Have seen the trailer for the new film Igor, and I'm looking forward with great anticipation to this film, coming from MGM in September. Igor follows the adventures of a talented Mad-Scientist's-assistant (John Cusack) in the kingdom of Malaria, where Mad Scientists are celebrities who create evil weapons and monsters, and Igors are... the hunchbacked guys who pull the switch. In a wild, wacky and very creative inversion on the Frankenstein story, one Igor (who is much more talented than his master) must overcome prejudices and other Mad Scientists to achieve his dream of becoming a Mad Scientist himself. Teaming up with sarcastic lab rabbit Scamper (Steve Buscemi) and the unfortunately stupid brain-in-a-jar Brain (Sean Hayes), Igor eventually gets his chance to create his own monster, Eva (Molly Shannon), who turns out to be exactly not what anyone expected.
Some wags on Youtube (which is where I saw the trailer) were blabbing on about how this seemed to be a monster-themed version of Ratatouille, but for my own part, I think there's much more at work here. It's arriving in theatres on September 19, just in time to open the Halloween season, so I'm throwing in with this cool-looking and inspired-sounding little movie. Further highjinks are sure to ensue, so I'll fill you in as it all becomes available. Check out the trailer for yourself at http://www.igor-movie.com.
Note: We will also be providing information on this film at The Morlock Heights Harbinger and The Powerhouse Files. Check them out.
Have seen the trailer for the new film Igor, and I'm looking forward with great anticipation to this film, coming from MGM in September. Igor follows the adventures of a talented Mad-Scientist's-assistant (John Cusack) in the kingdom of Malaria, where Mad Scientists are celebrities who create evil weapons and monsters, and Igors are... the hunchbacked guys who pull the switch. In a wild, wacky and very creative inversion on the Frankenstein story, one Igor (who is much more talented than his master) must overcome prejudices and other Mad Scientists to achieve his dream of becoming a Mad Scientist himself. Teaming up with sarcastic lab rabbit Scamper (Steve Buscemi) and the unfortunately stupid brain-in-a-jar Brain (Sean Hayes), Igor eventually gets his chance to create his own monster, Eva (Molly Shannon), who turns out to be exactly not what anyone expected.
Some wags on Youtube (which is where I saw the trailer) were blabbing on about how this seemed to be a monster-themed version of Ratatouille, but for my own part, I think there's much more at work here. It's arriving in theatres on September 19, just in time to open the Halloween season, so I'm throwing in with this cool-looking and inspired-sounding little movie. Further highjinks are sure to ensue, so I'll fill you in as it all becomes available. Check out the trailer for yourself at http://www.igor-movie.com.
Note: We will also be providing information on this film at The Morlock Heights Harbinger and Notes From The Monster Shop. Check them out.
For the first time anywhere, I present a self-portrait showing full Mad Doctor mode... and despite the grimly fiendish expression, don't worry; I really do like other people. It's just that I can't always eat a whole one...
We here in the Monster Shop are very stoked about the upcoming release of The Secret Saturdays, a new cartoon soon to debut on Cartoon Network. Created by Jay Stephens, this cool new show depicts the adventures of a family of cryptozoologists who strive to protect the world from ancient monsters and secrets, while simultaneously protecting said ancient monsters and secrets from greedy humans.
Cryptozoology, or the study of undiscovered animals, gets unjustly laughed at in scientific circles due to its concentration on what is known as "mega-fauna" cryptids. Mega-fauna cryptids are not things like undiscovered species of beetles or other insects, but big animals--in short, things like the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot. The earliest evidence of cryptozoological aspects in 'toons is most likely Hanna-Barbera's Jonny Quest, which is one of The Secret Saturdays' inspirations. Created by Doug Wildey, 
Jonny Quest details the adventures of the title character, a resourceful lad who travels with his father Dr. Benton Quest, pilot/adventurer Roger "Race" Bannon, Indian pal Haji and bulldog-pup Bandit on missions and adventures that span the globe and sometimes have them running into lost civilizations and ancient legends. Predating JQ, in the comic book format,
was Jack Kirby's Challengers Of The Unknown, sometimes said to be a trial run for what would eventually become The Fantastic Four. The Challengers were a group of adventurers who, after miraculously surviving a plane crash unharmed, decide that they are living on borrowed time and band together for adventures that take them not only to battles with monsters and ancient beings, but to alternate universes and even across time and space. To be involved with a branch of what is known as "pseudo-science", the Saturdays have a hell of a cartoon pedigree.
