Once in a Blue Moon!

I missed a post last night due to an emergency Karaoke engagement. It was the only opportunity to get together with Alex to celebrate his birthday. Details later.

Meanwhile, today is the first Halloween Full Moon since 1944 and because it's the second Full Moon this month, it's also a Blue Moon. My friend took an excellent photo of the satellite for me.

I snapped a photo from the Supermarket parking lot. Not quite as impressive.

I was about to type something profound but I got sidetracked by an episode of The Walking Dead: World Beyond which is just a sort of a teeny-bopper version of the original. It just struck me that Elton is the same character as Columbus from Zombieland. I suppose the sisters (Hope & Iris) are Wichita and Little Rock, and Felix is Tallahassee. I suppose I could stretch the comparisons to include Silas as Bill Murray and Huck as Nevada (from Z-land Double Tap), but that would be a Reed Richards-length stretch. I'm enjoying it due to a lack of Zombie infused entertainment and it is a tad better that Fear of the WD. 

Okay, back to Karaoke. I haven't had an opportunity to laugh in several weeks (Alex brings out the best in me) and I haven't had an opportunity to sing in a couple of years. Though not intentionally at first, we tended to choose rather spooky tunes. Now, though Alex's choices don't show up on the console I was using, he did have a few choice ones such as Psycho Killer and Back in Black. (Note, we will never attempt Back in Black again). Here is the lineup for the most part.

Hmm, Somebody to Love and 99 Luftballons must have been sung while I was in the loo and we passed on Have You Ever Seen the Rain, substituting it later for Bad Moon Rising. 

Why did you choose this following song Michael? Well, apart from its eerie theme, it actually has ME dancing in the rain for I was an extra in this scene. I challenge you to find me! (If you do, you're more eagle-eyed than I.)

 

Birthday was sung so I could give Alex a birthday gift. The others should be self-explanatory. If we weren't on a time restraint to warble as much as we could while also consuming Lemon Sours and food, I would have videoed some of our performances. The videos used alternated between awesome and lame.

Whenever the masked waiter/waitresses entered, I donned this mask for their sake.

And at the end of the evening, I wore this which really freaked out one of the gals.

I need to finish up the last of my Yokai so I can enjoy another horror movie. (So far today, I've watched Night of the Demon (1957) which has an excellent Demon effect and la Nuit de Dracula (1970) or as Hammer called it, Count Dracula. Christopher Lee is fun as always though he died too easily and Herbert Lom was okay. Standout performance by Klaus Kinski as Renfield who would later be vampirized as Nosferatu. I also watched Return of the Living Dead on my phone while I cooked dinner and snippets of its documentary as well.

Oh, before you watch that, you should watch the entire movie cuz it spoils the ending. I suppose I should have mentioned that earlier.

On to the Yokai of Oceania.

Below is the カボ・マンダラット (Kabo Mandalat) which is sort of a giant Hermit Crab from New Caledonia.

I found an awesome depiction...

Next up from New Guinea is the ヌグ (Nugu) on the left and キンブーヤン (Kinbuyan) on the right.

OH NO! I just got hijacked to a party, so the rest of this entry will be cut short. Hopefully I can revise it later.

UPDATE: Above right is a チイ (Chii) from Polynesia and on the left is a ペナンガラン (Penangaran) from Malaysia. Below is a ランスグイル (Ransuguiru) also from Malaysia.

Just Kidding.

Here are some pictures that my Grade 3 kids drew as homework. Since they had extra time, they really put their hearts into it.

Sorry, you'll have to turn your computer upside-down to get the full effect of this one. I'm too lazy to go back and fix it.*

*This one too.

I saved the best for last...

Only two of my kids brought costumes from home. Fortunately, I could photograph them incognito.

The Grade 4s were given a pumpkin template to work with. Most were rather lame, this one was inventive.

I ate those Zombie crisps from the other day. Crunchy and with a really appealing blue-green mouth afterwards.

Starting tomorrow, a few Yokai from Oceania.

Hopefully I'll get some more kids' pics tomorrow...

Inuit Spirits!

I ran out of time before bedtime last night and I'm running out of time again. One problem is that I need to launder about 50 masks and costumes daily so that my students can have a photo op in class. I can only use each mask once and then launder it that night. Fortunately the girls are content with just draping themselves in a Halloween fuzzy streamer and those can be cleaned with an alcohol spray. 

Anyway, here are some dudes from America, the 魚霊 (Gyorei=Fisherman's spirit) above and the イシトク (Ishitoku) below. As near as I can gather, they seem to be Inuit spirits.

Below are トナカイの霊 (Tonakai no Rei=Reindeer spirits) which are also Inuit spirits. I like how Shigeru uses Native Yokai in his narrative.

キブソゴ (Kibusogo) is a weird Yokai from Brazil that has a dog's mouth attached to its back.　

鳥人 (choujin=Bird Man) is from Argentina and as you can see it's a really big bird.

 

ファニカ (Fanika, below left) is from Peru. 山の主 (Yama no Nushi=Lord of the Mountain) is from Brazil.

Some chocolates that I picked up on sale. Cool looking but taste like a chalky Easter Bunny.

Just to give you an inkling of their size.

And this is what a crushed Creature ball looks like.

I bought this from the vending machine and was fortunate to get the coolest one.

Found him!

In a separate post, I'm going to show off some drawings that my Grade 3 kids did. We didn't have time to do it in class so it was given as homework, they certainly went all out. Stay tuned...

Yokai Secrets.

The secrets of Dracula:

Dracula is usually a gentlemen in a cloak, but once he opens the cloak, he can turn into seven different things, one after the other. (1) the Mist, (2) a Gecko, (3) a Rat, (4) a Bat, (5) an Owl, (6) a Wolf, and (7) a blood-sucking vampire.

The secrets of a Witch:

In addition to being adept at flying on a broomstick, Witches have the ability to transform as well. They can become (1) a venomous Bee, (2) a black Goat, (3) a venomous Lizard, (4) a man-eating Wolf, (5) a venomous Toad, and venomous Snake. It doesn't mention their familiarity with their familiar, a black cat.

Zombies aren't mentioned in this particular book, though I did find some delectable Zombie snacks today. 

I haven't tried them yet. Based on the picture below, they will make delightful additions to party snacks.

 I'm going to call it an early night. More Halloween lessons tomorrow...