In which I am happy about halloween

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Happy Halloween Everyone!

I realise everyone in the blogosphere (especially the fashion camp) are talking but Halloween. But I don't care! I love Halloween. I'm going to talk about it too, so there. It is a date in which everyone dresses up and even the people who normally feel they are too mature for costumes join in. It is also the date when the people who love costumes and cosplay can put that much effort into an outfit and instead of being mocked get to win prizes and be the envy of their friends. It is the time when that guy who shows up in jeans and a t-shirt saying proudly 'I came as myself' looks like an idiot. Josie Long does a lovely bit in one of her stand-ups about how people become proud and happy in a costume. So all in all I manage to find a lot of positives in a festival that essentially celebrates the monsters I aim to destroy.

I have always been an absolute sucker for dressing up. Back when I was wee in primary school we had world book day where you had to dress up as a book character. I went as Asterix, Willy Wonka and Mary Poppins.

Yes. I was a guy twice. However guys always got to have the most fun in stories. My Asterix costume was awesome! I had the hat with wings, the gourd and everything.That was when I grew to despise the people who came as 'Alice in Wonderland' year after year. Put some effort into it!

The past few years I have dressed as Death from Sandman (the dress took hours of sewing)

Sailor Jupiter

and as Sakura from Naruto. I apologise for the hastily drawn in mask. You know how it is with protecting secret identities.

This year I am going to rewear my Princess Mononoke outfit from m

y birthday party so I'm sorry for the repetition. That's why I won't bore you with more photos of that.

However, I can show you my joker inspired pumpkin carving!

Me and my awesome friend made this last night from the last pumpkin in the town:

There are so many fantastic pumpkin carvings out there (I mean things like these)

that mine pales in comparison. All the same I like my creepy jack. There may even be some pie from his remains later.

We also watched Mirrormask, a fantastic creepy children's story by Neil Gaiman. Did she? Yes I definitely mentioned Neil Gaiman again. I just can't get enough of the guy. I seriously recommend m

Mirrormask to pretty much everyone.

I realise I haven't told you the story about the pyromaniacs. I'm afraid you are going to have to wait for that. This is Halloween and so it comes first. Have a great night everyone!

In which I fight a crazed whitler

Could it be, could it be, could it possibly be Benjamin? No it's a blog post again and actually on a Tuesday!

I really haven't had much time for jewellery making I'm afraid. There has been a weird pandemic of people challenging me to duels.
The other day this guy declared that he could best Origami Girl in a battle of artistic powers. His name was ChipperMan.
Not because he was happy but because he could whittle things out of wood and bring them to life. Coincidently like mine I admit but really slow. He then sat down with a knife and spent aages trying to carve out this intricate owlbear to attack me.
I sat down and watched till he was about half way through. Then I made some paper men who over powered him, tied him up, took away his weapons and slapped him in the face. I didn't phone the police or anything. He didn't seem criminally unhinged just a little bit overconfident that a wood-thing could beat paper. Wrong again.



On the jewellery front I was talking to my friend at HighlandBooks on etsy about Artfire and its pros and cons. I am seriously considering getting a shop there. However the problem is then I am splitting the promotion. I already have www.eccentric-accessories.com which most of my friends know by heart and spout delightfully to anyone who compliments their jewellery.
I have www.etsy.com/shop/EccentricAccessories which is far too long a name to get people learning off by heart but I feel looks far more professional than my website.
Would an Artfire shop be too much? However it is free and therefore I have nothing to lose except my time. Etsy offers so much in terms of business advice in the blog and community posts that I do get a bit overwhelmed with lists of things I should be doing.

And then I get distracted by pyromaniacs trying to burn a forest down. More on that next time.

Any thoughts on spreading myself out too thin business wise?

In which I review some awesome blogs and think about the universe

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I decided to break away from my usual habits in blog reading of looking up fashion blogs like Sea of Shoes and pining for beautiful clothes. I thought I would try looking for more things in my other interest –comics. What hero doesn't love reading comics and picking up tips? I found a list called the Comic Blog Elite. I've been scrolling through trying to find new good things to read. So many of them were just reviews of comics. I think if you are going to do that there has to be something to mark you out, other wise how can I choose which one to read?

I confess I have been kind of drawn to things to do with girls, like Has Boobs, Reads Comics or My Comic Book Crisis

Because hey I like girls being involved in comics. Interestingly both their latest articles are a pretty image feast. The former doing hot guys in cosplay and the latter doing the marvel swimsuit edition. Like this:

(Image credited to Marvel and My Comic Book Crisis)

Images like that kind of make the ridiculously huge breasts of Storm and Wonder Woman seem more acceptable. There was also a picture of Collosus in leapord print boxers...

However the best new blog I have found is 'Comics make No Sense'

Seriously I have been laughing hysterically at this for days whilst I back read it. He takes old comic panels and points out the ridiculous in them. I found another blog that did a similar thing but the commentary here is the true wit and the other one posted the panels with no further comments.

