Much Ado About...

Ten Canoes

2011-02-04T09:50:00.001-08:00

Great movie about an ancient aboriginal tale that even little ones will enjoy, if only for the mesmerizing visual beauty of this film.

Floors and Ceiling (and Walls) of LA

2008-08-28T13:07:00.000-07:00

As I was walking about the public buildings of LA with Paulette last May, my first thought was to take photos of the fabulous floors and celings and then create a coffe table materpeice showing off these same floors and ceilings. In the meantime, life intervened and I ended up spending a lot of time fixing a water pump and all I have left are the photos.

LA Public Library

Griffin Observatory Rotunda

Union Station, Lobby

The Bonaventure, Lobby Ceiling

LA Public Library, Childrens Reading Room Ceiling

LA Public Library, Teen Reading Room

LA Public Library, Lobby

Union Station, Lobby Ceiling

Newman Lake Cabin Porch

2008-08-20T12:55:00.000-07:00

Another photo by Tom that captures the essence of a place.

If I made movies...

2008-08-06T16:33:00.000-07:00

...I would make exactly the same movies as the (sort of) famous Kevin Booth. With a name like that and talent, he must be soooo cool.

Guess where...

2008-08-01T14:37:00.000-07:00

the coolest public library (that I've been to lately) is. The Moorish themed art deco tower is a hint.

Scenes from last winter

2008-07-31T12:35:00.000-07:00

Thank you, Paulette…

2008-03-31T14:42:00.000-07:00

…you are so sweet. The light in your eyes compels you to rent the veil and uncover meaning in the most unlikely places.

Too much snow...

2008-02-07T13:46:00.000-08:00

...it hasn’t snowed this much for about 10 years. On the way out to shovel cabin roofs had to navigate through the deer and moose (can’t see the moose) milling about on the road. The snow is so deep these animals have nowhere else to go…

Got up on the roof and shoveled & shoveled till I was all tuckered out…and never even saw the roof. At some the point the shovel ‘slipped’ out off my hands and fell to the ground-a Freudian slip, as it were.

I was able to dig my way in to one of the cabins and find some snow gear-yea!

...doo, doo, doo looking out my back door.

A walk in the desert

2008-01-31T10:31:00.001-08:00

Back to southern Arizona for an enviromental conference during the week, a nice change from the 3-4' of snowfall in Spokane. This years environmental buzz word is additionality-you heard it here first (all two of you). Anyway, got a chance to take a walk in the desert-here are a few pics.

Cactus, cacti?

A copper based mineral-I forgot the name.

A skookum view from a nice hotel. Typically though, all the food groups available here start with beef. I met some helpful Indian guys who provided tips on how to navigate an overly carnivorous world. My conceit it that I'm reducing my carbon footprint by eating in a third-worldish fashion...uh yea and okie dokie.

World's largest asparagus shoot or a flowering spike from an agave (the tequila plant)? The agave waits for the right time to create this lone 20' spike, produces fruit, and then dies.

C’est formidable!

2008-01-25T12:11:00.001-08:00

One of the latest in a series by Tom the Artist. He's working on some new stuff for a showing at the Cafe Artisan in Tekoa WA (Tekoa?) in mid February. Seems like he must have read 'Moby Dick' or something recently since the whale motif is prevalent.

When I walk through what passes for a gallery in downtown Spokane, most of the items on display are merely decorative, mostly crap, and overpriced. Compared to that dreck, Tom prices his work very reasonably (too reasonably if you ask me). I'm not much of a critic, but spend time in every gallery I happen upon and so have some feel for the whole affair. My gut reaction-his stuff is quite good. So, if you want some original art, come to Tekoa around the 15th and check it out.

Artic sea ice gone in 5 years!

2007-12-12T14:04:00.000-08:00

Credit: NASA image created by Jesse Allen

Incredible-the data keep rolling in and it all points in the same direction-we're ******! It turns out that reality is much worse than climate model predictions. Just two years ago the projection for an ice-free artic was 2040. At the current rate, all ice could be gone by 2012. Chicken Little is finally right-with a vengeance, the sky apparently is falling. I’ll say it here-anyone who (still) doesn’t get that something momentous is happening is an idiot (and a dupe and watches Fox News)--read about it here.

Montana

2007-12-11T10:27:00.001-08:00

Montana: an apt name and really skookum, eh. I visit a power plant (carbon neutral, so there) in Montana occaisionally and so have a chance to see the sights. Here are pics from the last trip.

Along state Hwy. 200, Bambi and his brother- no quarter.

A line of slash piles.

They have guns in Montana, lots of guns.

LACMA

2007-11-23T07:56:00.000-08:00

Los Angeles County Museum of Art-Probably my favorite, most likely since my brother lives at Redondo Beach and I’m in the area periodically, so get to experience this top flight museum on a repeated basis. A really good museum is a continuing source of amusement and illumination. For example, I’d never been into the Americana style much, until I saw a full size Thomas Hart Benton and immediately...false distinctions disappeared and a sense of wonder filtered through.

I think it is that type of experience that helps us to maintain an open-eyed, child-like view of the world and keeps things interesting. I'm reminded of the first time my kids saw a work (in the LACMA again) that really shocked and impressed them. After being herded through every museum I could find on our travels and them more or less trying to appreciate (in a slack-jawed , glassy eyed kind of way) what they were seeing, their reaction to Bill Viola’s ‘Slowly Turning Narrative’ was deeply satisfying as I could see that all the time and effort had not been wasted. They spoke about the piece for days afterwards and have gladly gone without complaint on every museum jaunt since.

Slowly Turing Narrative, description from the web site: A large screen mounted on a floor-to-ceiling shaft is constantly rotating at the center of the room. An image of the artist's face in black-and-white is projected from one side, accompanied by a voice reciting a long list of individual states of being and actions in a repetitive, rhythmic chant. Color images of childhood memories, accidents, and medical operations are projected from the other side, with accompanying sounds. One side of the screen is mirrored, and it reflects the viewer's own image as well as the projected images which travel across the walls of the room as the screen turns, creating a swirling vortex of images in the space

Brendan and Kerry: in the garden on the way to the Japanese pavilion. On this visit they were showing Japanese ‘imaginings’ of the tiger. This collection of yamato-e (scroll style) paintings were done in the mid 1800s. What made this showing remarkable was that at the time, the Japanese had never seen one of these creatures live, they only knew them through their skins. They knew tigers were large, ferocious creatures but had to fill in the rest. So, all of the depictions are unique, capturing on the one hand an essence of the tiger and on the other this mythic imagining of what the tiger is…fascinating.

old pals

2007-11-19T08:36:00.000-08:00

Me and The Gav (left).

Windstorm

2007-11-14T15:38:00.001-08:00

Newman Lake: Another tree bites the dust-damn! This one had been dead for some time but I thought to leave it in place as habitat-oh well.

Tamarack

2007-11-11T16:45:00.001-08:00

In the forests around Newman Lake there aren’t many broadleaf trees so you don’t see a lot of leaves swirling around, but you do get this, a conifer (tamarack or western larch) that loses it ‘needles’ and creates this fantastic golden brown carpet on the forest floor. This effect is only around for a few weeks and then it’s gone…

Baby you can drive my car…

2007-11-07T11:47:00.000-08:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah…this is the best Beatles compilation, ever…EVER! I should know, I’ve tried and my amateurish foray into a decent Beatles song cycle has finally been put to rest by this…yes…masterpiece. Access to the master tapes and original producer (the producers’ dad, George Martin) plus two years of labor probably helped a bit.

Some people don’t like it as it represents a significant remix or revision of the Beatles work and so is seen as sacrilegious, kind of like trying to improve upon the Koran. I think that's silly-what I know is that the last listen I had of Help! via CD sounded like crap, like it was recorded in 1965 or something. I don’t know how Mr. Giles Martin did it, but everything on this CD sounds as if were recorded yesterday--a huge achievement, highly recommended.

P.S. OK-so I've listened to this hear and there and while it has all the notable tunes it's missing my personal favorite 'Everbody's Got Something to Hide (Except Me and My Monkey), even so I still give it very hgh marks.

Mexico

2007-10-30T09:21:00.000-07:00

I love this place-it’s at once so familiar and so exotic. I would live here if I had the time. I grew up in Cali, so had to take California state history in high school, which was mostly about Mexico! So, it’s like I sort of grew up here-sort of. Anyway, the people are very friendly, the climate is perfect….living here would enable me to learn Spanish well enough so that I could begin to think in Spanish, after all….

