Crowning of the Knight Baby

"but the night is young,"

he assured them, as they gazed from their perch

down the steep and bumpy street

who found its end at the foot of a glowing city hall.

So young, it hasn't even been born yet,

in fact, it's still in utero, I imagine,

in spite of the darkening sky.

Well, it looks like we have a front seat for the crowning of the (k)night baby!

and they all laughed at their pun,

exhaling steam or smoke or dragons

for this courageous baby to battle,

and they leapt up and tore off

through the maze of the city,

stretching their mischief from now until sunrise.

Baby be damned, they would drink its royal blood

to fuel their roaring youth.

If You Like Your City, Draw On It

I walk around a lot, and I see a lot of dope street art, though much of it is small--stickers and wheatpastes and a few tags that are stylish enough to be considered art. I like taking pictures of them, so I started a tumblr blog thingy to post those pictures up. Since I never update this blog. So, 

fricketyfresh

One reason (of many) to get a bike

While I've been here at this lovely internet cafe to (not) work on my finals for over an hour, a girl from my art history class who was supposed to meet me has been driving around in circles, burning gas and looking for parking anywhere nearby. I biked here in ten minutes fo free ninety-nine. Vive le Velo!

The Pendulum of Coincidence

The Dirty-Eight Geary--while often full of unpleasant smells and uncomfortable situations, I find that many of my daily affirmations of happiness occur while riding the love-to-love-it, love-to-hate-it MUNI bus.

It was hard not to stare when an elderly midget woman wearing a sparkly pink dress and various colorful accessories climbed daintily into the seat across from me, her sneakered feet hanging half a foot off the floor. I guess it would have been one of those "only in San Francisco" moments where you shake your head knowingly and give yourself a little self-appreciative punch on the shoulder for living in such a crazy place, but I was so zoney baloneyed from my 7am - 3pm shift that all I could do was stare, and I had forgotten my ipod bus-interaction-shield, which we all know is crucial to pretending not to care what is going on around you while riding muni.

I wondered if she didn't want me to watch her, even though she was wearing all that awesome stuff. But my prying eyes were rewarded when, without prompting, she animatedly began giving directions to the foreign, map-toting tourist next to her. After telling him what was up and offering to get off and help him find his transfer bus, she asked him what language he spoke. "German," he replied, and before he could even get the word completely out of his German mouth, she began spouting the Deutsch like she learned to swim in it.

Watching what was essentially a real life Fairy Godmother speaking German on Muni was a little bit sensational. It was a real treat, let me tell you, and it only got more cliche and inspiring when the older business man next to me took advantage of the lull in their conversation to physically reach across the aisle towards her, hoping to glean some of her magic. "Excuse me for asking," he prefaced tentatively but excitedly, "but how many languages do you speak?"

She waved her hands as if she knew too many to count, and said, "It's a gift, it's a gift. It's like music to me."

"Does it get harder to learn as you get older? Because I want to learn a language, but I'm worried..."

"No! No, just practice. Practice practice practice, like music!" she exclaimed, and went right back to chatting in German.

Stories

Sometimes when I come home drunk, and am not quite ready to go bed yet, I grab whatever book is closest to my pillow and "read" it. I actually spent an entire summer making almost no progress on what turned out, in the end, to be one of my favorite books, Kafka on the Shore, because nearly each night, I would fall intoxicatedly onto my futon, read three pages at the max, and then pass out. When I would return to the book upon a more sober moment, I would have to re-read all the damage I had done in my well-intentioned but low-functioning state the night before. Last night was one of these nights for me, and when I woke up this morning to see another of my all-time favorites, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay on my bed beside my head, I remembered one of the wonderful quotations I had drunkenly savored the night before. As it first introduces one of the two main characters, Sammy Clay,

"He had delivered the Eagle for most of 1931 in order to afford a set of dumbbells, which he had hefted every morning for the next eight years until his arms, chest, and shoulders were ropy and strong; polio had left him with the legs of a delicate boy. He stood, in his socks, five feet five inches tall. Like all of his friends, he considered it a compliment when someone called him a wiseass. He possessed an incorrect but fervent understanding of the workings of television, atom power, and antigravity, and harbored the ambition--one of a thousand--of ending his days on the warm sunny beaches of the Great Polar Ocean of Venus."


Ah. I love it. I first read that book Sophomore year of high school when we had to do a book report on a Pulitzer winner. I read 400 of the 636 pages the night before the report was due, expecting to skim, speed read, and call it quits early. Before I knew it, I found myself sobbing onto the final page at 4:30am, far too invested in the characters and enchanted by the language to stop any earlier. I highly recommend Michael Chabon's work, the few books/short stories of his I've read have been grand.

book suggestions, anyone?

http://collection.hht.net.au/firsthhtpictures/resbyfield.jsp?term=New+South+Wales.+Dept.+of+Prisons&field=AUTHOR&searchtable=&displayFormat=TABLE

The Olden Gaze

I'm currently taking a History of Photography class that's for the most part pretty interesting, despite the fact that the professor is super awkward--so awkward that I got the giggles and had to recuperate in the hallway for a good ten minutes--and we saw some amazing crime scene photographs from New York City in the 1930s and 40s. I'll let you see those in a few seconds (assuming time works the the same way for my dear reader(s) as it does for me), but first I want to post a photo I found by a NY "street" photographer of the era, Weegee. 

fuck. yeah.

