A Strange Vision

MORE PAREIDOLIA

The other day I was out walking along the quiet back road near the office when suddenly I perceived a strange - and unsettling - spectral vision.  Without any warning the familiar, mundane scenery before me - the narrow sidewalk in the shadow of the trees, the freeway overpass ahead, and the hospital to which it led - disappeared, replaced by a long column of soldiers, fearsomely armed and armored in medieval fashion.  They were so numerous I could not see where the column began or where it ended.  All a-bristle with polearms, swords and banners, some mounted on horses and others leading pack animals, they marched in ominous silence toward their unknown destination against a red sky.

DRY LEAVES AND BLADES OF GRASS CAN BE BETTER THAN INK BLOTS

A Magician

A man with three floating objects about his head.

I like it when odd images are left unexplained.

Last Night

I made like Bob Cratchit, and now my stomach is paying for it.

RATHER MERRY

Rush Hour

When the whole world heads homeward, including these clouds.

An Afterthought

Perhaps, if daimones could be assigned human faces, that lone individual might look like this?

An Early Arrival

Spotted today:  the first daimon of the winter!

So, one has made the return journey from wherever it is that daimones disappear to when they are not here;  but it's far too early for a proper return of the daimon population -- this individual is therefore something of an aberration.  Is it the daimonic equivalent of a misanthrope, preferring its own company to that of others of its kind?  Or does it simply possess a graver, more sensitive nature than its fellows, and find their discourse distracting?

Hanukkah Gelt

HAPPY 2nd DAY OF HANUKKAH, 2011!

I remember a comics series from back when I was a child still living in Korea.  It was called 'The Money Bug (돈벌레)' and it was both a monster fantasy and a morality play.  The titular character was a mean old miser who loved money so much that after he died he came back reincarnated as a giant centipede-like monster that ate money (coins, that is;  the story was set centuries in the past).  I reminisced about this while eating some of the chocolate coins that somebody brought to work today for Hanukkah.

The Growth And Maturation Of A Predatory Cloud

I LOVE IT WHEN A CLOUD STICKS AROUND (OR KEEPS COMING BACK)

Over the course of a couple of years this cloud, which I've christened 'Dinocloud' for its resemblance in the first photo to the smaller carnivorous dinosaurs, developed from a small, agile hunter to a giant mass of appetite -- too big and heavy to actively hunt any more, and so passively lying in wait for prey.  I hope it doesn't eventually turn into one of those cosmic monsters that keep trying to swallow the Sun or the Moon (see Here, Here and Here).

DINOCLOUD, April 2008

DINOCLOUD, May 2008

DINOCLOUD, Today

EDIT:  BTW, I can't be the only one who thinks that that other mass to the right of Dino in the last photo looks like King Kong...

Just An 'Amusing Trifle'...

Yet Another Blustery Day

With a tree taking a breather.

Related posts:
   First Blustery Day:  Here
   Second Blustery Day:  Here

Another One Of Those Vaguely Sinister Images

Or maybe not so 'vaguely'.  I'd say this one is actually pretty obvious.

These days monsters don't seem to be taking as much care to conceal themselves from us as they used to...  why?

Do they know something we don't?

Moon Overlooking A Point

Paper Crane Project Update

A seventh panel added.

I still haven't counted them, but I'm sure I'm still far short of a thousand birds.

Here's a close shot of the new panel:

And After A Rain... Pt. 2 (The Secret Language Of The Earth Pt. 9)

And After A Rain... (Pt. 1)

There are stranded worms on sidewalks and in parking lots.

Number of worms rescued so far:  34

[I did say at an earlier point that worm rescues would no longer be main post topics -- but hey, as Walt Whitman said, Do I contradict myself?  Very well, then I contradict myself;  I am large, I contain multitudes]

It's Raining

5th & BROADWAY, FROM MY 6th FLOOR WINDOW -- JUST NOW

Probably doesn't sound like much to most people, but in Los Angeles this is a fairly rare thing.  It rained most of the day today, and it's still raining now at 11:37 PM.

And I so LOVE the rain!

The Secret Language Of The Earth (Pt. 8)

A PRETTY PUDDLE

Strange Dream

Of course, all dreams are strange.  But there's something about the dream I had this morning.  Many details are already forgotten, but the main parts remain clear.

 

I dreamt that I had to drive to a destination located off Wilshire Boulevard.  I parked (in the dream I was driving my old pickup truck) in what seemed to be a small loading dock in a narrow alley off the main road (the setting seemed to be an echo of the alley behind the apartment building where I lived many years ago).  Once I got out of the truck though, it started to roll forward and down; I realized there was a slope, quickly jumped back in and re-parked in a more stable position.

