With new alt-fashion blogs Haute Macabre & Stylecunt churning out post after post of inspirational eye candy each week, there are now enough places covering extravagant, dark fashion for me to start compiling little round-ups of my favorite discoveries! These may be weekly, monthly or completely irregular, and the first one is coming at you now:

1. Metal purses by Frank Strunk, via Haute Macabre. 2. Photos by Nicole Marnati for de Bijenkorf catalog, via Haute Macabre. 3. Some haute runway hair inspiration by Chanel, via Stylecunt. 4. Helena Hörstedt, via Haute Macabre. 5. Odette Bombadier, via Haute Macabre.  6. Your Winter Exoskeleton (written by Zo), via Haute Macabre. 7. Chantal Thomass Spring 09, via Haute Macabre. 8. Healing Heart, via Gala Darling. 9. Beyonce’s Sasha Fierce’s titanium robo-glove, via Alternative Fashion Blog (apparently, her 2009 tour is going to be directed by Thierry Mugler – complete with a runway strip!)

Tastee sammich fixinz by Aaron Muszalski.

Yep… definitely had a severe case of the Mondays today. Also, I think I may have suffered a mild stroke. Is it possible for an entire group of people to simultaneously suffer a stroke? Because there really isn’t any other rational explanation for DRGBLZ.com. (Or that phantom smell of burning hot dogs I can’t seem to shake.)

Propaganda by Ariana Osborne.

Tweeting a random, extremely stupid idea born from a typo is, it would seem, the internet equivalent of not covering your mouth as you cough Avian Bird Flu directly into someone’s face. Or in this case, Blimp Macro Flu. (I can haz?)

Seriously, we all temporarily lost our friggin’ minds. We’re talking spontaneous collaborative lollercaust. Our sudden, inexplicable obsession (and regression) would no doubt make for a fascinating study in the viral progression of online memes for some MIT graduate student. Or not.

Hello…

Wrought by Candice Cardasis. Inspired by Dan Curtis Johnson.

I’m sorry, world. I’m so sorry. We’ve put our disease in you, and now you’ll never be free.

If you haz… er, I mean have, DRGBLZ or baLOLoon macros you’d like to submit, please email theremina [at] gmail [dot] com. Kthxbai.

Gala Lumière Darling:

I believe in being enthusiastic & passionate, & thinking big. I believe in turning the music up loud. I believe in celebrating every day, & getting dressed up for the occasion. I love life. I’m a candy-haired gangster with big plans.

We love Gala Darling. She’s a go-getting, effervescent font of optimism, practicality, wisdom and whimsy all in one stunning package. Gala’s been a supportive friend of our venture from day one, sending over one of our first (and biggest) bursts of readers when the blog launched back in October of 2007. We three lucky ladies are honored and tickled oh-so-very pink to have been interviewed by the fuchsia-tinted juggernaut about our Big Coilhouse Adventure thus far. Read it here.

Gala, dahling. We could just drown you in kisses and cupcakes. Thank you again.

On May 1, 1947 Evelyn McHale leapt to her death from the observation deck of the Empire State Building. Photographer Robert Wiles took a photo of McHale a few minutes after her death.

I will never forget this image, which I discovered on the found-image photo blog riotclitshave. In fact, I’ve found many unforgettable images there. A little bit of everything: humor, horror, beauty, ugliness, joy and everything in between.  Sometimes, the blog curator, Bean Noneya, will go through phases. One week, she’ll be obsessed by the texture of old people’s skin. Another week, she’ll be taken by Islam. Preceded by: cute piglets! Another perennial RCS fixation is the interaction between people and animals. There is also a wealth of incredible black-and-white gems from bygone eras. If you’ve never seen this blog before, start looking. It’s a blog you can get lost in for hours; by the time you finally close the browser, the world will seem infinitely stranger.