I have found it so funny that I was hunched over my laptop in near tears. If that's not a recommendation I don't know what is. :)

I have in the mean time been making a list of major problems with the universe and how they can be solved by origami.

When the internet doesn't work I have a moment of panic and think:

It's true I could read.

I could play scrabble.

Or I could save the universe.

Threat of Nuclear War -I really want to sneak around destroying all the nuclear weapons but I have a feeling that would just go terribly wrong. I don't know enough about science to carry this out successfully. This isn't Wonder Woman where I can carry it into the sea under my arm and leave it there feeling that was a job well done.

World Hunger –Already tried this one. Paper creations are just bad for the stomach. See entry

Racism – That one is really about the way people think. Not sure I can make people change their minds with my weapons. And tbh mind ray guns and the like usually fall into the villain category.

Global Warming –Ok I should definitely be able to do something about that. Like I could make a giant mirror for the sky. Or huge paper fans. Actually John could just make more ice caps for the polar bears. I might get him onto that. You know how it is with guys though. You have to poke them a bit before they save the universe.

Also I can make sure all my origami paper is recycled! Actually... I really prefer using nice washi paper and after it turns back to paper from being a gorilla or whatever it is usually ruined. Curses. Even my small attempts at saving the universe backfire.

The thing is when we aren't being attacked by super-villains or space robots it is pretty hard to save the world from these kinds of things. At least we keep the zombies at bay though!

Let me know if you know of any good comic-related blogs I should be reading.

In which I go to the cinema and read comics

This has been a pretty good week apart from the fact that my body has given in and decided to have a cold like everyone else.
I have been drinking so much lemsip and paracetemal that I was getting dizzy. In fact I was feeling so ill that when there was a massive car crash in town and I needed to lift a car up I made a spider monkey rather than a gorilla to do the heavy lifting for me. Like this one:

Trust me it just got in the way and made the fireman angry.

I did take a trip to the cinema and watch Scott Pilgrim with John. It was definitely very epic. Never have I watched a film that made me want to high five people so much. I also came out of it with a very strong urge to go to rock gig. John said he would be sad if there weren't Chinese dragons fighting above the audience and I see I am going to have to persuade him NOT to recreate the scene with ice dragons Hitsugaya style.

I also happened upon a Wonder Woman comic. I don't generally read Wonder Woman. It kind of seemed to go against my feminist sensibilities. Yet when I was flicking through this one (from the 70s) I saw the phrase 'women's lib' and decided to give it a go. It was actually really good. All about when Diana Prince had no powers other than knowing karate and yoga. The adventure? She took down a corrupt supermarket owner who paid his female staff ¼ of what the men were being paid. They got him done by the police by finding out he didn't have fire extinguishers. Definitely very interesting to read it alongside stories with the more typical crazed psychopath as the villain. It's this one if you are interested. (Also after some internet research it doesn't sound as though it continued to be very feminist)

In other news I read this really interesting interview with Neil Gaiman. Oh he is so very shiny.
http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2010/10/the_vulture_transcript_neil_ga.html

Have a good week guys.

In which I dress up as Princess Mononoke.

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Sorry for the long delay in blogging. I have been incredibly busy so had no time at all.

I did however have a fantastic party. It was rather belated for my birthday as folks had been occupied at the weekend.

I spent aaages making my costume for it. It was themed on 'things you would find in a forest' and I spent ages on the planning. I went for a walk in the woods with my sister and gathered sticks and things and wild feral apples and put them in jars around the room. I bought beautiful lights disguised as cherry blossom and then wound plastic ivy around the window bars and dotted playmobil trees and unicorns around the tables. It looked so beautiful and atmospheric.

Here is a picture of one of my friends in costume, looking 'atmospheric'. :)

Thinking about planning the party with my sister, I have just realised that having a sister is kind of unusual for a superhero. I think the heroism works for them in the comics because they are all 'an only child'. So much angst.

I'm trying to imagine batman with a big sister. She wouldn't have stood for all that emo nonsense with dressing in black and going travelling to 'find himself.'

Or imagine if Spiderman had a younger brother who caught him flexing his muscles in the mirror. A little brother would have just laughed at the skin-tight outfit, although probably been quite jealous.

The only ones who had siblings were heroes in teams, I think without them people like Iron Man can only think of operating on their own. (Although I suppose he had friends who helped but shhhh)

I think it is similar to how in children's fantasy novels the parents have to conveniently disappear. They are always orphans. Although it is something that I really like in the Doomspell books. The kids there have parents, worry about them and try to protect them from the witches and so forth. Really really good series actually.

But anyway I do have a sister.

I dressed up as Princess Mononoke for the party. Finally linking back to my first bit about spending time on the costume. I went on a little tangent there.

So here are some photos:

Notice, still wearing a mask. :P I love costumes so very much. I really want to do a 'wolf suit' from Where the Wild Things are one day.