodded, his grin widening. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he replied. And for a moment, in this bizarre, twisted world they both inhabited, everything felt oddly… normal.

Well, as normal as things could get when you had a faceless companion with a rubber duck bag and a floating photo of The Rock hovering by your side.

[pupsmailbox]

ALICE IN WONDERLAND ID PACK

NAMES︰ adelaide. alice. alyx. aspen. azalea. blanche. blanchesse. blanchette. bunny. cat. cherie. cheshire. chester. claire. clover. daisy. elsie. hart. hatter. hattie. hyacinth. indigo. iris, iris. jack. kingsley. knight. lacey. lacie. lily. matilda. merry. misty. night. noire. noiresse. noirette. oddity. opal, petunia. queenie. rook. rose, rose. rouge. rougesse. rougette. salem. simon. sparrow. tiffany. tillie. vanessa. verity. violet. void. wisp. wybie.

PRONOUNS︰ ae/aem. ae/aer. biz/bizarre. bow/bow. bun/bun. bunny/bunny. card/card. cat/cat. caterpillar/caterpillar. che/cher. clover/clover. club/club. creep/creep. cu/cute. curious/curious. cute/cute. dark/dark. diamond/diamond. dream/dream. eer/eerie. fall/fall. fear/fear. float/float. flower/flower. fool/fool. freak/freak. grim/grim. grow/grow. guard/guard. hat/hat. haze/haze. heart/heart. hx/hxm. hy/hym. h♡/h♡m. h♢/h♢m. h♤/h♤m. h♧/h♧m. king/king. knight/knight. lace/lace. lo/lost. lost/lost. mir/mirror. odd/odd. queen/queen. rabbit/rabbit. red/red. rook/rook. shrink/shrink. shx/hxr. shy/hyr. sh♡/h♡r. sh♢/h♢r. sh♤/h♤r. sh♧/h♧r. smoke/smoke. spade/spade. surreal/surreal. swirl/swirl. tea/cup. tea/tea. tea/teacup. teacup/teacup. thxy/thxm. thy/thom. th♡y/th♡m. th♢y/th♢m. th♤y/th♤m. th♧y/th♧m. time/time. twist/twisted. weird/weird. won/wonder. ♠/♠. ♣️/♣️. ♥/♥. ♦/♦.

[fertilize-my-eggs]

Send to the mha omegaverse Ch.1

Am I dead?!? ch.2 ch.3 ch.4 A03

A/N: This story is a self-insert x shigaraki if you don't like self-insert, y/n and dark theme content this isn't for youuuu!! It's for me personally since I thought about it for a while so I finally wrote about this, I hope y'all don't find me too boring in this story. 18+ no minors or antis, maps interact with my contacts GO AWAY!! I'll post this every Thursday not this Thursday but the next one!! (⁠◍⁠•⁠ᴗ⁠•⁠◍⁠)⁠✧⁠*⁠。*edit* I changed my quirk a bit so it's not a touching type of quirk but eye contact means that the reader can't look at people in the eyes so I do apologize for anyone who got confused by it.

✩｡♡ ࣪ ˖❀ ⑅ *✩｡♡ ࣪ ˖❀ ⑅ *✩｡♡ ࣪ ˖❀ ⑅ *✩｡ ♡ ࣪ ˖❀ ⑅ *

Living a boring life as a 26 year old woman, I would wake up to feed my cute dogs as I sat down to watch YouTube on television. It's like a hamster running on its wheel, everything repeats and it's the same. 

My life isn't as perfect as the others, it's like a roller coaster sometimes. I enjoy my time alone by watching anime and gushing over fictional characters online.

Most importantly tomura shigaraki, I couldn't help but smile whenever I see him on screen while I scroll on YouTube. I would gush over his voice and the way he talks in it.

I giggle whenever it's shown a video of him talking in his gaming references.

Man I love him so much, I thought to myself as I scroll away to see crochet Tiktok or tutorials on how to make cute items.

I pouted as I thought about it. Maybe I should crotchet outside and make a cute little bag with flowers, I smile happily.

I get up to walk into my room, I bring my bag that has my material as I went to get the yarns that I want to use.

Once I get a good handful of yarns, I begin to walk outside to look at the sky. It's a bit cloudy then usually as I walk towards a chair with a nice shade underneath my tree.

I begin to crochet quietly and watch the neighbors do their work. It was calm and relaxing weather today.

Suddenly I feel a drop of rain on my hair as I look up, maybe it won't rain as bad.

I continue to focus on my project as I ignore the rain. It was getting a bit bad as I quickly put my project away and started to run towards the door.

A sudden flash of light hit my view, costing me to close my eyes tight and ringing in my ears… Am I dead?!? as I fell over onto a cement… weird, I should feel the hard ground of dirt why is it hard and why am I hearing people talking?!?

I slowly raise my head up to witness a group of people standing around me. What I notice off the bat is that it's not realistic but it's like something that you feel is uncanny.

Everyone looked like cartoon characters and I noticed there was a mall that had a hero merch.

I immediately recognize the hero as it has all might… could this be.. no it can't be, I sat upwards as I began to look around my surroundings.

There were heros rusting in and asking me questions, it felt so surreal and it hurt my brain.

How… Can a simple thunder send me here in their universe!? I started to breathe heavily, feeling like it's a twilight zone.

I grip my hair as I curl into a ball, this isn't happening but this is what you wanted right?

You get to be someone in this universe then your old boring life, I begin to blink a few times to notice my belongings aren't with me.

What the hell? Where is my bag and everything??? Then I hear a familiar voice coming in, he has a concerned gentle voice.

“ Are you alright ma'am? ” I immediately look up to see izuku midoriya standing in front of me. It feels so bizarre, there is no way in hell. I can't look him in the eyes, everything feels and looks weird as I try not to freak out.

