Sometimes (like today), I get really down about not being able to grow a beard. Ok, honestly now: I'm never really down about not being able to grow a beard. I lied. But I do want to write a book compiled of short stories: one story for each of these men.
Shit I love this week. Click images to see 'em larger.
J. Morgan Puett's Chicken Coup:
Amanda's Autopsies:
The Selby:
The Malplaquet House (Photographed by Barry Lewis):
These images (which I would cite if I could, but saved without putting the source in the file notes):
And these websites (that I can't be bothered doing photo-collages for):
Thierry W. Despont at The Marlborough Gallery
Oh, and whomever loves me the most can buy me this.
Courtesy of The Blue Planet, I present: Homarus Americanus, a.k.a The Atlantic or American Lobster, a.k.a. The Most Beautiful of All Marine Invertebrates:
Pretty.
Things are back to peachy.
(Okay: I'll be the first to admit that things aren't exactly perfect, but I'm once again optimistic that they will be. I just needed a week or so to throw a tantrum and convince myself that everyone I'd ever loved had replaced me and that there really wasn't any point in trying to make things, since it's all already been made, and that even if I did make something or love someone, in any capacity, it'd be pointless anyway because everything is so fucking meaningless...
In other words, I need a week of being a ridiculously pessimistic, whiney piss-bitch. But I'm back to being the cynical optimistic that you're sort of used to.)
And now, for something different: 
I almost hate to admit how much I love Neco Z Alenky, or how influenced I am by Svankmajer's work, because it seems almost too artsy. I find myself judging... myself... for considering a creepy version of Alice in Wonderland inspiring.
But, whatever, I love it. And it makes me want to collect the bones I find scattered around our property, clean them, and display them in pretty outfits.
I managed to find Neco Z Alenky posted over on youtube in nine parts. Part 1 is posted below. For those of you who love it as much as I do, here's the torrent.
I've lost my notebook.
This wouldn't be a big deal... except for the fact that, in an attempt to avoid the temptation of the internet (by avoiding my computer altogether), I've done the majority of my writing by hand. In said notebook. All of my research (yes, I've done research) is in that notebook. All of my character sketches (including literal sketches) and plot outlines and maps and plot development and and random ideas for dialogue and scene inspiration and... well, all of my notes are in that notebook.
This is a major setback for Team Productivity.
But, as per usual, there is a silver lining:
While wasting time that should have been spent pouring over the list of potential names for imaginary subterranean cities now forgotten, I've discovered The Hollow Earth Theory. 
Now, I understand that the idea of a subterranean world lit by the center sun (where those of us less-enlightened had previously imagined a molten core) inhabited by near-divine beings living in perfect harmony, who use flying saucers to travel between Agharti (the subterranean world) and our... um... terranean (?) world is far-fetched and ridiculous, but you take inspiration where you find it. Slowly and surely, I'm beginning the maddening descent into the world of Science Fiction writing. And you know what?
I'm okay with that.
What's interesting to me is how the idea of a world beneath ours, like the similar principal tenets of many dissimilar religions, appears repeatedly in mythology from various cultures. Most strikingly are the parallels between:
•Shambhala, the capital city of Agharti believed in traditional Tibetan Buddhism to be a "place of peace/tranquility/happiness" occupied by the purest of the pure (located somewhere in Asia),
•Vanaheimr, which is, as I understand it, one of the nine realms of the earth (some of which are subterranean!) and is a dwelling place of the gods in Norse mythology (also theorized to be in Asia), and
•Heaven, the place where, in Christian mythology, God lives with the angels and where good souls go after they die (most likely not supposed to be in Asia (unless you're me, in which case Heaven is spending eternity lounging on a beach in Phuket with a near constant supply of Pad Thai and cigarettes, with no chance of skin or lung cancer and/or obesity)). 
Tolkien modeled his map of Middle-earth after the níu heimar ("nine worlds") of Norse myth; admittedly, the idea of the níu heimar is also one of my major inspirations, but Shambhala and the many hidden tunnels leading to Agharti fill in some gaps that I was having trouble with.
Like I said, you take inspiration where you find it. The Hollow Earth Theory has joined the ranks of Things That Have Influenced My Writing, where it will keep the "Planet Earth" episode about caves and The Lord of The Rings company...
Okay. I should probably get back to re-writing those scenes that I still remember, and jotting down concepts and inspirations before I forget them. Time to put the computer away and act like someone who's serious about writing. Again.
Sigh.
[P.S. Rational, empirically-inclined Dallas knows that The Hollow Earth Theory is totally ridiculous (in the same way that the Jehovah's Witnesses are). But the whimsical side of Dallas--the same side that makes me want to write a YA novel about subterranean cities--wants to believe that this is possible. I'm sure everyone laughed at Ptomlemy when he proposed the world was round. How is proposing that it's round and hollow that much different?
The world is hollow. There there be dragons.]
Listen: On The Road To Shambala by Three Dog Night
I'm not playing a role. I'm being myself, whatever the hell that is.
-Bea Arthur
This is a collage-blog about... stuff. Stuff that inspires or motivates me. If I had a printer, these would just get pinned to my bulletin board, but, alas! I have no printer. Instead, what would usually happen is, I'd copy them to a file I've named "inspire me plz" and then promptly forget about them. This week, instead of relegating them to the oubliette that is my external hard drive, they will get pinned here. I will decide later if this was an efficient use of time...
These are things that
a.) get me excited about creating,
b.) help pull me out of the writers' block,
c.) make me want to be a better person,
d.) make me feel okay about not actually being a better person,
or e.) all of the above.
(Sorry for the crappy quality of the collages--my Photoshop license expired last weekend. As such, I've tried to include a link to everything. Also, this is not to be confused with the "Things That Are Rad" list... though they're basically the same thing.)
