Sang along with Cat Power all down the soggy Main Middling City drag noting the smattering of holiday decs. Just had finished a gig at a residential place (making memento-worthy photox) with halls decked but, upon commenting to a femme in this joint working as a waitress, gleaned that not everyone has the same sensibilities of what is (emph on is) decorating.
This was tasteful botanicals, rich colors, emphasis on living and petite trees. There were no santas, twinkly little white lights, sheets of faux snow, overly-scented candles.
The waitress divulged to me and others on the waitstaff that her house is transformed during the holidays and I asked a multitude of questions, utterly fascinated that she even has holiday-themed canisters in her kitchen, and a holiday-themed bathroom.
Then, she continued, her and her husband, all hung over on New Year's Day, pack it all up whilst hungover.
She went on to illustrate for me her various collections.
I was oso curio curious.
And then I thought what in hell does Yours Truly collect.
I have collections of varied worth - both market-based and YT-based.
Cherry stems bent by others, wheatback pennies, bellybutton lint, men made of bottle caps from the 50s, various artwork by MC artists, and more things I just cannot think of at this time.
Onwards to very late dinner and more ruminations on curios, and rampant curiosity.

Love of catlike curiosity.

Nephew and I motored out to the Middling City Cement Coliseum to first bypass that whole scene by mishap of coordinates and continue along until Yours Truly noted that there were no giant sporty lights on the horizon to left or ahead. So we continued along and passed the fairgrounds and then were heading into the hinterlands and then made a scenic left turn and wended along until we could make yet another left and then lo and behold we were on Abbott Road, the real road of choice for MCCC access. We parked and trekked along with thousands of others and thanks Dave Pietrowski for placing us on the 48 yard line behind the home bench.
Of course I sang both national anthems and no this is not an error as today was Canada Day which included their festive and more voluminous country tune. Due to Canada Day there was mention of Stephen Brereton, Canadian Consul Général as well as some Canadian national beauty queens-all three in front of the game-cam.
Fireworks, vertical flame shooter, singing, occasional beers, a bona fide American fun success story and going to these sporty things makes you not only want to sing anthems and such but just groove on the joys of organized enjoyment.
From there a complete swing back to art of another genre and made images for Michelle Gigante's annual dance theatrics and live music. This was the best one yet, it zipped along for an hour and her and Paul Todaro read from Sam's Unnamable. A real sonic, visual, poetic treat. Saw Annie Deck there and afterwards held court so to speak in a corner of the vaulted reception area and talked to Cam Miller and Yes, I said, I would still be interested in doing an arts installation at Trinity. And doing that I will dive into the visual language of those ancient tales told to keep people in order, like a veritable rule book, an attempt to keep the defense strong against the bad things, the devil, the opposing team.
Time to wend on over to edits.

Rule of Love.

See this. Evidence.
Of Yours Truly being oso sporty when the occasion calls for standing up and being effusive and mugging all sportylike when one's sports shooter pal wends his way up the aisle to document above. Hockey. Sabres v. Penguins.
The former won as YT sat in seat number eighteen, one of the luckiest numbers.
YT was also recently on the front page of local section of Middling City News. There were several calls and emails telling me that my likeness appeared.
MCN is, apparently, trying out a super-secret new feature. Where's Nance, much like that Waldo or Elvis phenom past. To this date the likeness has been in this journal three times this year. Me working, me shopping for a cap, me walking. Just me, me, me. Here and there.
And, for Your absolute amusement and budding collection.


Collectible, wandering Love.

Recently Yours Truly was hobnobbing with a Middling City homicide detective.
A thug.
An intimidating man who made it his sudden m.o. to fetch YT a small slice of pizza. Hot peppers or not he inquired. Hot peppers, I warbled, imperiously. My cohort, who shall be unnamed here, caught the thug lying to his little lady near the back corner of the bar by the peestops, pretending to be at a press conference or a holding tank or somewhere else quite loud, important and workful.
The homicide thug pointed out the latest arrival, a shoe shine man, one of those sorts who looks like a dusting of cocoa powder happened and, come to think of local lore, this idiomatic twist could resemble the dustings of yore that straggled onto homes in the vicinity of Bethlehem Steel Corp., all those benzene molecules and such nestling into lungs.
So there is the shoe shine man, all obsequiousness, on the floor doing his thing.
All of his front and near-front teeth are, it seems, a distant memory, and the thug starts to shout at the shoe shine man.
When'dja get out of jail. Still smoking crack.
And more along those lines.
It was oddly uncomfortable, the thug intimidating the slavish shiner and when me and palsy-walsy left I stated that that scenario in that venue, which shall also be left unnamed, was like visiting a movie set.
We were in the roles of writerly watchers, anecdote makers.
Time to see Dorothy, who deftly shapes the auburn hairs I make.

Idiomatic, thematic Love.

There Yours Truly was and I can, perhaps, for the premier time, admit that I was not minding my own business.
I went to World's Largest Disco last night, having volunteered again to docudramaticize all the sub-happenings for Dave Pietrowski, knowing that YT wished to have a likeness captured via photons with celeb du soir, Danny Bonaduce. That kooky loose cannon filled in for snoozey Erik Estrada and Danny did not disappoint, first thing he did upon entering the VIP party was to march over to the top-40 dj in the house (Roger Christian) who earnestly slapped on "I Woke up in Love This Morning." Danny BonVivant asked Roger his name and he turned around in his faux Sabres jersey to reveal his name on the back - Roger. Well, Roger, Danny said in his spent-yet-distinctive voice, I always said that if I ever heard this song again I'd blow my brains out.
So there, song gone, Danny resumes standing alongside fans who shelt out $15 to have a Polaroid snap made of them, and him.
He wore a fire engine red suit with black shirt underneath and later, when he was upstairs doing more meet & greet & schmooze & smile I noted that his black shirt had fallen by the wayside and his hairy chest just hung there between the red lapels.
When he was on the mainstage with Dave Pietrowski he noted that many ladies in the house, probably braced by slutty polyester ensembles and scads of Grey Goose molecules and the like, had grabbed his nether regions. Not that he minded, he said.
When I had my likeness captured with him he held my shoulders oso tight as I asked if he'd liked the hockey game he had gone to with Dave P. the night before. He said he dug it, his first ever. I told him I'd just gone to my first game, too, thanks to Dave P. The man. The mover.
The usual mayhemish situs arose that one eyewitnesses at parties: polyester ass-grabs, dancefloor charisma and its yang ... the dancefloor wipeout, faux 'fro pickings, Sly Stone leanings, party train effusiveness, tentative shuffles, and Saturday Night Fever imaginings.
At some point it was time to give this annual 70s moment the slip before all the revelationized dancers became too too boogey-oogey-oogeyed.

Slippery poly-oly-ester Love.

As You know, Yours Truly is a Lore Lover, especially in these sobering, non-sober holiday times.
Who does not enjoy heartening and soul-bracing tales of scrappy determination and struggles, peppered perhaps with physical harm and confrontations with wild animals.
Or the ingesting of same.
Animals, not others of said scrappy determination.
Resulting, of course, in a party.
YT is attempting to parallel The Donner Party, always referred to as ill-fated, with The Pilgrims Party.
Both were groups who dug travel and adventure. One ended not very well, the other better. Both groups probably had to eat raccoons and other things gleaned from Nature.
Just completed a piece for Buffalo Rising Mag about intrepid Mark Goldman and his newest book, City on the Edge, with cover art by rising art star Julian Montague.
Met up with Julian and Cynnie last week and Julian says his artwork prices are soaring and I am wondering if I should get one now.
Great other art news is that recently I discovered two prints in my possession from circa 1842 are authentic and have value in the art market and it's time to have them properly framed.
Speaking of frames, the New Era Cap Co. gave each and every attendee yesterday a goodie bag and who on this Earth doesn't dig a goodie bag. I ask You.
Inside were several little favours, including a doll-sized New Era Cap in a glass box, on a wood base, tied with a black ribbon. It is a keepsake.
Here is the big question du jour and tomorrow jour.
Would you prefer to be an Indian or a Pilgrim.
Or is that indian or pilgrim.
Shopped and did not find yesterday paper party hats of indian headdresses and pilgrim chapeaux. Sorely disappointed. But not that I looked très hard.
Time to wend and write and do.

Indian Love of Nature Love.

Today has been one of those eclectic days and so far one of the biggest highlights has been seeing the inside of the former gun turret at the former Fed Reserve Bank on Delaware Avenue in the Middling City.
I was hired by my pal Dana Marciniak, now of New Era Cap Co., to document the hoopla surrounding the grand opening of their new h.q. and jumped from tour group to tour group and discovered this turret-related fun fact, provided by the co's project manager in brown blazer-no ballcap.
Moments later I met the retail head, standing amongst a whole lot of demi-spheres that will soon be topped off with caps of all colours, teams, affinities. To be truthful, Yours Truly had no inkling of the enormity of this whole cap phenom, or that New Era is as astronomically international as they are.
In the CEO office, where I was tempted to sit on his chair as I've done on a few other photo shoots, just to get a whiff of what it feels like to be a Captain of Industry, I did see a ballcap designed by a rap star whose name escapes me, featuring a real-live diamond accenting the New Era logo.
In mere moments YT is off to photograph gingerbread house construction.
My goal on that particular shoot is to offer my services as Taster of Shutters.
Off to Gingerbreadville.

