Would you pay $20 for a set of small intestines cleverly woven into a very small clown? Yes, please!

I really wanted to post this to crow about a completely awesome new crapeterium that opened on Lamar and Manchacha, what a magical wonderland of crazy stuff it was, just next door to Far Out Furnishings. I did. It was a cottage crammed full of peculiarities, including this little guy here, who obviously reigned supreme over everything he saw. I would recommend that you drop everything, including your job if need be, to run down there, but they closed. So you could go there and beat on the windows, howl at the dusty piles of amazement that are still inside, just out of reach. But I wouldn’t recommend it, because they are ever so quick with a restraining order.

You’ve heard the old saw, “laughing on the outside, crying on the inside?” This is kind of like that, but no-one’s laughing, and his insides seem to be on the outside, so he’s kind of crying and laughing at the same time, only he’s screaming. Which is a response that I endorse. I’m not sure what he’s wearing on his head, though. Possibly a cheerful yellow squid. I don’t know.

Someone’s grandmother probably made this for her grandson or granddaughter, with her own, loving hands. And maybe the child said “thank you,” or maybe started to cry, until Mom made him or her say “thank you,” but in that terrified voice that says “please save me” in addition to whatever the words might actually express. And dad, dad said, “Yes. It is a good thing that she is in the home, and they lock the door and keep her inside when we leave. Worth…every…penny.”

Brought to you by the tragedy of Far Out, formerly of Manchacha and Lamar :(

Honestly, the whole world of “high school art” generally just makes me a little bit sad, rarely does it ever actually frighten me. But I think we’re edging there now.

Mainly because I’m feeling like this might actually be some strange religious icon–”rapture of the dead pigeon,” or Pigiata. And if that’s the case the artist may have actually out-weirded the Unitarian Universalists, and that takes some effort.

Not sure what it is. But pretty sure you’re not supposed to feed it after midnight. Or really ever, feeding it might just encourage it. It’s bad enough that it’s a nightmarish bastard crossbreed of a care bear, Ross Perot, and a necrotic penguin, you don’t want to feel vaguely responsible for it somehow.

After the bird apocalypse, the last thing the starving, desperate members of the human race saw was this thing drifting over the horizon in a silent, still mockery of flight. The  particularly superstitious or foolish or Unitarian Universalist among them tried to placate it with worship. There is no more terrible way to die than a 700-gallon bird poopie.

Bird? Fly? Mouse?

Birdflymouse?

We don’t know either, but we think we saw this on “Ren and Stimpy” when we were much, much younger. Saturday morning cartoons were far, far too dark for us, and we longed for the blessed silence of televised golf.

Goodwill on 2222 and Lamar, Austin. 

I had previously thought that I’d seen every variation on the Thrift Shop Clown. Mutant ceramic clowns, bulbous blown-glass clowns, shell-and-macaroni clowns, acerebrated buffoons. This one was new.

Just to begin with, he’s a really nasty little creature. Check out those eyebrows. It’s like he thought adding a Hitler mustache over each eye would enhance his comedy appeal. This is of course a failed hope, no force on earth can enhumor a clown, but this one isn’t even trying. It looks like the last thing a child ever sees after learning how to turn a handle.

Hmm…in the interest of public safety, this one doesn’t actually have a turn handle. It’s probably for the best. I’m sure a lot of sudden infant heart attacks were prevented by that simple precaution.

Anyway, evil ceramic clown, blah blah blah, you’ve seen this one before. The artist’s real advance in coulrophobia induction is the brilliant “clown-slug” approach. This is a new one.

Ever wonder what you’d get if you added grease paint and ruffles to an uncooked, “feeds six to eight” German sausage? Wonder no more!

The pink box is way too innocent. It lures children into a false sense of security. They creep forward, expecting a prezzie, candy maybe, or even a puppy or an appropriate succedaneum–then, BAM, sausageclownslug. I know what I’m going to give my nephew once my sister’s speaking to me again.

Savers on North Lamar, Austin

Oh the things you find at Goodwill’s “Blue Hanear.” It’s kind of the place where thrift goes to die–vast bins of overstock, fractured ceramics, broken microwaves, and whatever the heck they couldn’t sell roll in, and move out the door for like $1.00 a pound. When a new aisle full of fresh bins open up, the stampede of bargain hunters is amazing–and frankly, I’m not surprised that there’s the occasional fatality.

I really feel for this poor guy. Life dealt him a few painful blows, and then, Blue Hangar. I’m not sure what he looked like when he was alive–kind of like a lion, I guess, but teetering around the Serengeti on stilts so that he could reach the succulent leaves on the topmost tree branches, maybe. But I know what he looked like after…Blue Hanger.

