persona non grata

something new

2011-11-07T16:31:00.002-05:00

It's easy to burn
when despair fuels a fire
set clumsily where my ribs meet.

My insides are hollow
filling slowly with the thick smoke
of my fleeting hopelessness;
It presses itself against my withering organs.

When I speak, I speak in carcinogens,
watch my words dissipate,
get a blood rush sensing your disgust.

I am vacuous.
I am desperate.

It's easy to burn
when despair fuels a fire
and I'll be warm
even when there's nothing left to burn.

hbjfyhgdgfd

2009-09-01T15:41:00.003-04:00

I can feel you,
ghosts of fingertips
on top of skin
sweat-kissed,
puckering in the air
of an open window

I can feel you,
dents in the mattress
scented in the creases,
dented from the weight.
When one has gone the
other stays, is patient

I can feel you,
the gnawing on exposed
limbs bent in all directions.
Eyes wide, still hungry and
waiting
for another taste of

you. I can feel
the blood-pulse, the rush
and the push of things.
It's swirling, dizzying--
teeth exposed, grinning
stupidly, wonderfully

I can feel you
when you're gone
when you come, go
when you return.

Where there is nothing
I can feel you.

thank you, too, for being a friend

2009-04-26T15:29:00.003-04:00

Yesterday Bea Arthur, the actress who played Dorothy Zbornak on my most favorite show The Golden Girls, passed away from cancer. She was 86. Here's to you, Bea.

blogger =

2009-03-31T11:29:00.001-04:00

livejournal

only we're older, more hip, and less emo.

thinking

2009-03-04T00:31:00.004-05:00

the neighborhood sits still and quiet
and the children are gone.
those who have moved away or died,
their cars rest in the driveways.
no one leaves in early mornings
or returns at dusk, just trees
and the branches that hang like ghosts
of people we've been before.

ice hardens like sharp glass
along the gutterways, a stark
and harsh light lining my way
back to this place that slips down
in silence at the end of each day
and the faint voices of childsplay
echo like a distant symphony
somewhere in the back roads.

no more stories of the old country
or dinners around the table where
so many dinners used to be,

no more old and and empty souls
retiring to recliners, sinking
into television sets that snow
when the station is off the air

no more mothers, fathers
yet i dream of where they've gone.
i shake and miss the morning break,
and fade into the dawn.

seriously fucked up

2009-02-20T03:22:00.002-05:00

not your ordinary whip-it

and so i've learned

2009-01-28T13:13:00.001-05:00

shit happens. deal.

happy saturday

2009-01-10T09:22:00.003-05:00

After doing nothing more than running a gallery opening, watching movies all night with my lovely boy, and coming home to chain smoke and go to sleep, I woke up this morning to the sound of my iPhone alarm -- a horrible, piercing sound that doesn't just bring the dead from their slumber but also makes me want to throw the piece of shit across the room and get my 9 extra fucking snooze minutes. I'm digressing. So I'm due in at the office just before nine, alarm blares at 7:15. As I reach down to the little pile of books and boxes my phone is resting on to turn it off I realize I'm feeling like I haven't slept much more than what a short nap would feel like. I am exhausted and so not interested in the Cindy Crawford anti-aging-give up the modeling endeavors-infomercial that plays softly from my crap-ass excuse for a television set (props to me for falling asleep watching Lifetime every night). So I snooze once, and snooze again. Lacking motivation to get out of my warm bed I lay there, "just gonna rest my eyes another second" ... an hour passes before I wake in a panic realizing that it's 8:35, and I barely have time to brush my teeth or even look in the mirror before I speed the drive to work which when done legally should take almost a half an hour. After teeth and deodorant it's now 8:40, no time for coffee, and yes I'm wearing some combination of what I slept in and what I had on last night. Today was a day for an Italian shower, but thankfully I'm only here until 4 and it's cold enough to make me feel pretty much clean all day long. I get in my car, it's freezing, neighbors in my cookie-cutter development are starting their cars, travel mugs in hand, waving to one another... and then there's me, I've got my aviators and "don't fuck with me right now" face on, get in my car and fuck the warm up, I'm GONE.