I slowly get off the floor, I clean myself off as I said.” I-I’m okay thank you young man.” is this the first season?? because izuku looks like he's wearing a black outfit and golden button as I witness the hero taking down a big villain that has deep brown hair as people were gathering toward mt lady while kamui woods looks a bit annoyed by this.

“ y-yeah you fell over on the ground costing everyone to be worried about you. ” he awkwardly put a hand on his neck as he chuckled as I stood still. Does this affect the story of this universe? It feels so wrong talking to him and knowing what happened in the manga.

“ yeahh… I'm doing fine-.” wait do I have a quirk in this universe, I gotta have a quirk.

Hopefully it is useful, people are more interested in the hero than a random stranger falling to the floor as I try anything.

Izuku tilts his head a bit confused by what I'm doing as I throw hands in the air or something like a power move..

“ What are you doing? ” I stop as I look at him but not directly as I think of something that isn't crazy.

“ uhh… I'm trying to see if I have a quirk but nothing is working. '' his eyes widened in an optimistic way.

“ oh!! Maybe you have something to do with contact kind of quirk?? Are you quirkless? ” I tilt my head as I think, it could be like a normal quirk or it could be like shigaraki's quirk. Where I accidentally hurt someone and that is izuku as I try to stay calm.

“ uhh I'm not sure… to be honest. ” I don't know how to tell someone that I'm not in this world or don't belong here.

“ Uhhm do you have a paper or pencil? ” he nodded his head as he pulled a piece of paper out.

I put my hand out as he put the paper on my palm, nothing happened okay so it's not like decay quirk as I sighed in relief.

“ mhmm how about you use it on me ma'am? ” I tilt my head with confusion as he begins to wave his hands fast.

“ no.. I meant to use my hand. ” I shake my head as I apologize to him, I hold my breath.

“ What if it hurts you? ” I had a worried look as izuku has a hopeful expression. 

“ I mean it didn't affect the paper, it would be-..” he started to mumble as I forgot he does this sometimes as I waited patiently and he started to apologize quickly.

“ oh my goodness I'm sorry miss, I-I tend to have a habit of doing that. ” I smile gently as I said.

“ you're fine, I tend to have it too when I'm hyper focused about something. ” he sighs in relief as he puts his hand out.

“ Whenever you're ready, miss.” I begin to hold my breath as I put my hand on top of his..

Nothing works, alright I'll try looking at him-... As we make eye contact as I pause for a second as I look at midoriya.

He looked at me strangely as he had a doopy silly smile and pulled me close into a hug as I gasped out loud.

What the hell?? Why is he acting like this so suddenly?

“ I'm in love with youuuu ma'am~!! ” oh… does this mean my quirk is.. something to do with love? Or maybe it's a yandere lovestruck type of quirk.

I shake him out of it and he blink a few times.

“ uhh w-what happened? ” I feel my cheeks getting red from embarrassment as I awkwardly laugh.

“ I think my quirk is lovestruck because you hugged me and said that you're in love with me so I can't make eye contact with anyone.”

“ in l-love?? That…” he gasps from this as he writes it down in his notebook fast.

“ incredible!! That quirk sounds so interesting and puts people in a mindset where they can't remember anything afterwards-. ” hearing him mutter about the possibilities of my quirk as I start to feel nervous so I can't make eye contact with others, this is gonna be a challenge .

I start to think about the possibilities as I put my thumb on my lips. A lovestruck quirk sounds harmless to others but I can't imagine if I accidentally look at the wrong person, will it be a dangerous individual or…

I widen my eyes as I pause for seconds since I know shigaraki and every character exists. What if I accidentally stare at him, will he be fully yandere towards me?

No that's possible, this is crazy… Everything feels so bizarre, I need to get home asap.

“ ma'am? ” I don't look directly at Midoriya but with confusion as I noticed him holding his nose as if I smell bad, I don't think I smell… okay now I feel self-conscious about it.

“ you should get patches on your neck, you don't want an alpha to bite your neck..”

Not only I'm in my hero academia universe but it's an omegaverse, this couldn't get any better..

[ragsy]

OC Masterlist (in alphabetical order)

Monster of the Week:

🐕 Dogmark (Mark "Dogmark" Stevens) (he/him)

A normal human guy in his late twenties/early thirties who got cursed to be a cannibalistic dogman. Extremely socially anxious, very fight-or-flight driven, struggling to come to terms with his monstrosity. Currently an NPC in an active game.

Tag: #oc dogmark | Visual reference

📚 Emily Song (she/her)

A real type-A woman in her thirties. She has a degree and a job and a fiancé and a dad (Kenneth) who went missing five years ago and suddenly reappeared out of nowhere, ranting and raving about having been in some bizarre surreal other world. She doesn't believe in the supernatural. She thinks he needs help. Currently an NPC in an active game.

Tag: #oc emily | Visual reference

🚬 Everett (any pronoun, but defaults to he/him)

Some manner of immortal smoke demon in a human vessel, using his powers of influence over people to grow his Youtube channel and Twitch audience. He doesn't want your soul, he just wants your impressionable teen's expendable income. Not currently in any active games.

Tag: #oc everett

🐟 Fishwoman (Diane Fishwoman) (she/her, it/its)

An emotionally constipated humanoid fish person (age unknown) who spends her free time daydrinking and stealing things. She's friends with benefits with Sloane, though she'd never admit to how much the "friends" component of that means to her. Not currently in any active games.

Tag: #oc fishwoman | Visual reference

🚪 Kenneth Song (Uncle Kenny) (he/him)

A goofy, soft-hearted widower and retired dentist (age 65) who recently escaped a five year internment in a liminal horror dimension called the Other Place. Trying his best to reconnect with his adult daughter. Currently in an active MOTW game (Searcher playbook)

Tags: #oc kenneth, #vistas from the other place | Visual reference | Playlist (YouTube version)

🍂 Mary Song (she/her)

A level-headed and analytical Voice of Reason, as well as a middlingly talented spellcrafter. She died suddenly at age 32, survived by her husband (Kenny) and daughter (Emily), and has been haunting their respective narratives ever since.