“To have another language is to possess a second soul.” Charlemagne

And who doesn’t want a second soul?

As a child, my parents would take me to the Jai Alai games in Tijuana. At the games, my fondest memory is of the tacos! Only 1 or 2 pesos apiece and they were fantastic-I’ve never been a big eater but I would gorge on those amazing tacos.

About ten years ago-the kids in a place called Tomatlan, wondering where in the world they are. I could live here...

On the boardwalk in Bucerias.

Too much sun & fun & food &etc. I think this was the first time in about 20 years I took a holiday without children. Notice the fake tattoo on the arm-poor choice eh?-it’s why tattoos are generally a bad idea. So, at this point in the holiday, I’m like the walking dead. I was cogent enough to realize that the meal here (River Café, Puerto Vallarta) was very good-better than anything in Spokane. I also thought Barcelona superb as it was served up simple, fresh, and excellent tapas. Both these places are as good as the Café des Artistes at a fraction of the price.

A real tough guy…and fully functional.

A small schoolhouse in the middle of a jungle with no electricity available. They beam in the lessons via satellite and use solar panels to power everything-pretty cool.

Zell

2007-10-19T10:04:00.001-07:00

A few years back we were supposed to go to Istanbul, but two weeks before departure a couple of British banks in Istanbul were bombed, prompting the State Dept. to issue travel warnings for Turkey. I thought that perhaps the war in Iraq was expanding and so didn’t dare take my, at the time, minor children and ended up on a European vacation instead. One of the places we dropped in to was Zell Germany, on the Mosel River-a great place and area that I would return to in a second.

Zell: Brendan is next to our car, a Skoda that we scratched up when I drove through the very narrow streets of a medieval town (Brodenbach) when I shouldn’t have-next time I'll learn how to read the traffic signs.

Cochem, down the road from Zell: There was a flea market and meeting hall here and the people were super friendly. The meeting hall was serving gluwein (a kind of mulled wine), cause that’s all they really have around here (wine that is). There was so much wine bottles were stacked on pallets along the highway. Notice the onion shaped dome on top of the church-kind of like Russian churches.

Zell: The little old pensioner driving this tiny car came into the restaurant where we were eating, had a beer and left. We then saw the car later on that night at the local winestube, the place was rocking and I thought it the place to be, but the daughter vetoed the idea, so we didn’t go in.

The Iron Artichoke

2007-10-16T16:14:00.000-07:00

I worked for a subsidiary of the gas and electric utility in San Francisco that for some reason had to move away from the mother ship and so decided on a move to Portland OR. In due time a beautiful building was designed and built on the Willamette River. To commemorate this move and a recent pipeline project, a sculpture was commissioned at apparently great expense. As soon as the conceptual renderings for the piece were passed around this thing was dubbed the ‘Iron Artichoke’. After the Iron Artichoke was completed but before it could be sited in front of he new building in downtown Portland, the local planning commission found out that this would be the ‘art’ adorning the building and quickly decided it didn’t meet zoning requirements…or so the story goes. The Iron Artichoke was relegated to the hinterlands and ended up in front of the Spokane office building where it really did look like crap; eventually kind of fell apart, and finally disappeared.

One day we sort of got lost in the basement of the Portland building and walked into a room with hundreds of Iron Artichoke facsimiles (they look far better than the original) in rotting boxes that had never been handed out to those worthy enough. We all grabbed one and I’ve still got mine…why…I don’t know.

The dock

2007-10-16T10:15:00.000-07:00

I went out on Saturday to work on the dock and was right on time...except I got the wrong Saturday and no one was there-beautiful day though.

The kids on the dock at about 5 and 6. I'd almost forgotten how blond they were.

HiFi

2007-10-08T08:10:00.001-07:00

Since I am apparently an expert, how about another foray into ultra-nerdom…the world of the hifi geek. I enjoy a respectable hifi setup as much as the next guy, but…it is possible to go too far. If the photos weren’t available you wouldn’t believe it. Most of this stuff looks like lab equipment (basically is) and has an equivalent price tag.

This was the device used to animate the monster in ‘Young Frankenstein’…and it plays CDs too!

Hello!...now that is a horn…looks like an eardrum destructifier to me. No really, an over the top but beautiful piece of audio technology and I’ll bet it sounds great.

What planet are we on now? Check out the speaker cables-you could run about 230kV through those.

Many audiophiles have specially designed ‘listening rooms’…cool…if only I’d gone to med school.

I'm a (Nerd) God

2007-09-28T12:59:00.000-07:00

So much for the uber-cool downtown slickster persona. I was joking about the geek thing on this post...oy vey!...this is what you get for studying science in college-the ulitimate in nerdnisity. My daughter is a TA in the chemistry department at the local college and this will have to be kept secret so as not to discourage her nerd quest.

45% on the dumb and dorky scale-ouch!

Look at the Man

2007-09-21T10:26:00.000-07:00

He's sitting on the steps of St. Dominics church in San Franciso. I love the way he filters Cali and the west coast and SF through his Irish sensibility. It helps me to see the place in a different way. I used to go to SF about once a month for work and hang about in the Irish bar that he would drop in to when he was back in town, so one of the places I really miss in Cali.

It’s funny how things are-you listen to an album for 30 years, over and over, and then, finally one day, you hear what the man is saying.

Everything on this outstanding album is worth listening to, but the best tracks are ‘Listen to the Lion’, ‘Almost Independence Day’, and the title track-‘Saint Dominic's Preview’. To me he’s saying something about the time when the bank account goes up and the sense of self begins to flounder, perhaps, as a result. The time when you’ve acquired the things you thought you wanted and it’s still not good enough…all you see before you is the abyss. His solution seems to be: go back to what really makes you fulfilled, everything else is vanity and crap--not bad advice eh?

Saint Dominic's Preview

Chamois cleaning all the windows,
Singing songs about Edith Piaf's soul.
And I hear blue strings of "no regredior"
Across the street from Cathedral Notre Dame.

Meanwhile back in San Francisco
I try hard to make this whole thing blend,
As we sit upon this jagged story block
With you my friend.

And it's a long way to Buffalo.
It's a long way to Belfast city too.
And I'm hoping that Joyce won't blow the hoist
'Cause this time, they bit off more than they can chew.

As we gaze out on, as we gaze out on
As we gaze out on, as we gaze out on
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview

All the orange boxes are scattered
Against the Safeway Supermarket in the rain.
And everybody feels so determined
Not to feel anyone else's pain.

No one's making no commitments
To anybody but themselves,
Talkin' behind closed doorways,
Tryin' to get outside, get outside empty shells.

And for every cross-cuttin' country corner,
For every Hank Williams railroad train that cries,
And all the chains, badges, flags and emblems
And every strain on brain and every eye (?)

As we gaze out on, as we gaze out on
As we gaze out on, as we gaze out on
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview.

And the restaurant tables are completely covered.
The record company has paid out for the wine.
You got everything in the world you ever wanted
Right about now your face should wear a smile.

That's the way it all should happen
When you're in, when you're in the state you're in;
Have you got your pen and notebook ready?
I think it's about time, time for us to begin.

And we're over in a 52nd Street apartment,
Socializing with the winos too,
Just to be hip and get wet with the jet set.
But they're flying too high to see my point of view.

As we gaze out on, as we gaze out on
As we gaze out on, as we gaze out on
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview.

See them freedom marching,
Out on the street, freedom marching.
Saint Dominic's Preview.

The Walk to Pig Out

2007-09-05T14:39:00.000-07:00

The annual 'Pig Out in the Park' was happening all last week. Only a few blocks away with lots of greasy food, pretty good music and so on--something to do for an evening.

Lourdes-those Catholics really know how to build a pretty church. I'm not catholic, much less religious but I still attend mass here occasionally as it pleaseth my soul.

Nordstrom: You want a sweet little $500 sweater for the fall season-get it here.

The ever popular ode to greasy carnival food and the myth of abundance: The Pig Out in the Park. I don’t eat much meat so the whole thing struck me as a bit repulsive (I occasionally eat chicken or fish when feeling especially saucy or when someone else is paying, but fish etc. don’t have feelings, so it’s OK, sort of). My biggest impression from the whole affair was the stench of about 20 separate flavors of spent fry oil mingling through the air...pretty vile and ironic considering that the smell of food cooking is usually delightful.

I had to escape from that unpleasant fried oil smell, so I here am with my son’s friend in the beer garden trying, rather successfully, to act like an idiot. I thought the hand signal was ‘cool’, something I must have seen in ‘Wayne’s World’ or something…little did I know, I was actually invoking Satan…check it out here.