...

So I'm wondering in a moment of panic what would be most appropriate to drive to work on. No time to choose, so risking the many obvious bad choices in 14,987 songs I pick shuffle. Who would have thought this would be the only stroke of luck I'd have in the morning? God was clearly on my side. As I swing around my corner without stopping, "Windowlicker" by Aphex Twin comes on. I found some odd solace in this trip of a song. Needless to say I was prompted to speed and got to work in 15 minutes (thankfully) without getting pulled over. Here I am, looking and feeling like shit... my only comfort is my iPod and the fact that I woke up with my hair looking pretty decent... but I've got the coon-eyes of a sleep deprived octogenarian.

Oh, I got to work on time.

The blogosphere is teeming with people who are dying to get noticed

2009-01-09T10:25:00.002-05:00

i.e. the blogosphere is dead.

my heart hurts

2009-01-04T10:31:00.001-05:00

very much

lundi, 100.

2008-12-22T16:59:00.002-05:00

I often find myself with too much time on my hands, trying to make sense of the things I encounter on a daily basis. I'm ground down to the bone from stress and other constraints and triggers, the need to strive for some sort of ideal that I don't believe exists. This time of year tends to bring out the worst in people. We carry along in our lives from day to day trying to construct something perfect, something wonderful... questing after happiness or whatever idea resembles the meaning of that word. We are, however, constantly vulnerable to and at risk of coming into blunt contact with a destroyer. At any instance this world we've drafted in our minds can be torn to shreds, ripped apart -- and there we are, shaking and afraid like children left to pick up the pieces and put it back together again, risking nothing but a reoccurrance... and so we find solace in the orchestration of a perfect song, a beautiful melody riddled deep with touching lyrics that hint at a life that exists only within speakers... a painting, vivid and bright, of a world unlike our very own... in a movie or play whose scenes are really just figments of another fucked up person's imagination. Things like this stand as confessions. We openly admit that our own lives are filled with garbage and so we must create an alternate plane to temporarily exist in. Who are we trying to impress? What are we trying to hide? I don't even want perfection, I'd settle for things being just so.

for patrick thompson, the party dolphin

2008-12-13T10:19:00.003-05:00

do i need to see an analrapist?

2008-12-10T09:33:00.003-05:00

For those who may be unfamiliar with the term, an analrapist (as named by Dr. Tobias Funke from Arrested Development and pronounced uh-nal-ruh-pist) is an analyst and a therapist. These days I think I'm in need of some assistance. My deep seeded self-loathing has launched me into a downward spiral of destruction --- everything in my path is being obliterated: my sense of calm, logic, comfort, 'relationships', et al. My question really is this, when does voluntary self destruction become a condition and not a choice? There's no other way for me to behave.

I've been watching a lot of the Craft lately, scrutinizing small details, reading the lines between blah and blah and

2008-12-09T15:50:00.003-05:00

that's all irrelevant. Last night I picked me up some new wheels. Wheels of my own. New car smell wheels. Wheels that'll gladly take you places. A NEW WHIP... shit...

strange days

2008-11-29T14:21:00.000-05:00

I was just reading an article on Current.com that totally blew my mind. The labor ministry in Japan is enforcing laws that encourage more "family time." You got it, mandatory sexy-time on the isle of Japan. After Durex did a study on the sex drive and culture of Japan they found out that the Japanese were exponentially less likely go get down and do the nasty than the global average. Their sinking population is running the country down into risky waters. So, gettin' horizontal will hopefully boost their population levels back up and they can be sustained. It's probably not a bad time for the Japanese to have more sex. In light of their recent economic collapse (or almost collapse), perhaps a little slap and tickle would raise the national morale. Just something to think about...