Ginger, candied Love.
*in honour of the one side dish YT insists on making, when possible, for T-G, trying to cram culinary tradition down the throats of others. Ginger Candied Carrots. Love them. Make them.

So el grande Mercury Buckets to Dave Pietrowski for Sabres tix for tonight-premier time for Yours Truly, former diligent floor hockey and street hockey left wing.
Still have to contact Dave about the big huge f-up in the mag that mysteriously published an incorrect date for World's Largest Disco. Twice. Even in the title. I was, to say the least, mortified. As if there was not enough to be edited and done on the mag without mucking up an otherwise stellar piece which does, in sooth, state that the WLD happens the Saturday aft T-G, which any Tom, Dick & Harry would just know is not the titular date given. Egads again.
Saw Marky Mulville last night at gig out in the dark exurbs and he says he is iceside tonight, shooting the game, so I said I'd give him my coordinates so he could doc my sporty moment.
We were both at a gig sans cheese cubes, lots of crudites but, curiously, no cubes of solid milkfat in sight.
Moseyed afterwards to meatballs and vino for a well-balanced, nutritious evening.
Today garnered an advance copy of Mark Goldman's pending book of Middling City troubles, City on the Edge. Pub date = January.
Spoke to a Prometheus Books employee and, at some point, mentioned that YT had worked for them back in the day when they were in the MC, at the then-not-so-terrifying corner of East Amherst and Bailey Avenue. Back when YT slogged away as assistant to both directors of advertising and promotions, choking on secondhand smoke puffed out by nearly everyone in the basement office with orange shag carpeting which yielded a small crop of mushrooms after each and every rainfall.
YT took fresh air breaks, hanging/hiding out with either the acerbic (in attitude towards the joint, not YT) designer or the shipping and receiving guys where the titles were piled up awaiting loving eyes.

Lovingly-eyed Love.

Urban, vehicular fable.
Written, demi-appropriately, to near-vintage Roxy Music in a Shiney Apple-related memory jag. This is driving music in the far and away sense.
Fable:
And by fable Yours Truly means You read a parallel meaning, dig.
Yesterday, amongst a typical marathon day of several gigs far and wide, interspersed with necessary electronic linkage to the world-at-large, decided to try one of those small, vehicular gestures that can make all the proverbial difference.
The car had been pulling to the right, often. It got me to thinking that perhaps I should motor over to see ol' Mat Sims at the dealership to swap out cars - again.
But no.
For a mere 75¢ in quarters YT wrestled with a borrowed hose (three minutes and counting) and its attached air-o-meter, filling all four sporty tires.
To the brim.
The tires were at 20 p.s.i. and they prefer to be about 45 p.s.i. That is shop talk for pounds per square inch, whatever the hell that really means and, being a very busy freelancing woman on the g.o. go, who can really care.
That is another matter altogether, to be Googled or Wiki'd perhaps never.
So in lieu of frustration, possible substitution, YT invested a meager amount of time and money to meliorate. Problem solved.
This fable may be applied, in whole, to the concept of relationships and to friendships.
Thank you for Your attention in this matter.

Respectfully Submitted, Love.

Sitting alongside a window facing the Great Lake and watching (You see Yours Truly is a highly-evolved typist) the waves breaking over the breakwall but Dig This YT is not in the Middling City.
Chicago is eerily much like the MC in the genre of people who live here - open-faced, eager, and oftentimes quite spontaneously hilarious. On purpose.
Why-o-why am I Perfectly ensconced in a business centre facing a great lake in a great hotel.
Well, I will tell You.
I am here to see Art, lots of Art, and to hear free jazz by some pals, including Peter Broetzmann and Fred Lonberg-Holm. PB played last night in a gallery and interspersed were words by a poet, who charmingly leant against the wall where his work was hanging with lots of sand-blasted bricks.
Found inspiration in this sprawling place of six, maybe seven million people - depends who you ask.
Time to wend some more before flying back to the MC, where the Albright-Knox Art Gallery announced yesterday that they're unloosing all of their antiquities. A sad move, I believe, as there's no place for them to hang and be viewed and inspire just as the modernist pieces et al do.
Modern, modern, modern is the AKAG mission and m.o. so goodbye Old Masters and ancient artifacts and g.o. go to Sotheby's and points far beyond.
Artists get inspired by all of the above. Just not in the MC any more.

More more Modernist Love.

Auto-Portrait, for Your viewing pleasure.
Dem dere Dems did DYN-oh!-MITE, to quote Jimmy Walker.

Vintage Love.

in any event, i think we need to try the Enlightened Dictator model. i have been pushing for it. i feel like i could be named the Dictator of America and the whole world would be such a better place. i would do all the good things we need to do to make this world work better. more money for education. higher fuel efficiency standards so we reduce dependence on foreign oil. more money for the arts. fewer tax breaks for oil companies. i had this discussion recently with a friend and of course another famous political quote came up.... absolute power corrupts absolutely. and then we debated whether I would be corrupted. i said i wouldn't. really. she doubted me.

Before Yours Truly blogs right on about this quote above, penned by an ever-faithful epinw reader (but close scrutinization of all things epinw and you might recall one castmember in particular), I discuss the evening's soundtrack. It shifted radically since the last gig du jour from old-time rock and roll to Barry White. Is it pre-election musings. I think so. Let us think about Love, the eternal, worldly constant.
All things are fair in matters of Love and war, it has been said.
YT would prefer not to discuss Love and war in the same breath.

The quote above reveals a few things.
*aside. I have been thinking that we should reinstate the custom of curtseys and bows. The bow is a very nice way of regarding and greeting and leaving others in Japan, I dig it. Ladies would curtsey, gentlemen bow - of course.
And, I just emailed the quotee above this addition to the so-called platform, in addition to a special new, silent way of greeting with jazz hands.
Firstly, that YT knows some hard-hitting dreamers and schemers.
Secondly, that the world-at-large is seemingly going to h.e.l.l. in a very troubling and yet vainglorious handbasket.
There will be a savage, Victorian hanging, if Sadam's appeal does not go well.
Capital punishment is wrong, always as wrong as domestic violence, female genital mutilation, child pornography, the fiasco of the Iraq Invasion, and shoving one's spiritual beliefs onto others in the name of spotty, nebulous Justice.

Tomorrow is Voting Day. Vote.

Vote, Love, Vote.

Aside & disclaimer:
Hips and Makers by one and only rockchick Kristin Hersh blares to comp for The Church of Pathetic Sonic Profferings.
I think their drummer might be grasping the concept of A Beat (goes on) but the yelling on the mic thing should stop, it is like so contrapuntal and obviously ghetto. It really destroys - on a regular basis - the masquerade that this is crafty urban pioneerism.
The screeching will abate – after several more hours, peppered with occasional prayerful respites.
You see all civic help or interest on such matters flies away as politicoes and police realize the noise emanates from a church, a church of God-fearing, God-screaming Hispanics. Longtime homeowners be damned.
Baited JW,Esq. with questions about his costume of a few days ago.
And the details that followed were up to his impressive party boy standards.
He was a naughty schoolboy, replete with lollipop, knickers, beanie.
In his words he was A la angus young of AC/DC.
He also added a super bonus, obviously knowing this was epinw fodder, informative history of identity-shifts and costume mongering in San Fran.
He then, as the night progressed, according to his report, began to inject the notion of rep/page shenanigans and even used the word cornholing. You fill in the blanks.
Soundtrack shift to Interpol as it's quick becoming more an Interpol kind of night and I've just been contacted to go out and play (again) and an executive decision must be made.
I share now some details dispelling the notion that YT is truly uly Perfect.
Once I had a roomie who brought to the table, so to speak, a vintage microwave. I recall it had a hole in its door and we ironically put a DYMO label on the rift stating something ironic. Maybe it said Run. Or Uh-Oh. I just don't recall. I hated the thing and never used it. Roomie, on the other hand, popped popcorn in it.
So, minding my own business, I was looking for something usefully necessary in Target and chanced upon some microwaves. Somehow Laura sprung to mind and I will not explain. But there I was, suddenly inspecting their shining exteriors, comparing their prices, their respective radioactivity levels. On the toppermost shelf, about fifteen feet up in the air, I noted some real loser klunker microwaves marked down to a mere pittance, $23 to be exact. I found some nice young man and he excavated it and I bought the thing. I am still rather afraid of it. I leave the room when it's on and it's only been on a few times. And one of those times, like today, was a raging fiasco. Working like a madwoman I thought Oh, veggie burger. I cranked the machine up to five minutes, left the room. Maybe four minutes later there was a whiff of smoke. There was the sad, little veggie burger with a big scorch mark at its center. It wasn't quite like Hiroshima, where only the shadows remained. Maybe a few minutes later, but there was a whole lot of scorch on the plate, a whole lot of chokingly pungent smoke. I hate microwaves. Why is it here. They are evil and make me think of chef Harry Kelly who once stated Slow cookin' is good cookin.'
I have one other domestic tale of disorder involving a sweater, a washing machine, and dashed dreams of wearing it that very same night. And subsequent triumph of returning the little potholder of a former sweater and exchanging it for some very ultimate boots.

