Tuesday

i finally got to meet a great lady who contacted me a few weeks ago. she wants me to make her a costume for the mermaid parade on coney island. her and her fiancée are filming a tv series where they travel the world in search of oddities & general historical mysteries. Billy, is an avid collector of rare and bizzare things, like skulls, swords, beautiful walls & walls of butterflies & other insects, taxidermy animals with two heads, shields, weird hair effigies, shrunken heads ~ (i heard he's got the largest collection in the world.) there is an elevator that opens directly into their marvelously luxurious marble & wood home. display cases everywhere... every inch of their massive place ornated with treasures from every corner of the world.

i had to remember to breathe.

jessica, the lovely lady is a pole dancing instructor. super friendly, she offered me a drink " i have literally anything you want". i asked for water.

descending down their spiral stairwell, i caught glimpses of old paintings, masks... an 18th century horse-drawn hearse that had been converted into a massive fish tank cabinet. in the least glamorous room of the house, held terrifying old torture devices. chains, iron chairs with spikes, a real CHASTITY BELT ( i always thought they were urban myths told to young girls to frighten them into abstinence and anti-masturbation). jessica unsheathed a brute brozen-y sword without a sharp tip at the end... instead, the tip was flat ... like the edges of a rounded envelope. she told me that it was used to de-head people. it was stained with ancient blood.

a skeleton bound to a limb stretching device. gigantic wheels on the wall used to bludgeon people's joints to death.

after becoming surprisingly acclimatized to the morbid content of the room, i became curious of the huge white freezer door tucked in the corner. human sausages perhaps? it could have been anything. and it was this :

it's a mark prent sculpture. i think it's a self portrait. apparently, it's got his real pubes. this thing is more terrifying than any picture you could find on the www. for real.

jessica showed me around the rest of the abode. two dancing poles in their place, large bathroom & closet. she has the bob mackie dress that sharon stone wore in casino ...

okay so the point is, i'm going to make this crazy golden mermaid queen costume for this super lady, with real sea shells , sequins, tule, etc ... for the mermaid parade on coney island for a television show (this segment where they go to NYC is side plot for the actual episode, fyi). in exchange, i've asked jessica to give me some pole dancing lessons. (sessions are 90$/hr for an individual class !!!) my eyeballs nearly fell out, and i biked home with my jaw dragging on the ground. i still can't believe the range of wealth that exists in our little city of toronto. i just assumed that everyone eats canned beans , solely for their gourment disposition.

ps. sharon stone is a babe , holy cow.