Oh god.

I’m going to suggest to any future designers of animatronic toys that any cute fuzzy creature’s natural, batteries-not-included state be “cheerfully awake with large, sympathetic eyes,” not “corpse.” The horrible black crust around the eyes and nose is not helping. Not at all.

Buy this one for your kiddo the next time they ask for a puppy. Put the batteries in first, the anticipation is more fun. Then the next time they pester you, ask, in a sweet voice, “Did you take care of your lion?” You can string this joke out for months. “Can I have a baby brother?” “Did you take care of your lion?” “Can I have dinner?” “Did you take care of your lion?”

Considering the therapy bills, a puppy might be cheaper.

All in all, a valuable lesson about life and death for the children. Or at least death.

Blue Hangar in South Austin

There’s nothing quite like the Goodwill “Blue Hanger” outlet store. Except if you imagined Hurricane Katrina washing the entire contents of a “Family Dollar” store down the street, picking up bits of cruft and drek, then depositing it like an alluvial plain into a flea market on “Tax Free Weekend” Saturday, under a full moon. That’s kind of what the Goodwill outlet store is like, but not quite as nice.

Framed gnome? Don’t mind if I do!

This poor little guy was in the refuse of a massive trough full of “housewares,” a catch-all term which covers, well, anything that isn’t clothes. Shattered VCRs, unidentified pieces of home appliances, board games missing their win conditions…and gnomes, apparently. Unhappy, broken gnomes.

You find yourself drawing closer to the gnome, as if the gravity of the trough is pulling you inexorably gnomeward. You think…”Dear god. It’s full of gnome.” But you throw that thought away when you meet the gnome’s gaze, because obviously…

No loving god would allow this creature to exist. See how it suffers, how animals–ANIMALS, I tell you, or Goodwill Depot shoppers, which are arguably more vicious than a pack of wild dogs at a pizza buffet–tore its beard free, its only real dignity. Felt eyes stare into a future that’s too bleak to even contemplate. Throw him back in the bin. Face down, it’ll be a fun surprise for the next person.

SPECIAL BONUS! If for some reason you’d like to use the SCREAMING FACE OF GNOME for your own desktop background, the Thrifthorror Management apologizes for the following link, wherein you may find screaming gnome in all his original glory. Do with this what you will, the management will tell no-one.

Goodwill outlet on Burleson near Highway 71

This was threatening customers in the “Woodcraft” aisle of the big Goodwill on 2222. And they were right to feel threatened. It’s hard to say if this is a wood shop project or an alien life form, ready to crawl from the top shelf, scuttle around the corner to the toy section, and disembowel and/or impregnate a giant stuffed pooh-bear, all the while clacking its mandibles/pincers/ovipositors to say…”you’re next. You know you want it. Unless it’s disemboweling, which you probably don’t want.”

Behold, on its thorax it bears the sign of ill omen, the likeness of the star that foretold its coming! The wake of its destruction shall be TERRIBLE, but really, it’s a thriftshop, and it’s Sunday, so pretty much the same as those four kids over there farting around in Housewares, no change. I’m not sure the pooh-bear would agree with me on that count, but it’s a good blanket generality.

From a distance, that was kind of a nice shading job. From the top, it looks like the entire thing got covered in gorilla hair. It looks like my uncle Jeff with his shirt off. Tattoo’s kind of the same, too.

Yeah, we’re keeping away from that. I don’t care what you’re into, some things are just danger signs, and a tiger-striped stinger the size of a catcher’s mitt is probably one of those. Wait until it’s distracted by the super-sized “Good Luck Bear,” savor the irony, then run.

Oh, but we had a special day in late June. Some nice person had unloaded something like a dozen of finger-painted, crazy-coat ceramic masterpieces on the 2222 Goodwill. Each of them was a special flower. But some of them…some of them were just specialer.

Take Cujo here.

It’s like the titular character from Blue’s Clues finally gave up on teaching kids to count and solve simple problems, and went forth to end it all in a storm of blood and glory. Obviously, Nickelodean is a much edgier network than I ever gave them credit for.

Say hello, Blue!

…good…dog.

Aaand, Blue has a friend! A cousin, maybe even, in that uniquely DIY ceramic sense of the word, a brother. Or a sister. Or whatever strange gender arrangements they practice on a planet populated entirely by blood-spattered canines with glowing blue eyes.

Gaze upon it with care. The last person to meet the creature’s eyes is now distributed in small piles across the back yard.

Really, my day would have been made with just the wonder twins there, but it only got weirder.