Here is the son-Brendan. He’s standing in front of some public art on the border of Riverfront Park. Like most art specified by bureaucrats, pretty lame stuff, but someone had the brilliant idea of putting tags on the runners with names of local area kids killed in the Iraq war-now it all means something. I'm thankful that he's here and not on one of those tags.

The cabins

2007-08-27T10:37:00.000-07:00

Trillium-I had the cabins painted to blend in to the surrounding forest-I guess it worked-it's one of my favourite places.

On the fridge in Trillium-apparently one of my kids has a sense of humor.

R.I.P: The original Das Boot.

If you look carefully in the foreground, you can see a rowboat-cum-flower pot. I‘m grateful it’s nowhere near the water. As you can see from the above and Das Boot II, we don't exactly break the bank when it comes to boating.

I remember being 4 years old or so, out on the water, while the ‘bailer’ was fast at work. Yes, this rowboat constantly leaked, a situation I couldn’t fathom. 'They' got me out on this thing at least once and I was duly terrified, as the survival instinct kicks in even at 4. All I could see was the boat sinking in front of my eyes, and the shoreline much too far away. This boat is where it belongs.

The other cabin-Honeysuckle. I prefer to keep things natural. Some of the trees are over 100 years old, so who I am to mess with that. I don't care for this 'defensible space' crap I see all around me. If the forest is so frightening that one is compelled to destroy it then perhaps a gated community in the surburbs is more appropriate. I'm not exactly a tree hugger; I like the term forest fascist.

The Dude

2007-08-06T10:05:00.000-07:00

I love the scene from ‘The Big Lebowski’ where ‘the Dude’ is shopping at the local grocer, in his bathrobe, while he pinches a carton of milk, and then sidles up to the checker with milk all over his lips--perfect! He sums up…he is dudeness. Something way down inside me really admires this guy--his lack of guile, simplicity, and complete disregard for the façade we all show to one another.

At this point in time, it’s not a matter of what I’m going to be when I grow up, that’s already been settled, but who or what I will be. I guess I need to believe that is still up for grabs. So, ‘the Dude’ pretty much does it for me, gives me goose bumps every time I see that scene from the movie. I’m thinking a cross between or perhaps inhabiting the space between ‘the Dude’ and someone like Henry Gieger would be good.

Les Paul and Mary Ford

2007-07-13T09:58:00.000-07:00

I always thought this guy made guitars or something…well, big surprise, I was a little off. He not only collaborated with Gibson on the most popular solid-body electric guitar design ever, a design that hasn’t changed much since 1952, he also sold over 20 million records in the early 50s with his wife, Mary Ford, and invented multi-track recording (for overdubbing and so on).

He is the only person to be in both the National Inventors Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Wow...he da man!

So, you can learn something from the tele, you just have to tune in to the right channel…see all about it here.

The Weathermakers…

2007-07-05T09:08:00.000-07:00

…r us. This is a good intro into the science and issues surrounding global warming. Most books focus on climatology and are a little dry as a result. The author of The Weathermakers is a biologist from Australia and discusses global warming in terms of affected species impacts (well, all species are eventually impacted). Australia, New Guinea, and Tasmania are rife with unique fauna and flora and provide a persuasive backdrop to his story. He and other scientists have been noting species movement to cooler zones since the 70’s, a trend that is only accelerating and will led to (additional) extinctions regardless of what we do in the short term. That’s right; we’ve already bought the farm in terms of significant and probably irreversible impacts: Glacier Park in MT-gone, the snows of Kilimanjaro-gone, and so on. This is even if man-made releases of green house gases were to stop today.

This along with Global Warming: The Complete Briefing by John Houghton are the two most user friendly I've read and a good place to start.

Seksmisja

2007-07-03T15:09:00.000-07:00

My kids frequent the movie library at the local university and come home with the wildest stuff.

Seksmisja is better known in these parts by the lurid and suggestive english title, Sexmission. This classic of Polish cinema is a weird combo of comedy and sci-fi and is, in fact, the most popular movie ever made in Poland (honest, it said so on the DVD cover).

Albert and Maksymilian agree to be frozen and returned to life after a period of three years as part of a science experiment. In the meantime, WWIII breaks out and they are forgotten until sometime in the future, when they are revived by the League of Women’s Lib. It turns out they are the only two men left on earth (the women have developed a form of parthenogenesis so men are unnecessary). So, these guys think they're going to get real lucky and some of the women seem interested, but the league eventually decides that, for them to live, they must dispense with their…uh…‘manhood’…all of it. Being two red blooded males in the prime of their lifes, they of course refuse…and escape…you’ll have to see the movie to discover what happens next (not a huge surprise, but why give it all away.

Personally, I was entralled during the entire film...you just never know.

Books

2007-06-27T14:26:00.000-07:00

From the latest copy of The Inlander, here is an except from the commencment address David McCullough gave at UConn in 1999. This story could be almost be a mantra for my life, sort of.

"My message is in praise of the greatest of all avenues to learning, to wisdom, adventure, pleasure, insight, to understanding human nature, understanding ourselves and our world and our place in it.

I rise on this beautiful morning, here in this center of learning to sing again the old faith in books. In reading books. Reading for life, all your life.

Nothing ever invented provides such sustenance, such infinite reward for time spent as a good book.

Thomas Jefferson told John Adams he could not live without books. Adams, who through a long life read more even and more deeply than Jefferson and who spent what extra money he ever had on books, wrote to Jefferson at age 79 of a particular set of books he longed for on the lives of the saints, all 47 volumes.

... Once upon a time in the dead of winter in Dakota territory, with the temperature well below zero, young Theodore Roosevelt took off in a makeshift boat, accompanied by two of his ranch hands, downstream on the Little Missouri River in chase of a couple of thieves who had stolen his prized row boat. After days on the river, he caught up and got the draw on them with his trusty Winchester, at which point they surrendered. Then, after finding a man with a team and a wagon, Roosevelt set off again to haul the thieves cross-country to justice. He left the ranch hands behind to tend to the boat, and walked alone behind the wagon, his rifle at the ready. They were headed across the snow-covered wastes of the Badlands to the rail head at Dickinson, and Roosevelt walked the whole way, 40 miles. It was an astonishing feat, what might be called a defining moment in that eventful life. But what makes it especially memorable is that during that time, he managed to read all of Anna Karenina.

I often think of that when I hear people say they haven't time to read. "

So, next time you find that dusty and forlorn copy of Anna Karenina or its kind, no excuses.

Todd

2007-06-22T12:08:00.000-07:00

Todd: I used to play this LP constantly when I was a teenager; so much so that my original copy is pretty much worn out. It's a great mix of, among other things, proto-electronica weirdness, Hendrix-esque guitar pieces, and lush ballads. On CD you can listen to the whole thing at once, as opposed to the double LP that necessitated a lot of flipping, so a big improvement. My favorites, then and now are the ballads, as sweet and sincere as they get. I mean, this was one sweet guy, the man who actually raised Liv Tyler and is still her ‘first’ dad to this day.

I Think You Know

The visitors were never seen
They missed my monologue between
But I think you know
The letters came, the letters went
The last reply was never sent
But I think you know
I cant explain whats in my brain
That tells me where to go
But I think you know

For I would draw a diagram
To signify the things I am
But I think you know
And in the end it all boils down
A useless bit of running round
cause I think you know
And love I send to you my friend
But never tell you so
But I think you know

His...and His Trucks

2007-06-20T12:53:00.000-07:00

Actually, I’m told the vehicles are called pickups in these parts. The his and his thing; a joke that sounds about right for the occasion. It goes like this: since our mum’s went to school together, I’ve known Gavin since we were in diapers. Our lives have paralleled and diverged over the years and now they’re back on the parallel. We’ve been both divorced in the last few years, living and hanging out downtown, blah, blah blah…

So, I have my p/u in town and find out he’s moving to another place and I go over to help. I knew he had a junky yellow truck but never paid much attention to it until I got it alongside my junky blue truck. As you can see from the photo, they’re identical! Too funny--we haven’t come to a conclusion on which is in worse shape-almost a point of pride as trucks/pick-ups aren’t supposed to be pretty, after all. I dumped mine in a ditch a couple of weeks ago, got pulled out, and drove off with not a (noticeable) scratch, to the p/u that is.

Check out the great place he’s moving into. I used to walk by it almost every day as it’s around the corner and visible from the house I lived in-a place I’d rather forget. Gav keeps on saying he has too many memories here and it’s time to move on to Seattle or something. He may be right…

The good ole' days?