2008-11-28T15:04:00.001-05:00

updating via iPhone... I sold out everyone haha

it's 8:41 am

2008-11-26T08:39:00.000-05:00

and I'm sitting alone in the office for what will probably be a very long day. Everything is humming, I hear the refrigerator in Studio 1, the copier, 3 of the 4 hard drive towers... Any minute now the phone will ring and honestly, I don't want to answer.

2008-11-25T18:20:00.002-05:00

These days I find myself
sinking slow down into my chair,
hair mussed twirled 'round finger,
thoughtless I blink and breathe.

My cuticles are dry and worn,
knuckles arthritic and sore,
cold weather beaten I'm blank
and lonely, skin peeling away.

Creases by my finger tips
tell stories of every object
I've caressed, frigid hands,
I fold up like an envelope.

My life is a schedule of hats
and missing bobby-pins,
mismatched socks and lukewarm
coffee, stained mug and all.

There are nightly fevers,
and dreams, but mostly cold sweat,
beads forming, nape of the neck
back pain shivers down the spine

These dreams are mine
they'll stop in time
when I cut the line
between you and I.

pree - tee givin'

2008-11-25T17:16:00.002-05:00

yr in my kichin eetin mah stuffinz

New York, I love you but you're bringing me down.

2008-11-22T19:40:00.003-05:00

For the first time in my life I didn't really enjoy my visit to the city. I don't know if it was the frigid air, lack of available taxis, strange assortment of people I was with, the high prices of everything, and just a (recent) general distaste for that whole scene -- but I had such a wrenching feeling in my gut about it all that I packed up and split to go home this afternoon, not without paying a $15 surcharge to leave today instead of tomorrow like my bus ticket proved I had originally planned. In a very crowded bus that wreaked of hot wings and hair grease, I curled up and patiently awaited my arrival in Atlantic City. The woman from Queens who sat next to me was fidgety as all hell but nice enough, and In Rainbows made the ride a little better. Other than two wonderful meals, one at Bread and the other at Westville, I think I'll stay put for a while.

ms callender --- the ghost of english past

2008-11-21T00:45:00.001-05:00

I promise by 2 min 30 sec it's worth it.

epilogue to eucharist

2008-11-21T00:42:00.002-05:00

pulse

Swift is the way my hips move
as I gravitate toward your space
on the bed,

and it is magnetic--
how I long to lock your rib cage
with mine, and

I want to see each breath you take,
watch as the massive pockets of air
press their faces up & underneath
your clear skin, hair spotted.

You are living somewhere between
my legs, where truly few
have been,

hot and full of one kind of love
or another,
so much that it hurts.

Both you and your ghost seem to draw the blood
from my limbs and hold it somewhere
in the center, and the parts of me

that crave you most---
they are warm and ready
to take you in.

You are the rush from
my thighs to my eyes that screams
like a fire that blazes.

You are the numbness in my toes
as my head lilts backward
onto your pillow,

leaving an imprint you will sleep in later---

you are the one who comes
and stays there

ch ch ch changesssss

2008-11-12T14:55:00.001-05:00

I'm really excited to go away this weekend.

I'm totally stoked on this adorrrrrable boy I know.

My hair's been behaving itself.

YEAH BRA, what could be better?

daughters of the soho riots - the national

2008-11-08T10:22:00.000-05:00

I have your good clothes in the car
So cut your hair so no one knows
I have your dreams and your teeth marks
And all my fingernails are painted

I'm here to take you now

You were right about the end
It didn't make a difference
Everything I can remember
I remember wrong

How can anybody know
How they got to be this way
You must have known I'd do this someday
Break my arms around the one I love
And be forgiven by the time my lover comes
Break my arms around my love

Break my arms around the one I love
And be forgiven by the time my lover comes
Break my arms around my love

I don't have any questions
I don't think it's gonna rain
You were right about the end
It didn't make a difference

I'm here to take you now

Out among the missing sons and daughters of the SoHo riots
Out among the missing sons and daughters of the SoHo riots

I'm here to take you now

How can anybody know
how they got to be this way
You must have known I'd do this someday
Break my arms around the one I love
And be forgiven by the time my lover comes
Break my arms around my love

Break my arms around the one I love
And be forgiven by the time my lover comes
Break my arms around my love

Break my arms around the one I love

YES WE CAN

2008-11-05T13:46:00.001-05:00

it's all good now =]

hope? nope.