Onwards to more work.
And then more work.
And then.

Then Love.

An elf, Yours Truly queried thusly.
No, my teddy bear, the barista answered.
And so began my day of mis-guessing the Halloween costumes of others yesterday.
Are you supposed to be a doctor, I asked a tall, handsome fellow in scrubs.
No, he answered, I'm a medical parts specialist and I have to take part in some open heart surgery in about an hour.
There were more people in scrubs at the movie theatre last night (but I was like so over the guessing) when Kennedy and I went to see the new Scorsese movie that rather rocked.
Laura did not like the movie but I am betting that it had something to do with the odd old comedian with whom she attended the screening.
There were a few moments I confused the two whiteboys in the lead roles - Leonardo and that Matt D. I wished for more more more Marky Mark screentime. Now there's a superstar. And he does get the final, surprise twist at the ending.
Soundtrack was fab as it included not only a John Lennon song sung by himself, but a Pink Floyd cover. Or at least YT thought it was a cover. It was Roger Waters with The Band. Most shocking.
Time to wend and wend some more after hours of editing, pixel pushing as I am wont to say.

Wont Love.

I've never been one to dig descending into the basement.
Well, not since I printed art down in the darkroom amongst the doom, gloom, spider webs.
In the basement is where all the terrifying mechanicals hang, all the things that mysteriously work, do not go bump (one hopes) in day or night, and where there all sorts of things that can go completely wrong.
Like the sump pump.
Speaking of such, as well as the descending aversion, Yours Truly has been skipping down the stairs at a few moments to see if the duct tape is holding, if the lifetime-warrantied sump pump is still working, and to marvel at my woman of the new milennium pluck.
Brucey called this morning as I was en route to the John Edwards (yes, as in former running mate of the John Kerry, spouse of ketchup heiress) gig at the big U to ask if the above problem (the sump pump, not the loss of the Johns) had been fixed.
Uhhh, YEAH, I kind of snarked, DAYS ago.
John Edwards punched out fun facts. And I noted that he is a big-time Blinker.
YT also found herself today going through what was a Being John Malkovich door out of the undergrad library at the big U to walk out onto a roof to photograph some solar panels.
Can You say you walked on a rooftop laden with solar panels.
I thought not.
I came back in the BJM door and asked someone nearby if I was very tan as the Middling City sun beat down upon me and about a thousand panels converting sun molecules into power molecules.
It's like what happens in the basements of the world - best left to experts.
Ours is just to consume, pay, shoot.

Being Love.

Minding my own business, or at least attempting to with a plethora of distractions and a pending meeting and such the sump pump continued to buzz louder and louder at intervals. Until it would not stop its buzzing and closer inspection revealed a burning electrical smell and a burning hot sump pump that had finally given up its ghost.
Laughingly, I called two immediate plumbing options - TonyC and Seneca Plumbing. TonyC was unavailable and Seneca told me they could give me a hand with the sump pump fiasco in December but by then the house would have floated away.
So during the meeting Seneca did call back (shock) and said I had to measure the sump pump - how many hoses, how wide the hose(s), etc.
Measurements happened and I rushed over there.
I spotted a man floating in space holding a toilet seat and told him the woes at hand. He said I do not work here. But, I warbled, you LOOK like you are working, nodding toward the seat.
An x-biker did help and I told him this.
One hose, 4 and three quarters, as high as my leg.
He looked somewhat dazed.
I looked over their handy sump pump display nearby and discovered the leg-sized sump pump is basically a piece of unsuitable crap meant for the occasional sump pumper, not an everyday user.
The new sump pump is three-quarter horse power and I asked the x-biker how fast, were it a motorcycle, the thing would run.
Oh, are you a biker, he queried. This is how Yours Truly learned of his x-status.
No, I said most emphatically. You.
He said Yes and mumbled something when I asked if he'd been in a club.
Oh, is this a SECRET, YT pushed.
He showed off a small tattoo on his arm while saying Chosen Few and answered that this sump pump soon to be in my possession could run seventeen m.p.h.
Not bad, YT thought.
So x-biker hooks up, after my description, a length of p.v.c. pipe about four feet up into the air. After I'd told him a flexible hose is what had been there.
I thought to myself Well, he must know this will work.
I hint at the unfortunate circumstances to follow.
I make a little bed of bricks for the new pump in the well, I put it in atop. I cut some flex host from p.v.c. to p.v.c. that leads to the sewer pipe and plug it in and then witness an enourmous tsunami of brown water shooting out all over the area.
I unplug.
I run for the duct tape.
I tape like there's no sump pump tomorrow and wait and wait for the little 17 m.p.h. machine to work its magic.
Water streams out about three feet from a few spots so I get busy with the duct tape and cover and recover the spots.
Now, when I have a spare hour, I will figure out how to connect these pipes in a more orderly fashion with more pipe, some clamps, some goop, some other do-dads still unknown to YT at this juncture.
This sump pump has a lifetime warranty.
This just oozes confidence that this pump, unlike the other, will not let off periodic troubling noises and smells.
Time to gussy up and head to gig du jour, leaving the plumbing world and all its cares behind. For now.


Plumb Love.

Found myself at some point today standing within a soundproof box, if You will, a sort of portable recording room contraption, out on the muddy campus of Middling City U. Amongst others I was making some portraits of a guy who studies neurological and musical things that he explained well and I will merely paraphrase. He spoke of slip of the finger happenings, like slip of the tongue. He also studies people who cannot sing as well as those with passable karaoke voices by putting them into said booth and having them sing while they hear altered recordings of themselves singing. It was a bit over my head but I offered up my (imPerfect) voice for his study. He said Some people think they have a bad singing voice but really don't.
Oh, Yours Truly replied, believe You me, I heard mine is quite bad. I did not go on to tell him of that one night down at Winnie's with the drunk midget with YT warbling DreamWeaver. I didn't think it was all that bad. Justy had another op.
This researcher of bad singers and such says he'll email me if he needs another under-microscope volunteer.
Onwards then to a photo shoot in one of those dreaded, added-on hospitals which make no sense whatsoever as to which elevator leads to what floor and rooms seemingly numbered randomly by a dyslexic.
So I finally find the sinus/fungi guy in his strewn office and wished I had left a trail of popcorn for myself as I had joked to the helpful lady at the helful desk. Finally the correct door was discovered and I was like so out of this hospital and, while driving down the Avenue, spotted two guys messing around with red plastic sunglasses at the bus stop. I thought Oh, right, Halloween, how utterly silly of them to be putting on those archetypal wacky glasses probably with the mirrored googly eyes.
Wrong.
The one man lifted the red plastic sunglasses off the other guy's face and I nearly fainted behind the wheel, being all bloodsqueamed and all. There was a Perfect Japanese flag underneath where the right eye should have been peeping out. Swoon. Swoon. Onwards then.

Swooning, Love.

Off to points beyond.
Amongst others a shoot involving more cleaning up of fallen branches.
Spoke to Dorota last night, expecting her to have already landed out at the Suburban/Non-International Middling City Airport. She was still sitting out in the Far Rockaways, strapped in with somewhere to go.
The sound of chainsaws wafts about this fine morning and I'm watching a man out yonder with a much much bigger chainsaw than I have. It is gas powered, it is probably the Husqueverna of my dreams. Not that Yours Truly could even foist the thing more than a few inches off the ground.
Time to find the tree-related do-gooders.
Really, to reiterate, had You bought me a burro for my b-day I could be renting the little rascal out to help pay the utility bills, yes, but to also offer people the option of greater ease of branch-dragging-at a reasonable price.

Reasonably-priced Love.

+
This just in.
A small slew of email awaiting me post-mudpit/devastation image making.
One from PB telling when he'll be gigging in Chicago.
One from Literal Harold stating that he heard from some colleagues at some gaming convention in SF that the Navy Seal junket (that I desperately wanted to attend to blow shit up in the desert around Las Vegas) involved loads of shooting but only a demo of a bazooka, nobody was allowed to shoulder it.
One from Jana who sent along her review of that so-called wine bar we kind of junketed to in the Middling City's University Heights zone and how YT wished to display my pugilistic tendencies and go over to the ersatz wine bar all duded-out in sports crap and whack the crap out of a punching bag suspended, oddly, over some bottles.

