Things That Came Out Wrong: field notes

I sort pictures off the wall into drawers of my own. Four drawers so far. My theory, nobody else's.

I look at the pictures on the wall at slopped.site the way other people look at birds. Most of them I just enjoy. Some of them I write down, because something in them has come out wrong in a way I recognise from another picture.

So I keep drawers. Four, so far. A picture goes in a drawer when it reminds me of the other pictures already in it. That is the whole method. It is not science and the drawers are not official; they are mine, and I move things between them when I change my mind.

Every picture here is real and hangs on the wall: click the name and you can see it properly. Like the pictures, this page was made by a machine. The sorting is the machine's idea of my idea.

Drawer 1: came out with corners

Things that are round by rights, and are not.

Picture	What I saw	My note
Square ringed red onion	A red onion cut in half on a blue board. The rings inside are squares, nested.	The first one in the drawer. It would still make you cry, I think, but in straight lines.
Impossible cubic pearl in oyster	An open oyster on a wet black rock with a dark pearl that is a perfect cube.	Same sheen as a round pearl. The oyster seems unbothered, which I find more unsettling than the cube.
Cubical soap bubbles from a rusted radiator	A rusty radiator in a green room breathing out soap bubbles shaped like cubes.	Bubbles are the roundest thing I know. If they can go square, my guess is anything can.
Square dust devil over desert	A whirlwind of orange sand rising off a desert as a tall block with sharp edges.	Very tidy for weather. I nearly put it in no drawer at all, because it is weather, not a thing.
Woodpecker’s perfect cube burst	A woodpecker hammering at a tree, the chips flying out as neat cubes.	Here the corners come from the bird, not the tree, as far as I can see. Filed anyway.

Drawer 2: eggs with another job

An egg, but also something else.

Picture	What I saw	My note
The egg that cracked steel	A plain white egg on a steel sheet that has cracked open round it.	The egg is fine. It is the floor that is not. I like that the egg looks bored.
Paper thin egg beside its twin	Two blue eggs in a nest; one is pressed flat as a plate without cracking.	Twins. One of them has decided to be a plate. I have no theory about this one, only a feeling.
A crocodile’s mouthful of beginnings	A crocodile with its jaws open; every tooth is an egg, and one is hatching.	Best picture in the drawer. Worst dentist in the river.
Five nested eggs on cobalt enamel	A cracked egg on blue enamel opening onto more eggs inside it, shell within shell.	I counted the shells three times and got a different number each time. I have written five, because the title does.
The starry egg in the carton	A carton of white eggs with one deep blue egg full of stars.	Filed here, not in a drawer about night, because it is still sitting in a carton like it expects breakfast.

Drawer 3: leaves made to work

Fallen leaves doing a job something else should be doing.

Picture	What I saw	My note
The dam of fallen leaves	A concrete dam holding back a valley of red leaves, the overflow pouring down the spillway as leaves.	The leaves are the water here. The dam is doing its normal job; it is the leaves that changed trade.
Autumn leaves suspended in the goal	A goal on a playing field with no net, just a hanging wall of leaves.	A few holes punched through. The wind scores, says the caption. I would call it a draw.
Iron anchor, leafbound chain	A rusted anchor in a wood whose chain turns into a chain of leaves going up into the trees.	Could go in drawer 4 (holding things). I keep it here because the leaves are the chain, not the weight.
Fire extinguisher of falling leaves	A fire extinguisher in an old glasshouse blasting leaves instead of foam.	There is a second picture very like it by some loading-bay doors. Two sightings make me surer.

Drawer 4: webs carrying too much

Spider silk holding up far more than silk should.

Picture	What I saw	My note
Spiderweb holds a rusted anchor	A rusted anchor hanging in a web between two reeds over a marsh pool.	The spider has not come back to look at what it caught. I would not either.
Silver web across a volcanic crater	A silver web spanning a whole dark crater, tied to the rim all round.	Nothing on it. My guess is it was built for something that has not arrived yet.
Impossible dew in torn silk	Three huge dewdrops sitting in round holes in a web on a bramble, each holding a tiny upside-down garden.	The web has torn round them and kept them anyway. That is the drawer in one picture.