Weegee wasn't a professional photographer, but his stuff is really great. Here's a shot titled "Their First Murder":

Whoa.

I'm not sure who took the following crime scene photos, it might be Weegee, but I think it was policemen and crime scene investigators. Man, the untrained eye can see some spectacular sights, and these photos are proof...

They don't even look like evidence of murder, they look like art, or theater. Am I a total creep for being entranced by them? While hot on the trail of this genre (my current printmaking assignment theme is sex/death/propaganda, okay?), I found some incredible old mugshots. I actually did a bunch of mugshot prints waaaay back in spring 2009, but they don't hold a candle to these beautiful photographs. Behold.

Fraudsters, for the most part.

Nice stuff. I love looking at this, but for the record, I always hope to be separated from these people b at least a lens-worth.

A Portfolio of Sort(folio)s

underbitten, 2009. 

Grampaw Jack, 2008. Stencil.

Typewriter, 2009. Screenprint, 2 layers and chine colle.

Ethel, 2009. Plexiglass etching.

Who are our friends?, 2009. Linocut.

Spirit animal, 2008. Acrylic mural.

Lighthouse can, 2009. water color collage

Nametag, 2009. Rubber stamp.

No Sleep Til Brooklyn, 2007. Charcoal.

Weiner Webb, 2009. pencil

Family,  2009. collage.

who are your friends?, 2009. pencil (about 1" high)

mary blair inspired sf houses, 2010. 

stenciled shirt, 2006.

Ted, 2009. watercolor and pencil

John Wayne Gacy, 2009. Plexiglass etching

stenciled skateboard, 2006.

stenciled shirt, 2006.

stenciled shirt, 2007.

animals, 2010. 

Fuf, 2009. 

Turkey, 2009. Plexiglass etching

steve martin, 2010. pencil

i like my piggies moist and pink, 2009. watercolor

honey, 2009. screenprint

Herman, 2009. Linocut

BK for Lara, 2009. watercolor

Toddlerz in Tiaraz, 2009. 

Beaker, 2009. stencil, 4 layers.

AHHH!

Well 2010, we're a good month and a half into you, and at least for me, you've been pretty crazy so far! A harmless bender or two, lots of rigorous bike rides, a crazy trip to Oregon (shout out to AJ), the final season of LOST, and lots of keeping of resolutions that I didn't even try to make. And on top of it all, I got a job that actually has to do with something I might want to do for the rest of my life--teaching. I'll be tutoring for a program called Families and Youth in Transition at a middle school in Noe Valley. Actually, I'm killing time in my early morning kitchen right now until I leave for my first day (AAAH!). I don't know if I'll be able to keep doing this or a similar job after I graduate, since it is through USF, but at least it shows I've taken some initiative further than Event Scheduling and froyo. Anyway, more on all this after my first day. And before Printmaking 3. Or after. My days are just packed.

2010 is the year of...

infinite possibilities!!!

Another Confirmation That I Grew Up Too Much in 2009

Have you ever gone back to something you found fun and challenging as a kid, only to realize that it's now incredibly boring and easy? I made that tragic discovery last night, when Katelyn and I decided to bust out the old Playstation and play one of our childhood favorites, Crash Bandicoot. We swelled with excitement at the Naughty Dog load screen, but as soon as we started a level, that excitement began to diminish. There are about three ways to kill any bad guy, there are checkpoints to save your progress the whole time, a Woobuga saves you from dying once, twice, even three times, and they give lives out like candy. Sigh.  

this is a real bandicoot

It's probably a good thing that video games aren't just as consuming as they ever were. Still, it put us in a melancholy mood, one that could only be lifted by returning to an old favorite that will always stand the test of time; Arrested Development. What can I say about this revolutionary TV show that hasn't already been said? I'll say this--I was telling everyone to watch it as it floundered and doggie paddled and gasped for breath from the ratings of the retarded American public back in 2005. And did you bitches listen? No. But at least everyone likes it now. It has undeniably influenced television sitcoms and comedy in general since then. Thank god, too, that it helped de-popularize the laugh-track. Anyway, amidst the slew of complete reality show trash, there was a lot of good television in the 2000s, especially towards the second half, and we have Arrested Development (and Freaks and Geeks) to thank for it. 

sidenote here: the first time we watched this on DVD, we literally re-wound it and watched it seven times in a row

As my good friend AJ said, people who say they don't watch TV to sound smart just aren't smart enough to watch the right TV.