sunday in the park with “george”

the funniest thing that happened to me recently:

i take my dog about 4 times a week to a dog park so he can run around and swim. by this point, i’m on a first name basis with many of the other regulars of the dog park.

one guy there all the time has lost the bottom part of one leg from the knee down. we’re not friendly enough for me to ask how he lost part of his leg. but i have seen him enough to say, ‘hey, how are you? how are your dogs doing? nice weather, huh?’ he seemed friendly enough, very chatty.

a couple of weeks ago he was excited because he was getting a new prosthetic leg because as he said ‘the one i have now sucks ass.’ i said, ‘well, that’s nice. good for you.’

i show up at the park a few days ago.

he got his new leg.

he got a designer model.

the plastic part that covers his knee and connects to the metal rod leading to the shoe has a design on it.

the man got an artificial leg completely emblazoned with a confederate flag.

our conversation was something like this:

i said, ‘i see you got your new leg.’

he said, ‘yep, it feels much better than the old one.’

i said, “uh-huh. well…uh… what’s up with the flag on your leg?”

he said, ‘this is the one i liked the best. the other patterns available were weird.’

i said, ‘they didn’t even have beige?’

he said, ‘nope.’

i said, ‘well… i’m kinda scared of you now… i’ll see you later.’

if we were better friends, i’d offer to take him to michael’s to buy modge podge so we could decoupage his leg with pictures of unicorns or butterflies. it may be sexist, but even decoupaging nudie pictures from playboy would seem more reasonable to me.

completely true story!

come on, “george”… just bite the bullet. learn spanish, start buying hip-hop albums and get yourself invited to at least one lesbian commitment ceremony this spring.

you’re bound to enjoy at least of these things.

it’ll get you out of your racist rut.

construction update

the addition to the house is coming along.

the biggest news is that the klansman is now apparently the construction foreman.

my complacency created a middle manager.

sorry.

mommy, i’m scared.

i don’t know why i’ve been on a computer-related writing kick lately.

on that front, this video scared the crap out of me.

in 5 years when that thing has a laser gun and my credit report, i’m a dead man.

nice knowin’ ya.

i’m gonna go hide in the woods for a while.

out.

fill my hole

(oh, puns. i am powerless against the power of the pun.)

my hole is now full of something that looks like a building.

but there is still a little room around the edges of my hole.

my hole has to be approved by the city’s inspectors before it can be completely filled-in.

come on, mr. inspector. help me fill it up!

oh, yeah! mr inspector, sign that form and complete me!

heritage pride is not a hate crime

this truck has parked in front of my house for a week.

ok, here’s my point:

if i’ve said it once, i’ve said it a thousand times, “moral outrage is a luxury of the young.”

i admit that for a minute i thought of complaining to the general contractor about the klan’s regional rep working on my project’s construction crew. (those are his bumper stickers on his ford F-250.)

‘hey, mr. contractor, what’s up with the grand wizard assigned to work on plumbing?’

yes, of course, i could have asked that question.

but i didn’t.

this fucking garage has taken months to get started. am i willing to wait until every construction worker involved in the project is vetted to ensure they all appreciate a rainbow coalition utopian ideal?

HELLLLLLL, no.

as long as i can’t hear him saying i represent everything that’s wrong with america, i will have no part of slowing down this job site.

i figure i can cleanse his bad mojo by asking my jewish black trannie wicca lesbian friend to take the first official dump in the toilet he worked on…

…flush his negativity down into the sewers.

(the scariest part of all this is that mr. wizard has access to my house keys.
that’s why i’m just gonna keep smiling pretty and saying, ” good mornin’. how ya doin’? you’re lookin’ especially aryan today. you musta got a good night’s sleep; no rally last night or did it just end early? …ok, have a nice day. bye-bye.”)

a $250,000 rothko ?

would you believe this is the latest rothko painting up for auction at sotheby’s?

…ok, it not.

but i only got this shot by agreeing to spend $250,000.00. so it’s just a bit behind the current prices fetched for similarly derivative modern art.

to me, these are more important and stress-inducing than owning an uninsured rothko during hurricane season.

the excavator didn’t show up to finish the dig for the garage addition i’m putting onto the house. so the huge hole in my backyard has just been a poo pad for the dog. after a week of taking the dog out in the morning, i’m very familair with every nook and cranny of this hole.

so i decided to harness my nervous energy towards a creative exercise and document the dig.

to defray the compounding interest of the construction loan while i wait for the fucking excavator to get out on bail and finish his job, i’m open to selling prints of my abstract expressionism.

here’s another one:

here’s the hole when not using the telephoto lens:

instead of shooting pictures, i should just shoot myself…

… $250,000…

…OMG

please don’t tell PETA

the foster puppy is in it’s new home. but as you can see my dog is still sufferin’.

when it’s too cold to go outside and the camera’s battery is fully charged, i can sense the dog getting nervous that a photo session is in the works.

i don’t want to go into the details as to why, but i had a boutonnière in the fridge.