Tag: #oc mary

🔫 Sloane (Agent Hill) (she/her)

A broad-shouldered tough-as-nails action butch. Makes her living doing field missions, getting monsters and other supernatural beings out of sight. She has a curse on her left arm that's slowly spreading to the rest of her body, but she hasn't told anyone besides her immediate superiors about it. Despite her hard exterior, she's got a warm heart that genuinely cares about the people she protects. NPC in a defunct campaign, currently planned to be a PC in an upcoming campaign, Professinal playbook.

Tag: #oc sloane | Visual reference

Dungeons and Dragons

✨ Arjibi (Arji the Fool) (he/him, they/them)

Farmboy turned stage magician turned adventurer! He's a sweet silly boy with big expressive eyes and too much joy for his twinky body. Also, statistically speaking, he's your friend now. Dragonborn sorcerer (draconic heritage). Currently in two separate active campaigns.

Tag: #oc arjibi | Visual reference | Defunct inspo blog: @arjibi-time

👊 Carex (she/her)

Aarakocra monk, way of mercy. Looks like a secretary bird because she's really good at kicking the shit out of people. Currently in an active campaign, but she's not really as much a character to roleplay as she is a tool to use in combat.

Tag: #oc carex

🤖 M.A.G. (Mechanical Autonomous Guardsman, aka Maggie or Mags) (it/its)

Once a mindless patrol construct, now mysteriously gifted with self awareness and holy powers. It's driven by duty to protect others first, and curiosity second. It's learning how to be a person! A little bit like a cross between Big Bird and Levi Scavengersreign. Warforged Paladin, oath of the crown. Currently in an active campaign.

Tag: #oc maggie | Visual reference

🧪 Professor Dewlap (Finneas Carlton Dewlap) (he/him)

Mad scientist. Cantankerous old bitch. Blew himself to smithereens in a freak lab accident, currently climbing his way back out of the afterlife to resume whatever the hell he was working on. Has actually died many times before, but this is the first time his now recently divorced ex husband hasn't been there to revivify him. Dragonborn artificer. Currently in an active campaign!

Tag: #oc professor dewlap

⚔ Sir Dillion (Sir Dillion Fontaine Sargasso) (he/him)

Chivalrous medieval knight in shining armor with a fish for a head. Broad of chest, kind of heart, dumb of ass. Triton fighter (cavalier subclass), campaign completed!

Tag: #oc sir dillion | Visual references

Miscellaneous

🦎 Lizardsona (any pronoun)

This is literally just my fursona. Some sort of lizardy muppetty creature.

Tag: #lizardsona | Visual references

🐲 Marginalia (Marge) (any pronoun)

A medieval scribe's drawing of a dragon, come to life. Also sort of a quasi-fursona, though I don't use them very often.

Tag: #oc marginalia | Visual references

[1863-project]

Okay, was thinking about it and I remembered a lot of you were very young or not even alive for this, so:

When 9/11 happened I was 12 and had just started 7th grade. I grew up in a suburb of New York City. 12 people from my town died, including a firefighter whose son was in my younger brother's CCD group.

Things changed SO fast. Practically overnight. Suddenly, we were all hypervigilant, and after the immediate response of assistance from around the world, the prejudice was oozing from nearly everywhere. In northern New Jersey, we had and still have a large west (Middle East) and south Asian population. They were hit the hardest.

People freaked out just because a mosque was going to be built in lower Manhattan within several blocks of Ground Zero at one point. It was ridiculous and the Islamophobia was so fucking awful and infuriating. It still is. It didn't go away. For the most part, New Yorkers are usually good to each other because there's literally someone from everywhere here, but this was legitimately terrifying. People would even attack Sikhs - who weren't Muslim, Sikhism is its own thing - because they saw the turbans and made a decision based on racism (i.e. bin Laden had a turban so these people must be like him).

The "patriotism" was miserable. "Freedom fries" happened because people were mad that France didn't want to go into Iraq with Bush in 2003. We all thought it was stupid then too.

The Chicks (formerly known as the Dixie Chicks) got blackballed because they came out against said war. They were one of the biggest country acts in the world at the time. In general, country music went through a massive tonal shift post-9/11 and became far more "patriotic" and conservative. Johnny Cash wouldn't have recognized it.

The Flash movies that inevitably popped up satirizing politics were...something. You can find most of them archived on YouTube these days. But that was how the internet tended to cope back then.

The shift from happiness to paranoia was so fucking fast. I went from a world where my biggest concern was pre-ordering the GameCube to being worried about politics and death all the time. All the news showed was footage of people dying for weeks. Politicians started using the footage in commercials. You just had to keep reliving the trauma of it over and over again. I stopped watching the news.

It was, looking back on it, a huge galvanizing point for the American right. Politicians started using 9/11 to justify so many things. This was where I began to see as a young teenager that you could use people's prejudices to get a grip on power and get what you wanted. I didn't like it.

People started drawing memorial art almost immediately. The phenomenon of memorial art being done decades later with cartoon characters still persists on deviantART to this day, but when it started, it was mostly people doing vent art because it's really upsetting to be a kid and see death on that scale on the news.

It took me 15 years to go back to the site after 9/11. I'd been as a kid in 1997 and I went up in the South Tower with my family. I didn't set foot there again until 2016, 15 years after the attacks. I found the name of the firefighter whose son was in my brother's CCD class. It was surreal.

This chapter of American history arguably closed for many people in 2011, when bin Laden was killed in a raid. I remember watching the Mets play the Phillies that night. Daniel Murphy, who I'd named a cat after two years earlier, was at bat, and suddenly the crowd started chanting "USA." I used my Blackberry to check the news and that was how I found out. I was a senior in college, about to graduate. I don't even remember how I felt, just that the way I found out was so fucking weird.