I've been with Blogger since just about their day numero uno and have endured all the speedbumps along our blogging ways. I've been such a loyalist that they even sent me a Blogger hoodie years ago Just because.
So the other day, of course, as I minded my own business, they offered up a chance to switch, as all the world is, to having ties with Google. GMail, Google, GLove are taking over the world. Simple enough, a couple of keystrokes and then voi-freakin-là all goes kapoof and also voi-freakin-là the old template is like so not working (and I do miss the cartooned flames and such) and the archive, my blogging history, was nowhere to be seen. I slept on it.
And all is better this fine gray Middling City day.
A new look for epinw.
Yesterday cleared brush with Kennedy for hours, chainsawing the afternoon away - merrily. Extra watched from a distance.
We finished and had made quite a nice beaver dam in front of the property. Now here comes the surreal, otherworldly part. Twenty minutes later some trucks appeared and scooped up all the broken and shorn bits.
And, as far as I know, the MC still awaits FEMA judgement. Are we a national disaster. Or not. Any meager drive about and into the suburbs reveals what any reasonable person might toss up as a big, wrenching Yes.
A few days ago, in a grocery store, YT was in line, waiting impatiently and reading trash. A woman sort of shouted to the woman parallel with her behind me in same line OHH, you can tell who has the power and who does not, you're buying ICE CREAM and I'm buying ICE.

(N)ice, new looking Love.

topote: Here are images of Godzilla, of a soldier in Basra. What is more ferocious.
Somehow, when writing deadlines have been eyebrow deep, there have been horrific Middling City natural debacles that mean nothing can happen but writing. This to date has happened three times. Driving bans, nearly every place closed, a pervading sense of not doom as one from this region might imagine, but a resolve to get through this with aplomb - once again. And for Yours Truly it means open-ended time to write as much else has stopped.
This landscape resembles what a place looks like after a hurricane. There was a hurricane named Bob one summer in Maine when I was the arts lady at a camp for girls from the inner-city and rural places nearby. Not realizing the severity of what this actually meant, I headed out into the hurricane in my small car and somehow all the large flying parts of trees missed me. Then about an hour and a few miles later I turned back for camp, abandoning my night off and then we collectively had to abandon the camp for a closed-for-summer public school where YT attempted to jumpstart the generator for the school in a little shack with my jumper cables and the thing would not start. I did not know that the battery was missing all water. Later, someone figured this fun fact out.
So the landscape outdoors looks like a hurricane whipped through as the trees are shorn in odd ways and now branches are piled up on lawns and next to streets like snow is post-blizzard. It is sad.
Some trees might continue to live after their bad prunejobs but many more branches will fall and trees will have to be stumped.
Whilst writing last night I visited the site of Lisa Jarnot, who is an X and still a good friend of Bruce's. She is formerly of an exurb of the MC and now lives in an exurb of the Shiney Apple and works hard on a book about Robert Duncan (one of the most unforgettable readings ever seen by YT), writing good poetry, teaching, and starring in the movie being screened at Hallwalls soon - The Time We Killed.
Bruce says he's not sure he could watch it sans bursting out into laughticuffs and he means this in the best way possible as Lisa is a star.
So on her site there is mention of her 100 Hats Project so I wrote to her about it to tell her I'd like to sponsor a hat. People sponsor a hat, she says she makes about one per month, and it's meant to rep people killed during the Iraq War. When you sponsor the hat you're asked to send a jpeg to her and she lists the way the hat looks with the image and name of sponsor.
I sent her an image I found of an Iraqi man holding his dead three-year old after some arbitrary shooting about by soldiers from both the good and bad sides. Actually, as I wrote that I pondered What is the good side, what is the bad side.
Lisa has a comment on her site that she started this project to show the physicality of the war and this is very much like the ongoing project of boots that are tagged with a dead soldier's name. This turned up one day in Union Square.
Time to write. Write and wrong, good and bad. But mostly oso good.

Greenest Love, in the sense of Nature.

So guess who is chainsaw laughing now.
Just about Everyone known by Yours Truly thought the purchase of a shiney electric chaiinsaw was madness but as the Middling City has trees in heaps this record-setting day, it has become a necessary tool du jour.
First, chainsawing was necessary to get out the back door sans peril.
Next, chainsawing was necessary to get the driveway cleared out and to rid the bottom of the vehicle from some tree limbs when YT got a little risky with the gas pedal and the to and fro that all MC drivers know oso well.
Somehow I thought I could plow backwards through major brush.
Somehow this really did not work out so well.
Then onwards I drove and got petrol at Delta Sonic, as well as a petite coffee (only size available), and some cheese sticks-for sustenance's sake.
Then made a slew of images of trees everywhere.
Called to see who needed chainsaw aid and landed then at Kennedy's.
Onwards then to SPoT which is full of my restless brethren and we are all sipping and laptopping and such whilst dance hits blare from above.
It is impossible to not notice that the mural to my immediate left has been altered. Now the newspaper sitting atop the table in said image shows The Beast, the snarky newspaper intent on blasting shotgun blasts into anyone's ego, has replaced the newspaper at which I toiled for fifteen years.
Wondering how this may have transpired.
So the snow is deep and heavy and there are thousands of ruptured trees.
This city's landscape has been temporarily altered.
Trees grow back but this pruning has been quite excessive, collective.
Some radio types are already calling this The Friday the 13th Storm. It began whilst YT was lunching with Leah and Matthew at the Thai joint on Hertel, the flakes were diagonal and non-stop.
According to the Day-Timer, they are like so right.
Again, to reiterate:
I have a chainsaw, and I know how to use it.

Powerful tool Love.

This is my special day. Actually, also of niece Katharine.
This has been a most magical day. It's been a magical day in stages and the final stage is upon me, a meet-up at some joint. And then there's another celebration tomorrow night post-reading by longtime acquaintance Marten Clibbens. But that is another day, another small story.
Following is, in entirety, an email from JW,Esq. Yes, I did have chocolate cake today that could make You weep with its precision, the perfection of a white chocolate mousse centre. And I did get many fab shiny new presents. Well... just read.

Happy Birthday!!! I hope you are having a very nice restful day, and that you get a nice big double chocolate birthday cake and lots of shiny new presents. You deserve it all.
To celebrate your birthday, I am going to see Roger Waters tonight. He is performing Dark Side of the Moon in its entirety, all the way through. I could think of no better way to celebrate.
Luv,
John

1. Yours Truly is completely flattered beyond belief that Everyone, and I do mean Freakin' Everyone, knows about my SLM (seminal life moment) when Dark Side of the Moon landed in my ten-year old hands. And many Pink Floyd points beyond. I am thrilled that JW,Esq. knows this and sees the beauty of seeing Waters perform such on this most YT-centric of days.
2. I think the appropriate thing to have done would have been to jet me out to said performance for the most superb of presents.
3. I think on this most special of dates I want to, metaphorically of course, scratch out JW,Esq.'s eyes in a small stormcloud of rock & roll-related candour.
4. OK, I forgive him, re-reading point #1 and am carrying on in a glamourous vibe of grace and elegance, tottering along in my sky-high heels and captivating birthday twinkle.

Onwards to the final stage of revelry.

Love of Perfect Revelry.

Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue.
John Lennon came across the ocean from Europe to same destination, accidental or not - America!
Christopher Columbus searched for spices, women, high times.
John Lennon searched for drugs, women, high times.
Christopher's people killed natives who stood in the way.
John's people broke hearts of fans who did not get the game of rock & roll.
Christopher is a legend.
John is a legend.
Christopher gets a national holiday.
John does not.
Christopher, as far as Yours Truly knows, did not write music.
John wrote everlasting music that supercedes the realm of what is termed pop.
Christopher was not an artist.
John lived his life as an artist.
Christopher does not have much social, or modern relevance.
John has continued grace, relevance through his messages of social justice, and peace.
Columbus Day unfortunately sometimes falls on the birth anniversary of John Lennon. Sometimes of Yours Truly.
John Lennon was born on 10/9.
Yours Truly on 10/10.
Hooray for being in this complicated world of wonky politics, art of varying degrees of competence and genres, difficult people, dogs, stray cats, gardenias, burroes, great sound systems on dance floors, friends who make laughter possible, parents who squeezed us out into this world, siblings who make us grounded, nieces and nephews who reflect the life force, and shoes.

Love to One, to All.

