Daddy's Little HELLper

Someone sent me this photo from a big rummage sale they attended -- not strictly thrift store, but definitely terrifying.

Someone put a lot of work into this doll! Per the tag on its foot, it has human hair and eyelashes, is artist-signed, and is called "Daddy's Little He(lper)" (I couldn't read the whole last word, but I'm assuming). But why did they give it (in the words of one commenter) the smile of Jack Nicholson? (She also said he was missing his axe, which explains the outstretched hand.)

I will devour your soul.

Of course, I was punished for my opinion, because someone else looked at the photo and said it resembled me as a child.

Worse yet, I can kind of see her point.

Which, now that I consider it, raises some serious doubts... about my... personality... heh heh... Where did I leave my axe again?

Bowling For Bridegrooms

Hello again! I must apologize for my disappearance these past few months; on top of my normal chaotic schedule, I've been in the process of buying a house (and stripping paint, sanding plaster, filling out paperwork, moving furniture, packing, and all the other associated complications).

But I'm going to try to resume posting regular terrors for the rest of the summer!  And since it's the first week of June, which is the traditional month of weddings, here's something to kick off the happy month:

I can't tell if this is an Italian tenor or a distressed groom facing his new mother-in-law.

Well, maybe that should be knock down instead of kick off. The poor fellow looks horrified. It's a little disturbing to think that there might have been a whole set of these terrified pins -- or perhaps just this one, with a white bowling ball hurtling toward it, trailing a bit of veil down the alley.

This is Representational Art. I Think.

Is this one of those Magic Eye things?  Because I've always been really bad at those...

I'm pretty sure this actually belongs on Cake Wrecks.

I see flowers.  I can get the flowers...  And then there's that thing in the middle...

After staring at this for a while, we decided that it was supposed to be a girl smelling a flower.  But there's some weirdness going on with the head, like the fact that it's shaped like a kidney bean, and half of the face is missing (zoom in -- it's creepy!), and there's no lower torso -- she (it?) is just floating there like a ghost, splotchy red fabric rippling in the breeze.  Maybe that explains the watery bloodstains around the outer edge.

I'm desperately hoping that this is a handmade home project, though, which would allow us to cut it some slack for being amateur work instead of commercially-produced.  It's on a commercial saucer, but it's just possible that the decor was added after-market.  I wouldn't have a problem with this being a kid's art project in school; but I would be pretty astonished by someone paying money for it in a store.

Attack of the One-Eyed Snowmen

There is a horror creeping among us -- a rash of ghostly one-eyed beings of ice, who, with their mocking smiles and curving orange noses, are attempting to infiltrate our homes and spy upon us with their 50% vision.  They masquerade as rosy-cheeked holiday decorations.  Some wear seasonal earmuffs and scarves:

I seeeeee you... but not well.

Others dress more plainly, their features fading in and out of view:

Lumpy snow is the creepiest snow!

(Or perhaps snowmen, like daruma dolls, need to have their second eye filled in by the person who buys them.)

But as scary as these one-eyed snowmen might be, above all, beware the fearsome two-eyed snowmen -- for if you look directly into their icy eyes, you could become... mesmerized.

(And if you have ever attended the Historic Artcraft Theatre, I guarantee you just heard that in Rob Shilts's voice.)

Censored Clarinetist

I am an artist.  I understand that sometimes artists run out of storage space or just don't have any use for pieces, so they end up donating them.  Several of my own ceramics pieces have ended up at Goodwill, because they were just things I had made for class assignments and wasn't really attached to.  So I can't be too critical of the craftsmanship in this obviously-handmade piece, because I don't know why the piece was made or what the sculptor was aiming for.

After all, it's entirely possible that the artist was good friends with a clarinet player from the local nudist colony, and made this shelf-sitter as a gift for him.  That's really the only explanation I can think of for why there would be a naked and anatomically-correct clarinetist sitting on the shelf.

Picture has been censored for your protection. Sorry, you'll have to get your nude-clarinetist kicks elsewhere.

Is this a thing?  Naked musician shelf-sitters?  I have not encountered them before... but if there are more of them out there, somebody please forewarn me.