2008-11-03T09:23:00.003-05:00

Please help me decide what to do tomorrow because I've got an awful, wrenching feeling in my gut telling me that either way I'm making the wrong decision.

Overheard in NY

2008-10-30T13:01:00.003-04:00

makes for some really excellent at work zoning out reading time. I'll share my favorite quote with you for today:

Teen: I'll get us a cab.
Grandma: Let's just walk, it's only a few blocks from here.
Teen: Are you sure? What about your hip?
Grandma: Well, it hurts, dear, but I'm not going to be a pussy about it.

--57th St

My friend Tyler just brought me some of his original artwork. I'm excited to have started my collection haha.

NEW COMPUTER

2008-10-29T12:42:00.001-04:00

i finally got one! wooooo sony vaio :)

A MUST HEAR

2008-10-27T12:57:00.005-04:00

Sleepyhead by Passion Pit, from the EP Chunk of Change [2008]

Steady ecstasy induced beats and hand claps, soulful high pitched vocals that are birthed from some strange combination of the singer from TV on the Radio and one of the Bee Gees' Gibb brothers, creepy high pitched backing vocal samples like you'd get from a UGK or Kanyeezy song, a little Bollywood shit and some Muscles from the Guns Babes Lemonade era just for fun.... late 90's rave vibes... a complete and total flourish of aural stimulants!!!

The word of the day

2008-10-27T12:47:00.001-04:00

is precocious.

[adj] 1: characterized by or characteristic of exceptionally early
development or maturity (especially in mental
aptitude); "a precocious child"; "a precocious
achievement" [ant: retarded]
2: (botany) appearing or developing early; "precocious flowers
appear before the leaves as in some species of magnolias"

"I once had a dream so I packed up and split for the city

2008-10-27T10:56:00.007-04:00

...I soon found out that my lonely life wasn't so pretty."

Today's song of the day is:

The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds [1966]

That's Not Me by the Beach Boys from one of the most influential rock/pop albums of all time. If you don't own this, you should. If you haven't pirated a copy, you should. If you've never heard of this album, well:

(most frequented) albums of the week

2008-10-26T12:16:00.009-04:00

Pedro the Lion - Achilles Heel [2004]

TV on the Radio - Return to Cookie Mountain [2006]

Shout Out Louds - Howl Howl Gaff Gaff [2005]

Elliott Smith - XO [1998]

Midlake - The Trials of Van Occupanther [2006]

Death Cab for Cutie - Something About Airplanes [1999]

Depreciation Guild - In Her Gentle Jaws [2007]

David Bowie - Hunky Dory [1971]

The Get Up Kids - Something to Write Home About [1998]

Yo La Tengo - I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One [1997]

