This is weird. Am I dreaming that I’m blogging what I’m dreaming about? Or am I blogging that I’m dreaming about what I’m blogging about?
(hat tip to Adam Cuerden)
Hey, somebody went to the Cephalopod Appreciation Society show in Seattle — and Tikistitch came back with pictures! I love the idea of suede squid draped decoratively about the house, but at $2500 each they are a little bit out of my price range.
She has also discovered a Japanese fashion doll with a pet Cthulhu. It sounds neat, but ewww. The Chtulhu figure is cute and cuddly, but the doll…that noseless face, the tiny mouth that can only be good for sucking up fluids, the huge insectoid eyes taking up half her face. <shudder> It would give me nightmares.
You really don’t want to know what goes on inside a slaughterhouse. That way, you’d never hear about toxic pig brain mist.
In a rapid-fire process that is noisy, smelly and bloody, severed pigs’ heads are cut up at the head table at a rate of more than 1,100 an hour. Workers slice off the cheek and snout meat, then insert a nozzle in the head and blast air inside until the light pink mush that is the brain tissue squirts out from the base of the skull.
This is in the news right now because Minnesota slaughterhouse workers are coming down with an autoimmune disease, chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP), that is thought to be caused by the exposure to all the brain matter flying around in those environments. Exposure to the antigens in the pig nervous tissue is triggering the workers’ immune systems to attack their own nerves.
I’m swearing off pig brains forevermore, I promise.
(via Yet Another Web Site)
…but I was afraid of what they might find.
This is some tree:
An important point of clarification. Some have objected to the diversity of terms used for this holiday: Cephalopodmas, Squidmas, Cuttlemas, Cthulhumas, Octopusmas, Nautilmas, etc. Do not be intolerant! This is a thoroughly ecumenical, non-sectarian holiday, and we gladly embrace all of our molluscan brethren. You can just call it ‘podmas for short.
OK, I saw these links to weird decorations, and except for this set, there’s nary a cephalopod to be seen. And then I realized these aren’t squidmas decorations, they’re nerdmas decorations! Obscenity! Heresy! By not exclusively recognizing our sacred traditions and not snubbing alternatives, this is clearly an instance of the War on Squidmas.
Don’t allow this to happen. When someone waves a Mario Bros. ornament at you, or shows up wearing a stormtrooper helmet, or says “Happy Nerdmas!”, slap ’em with a tentacle and howl about how they’re oppressing you.
Since we’re entering the holiday season, and I wouldn’t want to be accused of contributing to the War on Christmas (oh, horrors!), here are some fortuitously christmassy entertainments.
If you’re shopping for just the right gift for that devout Christian, look into the Twelve Days of Kitschmas. These are exactly the kind of garish ticky-tack most appropriate for your beloved followers of the prosperity gospel.
But perhaps you want to share with more spiritually minded loved ones. How about some Bible verses? In fact, how about the most badass verses in the entire Bible? 1 Samuel 18 suggests some great presents for your father-in-law, too.
Whether you love Christopher Hitchens or hate him, there’s something here for you: you can read Hitchens’ account of getting a full Brazilian. There are photos (don’t worry, nothing to make one stagger to the fainting couch).
I think I’m going to have to cancel my appointment, though. It sounds like it hurts.
For those of you who just like your cephalopods natural, here’s a plush cuttlefish. It’s cute and cuddly, and I wouldn’t mind having one to snuggle up with.
On the other hand, if you like your cephalopods unnatural, you could carry out perverse and disturbing acts on ordinary stuffed animals, turning them into chthonic entities with alien properties.
They’re all fun, and all part of a happy squidmas celebration!
