Sunday, December 30, 2012

Filter



I've been very gratified to have my painting "Filter" displayed in Affare, the most happening restaurant in the heartland. Thanks to Herr und Frau Heuser for the wall space.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Dog poem

That old dog
every morning trod
the same worn path
out into the yard


Sunday, February 12, 2012

Again, Chris Levine


It’s easy to imagine baby Chris, crawling to the stereo cabinet beneath the swag lamp, getting into the LPs. He pulled them down and began sliding them around on the shag carpet, a precursor to actually spinning platters. The records would have included “Sketches of Spain”, “Spiritual”, “Astral Weeks”, and “Greetings from Asbury Park.” Baby Chris cooed and giggled.

As a boy he stood in front of the stereo from whence “Boogie Nights” played. He shook his hips and stomped his feet, leading the band, singing out all the words to the song that he knew and all the ones he thought he knew.

As a teenager in Los Angeles, Chris surveyed firsthand the wasteland wrought by X and Lydia Lunch and the Go-Gos. Then, rising from the Pacific Northwest, a different nihilism, and Chris intuited that the path to true individualism lay elsewhere.Adult Chris, living in the valley, in a swank pad with the missus, hosts another Hukilau party with torches and potent fruity drinks and Hawaiian shirts, loving it all without irony.

It’s almost like a superpower - like the stereo was radioactive and it somehow infused 100 years of pop music into the young hero. As a result he can explain the mathematics behind “Take Five” as well as social importance of Dr. Dre and how everything that we are musically came from the recombinant DNA of Louis Armstrong and Hank Williams.

Chris doesn’t make a mess on the floor with music anymore, and he’s more discreet with the hip shaking, but he’s met some interesting people and developed some exotic new tastes. He’s been some places, he’s done some stuff, and now this cultural repository is sharing beyond those sitting around his patio. He's found most regularly at www.thespacelab.tv.

Enjoy.

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Benefits of a popular brand

I'm always amazed when popular companies fail to merchandise their popular brand with gear. The argument against selling t-shirts and hats always seems to be that if someone is wearing one when they rob a convenience store, then it might be bad for business and as a result  the company ignores valid revenue streams.

Of some interest in the no-publicity-is-bad-publicity dept., see http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2012/01/did-purell-pay-to-appear-in-the-dragon-tattoo-torture-scene/251287/

Sunday, January 15, 2012

What the smart guys know

Yesterday on Google+ I said that the Patriots would cream the Broncos and they did. I said that while Tebow's run was as impressive as it was unlikely, the Pats are a money team and Bellichek and Brady would beat the by between 30 and 50 points. 

And I was delighted to be right.

However, a week ago, I watched as Drew Brees made decisions and threw passes that the great Joe Montana could dream about. Yesterday, I watched Brees orchestrate a go-ahead TD with just under a couple of minutes to go and I thought how only an idiot would ever count this guy out. Then I watched as the 49ers went ahead with mere seconds left.

No one, certainly I'm not, is saying that only an idiot would count Alex Smith out. But there it is. The 49ers are for real and man can't see the future.

Last week the Federal Reserve released the transcripts of the Fed governors saying that though the housing market may be overheated and there were certain risks in tying mortgages to the markets, everything was rosy - any landing would be soft.

Smart people look things up and down. They study it. They are sincerely interested and there is always always always the thing you haven't thought of, like a tight end who didn't buy into Drew Brees' invincibility.

I'm reading The Management Myth by Matthew Stewart and Warrior Politics by Robert Kaplan. They are reminders, like watching football, that nobody knows anything.

Have a nice day.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Chris Levine's Eclectiblog

With his collection of Eclectiblog essays and entries, Chris Levine comes fully around the New Media circle with his goal of getting everyone involved intact.

It is a wonder that someone of Levine’s gifts - keen eye and memory, aesthetic polish, and the intellect and imagination to draw connections between them - are found in someone so genuinely friendly.

That’s the chord - friendliness - playing behind all the things that he does. He wants us all to get along, and what better way for us to do that than with mutual appreciation for the funky bass lines of Freddie Trujillo, or the fearless soul performance of Bettye LaVette?

What’s that? You haven’t heard of them? Neither had I. But Levine thoroughly explains, not like the coolest teacher you’ve ever had, but like the coolest, smartest friend your little brother ever had. He possesses no hipster disdain, displays no Jack-Black-in-Hi-Fidelity smugness, when, say, he breaks down Chris Dowd’s contribution to Fishbone.

Levine does it because he wants you to know, because knowing is awesome and cool, and once you know, you’re bound to have as much fun as he’s having.

That’s not true, of course. Hardly anyone has as much fun as Chris Levine, though that’s not for his lack of trying.

Here's the pitch . . .

I can throw more than one pitch.