Winter is Here, Officially

I hope you enjoyed your winter solstice night. We had rain and fierce gusts of wind, and I was entertained by the noisy drama of this infrequent storm. After I post this, I will make a fresh pot of coffee before I venture outside to look for damage.

6EQUJ5

Seven Ales and Ciders

The two Geranium Lake Properties comics in today’s post were not published in newspapers. They were included with six...

6EQUJ5

Maybe Titania, Maybe Mab, Maybe Not

These four masks are the results of Yost messing around with the character design of...

6EQUJ5

Sharp as Holly

We are not famous in our neck of the woods for...

6EQUJ5

Eighth Day Cake

...on the eighth day, jackalopes will tell you, He Ate Cake. Which brings us to the honored-but-not-too-revered Jackalopian tradition of eighth day cake....

6EQUJ5

6EQUJ5

Jackalope Mask

Another fine jackalope mask designed by Alice Aroumbeyski, a mask that Yost presented as one of her self-portraits. In the “The Ringer in the Substratum”, Alice has a conversation with her childhood friend Kamlyn about the suitability of wearing this mask to the wedding of a cousin who is essentially a stranger. (Alice had not spoken to her cousin for 16 years.) The two women decide that Alice should save the mask for her own wedding to Jack Loki.

Kamlyn was actually named Alice when they first met, when the girls were four years old. They did not become boon companions instantly, but because “a lamentable conspiracy beyond our control” (Alice’s words) kept throwing them together, they agreed to an alliance. The two girls decided that having the same name was “tiresome and traumatic” (Kamlyn’s words), so one Alice became Gwynne and the other Alice became Kamlyn. After a few years, Gwynne decide to become Alice again, but Kamlyn kept her name into adulthood.

6EQUJ5

Bat Signal

6EQUJ5

6. Maskyrinth 2024

5. Masks For All Seasons 2024

4. Twenty-Two Variation 2024

3. Twenty-Three Masks 2024

2. Full Phiz Masks 2024

1. Masquerade 2024

The Five Masks of Aybahjee

These five masks of the person known as Aybahjee are a mixture of published and unpublished Geranium Lake Properties comics. I am not going to bother sorting out which is which in this post, for reasons that are not reasonable and somewhat inexpressible. Also maybe I wish to avoid possible adverse legal repercussions.

In the tales told by the Inultaru, Aybahjee is an entity best described (I think) as a giantess, although sometimes she has been called a troll, an ogre, or a queen of the wild. She does not seem particularly wild to me; in several stories she appears...

6EQUJ5

Firebird

According to historical legends of the Inultaru, the Sunissan-Pessoa was the cultural analog of...

6EQUJ5

The Gaze (& Calendars!)

“Curiosity is gluttony. To see is to devour.” So writes Victor Hugo (Les Misérables). But do not forget that the one you devour...

6EQUJ5

A Door Stands Open Today

The first image in today’s post comes from Jack Loki’s escapade in “The Conundrum of the Butcher’s Broom”, and the second is a mask...

6EQUJ5

The Green Map

There have been many people who have attempted to use the Green Map to find Ulciajheyld Shain Erin, aka Near Faraway Mountain, only to discover that this map can be a perilous pathfinder. The Second House Cartographers Guild in Outer Tald Busket will adamantly refuse any commission to draw or copy the Green Map. Jack Loki was an apprentice for 13 months at the Outer Tald Busket Guild*, where he gained his Journeyman Certification. He achieved his Mastership in Mapmaking through years of practical experience and independent study. When he felt confident enough in his skills in augury, thaumaturgy, cartography and mythopoeia, Jack made his own Green Map, which led to the grievous occurrence in “The Journey to Near Faraway Mountain”, which was one of the few barely-survivable adventures Jack came to regret.

* His first choice was the Cartography, Mythopoeia and Zymurgy (CMZ) program at Gurrackelleen College, his mother’s college, until almost the last moment, when he decided he did not want to be her legacy.

6EQUJ5

Plummeting Into Fall

We had our first rain yesterday, today is the first of October, and autumn is...

6EQUJ5

Movements and Gestures

austice

n. a wistful omen of the first sign of autumn–

6EQUJ5

Night and Day

I am now able to tell you that this mask by Alice Aroumbeyski is a portrait of the demmalyun Yemjeyjey-ollu-Zoyozaya, who is often depicted as...

6EQUJ5

Masks of Verisimilitude

“We did not develop language to tell the truth. Yes, we first used language to communicate, in desperation...

6EQUJ5

Yellow Porch, Blue Gull

This portrait mask of Disappear-Out-of-the-Sky, the blue gull demmalyun, was designed but not...

6EQUJ5

The Mask of Neivrilyadan

Today’s post features two interpretations of the Mask of Neivrilyadan. Because of various...

6EQUJ5

Seasons Change and So Do I

Summer is overblown and aging fast, so I feel that I need to post this one quick, before the season falls apart. There are four panels in this series, one for each season. I believe Yost used the Winter mask for a Christmas card in 1998, but other than that, the four masks (which I plan to post in their appropriate seasons) have remained unpublished until now.

The Big Bang of Pyrotechnocracy

July 4th is a night of unhappiness and terror for American dogs.