So there I was, minding my own business, under the bushes, when I hear a ROAR. A ROAR so roaring that, despite the fact that I was using the sanity-saver (a.k.a. the cd walkman to blast some Nelly Furtado down into my eardrums to drum out the drumming and screaming emanating from Church of the Perpetual Disregards) I turned my head to witness Andrew, teen gang member, riding a contraption down the driveway about six feet away from me, under said bushes.
I scrambled out from said bushes and surprised Andrew, teen gang member. I am not sure why. He saw the barn door open (actual barn, not the metaphorical sort below waist) and headed over, he said. We talked, as is our wont, about the 'hood and, as is his wont, he gave me the dirt. The African refugee family has moved to Grant Street. (yikes) And more news. What was roaring was a mini dirtbike, really I think a lawn mower on two larger wheels, that he'd purchased for $80 off of some friend. So Andrew tells me there's a rallying bunch of teens who off-road it down at the end of Smith Street. We usually talk as pals but suddenly out blurted from my lips the maternal Just don't break your neck. I think this surprised the both of us. So Andrew is heading to college, a program of sorts, and I suppose this beats his usual destinations like shock camp. Andrew is expecting his first child in May, is living with his girlfriend and her two children, and is already calling in sick to his new security guard post so he can rally about on a lawnmower-type device not breaking his teen gangmember neck.
Speaking of gang-related activity, Jana and I headed to some University Heights joint that calls itself a wine bar. Upon entering what was once Blu (where Allen and I saw one unforgettable Odiorne gig), I could tell that this was no wine bar. First hint - sports regalia. Television sets.
So we get to talking to a Mommy Escapee, Nikki, who was on the town solo to celebrate the fact that she had wrenched herself away from her premier role, and her new job. Upon further noting and talking and such the drug activity became fairly obvious as it is in most night places. Jana will not, of course, be able to mention such in her newspaper overview of the place but really, is this not understood. I recall a big verbal brawl with a long-time pal who was plotting the closing of a neighborhood bar frequented by African-Americans. And some in the drug trade. I remarked that all the bars in her neighborhood had these goings-on in their dark recesses. What exactly made this place more despicable. I think We know. I did make her go into this bar with me that night and we did end up, or, rather, I did, have a fine time. People were doing a newfangled bus stop-type dance. Music played jubilantly. This place is closed now, the neighbors succeeded and now this storefront is refurbed.
Onwards to a meatball meet-up and work points beyond.
Literal Harold mentioned to Yours Truly that surrogate motherhood is très illegal in this Empire State yet I just read an article about Annie Liebovitz's pending exhibit and the NYT reporter stated that she's got two children - via a surrogate.
Now time for the departure.

Roaring Love.

Today,utterly minding my own photographic business, on the day's third or so gig, found myself holding a mandible. In a lab, a jaw formerly of a Middling City resident. Also found myself today in the jam-packed dwelling of Tony Conrad, making some portraits of him amid the collections of music, movies, canned goods. Had not been there in ages and since last there a drum kit (owned by his son, Ted) now occupies the apartment's most comfortable chair, in front of the kitchen window. I commented on some of the canned goods and we examined three cans of various items whose obscure names I cannot recall. One resembled a horse chestnut, the other a Japanese cookie.




By now, if it had been possible, I would be jetting back from Las Vegas with Literal Harold post-blow-up junket with the Navy Seals. O, well.
About to depart for another of Jana's reviews of a watering hole, replete with characterizations, quotes, cocktail scrutiny.
Little Laura and I just had our usual fab dinner out and she was awaiting a call from a famed comedian to take him to a movie - his choice. The call came, she yawned, I ordered her a cappuccino to go. Ahh, the life of us rock stars.

It is the Hunter Moon, night sky all full of light, illuminating the ground for the avenging kitties trolling the streets looking for little rodents and the like.
Extra is out there somewhere, hunting, his over-sized paws of Love turned into Objets de Mort.

Hunting Love.

This is a big hint.
The anniversary of the birth of Yours Truly is this pending 10th and YT wishes to have a burro. See illustration of Wish.
Thanks for Your attention in this matter.
OK, I just Googled said Wish and watched a short movie featuring a young person feeding a snicky-snack to a burro. Please remember, the narrator droned, these are wild animals. They like a warm climate. They originated in Spain. Perhaps my little burro will not fare so well in the Middling City.
The ring I dream about from Me & Ro is also still a nice possiblility - the green tourmaline, round, set in gold.
Last night hung with some of my favoured musicians - PB, Han, Eremite.
et al
Made a nice feast of various items that I gleaned from one of the favoured recipe amalgamations amid a gig photographing some wondrously bright young students who had been videotaped about their academic exploits before I whisked them away for some still photos and conversation.
Cobbled together was quite a lustrous menu, if YT may say so herself:
curried zucchini soup with goat cheese schmeared crostini, lobster salad in a delicate tarragon dressing, my trademarked smashed vegetable combo, Provencale haricot verts, Senegalese chicken, Asian-spice-rubbed pork tenderloin. For dessert I, despite the advice of one of the shining academic examples, attempted my premier soufflé. It was large. Then it was not. It was a chocolate soufflé shrunk large, ending up a mere 3/4" in height. With a chocolate spread atop.
I suggested, upon its arrival at table, that one of the boys in attendance rush out to one of the nearbyest stores of convenience to purchase a bag of marshmallows, that the cake be striated, boosted up by the marshmallows.
Chocolate is chocolate, how can it be bad if it is not burnt.
I recalled en route to this blogging the moments of co-written poetry with Patrick and how we created a dual alter-ego and how we entered into this alter-ego's space and wrote words very different from our own.
Lesson: collaboration, always, in oso many ways is the way to reach higher, baby.

Reached higher Love.

Yesterday's ultimate gig was following around some undergrads who were hanging how-to safety hot tips on doorknobs of the University Heights neighborhood within the Middling City's collegiate/business/neighborhood sector very much unlike the others within the Middling City. This is a dangerous neighborhood with occasional homicides and stick-ups and, while walking, the co-eds were regaling Yours Truly with enough gore to have me, post-gig, trotting as top-speed as possible back to the car. One of the co-eds told me how, in his freshman year, he'd been held up by a man with a gun who jumped out of a car. Sobering all around as no neighborhood here or in environs can be called safe. And as I walked along photographing the do-gooding students, snapping and flashing, an irate neighbor came to his door yelling Why is she photographing my house. We all kept walking whilst stating it was them I was zoning in on, not his soggy wooden house.
Onwards.
Things Seen As of Late, sub-filed under Minding My Own Business.
- Last Sunday saw police line do not cross tape around some trees alongside Ellicott Creek as I left Menne Nursery with a car full of perennials for Kennedy's garden. A few days later I heard what happened at this spot, a distraught femme drove her car into the trees and then water for a big, dramatic ending. I forget if she was successful.
- Yesterday I saw a man, very early in the morning, en route to a presentation by Middling City U at Albright-Knox Art Gallery, who I think had just taken a whizz (as they say) off of the bridge down onto the expressway.
- Much later yesterday I saw another man wandering along in the middle of a street and as I approached he motioned for me to roll down my window - an interesting, old-fashioned concept to be sure. But perhaps he's never owned a vehicle with power windows, or any vehicle. He walked toward the car as I drove along and then Yours Truly ran a very red light to get away from this man, lest he be armed.
Onwards again.

Odd, sighted Love.

Open letter to beloved JetBlue.
Dear JetBlue,
I understand you're all jazzed up about your AmEx card but No Thanks. And I do appreciate seeing all your so-called cheap fares to wherever. However, when you do write to me perhaps in the subject line it's best to not use the word falling, such as Our Fares Are Falling. Do I want to think of the word falling when perusing your sale prices between Philly and, say, PR? I think not. Thanks for your attention in this matter.
Antithetically.
Accepted and moving onwards into a new gig as Arts Editor for Buffalo Rising, for the new and improved mag to accompany the already well-hitted site.
Time to wend towards the coffee stand and make and do do do.

Do Love to Do.

The Dalai Lama events are done and I realized I had not posted any images yet from that and decided on this image of the mandala deconstruction. I am thinking of my favoured parallel to make of this gesture right now. Could this deconstruction be likened to the throwing of a party in one's home. The invitations, the floral arrangements, the spending, cooking, arriving. And then it's over and there are bags and bags of garbage to lug out to the tote and some glasses have been busted and maybe someone accidentally broke another item but all in all there is the lush memory of a great party and the glow of it lasts. Or growing a garden and all the toiling and then it's late September and the light has changed and the sogginess starts and all is getting toward the downward arc of lush.
Watched a short vid on NYT's site yesterday, an interview with very troubled Cat Power/Chan Marshall who seems to be hanging on to sanity and life by a claw. At one point in the interview she began popping her knuckles and I nearly ended up on the ceiling.
Parting thought is about honesty. Honesty is not omitting detail or fact. Honesty is open communication and there is no love or respect without that. Not telling a fact (fun or otherwise) that will be or could be hurtful is not ever my policy and isn't something I seek out in any event. It rains hard here today in the Middling City and despite all that dropping the colours in this small slice of the world are vibrant in a dusky, early morning way.

Vibrant and dusky Love.

At left are artifacts, besides a plethora of images by Yours Truly, what is left–unripped tix, and sand mandala sand from its deconstruction.
Yesterday was the day of collective awareness boosting, a large-scale teach-in ending with an hourlong, wind-swept (read difficult to hear in parts due to such) talk by HHDL. Enjoyed seeing the boy colleagues, squeezing in a coffee break with Marky Mulville, and an unscheduled stop and shoot at the mandala un-do. That was the most powerful part of the three-day affair-the making and unmaking of the mandala and its attendant ritual with music. And Philip Glass pre-HHDL was sublime and I saw him leaving with another Philip to catch a plane and told him so, awakening him out of a small revery. He did solo piano pieces and then performed with a Tibetan musician and this has inspired me to track down some Glass solowerks. Yesterday night was onwards to an 80th b-day party for Will Clarkson, and then a show at SoundLab by Kayo Dot of the Shiney Apple. An all-around, well-rounded primo day.
All colorful glass sands merged together equals gray.