It was a really stressful, bizarre climate to grow up in. In the time between my 12th and my 22nd birthday, I saw my entire world get turned upside down overnight, massive waves of prejudice, unnecessary wars that killed even more innocent people, literal war crimes (tw: rape, murder, prisoner torture, every other bad thing you can think of under the sun), and the rise of false patriotism and nationalism, which you can still see the right wing harnessing today.

If you're going to mock something here, mock the false patriotism. Mock "Freedom Fries." Mock George W. Bush. Just...don't mock the actual moments where people died. Too many innocent people died from the attacks themselves, the Islamophobia afterwards, and the wars that followed. That shit isn't funny.

[madeintimeland]

this blog is a safe space for weirdos and freaks and creeps and degenerates and the strange and socially unacceptable and deranged and odd and quirky and wacky and bizarre and surreal and confusing i love you so so so much please keep making the world a stranger place

[goldenfreddys]

march '04, plymouth county, massachusetts: the living dead & his lover

“It might make me feel better if you put on the sexy nurse outfit. Y’know, act out a scene where you fuckin’ know what the hell you’re doing?”

Eugene gave Mike a queasy smile from the edge of the bathtub, “If that’s what it takes.”

Mike was standing at the sink, boggling at his own partially decomposed body in the mirror– which, somehow, looked in better condition than it did the day before.

“... This should be more painful and terrifying. I should be dead.” Mike murmured, flatly, “I can’t feel anything. Like if I stop talking, I might slip off again—this time for good. N’ I don’t want to, but it all feels so… Surreal.”

Eugene tried to seem unphased by the sudden shift in tone this conversation had taken. He remembered Mike telling him it was an inherited quirk; the rapid, indecisive way he shuffled between humor and sincerity, to the extent that telling where one ended and the other started was getting too complicated for everyone involved. Eugene knew that in this context, ‘inherited’ meant Mike unintentionally picked up the mannerism from his father, which one could easily extrapolate to mean it was something about himself that pissed him off to no end.

These past few years—well, maybe since the day Eugene met him, really—living in proximity to the Aftons was one batshit thing after another. Mostly tragic things, but always bizarre. He flowed with it. Mike was, after all, the only freak in a hundred mile radius that could even relatively handle him.

“... Mikey?”

He hummed in response.

“I did some sleuthing while you were away.”

“You were stalking me?”

“Forever and always. Anywho, the Funtime Animatronics, Mikey. Freddy, Foxy… Those are clearly Fazbear Entertainment’s exclusive intellectual property. If Afton Robotics LLC. is a separate legal entity, he would’ve needed to request permission to use these assets. Alternatively—and far more likely, given the circumstances—it’s a related enterprise that’s operating off Freddy’s resources without Mr. Emily’s knowledge.”

Mike finally turned away from the mirror to look at Eugene, though he seemed to still be processing what he was trying to say.

“If that’s true, at the very least, your father is in several different precarious legal situations. Which- well, obviously, but disingenuous business practices would be a good ‘first domino’ in the crime trail. It’s simple, it’s believable. It opens the door.”

He grimaced, “It wasn’t just me. Two other technicians, at least- the last night… I don’t know the scale of it, but… Whatever or whoever he’s using to cover this shit up, it’s been working flawlessly for a long time.”

“Complicated lies tend to come apart fast. All you need is the right loose thread. Speaking of which,” Eugene stood up, stretched and touched his shoulder, “Just realized I didn’t tie those stitches off right at all. Hold still.”

Mike groaned.

[castlebyersafterdark]

that genuinely fascinates me about guys being self conscious about their noises, perhaps its common in gay circles, i dont know if youve ever slept with any men who consider themselves straight, but please can we megaphone the message out to all men that us girls LOVE the noises you make and in fact that's sometimes the only thing that gets me over the line? more than visuals and sometimes even feel, depending on how im feeling? like, dont send me a dick pic. send me an audio clip of you going to town lmao. seriously, hottest thing ever. when people on here talk about will's pretty moans, its always like... damn. you know what's up.

side note: seeing as finn/mike has the higher vocal register, i think his moans would be amazing too. and so much for anti spicy byler, cos THIS video has a suspicious amount of 'most replayed' clicks in a certain section where finn could be seen as... well. ahem.

https://youtu.be/GnYmwJ8TM3k?si=7tR2_FN1al0dJtgP&t=92

Addressing the youtube link first because one - I do not understand bizarre/surreal internet humor because what the hell did I watch and TWO- HAHAHA people of the internet, yall are not slick. Most replayed. PSSSH yall are freaks. Love it.

Onwards. WITH YOU THOUGH ughh and I think it's a man thing, I just really have found it true with a notable number of both uhhhhh gay guys and straight guys. "Straight" in quotation marks because how straight are you if you routinely enjoy a guy going down on you like hmmm. College was interesting. Frat guys are interesting. "Interesting" in quotation marks as well. Frat guys love to lose gay chicken. Oh man. I am saying so many things. Don't care I guess.

But silence isn't interesting, no quotation marks!! Visuals and touch are only half the show, sounds, please! Otherwise it seems too detached, almost transactional, where's the feedback? The communication? The proof that what you're doing is working? People don't need to sound like a prnstar or some OF playing it up for subscribers, but forcing yourself to completely hold back or tense up because of self consciousness, that's no fun. And on the flip side, making too much noise but purposefully trying to hold back due to a situation where you need to be quiet - that's still good but in a different direction.