Because there is no scientific proof that cryptids exist, and because most evidence for these creatures largely consists of unreliable eyewitness accounts, cryptoozoology is considered a pseudo-science. Yet at the same time, much of the Earth is still unexplored, especially its oceans and seas.
And one thing that is perennial about the human condition is that we have a need in our lives for monsters, myths, the supernatural, and the unexplained: things that cause us to suspect that there is another world beyond the one we know, things that fill the heart with wonder and the eyes with stars. Religion gets blamed, and often unfairly, for being the cause of unrest in the world, but even though every atheist I know would grind their teeth at this statement, we need a God. We need great big things like God, because sometimes we can hide under them from real evil. We need to know and believe there are forces for good in the world that work in our favor, and we need monsters to represent our worst fears and our greatest evils, or even to represent the evils in ourselves that we can't face.
And sometimes--many times, in fact, the monsters wind up being the good guys, or at least an indicator of our need and capacity for redemption. And never is this more present than in cartoons. Take the case of Hal Seeger's Milton The Monster, who showed up on Saturday morning screens back in 1965, but was actually in the production stages as far back as 1964, pre-dating both The Addams Family and The
Munsters. Created by goofball mad scientists Professor Weirdo and Count Kook, Milton was an amiable Frankenstein who got overloaded on "tincture of tenderness" during his creation, making him sweet and lovable--and usually the victim of his creators' schemes. Other monster toons have proliferated as well; master cartoonist Alex Toth's The Herculoids were a team of 
super-powered creatures who protected their home planet of Quasar from encroaching aliens and outer-space bad guys. The Addams Family, depicted on TV as a clan of macabre and monsterlike individuals who were also the ultimate loving and cordial family, got their own Hanna-Barbera animated series in '73, traveling the country in a Victorian-styled RV and helping out folks in trouble. Though dismissed as a Scooby-Doo clone, the aptly-named Fangface was an actual werewolf who was on the side of good, and he and his gang of pals often ran into real strange creatures--not just crooks in monster suits but actual supernatural occurrences. And during the '80's there was the Drak Pack, in which the teenage descendants of legendary monsters, led by a reformed Count Dracula, used their supernatural abilities to atone for the sins of their ancestors by defending the world from evil.
So I think there's a need, if not a scientific basis, for cryptozoology, for wonder, for anything that causes us to try to be better, braver, or smarter, or helps us deal with the unknown.
And cryptids are real. If you don't think so, then check this out.
(Note: click on any picture to see it full-size.)
So. I was hoping to get some more website stuff done that day, but the rain came and then behind it came a thunderstorm, which meant that the computer, the Internet and so forth all got shut down immediately to avoid getting fried by errant lightning. So I took advantage of this brown-out to spend some downtime putting together Dracula: A Toy Theatre By Edward Gorey, which I had hunted for and finally found, and then been unable to properly deal with because I'd gotten busy.
Toy theatres are pretty cool. Emerging with the rise of mass printing, these were originally sold at real performance or vaudeville theatres during the 18th and 19th centuries, and most of these were fairly elaborate works of art and illustration. People took them home, put them together and performed their own little plays. Dracula showcases Edward Gorey's costume and set designs for the 1977 Broadway production of Dracula, which starred Frank Langella. Those of you who watch Mystery! are familiar with Gorey's work; the animated opening sequence is derived from his artwork.
