"All Art Is At Once Surface And Symbol. Those Who Go Beneath The Surface Do So At Their Peril." - Oscar

Turns out there's a Greek myth for everything...

Where did soulmates come from? Why is love a thing?

According to Greek playwright Aristophanes, there were originally three kinds of human beings: the Children of the Moon were male and female in one body. The Sun's Children were two males in one body and the Earth's were two females in one body. With two united minds and eight strong limbs each, they planned to overthrow the gods and live on Mt. Olympus themselves. But Zeus, wanting to end this rebellion before it started, sliced every couple into two, had Apollo smoothen them out and gave them belly buttons as an eternal reminder of their failure and made it possible for them to reproduce as we do now. Having been whole all their lives, they refused to do anything apart and started dying because of it. So Zeus reshaped their bodies again, making becoming physically one temporarily possible.

Now it's the inborn fate of every person to seek wholeness in another. Those who were once a man and woman desire the other gender and those who descended from a combo of the same gender seek to unite with the same gender.

They are soulmates, and this pursuit is love.

La Noria (The Waterwheel) by Karla Castañeda.

Really like the costumes on these guys (designed by the great Sid and Marty Krofft).

Fun Fact:

Zeus was even more popular than you realized.

There's actually a temple in Egypt that was dedicated to Zeus. I'm not making a word of that up. It's not dedicated Osiris, not Set, not even Horus. A temple dedicated to Zeus.

Apparently, the site was originally found in the early 1900s when French Egyptologist Jean Clédat found ancient Greek inscriptions referring to a temple to "Zeus Kasios". Kasios being the local Syrian Mountain where Zeus was worshiped at one point, but the temple wasn't excavated until recently. They've also found inscriptions in the area that tell of the Roman Emperor Hadrian renovating the temple as recently as the second century. The team of archaeologists are continuing to explore the site and personally, I can't wait to learn more about what they dig up.

Most monsters in this day and age are impeccably tailored and well-coiffed.

Not to mention, they smile on TV.

Fun Fact:

Bad news everyone. If you've seen a ghost recently, then there's a chance you have black mold poisoning. At least that's the theory that scientists at Clarkson University started studying in 2015.

Their hypothesis was that experiencing paranormal phenomenon at older homes could actually result from the presence of black mold, which is known to cause hallucinations, delusions, anxiety, depression and the feeling of impending doom. Rye ergot fungus is one culprit they're paying special attention to, because it can have a psychedelic effect when ingested and some even think that ergot growing on crops may have been what created the delusions and mass hysteria during the Salem Witch Trials.

Is black mold poisoning better or worse than being haunted?

Matinee by Joe Dante.

One of the great ones.

The most overlooked movie about movies.

Joe Dante's love letter to horror gimmicks.

The Neverending Story (German: Die unendliche Geschichte) by Michael Ende.

A magnificent book.