2007-06-19T12:45:00.000-07:00

1956: In the fields near my hometown of Fresno in the San Joaquin Valley of California, a farm worker is forced to stand naked while being sprayed with DDT. The photographer was later arrested for 'documenting' such treatment.

Sweet Dreams, Sadie

2007-06-13T10:07:00.000-07:00

Sadie had been dumped by someone near my place at Newman Lake and was sort of taken in by one of the neighbors. Eventually Sadie became the neighborhood dog and everyone fed her and so on. Unfortunately, no one took responsibility and she usually had no place to go on cold winter nights. When I was out at the lake, especially in winter, she would show up, eat, and stay for awhile and then leave, not seeming to mind the cold. Sadie seemed to do OK but as she got older I became concerned for her well-being. I would have brought her back to Spokane but at the time I traveled a lot and wasn’t home enough to care for her. So, when a friend mentioned that she wanted a dog I knew exactly what to do. We zoomed out to Newman. Sadie was waiting as usual, jumped into the car and laid down in the back. It was like she had been waiting to come home...at last...all this time...

The friend had a fence put up around her place and Sadie took to it and her instantly and vice a versa. Sadie seemed very relaxed and content in her new home, but oddly lethargic. Then one day, about 6 weeks after Sadie moved in, she collapsed and was taken to the clinic. Sadie was terminal, suffering from cancer that had metastasized throughout her body. My friend was devastated; I was also shocked but grateful that this kind and devoted creature had a few comfortable weeks at the end.

The vase

2007-06-10T19:42:00.000-07:00

Another creation by Chris Kelsey; I particularly like the way he uses bone ash as the outer layer of glaze to achieve the wrinkly effect. It reminds of something really ancient; something you might find during an archeological dig. Pieces of this type always sell quickly so I asked if he could make more just like it. He informed me that the effect is not exactly reproducible and comes out differently each time, often disastrously, part of the charm I guess. Anyway, one day a friend and I were looking at a similar piece and she asked “what do you put in it…flowers?” He gave us this contemptuous look that read something like ‘you soulless philistines, how dare you presume to debase this work of art…’ but after a pause finally said “it’s fine the way it is, nothing goes in it”. Oops--and that settled that.

I had never cared much for pottery, always thought it kind of a lesser art. A while back I started frequenting the Trackside Studio where Mark Moore and Chris Kelsey create and display. Now…well…as you can see from the photo…pottery is way cool.

Indirect Reflection

2007-06-07T10:36:00.000-07:00

Here is another painting by Tom the Artist; from his ‘Indirect Reflection’ series. He tries to explain to me how, what, and why he does what he does, and sometimes...I understand some of what he says-bonus!

Talkie Walkie and the Totem Arro

2007-06-05T16:30:00.000-07:00

I scored a great deal on a pair of the waif-ish Totem Arros and started playing some of my favorite CDs. They all sounded pretty good as the Arros put out a huge soundstage, but then I got to Air’s Talkie Walkie from 2004. It had always sounded somewhat cutesy before, I mean, they’re French guys after all. But now, I’m totally floored…c’est fantastique! I finally realize why they named themselves Air. They throw out dense, swirling layers of sound that are at the same time totally ethereal; I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything quite like it. It is similar to what Roxy Music achieved with the 1982 release of Avalon but with significantly improved recording and playback technology that allows one to really hear the skill and craft these guys put into their music.

French Pop + French (Canadian) speakers = a sonic revelation...an aural ephiphany..."wonderful, wonderful, and yet again wonderful".

ArtFest/ElkFest

2007-06-04T15:56:00.001-07:00

A piece from local potter Chris Kelsey's 'Origins' series. From the photo, you can't see the glazing inside the egg-like things but the piece is fantastic--this guy is good.

Public art on Riverside Ave.

My daughter Kerry and friend Tom, formerly known as 'The Artist'; neither cared for the raucous and overly crowded Elk. Actually, Tom IS a very fine artist (he did the fab Lake Painting and this gem). We both carried cameras and I was fascinated by his skill or talent in composing shots. That 'creative vision' thing again.

A Quote

2007-05-31T15:31:00.000-07:00

I borrowed this from The Naked Soul (great blog, check it out) as it just kind of fit how I felt today-so here you go:

“People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.”

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Do Si Do

2007-05-31T10:39:00.001-07:00

Here is a photo of Gram (Caryl Byrne) and one of her good friends ‘Red’ doing what they did best. The local paper reprints old photos from their archive and this one happened to show up. I requested any other photos of my grandmother and father the paper may have and they found about 20; but they wanted $50 a pop for each photo-ouch! Anyway, I knew Red pretty well from my time living with gram as he would often visit with his partner ‘Frenchy’ and I though them both very distinguished, if a bit odd, gentlemen.

The Gav...

2007-05-30T13:48:00.001-07:00

...does it again. So there I am at Huckleberry’s waiting for one of my best friends to show so we can have a talk and a ‘juice of the day’ (yea…we are really tough guys, so watch out) and he rolls up on this monstrous thing. Hello!...is it just a reaction to the mid-life crisis or a very shrewd move; only time will tell and I’m betting on the latter.

The Fish

2007-05-30T13:29:00.000-07:00

My daughter gave me the fish and water plant for Christmas since she thought I should have 'something alive’ in my place. So OK, now I have a lovely fish that I dote on…really! Even though being confined to a vase seems cruel and unusual, the fish appears to be thriving. A friend who is also a vet told me that the fish would live two years at most and my thought was ‘it’s a miracle this thing is alive at all’ as I keep things a bit cool during the winter. Did I name my pet? Of course, its name is ‘The Fish’.

Tortillaphilia

2007-05-29T15:08:00.000-07:00

Tortillaphilia-what will he think of next? Remi’s latest blog is all about the tortilla…in Spokane! Being an unrepentant tortillaphiliac myself, a site like this is manna from heaven. I grew up in Cali, so of course I have an excuse for being a tortilla junkie. Remi is from Norway and has no similar excuse; he is simply a genuine cosmopolite and absolutely correct about De Leon Foods-the revolution begins there.

Only in the USA

2007-05-29T12:40:00.000-07:00

Where else do we obsessively stay the course…thumb our collective noses at global warming, etc?

Where else in the world can one see a fridge, in the middle of summer (almost), on a street corner, dispensing ‘the official soft drink of NASCAR’...nice touch, eh?

The hidden hand, the 'genius' of the marketplace at work I suppose, don’t really get it….but, hey…it’s been fun...

The KYRS Outhouse and Receiving Station

2007-05-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

The juxtaposition of KYRS and an outhouse is in no way meant to demean a very fine community radio station. It’s just that I will do anything to receive the signal during weekends in the country. Note the antenna attached to the outhouse; in order to receive the weak 50 watt KYRS signal at Newman Lake in hi-fi, drastic measures must be taken...finally...the outhouse is good for something.

See the original post about KYRS for more info.

The Fast Runner...

2007-05-20T20:46:00.001-07:00

...is the first and only film made in the Inuit language. Using an old Inuit folk tale as the basis for the plot, it is a stunning, almost surreal, and superbly crafted film about the lives and ancient culture of these incredible people. Popular culture has silly notions about the Eskimos and their existence on the ice and snow, but to see the reality is a shocker...I mean, where is the nearest Safeway? At times I have this conceit that my life is tough-what a joke…it’s just a game I play. The Inuit hardly seem miserable, quite the opposite, but they do lead very strenuous and difficult lives. Me--I go to the grocer and can’t decide what fruit or veggie to eat that day--the Inuit eat raw meat, when they’re lucky.

Imagine a life living in a house made of ice…impossible (for me at least)…watch this great film and see for the first time what it’s really like.

Herzog

2007-04-20T16:18:00.000-07:00

Moses Herzog: Self-absorbed middle aged intellectual goes through mid-life crisis. Hey—that’s me!...with the exception of the intellectual part. No, really, this is a modern classic and a great book to discuss with friends (self-absorbed middle aged pseudo-intellectuals like myself...you know...birds of a feather etc). Anyway...Herzog ponders at length such weighty topics as 'how should a man live his life in the modern world'. Fair enough question, don’t you think?

Moshe spends his time writing letters he never sends, tries to exorcize the demon of a disastrous marriage to a beautiful, but uh…difficult woman, and finally finds himself (yea!) while at his wonderful, but semi-abandoned and derelict house in the country.

Wow! I think it’s time for a retreat, of sorts.

Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

2007-04-09T14:00:00.000-07:00

Once you tire of the ‘coffee shops’ etc, try the Van Gogh Museum. When I used to think of Van Gogh, it was of his out of this world mature style-the sunflower series, Starry Night, self portraits. Until I visited the Van Gogh Museum, I had no idea how much effort went into developing the style that we’re all familiar with. This man was not just a nutty creative savant who whipped this stuff out …he worked his ass off! The process of how he arrived at his highly articulated creative vision is fascinating and all on display in more or less chronological order in the museum. In the span of 8 years of intense labor, he progressed through a multitude of differing styles, until arriving at Arles primed to create the masterpieces he is known for, just 2 years before the end of his life.

Started painting at 27, dead at 37. Perhaps prozac would have helped, then again, Starry Night may then have looked like something done by Thomas Kinkade.

Another monkey story

2007-04-01T16:03:00.000-07:00

I look at this and ask myself…what were you thinking of? My normally discriminating taste in objets d’art was apparently absent the day I spied it. Well, the artist was a cool guy who was really putting it out there, something that should be encouraged, right? So, I wanted to support him in his quest and thought I should get something and the monkey pic was the least expensive painting he had on display. At the time I thought it was great...oy vey!

I suppose I’ll put it next to the family portraits at the lake place.

Mi Familia

2007-03-30T09:59:00.000-07:00

Here is dad, the grandfather, sis, gram with doggie, my very lovely mum, and me at 10 or so (in a rare shot of manual labor). My little brother is missing as he hadn't been made yet.

My grandparents would plant a fruit tree for each of the grandchildren in their backyard. Mine was a cherry tree that was massacred by an over-zealous pruner when I was 20-haven’t felt the same since.

craigslist

2007-03-16T09:38:00.000-07:00

craigslist, just a bulletin board…simple, direct, and utterly brilliant. You need to move to Amsterdam for six months-find an apartment here. You have a junk fetish-satisfy it here. My favorite section is the best of craigslist. Ranging from the hilarious to rants (…from a UPS driver), mawkish, I’ve so been there stories (The Perfect Craigslist Girl, Or So I Thought), oddities, lots of oddities (My Turtle Needs A Booty Call), and instruction guides (Advice to Young Men from an Old Man), all written by people far more clever than myself. The only downside is that it takes so long to update the best of list that I run out of things to read.

Only in Finland

2007-03-15T09:50:00.000-07:00

A church built within a huge rock—wow! The Temppeliaukion Kirrko or ‘Rock Church’ was built in 1969 out of a block of solid granite. I’ve never been but now I know where to go if I should ever find myself in Helsinki. It’s suposed to have great acoustics-think Laser Floyd on an aurora borealis kind of night.

Silbury Hill

2007-02-26T15:30:00.000-08:00

Silbury Hill, Wiltshire. About 5,000 years old and no one knows who built it or why. They do know how—with chalk blocks formed with deer antlers and moose shoulder blades—incredible. Archeologists calculate it took 18 million man-hours to create. We climbed to the top and looked around-pretty cool. When we go back to the car park Kerry wanted to take a picture of a lovely Alfa-Romero and instead of ‘pressing the button’ inadvertently opened the camera and exposed all the film. I yelled at her and then we both felt bad. The End.

Private Dancer

2007-02-26T12:44:00.000-08:00

From the recent copy of "The Word". File under 'why didn't I think of that?' Perhaps it would give me something to do on Friday nights.

Monkey Attack!

2007-02-26T07:34:00.000-08:00

...a tale, told by an idiot, signifying...nothing...but monkeys...

We stay in an old gatehouse near Bath and the proprietor is very kind and spends a lot of time talking to me about where we are going etc on our UK trip. Since my traveling companions are an 11 and 12 year old, the itinerary has to be somewhat kid friendly, so I tell him we’re going to drive through Longleat Animal Park. He becomes very specific at this point and said, ‘do not drive into the monkey enclosure’. So, OK. We get there and drive through the place, the kids like it, and then we get to the gate of the monkey enclosure, which is plastered with all these warnings and disclaimers. I figure, hey, we’re on vacation and they’re just monkeys, what could they possibly do? So, we go in, the monkeys all rush to the car and jump on and I’m thinking they’re friendly little buggers. As we're watching the monkeys one jumps on the hood, removes the little plastic device that directs windshield wash water and pops it into his mouth! The little ******* are eating the car! I’m thinking, oh no, it’s a rental! The kids start screaming and I pop the car into gear and screech out of there. Once we were safe, got out to inspect the damage: 3/8” deep tooth marks on all the high-impact (and hard) plastic pieces of the car, some were chewed up completely and everything removable was gone.

Apparently, monkeys, even small ones, are not to be trifled with. Some just have to learn the hard way...a wise person out there invented rental insurance for people just like me--thank you.

Andrew Wyeth

2007-02-16T14:56:00.000-08:00

‘Christina’s World’ was completed in 1948 and hangs in the MOMA in New York. I have a copy hanging in my office and I’m repeatedly fascinated by the way this painting captures an essence. So much is said, but so much is also left to the imagination...in short, a wonderful painting by one of the greats of the last century.

LA Story

2007-02-16T14:36:00.000-08:00

Nobody (guys that is) likes a chick-flick, since most are mediocre and not really worth watching. I’m no exception. To be fair, most movies are mediocre, just ‘product’ and not film. But, every so often, a romance comes along that hits the mark, and when it’s good, it’s the best! LA Story is one such film. Up there with the likes of ‘A Room With a View’, ‘Moonstruck’, and the BBC version of ‘Pride and Prejudice’, it is one great movie.

Tucson

2007-01-31T11:46:00.000-08:00

Spent last week in Tucson, it snowed (bummer) and then I broke my camera by dropping it on the marble floor of the hotel lobby (total bummer). Other than that, it was great!

Seven Devils, Idaho

2006-12-28T16:42:00.000-08:00

I like this pic of the kids-it was taken about 5 years ago.

Situated between the Salmon and Snake Rivers in west central Idaho, the Seven Devils offer high alpine hiking that is second to none. Really steep and difficult hiking at times, it is one of the most incredible places I’ve ever been. This stark and austere environment is something you cannot appreciate unless you experience it firsthand.

Drive to the campground at about 8,000 feet and go up from there. While we were up on the 3-mile-wide bench that forms the Seven Devils high country, a goat followed us for about 30 minutes; it must have been looking for food, but a strange occurrence in a strange place nonetheless. As we were up on the ‘bench’ a storm looked like it was headed our way and I thought I could hear it screaming towards us-like something out of a movie. So there I am, totally mesmerized by it all and two A-10 war planes come roaring from behind one of the peaks-impressive, but the spell was broken.

The Lofty

2006-12-27T09:45:00.000-08:00

Why sleep on the floor when you can recline on the stainless steel ‘Lofty’. They have got to be kidding, I mean, it looks great, but aren’t humans supposed to use these things for relaxation? Form follows….nothing? It's enough to make me lose faith in nihilism.

Window Drops

2006-12-21T14:26:00.000-08:00

Window Drops-a great idea! Just imagine what you could do with a large window to make it more interesting, especially on those gray winter days. Each set includes eight drops of various shapes and sizes The largest drop measures 5" x 2.5"; smallest drop is 2". All for just $13.

P.S. They suck! They don't look like the photo and won't stay on the window.

Time Out

2006-12-16T09:35:00.000-08:00

One of those great French films that break down barriers and show us a portrait of domestic middle-class life that is instantly recognizable. After an education and life spent immersed in a somewhat chauvinistic Anglo-American mindset, where the culture of Latin Europe is almost completely ignored or at best downplayed, to see a portrait of life so familiar, here on the frontier of the western world in Spokane WA, is a revelation.

Time Out is the story of Vincent, a consultant/bureaucrat type…etc who loses his position and cannot bring himself to tell his family. The film examines the interlude between positions and the evasions and turmoil of Vincent's life. One of my favorite scenes is of Vincent walking, in the dark, along the outside of the building housing his old firm, watching his former colleagues give presentations and so on. I guess one has to walk in those shoes to know what it feels like. You may feel like your work is dull and repetitious at times, but when seen from the outside, it seems like everything.

This film has an emotional honesty and resonance not typically seen in your typical Hollywood production. Again, to feel that this person could be me from a culture I’ve always been taught to regard as so foreign, so yesteryear, gives the lie as to our supposed dissimilarities. The makers of this film are depicting a world of values and practices more true to my own than almost all the homegrown crap I’ve seen lately. Crap that at times meets its goal of providing entertainment, but doesn’t enlighten. Time Out does just that.