sunny sundae smile

2008-10-26T12:06:00.003-04:00

I have become a list maker. My day planner is filled to the brim with To Do lists, pages upon pages. Until I got a big girl job I had never found myself to be overly productive or the aforementioned planning type. I now look forward not just to seeing what my day will be like, but checking off things I get done. There's a sickening sense of enjoyment that I get from seeing the completed tasks outnumber the ones I've left for another day. In the morning I wake with plans already on my mind. I am not sure where in my brain this all comes from, or how I somehow make the decision to do or not to do at any given moment. After a day of gray skies and rain I woke to what appears to be from my window a beautiful fall day. While my family sits around downstairs watching football all day -- I do not want to do this, I hate it and this time of year makes me hate Sundays, parts of Saturdays (which I'm thankfully not around for anymore), and Monday nights -- I'd like to find myself doing something a little more exciting and less mind numbing. I'll probably start with cleaning my mess of a room. I'm usually great at this and I get it done quickly (wow, efficiency) but I can't seem to maintain it for more than a few days. I'd like to write an essay, but I'm sure I'll just do that while I have downtime at work tomorrow or the next day... I'd like to buy something but I've spent too much money this week and must wait for next. I'd like to go for a run, but the state of the air outside is holding the fate of that feat in its hands. I can't seem to look past the small piles of towels and work clothing and shoes and bobby pins and scarves around my room. First I will shower. Then I will eat. Then I will clean my room. I'll probably find myself at the video store later this afternoon, returning Candyman which was a terrible film, and renting Inland Empire, Wild at Heart, (possibly) Dune, and definitely Eastern Promises. If I can find a good foreign film I'll rent that as well. Maybe I'm on a more intense David Lynch phase these days. Maybe I just don't want to let my mind rest. I'd like to bake something. I'd like to sit around a fire tonight. I'd like to meet someone new. I'd like to do all of these things.

And because I haven't posted enough today:

2008-10-25T14:44:00.004-04:00

I've become somewhat interested in the "Oral History of the World" -- as taken from the movie Joe Gould's Secret starring Stanley Tucci -- relaying the conversations "overheard" (like Overheard in NY only via my blog) ... I didn't hear this but in my work enduced boredom today I discovered a laughable and laudable conversation per Instant Messenger:

vicemag style

2008-10-25T14:39:00.003-04:00

coming soon:

more about art, i.e. an entry on photorealism and some notable artists to peep.

do's and don't's -- (not so much like Vice but) just some things out there that I think are stupid and what is noteworthy.

WHAT I WANT, for the (vain and) materialistic.

album or song of the week.

Some would say Jade has too much time on her hands.

dedecim

2008-10-25T10:16:00.009-04:00

If you're into photography (in general) or really enjoy black and white photos caught on film, my friend Devin Yalkin's photos are incredible. Click the link after the second picture!

These are some of my favorites:

Little Oscar

rOsa

orgasme

Where I Came From

I think I love this last picture the most because I've met his parents and they are as adorable in person as they appear in this photograph.

The word of the day

2008-10-25T09:59:00.002-04:00

is synergistic.

[adj] 1: used especially of drugs or muscles that work together so
the total effect is greater than the sum of the two
(or more) [syn: interactive] [ant: antagonistic]
2: of or relating to the theological doctrine of synergism
3: working together; used especially of groups, as subsidiaries
of a corporation, cooperating for an enhanced effect; "a
synergistic effect" [syn: synergetic]

no such thing as let down

2008-10-24T11:18:00.006-04:00

The Tim and Eric awesome show rarely disappoints, if ever. So how could anything that is one half that amazing product be anything short of fantastic on its own? The answer is that it couldn't. I was sent a single link via e-mail this morning from my friend and this is what I started my day to:

Cosby sweaters, cellulite, Tina Turner inspired garb, awful dancing, gross displays of sexual affection, psychedelic flashing lights, and borderline animation... I couldn't think of a better way to complement this song (Parisian Goldfish from Flying Lotus'Los Angeles LP).

For those who enjoy a resurrection every now and then just for fun,

hahahah JK, though Raphael is delicious.... check out this old throwback (sort of)

I Need Love .... not the LL Cool J version

and def not Necro ... but I like it.

The word of the day

2008-10-23T11:42:00.001-04:00

is proverbial.