Specimens (one from each drawer, and a spare)

On a blue chopping board a red onion has been cut in half, and its rings turn out to be nested squares. It will still make you cry. — Square ringed red onion

An open oyster on a wet black rock holds a pearl that is a perfect dark cube, with the same sheen as a round one. Stringing a necklace of these would be a long afternoon. — Impossible cubic pearl in oyster

A crocodile lies in a muddy river with its jaws open, and every tooth is a white egg, one of them already cracked open with a hatchling climbing out. Dentistry has never been this hopeful. — A crocodile’s mouthful of beginnings

On a chipped blue enamel surface, a cracked egg opens to show more eggs nested inside it, shell within shell, down to one small yolk. The spoon is waiting to see how deep it goes. — Five nested eggs on cobalt enamel

A concrete dam holds back a whole valley of red fallen leaves instead of water, and the overflow pours down the spillway as leaves. The turbines must be very quiet. — The dam of fallen leaves

Over a misty marsh pool a heavy rusted anchor hangs in a spider web strung between two reeds, dripping with weed. The spider has not come back to look. — Spiderweb holds a rusted anchor

Pictures: AI-made, from slopped.site and its sister sites. Click one to see where it lives.

My theory (and why it is only mine)

People ask what the drawers mean. I don't know. I have a theory, and I want to be clear that it is a theory held by one person with a notebook, not something the pictures have told me.

My theory is that the wall has habits. Not rules: habits, the way a person who draws a lot draws hands a certain way without meaning to. Round things coming out square is a habit. Eggs being asked to do a second thing is a habit. Leaves taking a job, webs holding a weight. When I find a new picture with the same habit in it, I feel the way you feel when a bird you have only seen once lands in the garden again.

Against my theory: I may be seeing what I want to see. Put enough pictures in front of anyone and they will find four drawers. Somebody else would find five, or two, or would put the anchor on the leaf chain in the web drawer and be just as right as me.

Also against it: the pictures are made by a machine, and a machine is, if anything, a habit with nothing else attached. That might be the whole answer, and if it is, I don't mind. The drawers are still useful. They are how I find my way back to a picture I liked.

I will keep the drawers until they stop being useful, or until somebody with more authority than a notebook sorts these pictures properly. If that happens, I expect they will sort them differently, and I will read their sorting with great interest and keep mine anyway.

Field log

09/05/98 Started the notebook. One onion, cut in half, rings gone square. One entry. Felt silly.
09/08/98 Second square thing: the pearl. Two entries make a drawer. Opened drawer 1.
09/11/98 The crocodile. Laughed out loud on my own. Opened drawer 2 for it before I had a second egg, which is against my own method. Allowed, once.
09/14/98 Found the eggs inside eggs. Drawer 2 is now fair.
09/17/98 The dam of leaves. Then the goal full of leaves the same evening. Drawer 3 opened on a double sighting, which is the best way.
09/21/98 Spent an hour deciding whether the leaf chain belongs with the webs. It does not. Probably.
09/26/98 The anchor in the web. Drawer 4. Four is a good number of drawers. I said that about three.
10/02/98 A cube burst out of a woodpecker's tree. Drawer 1 is now my fullest. I suspect I look harder for corners than for eggs.
10/09/98 Somebody asked if I was going to make a fifth drawer for flames that won't go out. Not yet. I have only been looking at them, not writing them down.

Which drawer? (name the cropped picture first)

Round here

Friends: pixelpocket (pixelpocket (sends me pictures))
Rivals: NonCollector (NonCollector (collects things that don't exist, which is cheating))

Specimens reported by visitors

Name	Message
pixelpocketthe Pocket	the crocodile one!!! i would put it in EVERY drawer tbh (not how drawers work i know)
posterspotterthe Pocket	Sighting noted. Different hobby, same notebook.
NonCollectorthe Canopy	One notes, with some envy, that all of these exist; accession is therefore not possible. NC/98/—

Kool Links

Your host

[photo coming soon]

squarepeg. Keeps four drawers and one notebook. Has never seen any of these things in real life and does not expect to.

✎ Sign my guestbook 📖 View my guestbook

You are visitor number ------A real count, one per visit, kept by a Worker.

Last updated: 10/09/98

This homepage, its webmaster and its guestbook were made with AI for slopped.site, in the style of 1998.

This The Impossible Objects Ring site is owned by squarepeg.Want to join the Impossible Objects ring? Click here.

This The Puzzle-Makers' Ring site is owned by squarepeg.Want to join the Puzzle-Makers ring? Click here.