should have been a trust fund kid

It's very late, and I should be sleeping, but instead I'm musing about how this brilliant 30 second character introduction in an otherwise almost naive movie, slo-mo and silent and set to a Style Council song of all things, could possibly be so perfect. The editing is perfect, the lighting is perfect, the acting is perfect, the wardrobe and hair and makeup and sound and characterizations - seemingly effortlessly perfect. It evokes that profound and nebulous emotion that only exists in a rueful memory of the moment when someone walks into your life and changes it: someone who fails to hold up under close scrutiny or never allows it; someone you never want to hunt down ten years later incase you find he / she's aged poorly or amounted to nothing; someone who changes you by embodying all of your dreams which eventually slip away, who shows you a new reality which isn't real at all, and compared to whom you feel more deserving and yet also more inadequate than you ever thought possible.

It was like the 30 second music video remake of The Great Gatsby. I watched it a dozen times, like a car accident, and it was the same each time.

I'm inspired and empty. This is the kind of story I would tell in my biography, after a long and influential career as a film director, of the moment when I knew what I wanted to be. If I were that sort of person. If I had had that sort of privilege. But instead I have a heart like an air balloon, beating next to a pin.

final sale

visual therapy

(Images, respectfully borrowed from the New York Times, are of Grey Gardens and the Kips Bay Decorator Show House)

horriblescope

I saw this horoscope awhile ago, on a screen behind a coffee stand, but it's so great:

"Life's little mysteries enrich the world. So stop trying to solve them all."

Ok. Be frivolous ..

Look at these coats I saw in Massachusetts when I was there for Christmas ...



and these great rain boots, which I didn't get and then got by mail order after most of the rain had passed, and now I pray for rain ...


For no reason:  I've always loved this picture of my boy Rasputin, where he looks partially desaturated, as if he's been colorized badly .. like his tail and elbows were hanging out of the frame .. and then he whipped his tail back in, but it was still in black and white.



And then there's the story of Christian the lion who these two guys kept as a pet and then released into the wild in Africa, and then when they went back to visit him a couple years later, he jumped up and hugged them like a little house cat.

Here are some photos before they set him free ..



He came back, thus he is theirs.

Late. sleep. unemployment. dreams ZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

electile dysfunction

Ah, the George W. Bush years .. wasn't that something?

Now that we can truly laugh about it - he's just days away from being out of the White House forever!! - I thought I'd share this little ray of sunshine, the chalkboard specials at the Black Sheep Cafe in Amherst, MA, October, 2004:

ELECTILE DYSFUNCTION
$6.95

The Burning Bush - JERK chicken with green chilis, pepper jack cheese, lettuce, tomato and spicy lime vinaigrette on a baguette.

The Challahburton - Lots of PORK loin with pear chutney, spinach, roasted red peppers, red onion on challah. (accompanying illustration: smiling pig reclining with feet up on large sacks of money, staring at oil barrels)

The Big Dick Cheney - An OVERCOMPENSATING amount of Black Forest smoked turkey, cheddar cheese, sliced apples, red pepper mustard, lettuce, tomato on a baguette.

The Ronald Dumsfeld - An OFFENSIVE amount of 5-spice baked tofu, spicy hoisin peanut sauce, pickled carrots, lettuce, scallions, roasted garlic sauce on a baguette.

Wolfowitz in Sheep's Clothing - AGRESSIVELY spiced kafta (ground lamb patties) with yogurt dressing, lettuce, tomato, onions, cucumbers in a pita.

(final illustration: a sheep dropping a vote into a ballot box)

And in the bakery section, they offered Republican Convention Cookies (filled with fruits and nuts).

thank you, London

... for the atheist bus campaign

don't quit your day jobs

my week, on fast forward:

Sunday: six mile hike in Griffith Park, at night with a head lamp .. kind of felt like lying in bed thinking about taking a hike, except I had company.

Monday and Tuesday: ten hours in the dentist's chair, with my dippy student shooting novocaine in the wrong nerve, out the other side of my gums and down my throat, etc.

Wednesday: lunch at the Alcove, spent reading all the notes in the chess table drawers (all new since I read them last .. they must periodically chuck them)


highlights:

“I like alcove and I like yogurt.
Sometimes I heal and sometimes I hurt.
Life is cruel and life is sweet.
If only my food were here so I could eat.
Days go by and people move on.
I only hope that ..
Oh wait. My food is here now.”

“Even though you cheated on me w/ur sister’s best friend, I forgive you.”

“Lunch was delicious. Off to Target! –Giselle.” (deep one. Go Giselle.)

“last night sucked! Wow!”

“Who would have thought I’d become a high school teacher? I was always such a fuck-up”

“I have nothing interesting to say.” (Well, thanks for clarifying.)

“I shot myself @ work & had to go home.”

“I just texted the wrong boy the wrong message oops!”

“what is the life span of a jellyfish? I wonder if they are monogamous like penguins – do they even mate?”

“It is better to want what you can’t have than have what you don’t want.” (hear hear.)

“Dear Jamie, tonight I spill my blood, until the last drop I think of you. The whole (sic) you left I cannot fill. I cannot go on. Drew” (hope he’s kidding.)

more:

















Today: bought a car. ditched the Hawaiian seat covers pretty quick, for the record.


kind of like my old car. well, at least I know what I like.

I met this guy coming out of the subway in Long Beach.


I saw these tables




and this chair


and this window display



waiting for my mechanix to get my new car to pass smog


now I’m eating cookies.

there it is.