The Gorey toy theatre includes three scenes, fifteen figures and props that you put together, plus a four-page booklet (more a pamphlet, actually) that outlines the basic action of the play and gives some background on Edward Gorey, all in a nice bookshelf-quality box. My familiarity with Dracula is not from the play, but mostly from Stoker's original novel and myriad movies, so I was kind of irritated that the female lead was Lucy Westenra, or rather Seward, as the play combines hers and Mina Harker's characters.** However, Mina writes a diary that composes half the novel, and if anyone has ever seen the beautiful if overwrought and somewhat ham-handed movie Bram Stoker's Dracula featuring Gary Oldman as Drac, then it's easy to call Lucy (played by Sadie Frost) the most obnoxious character, as she spends most of her onscreen time behaving like a total horndog and driving her suitors into various extended expressions of masculinity. Quincey Morris (Bill Campbell), presented in this movie as an Old West American, shows plenty of Ah-Luvs-Ya-Miz-Scawlet love, while Dr. Seward (Richard E. Grant) gets obsessive and shows Weird Geeky Intellectual Love, expressed by the scene where he shoots up with opium while giggling insanely and listening to hot classical music on his recording phonograph. Lord Godalming, played by Cary Elwes, is a stiff-upper-lip sort, so he doesn't do much besides be really British at her.
But I digress. The photo below shows the play props, all exquisitely and simply done, consisting of Lucy's Bed, The Doctor's Couch, The Dank And Noisome Tomb,* and two Carpets For The Library And Boudoir. The Dank And Noisome Tomb was actually the easiest thing to put together, while The Doctor's Couch had me scratching my head and fumbling for a few minutes before I finally grokked how it was supposed to be folded.
The fifteen figures include the main characters: Jonathan Harker, Dr. Seward, Lucy Seward (who is Dr. Seward's daughter in the play), Professor Van Helsing, and Drac in various poses and costumes for the three acts that make up the play, plus Miss Wells the maid, the tortured and maddened mental patient and vampire stooge Renfield, and Butterworth, who is Renfield's keeper and generally looks like he'd like to beat the crap out of Renfield. As per the booklet, at the beginning of the first act, Mina has already been a light supper for Dracula, with plasma for afters.
All the costumes have a definite 1920's-30's Agatha Christie feel, which stands to reason since the 1931 Dracula with Bela Lugosi is pretty much in that time period. Still, the most curious of these were the figures for Act III, which (as per instructions) takes place in A Vault. I cannot see anyone going vampire hunting in evening dress.
There are three figures of Drac in different poses, which I dubbed Normal Drac (for when he's misleading people into thinking he's just an eccentric rich dude who lives in an old church and really likes his opera cape), Sleeping Drac (for those daytime naps after a night on the town), and Working Drac (pretty obvious). Sleeping Drac was a bit strange to me; I felt that instead of being in a stand like the others, there should be a tab-and-slot arrangement so it could fit on The Dank And Noisome Tomb for that added touch of realism.
A shot of the secondary characters: Miss Wells the maid, Renfield and Butterworth. I think Butterworth is a bit put out with Renfield.
After the props and figures were done, I did the scenery. This part was easy: you stand up the set pieces, fold down the floor and tape it together, then tape the three scenes together so that it forms a model that can be turned back and forth for each scene. I opted to leave the scenes separated, as I did not want Yet Another Dust-Catcher in my house, and wanted to store most of the stuff in the box. (I guess that Dank And Noisome Tomb will be a display piece.) I also reconfigured the floor taping so that a small crack was left in the floor seam, then taped both the top and underside of the floor, creating a hinge that made for easy refolding and storing in the box. A burnishing with the handle of my X-Acto knife made the invisible tape substantially more invisible.
Here is a shot of Act One, Dr. Seward's Library. As you can see, there is a repeated bat motif throughout the scenery, suggesting the unseen presence of Dracula and Encroaching Evil.
Act Two, Lucy's Boudoir.