And I love how everyone seems to be in agreement that Will sounds absolutely divine when he's lost in these moments. Love that for him. We all know what's up. Of course a pretty boy like that would sound pretty, too. 🥰

[hospitalterrorizer]

diary256

5/30-31/24

thursday - friday

sitting here, tired kind of.

bunch of carpenter ants showed up, but they really don't seem as tenacious as the roaches, which is bizarre, but i guess that one time i saw them, that was real and i wasn't going crazy, but it felt like that. seeing them all there was so surreal, it's strange that bugs are really like that. it's getting less bad i suppose, or it doesn't freak me out and make me super depressed / ocd-triggered in the same ways.

i worked on 3 songs today too, which is nice.

i am staying up toooo lateee noww though. also i still have those selfies i need to send to myself. really annoying how bad i am or bad file transfer is between devices, or like, just becuz it's a fucking iphone and itunes is like one of the worst applications ever developed, and i guess i really am just kind of lazy.

i played more vtmb today, it's sad how much less good the game gets + the atmosphere sort of disappearing as well. idk. santa monica and downtown and hollywood are perfect places to be, kind of, in videogame history essentially, to me at least. everything after just gets a little idk, the game has a lot to offer when it lets you stumble around, find quests, i know it was rough to develop though, still, it's tragic how vacant it gets, almost.

also re-read the first volume of dead dead demon's dedededestruction, loved that, still. crazy that it could be better to punpun, for me. he just hits on something really perfect there, i see people saying the anime isn't super promising, we'll see i suppose, but i guess i'm not married to it being good. it's usually always the case that manga is better than anime i think, in my experience people do much more interesting work in manga typically and there's a lot more there that's stuck with me and inspired me, i feel like.

maybe i should talk about that more tomorrow. and revisit some stuff or go back to ppl like naoki urasawa and get some more of his stuff to read. he's such a genius. could be up there w/ nagai and tezuka, as kind of like, a real force in manga... idk. i wonder who i think the best people to make things are, in manga, like who my favorites would be. would be fun to figure out i guess.

anyway i really need to sleep so:

byebye!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[nitrateglow]

Halloween 2023 marathon: 2-4

The Skeleton Dance (dir. Walt Disney, 1929)

It doesn't feel like spooky season without a screening of The Skeleton Dance. The debut of the Silly Symphonies series, it remains one of the most iconic Disney cartoons.

I'm doing a post about the Silly Symphonies for my Wordpress and watching several of them, it's clear most of the earliest ones were more set on being tone poems. With its gothic atmosphere and macabre sense of humor, The Skeleton Dance might be the most successful Silly Symphony in that regard, competing strongly with the more visually refined The Old Mill from 1937 for the GOAT Silly Symphony crown. Personally, I prefer The Skeleton Dance-- it's funny, creative, and creepy, with an energy that seems inherent to its "primitive" state as an early talkie. (That part where the skeleton quartet combine into a four-headed monstrosity is still kind of creepy, even as an adult.)

Swing You Sinners! (dir. Dave Fleishcer, 1930)

This bizarre cartoon from the dawn of the talkie era went viral a few years back. People freaked out over the macabre visuals and merciless content: a dog tries stealing a chicken, then ends up in a cemetery where he's terrorized by talking tombstones and shapeshifting ghouls swearing they'll "scatter your bones away" and torment him forever.

I know saying "this was made on drugs" is a descriptive cliche, but... that's the vibe of this thing. The Fleischer cartoons of the early 1930s could get surreal indeed and this one is among the most uninhibited with its horrific images and comic but despairing tone. If I had seen this as a kid, it would have given me nightmares and watching it creeps me out even now. It doesn't even end with the dog escaping-- he's swallowed up by a huge skull and then the cartoon hits you with its "the end" card. Damn!

Hell's Bells (dir. Ub Iwerks, 1929)

In many ways a companion piece to The Skeleton Dance, Hell's Bells is a Silly Symphony about a bunch of devils partying it up in hell before they turn on one another. I just love the atmosphere and dark humor in this as well. We also get some weird, weird moments, like when the devils milk fire from a demon cow-- a strange mix of early Disney barnyard humor and the infernal setting.

It's interesting to compare the two Disney cartoons with the Fleischer one, now that I think about it. The Disney ones have some dark content and threats of peril, but they end on a resolved note: dawn comes and the skeletons have to go home to their grave, and the chief devil is punished for picking on the smaller devils. But the Fleischer cartoon just ends with its protagonist being punished far beyond the proportion of his crime with no hope of redemption. And it ends so suddenly too, giving you no time to let that sink in until the end titles have vanished from sight.

All three of these cartoons are great. If you're short on time for an evening viewing of a horror movie after work during the spooky season, all of these are under 10 minutes and well worth the watch for bite-sized chills.

[sincerely-sofie]

I'm not sure how weird of a question it would be to ask, or if it's one i should ask, but if you could choose to hallucinate one of them again without any kind of drawbacks just to talk with them, would you? And who would you talk to?

Not a weird question at all, and it's one I've actually asked myself a lot over the years! If I were able to hallucinate one of my old Brain Roommates™️ again, but without the intense anxiety that is required for me to hallucinate in the first place or the actual damage to my brain that hallucinations do, I'd be very, very interested in it. However, my answer for who I would speak to in this hypothetical scenario has changed throughout the years.

Originally, I wanted to talk to the Black Clock. He was the most consistently distressing hallucination, and was a sort of manifestation of my intense perfectionism and high standards for myself. I wanted to ask him if I was enough. It was a question that haunted me for years, and either answer scared me. If I was enough, then that meant I wasn't living up to my potential and that I was "sinful, irredeemable filth" according to the script I told myself back then. If I wasn't enough, then I didn't deserve anything good and I was an active blight on all that I loved, somehow. Nowadays I don't have anything to say to him. I'm enough for myself and I'm enough for God. The opinion of some misfiring synapses doesn't matter.

After that, I wanted to speak to the Red Woman. She expressed remorse after I found my first set of medications that partially stopped me from hallucinating, and she apologized for what she put me through and told me goodbye. I held her the night I took those medications while she cried and said she was scared to die. I never saw or heard from her again, at least as a hallucination. I wanted to tell her I forgave her and that I hoped she was okay, wherever she was. I don't have that same anxiety over the speculative mortality of the voices in my head anymore, so I wouldn't say I would want to talk to her again. There's not much point to it in my eyes. She hurt me and said she was sorry. That's a full sentence. I don't need to open it up for anything else.