[adj] 1: of or relating to or resembling or expressed in a proverb;
"he kicked the proverbial bucket"; "the proverbial
grasshopper"
2: widely known and spoken of; "her proverbial lateness"; "the
proverbial absentiminded professor"; "your proverbial
dizzy blonde"

COM LAG 2 EP

2008-10-21T17:56:00.001-04:00

Gagging Order by Radiohead

Move along, there's nothing left to see

2008-10-21T17:25:00.004-04:00

The bones of this house are
cold. They are most frigid
at the center where the marrow
has grown weak and dry, while
the air outside has become
crisp -- smelling of burning leaves
as they crackle and curl
in a flash of golden embers.
I sit somewhere inside as
an empty home breathes in
and out, craving the scent
of electric heat, I click
my heels hoping to
spark the thermostat.
The old metal vents
fashioned into a sinking
ceiling begin to sing,
their rusty shafts blow
an uncomfortably warm
breeze onto my scalp.
I think of better days,
inhale the foreign smoke
of dry tobacco, and
wait for first frost.
The trees undress
along with me as the
sun tucks itself away
at an earlier hour and
we remain -- stark, naked,
and insatiably hungry
for something hotter
than this.

your 69th entry will be here in 69 minutes!

2008-10-19T22:41:00.004-04:00

post otherwise known as "down in the dirty"

Things like this reassure my faith in humanity....
I mean, question it....

and check out this too! priceless!

sex drive

2008-10-19T16:41:00.001-04:00

So funny I laughed until I got a headache... Plus Rumspringa? OMG!

everybody wants to be italian?

2008-10-18T11:08:00.007-04:00

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be on the arm of a my-new-haircut club going douchebag with hair spiked up into a perfect vertical line... with wax of course... going to the gym together, taking supplements... drinking wheatgrass shakes sometimes... driving around in a car, always shiny... going tanning, showing our midriffs... blasting Tiesto no matter what streets we're on... doing everything together and walking around with our hands in our respective back pockets... falling asleep to MTV's NeXT, knowing all the words "Shake It" by Metro Station... knowing when the new Ed Hardy line is gonna drop... doing Jager bombs or walking into a bar and the dude behind the counter already knows that I want a Red Bull and Vodka... our idea of culture being a night out at Caesar's casino... knowing all the bro bars in Philly, calling Philly the 'delph... going to Deptford... or Cherry Hill... wearing white after Labor Day... fitted hats... stilettos... Coach brand sneakers... Juicy Velour Jumpsuits... my man wearing Juicy for Men... I'd carry my dog in my purse, douse him in Juicy dog perfume... all of us will smell so fragrant that we'll leave a trail behind us... always having my nails done, pretty much unable to do anything with my hands... both graduating from community college... having my Grandfather call my boy Paisan... getting mistaken for Eurotrash...

then I come to my senses and wonder what the fuck I was thinking

Magnetic Fields

2008-10-18T11:02:00.001-04:00

True I'd give my right arm
To keep you safe from harm
And, true, for you I'd move to Ecuador

And I'd keep a little farm
Chop wood to keep you warm
But I don't really love you anymore

I don't have to love you now
If I don't wish to
I won't see you anyhow
If that's an issue...

There'll be some day when your eyes
Do not enthrall me
I'll be numb, I realize you'll never call me

'Cause I've read your horoscope
And now I've given up all hope
So I don't really love you anymore

'Cause I've read your horoscope
And now I've given up all hope
So I don't really love you anymore

I would love

2008-10-14T18:16:00.001-04:00

nothing more than to cut things out of my life if I was completely able to, and never look back.

an "american idiot"

2008-10-07T22:25:00.002-04:00

McCain and Palin have no business in the White House, not once not neva, NO WAY.

2008-10-07T16:31:00.002-04:00

WTF?! Tonight's debate is going to be awesme. Check out this NYT article regarding the offensive "offense" happening along the McCain-Palin campaign trail. It's total B.S.

Does anyone remember Ms. South Carolina? I mean come on, she's just as qualified to be the VP!