The bat motif gets really heavy in Act Three, A Vault. It would be hard to walk into this sort of place without having a "we're as doomed as doomed can be" feel, even if you're dressed in a snappy evening suit.
So there you go. At this point some imagination was bound to take over, so our last picture above is a scene from my own production of Dracula with set designs and costumes by Edward Gorey, in which an itinerant dragon, unimpressed with the cardboard performances of the actors and distressed by the liberties taken with Stoker's original work, seeks to dismantle the production in the middle of the third act. Further highjinks are sure to ensue.
*No, it really is called that on the back of the box.
**This same type of compression also happens in the theatrical version of Frankenstein, which I have read, and which has no monster creation scene and confines the lab to a single door on the stage. Sorry, but if I was directing it we'd have that laboratory set and that creation scene, and the audience would just have to hunker down. Some things are sacred.
Special thanks to Claudia and Charlie White, who let me use their digital camera and helped with this photo essay.
Hello, everybody! Frankie Franken reporting here with news on an awesome new cartoon coming out this fall on Cartoon Network--The Secret Saturdays!
The Secret Saturdays details the adventures of a cryptozoological team who travel the
world to protect ancient secrets and monsters (called "cryptids") from humans who would otherwise destroy or exploit them. Consisting of Doc, Drew and Zak Saturday, and accompanied by loyal cryptids Fiskerton and Komodo, the Saturdays team tries to stay one step ahead of madman cryptid hunter V.V. Argost in their exploits. The cartoon was created by Jay Stephens, who also is drawing and writing comic stories featuring the Saturdays that will appear in every other issue of DC Comics' Cartoon Network Action Pack until the show's premiere in the fall. The latest issue, #26, features the first of these stories, showcasing Stephens' excellent character designs and artwork.
We're excited about this cool new show, and we hope you will be too! Stay tuned here for more news on the upcoming Secret Saturdays!
I miss Cartoon Network.
You may think that's a silly thing to say as the channel still exists, but the Cartoon Network I was turned on to is not around anymore. That honor now goes to Boomerang, which is where most of the cartoons I grew up with now appear, and which is beginning to fall by the wayside too. There was not as much good stuff on there the last time I was at my parents' home, which is where I see Boomerang because the cable company in my hometown is run by Philistines, who see fit to have two feeds for BET and two religious networks featuring People With Big Hair and Joel Osteen, but cannot bring themselves to add BBC America and Boomerang to compensate.
But I digress. CN once had shows like Teen Titans, Justice League Unlimited, Megas XLR and so on; now they show anime almost exclusively as part of their adventure lineup (though they are doing Spider-Man and Transformers). Their "cartoons" consist of horribly drawn, eye-wateringly stylistic characters with no heart or soul that aren't funny. (Don't get me started on the rehash of George Of The Jungle. That rumbling you hear is Jay Ward doing doughnuts in his grave.) It almost makes me want to go to Youtube and watch old 1930's animation, which is so frenetic that it usually drives me nuts, just to see a character that someone has built out of an actual shape, as opposed to some effed-up-looking abstract idea thing.
Some hope may be at hand this fall, though, with the release of The Secret Saturdays. Created by Jay Stephens, this cool-looking cartoon depicts the adventures of a family of cryptozoologists who travel the globe on various missions tracking down ancient mysteries and fighting monsters. Unlike its predecessors such as Jonny Quest and Challengers Of the Unknown (which both cast a long shadow over this series), TSS takes more of a quasi-environmentalist stance, concerned with not only protecting the world from Things Man Was Not Meant To Know, but also protecting those very same Things from those who would exploit them for nefarious purposes. The Saturdays team consists of eminent scientist and adventurer/cryptozoologist Doc Saturday, his true-believer wife Drew (who serves as a Mulder figure to Doc's Scully-like "hard facts" stance) and their son Zak, who comes across as Jonny Quest with an X-Games attitude, throwing himself into missions with gusto. The mascot of the team is Fiskerton, a strange-looking but intelligent "gorilla-cat" creature who is comic relief and pet/protector/older brother to Zak.