La Evolución

2006-12-08T13:36:00.000-08:00

Way cool lighting…when can I get it at Target???

La Evolución provides an exceptional lighting experience to enhance the ambience of a living or work space. These wall-mounted light panels measuring 50×50 cms can be used as single units or can be clustered together to create a striking strip of light. The panels are available in primary basic colors or bearing works of contemporary artists, designers and photographer to create distinctive panels. The light panels are hand-moulded and the surface is polished crystal-clear composite resin.

Atomised

2006-12-07T10:30:00.000-08:00

“…all you touch and all you see is all your life will ever be…” Pink Floyd ‘Talk to Me’

I used to sort of believe that, but it wasn’t good enough…it seems as if too many of us are just wasting away in this so-called paradise. Except it’s just a vision of paradise for the many and ends up being a living hell. Not the gut wrenching reality of medieval life, the ‘vale of tears’, but a separateness…a hell with no explanation, no closure, no meaning. Such is the world we have inherited. Lo and behold, miracle of miracles, this is the document that attempts to tell all. After reading this, I am all a quiver with hopefulness and dread. Such is life…this book gets right to the soul of our modern dilemma....society's listlessness as it slips away in a sea of boredom inversely proportionate to our materialism and diminishing fundamental values or belief's in anything. It is a sophisticated and unsparing look at where we're headed.

A good read and translation, full of laughs but deadly serious--highly recommended. I first came across it while reading the top ten lists in The Guardian. Purchased it used on Amazon as it apparently hasn’t been published in the USA. Atomised and Houellebecq are the most thought provoking pair I've met in many a moon. I mean, who would have thought that John Paul II was right all along! I certainly never did, until now. I am confused.

Donkey Island, Spokane River...

2006-11-09T15:57:00.000-08:00

...is closed for the season. Remember the island where Pinocchio was sent with all the bad boys and they were turned into donkeys and then shipped off to the salt mines, well, this is a different Donkey Island. The one you've never heard of and it's right on the Centennial Trail. It's a very cool place, but the lagoons (it's not really an island most of the year) contain PCBs, so don't eat the sediments. In a month or two, it will all be cleaned and then, you can eat all the sediments you please.

Gramps

2006-11-06T18:22:00.001-08:00

The first guy to climb the Matterhorn in oxfords…just kidding, and I didn’t dare call him Gramps, he was the Grandfather. Kind of old school, one might say, he was of the ‘children are best seen and not heard’ crowd. From my vantage point now, can’t say that I disagree. He retired at 40, so he could ‘travel’. How, you may ask, does one do that? Since I not only missed that boat, but didn’t even know the boat had docked--can’t really say.

So, he was mostly gone, usually with ‘Gram’ (she was much more user friendly; a lovely and amazing woman). When I would go with my parents on one of our infrequent trips out of the county or to New York, they would meet us for a few days, which I always thought was very cool and a good way to spend time with Gramps. I could never quite figure out the ‘what are they doing in, say, Montreal the very week that we’re there?’ thing. Seemed like magic at the time--Gramps, you were one of a kind, at least in my book, and the walk up that mountain must have been killer.

West Riverside

2006-11-05T18:07:00.000-08:00

Call me trashy and reactionary-there is no sight as majestic in this town...

Senmut? Helloooo...and I'm told that I'm odd?

A modified Corinthian with an Indian head...what will they think of next?

...and of course, the lion motif-ever popular and it always works.

Thank you Mary, for such a pleasant street.

First Friday

2006-11-05T17:40:00.000-08:00

Kolva-Sullivan Gallery/Trackside Studio, W. Adams St.

The lovely and elusive Miss Kerry.

Every first Friday of the month, all the galleries in downtown Spokane are open and the artists are typically available for discussion. Most of the time, it's hard to get to know such people, but on a day like this, it's all out there-really, really fun. Shown is a pic of the Kolva-Sullivan Gallery/Trackside Studio on South Adams. Being a shameless consumer (something I apparently choose to pass on to my children), I had Kerry pick out a piece of pottery. The child has good taste! The piece was exquisite but had unfortunately been previously purchased. As I stood around the gallery, I noticed others eyeing the same piece. Anyway, she choose something else and now, she has become an ART COLLECTOR. The tradition of pretentious consumerism is passed along-it’s all good.

Newman

2006-11-03T11:17:00.000-08:00

Funny-all these posts about water lately, must be some kind of Jungian thing. Anyway, since so many posts refer to water/Newman, here you have it.

Upriver

2006-10-24T14:42:00.000-07:00

What I do for fun during the day…today we (Ecology did the press release) had a ‘major media’ event at the Upriver Dam PCB Sediments site. All the TV stations and the paper were there. Ecology and the Dept. of Health guys did most of the talking. I wasn’t interviewed which was good as I was having a bad hair week (never date your hairstylist and then don’t call back AND then go back for another cut, the result, as they say, is entirely predictable).

So, the intent is to cap the PCB sediments near the north bank of the river using an enormous ‘long stick’ excavator on a barge, which can be seen across the river in the photo. This is where I’ll be hanging out off and on for the next month or so.

Lake Painting

2006-10-24T14:35:00.000-07:00

One of my best buddies did this multi-media painting/creation for the cabin the other day. His family also had a cabin at Newman when he was growing up, so we’re both kind of sentimental about the place. The photo just shows a section of the piece and doesn’t do it much justice. It’s a really beautiful work that takes a while to grasp fully; everyone I show it to points out different elements that I had yet to notice. I still don’t get it. What I do know--definitely one of the coolest gifts I've ever received.

Das Boot

2006-10-16T13:46:00.000-07:00

From Fallingwater to The Boat…reality bites. The Boat has sailed the seven…er…three bays of Newman in splendid style-it just needs a little TLC at this point or something...maybe a torch. One big lesson I’ve learned from The Boat-never leave shore without a paddle.

Fallingwater

2006-10-13T13:49:00.000-07:00

Nice house, now it’s some kind of museum-I’ve heard the roof leaks due to design flaws-so what. A few pots and pans to catch the drips and some strategically placed Squirrel Trophy Heads-killer crib-I'll take it.

"Give me the luxuries of life and I willingly do without the necessities." -- Frank Lloyd Wright

Squirrel Trophy Head

2006-10-06T11:11:00.000-07:00

It seems as if the one of the main functions of the internet has been to provide a virtually unlimited consumerist smorgasbord catering to every known fetish and creating new ones along the way. For example, the squirrel trophy head available at Custom Creature Taxidermy Arts. No cottage is complete without one. I think I’ll get two.

Or how about 'bringing your cottage to life' with custom toilet seats.

Real Climate

2006-10-05T13:49:00.000-07:00

Real Climate is the real deal, the bona fide no-spin zone on climate change. It never ceases to amaze me just how sophisticated the mass media have become at propaganda. As a result, the populace as a whole have a distorted view of what is really happening when it comes to climate change. Perceptions are slowly changing as reality has a way of getting peoples’ attention, eventually. One of the favorite ploys of the media is to position a credible climate scientist against one of the quickly dwindling group of contrarian climate scientists and stage a kind of faux debate for the ‘benefit’ of the viewing public. The effect is to introduce far more confusion and uncertainty that actually exists-to mischaracterize and forestall a call to action on the part of the general public. Guess what-it’s all over except the tears.

If I hadn’t seen so many times how the mass media get it wrong I wouldn’t believe it either. At some point, one is faced with the realization that the media have an agenda and the agenda doesn’t have much to do with facilitating public debate on critical public policy issues...kind of makes you wonder what is really going on.

Remember the ozone depletion debate, how it raged in the media for a few years and then just...disappeared. Media coverage and the debate surrounding the issue disappeared due to the results of experiments based on the Rowland-Molina (both won the Nobel Prize for their work) model of ozone depletion in the upper atmosphere, an event the media covered poorly or not at all. Unfortunately, such decisive evidence is not available for an issue as complex as climate change. However, climate models are continually being refined and circumstantial evidence continues to accumulate. So much so that only a very few credible climate scientists are in the ‘change is not happening--or--there is nothing we can do about it anyway, so why bother’ camp. These are the folks you see on television.

So, if you’re interested in what mainstream climate scientists think about climate change, got to Real Climate. Then, go buy yourself a bicycle and get used to it.

Nuspirit Helsinki

2006-10-04T16:22:00.000-07:00

At first I thought it pretty much sucked. But after a few beers and some time spent meticulously tuning the hifi, I decided to try it again. Lo and behold-this is one great CD. I didn’t realize they even knew about jazz in Finland, but these guys do it all. One of the best jazzy/chill CDs I’ve heard in a long time. Oddly, though it was released in 2002, it seems to be out of print and only available used. Read what others have to say about it here.

