Red Monster, Again

Some time ago I passed by the Red Monster in Sinchon.  It had been cordoned off and a man was working on it, cleaning and painting it.  Today I happened to pass by it again, and sure enough, it was all spiffed up and sleek, and on top of it, surprise! -- its mirrored face was now a monitor screen.  I stood in front of it, taking a selfie via the mirror, and another surprise! -- the Red Monster was checking me out with a giant eye even as I was checking it out.

Related posts:  Red Monster;  Gull Checking Out Man Checking Out Gull

"Hold Me"

After the last Moon post, I was going to wait a while before posting this one, but well, I felt there's something extra special about it.  I took this shot just a couple hours ago, and once I decided on the title I couldn't hold back -- it just seemed a perfect fusion of vision and poetry.

White Moon

A lovely image need not have any justification or reason for being other than that it's lovely.  Like Freud's cigar, sometimes a pretty picture is just a pretty picture.  It causes the viewer to experience pleasure and joy.  Even when it's out of season.

Errant Owl

At the foot of the subway station stairway.

Related posts:  Errant

A Visit To Gyeongdong Medicine Market

A market for old-style medicinal herbs that is, as you can tell by the sculpture representing the clay kettle traditionally used for brewing concoctions, bearing the Chinese character for "medicine"

and the ginseng (insam in Korean, pronounced "een-sahm") painted on the pavement.

It's said to be the biggest, most famous market of its kind in the country, where you can find herbal remedies -- mostly plant parts -- leaves, barks, stems, roots, fruits, flowers, as well as fungi and animal parts (safely dried), most of which I didn't even know the names of, for just about every ill that can afflict a human being.

Deer antlers

Don't know what tree these scary things come from, but my hat is off to the first guy who thought of using them for health

Marigolds

 

Ginseng

More antlers

Yet more antlers -- along with ginseng root, these are very popular as a tonic;  when I was a kid I was weak and sickly, and I remember taking it to boost my health (they're sliced thin and simmered and filtered until they turn into a horrible tasting "tea").

And lastly, ground cherries and "Korean frogs"

Like An Old Postcard

I thought I'd take this slightly strange image and add to its mystery by making it look like a time-worn, faded old print photo from several decades back.  I think it works -- perhaps even a bit too well;  now, when I look at it I feel a vague sense of nostalgia, with a tinge of sadness.  It reminds me of the time when my mother showed me how she'd kept all my old school tests in a box in the attic, the old newsprint sheets all yellowed and crackly and just about falling apart.  I miss you, mom.

Related posts:  A Trick Of Perspective?;  One More Instance Of

A Pair Of Anglerfish

at a fishmonger's stall.  I remember reading that the reason only female anglerfish seem to ever be caught is that male anglerfish are tiny compared to females, and when a male encounters a female he will bite onto her body and become fused with her, gradually losing most of his own body until he becomes a parasite that consists of nothing but his sexual organs.

I remember feeling quite repelled and even a little scared as I read that article.  What does a male anglerfish feel as he undergoes this process of de-evolution?  Does he stay conscious even as he loses his sight and his brain begins to be absorbed into his mate's body?  What must that be like, literally "losing his mind" as his brain dissolves away?  Doesn't it seem a little bit like being buried alive, without actually being buried?  What a grotesque way of propagating a species, like something out of a horror movie.

Half A Sunset

Peekaboo!

 

Yet Another Wizard's Laboratory

It's true! Seoul really must be some kind of wizards' hub -- I'm sure this is yet another of their workshops. I was just randomly ambling along on a postprandial stroll when I happened across a rundown old building in an alley. I thought maybe I could get a photo out of it and took a peek inside -- and look! That sinister red glow pouring out of the doorway -- whatever's going on in there, it must be a particularly powerful and dangerous kind of magic. It even looks like something preternaturally hot was dragged down the stairs (or is it up the stairs? I can't tell), leaving a trail of burned flooring behind. I got out immediately after taking this shot. Smartest thing I ever did.

Related post:  Another Wizard's Workshop

Like Ships Passing In The Night

A crow caught mid-flight, climbing toward the treetops, and far in the background, a cloud rising in the opposite direction, a faint but unmistakable echo of the fairy maidens in the folktale I referenced near the very beginning of this blog.

They never knew of each other's existence, but I know both.

Related post:  I-Witness: 2 Angels

Another Random Face

At 4:50 AM.

I think it looks kind of Slavic (Hello, Knyaz Igor, your highness could use a moustache) -- despite being the opposite of the "broad-faced" stereotype.

I don't know.  Is it the hour?  Maybe I just need to go to bed.

 

Related posts:  Happy Evil Face;  Haven't Done One Of These For A While;  Ugliness Abounds;  Madman Scowling;  Sour Expression;  Another Morning Meeting;  Today's Random Face;  Happy Face And Real Face;  Afternoon Meeting;  Some Intimidating Dude;  Bunch Of Characters In Search Of A Story;  8:00 AM Meeting;  Another Random Aimless Made-Up Face Drawing;  A Mysterious Urchin;  Made-Up Character 5;  Made-Up Character 4;  Made-Up Character 3;  Made-Up Character 2;  Ed, The Plumber

A Pair Of Roguish Eyes--

 

Pig Heads

At a butcher's in YeongDeungPo Market.  Livid from being thoroughly bled and washed, and dried out somewhat by exposure to air, they seemed almost translucent.

 

Talking Heads

Seen at the National Museum of Korea, Seoul.

Errant Scarf

of the color of raw meat.

Related post:  Another Errant Jacket

Staring Contest

Yet Another One

Wheel Of Fortune

This requires a bit of a mental leap.

From

"Going up or coming down, it's hard either way"

and

"Well, actually it's way easier coming down -- only it'll hurt more"

to

*O fortuna

velut luna

statu variabilis...

*Quoted from 'Fortuna, Imperatrix Mundi' (Fortune, Empress of the World) from the collection of poems known as 'Carmina Burana'.  It has famously been set to choral music by Carl Orff.  Here is a cover of the score showing the Wheel of Fortune.

Wow

*Expanding the image is an absolute must!

My "Phone Doodles"

have finally revealed themselves to be what they always have been in truth... maps of Hell!

All that time I spent absently graffito-ing mazes -- and even mentally constructing them in my imagination -- I was actually recreating sections of the one maze you can never escape.  No need for a Minotaur;  you'll just be wandering its claustrophobic corridors forever, eternally thwarted at every turn.

Related posts:  More Musings On Hell;  Custom-Made Hells

A Recent Jaunt To An Exhibition Of Pulitzer-Winning Photographs

inspired this documentary-style look back to March 2018.  I was still living in downtown L.A., and this anti-gun protest passed right under my 6th-floor window.  It was probably the biggest, densest, most massive crowd I have ever seen in person.

Misty Full Moon

 

Rude Fish

"Can you just stop staring?  It's very rude."

Liliputians Discover Brobdingnag

Sly Cat

Hm-m...

Made me think of Klimt's symbols for the yoni.