The Secret Saturdays has so far gotten good word-of-mouth from those in the know, and was once the subject of a clumsy name change from Cartoon Network (who wanted the generic-sounding title The Secret Adventures Of Zak Saturday; fortunately, common sense and coolness prevailed). For my own part, I am looking forward to TSS. The characters are very likable and personable, the style is pleasingly retro (atomic science is always more fun than nuclear science), and we haven't had a good Jonny Quest-style adventure series on TV since, well, Jonny Quest. Plus there are monsters, and if you've seen my own stuff you know I likes me some monsters, so hopefully this will hang around for quite a while.
A preview of the treats this series has to offer may be seen not only at Cartoon Network's website but also in the DC comic Cartoon Network Action Pack. The latest issue, #26, features the Saturdays as its cover story, and according to Stephens' blog Monsterama, Saturdays tales will appear in every other issue until its premiere in the fall. Personally, my money's on this one as my new fave for this fall season. I have already caught a bit of The Marvelous Misadventures Of Flapjack, and I just wanna say this... Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ with pliers, Cartoon Network needs help! Viva Saturdays!
It is the sad duty of The Morlock Heights Harbinger to report the death of Stan Winston. Winston, the Oscar-winning special-effects master who created the creatures in many of our favorite movies at the Monster Shop, has died at 62 following a long battle with multiple myeloma.
Notable among Winston's works are creatures and characters for The Terminator, Aliens and Jurassic Park series of films. Winston, who worked with such fantasy stalwarts as James Cameron, Steven Spielberg and Tim Burton, for whom he created makeups for Edward Scissorhands and Batman Returns, leaves behind a legacy of over four decades' worth of special effects work. He won four Oscars under those directors for 
1986's Aliens, 1992's Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Batman Returns, and 1993's Jurassic Park. Most fondly remembered here at the Monster Shop are his splendid makeups for the genre favorite The Monster Squad and the title creature of Pumpkinhead, which is considered by us to be a masterwork. His last work was with director Jon Faverau for the recent hit movie Iron Man, based on the Marvel Comics character. Winston is survived by his wife Karen; a son, daughter, brother and four grandchildren.
In pace requiescat, Mr. Winston. Thank you for everything.
At long last, the original animated incarnation of Sabrina The Teenage Witch finally makes her very auspicious DVD debut. Genius Products, in tandem with its other Archies releases, brings you a 3-DVD set of the original Filmation animated series featuring all 31 episodes.
Sabrina made her first appearance in the Archie's Madhouse comic series and gained a fair amount of popularity, eventually spawning her own comic book. Filmation brought Sabrina to animation in the prime-time special Archie And His New Pals, and eventually spun off her own series after showcasing her as part of The Archie Comedy Hour. The resulting cartoons depict Sabrina as a resident of Riverdale and a student at Riverdale High, accompanied in her adventures by her boyfriend Harvey and her friends Spencer and Ophelia (who respectively serve Jughead and Betty functions to Harvey's Archie).
However, as our title says, Sabrina is a witch, and therefore must keep her magical abilities a secret from the Riverdale denizens. Though witches are expected to hex people, the good-natured Sabrina often uses her powers in attempts to help others or solve problems, usually with disastrous results. Most of the plots revolve around Sabrina's attempts to juggle her witchly studies and her teenage life, featuring her magical cat Salem and her two aunts, the cantankerous Hilda and the kindhearted Zelda. There is also Cousin Ambrose, a sophisticated, somewhat bon-vivant warlock who is more sympathetic to Sabrina's teenhood and occasionally aids her in her adventures, serving as a mixture of the Dr. Bombay and Uncle Arthur characters from Bewitched. The Archies crew makes regular appearances, with Reggie continuously (and unsuccessfully) trying to out Sabrina as a witch to the rest of the gang.