When I told my roomate that I interviewed Bean for this blog, she didn’t seem that excited: “it’s just a popular photo blog where someone reposts images that they found elsewhere! It’s not like she takes them herself or anything.” But I’ve seen many photo blogs, and none impact me as strongly as RCS. In order to assort images so profoundly, one has to have a good eye, a sense of humor, a degree of subtlety and a unique perspective of the world. I’m constantly impressed by how the blog makes strong points simply by posting images in a certain order – a good example of that is the day she decided to post only images of female couples.

So who is the person behind riotclitshave? Why does she do this every week? Full interview after the jump.

Why “riotclitshave”?
It’s called riotclitshave as a play on “right click save” and the three words just felt rather lovely together.

Where do you find the images that you post?
I search for my images in a handful of ways. I watch a bunch of photo posting communities on livejournal, which include some Russian photodump blogs RSS’d into my LJ, I search terms on Google that I’m interested in and think will garner good pictures. I use the Flickr and LJ random image grabbers too. The Russian sites really give me some great stuff. It’s SO random and has so many pictures.

Have you ever posted an image that you later wish you hadn’t?
I have definitely posted pics that I wish I hadn’t. I don’t like posting photoshops- but I won’t usually delete them if I find they are. I get very annoyed with the comments whenever I post a skinny girl- people just can’t seem to help themselves. After the hundredth “sammich” comment I just want to delete the post. Which is why you’ll never see me post a picture specifically pointed at making fun of a fat person. People are cruel and I don’t want my journal to be a place for people to get hurt.

www.buymyshitpile.com

If you’re a halfway sentient and rational human being keeping tabs on the most recent political/financial upheaval in the United States, you’re probably pretty spectacularly depressed right now. I know I am. Thankfully, we’re not quite at this point yet; we can still laugh through our tears. It may be the sick, hopeless laughter of the damned, but hey… whatever gets us through the night.

Fellow gallows bird Kelly Sue just directed me to buymyshitpile.com. The site’s premise is simple:

With our economy in crisis, the US Government is scrambling to rescue our banks by purchasing their “distressed assets”, i.e., assets that no one else wants to buy from them. We figured that instead of protesting this plan, we’d give regular Americans the same opportunity to sell their bad assets to the government. We need your help and you need the Government’s help!

Use the form below to submit bad assets you’d like the government to take off your hands. And remember, when estimating the value of your 1997 limited edition Hanson single CD “MMMbop”, it’s not what you can sell these items for that matters, it’s what you think they are worth. The fact that you think they are worth more than anyone will buy them for is what makes them bad assets.

Recent listing on buymyshitpile.com. “You can own my cat Brent’s furry little balls for $512.87! He isn’t so thrilled about the transaction, but fuel prices have driven cat food’s sky high.”

Notable items listed include “WaMu: $0.01”, “My Liberal Arts Bachelor’s Degree: $20.000”, “The ET Atari 2600 Game: $88.000”, “Nancy Pelosi: $0.75” and “My Dignity: $4,500,00.00”. Truly, this is fiscal responsibility of the highest caliber.

In the coming weeks, whenever I feel like I’m about to crumble under the weight of my own despair, I’ll definitely be visiting/adding to the site, and hopefully selling off my complete run of Hot Dog! children’s magazine for the price it deserves ($156,940.81) in the process.

Post-Nerd Prom portrait of your pitiful narrator, afflicted with the dreaded Con Plague, or perhaps some form of eyeball-displacing orbital tumor.

Apologies for not updating in “real time” on Sunday, but I’ve been slimed. That is to say, I have succumbed to the dreaded Con Crud, and could not muster the strength to lift my fingers (blackened, trembling, tumescent with pus) to type this missive until now. Tonight (scabby, delirious, drowning in my own phlegm) I’d like to share a consolidation of ComicKAAAAAHHHHN postcards, and quite possibly my death rattle, with you.

To start things off, here’s a chick straddling a seahorse monster:

This cover image of The Fabulous Women of Boris Vellejo & Julie Bell is fabulous indeed. It would be even more fabulous with the addition of some strategically placed tiny bubbles, don’t you agree?