long ago and far away...
...i worked for a friend who occasionally hired me to help him photograph weddings. there were three of us this one hot, sweaty day, in some sort of strange, orthodoxy eastern european-dominated catholic church in toronto. i was shooting video from the altar, and when the ceremony ended i had to pack up that camera and run through the basement, popping up at the rear of the church to help shoot the recessional.

while running through the basement i saw something odd out of the corner of my eye, and noted that i'd have to come back when i was finished to see just what it was. an hour or so later we were done at the church, and had a bit of a break before we began to shoot the standard bride-amongst-the-flowers shots at a local garden. i went back to the basement of the church and found the odd object -- it was, as i'd suspected/feared, a dog's head on a stick (a great long wooden pike, actually). it was standing in what looked to be a huge pile of theatrical props, but if it was a fake, it was the best fake i've ever seen (and none of the other props were nearly so realistic). it was an alsatian and looked quite beaten up and weathered, as if it had been banged around quite a bit.

i was standing there, quite shocked, wondering what sort of perverse rite the churchfolk used it in, when a pope or bishop or some sort of churchy official came in the room and angrily ordered me out, stating that the basement was strictly out of bounds. i never did get a good chance to get hold of the head and examine it, but i still think the damned thing was real, and that these freaks were busy conjuring up satan or some other of their bizarre deities to wreak vengeance upon the world.
( postbear has metal knees, Wed 20 Jul 2005, 6:36, Reply)