And of course, there are the Groovie Goolies. Yep, this set not only has all of the Sabrina episodes from her own series, but also the episodes in which everyone's favorite gang of maladroit monsters made their first appearances. Mixing the Goolies, the Archies and Sabrina together creates a special blend of comic chaos, and these episodes do not disappoint. As a special feature, the set includes the first episode of The Archie And Sabrina Surprise Package, in which Archie, Sabrina and the gang work together to solve a mystery at Riverdale. (Will this series be a future DVD release? Only time will tell.)
The set is colorfully packaged, though not in a clear slipcase like the other Archies releases, and the artwork is of the usual excellent standard. The episodes appear to be sourced from the best materials, showing clear pictures and few signs of aging. The DVD holder is a bit difficult to operate at first (the first two discs are overlapped, placing the click-tabs on the sides rather than in the middle), so examine carefully rather than tear into it.
Pick up this set if you're an Archies or Sabrina fan, and pair it with the Groovie Goolies set for the right mix of supernatural Saturday-Morning silliness. You'll see her tug her ear... and you'll see your blues disappear. Count on it.
The Morlock Heights Harbinger sadly reports the death of Maila "Vampira" Nurmi, who passed away in her sleep on Thursday, January 10, 2008. She was 86. A legend among horror fans, Nurmi first came to prominence as the character of "Vampira," the first television horror host.
Born Maila Elizabeth Syrjaniemi, Nurmi's career as Vampira began when she attended a masquerade party dressed in a costume inspired by the cartoons of Charles Addams. TV producer Hunt Stromberg, Jr. hired her shortly after to host horror movies on Los Angeles' ABC television affiliate KABC-TV. Based on elements from Theda Bara, Gloria Swanson and The Dragon Lady from the comic strip Terry And The Pirates, Vampira's fame spread quickly, leading to the eventual creation of the now-classic Shock Theatre and an explosion of horror-movie hosts in the years that followed. Vampira went on to make guest appearances on a variety of TV shows of the Fifties, including The Red Skelton Show and Ed Sullivan's Toast Of The Town, and was nominated for an Emmy for "Most Outstanding Female Personality" in 1954. Though she appeared in several films, her most famous role was in Ed Wood's science-fiction-horror flop Plan Nine From Outer Space. She is also a direct inspiration for the character of Elvira, created by Cassandra Peterson--and also served as the main model for a certain vampire MonsterGrrl.
We express our sympathy and condolences to all her fans and friends. At the time of this writing, funeral details were still unknown. Vampira will be sorely missed by us here in the Monster Shop.
POST-MORTEM: Vampira: The Movie, a 2006 documentary about Maila Nurmi and the Vampira character, has its official website here.
Hey, y'all! My name is Petronella Nightshade, but everbody calls me Punkin, and I am speakin to you through this here computer blog. You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The MonsterGrrls, what was written by Mr John Rose, who I have been thinkin must had some witchery way back in his family as he is such a creative sort of feller. (I have read his book and it is a right smart, with the occasional bit of kerfluffle here and there.)
Somethin I was noticin was that a while back, the movin picture folks was makin a whole bunch of scary movies about zombies, which shows that most folks are scairt of bein eaten by zombies. This is all twaddle, as anybody with any common sense can see that dead folks do not need to eat,* even if they are roamin around a bit. However, I am postin this first recipe so that some of these folks may regain their self-confidence and well-bein by gettin to eat zombies instead of zombies eatin them. This here's pretty simple and is most efficacious for those households with young ones as it will give them somethin to do, but mind them whilst they are about the stove as we don't want nobody gettin burnt. Also, it is right nice for Hallowe'en, which is fastly approachin.
What You Need:
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 3/4 cups flour
1 tablespoon milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
What You Got To Do:
Preheat your oven to 375 F. Cream butter and sugar together (this means beatin it with a hand mixer till it gets all fluffy). Add the egg and mix. Add your remainin ingredients and mix until smooth. Refrigerate your dough for 2 hours.
