Welcome back! Ready for MORE mail art madness? Here are the next 10 envelopes I've gotten ready to go-go! Shall we just dive in? Here we go...
WHERE THE LEPRECHAUNS GO: Yes, I realize St. Patrick's Day has passed--as has Easter. However, this first envelope flashes back to March 17th, foregoing the usual horror in favor of family-friendly (??) toilet humor! Oh my! What happened was, a while back, I made an envelope called FLATULENCE OF FEAR. While looking through leftover scraps, I found an extra image I'd used for the mysterious ghost gas. Seeing the gassy image--in green--made me think of ...leprechaun farts. It was all down hill from there. As so-so as it is, my biggest complaint is that the title is too small. That-and the typo (which I did NOT notice until NOW) "...surprises awaits" instead of "await"...GRR! Oh well. It's still "Magically Stink-A-Licious!" P.U.)
CURSE OF THE TIKI CON: Oh my! I must have poop on the brains. (Perhaps it is my current G.I. issues?) Only now, I've gone from potty humor to gross-out potty HORROR! EEK! Anna Maria Sophia is a tiki pal in North Carolina that I've never met. She's a teacher--and I used to be one. We are both members of (Tiki with) Ray Wyland's Tiki Goth Club, and we both recently started writing for Exotica Moderne magazine. A long while back, I needed a screaming tiki person for my mail art and I asked Anna Maria if she would be my tiki scream queen and pose for some pictures for me to use on my envelopes. I have used them a few times so far--and she sent me plenty of poses to chose from. While I have sent her a few envelopes over time, I'd never sent her one starring HERSELF. Since I was caught up on my mail, I wanted to surprise her. I had something half-formed in my head using the images below, but no title or theme. I misplaced the tiki image and then had an ink cartridge run out on me. By the time I got more ink and just reprinted the image, I'd finished the leprechaun envelope above. The juvenile toilet humor of the above envelope made me think of pupu platters...which made me think of the severe effects of food poisoning...which led to this envelope. Really--I TRIED to think of something else. But once my brain was trapped in tiki turd land, I had to make it if I ever hoped to move on... I am sooooo sorry Anna Maria Sofia!
My mail artist friend,
Amy Kiessling, found this "Monster" postcard and added the "A-GoGo" part to iy. Very clever and sweet of her.
I was already working on this envelope for Amy when I got her card. When I was printing the images and titles, etc., I envisioned them all on a standard envelope. It proved to be too much for a regular envelope...so I bumped it up to a larger size. But, by doing so, everything I'd printed was too small. UGH! It wasn't that great of a concept/idea anyway. Sorry, Amy. I did use pictures of Amy and her boyfriend Chris though. Hopefully it won't be too disappointing...OOPS! Ha! I misspelled Amy's name in the top blurb. I reprinted it and pasted over the one shown. Golly! At least I caught that typo in time.
ECLIPSE OF EVIL: Yes, I know the eclipse is over. (Missed it, but maybe I can get to Spain for the one in 2026?) Couple the eclipse with my recently going to see the new OMEN flick (THE FIRST OMEN), add in a baby carridge, and you get this very obvious knock-off of...well, ROSEMARY'S BABY, actually. (Or maybe IT'S ALIVE?) Nothing to write home about.
THE MANOR HOUSE OF HORRORS: My friend Janet did something so especially nice for me a while back. I "thanked" her for it with an envelope. Of course,
the envelope turned out crappy. This is my replacement. Interestingly, unlike Amy's above, I was planning on it being on a larger envelope. I had all of these other images and tag lines to go with them. I was thinking this "movie" would be like an old Hammer or Amicus horror anthology. (Think TALES FROM THE CRYPT or ASYLUM.) I had a vampire woman, a skeleton emerging from a mirror and a group of skeletons. I just didn't have the room for any of it. Oops! Still, the pared down version looks okay. Sometimes, maybe, less is more.