Gray, glassy Love.

This was submitted to Yours Truly by one very loyal epinw follower and YT appreciates this enthusiasm greatly.
This images = super bonus points.
Not quite sure what a cruise night is but I imagine it might have nothing to do with a Love Boat. The concept of a streetcentric cruise makes YT nearly automatically think of the large photos of Lauren Greenfield of kids of all stripes and such in cars doing just that whilst oogling, googling, &C.
I sent along the following Buddhist thought du jour to both Jana and Liz (as just about the entire Middling City is aglow with anticipation of the arrival of who is now nearly always referred to as HHDL... Dalai Lama v14), an all-purpose gem. And do note that loads of the most devout of Buddhists tend toward tipplerism.

Let us live gladly! Quite certainly we are free to do it. Perhaps it is our only freedom, but ours it is, and it is only phenomenally a freedom. 'Living free' is being 'as one is'. Can we not do it now? Indeed can we not-do-it? It is not even a 'doing': it is beyond doing and not-doing. It is being as-we-are. This is the only 'practice'. 'All Else is Bondage; Non-Volitional Living' - Wei Wu Wei

Wu wei is a little flowering branch of Taoism, knowing when to do and when not. Wei Wu Wei (who preceded the other www by about four decades) is an Irish-born scholar.

Moral offering: we should all live gladly, with gratitude - and the occasional, life-enhancing mental or physical cruise.

Glad, grateful Love.

Because it is this day, a short story to tell of images.
Henry the Dog, a very large dog who exuded puppyness, lived with me for a week as Tony went out of town with his fiancée et al. Because of the 11th five years ago he couldn't fly back to the Middling City and it took quite a while to secure a van and drive cross-country so Henry and I hung much longer and I spoilt him quite a bit as I knew he missed Tony. But I also knew their days together were numbered as the fiancée concocted an allergy to Henry the Dog so it was in the air, so to speak, that I might end up living with Henry for much longer. I did not. He's large, as I mentioned, and now has sweet digs in the country.
So when things settled a bit, and Henry went home, it was time for Yours Truly to visit those in my heart in the Shiney Apple and as the JetBlue jet approached the island the pilot flew us over Ground Zero, tipping the plane as we circled around it and my side of the plane was able to look - unforgettably - down into the cavern.
Stayed at the loft and, armed with a plan and a camera, I walked to the site and blocks away the scent of burned things still hung in the air. I spent some time walking around but was there mainly to shoot the sand mandala creation in The Museum of the Native American (where I have some images on permanent display of Natives making beadwork) nearby, so I escaped the overwhelming grief for the much-darker space and became entranced by the monks's work, and the sounds of the scraping of their tools to unloose the coloured sands.
I bought a ring from Me and Ro with the Tibetan word for compassion on it.
I asked a monk if this was truly the word (thinking maybe a benchman working one floor above us on Broome Street could have had a wangin' hangover and for all I knew etched in the word bird dropping instead) and he took a while looking at it but then did confirm. Compassion.

Love, don't hate.

See this.
This is my contrib to Paint the Town, the annual Hysterical Society bennie that takes place now. Sent the parents as Yours Truly was predisposed and they so dig it.
Here is a tale.
YT sits on the Michigan Ave. bridge, lap full of sketchbook, graphite, the like.
Suddenly there's a small racket to the right and a glance yields this sight. An older guy on a touring bike. Helmet, jersey, that kind of gear that is meant to scream I AM SO SERIOUS ABOUT MY HOBBY.
He is approaching but I am merrily sketching in the gorgeous autumn light.
He passes and I hear him speak. He yells. Yes, yells.
Thanks for getting out of my way. Rreeaall polite.
Yours Truly was abso-freakin-lutely flabbergasted.
As if.
As if I'd just jump up upon seeing his eminence, scattering pencils and the like.
Mind you there is a sidewalk of sorts on either side of the lift bridge that is about four feet wide, puh-lenty of space for an arsehole on a stoopid bike with 1/4" tires to breeze by a drawer of small size.
Keep the vibes good an happy, I am wont to say.
And don't fuck with the cheritable of heart, who shall inherit the entire fucking universe.
Onwards.

Painting the Town Love.

Pop lovers, photograph makers, Yours Truly poses a question.
Can one make an image employing a background wall of cheezball 70s-era paneling and not conjure up one Calvin. As in Klein.
I think not.
Made some excellent images of a femme yesterday and amongst my pre-planned settings, venues if You will, and clothing ops, opted for this femme in throes of poring over items in an archive. I am not naming names. Dig.
So now I'm editing away and all I see, well, demi-see, is this 70s wall.
Playful, sporty, poppy.
To matters more musical.
Absolute guilty pleasure is the new Nelly Furtado, Loose, esp track 1 - Afraid. And track 4 - Glow. Always liked Nelly.
And also Cat Power's The Greatest. It is so oodles better than what the B'lyn Boys played out of hi-fi's. This is coherent. But images do waft back of Chan/Cat head on piano in a post-cocktail stupour, crying jag mid-gig - described most eloquently by Troust Sibs.
Out in moments. On the Middling City if You will.

If You Love.

At moments there are brilliant flashes of a Perfect image and there's no camera onhand so the image stays très virtually virtual.
Yesterday spotted a boy leaning on a running gas lawnmower, stopping for a break to lick one of those noxiously-coloured popsicles, azure blue. Especially azure blue in the light of dusk.
Summer is so like over and for those out in the world such as Yours Truly, the freelancers, this is back to normalcy. Less reports of everyone known trekking all over the place, basking on beaches, or wherever. As I wrote to Justy earlier today, he being another worker who works wonders of design all the summer long, I've thought of summer for these last two decades as one prolonged New Year's Eve - so much pressure to be having Fun. To be personifying Fun. Sure, there's Fun in those sneaked-in moments but summer is, in my non-humble op, one long and blazing stretch in which others perform Fun.
I was on a beach twice this summer, I think. Both occasions I was freelancing, making stunning pictures of happy people.
+
Spent afternoon with niece and nephew, who I took shopping. Chopping is always an ear-catching substitute.
Bought them each an auntie-sanctioned Halloween t, as they share my adoration of this holiday, as well as two school shirts each. Their choice on the two shirts each. Tried to steer their little minds toward the colour green, but, really, this was to be their special school shirt selections.
Time to make and do.

Ch/Sh-op Love.

The
site
is
finally,
repeat,
finally,
up and running.
Run and see.
So I've been a faithful blogger via Blogger since 2001, made a mandatory Parsons School of Design website via the horrid DreamWeaver, and now - now - have finally made a real website that may be administered by Yours Truly.

Administration of Love.

* This just in, image at left.
Shown is one disingenuous person, one person caught up in a rather surreal moment knowing that she's meeting The Man, repping tape as red as his necktie resulting in over half the refugees of Hurricane Katrina still being displaced.
George Bush has visited (I imagine at this moment he's jetted out, maybe even back to Maine) New Orleans on the anniversary of the natural disaster that killed 1700 people. He had breakfast, visited sites, he posed for photos, he promised things.
This exchange was reported by BBC:

As the president walked into the restaurant, waitress Joyce Labruzzo asked: "Mr President, are you going to turn your back on me?"

"No ma'am, not again," he replied to laughter.

This acknowledgement of lack of Help requires some spin, I'd imagine.
And laughter.
Would that be Omigosh, we're in the international spotlight uncomfortable laughter.

To be filed under the numeral one, as in One More Reason to Love the Internet System.
One of my most beloved campers from days of yore up over in the corner of Maine just found me on the internet and all signs point to the fact that she seems to be her same, rock-loving, word-playing self. She's 28 now, and I think she was about 8 when she first came to the summer camp and hung with me in my art building and I recall that she didn't like to do much else of the camp activities and I told the camp foundress, my pal Big Nancy, that I liked having AnnMarie/Cougar (at that time) hanging about. So she stayed and came back to camp long after the cut-off age of 12.
I was at camp ten years, I think she might have had nearly the same run.
Yesterday should be filed under D, as in Dang, THIS was One Miserable Day.
Because of a snafu here, a snafu there, created by the mishaps of others, Yours Truly was rushing much of the day in a bedraggled fashion - fixing snaf, altering u.
One wondrous thing witnessed this past weekend was the girl of honour at a Bat Mitzvah wormin' in her little black cocktail dress across the dancefloor not once - but twice. She wormed well, and did not make a spectacle of herself as she did such. She was the only teen that attempted this old school maneuver and it was impressive.
Off shortly to make a formal and glowing portrait of the president of a college for all the world to see. As Jackie DeShannon might warble What the world needs now is photos, more photos, it's the only thing that there's just too little of.