Roll out your dough about 1/8 in. thick on a lightly floured surface, and dip cutters into flour before each use. Use one of them gingerbread-man cutters, or make your own pattern, cut it out and trace around it on the dough with a knife. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 12-15 minutes or until lightly browned.
Place on a coolin rack for 5 minutes, remove from sheet and cool.
After the cookies has cooled, you decorate em to look like zombies. This decoratin recipe come to us from Mistress Keetha DePriest Reed, who has written a couple of cookbooks and I reckon is a right smart when it comes to bakin. You can divvy up the frostin and add a few drops of food colorin to each batch to get the different colors you need. Some folks reckon that since these is zombie cookies they ought to be decorated in black and gray and such, but I am of a mind that you should want to look at what you're eatin. Here's Mistress Keetha's recipe:
Royal Icing
All manners of cookies can be decorated with this icing, which can
be tinted virtually any color. It’s great for simply
outlining cookies and can also be used to create elaborate,
detailed images. Simply thin icing with water until it reaches
the consistency you like.
1 pound confectioners’ sugar
3 tablespoons meringue powder*
4-6 tablespoons warm water
2 teaspoons flavoring (such as vanilla, lemon, butter, or
almond)
*Meringue powder is available at cake decorating supply
shops as well as many craft stores and large discount stores.
Sift powdered sugar into large mixing bowl. Add meringue
powder and combine. With mixer running on medium, add
about 3 tablespoons warm water, 1 tablespoon at a time. Add
desired flavorings and additional water as needed.
To outline cookies and pipe details, icing should be fairly stiff.
After outlining and piping, simply return any unused icing to
the bowl, mix, and add more water until icing is thin enough
to spread or pour easily.
To quickly fill in large portions of cookies that have been outlined,
fill a squeeze bottle (like ketchup and mustard are in at
hamburger joints) with icing and use it to fill in the areas. This
is a quick method, great especially if you are making a large
quantity of cookies. Be careful not to overfill the cookie, causing
the icing to run over the “dam” created when you outlined
the cookies.
Allow cookies to dry completely, several hours, before stacking.
Mistress Keetha also tole us about somethin called Candy Melts, which is from a company called Wilton that makes all kind of pans, tubes and equipment for decoratin cakes and such. They come in ever kind of color and taste like chocolate, and can be melted up real quick in a microwave oven or over low heat on a stove for decoratin with. These can be found at craft stores and that old Wal-Mart place.
So that's it. Next time I'll be back with some more recipes and maybe some other stuff. Hope y'all enjoy this recipe and have some fun with it, 'cause you can make any kind of cookies with it, for other holidays or just any time of the year. Y'all take care, and peace be to you.
Sincerely,
Punkin Nightshade
*They really don't. But we has noticed that zombies got a right smart taste for human fast food burgers, which I am thinkin says more about some humans than it does about zombies.
POST-MORTEM: If you got a recipe you want to share with everbody, send it through the e-mail to fangclub@netdoor.com, and be sure to give us your name, city and state. We will sure put it up as we go, but please allow us time to get everthing straight. --P.N.
One of my personal heroes died on September 6, 2007, the same day that one of my best friend's personal heroes died. Hers was Luciano Pavarotti; mine was Madeleine L'Engle, who wrote A Wrinkle In Time.
When I was a kid, there were reading lists of important books you were supposed to have read, that someone somewhere felt would enrich you in some way or another. I think the only book I ever read voluntarily from any of these lists was Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer, which made me yearn for a lost age in some way that I couldn't define. Then I encountered Twain's Huckleberry Finn, which more or less handed Tom Sawyer its behind, and stands to this day as one of the two most important and inspirational books I ever read, where writing was concerned.
The second of these two was Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle In Time.
