The patient next door to my patient—a distracted-looking thin guy in his fifties, about whom I know nothing except that he seems fairly sick but not too unhappy about it—greeted me a couple of times today as "Brandon" and said I was good people. Then, as if he'd just realized something pretty amazing:
"Did anyone ever tell you you look exactly like Jim Morrison? Do you know who that is? Jim Morrison, of the Doors."
I said truthfully that no one had ever told me that. I said I was a little skeptical of the idea, too. In fact I didn't think I looked even a little bit like Jim Morrison.
"Well, you only say that because you don't know him like I do."
A visit from a Vacaville woman who wants some answers:
Cindy Sheehan
And a frivolous petition that isn't:
The George W. Bush Paid Vacation Act
If you're in SF, I cannot advise y'all strongly enough to go see this. They're not just my peoples, they're also some real talented peoples. I'm gonna try to make the reception.
INK - Bay Area Cartoonists
curated by Justin Hall
August 18th-September 17th
(opening reception: Thursday, August 18, 7-10pm)
Amaru Gallery
510 Valencia St. (at 17th St.), San Francisco
featuring
Andrice Arp (Hi-Horse)
Fredo (Black Sheep)
Renee French (Grit Bath, The Soap Lady)
Justin Hall (True Travel Tales)
Lark Pien (Long Tail Kitty)
Jesse Reklaw (Slow Wave, Couch Tag)
Justin sez: "The show will display pages of original comix art alongside other media (paintings, drawings, prints, etc.) in which these talented, local cartoonists also work. This will demonstrate how a cartooning aesthetic can move between actual comics and non-narrative fine art. There will also be actual comics and mini-comics on display and for sale along with the original art."
I finally got around to writing about my 2-week European thingy, and posted some pictures too. Go here if you're interested.
This is no good at all: Joseph Schmidt and Scharfen Berger are now owned by Hershey's, who made my home state infamous for terrible waxy candy. (The good Pennsylvania chocolate is Wilbur's, from Lititz.)
Okay, I know there are probably only two other people I know who read fantasy fiction who aren't already ahead of me by about 4000 pages of this, and it's probably been reviewed to death, but I'll just say that George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series is very, very, very good.
The person who described it to me as "crack" was not really exaggerating: I lost some sleep reading the first book, and I just caught myself reading the second book during a brief lull at work (and I don't have a desk job); good thing I already have the third book so I won't be tempted to mug anyone for it. Damn. However, as far as I know there's not so much variety, humor, mystery, and philosophical content in actual crack.
Also, I'm trying to think of other authors who are that good at portraying hideous cruelty without seeming like cruel and creepy manipulators themselves. Not many are coming to mind.
Studio 360 is not a great radio show except by NPR standards, but it's always good to hear an interview with Phoebe Gloeckner:
"I remember in fourth grade, people always asked me to draw penises, because they didn't know what they looked like—these were the other girls. And of course, I didn't know at that time either, and, uh... I used to draw a pickle with hair all over it, like all over it. Probably I, you know, planted this image of this hair-covered pickle in the heads of a lot of eight-year-old girls."
The second half, where smarmy Kurt Andersen basically invites two bluenose commentators to trash Gloeckner as an agent of cultural "coarsening" (though Michael freaking Medved(*)
Until now, I could truthfully say "I've never posted pictures of cute kittens on the Internet."
Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww <SNEEZE>
Disaster relief money should go to the Red Cross—there will be massive damage and refugees to take care of.
The last report I've seen said maybe as many as 100,000 people are still in New Orleans; they've sheltered a few tens of thousands in the stadium. As far as I can tell, no one's provided any free transportation out of town. I hope it's not as bad as everyone expects.
(Update: And it's not, as of this morning - now it's just a big disaster, instead of an unprecedented catastrophe. But help will still be needed for sure. Also, I know some people are uneasy about the Red Cross because they mishandled funds and blood donations after the September 2001 attacks. My take on that is (a) they were hardly the only ones who screwed up then, and (b) there's still no one better equipped to help right now.)