Later on, I wanted to talk to the Lime Hands because, in a very bizarre exchange, he expressed to me he was depressed and didn't want to exist. I wanted to see if he was feeling any better, as strange as it was to ask that of a hallucination. Now, though, I hate that freak and make no apologies for what the dang thing put me through, and the only way I'd want to reunite with him is in some wonderland scenario where I could tangibly interact with him. And that's only because I'm punching that sucker's teeth in and breaking his pinky fingers.

As for the present day answer: If I were to choose any of my hallucinations to speak to without consequence, I think I'd like to speak to Doc Brown, or the Marigold Girl.

Doc Brown was the most cordial of the hallucinations and actually stepped in to advocate for me on occasion when the pain was really bad. I liked him a lot. He was a friend to me when I had very few people to talk to. We joked together and he gave me advice and words of comfort during some of the worst nights of my life. I think it'd be fun, in a very surreal way, to catch up with him— ask him how he's doing, how he's been, if he and the Marigold Girl are still buddies and if the Red Woman and him ever got over the hump of their flirtatious hatred for each other and actually became an item. It'd be a nice little send off to the guy. He was one of the first hallucinations I stopped experiencing, and his disappearance was very abrupt. I'd like to be able to say goodbye properly, thank him for his help, and smile and kindly say I hope I never see him again.

(also, the guy's whole shtick was anxiety over disease / contamination and the possibility of me infecting others with whatever bug I caught at the time. I stopped hallucinating him WAY before 2020 and I think he would lose his mind if I told him about COVID-19. That was his time to shine and he missed it. Poor thing.)

The Marigold Girl was a very difficult figure for me to handle when I was hallucinating. On the one hand, she was a lovely, if somewhat unsettling, little girl. She liked it when I read books and explained the plots to her. She always wanted to be held. She was scared of the dark. She adored my stuffed animals and would whisper to them while I was trying to sleep. I enjoyed being around her for the most part, but she was a very weepy hallucination, and the Black Clock would deal out punishment without fail whenever she cried— it was always my fault somehow, and so I suffered the consequences of her being a bit of a crybaby.

Looking back, I feel bad for her. She was a good kid, or at least as good of a kid as an unhealthy cocktail of neurochemicals in a weary brain can be. She once said she didn't want to cry all the time and wished she knew how to stop because I got in trouble because of it. I think it would be nice to comfort her and tell her it wasn't her fault that I'd be hurt. She couldn't control things anymore than I could back then.

I'd really like to show her the new stuffed animals I've collected over the years and read her one of the short stories I've written. I think she'd like Winter Came and Went if she didn't have to worry about the consequences of crying during the sad parts. She'd definitely enjoy Bibbidy Bee Goes to the Library. If possible, I'd like to ask what her favorite color is. I think she'd have a lot of fun answering, and I'd like being able to get to know this part of my psyche that was scared to let herself show any sadness for fear of hurting others with it.

[harrison-abbott]

Semi Autobiographical Story

They told me I needed to go and see the Guidance Officer at 11:15. At that time, I was in maths class – so I had to tell the maths teacher that I had to go. He seemed perplexed. As did I, because I had no clue why I was being pulled out. So I went down the claustrophobic yellow corridors and all the way downstairs and then I knocked on the Guidance Officer’s door. She was a mid-thirties blonde women who gave an air of not knowing what to wear if you saw her at a party, or, had gone into this profession without any desire to teach children and only chose it for the money, or, most importantly, had no training in child psychology, and had no qualification in counselling or any other form of therapy. “Come and sit down, Billy,” she said to me. And then she brought out two bits of paper.

“Did you write this?” I blinked at the story that I had written in English class. I nodded, thinking it was a bizarre question because it had my name written at the top of it. She pulled out a red pen. As in, a marker pen. “What gave you the idea to write this?” she asked me. I told her that I’d written it as an assignment for English class because they wanted us to write a scary story.

“But what made you write this material, Billy?”

“I just made it up. You know … because the teacher asked us to do a spooky piece.”

She sat back in her chair and looked at me. Prickling all over, and when she spoke she used that reprimanding voice that adults do with people who are far younger than them; and I still hadn’t much clue what was happening. Then she said,

“Do you know what happened in Germany earlier this week?”

“No.”

Apparently some German teenage boy had walked into his high school with a gun and had killed several people with it. As she told me all of this – again – I still had no clue why I was here or what this event in Deutschland had to do with me personally. She waffled on for a bit. And then went,

“Well. If something did happen here, we would have to say that we did know about it. So we can’t ignore what you’ve written in this story. Now. Let’s go through it.”

And then she proceeded to mark the 1500-word odd story that I had invented. It was probably less words than that actually, maybe around 900. And it was fairly skimpy writing because I was only 15 years old when I wrote it. I think, if I remember correctly, it was about an alien that comes down to planet Earth, disguised as a human. The alien walks about a suburb, looking like a handsome man. Nobody knows who he is. Though he can speak the neighbour’s language, they find him a bit weird. So they call the police on him because they’re freaked out by his presence. And then when the policemen arrest him, he panics and gets violent and ends up killing one of them. The alien runs away and there’s a manhunt for him – and nobody knows that he’s not a real man.

Honestly, it was about as silly as that. It was just a horror story … I thought that was what they’d told us to do. Make one of those.

But here was this Guidance woman underlining different bits in the story – as if I had made mistakes on an exam – and then asking me why I had included each bit. It was quite baffling. And because I was so young I began to believe that I had done something especially wrong. I thought I was ‘in trouble’, and yet I was confused as to what the crime was.

She then asked me if I read in my spare time? Yes, I said. Then she asked me what I read. Hmm, well, I said, I used to read those Edge Chronicles books, and those Mortal Engines ones, and, umm the Phillip Pullman ones … oh, and I just finished In Cold Blood. And her face changed when I said that and she went, “In Cold Blood?” She then wrote the title down on her notepad.