I first encountered Madeleine L'Engle through the library of the now-defunct Jefferson Davis Academy, one of several places in Meridian, MS where adults sent the children they wanted to keep out of public schools. There was a book there called Spooks Spooks Spooks, which was a children's compendium of poetry and short stories about ghosts, goblins, witches, and other mysterious things. Among the pieces in the book was the climax of A Wrinkle In Time, titled "The Black Thing," where Meg Murry returns to the planet of Camazotz to save her brother Charles Wallace from the grasp of IT, the disembodied brain that has taken over Camazotz, and the Black Thing, the red-eyed human-looking agent of IT. She realizes that the only way she can stop IT is to use what IT does not have, and
never will--her love for Charles Wallace.
People use phrases like "burned off the page" to describe how words affect them. That was not what happened to me the first time I read this story. Instead it was as if Madeleine L'Engle stretched her finger from Manhattan or Connecticut or wherever she may have been living at the time I read her words, tapped me on the forehead and spoke directly to me. It didn't have anything to do with the love she wrote about, or its importance or power; at the time I was in fifth grade and a perfect representation of callow youth. I didn't understand love by any means; I had the same vague, usually self-centered comprehension of it that every child of that age has.
But something about the way she explained it, described it, said it, spoke to my soul. It spoke to the part of me that very desperately wanted to see and believe that there were other worlds apart from this planet, and said, This is important. Keep this in your heart.
Later on, when I was (thankfully) old enough to fully appreciate it, I read all of A Wrinkle In Time. I have three copies of this book; an old paperback, an even older hardback and an almost brand-new omnibus of The Time Quartet, the series which this book begins. I would cheerfully hand over all seven of my Harry Potter books to be burned to ashes before I would part with any of them. It is, and has been, that important to me.
And as for Spooks Spooks Spooks... well, I eventually left Jefferson Davis Academy, but I returned at one point, for two reasons. The first was that I had decided to watch my old class graduate, and I now shamelessly admit that this was my cover story. The real reason I was there was that I hoped to steal the copy of Spooks Spooks Spooks from the JDA library to have for myself. I did not succeed. But later on I found it in a library sale for all of $2.00, and snapped it up.
I suppose you know which part I read first.
In pace requiescat, Mrs. L'Engle. And thanks for everything.
We were saddened to hear of the recent death of Madeleine L'Engle, who served as a great inspiration to us. The author of The Time Quartet, which included A Wrinkle In Time, A Wind In The Door, Many Waters, and A Swiftly Tilting Planet, L'Engle's work was, in addition to being some of the best science fiction ever written, an eloquent and heart-felt statement on the power of love.
Born in Manhattan on November 29, 1918, L'Engle was considered a 'stupid' student by an elementary school teacher, and retreated into writing due to feeling like an outcast among her peers. She would eventually graduate with honors in English from Smith College.
In 1959, she had the idea for A Wrinkle In Time. When the novel was completed in 1960, it was rejected by 26 publishers. Finally published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux in 1962, it went on to be regarded as a masterwork, winning the 1963 John Newbery Award and gaining sales of eight million copies. It is now in its 69th printing.
We bid a fond farewell to a wonderful and inspiring writer, who wrote one of the most important books ever read by those here at the Monster Shop, which colored everything that was to come from us. Though we never met her personally, her words made her feel to us like a friend.
Click our title link above for the New York Times' article on L'Engle, and click here for more thoughts on Madeleine L'Engle at Notes From The Monster Shop.
Have seen the trailer for the new film Igor, and I'm looking forward with great anticipation to this film, coming from MGM in September. Igor follows the adventures of a talented Mad-Scientist's-assistant (John Cusack) in the kingdom of Malaria, where Mad Scientists are celebrities who create evil weapons and monsters, and Igors are... the hunchbacked guys who pull the switch. In a wild, wacky and very creative inversion on the Frankenstein story, one Igor (who is much more talented than his master) must overcome prejudices and other Mad Scientists to achieve his dream of becoming a Mad Scientist himself. Teaming up with sarcastic lab rabbit Scamper (Steve Buscemi) and the unfortunately stupid brain-in-a-jar Brain (Sean Hayes), Igor eventually gets his chance to create his own monster, Eva (Molly Shannon), who turns out to be exactly not what anyone expected.