That answer is just like last weeks debate! "I'm not going to answer your questions, I'm just going to do what I please!" OMGZ PLZ!

big big big

2008-10-07T15:50:00.003-04:00

I have always loved large scale installations. A professor I had my freshman year of college inspired me to always go bigger. Big, big, big, he'd say. Unless it's overpowering you can't feel it. Now I don't always believe that things must overpower you to make you truly feel its presence, it's idea can be bigger than it's size. The size of your concept must almost always, undoubtedly, outshine everything else. Now there are some people who work with size and it's incredible: Richard Serra, David Smith, Jeff Koons, Vik Muniz (who is AMAZING if you're into re-purposed art, that link goes to a pic from his junkyard series, a replication of Caravaggio's Narcissus), and my new favorite -- photographer Wim Tellier who works out of Belgium and the Netherlands (We all know Netherlandish art has made its presence known for centuries). Here's a link to his new project proposal: http://www.artinfo.com/news/story/28867/photographer-wim-tellier-plans-south-pole-installation/. This is going to be the largest installation in the South Pole ever to be done. Here's a peek at one of his older installations, a blown up image of a baby superimposed onto a bed a rubber ducks.

Boo

2008-10-07T14:13:00.007-04:00

What I would love is to have someone to share my good news with, share a bed with, share a moment with. Someone who won't let me down. Someone who is okay with holding pinkies instead of hands. Someone who pulls me closer by my front pocket. Someone who understands why Belle and Sebastian is perfect in the fall, and who doesn't mind that sometimes Ben Gibbard makes me cry. One who knows how I find some sort of emotional significance to every lyric that passes through my lips. One who does the same.

Use Somebody by Kings of Leon
from their album Only By the Night

drinking champagne from a paper cup is never quite the same

2008-10-06T10:26:00.002-04:00

The Death Cab show last night was even better than the last two times I saw them. Ben Gibbard lost his teddy bear like chub though, which makes me sad. I didn't recognize him. They played a really varied set, and though I can't remember the order this is pretty much what I recall being played:

*THEY opened with: Employment Pages... then all these showed up somewhere, I'm working on arranging the list:
Movie Script Ending, We Laugh Indoors, Bixby Canyon Bridge, I Will Possess Your Heart, Cath..., Grapevine Fires, Long Division, The Ice is Getting Thinner, Soul Meets Body, I Will Follow You Into the Dark, Crooked Teeth, The New Year, Title and Registration, Sound of Settling, We Looked Like Giants, Company Calls, Company Calls Epilogue and encored with: Champagne From a Paper Cup, No Sunlight, Tiny Vessels, and Transatlanticism.

OMG MY MIND WAS BLOWN !

PAPERMONSTER update

2008-09-30T14:17:00.001-04:00

My friend Victor Garcia is doing amazing things with his art work! Please check it out!

www.papermonster.org

He's also released a skateboard deck!

You can check out more details and download pictures of pieces in the show by visiting:::
http://papermonster.wordpress.com

There, you will find upcoming shows and projects including a laser cut skateboard which you can view pictures of here:
http://flickr.com/photos/5280lasers/2808499681/

at the museum

2008-09-28T19:14:00.010-04:00

1
Statues of archaic figures with
almond eyes hover above a diffusing crowd,
much like storm clouds do in springtime.
I have rewritten their language to be my own.
Clinging my belongings as they spill
over my weak half nelson, I appear to some
as a bag lady, some as an Olympian.
The clicking of my too-tight-shoes
grows loftier as I make my way down the corridor,
and the stare of some Doryphorus burns itself
some place between my shoulder blades.
Athens rests upon my lips here, it is
sweet and the scent of Cyprus, of clay,
of dry air -- it is all the heaviness
of the Gigantomachy on the Temple of Zeus
in Berlin, and it stings my sinuses.

