(no subject)

Saturday afternoon, after a failed attempt at being drug to a "psychic fair" (which was accused a thinly disguised attempt at milking people for cash, twenty dollars to walk in the door, I ask you), I drug the Engineer to the dirt mall (Berlin Flea Market).

I haven't been there in a handful of years, not since I lived in the area, and had been itching to go for the past few weeks, as the weather has been so good.

After a very scary trip to the bathroom, we went outside and wandered up and down the dirt aisles, looking at various things for sale. I've been attempting to find some new things of a spooky and not-so-spooky nature to put on the new bookcase I found in the trash bookcase that the Engineer built for me.

I didn't find anything I really wanted for the bookcase (although earlier in the day, I made the Engineer and the Amazing Larry go into Village Thrift with me and I bought a red Depression-era glass vase that wound up going on one of my end tables instead of the bookcase), but I did make one absolutely spectacular find.

I'd call it a print, but I'm not really sure if that properly describes it. It's an Aubrey Beardsley drawing, "The Peacock Skirt", printed onto some kind of hard plastic/resin stuff and then mounted on another piece of the plastic resin stuff. It's freaking AWESOME. And it only cost me ten dollars.

I probably could have haggled with the guy to bring the price down a little, but I am absolutely amazingly bad at haggling. Usually because once I've spotted something shiny to bring back to my nest, the amount of cawing and flapping that goes on is a little hard to get away from. Essentially, I don't have a good game face.

I tried to take a photo of it with my shitty little webcam, but they didn't come out too good at all.

( Surprise, surprise. )

We also stumbled upon a little trailer that's been at the dirt mall for about seventeen years, with a little old man inside it who sells dried and fresh herbs of various types (culinary and botanical). I've been to the farmer's market a thousand times and never noticed this guy, but I'm not complaining about finding him now.

I bought a wee rue plant, which now lives on the Engineer's windowsill because my plant-keeping skills are on par with my game face skills. Not only that, but my cats would probably eat the poor thing and then I'd have even more vet bills than I already have.

I've been wanting rue for quite some time, because it's good to have around for doing protective things of a boo spooky nature. On the drive home, I'd been pondering how I could carry a bit around with me when I'm doing things like 'work' in the cemetary. It's recommended to put some in one's pocket, but I rarely have any pockets.

Inspiration struck in the form of remembering my glass locket, that has never had anything housed in it.

( another bad photo. )

I also put a little bit of the sandalwood chips that the Engineer bought, for good measure. Once the plant gets a little bigger, I'm going to dry some of it out and make a few gris-gris. :D

For your additional entertainment, here's a photo of my china cabinet (where the empty birdcage I mentioned in a prior journal entry now lives). I took the photo by accident when monkeying around with the webcam and was delighted with the way it turned out, I decided to keep it.

The few bits of my mother's crystal lives inside the cabinet and on top of it are two great candleholders I bought at Target, a big-ass wrought iron candle-AH-bra I was given by thee Pumpkin Girl when she moved out of Philadelphia, a sterling silver teapot I bought for whoa-cheap! at a yard sale, a sterling silver budvase that fell from the heavens encased in a meteor (I don't know where it came from, it just appeared one day in my apartment) and a little purple candle holder that I bought a few Halloweens ago (when you light it, it throws a little bat shadow on the wall).

( yonder lies teh sp00ky... )

One of these days I'm going to steal borrow the Engineer's shiny new digital camera and take proper photos of everything I've been doing to the apartment, which I am increasingly happy with.