Next thing I remember, there was a big to-do over this big spiderweb hanging in midair --  there was a bat caught in it.  At first I thought it was dead, but then it started to struggle, trying to free itself.  I grabbed my camera and took aim, but I was shooting through the truck's cab and this annoying idiot (a frat-rat type individual, that is) on the other side of the truck was inserting himself into the frame, posing mischievously in the window and spoiling the shot.  He was quickly joined by some of his buddies and I became impatient.  I finally lost my temper and yelled something like "Get outta there, you assholes!" -- and rather to my pleasant surprise, they all sheepishly obeyed me instantly.

Then I was playing with my cat Blood* (it's worth noting that over the years since Blood** died his image in my dreams has been steadily eroding, becoming more and more of a generic-cat with each appearance;  however, in this dream he looked exactly as he did in life -- what a welcome development).  I put him in the truck and closed the door while I had to do something else.  When I came back I was concerned that he might run out when I opened the door and become lost, but to my relief he stayed put.  Once I got in and sat down though, I realized Blood*** had climbed up under the dash (he actually did this sometimes) and I became concerned that he might chew on a wire or something in there, so I reached under there and pulled him out.  When I did, his face had become thin and he looked just as he did when he was sick, just before I had to have him euthanized.

I began the return drive home, but in the meantime some people had been moving house and the alley had become clogged with all kinds of furniture and assorted debris.  Grumbling impatiently, I got out of the truck and began to clear the road.  Some of the people began to help, and a young woman heard me complaining and smilingly said "What, you thought this was an ordinary lane?".

Happy Face And Real Face

Today at work I doodled this:

Even though I was actually feeling like this:

A Thing

I'M AFRAID OF MY OWN CREATION

It's wearable as a brooch.  But now that I see it like this it's vaguely sinister, like some deep-sea monster...

On the other hand, I do tend to regard a lot of things as vaguely sinister.

Still More Iridescence

Not to be irreverent, but this undeniably beautiful image makes me think of those kitschy illustrated Bibles.

A Silent Explosion

MY MIND PLAYING TRICKS ON ME

I once read about a study that found that a surprisingly high proportion of the 'normal' population reports having heard voices at least once.  Not inside their heads, but 'actual' voices, seemingly heard with the ears.  This is entirely credible, as it's happened to me, too -- and not once but a few times, as I remember.  Not conversations or sentences, and certainly not commands to pick up a heavy blunt object and nail the nearest person with it,^^ but just single, incomprehensible syllables shouted close to my ear, almost like a bark.  Just once though, I thought I heard my name spoken.

Then there was this other episode.  I don't know if it belongs in the same category as hearing voices, but anyway it was memorably strange.  I was lying in bed.  Whether waiting to fall asleep or just waking from sleep, I don't remember, but suddenly there was an explosion;  an intense blue-white light flashed, dazzling my eyes;  I was thrown like a rag doll, perhaps a couple of feet straight up into the air, fell back onto the bed, bounced, and fell back again.  There was a kind of throbbing sensation as I lay there, and I felt the bed waving and vibrating under me.  All without any noise whatsoever;  that's how I knew it was a subjective experience, not an actual disaster -- but what an odd hypnagogic/hypnopompic hallucination, if that's what it was.  Oh, and that old man image (Doctor Lao?^) is from one of my own paintings.

EDIT (March 4, 2012):  Actually, something like this has been written about before.  I don't know why I didn't remember it when I first wrote this post, but Robert A. Monroe, in chapter 12 of his autobiographical classic of occult literature, Journeys Out of the Body (1971), describes an incident that sounds very much like this.  He wrote that right after he lay down in bed, an explosion took place that hurled him clear across the room and left him tingling all over as if he'd been shocked with electricity.  Without a sound.  At first he thought there had been a real accident in the house, but then he looked up, saw himself still quietly lying in bed, and realized it had happened to his 'astral body',

Yet Another Scary Cloud

Looks like a vast, one-eyed, spidery/amoeba-y monster poised to descend and engulf everything like some evil god.

The Other Week's Thrift Shop Purchase

It's a box disguised as a book!  I've always loved these ever since I was a tot.  Along with the mysterious cabinets of wonder made out of cardboard boxes.  Why?  Probably has something to do with the unexpected and unknown made real.  Like the mermaid piece here.