Too Little Love.

woah nancy, you DID blog the BR. i'll pass on the mv/ee.
This is what Eremite (aka Mo' Jiggs) wrote back upon seeing The Bummer Road (translated, curiously, with mysterious nods to illusory tactics, perhaps, as la route de déception by Babel Fish just seconds ago) had been blogged by Yours Truly.
In mere hours the fun-loving band Sloan plays that Middling City drunkfest aka Thursday at the Square which has, concurrently, inspired legions of motorcyclists to congregate downtown and terrorize one and all with their loud pipes that they believe save lives. I think a better plan would be to share the road wisely with motorists as I've witnessed this summer some incredible, irresponsible motorcyclist weaving and bobbing amongst vehicles doing about 55.
Forgot to note this past Sunday Westfield, NY was a destination for a piece for the Shiney Happy Mag and took the scenicest way down, stopping along the way at The Rez for some petrol and did truly marvel at a $6.99 lighter shaped perfectly as a miniature double-barreled shotgun.
With dual flames, bien sur.
While lunching in the beloved, vintage diner of the town I read the local (downturn of voice) daily and how a fugitive of prowess as of late had been spotted in the town. They did not, curiously, run a photo of said fugitive which I found rather interesting as if townspeople spotted a man who they did not happen to know from the diner, from the watering hole, wherever, how could they accurately do some fingering.
On the same topic here's a short tale of fingering.
A pal reported that his very backroads pal was surrounded, upon leaving a WalMart conveniently located in the midst of what some cityfolk might term Nowhere, by scads of troopers. A WalMart shopper, perhaps even a greeter (for we know they are all probably, safe to say, senile), fingered the pal of the pal. Incorrectly.
Moral:
Finger only with resolve and, if possible, consult newspaper file photos.

Fingering Love.

* This just in, added for erudition's sake.
One embedded blogpost image shows Bucky, the fugitive.
One embedded blogpost image shows Bucky, the mascot.
Lest you encounter a shadowy, becapped, strutting figure.

Here They are.
Ladies and Gentlemen, hippies and dog lovers, free jazz associates, and anarchic genre benders.
The Bummer Road.
Why now, as they played the Middling City oh but exactly three weeks ago during the MC's most hottest of a slew of days that inspired Yours Truly to purchase a/c for their stay.
As Mo' Jiggs, as pictured in scarlet, asked for a quick batch for a mag that will be featuring musings on their musings. I emailed Mo' Jiggs, as pictured in - yes - Birks, a selection of eight. Last time they played the MC some photos of them by YT appeared on that bountiful blog/site controlled by Thurston.
Note the dog, beloved Zuma, who has never given my hand a chomp.
Today, after a few gigs at MCU I wended to a bookstore and purchased one of those Dummies books to help someone land a 747 of sorts but could not offer up much help as the password for the unloosing of the machine's every bits and bytes could not be recalled by its newbie owner.
Well, YT stated, I can't do a thing.
If it ain't got that swing.
If it ain't got that admin password issue all under control.
And off I faded into the heavily-aired afternoon.

Heavy, airy Love.

Yours Truly is taking a long shot here. You may recall that I am not only a super-secret dart player of Zen proportions, but a keen shooter with both gun and camera. Recall that the FBI asked if I may have an interest in joining up with them after indulging in their for-the-media shoot-a-thon with guns of all ilks. So when I am taking a clichéd long shot, it is going, probably, to be dead on.
So here is an image of something blue, obviously a fishy member of the animal kingdom, a swimming part of Nature.
You are terrified of it, as I was. It is something that Literal Harold just informed me of, yet another frightening image supplied by a pal. And I am even more perplexed that after my decade of being the Arts and Crafts teacher at for The Summer Camp up in the corner of Maine, replete with nights off spent on the coast, and a very informative and chefly beau there, that YT never - ever - heard of this beast, this mola mola. I doubted Literal Harold and ran to Wikipedia to just see if LH was fabricating this creature that, allegedly, propels itself into the air, out of the water, to rid itself of barnacles.
It eats jellyfish. It is a sunfish. It likes to be alone.

From Wikipedia:
Breaching has also been observed. This is when sunfish jump out of the water as whales sometimes do. They are reported to jump up to ten feet out of the water. This is probably done to dislodge the large number of parasites on their body. Molas also seek drifting kelp in search of small fish to remove their abundant parasites.

Thinking of a nice, solid parallel to how we everyday people jump to rid ourselves of parasites and all I can come up with is how we might jump into another situ - coffee joint, bar, restaurant - to change our bodies, dump those existential parasites.
Off now to photograph the creepy Scientology Palace for the last of the Secrets of Allentown images for the small, shiney booklet for the tour on September 16th.

Mola Mola Love. (no)
Idea of Mola Mola Love. (yes)

New chestnut, compliments of Yours Truly.
Chronic dreams, chronic schemes.
So had the chronic scheming dream where I am trying to get to the Shiney Apple and am doing just about anything to catch the plane - wading through waist-high water, trying to catch elusive cabs. Then the other part of the dream is actually being in the Shiney Apple and deciding to prolong my time there, indefinitely. Calling whomever in the Middling City to say Well, I am going to be here much longer. How much longer, I cannot say for certain.
All this means YT is in desperate need of wending along the art-yielding streets.
One part of the SA portion of the dreamscape was someone wanted to cook me a dinner and I was thinking how I just wanted to sneak off to one of my favoured restaurants instead.
JT stopped by last night, after her melanoma-related visit to Roswell Park Cancer Institute, part of the expanding medical corridor that will transform the MC into a different kind of town, a white collar town. She described for YT how a mole may grow down into the skin several inches, a column of death. This visual will be haunting me for a while, as will the Shiney Apple chronic dream.
Today is a gray-skied day and will make the finishing up of the Secrets of Allentown images murky. So instead it's laptopping and editing like a madwoman.

Chronic, chronic Love.

So there I was, as You know, or might assume, minding my own business.
I was out in the hot Middling City sun and I'd forgotten to slather the 1.5K SPF lotion all about so I was silently being microwaved as I shot architectural images for the traipsingly wondrous Secrets of Allentown - highly recommended for its snoop-enabling possibilities as one wends along as a self-guidee poking one's curiosity into converted mansions, small former cottages, luxe middle class establishments on veritable Free Pass Day.
On the list was 388 Franklin Street and it was completely in hiding. I circled and then circled some more about the one-ways and finally just freakin' parked. I saw a woman in a yard on the corner of Edward and Franklin and asked if the place was 388. It was. And it's a much-viewed mystery building, a brick building with a somewhat-wobbly rainbow painted on two sides. It seems to be a daycare center but upon introducing myself to the lady, who is a nun, I was informed the building is not a daycare center but a pre-K situation. And a convent. I got a tour, the same that the public will have and amongst the architectural features were artifacts of both ilks. The guide, Brazilian-born Sister Victoria, asked, when I asked about her religious order, if I'd like to join the order, The Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, to be all about exactitude.
I was stupefied.
Thanks, I said, but no. Then I suggested that she have brochures handy for the tourists - about joining up with the four conventioneers, as well as about the charming, warm school for mainly immigrant children from 3-7.
Yours Truly was not a taker, in this religious matter.
Time to wend toward freelance gigs of a more secular nature.

Love of Nature, and Order.

Had a gig that drug me into the Middling City Museum of Science this fine morning, to document a team of scientific types setting into motion the forlorn Foucault pendulum there, an unloved item one can spy when going up and down the terrazzo steps in lieu of the vintage elevator that does not instill confidence.
On my way out I decided I must have a look around as it's been a while since my last visit.
This, Yours Truly believes, is a sad sad building whose architectural magnificence has been stolen in the name of progress - and, obvious lack of funds. The grand entrance reminiscent of The Met in the Shiney Apple, AKAG in this city, and on, is not used. Instead an entrance has been fashioned between the old portion of things scientific and a new build which features a science magnet school. Displays are unloved, dishevelled. There was a good photo exhibit of Tibetan images made at the dawn of the twentieth century when it took about a year to get to this place that no longer exists, really. YT is seeing a parallel. But this exhibit is to coincide with the Dalai Lama visit next month, the nineteenth of September, a grand event.
I spent time with the Marchand wild flower models, and an overview of the dioramas nearby, encased in oak with untouched floors and a gravitas that is precious, elicits memories of Sugimoto work documenting similar showcases. These showcases need some cleaning and some had (I stress had) names of flora and fauna taped to the glass for those who could not make the leap from wall note to showcase easily. Moth. Raccoon. Bear. And more. YT ripped off these small print-outs sometimes taped right in front of a taxidermied face - it seemed disrespectful, not to mention idiotic.
On the way out (mind You I have only passed a small group of children making crafts and some very suspicious handlers, in addition to the scientific types I documented) I noted with special special interest the showcase devoted to two beloved MC primates - Jonesie and Eddie.
I remember them both. There was no showcase devoted to Sampson, who terrorized my dreams when I was very young. Jonesie, I learned, was named for a local milk company. There was the photo documentation of each of them and in front there were their taxidermied selves. Eddie's nameplate had fallen but from the photos behind him you just knew - EDDIE.
One photograph showed Eddie Doing his part for the war effort and shaving a man who appeared to be very dead in a wheelchair. His face was not only lathered but contorted.
Alongside Eddie's memorabilia was a large drywalled area where folks could jot down a fond memory of Eddie and affix it to the wall. From the scribbled penmanship it was obvious that most of the memories were being left by the very young who only knew taxidermied Eddie, not the banana-munching ape so beloved by the freakin' city.
One child wrote this, my favourite.
I don't trust Eddie.
Another wrote
I am looking at Eddie and his eyes are following me.
Your homework assignment is obvious.