Altogether the one on one meeting with her was surreal. Befuddled as to how to defend myself, I said at one point, “I’m not insane.” And she said, “I know, Billy. I’m just trying to figure out where these ideas came from. They’re quite offensive.” She finished the meeting by telling me she was going to phone my mother and tell me about this. And she ordered me to go and apologise to the English teacher – who had been shocked by the story – and had been the man that had passed it on to her. It was him that flagged me up for it.

So I was let go for now. With this acute feeling that I was something dangerous and disliked and that the teachers were suddenly afraid of me. In short, I felt like a creep. I got back to maths class and tried to concentrate on the sums. And later on in the afternoon I saw my English teacher. I knew I had to go and say sorry to him and that’s what I did. It was in front of the other schoolkids; and their ears twitched as they listened, or they stared, wondering what I was apologising for. The English teacher was a mousey man from somewhere in England, whom hitherto I had actually been quite friendly with, and we’d even talked about books a few times. And it was quite jarring that he had snitched me out to the Guidance Officer. Was a tough betrayal to know that. “Okay, Billy,” he said, not looking at me, “Okay.” He was obviously keen for me to leave and take the attention away from him. [A few days later I saw him again, somewhere else in the building, and he flatly ignored me, when he obviously knew it was me, and walked past with a nervous expression.]

Yes. The Guidance Officer called my mother about the whole thing. And my mother stuck up for me, because I had written a creative story, and had done nothing wrong. Though I never knew the exact transcript from the phonecall, mother said that the Guidance woman got very irate and said things like, “Can you see the types of things he was writing here!” But, my mother was, quite rightly, on my side. [During the phone call the Guidance lady told my mother that I had read In Cold Blood. Mother said, “So what?”]

The incident did leave me damaged for a long time. Left me with the notion that I was dodgy or that I unnerved people.

There are similar examples from that particular high school which I’ve written about before. Perhaps I was a bit unlucky that I went there. I find it telling that I left high school early – and a couple of years later went to university, instead, where things were far different, and totally flourished there as an academic.

Nowadays I still look on this tale as being a bit odd and unfair. I was not an alien going around a sunny suburb killing people. That was fictional short story. Jesus. But at the same time, it did kinda plant an idea in my fifteen year old head that went, ‘Hey, maybe I could be a writer one day.’ And … there you go.

[kevinsreviewcatalogue]

Review: After Hours (1985)

After Hours (1985)

Rated R

<Originally posted at https://kevinsreviewcatalogue.blogspot.com/2023/06/review-after-hours-1985.html>

Score: 4 out of 5

After Hours is not the movie I was expecting. Between its director, its cast, its '80s New York setting, and the fact that Popcorn Frights screened it a couple of weeks ago, I expected a dark, downbeat noir thriller with horror touches, and perhaps one of Martin Scorsese's lesser films given that it came from his period in the '80s when he'd lost the approval of critics and audiences. Instead, I was surprised at just how funny the film was, albeit going in a very different, darker, more Kafkaesque direction with its humor versus what we often associate with the R-rated '80s comedies that it only superficially resembles. It's a film born from a successful filmmaker who was at a low point in his life and career, and damn well knew it, channeling all of his frustration with his struggle to get The Last Temptation of Christ made into a story of a man having the worst night of his life as everything that can go wrong, does go wrong, often in such a manner where you can't help but laugh and cringe at the same time. It's one of the darkest versions of this kind of movie to exist, don't get me wrong, but that movie is a hilarious, surreal, gut-busting comedy that I absolutely enjoyed.

Our protagonist Paul Hackett is a yuppie in Manhattan who inputs data at a firm and longs for more out of life. One night, while at a diner, he meets Marcy Franklin, a beautiful woman who tells him that her roommate Kiki Bridges is a sculptor who makes plaster-of-Paris paperweights, and leaves him her number, ostensibly in case he wants to buy one but really because she's into him. Later that night, Paul obliges and heads down to Marcy and Kiki's apartment in Soho, in what turns out to be the beginning of a series of events involving a dead body, a pair of burglars who for once weren't carrying stolen merchandise, a bartender who's lost the key to his register, a punk nightclub, a vigilante mob, and a whole lot of really weird women.

It's the kind of night that feels absolutely cursed, an experience that most of us can probably relate to even if the threat of death never came up for us the way it has for Paul by the end of this movie, and Paul's actor Griffin Dunne does a great job of selling it. Dunne plays Paul as a man bored with life, the film opening with him doing perhaps the most soul-sucking office job you can imagine. You understand from the moment you see him why he might run off into Soho in the middle of the night, simply on the promise of meeting a beautiful woman. As the film goes on, he grows to regret his decision in increasingly bewildered and desperate fashion as the city tortures him with every indignity it can throw his way and uses him as its own personal chew toy, from little things like losing a $20 bill to some outright wacky stuff, slowly but surely sinking into madness as he goes. Each new scene makes you wonder how the city is going to fuck with him this time, like an old-school point-and-click adventure game that throws all manner of increasingly bizarre obstacles in the way of what should be a simple goal. "If I want the keys to my apartment back, I've gotta go to the bartender's apartment, but there are burglars on the loose and the other people there don't know me, so they think I'm a criminal..." Given the hell he was going through at the time, it was no wonder Scorsese saw something in Joseph Minion's screenplay.

And the movie wouldn't have worked as well as it did if not for how Scorsese once again made New York the other main character. In this case, it's not a bustling metropolis, but a place in the wee hours of the morning (after hours, if you will) where the streets are deserted and the people you do meet are more likely to be the freaks and the weirdos. I can easily picture the version that Tim Burton (the director originally attached to this) might've made, and it probably would've been an inventive film in its own right, but Scorsese fuses that style with his own background as the guy who defined the image of 1970s/'80s New York on the big screen, creating a slightly askew version of his usual "gritty realism" where it feels like anything bad can happen, and not just the things you hear about in the next morning's headlines. It feels like a place that hates Paul and wants to see him suffer for the sake of its own amusement, and Scorsese, filming a New York devoid of traffic, makes the place simply feel wrong, like a maze designed for his torment.

