Today is the 50th anniversary of the interstate roadway system.

(unrelated picture)

Quote...

No people ever recognize their dictator in advance. He never stands for election on the platform of dictatorship. He always represents himself as the instrument [of] the Incorporated National Will. ... When our dictator turns up you can depend on it that he will be one of the boys, and he will stand for everything traditionally American. And nobody will ever say "Heil" to him, nor will they call him "Führer" or "Duce." But they will greet him with one great big, universal, democratic, sheeplike bleat of "O.K., Chief! Fix it like you wanna, Chief! Oh Kaaaay!"
-Dorothy Thompson (1935)

More than 10% of the Dominican Republic has immigrated to the United States.

I watched a few World Cup matches with Momo while babysitting a video shoot this afternoon. I can't see how people in this country can't get into watching it. I'm sure it just comes down to it being hard to market without the possibility of commercial breaks, so it's just hard to find.
Late monday night, I found myself somewhere on Smith Street with George, semi-stranded after a night of watching him and a friend of his put away a lot of drink. After making a big mess in a diner, George ended up wearing a large slice of cheesecake, and chasing his friend into I-don't-know-where-land while brandishing a half-full trash bag borrowed from the curb. When we eventually hailed a cab, the driver looked nervously from his window as a man with cheesecake embedded in his beard approached. I said, "it's cake," and the driver said, "oh, okay."

I would like to thank Allison Glancey for contributing a wonderful screen print to my meager, but growing, art collection. She will be duly compensated as soon as I can find something worth mailing. And it was nice getting a few minutes with her after 20 years or so. It'd be fun if we could sit down some time.
And speaking of 20 years ago, what did we do before Google? (If you don't know what I mean, I'm not asking you.)
Does anyone like any of the pictures I put up here? That's the whole point of this blog. No, its not. I lied. But it's a part of it, so feel free to criticize.

Half.

Waste.

Couple of guys with ladders and a pick-up tore down the "Variety Health Food and Candy" sign from across the street last night, and guys with hammers continued to gut the old tire store today. The cashier at the grocery pointed to my yogurt, and told me it was "good for colon." Maria says I'm right about everything. I waited by the phone all day waiting for my health insurance administrator to call me back. She never called, and it really brought me down. Wasted the whole day. I just picked up the Ruin CD from the PO Box, and I'm already listening for a second time. Why do bands feel like they can, or should, improve things on a reissue by remixing the album? I want it to sound like it sounded when I first heard it in 1986. By the By is still my favorite. I have to go back out to the store because I forgot the main ingredient of dinner. I'll start the Ruin CD over while I get dressed.

Simulation.

But if you could see the moon.
The one we have in Brooklyn.
The moon that's up right now.
Not just a picture.
Here, from my window.
We would learn a lot about each other.

I need one of those L ruler things.

Happy birthday KG. Was swell seeing you at Joan Jett. Quite a surprise, though every lesbian I know was there, so the surprise wore off quickly. And great to see the one who came from SF to see the show. She talked of her break-up, with shock that it came out of nowhere. That surprise dumping happens more often than people realize. She was the second person I talked to in that situation in as many days. There's that one-sidedness where the dumper is prepared, and keeping a secret for some time, so you two will never be on the same page. Probably has to do with trust. So we all nodded and commiserated and gave her a hug and I thought about how there was really nothing we could say because she already knew it would take time and there was no way to tell her how much. I guess gay marriage would have only made things worse.

And it's a good thing that senate vote to put a gay marriage ban in the constitution failed. Or did it? The whole point of that vote was to lose. To draw out the extreme right for the mid-term elections. How come no one exposed the plan on the senate floor?
"Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo." -H. G. Wells

I've thought up a good way of cleaning out the clutter we all accumulate from staying in the same home for more than a few years; pretend you're moving. Mentally pack up the belongings you're taking with you, and jettison the rest. This exercise might take a while.

Mail call.

I received a couple of interesting items in the mail yesterday. One was a 30X40 canvas with a painting of Frankenstein and Lydiaemily in a lustful embrace. I need to figure out how to transform it from a roll to a plane. My meager art collection grows.

I also got a film by Marc Israel called Nearer My God To Thee. Let's get the obvious stuff out of the way first: It's very well made. Well paced/edited. You have a vast pool of music knowledge to draw from. That first shot where you run across your apartment to film the snowblower made me laugh so hard I had to rewind so I could get the narration. The little clip of Jed caught me off guard.
What I've been thinking: Brave? Self indulgent? You clearly struggled with that question yourself.
Once it became about finishing the movie, it reached a point where it could have gone on forever. You shoot a reel of you guys editing, and the next reel you shoot is of you guys editing the last reel you shot of you guys editing... You found a great way to end it.
I feel like we ran into each other, and I asked what you've been up to, and you said, "it's a long story. Maybe this DVD will explain." I think of a world where we just have our lives on DVDs, ready in case someone asks where you've been all these years.
I think of this time in high school when you were having a particularly bad week, and you were going on about how all these things broke all at once; your stereo, a light, something else I can't remember. It was like the series of plagues in the film, but more, um, high school?
I think about how you would walk around school seeing how long you could go without saying a word.
I think those indians made beautiful music.
I think about how we both have progressed into primarily visual mediums from our musical beginnings, but it's not so far fetched. You were always a storyteller in song, and that follows through to your films. Photography for me follows my less narrative tendencies in whatever music I made.
While your circumstances and actions may seem extreme, the themes are pretty universal; love, loss, isolation, finding what's missing, communication, wanting to be "normal" (something you'd never hear either of us desire 20 years ago), looking back at your past and trying to figure out how you got here, regrets, finding something to keep you going, coping with a chronic illness or two. I can certainly relate to at least ten of those themes. I'm sure I'm not alone. Dare I say this film can help others beyond yourself?
I know you didn't ask for some sort of analyzation, but I didn't think I should just say "it was nice."
I sorta want to show it to my parents.