Monsters and Leopards and Frogs, Oh My!

It's my favourite month of the year again as we inch towards All Hallow's Eve. I've participated in the Annual   Countdown to Halloween (click that for over 200 participating bloggers) for the last few years now and if you click here you can jump on the CtH M2YW* style from 2009-present. Before I even knew that the Countdown existed, I had my own little unofficial Octoween as far back as 2008, 2007 and 2006.

Unfortunately, I have run into yet another snag in getting my scanner ready, so those pristine scans of my newest Yokai book and Yokai mazes that I was hoping to delve into daily will have be postponed. In the interim, I snapped a pic with my Eye-phone (sounds scary) to tantalize your tainted taste buds.

As you can see the above book is by Shigeru Mizuki, the creater of Kitaro no GeGeGe and there are some different renditions of some familiar familiars and a few unfamiliar familiars. More to come in the upcoming month!! If you set the Wayback Machine to this post you'll find the beginning of another of his books and you'll also see some pictures of my sister, Leah and her son William dressed up as leopards. I know I said they were tigers but c'mon it's been 45 years since she last donned that costume. She just happens to turn a half-century today! Congrats on your jubilee!!

Another book I'll be scamming scanning from is this book of Amazing Mazes called おばけのめいろあそび or Obake no Meiro Asobu. (Starting once I get my scanner ready. If you can't wait for that, go buy your own copy.)

Finally for my premiere post this month, I'll offer up Halloween Chopper 2012 for your bemusement!

Be sure to head over to the other CtH sites by clicking the shrunken head on this page or the very first link way above!

I'd like to include a scary video daily but today I'm only going to show a short one (very short-2 Seconds). Last night was a nasty typhoon and this morning was a beautiful blue sky interspersed with several clouds. When I pulled into the parking lot at work, I espied this little guy hopping away. I intended to take a picture but it came out blurry and I accidentally filmed him instead. This is an アマガエル ama-gaeru or Rain-frog. Its Latin name is Hyla japonica and we would call it a Japanese Tree Frog. Cute little bugger!

Don't blink or you'll miss him!



*Countdown to Halloween My Two Yen Worth style