If you took a frog, and threw him, as hard as you could, at Jackson Pollack when he was painting, this is what you’d get. That, and a confusing series of dots and splatters with a frog-shaped smudge halfway down the canvas, and a really pissed-off abstract-expressionist. But the frog? He doesn’t mind. He’s mellow, at peace. He would like a chance to wash the black paint off his face generally and out of his eyes in particular, but he’s easy, whatever.

But these creatures were mere stepping stones, guardians on the path, to the thing that was waiting at the end of the aisle.

Because combat boots with THAT dress is clearly the sign of a mind far past the madness horizon and accelerating.



Sometimes a man turns to the sun in the west, pulls back his hat, and screams in sheer, unadulterated horror at the wrongness of it all. When you’re on the great plains, and your only friend’s yer horse, and he’s gotten a restraining order and you can’t come within 500 feet…when you’ve eaten beans all week, and then you sit too close to the old campfire, and there’s kind of a flare of bright light and then nothin’ for a few days, and then you gotta climb onto a saddle and ride for six or eight hours, and you know, they say it burns twice, and that’s pretty much the truth of it…but mostly, when the cows start chanting in a low chorus and one of them turns toward you and it’s got a HUMAN FACE and it says your name, they ALL say your name, and you know that even so, it’s still time for them to take the last ride on the cargo train tomorrow, and you’re getting paid for it, faces or no faces…that’s when you gotta scream.

But that’s your Thursday scream, because tomorrow’s probably worse.

Savers on Burnet near 2222, Austin

So pretty much every level surface in my room is filled with…stuff. I do occasionally buy these dreadful things, and between that, the empty bottles from my meds and the carefully rinsed and cleaned sour cream tubs, that’s pretty much it so far as viable storage space goes, and it’s kind of an effort to find a place to put something anymore.

So when someone found this in my bedside cabinet, I really didn’t have an answer for them. “There wasn’t any room on the bookshelf” didn’t seem to fit the occasion.

Two talented astrobotanists and a team of highly-trained stunt writers haven’t figured out what this is. The continuum between “pagan idol” and “pencil holder” is just too broad. If it is a pencil holder, the people demand answers. It should be a ceremonial pencil holder, something used to hold the pencil of the hierophant during the Mass of St. Pignolla the Ostentateous, patron of petty bureaucrats and button-makers.

Or maybe it’s a potato. One of those Three-Mile Island Reds I’ve heard so much about. Apparently once you slice them they cook themselves.

File under “Dangerously Miscellaneous.” It’s like H.P. Lovecraft’s paperweight. It’s either a synesthetic representation of the sky over a dead planet where the stars dance to the endless discordant strains of a mad piper, or Tsoggatha’s chewing gum.

There is no angle I can take on this that it doesn’t look faintly obscene. I like that in a piece of high school art. But I’m still not certain about all the tiny holes. Does it need to breathe? Or worse, is something inside it still breathing? *shudder*

This mother’s day, give your mother something she’ll treasure forever. Or if you forgot Mother’s day, give her this. She won’t.

Savers on South Lamar near 290, Austin

…And Easter continues to continue! Today’s rabbits are truly bottom-of-the-barrel beasties. Take this guy for example.

At least I assume he’s a guy, he’s blue. The long eyelashes are a bit of a nod toward androgyny. The whiskers made of push-pins are a bit of a nod toward insanity. Overall, this is the face of a rabbit that has stared into the brink of madness and taken photos.

You kind of have to take it on faith that this is a rabbit. The ears add a bit of context. One fun thing about this particular basket? If you put “peeps” in it, they try to escape through the mesh holes. True story.

If the first one is a “before,” this poor creature is the “after.” Let’s just root around in here and see what the trouble is. Oh, I see the problem–you’re filled with jelly beans! We’ll just pick out all the bad colors.

That’s one heck of a buck tooth you’ve got there, princess. And the huge, catlike eyes are…different. It looks like spiders are trying to escape your corneas. It’s sad when the fact that you have a pop-top cranial cavity is actually one of the more normal things about you. Please don’t jump up and down too much though, something might fall off.

…well, what’s not to love here? The hideous pink eye? The stump of an arm? Or the strange yellow bile coughed up over a dress that accessorizes far, far too well with strange yellow bile? Maybe it’s the way she’s staring at you. She’s preparing a hug. For you. A sticky hug. Happy Easter.

Drink deeply from the basket of Easter. Join us. Join us in hunger and rage and strange, amorphous pantsuits and airbrushed dresses. Stain your muzzle in the juice of Easters past. Some say it’s a basket of fruit, but we say it’s…vengeance.

Blue bunny basket and hideous Easter ooze: Goodwill on 2222 and Lamar. Screwtop ziplock easter bunny and bunnies with basket of…red…from Goodwill on Stassney and Manchacha.