The supporting cast, too, nails it. Being among the few people in the neighborhood who live their lives at night, they're strange even for the standards of New Yorkers, from Linda Fiorentino's kinky artist Kiki to Catherine O'Hara's stuck-in-the-'60s ice cream truck driver Gail to Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong as the small-time crooks Neil and Pepe. Most importantly, however, as Paul interacts with all of them, we get perhaps the most uncanny element of this film's upside-down New York: a place where everybody seems to know each other, like a small town that just so happens to be nestled in the middle of Manhattan. People who don't treat each other as total strangers? Now that's how you know something's wrong in the Big Apple, especially if you're an outsider. It adds to the feeling that Paul's night has gone completely sideways, like something has not only gone totally wrong ever since he stepped out of his apartment into the wild world of New York's nightlife, but has been totally wrong since long before he entered the picture, like he wandered into something that by all logic shouldn't exist in the middle of the City that Never Sleeps but does so anyway. It builds to an ending that arrives suddenly, but feels like the perfect punchline for everything we just witnessed.

The Bottom Line

I was not expecting After Hours to be the movie it was, but I'm glad I got to see it. Martin Scorsese and the cast together do a great job lending a very off-kilter black comedy feel to his usual style, and I had a great time watching it.

[thewither129]

This. Now THIS is architecture.

What a magnificently bizarre abode. I think “the magnum opus of a rogue window salesman” really is the best way to describe this. But hes also a minigolf freak for some reason.

I genuinely cannot fathom the thought process in here. Its absurd.

I just cant imagine someone living here. Its surreal. You really do have to be a tasteless filthy rich nutjob detached from reality to want to live here.

Peak.

we've found it folks: mcmansion heaven

Hello everyone. It is my pleasure to bring you the greatest house I have ever seen. The house of a true visionary. A real ad-hocist. A genuine pioneer of fenestration. This house is in Alabama. It was built in 1980 and costs around $5 million. It is worth every penny. Perhaps more.

Now, I know what you're thinking: "Come on, Kate, that's a little kooky, but certainly it's not McMansion Heaven. This is very much a house in the earthly realm. Purgatory. McMansion Purgatory." Well, let me now play Beatrice to your Dante, young Pilgrim. Welcome. Welcome, welcome, welcome.

It is rare to find a house that has everything. A house that wills itself into Postmodernism yet remains unable to let go of the kookiest moments of the prior zeitgeist, the Bruce Goffs and Earthships, the commune houses built from car windshields, the seventies moments of psychedelic hippie fracture. It is everything. It has everything. It is theme park, it is High Tech. It is Renaissance (in the San Antonio Riverwalk sense of the word.) It is medieval. It is maybe the greatest pastiche to sucker itself to the side of a mountain, perilously overlooking a large body of water. Look at it. Just look.

The inside is white. This makes it dreamlike, almost benevolent. It is bright because this is McMansion Heaven and Gray is for McMansion Hell. There is an overbearing sheen of 80s optimism. In this house, the credit default swap has not yet been invented, but could be.

It takes a lot for me to drop the cocaine word because I think it's a cheap joke. But there's something about this example that makes it plausible, not in a derogatory way, but in a liberatory one, a sensuous one. Someone created this house to have a particular experience, a particular feeling. It possesses an element of true fantasy, the thematic. Its rooms are not meant to be one cohesive composition, but rather a series of scenes, of vastly different spatial moments, compressed, expanded, bright, close.

And then there's this kitchen for some reason. Or so you think. Everything the interior design tries to hide, namely how unceasingly peculiar the house is, it is not entirely able to because the choices made here remain decadent, indulgent, albeit in a more familiar way.

Rare is it to discover an interior wherein one truly must wear sunglasses. The environment created in service to transparency has to somewhat prevent the elements from penetrating too deep while retaining their desirable qualities. I don't think an architect designed this house. An architect would have had access to specifically engineered products for this purpose. Whoever built this house had certain access to architectural catalogues but not those used in the highest end or most structurally complex projects. The customization here lies in the assemblage of materials and in doing so stretches them to the height of their imaginative capacity. To borrow from Charles Jencks, ad-hoc is a perfect description. It is an architecture of availability and of adventure.

A small interlude. We are outside. There is no rear exterior view of this house because it would be impossible to get one from the scrawny lawn that lies at its depths. This space is intended to serve the same purpose, which is to look upon the house itself as much as gaze from the house to the world beyond.

Living in a city, I often think about exhibitionism. Living in a city is inherently exhibitionist. A house is a permeable visible surface; it is entirely possible that someone will catch a glimpse of me they're not supposed to when I rush to the living room in only a t-shirt to turn out the light before bed. But this is a space that is only exhibitionist in the sense that it is an architecture of exposure, and yet this exposure would not be possible without the protection of the site, of the distance from every other pair of eyes. In this respect, a double freedom is secured. The window intimates the potential of seeing. But no one sees.

At the heart of this house lies a strange mix of concepts. Postmodern classicist columns of the Disney World set. The unpolished edge of the vernacular. There is also an organicist bent to the whole thing, something more Goff than Gaudí, and here we see some of the house's most organic forms, the monolith- or shell-like vanity mixed with the luminous artifice of mirrors and white. A backlit cave, primitive and performative at the same time, which is, in essence, the dialectic of the luxury bathroom.

And yet our McMansion Heaven is still a McMansion. It is still an accumulation of deliberate signifiers of wealth, very much a construction with the secondary purpose of invoking envy, a palatial residence designed without much cohesion. The presence of golf, of wood, of masculine and patriarchal symbolism with an undercurrent of luxury drives that point home. The McMansion can aspire to an art form, but there are still many levels to ascend before one gets to where God's sitting.

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