Items, annoyances, and electricity.

Hello loyal S&Pers!

So sorry for the delay, but two nights ago we lost our cable modem, wireless router, two tv's, a dvd/vcr unit and our answering machine to a lightning hit -- good ol' Ozarks Spring weather!

Funny how our stuff was taken out by the very thing that brought 

Frankenstein's Monster to life.

Oh well. We still have to figure out how to replace things, but we finally have our internet connection back, and for that I am happy and grateful -- I do miss this place when I can't get to it.

Another annoying bit of bizniz is that the site which hosts the audio files for the jukebox and the Hallowe'enith radio has been down for the last 14 hours or more, and I have not been able to upload the Easter songs I wanted to share with you.

Come on, Podbean, get with it.

So, as a small treat, I thought I should show off some of the cool little bits and giggles of Horror Goodness I procured at Monsterpalooza.

Nothing expensive (who has money anymore? Besides 2% of the population I mean?). But cool nonetheless.

First up, a few gifts from some great people.

My kind friend, the funny and fun Joe Moe, a renaissance man from Hawaii with music, art and writing in his blood, gave me a copy of the first issue of a new monster magazine he's involved with called Mad Monster!

I love the Frazetta Mad Monster Party art tribute for the cover, updated to a bit more modern monster flair. In fact I have to say that it certainly feels like a new kind of monster magazine -- it absolutely has that sense of info-visual-overload fun for the 21st Century -- and with animated flipbook-style corner images, crazy fonts, cut out haunted houses, horror paper dolls and other goodies, Mad Monster in fact feels very much like holding a cool horror website in your hands. I urge you to go grab it for the paltry price they're asking.

Another great guy and loyal S&Per, the incredible artist Bob Lizarraga gave me this splendid bit of sketchwork as a thank you for setting up that KTLA Morning News segment with Allie MacKay (you recall this post).

Yep, it's Henry Hull as the lycanthropic Dr. Glendon in Werewolf of London (1935).

To have two pieces of Lizarraga brilliance in my house is a real thrill (the other can be seen here).

Next, my friend Aaron Lewis, a fine sculptor, painter and maskmaker, whipped up these great little Shrunken Heads which sold out very quickly:

They are the heads you could make with the Thingmaker Fright Factory kit from the 1960s.

Just superb, especially with the 'fantasy' header tag using the Fright Factory box art.

I also picked up some very cool little horror pinback buttons from Creepycult, for my nieces, nephews and granddaughter Kiara. They all have theirs now, so I don't have pics of them, but I have a shot of the one I picked out for myself:

Of course, it's Duane Jones as Ben, wielding a two-by-four in the original Night of the Living Dead (1968).

The kids all got some kind of classic monster button, and I think it's neat we all

have a sort of matching set divided amongst us.

Speaking of the living dead, I also picked up this set of ghoulish finger puppets:

There was actually a fourth ghoul in the set, but I gave that one to my mother as
a gift for her birthday, which was April 8th. Mom gets a zombie finger puppet
'cause that's how I roll. She loved it, by the way.

And here they are in their natural habitat on my zombie shelf:

Lastly (for now), the very cool David Colton, the guy who heads up those Rondo Horror Awards I keep harping about every Spring, gave me a real button as a thanks for all the virtual buttons I post here at the S&P:

Awesome.

Well, damnit, we continue to deal with flooding rains and lightning all day and night, so I need to duck out now and unplug things before we lose another set of expensive things.

Geez nature, lighten UP!

DUMDUMSHREKPEEPS!