so when the dog didn’t seem particularly busy…

snap, snap, snap…

…another cute doggie picture on the internet.

bang the drum slowly

i wrote about bongo playing the other day. so to continue with the percussive instrument theme, i thought i’d share this video.

this film has nothing specifically to do with asheville, new orleans or new york.

but if you want to infer widespread, cross-cultural anthropological meaning from a half-a-second snapshot of people doing some arbitrary activity, feel free. that’s what i did.

here’s what i found out:

• your own kids are cute; other people’s, not so much.
• teenagers are sullen little shits.
• women get a new burst of energy after menopause.
• not many sullen little shits make it to their 90’s.

my favorites were:

• 26
• 37
• 49
• 53
• 73
• 78
• 83
• 91
• 98
• 100

special shout-outs to #91 and #100. you, ladies, rock.

out

brad pitt tastes bad

sorry, i meant to say, ‘brad has bad taste’.

his commitment to rebuild a part of the 9th ward area of new orleans is admirable. my sister and i went to see the ‘pink houses’ during our christmas visit. there was an exhibit on view to highlight the development process of the proposed home designs to go up in the area.

most were novel approaches to building on the flood-prone, long, narrow lots typical of new orleans.

the model shown above is the one i think is in bad taste.

katrina pushed, pulled and upended everything in that particular neighborhood. why would building a house that looks like it’s cracked in two be a good idea? it’s too soon for architectural irony… too soon.

in 10 years when the original owners sell, that area is going to be one super hot neighborhood.

here are the other house designs.

out.

ps

a couple of days before we went to see the development. my aunt went. she was driving around the area. a lady stopped her and asked if she had a minute talk.

she said ’sure’.

exit p.r. assistant; enter mr. pitt. he asks my aunt, ‘are you having a good day? yes? great, i’d glad to hear it. bye.’

thanks to that slighty strange conversation, you, dear reader, are now only 5 degrees separated from maddox.

how cool is that?

quotable quotes for $200, alex

“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.”

- Martin Luther King Jr.

for a wide variety of social issues, this idea is the most important role of government.

out.

ps

here’s a miscellaneous asheville observation:

employees at the asheville barnes and noble are allowed to work in crocs.
yikes.

my favorite new phrase

i didn’t think of it. neither did the guy who said it to me.

maybe it’s just the alliteration, not the subtext.

here it is:

“everything i resisted has persisted”

out.

my car ate the go-go’s

my first cassette tape purchases for the ipod touch of its time, a sony walkman, were the go-go’s and the talking heads. the go-go’s album, “beauty and the beat“, was my claim to hipdom. 1981, people. 19 fucking 81.

this week reality slapped me in the face. my aging process seems to be speeding up. i couldn’t lift my head off the bed because of a strained back. then the go-go’s tape i’ve had for 26 years popped.

my car is old enough to have come with a factor-installed tape player. after i listened to ‘we got the beat’, i pressed the button to switch to the other side of the tape. nothing, no music for 5 minutes. i hit the eject button and there was no more magnetic tape to be seen in the plastic case.

my car ate the go-go’s.

i solved the back trouble with muscle relaxers… lovely, lovely things, those pills. they address the problem without calories. double plus goodness.

but the cassette-chewing car is a problem i have yet to solve. i’m scared to stick another tape into the player for fear of losing more of my dwindling stockpile.

i hear that kids now burn cd’s for their cars. can one of you, young’uns, explain to me how bit-torrents work?

thanks in advance.

like julia roberts in ‘pretty woman’

i love ‘before and after’ pictures.

…the power of transformation.

it doesn’t matter the topic. i have to buy any magazine with a ‘before and after’ segment …architectural digest, glamour, national enquirer, star magazine… popular mechanics; whatever it is. i am drawn to it like an ashevillean to a sports sandal.

a plain, fat girl transformed into a hillary duff clone.
a crack den transformed into a trendy, urban loft.
a bobo mercedes transformed into a pope mobile.

why is this on my mind?

“raking autumn leaves” before:

“raking autumn leaves” after:

i hope the neighbor lady is proud of me.

the rake is now for sale on craigslist.

out.

ps
of course, i didn’t rake the leaves. todd did.
thanks, todd (the henry higgins of landscaping).

sucks big hairy chunks

asheville radio sucks big, hairy chunks of badness.

the fact that public radio earnestness runs right next to evangelical diatribes on the dial was funny for a minute. now that i realize that’s basically all there is, it’s not so funny.

the lettering on the ’scan’ button of the car’s radio is faded from my having pressed it so much in the last couple of months. i can program up to 9 stations on the car stereo system. so far, i’m using 3.

i realize catching radio signals in the mountains may be tough. there’s a huge antenna on mt. pisgah, use that for something worthwhile.

i wondered ‘who is going to pay for radio?’ when sirius and xm radio debuted. now the stiletto 2 is probably going on my amazon wish list.

yes, i have an ipod. but it’s a closed system. you only hear what you put in. there is no chance to be excited about a new band you just happen to catch on the way to the grocery store.

