Day 4920: Steampunk Spiders & The Male Sea Horse.

"Malaise": junk collage, graphite, acrylic, digital.

  

Want music?

    Click: Al Green, Still in Love with You.

2GN2S

All images © Peter Szucsy

For 25 years, art director and artist Peter Szucsy has filled his days with rendering the bizarre, sinister beasts that run rampant through video games. “I have made many creatures, monsters in the virtual world… but a few years ago I felt it is about time to create something different,” he says of his time working in the industry. “So I left my computer and made lots of my ideas come alive in the real world.”

The result is a curious menagerie of steampunk spiders that the Budapest-based artist assembles with parts of vintage watches, cameras, and medical equipment. Each week, Szucsy scours a flea market near his home to find materials that include rare, pricey timepieces, although the artist notes he avoids dismantling anything that a museum or institution would value. In his studio, he parses the found metals and meticulously crafts the articulate eight-legged creatures.

Szucsy holds a degree in illustration from Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design and plans to launch an online shopto sell some of the spiders in the coming days. You can follow his latest creatures, which he hopes to include dragonflies and praying mantises, on Instagram. 

   

He isn’t injured. He isn’t bloated. He’s pregnant.

This image shows male seahorses, their bellies stretched tight with life inside. In this species, nature flips the script completely. The female transfers her eggs into the male’s brood pouch, and he becomes the one who carries the pregnancy.

Inside that pouch, the male controls oxygen, nutrients, and even salt balance, creating a womb-like environment for the embryos. Over the next few weeks, dozens or even hundreds of tiny seahorses develop in total darkness, protected by their father’s body.

When the time comes, the birth is violent and exhausting. The male goes into labor, contracting again and again until fully formed babies burst into the open water, already independent from their first second of life.

No applause. No protection after birth. Just instinct, biology, and survival. This is one of the rare cases on Earth where fatherhood is physical, dangerous, and absolute.

 

WonderWoman and Superman are in Orange County Monday through Thursday. SM is on a busy business trip and WW is busy seeing friends and family and helping me do some much needed purging. Today we fit in a Mother-Daughter lunch with besties, Cheryl and Carole at the Anaheim Hills restaurant, Story. A 5 star venue with a dramatic atmosphere, a first for us.

8150 E Santa Ana Canyon Road
Anaheim Hills, CA 92808
(714) 253-3413

   
While there, WW noticed a group of ladies in a private dining room, all dressed up and having a wonderful time. I used the ladies room in order to go by, and she was right, it was just so special. I decided to ask if I could take a photo for the blog. They said yes. Special thanks to Carla Maxwell. She said they were the Madhatters.

Thank you Ladies, you made my day! I had to add this extra!

Another great day!

  

 

A 4 minute video, Go Blue!, here.

 

Just because ...

Bewick’s wren

 Thursday's Smiles ... 

 

Hoping you feel all the good things in your day.

  

 

  

Day 4919: A Short Dad Story & Sequoia in Snow.

      

"Sisters": junk collage, old photo, pastels, digital.

 

Want music?

    Click: Lionel Richie, Love Will Conquer All.

2GN2S

A Dad story

My parents were divorced just before I turned six.

As mentioned earlier, I was in boarding school at age eight.

Every weekend either my Mom or Dad would pick me up for 
the weekend, but I remember so many girls were not that lucky.

One cold weekend I was at my Dad's.

He was in the bathroom shaving and I was reading a book 

on the table, standing too close to a portable floor heater ...

when you stand close it feels so good, then it gets really hot?

My dress caught on fire. I yelled for my Dad. 

He looked in and yelled "don't move, don't move, Jack."

(My Dad had wanted a boy, and only called me Jack, ever)

I did as he said, and in my memory he flew to me. 

And, with his hands, he patted out the fire.

Seventy-six years ago, but so clear in my memory. 
He explained later that if I had run, the fire would've got to me.

I changed my dress and we went for breakfast.

All in a day for a Dad hero.

This is the size of the sequoia compared to a human.

What we see here is the largest living creature on Earth and the largest giant in it.. the giant sequoia tree.

Sequoia is considered the largest living creature in the world and the longest-lived trees, as some of them exceed 88 meters in height, and some of them are estimated to be more than nine meters in diameter.

This video shows the true scale of giant sequoias — the largest living trees on Earth, towering far beyond human size

 

  

 

A 5+ minute video, Hop, here.

 

Just because ...

   

Red-headed Trogon

 

Wednesday's Smiles ... 

 

  

Hoping you feel all the good things in your day.