HORROR ON THE HILLSIDE: I have another medical appointment coming up next week in Anacortes. I recently discovered there is another mail artist there. I've had ZERO interaction with this person, Amy Pfeffer, but I made her an envelope and invited her to lunch, if she is available. I am a stranger. I get it. I made sure I sent my name, contact info, photos, and I even sent character references. If she shows, great. If not, no big deal.
NIGHT OF THE CREEPY-CRAWLY CORPSES: Since I am going back to Anacortes and I have invited Amy to lunch, I thought I would try to invite mail artist Jan Hodgman once again. I included things I sent to Ms. Pfeffer (pictures, name, contact info and character references). If Jan shows--wonderful. If not, I won't ask her again. I don't know her at all. What do I really care? I'm not a stalker. I just am trying to be mail art neighborly. OH NO! I just noticed ANOTHER typo. I forgot the "y" in "they". Darn it all! (Spoiler: The hand reaching out is supposed to look as if it is the zombie reaching out--but it clearly has different skin tone and it's a right hand instead of the left--which is what it should be. And how or why would zombies be in the basement?)
A VERY CTHULHU BIRTHDAY: If you read
my blog entry last time, you may recall that a woman approached me out of the blue about making her husband one of my envelopes for his birthday. She mentioned that he (Ben) likes H.P. Lovecraft and had been a local TV horror host in the early 1990s. Okay... I was developing an idea. I asked for pictures of him to use for the envelope and some of her as well. She sent several pictures of her husband--but all were from his horror hosting days as Dr. Speculo. That put a dent in my plan, somewhat. The really hard part was that all of the pictures of him were at a table in his lab. He had beakers and other props in front of him. The image below of him (on the left with the book) is actually a composite of four different photos of him. His wife (Laura) also sent in a more recent picture of herself (right foreground) taken in their haunted house. Because of the requested Lovecraft tie in, I went with another of my "A Very Cthulhu..." titles, this time birthday-themed. (Cthulhu is a creature--an "Old One" or "Old God"--of Lovecraft's creation in a few of his stories, as is the book The Necronomicon.) I HOPE it gets to its destination and the recipient likes it.
I, myself, had a birthday recently. Among many cards, gifts, and messages from friends and family, my friend Vye sent me this mail art birthday card she made herself. For whatever reason, we have had this weird fascination with the new-ish Dolly Parton mixes from Duncan Hines. For my birthday, she sent me this cannibal cake mix ("Human flesh flavored") and she doodled blood where "perfectly moist" was printed. Ha! Thank you, Vye!
STAGE FRIGHT: This is what I came up with for Vye. Years ago, Vye was a stage manager and/or a property mistress in New York. When I was brainstorming possible titles for future envelopes, this name came up. I knew it would have to go to Vye. But aside from the title, tag lines, and the idea for having the curtain on the side...I had zero ideas. I slapped on a screaming woman and the skull I recently found (which I've already used too often) and...eh. Not so great... Actully it's a big nothing, really. Sorry Vye.
Adam Roussopoulos is back in my mailbox (even though he again had my zip code wrong).
He sent an interesting zine, the pages of which were all perforated as if they were postage stamps. It is made of several pages of color photos of him Xeroxing his face. Ha! Actually, I saw a video somewhere of him doing that.
THE CREEPY HOUSE OF TERROR: This one was rushed--just to get it done. As I write this, the day after tomorrow (Tuesday) is the day I return to Anacortes for another medical appointment. I wanted to have this ready to go then--so I slapped it together. Lame title. Unimaginative taglines. Same-ol', same-ol' images. Nothing new there. (Sorry again, Adam.) But, hey! It's done!
And that is my ten envelopes to share this post. Before you dash off, I want to tell you that I have heard from Amy Pfeffer, one of the two mail artists in Anacortes. She has agreed to meet me for lunch after my cardiology appointment. I have no idea if Jan Hodgman will show up or not. It would be nice if she does, but I won't hold my breath. I'll try to get some photos of Amy and I (and Jan if she decides to come) and post them in the next blog entry. Stay tuned...
And thank you, as always, for visiting the page.
CHEERS!
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