The blue building

2006-10-02T13:55:00.000-07:00

This is the blue building, where I spend a lot of time. Completed in 1958, it has that Jetsons-like modern look to it. It was built during a period when people still believed in progress, in the modern as a way. Now, I don’t know…but we still have buildings like this to remind us of what once was.

Here is a pre-construction rendering of the blue building. It seems like there was so much optimism and hope for what the future held. I really like the boat pier on the river—hey!..we don’t need cars--just take the ferry. The reality: neither boat pier nor boats on this stretch of the river…seems strange. Anyway, I've really become attached to the place, it's almost 'homey' in a way. Sounds odd perhaps, but I've spent most of my life in schools and workplaces similar to the blue building; I've been institutionalized all my life and didn't even know it-at least they let me go home at night.

Gerona, Catalonia

2006-09-28T09:16:00.000-07:00

We arrive by plane from Brussels and the place looks just like my original home (San Joaquin Valley, California). Since I speak enough Spanish to get by it feels great to be there. We book a hotel for a couple of nights and then go to the nearest café for dinner. I get the menu…hello!...you’re not in Spain, you’re in Catalonia…they have their own language, which sounds like Spanish (or Castellano, as they call it) but ALL the words are different. I can’t read a word of the menu and my Spanish isn’t good enough to ask the waiter to translate from Catalan to Spanish. At least the waiter was kind enough to speak Spanish; a lot of the older folks would only speak Catalan. Given the history of the place, they're a bit touchy about their language and culture, rightfully so. Anyway, I’m reduced to pointing and not having a clue what I or the kids are ordering. The entrée comes: an egg, on a bed of rice, topped with ketchup…at least it’s recognizable. I’m thinking this must be some weird dish specific to this café. The next day as we're walking through this fantastic medieval city, I notice the entrées lined up at the café windows, and they all serve ketchup/eggs/rice--a local favorite.

One thing I thought very cool about the place is that the people, teenager and adult alike, promenade along the downtown streets before dinner (which isn't served until about 8). They are for the most part well scrubbed, well dressed, and a delight to watch, which is the whole point, I guess.

We were there during the Christmas holidays and I also noticed all these shops with signs that say ‘Bon Nadal’, which means something like ‘good birth’ in Catalan. So, I’m wondering, if they have so many maternity shops, where are all the infants? It takes me a few days before I realize that it’s the Catalan equivalent of Merry Christmas. Yep--just another dumb tourist.

Caverna del Diablo

2006-09-27T10:44:00.000-07:00

Mazatlan: The Devil's Cave used to hide soldiers guarding ammunition during the revolution. Now, during the crazy days of the annual pre-Lenten ‘Festival’ it serves as an overflow drunk tank—it’s so called because it ‘smells like the devil’. I took our driver's word for it.

It all starts with you

2006-09-26T10:32:00.000-07:00

So here I go from extolling the virtues of virtual consumerism on Amazon and hyping my favorite TV show to beating the drum about this radical anti-consumerist tract. How can two such divergent sentiments possibly co-exist? Perhaps I’m not just a consumer or a radical, but an armchair rad-sumer (that was supposed to be funny, in print it just looks stupid, oh well).

More relevant than ever, The Revolution of Everyday Life, written by Raoul Vaneigem in the late 60s, is a far easier read than the similair work by Debord, The Society of the Spectacle. It attempts to dissect the complex web of consumerism that we’re all caught up in and provide a few pointers to what an authentic life looks like in the face of such a sophisticated and effective onslaught—an onslaught that amounts to a commoditization of human life. Call him a leftist, pinko, or whatever, his call for a return to a more spiritual approach to life seems ironic but is not. I think it’s just an example of how we all yearn for the same things, regardless of the stories we tell ourselves.

4 8 15 16 23 42...

2006-09-25T11:59:00.000-07:00

...are the magic numbers.

I never watch TV, except when I do. Usually, I prefer to relax in the evenings with literature and classical music (on the radio at 88.7, KAGU, it just keeps on rolling). Now that may seem pretentious, but I’ve found that if you try hard enough, you actually become pretentious, and then it’s OK, sort of.

Enough of that…it turns out that watching a hit TV show on DVD is a splendid way to keep up. You can watch a whole season in a matter of days. I find the pacing of a weekly TV show interesting as it’s so different from a movie, and something you don’t really notice until you watch the TV show like a movie, a really long, digressive movie. An unfair comparison perhaps: a movie has about 2 hours to wrap everything up, a TV series keeps on rolling until the ad $$ dry up.

Lost is kind of like a cross between Mysterious Island, The Magus, and Survivor (with guns). With one cliffhanger after another, all you have to do is click to the next episode to see the (partial) resolution. I’m totally hooked, but after 25-30 episodes of season 1 and now most of season 2, I’m getting a little bit itchy as to what it’s all about. I mean, how can long can they string this thing out? The downside of watching via DVD is that the next set of DVDs is a year away, so you forget a lot about the show.

Never buy from Amazon…

2006-09-22T08:02:00.000-07:00

…fooled ya, I buy loads of stuff, always from the Amazon marketplace. With almost anything, but especially with the likes of CDs and books, the Amazon marketplace is the place to shop. The marketplace is a clearinghouse for a zillion independent sellers worldwide of your favorite items, usually at a huge discount. I purchased a CD from Argentina once and it came in 3 days-how do they do that? After 20-30 or so purchases I’ve only had a couple of bad deals: one from the Amazon warehouse, a double CD that was missing a disk and the other a book that had the correct cover but was a different book inside (the book only cost about $1 plus shipping, so whatever).

TV on the Radio

2006-09-22T07:32:00.000-07:00

...are pretty weird and take a lot of getting used to, but it's time well spent. Totally original, I've never heard anything quite like them. I think I prefer the last release Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes just because I'm used to it now. Their latest album Return to Cookie Mountain continues the weirdness. Nothing is quite as odd as the sound of the first song-great lyrics though-sort of like a sympathy card to someone...

Ivan Illich

2006-09-13T14:54:00.000-07:00

You’re about 20, in school, taking philosophy courses here and there, and just not getting it. And every so often, the instructor assigns a book that, well, you still don’t get but somehow never forget. Illich’s Tools for Conviviality is one such book.

He prose can be relatively dense and difficult to decipher, but not always:

‘I believe that a desirable future depends on our deliberately choosing a life of action over a life of consumption, on our engendering a lifestyle which will enable us to be spontaneous, independent, yet related to each other, rather than maintaining a lifestyle which only allows to make and unmake, produce and consume - a style of life which is merely a way station on the road to the depletion and pollution of the environment. The future depends more upon our choice of institutions which support a life of action than on our developing new ideologies and technologies. (Illich 1973a: 57)’

Yea-he's the man-pick up a used copy at Amazon or read more about him here.

---"Man must choose whether to be rich in things or in the freedom to use them” Ivan Illich

La Puerca Gigante

2006-09-02T06:41:00.000-07:00

Kerry got a piglet that was oh so cute, until it grew and grew and grew…I’m told that it’s small as far as pigs go-hello!...it’s huge. It has a name, but I call it in my fractured Spanish ‘La Puerca Gigante’ for obvious reasons. Kerry says it looks like a really fat dog running around the yard; I think mini-hippo is closer to the mark. When this thing is barreling through the yard, you stay out of the way, way out.

El Gallo Giro

2006-09-01T18:28:00.000-07:00

If you like Mexican food, this is the place. I could eat here everyday, and sometimes I do. Here you have taco truck authenticity in a sit down setting.

I especially like the self-serve salsa bar, as it's the best salsa bar in town and one of the best I've seen anywhere. Today they had guacamole, carrots, salsa fresca, salsa roja, salsa verde, mild salsa, a fresh chipolte salsa (the best of the lot), and a pickled jalapeno/onion mix. It changes from day to day; some days they’ll have a fresh jalapeno/onion/cilantro mix or a genuine habanero salsa (really, really spicy, so be careful, but oh so good!).

They are located on the corner of 3rd and Freya, attached to the gas station.

The plastic building...

2006-09-01T17:37:00.001-07:00

…is where I live during the week. Some people don’t like it ‘cause it doesn’t fit in with the historic architecture on West Riverside--they do have a point. Taken by itself though, I think it’s magnificent and very cool. A splendid example of 70’s architecture and a building Spokane loves to hate. My daughter Kerry took the second pic to contrast the dark exterior with the flood of light within.