Eddie, Sampson, Jonesie Love.

Really not thee biggest question at hand but Yours Truly is rolling in deep procrastination and was distracted by the pretty header on the letterhead - LEADERSHIP BUFFALO. Their Class of 2007 Application. This org's been on my tail annually since a client pal handed over my namely goods about six years ago. I have hemmed, I have hawed. I asked hipster congressman Brian Higgins, who I saw out and about this week, if he'd ever done it. Always searching for signs YT says to herself and not aloud Hey, if the congressman's done it, so shall I. Well, he did not. But I am still hemming, hawing.
*sidebar: NYT ran a very bouncey piece on young Belgian-born designer Olivier Theyskens, and it did include one quotable quote, it goes something like this and has been added to my Smart Words folder.
“I’m forced to think ahead, to imagine what a girl should look like in a year from now. That makes your mind sensitive to signs. And looking for signs makes life more logical in a way: you are always ready for the future.” *
In the poo poo column of Leadership Buffalo is that there's tuition and said tuition hovers over $3K. Also there are sleep-overs. And there's homework.
Lately YT has been the imperfect IT Girl. And I do not mean It girl, I mean IT girl, helping others with their computer glitches, improvements, transitions. A bit of my own laptop issues tossed into the chaotic salad but let's just say that I am getting to know the guys at the Genius Bar out in the mall in the former wetlands well. But not as well as a few distressed iPod users who always seem to be facing one of two raging problems - heat surges, and drop-related fiascoes. YT is happy to report that my own iPod, like my PalmPilot, is safely nestled onto the non-virtual desktop, unused and unloved. The iPod has twelve songs imported by the X and there they remain. And not even my favoured selections to boot.
Listening to the new Sonic Youth, again. It's good and I float along with it but really, with a gun to my head, could I name any track titles, could I say (yet) Oh, yes, this is blankety-blank, not blinkety-blink. I think not. Plus this is a copy made by Bandmate Scott so, in my defense, I have no liner notes to make any of the list more stickable.
Speaking of sticking, today is the death anniversary of Jerry (jeez, Garcia, get like so with it), as opposed to his birth anniversary on the first of this month. Told Kennedy I'm making a cake for Jerry, a nice vegan recipe supplied by Vegan Queen Amy Beeman.
Came out of Liz's house with a supersized glass of white and found that I was standing right next to a guy reporting his name and status amid the circle of gathered freelancers and scant staffers for the Shiney Happy Mag Idea Toss. Tossed in several fine ones of my own of varying degrees of servitude (funny how certain words just pop out on their own), seriousness, irreverence. We splintered off into smaller groups where the ideas were bandied about and me and Lawyer Bill did our usual good-natured sparring. One '07 story idea I'm rather excited about is a piece on pool-hopping which I fear may be a lost (or waning) art.
I deemed it oso necessary to have an illustration tracing our (Lawyer Bill and I said we'd co-write this) steps and dives, just like those endearing "Billy's Path of Ruination" illustrations in Family Circus that, as a child, one could get lost in for possibly a whole fifteen minutes.

Fifteen minutes of Love.

Usually grandmothers are the seers and/or the saints, the family members who've crawled on their bellies through raging fires of personal experiences, put some out with a handful of flour onhand in the larder, held most of the adults in the room when they were newbies. My own beloved grandmother, Victoria, I felt, looked in upon my soul as nobody else could for this lady not only knew me from the first hours, but was a wisdom conduit. If you asked, if you listened.
But yesterday, shooting an ultra-country wedding, the grandmother in the room was like so wrong. And I didn't want her to be wrong, going along with the beliefs outlined above. But when Country Gram wandered about, telling everyone that the wedding cake collapsed because of the wedge the couple removed for that choice photo op, I tried to reason with her frail self. Yours Truly said No, they cut the wedge here (gesturing) while the collapsing is here (gesturing again). She would not look, nor see the truth. It was that the base (not visible under what appears to be seaweed) was not level itself, sending all tiers into a dramatic and slow-motion whump. YT was seated nearby, as luck had it, with a divorcé whose wedding I shot several years ago, her dairy farmer date (who I peppered with questions about his transformation to the world of organics. . . and expressing my unfettered negative reaction when he told me about the lifespan of machine-pumped/chem-addled cows who yield an excessive six years as opposed to happier, organic cows who can live about four times longer), a woman I knew from Darien Lake's rock & roll venue, and some exurban tavern owners. Someone muttered that the cake was collapsing and I turned most quickly as my camera happened to be resting near the cake on the very same table. As it were, the collapse happened at six o'clock whereas the d2x was at 10 o'clock and it was not necessary to lick sugared shortening out of its delicate crevices. I documented the minimal wedding-day debacle and even assisted a youngster with his cell phone with getting the best shot until the caterer said We would prefer as few photographs of this as possible. To which YT stifled a gut-wrenching guffaw. Scouted out some fab locations for going off the grid as I wended to and fro the Middling City. And, lest You are unaware, all this happened, and this landscape may be gleaned, in under fifty miles from currently sani-wrapped City Hall.

Landscape Love.

Today is the tiny window of opportunity (two hours, cheesh) to drop off donated work for Children's Hospital of the Middling City and I'm looking at the clock wondering if I have time to rush north before I need to drive way east. This is a Middling City Society of Artists Plan.
Yours Truly did the same a few years back for Roswell Park Cancer Institute, donating the piece Touching Green that I totally dig.
Think I'll have to contact Jerry Mead and say it's coming, on a later day.
Speaking of art and logistics, signed on for Secrets of Allentown another year, despite the oddness of last year when my parents were standing at the starting point's ticket table and being told that, despite their daughter's hard work and nominal honorarium and agreed-upon four comps, they were going to have to pay. I had my dad pass his cellie to the SoA leader and was told by him that Several people donate their time and services and . . .
YT said, as politely as possible, give my parents their effin comps, s'il vous plait.
We'll see if this year is as fraught with discombobulation.
Speaking of such, JW,Esq. informs me that he is loftless but owns a sailboat now that he does not know how to operate.
In my non-humble op, I believe this corporate counsel has perhaps embraced too richly the rock & roll lifestyle, tossing his concerns to the four winds and such.
Speaking of r&r, shot some ports of The Bummer Road in front of closed Happy Corner Store. The band says they just might entitle their next release On the Happy Corner.
I asked if we should have the rotund lady in Cleopatra sandals move out of the way and Matt Valentine said Extras are GOOD.

Extra extra Love.

Although some, if they did in fact see a snapshot of Yours Truly entering the car dealership, might proffer up that it was the strappy sandals, the preferred raison would be my keen bargaining skills, a raging and recurrent audaciousness.

*sidebar tell-taling is that I was selecting blogmusic and hit the hi-fi's eject and out popped several that YT had not inserted - discs placed in the carousel by the most-recent outta sight/outta town guests, The Bummer Road, who played a subterranean Middling City gig this past Tuesday. Reflecting influences, collective m.o., and chemstate, they listened to Mazzy Star, Love, Miles. Of course, of course, and of course.*

So there I am, at the dealership, full of pique, up to my discerning eyeballs with the Mildewmobile, its exhaustive issues, its short list of lemony quirks that should have stayed away from the 1.5 year-old vehicle. But no. So, having had enough, I am there, in the strappy sandals, as I mentioned. I was shuttled over by a greeter type, a femme in training, to a young former film student and grip (one shares personal fun facts over such wheelings) taking the first bite of a sandwich. In a nutshell, two hours later, I was signing a contract for a new Subaru lease. I picked it out from the slim manual transmission pickings - dark gray. Do you want to drive it, Matt the former film student/grip asked. No, that's allright, I shot back. Two hours later it had been detailed and I was again on my mildewless way. Happily.
Onwards. Literally.

Recently I horrified a pal with my strong summertime, male-related belief system that, in a nutshell, is a most unratifiable short list.
1. Men should not ever be shirtless in public, no matter their age, follicle level, social status. Except on a beach.
2. No sandals for men. YT has never seen a man in a pair of sandals and thought Geez, he does look smart and sassy and great in those. No sandals for men, ever.
Not even on the beach.
And I do thank You in advance for your attention to these important, seasonal matters.

I just hauled three pals into the new Woody Allen movie. There went two hours of our lives, eight hours of wasted life time in all.
The best part of the movie was some shots of gardens, I saw some of my beloved plume poppies. Of course the plume poppies were much more controlled than what appears in the personal jungle.

Jungle Love.
It's driving me mad, it's driving me crazy.
As Steve Miller et al are wont to say.