there’s an opening in the marketplace…come on, creative class, start researching how to fix this problem.

clear channel communications started somewhere.

out

ps
WRES is doing their best, bless their hearts.

editor’s note: (12/9/07)
the original post was edited after receipt of intelligence reports that in its original form the post would have lead to social unrest. if you are in possession of a screen capture of the original, unedited post, please destroy immediately. thank you.

a quick dedication

this entry is dedicated to lil’ ray-ray.

see, ray-ray, i understand the kind of energy you’re trying to put out into the world.

out.

whole heap of love

this cross is on an overpass of highway 240 on riverside dr., asheville.

is this festus related to that ‘gunsmoke’ festus?

or is it related to the modern ‘festivus’ tradition sweeping the country?

at first i thought it might be a memorial for some guy named festus who died during a crystal meth-fueled rampage when his silverado quadcab hit the overpass. (i’m assuming it was a chevy or similar. i’m pretty sure it wouldn’t have been a honda ridgeline. those are kinda gay. i don’t see a ‘festus’ driving a girlie truck.) but wouldn’t his mourners put his full name on the cross and the date of death?

so many questions, so few answers.

out

ps

i’ve lived in the mountains for about 2 months now. do you think that’s related to me thinking that gunsmoke’s festus looks kinda cute in that there photo?

french quarter franchise news

here’s another asheville business that is stripping new orleans of its heart and soul.

all the memories of the hairdresser i dated from eclipse new orleans came flooding back when i saw this sign. what’s the point of having moved 700 miles away if the ghost of lost loves can still find me?

give it up

come on people, give it up to asheville.

i took this picture on monday.

this view is literally a 25 minute drive from my front door. and my house is just 7 minutes from greenlife, even if i catch every red light on merrimon.

out.

what’s wrong with america

the biggest thing wrong within america is not racism, an unfair health care system, or an insolvent social security system.

this is the biggest problem:

if i have to explain why, you’ll never understand.

out.

my morning view of asheville

asheville view from porch

Originally uploaded by distorttheinfo

here are a couple of shots of the views from my windows.

it sure is purdy up here.

the shots are fuzzy because i shot through the windows’ mesh bug screens or because i bought a crappy camera. i’m not sure.

out.

whitney museum: kara walker

prejudice is bad.

but if it could be eliminated, what would people do with all their extra time and energy?

Kara Walker: My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love

October 11, 2007 – February 3, 2008

Whitney Museum of American Art
945 Madison Avenue at 75th Street
New York, NY 10021

General Information: 1 (800) WHITNEY

Olympus Stylus 790SW

this thing came on saturday.

watch out, people. i’m gonna be a photo-taking fool
for about a month until i get bored, break the camera,
or fall into a winter funk.

yep.

ok, friday i went to “the craft fair of the southern highlands” at the asheville civic center.

there were lots of interesting work. i especially liked the modern style of woodworking taken by some of the exhibitors. though the arts and crafts movement of the 1900’s is still the governing influence on independent furniture makers.

i guess you have to make what people want to buy.

i thought the highlight of the visit was going to be this overheard conversation in the main exhibit hall:

lady in her early ’60’s: “this (the asheville civic center) is the ugliest building i’ve ever seen.”
lady’s mother (late 80’s): (pauses her wheeled-walker in mid-glide, straightens-up to look around, and says) “yep.”
lady in her early ’60’s: “what a shame.”
lady’s mother (late 80’s): “yep.”

the real hightlight of the trip was a realization that hit me about 20 minutes after hearing the ‘yep’ lady.

what was that realization?

i was the only minority in the room.

ok, to be honest, i can pick and choose from a variety of minority affiliations depending on my mood. today i was feeling particularly asian.

i noticed something about an hour after arriving at the exhibit hall. the sense of being the odd-man-out kinda creeps into consciousness. all the dolls are white; quilts cost $3,000; i get ‘the evil eye’ more than once in a 30 minute period. these, and other things, individually don’t mean much. but taken together it means: ‘this asian man walks alone.’

i love this feeling.

after realizing the situation, i pay close attention to my fellow fairgoers. from the back, every brunette and badly-dyed blonde is inspected to make sure i’m still the only one. for the next 20 minutes, i am the only one…

…the only one in a room full of 5,000 people. i am unique. i am singular. i am a rock star!

i’ve been in this situation many times before.

my goal became to remain the only asian fairgoer. who came and went to the fair when i wasn’t in the center didn’t matter. without cheating (rushing through the exhibits, keeping my gaze to the floor, etc.) i would win if i didn’t see another one like me until i left the building. i don’t know what i would win, i would just win.

all around the mezzanine level, no problem. down to the main hall… a chubby korean girl selling hotdogs, she was working the fair, not an attendee. she didn’t count. there’s a japanese guy selling pottery; he doesn’t count.

i round the corner to walk up the ramp leading to the exit. i had been at the fair almost 2 hours.

i was literally 75 feet from the exit.

there he was.

a 20 year old cambodian with a ponytail, a man bag, and his older, gentleman friend.

fuck.