(F)utility

what is irony?

is it Thomas Kinkade's painting entitled 'Heading Home'? Let's all give a round of applause to Modern Painters for bringing Kinkade into the Artworld dialogue. I have some plans for you mister Kinkade, but i'll save that proposition for another day. On a different note, I was walking down College Avenue the other day, passing by the thick cloud of sweetened udder-milk hibernating in front of Bittersweet cafe, when I noticed their sidewalk sign in my path. It clearly stated that Bittersweet is now "proudly serving Starbuck's coffee". I laughed a bit and then realized the genius behind the words. I then proceeded to walk through the rank dairy cloud and up to the front counter only to find out that it was all a straightforward joke. Perhaps there are no geniuses out there after all.

(kinkade's description of his piece: I did not choose to show the warrior's face in my painting of the homecoming veteran. The hero of Heading Home is not an individual at all; he is the essence of the American soldier. We cannot tell whether he returns from Normandy, from Saigon, from Beirut. In a sense, he has spilled his blood on all those fields of honor.) hm..............................

Stone's Throw

Biting my nails while waiting in traffic to get into the city this morning, the radio turned on (yes, all by itself, you see, my cd player broke and ever since then the radio has a mind of its own and makes this harsh popping sound when it decides to turn on or off). Jennifer Stone came on (KPFA). I had no idea who this lady was, but her mature voice began to crack a little as she started talking about spring and birth and death and poetry and HBO...yeah, she's all over the place, but all in the right places. She's very poetic and knowledgeable about seemingly everything, and she enunciates every letter in every word with such care, it makes my ears tingle. She's sort of the female counterpart to Andy Rooney, but less crotchety. Sorry Andy.

At the end of each show, Stone remarks; "this has been Jennifer Stone with Stones Throw. Till next Tuesday at 3:30, go easy. And if you can't go easy, go as easy as you can".

on peace

i'm trying to clean out or dispose of the clutter in this room of mine. i'm moving soon and have to part with some of my most treasured forgotten papers hidden away in the dusty crevices next to my bed. one of these papers turned out to be a poem my grandmother had written and sent to me in November of 2006. i somewhat remember having read it and sort of pushed it aside, thinking it was sort of silly. but, it has since resurfaced and been reconsidered.

PEACE THE LOSER WORD by grandma

How did peace become a loser word?
The loser-est word we've ever heard.
War is macho
Hate is fine
Kill the mid-east, that's devine
But peace? Who needs it?
It's for nerds.
It's one of those smart ass liberal words.

How did peace become a loser word?
The most boring word we've ever heard.
Power's great
Big money's fine
Steal the oil,
That's devine.
But peace? Forget it.
It's for nerds.
It's one of those love-thy-neighbor words.

Blow up towns with bunker busters,
Kill small kids with bombs in clusters,
Get the refugees to run
Then blow them up for good clean fun.

Neo-cons we all attest
Pre-emptive war is still the best.
Forget Viagra and the rest
Try the manly war-hawk test.
Scare the people with fake dangers
Then get it up by killing strangers.

How did peace become a sissy word?
The sissiest word we've ever heard.
We let them scare us
Our minds froze.
Bush and Cheney's
Who we chose.
So peace? Forget it.
It's for nerds.
It's one of those save-the-planet words.

two-month old balloon

creative commons

my mother called me up today and told me she was trying to find my website (i don't have one). so, she typed in my name on google and found a link to a flickr page where someone (mystery person who i will soon find to thank) posted a photo they took of my show. thank you to the mystery person who documented my show, for i didn't get to it. also, thanks to creative commons and the internet for making image sharing/stealing/copying/borrowing so goddamn easy.
flickr link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/wink/2321382264/