Yesterday Kerry took me down the stairs to the west of the building that lead the way into Peaceful Valley, an old, quaint neighborhood on the river. There were homeless kids (actually young adults, I suppose) living in the woods along the stairway. When we went back to the plastic building it felt very peculiar that they were in the woods and we were ‘safe’ in this plastic citadel.

ee cummings

2006-08-30T14:10:00.000-07:00

Since he was in all the grammar school literature texts due to his way with punctuation and spelling, I always thought he was a poet for children and didn't think much about his work. Until I came across this…like all great poetry, it operates in that sublime space beyond words. How can one speak of the essence of love except in such a way?

[somewhere i have never travelled]

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain, has such small hands

PostSecret

2006-08-30T10:10:00.000-07:00

You just know it's true...

PostSecret is a site I keep going back to. It’s updated once a week on Sundays. I feel a little voyeuristic when I read other peoples’ secrets; I just can’t seem to help myself. Some are funny, like the one above, some are really sad, and some are creepy.

PostSecret is a weblog that asks people to submit 4-by-6-inch postcards that contain anonymous secrets. The postcards are scanned and placed on the website.

In the words of the PostSecret bloggers: “Each secret can be a regret, hope, funny experience, unseen kindness, fantasy, belief, fear, betrayal, erotic desire, feeling, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything - as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before".

Yea-as if anyone could resist checking it out.

Towering Above the Rest

2006-08-21T15:27:00.000-07:00

Radiohead-Towering Above the Rest is 186 tracks spanning the length of 10 cds of rarities, live performances, promos, demos, b-sides, and other assorted hard to find tracks. Covers and collaborations range from Glen Campbell to The Posies, Carly Simon to Michael Stipe.

My kids somehow downloaded this onto their iPod, apparently the only way to get it--you can’t buy it anywhere. The originality, playfulness, and breadth of styles is, well, shocking. I just never had a clue these guys were this good. This isn't top of the pops-but way beyond-pop music as Zen. I really enjoy the latter studio albums by Radiohead, but after hearing what this band is really about, the studio albums seem narrowly focused and a bit tame—probably at the direction of their record label (Capitol) to ensure a palatable mass market 'product' and mega-million sales figures.

Now, it’s becoming clear why the record companies are so adamant about controlling downloads—their marketing and distribution model is irretrievably broken. What once appeared as breach in a dike is actually a tidal wave of musical creativity that won’t be stopped or controlled.

Bukowski

2006-08-16T13:17:00.000-07:00

Bukowski…the uninhibited bachelor: drunk, slobby, anti-social, vulgar, utterly free, and possibly the best American poet of the 20th century. I watched a movie the other day where one of the characters said the secret words of life were ‘be present’. Bukowski was the only poet I got as a young adult (yea--so I was a bit slow when it came to such things) probably because he was so present and direct, as Bono says in the documentary ‘Bukowski: Born Into This’ he went to the bone, the marrow of the bone with his direct style.

He didn’t even start writing poetry until he recovered from a life threatening illness in his 30’s, but continued to work as a postal clerk to pay the bills. It wasn’t until he was 49 that he started writing full time. As he explained in a letter at the time, "I have one of two choices -- stay in the post office and go crazy ... or stay out here and play at writer and starve. I have decided to starve.”

Be Kind

we are always asked
to understand the other person's
viewpoint
no matter how
out-dated
foolish or
obnoxious.

one is asked
to view
their total error
their life-waste
with
kindliness,
especially if they are
aged.

but age is the total of
our doing.
they have aged
badly
because they have
lived
out of focus,
they have refused to
see.

not their fault?

whose fault?
mine?

I am asked to hide
my viewpoint
from them
for fear of their
fear.

age is no crime

but the shame
of a deliberately
wasted
life

among so many
deliberately
wasted
lives

is.

Charles Bukowski

Spo-Tropolis

2006-08-15T08:31:00.000-07:00

Just a portion of the Spokane skyline—hey, it’s a real city! Finally, the downtown area has come back-new restaurants, lofts, condos, etc..it’s a wonderful sight. Starting with the Ron Wells/Avista project at the Steam Plan, Riverpark Square, and the fabulous remodeling job on the Davenport, downtown Spokane hasn’t had it so good in many years. With gas heading towards $5/gallon, living downtown is starting to look like a really good idea.

Tortilleria y Tienda de Leon

2006-08-10T11:19:00.000-07:00

Finally, a tortilla factory opens in Spokane-De Leon Foods at 102 E. Francis Ave. If there’s one thing a man needs it’s fresh corn tortillas (OK, a few more things-add wine, cheese, chilies, etc...to the list). I grew up in California and it wasn’t about the burgers baby. I’ve lived in Spokane all my adult life and have felt somewhat deprived, since supermarket tortillas are either full of preservatives and taste like it or are ‘fresh’ and usually inedible. Try these freshies yourself-there is simply nothing like a warm, fresh tortilla with almost anything! The possibilities boggle the mind.

KYRS

2006-08-09T13:51:00.000-07:00

KYRS-the best radio station in the world or what? Well OK-how about the best radio station in Spokane. KYRS IS the best thing to happen to radio in this area since public radio was invented. Talk about eclectic-you never know what you’re going to hear. The music is all over the board, most of it, I guarantee, you’ve never heard before. That alone is reason to change channels and give it a try. It’s also a ‘community’ radio station, meaning you can have your very own show--most are quite good (understandably, there are a few exceptions). One of my favorites is "Around the World," hosted by Michael Moon Bear on Wednesdays at 2:30 p.m.(world music show) The talk portions are pretty lefty (while probably closer to the truth, kind of like the opposite of Fox News), but that’s OK as the 'mainstream media' has become pretty nauseating, so KYRS is a welcome antidote.

KYRS is one of a cluster of low-power FM stations licensed under new rules set in 1999 by the Federal Communications Commission permitting small broadcasters to run inexpensive stations. An outcry over media consolidation and more stations being owned by fewer large corporations triggered the ruling.

KYRS broadcasts over a 50 (or 100?) watt transmitter, which is minuscule compared to commercial radio. But I receive it in Newman Lake and on good days it sounds great. I was even inspired to purchase some old school fm tuners on eBay (they don’t make them like they used to) to take advantage of this wonderful cultural resource.

KYRS is the brainchild of station manager Lupito Flores, a true local hero.

Henry Gieger & MANAS

2006-08-04T10:27:00.000-07:00

I'd like to be like him when I grow up...hah, fat chance! MANAS, a "weekly journal of independent inquiry," ceased publication on December 28, 1988, not quite 41 years after its first issue. Henry Geiger, the man who conceived the publication and wrote almost every word of each eight-page issue, died February 15, 1989, at the age of 80.

Abraham Maslow once called him "the only small 'p' philosopher America has produced in this century"' and a Canadian journalist who read MANAS for six months but had never met Geiger wrote a feature column about him entitled "Socrates Lives Again in Los Angeles."

Go to the MANAS site and read some of his stuff-it will make you happy.

Kerry

2006-08-02T15:01:00.000-07:00

I've always been really fond of this picture of my daughter, Kerry. It was taken a few years back. The helmet she’s wearing fits perfectly-what a sweet little Viking!

Huichol Yarn Art

2006-07-18T13:41:00.000-07:00

I love these yarn paintings for the vivid colors (again!) and the phantasmagorical subject matter.

The Huichol can be found in the most remote regions of the Sierra Madre mountains in Mexico. Today, the Huichol number only about 10,000.

These paintings serve as pages of their history, an explanation of the world they live in, and an accounting of good and evil. Each color, every line, every symbol, no matter how abstract, has a meaning.

White represents the cloud spirits. Blue is the south, the Pacific Ocean, water, rain, and femininity. The rabbit and serpent represent fertility. Red is the east, grandfather, fire, and masculinity. Green is the earth, heaven, healing, and the heart. The eagle is a divine guardian. The two-headed eagle is god looking all ways at once. The figure, with what appears to be long protrusions from his head, is a shaman talking with gods or the spirits. The deer represents peyote and the link between the shaman and the great spirit. Flowers, which always adorn their artwork represent the passageways of the heart.

Mexican Blankets

2006-07-14T13:00:00.000-07:00

Just because I like the vibrant colors.

Guell Park

2006-07-13T14:05:00.000-07:00

Guell Park-Barcelona. Here you have the fabulous and bizarre genius of Antoni Gaudi in park form. My son said it looked like Dr. Seuss land--it’s hard not to agree. You know you're in a special place when you can catch the kids on camera in a rare bout of sibling affection.