2
These many words have not been translated,
not to me and everybody knows it, even the guards
in all of their hand me down shirts.
In some other hall or gallery a thousand
Madonnas line the walls, the pietas
sag and melt like molten steel -- she
sinks low and slow like blackstrap molasses,
or like some Herb who's reluctant to speak up.
This is my thirteenth time visiting this wing,
which is why the Mother's behaving this way.
It's tricking and I got it.

3
In the darkness of the third floor
I'm noticed by a woman of about ninety,
the thick lines of pragmatism hide in her face.
She picks my scarf up off the floor, looks up,
her bright eyes the like the hole in the Pantheon.
I imagine scooping them out like soft pearls
and fashioning a necklace to see forever with.
Shade thanks the woman for her keffiyeh,
then continues down the hallway in silence.
She will go on knowing the woman is
only steps behind her and will think
about the years between them, all of
the miles and countries that make
her a girl in her twenties and
the woman unknowable.

4
I lean against the salty marble wall,
wrapped in shivering coldness chattering
teeth that could provoke an earthquake.
In nomini Patri... In the name of the father,
I mumble this while all the saints and sinners mock me.
The legends here have their place on the wall,
I am their outsider getting drenched
in their laughter and finding my
way back into the crowd.

reckless, depraved, and bitter

2008-09-28T13:22:00.005-04:00

Tonight is the season 2 premier of Californication, one of my most favorite shows ever. Nevermind the articulate (yet pithy at times) dialogue, picturesque setting, or the bittersweet Hollywood hopefulness, oh and the youngest daughter from The Nanny's boobs popping up every once in a while -- I'm entranced by David Duchovny's transformation from almost character actor (can we remember Evolution? that was him, wasn't it?) into -- BRACE YOURSELF -- David Duchovny basically acting like himself. An intelligent, super awesome, slightly pessimistic, ridiculously sex driven "power" male... oh throw in the fact that he is the type of writer in the show I'd love to be and we basically have a match made in heaven. Never watched X-Files, don't know which is Mulder or Scully, but I can say this... since Twin Peaks, you've come a long way baby!

honesty. honest tea.

2008-09-27T14:46:00.002-04:00

While working at an organic food store I became reacquainted with my love for Honest Tea of all flavors. Moroccan Mint Green, Assam Black, First Nation Peppermint, Just Black, Just Green, Pearfe"ct White, and Community Green Tea (with Maltese Orange essence!) -- just to name a few. Anyhow, much like the famed Snapple caps, the makers of Honest Tea have included what I find quite interesting quotes underneath the lid of each delicious bottle. I began to compile a collection of the quotes, and I see no better time than now to share them:

"In all things of nature, there is something of the marvelous." -Aristotle

"The person who knows how to laugh at himself will never cease to be amused." -Shirley MacLaine

"Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it." -Confucius

"The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others." -Ghandi

"The first human being who hurled an insult instead of a stone was the founder of civilization." -Sigmund Freud

"The true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit." -Nelson Henderson

"I would rather regret the things I have done than the things I have not." -Lucille Ball

"Never hope more than you work." -Rita Mae Brown

"To bend a bamboo, start when it is a shoot." -Malaysian Proverb
Abraham Maslow

"He who throws mud only loses ground." -Fat Albert (umm, ok)

"The bad news: there is no key to the universe. The good news: it was never locked." -Swami Beyondananda

right now

2008-09-27T12:16:00.002-04:00

Little Bit by Lykke Li from the album Youth Novel

my brother's morning playlist

2008-09-26T14:09:00.009-04:00

I had a Zooey Deschanel in Almost Famous moment during my family's Jeopardy and countertop dinner last night. As most of my friends know, we have this really great nook off of our kitchen which provides a nice place to eat dinner but for some reason my family is more apt to sit around the island in our kitchen and eat dinner there amongst the yammering of Sam Waterston on Law and Order, or the obnoxious voice of Alex Trebek. Anyways, this moment made me proud to be a sister. My brother decided to share with me the music he listened to on his way to school (he's a high school junior)... nonetheless this completed me. On a rainy morning on a bus filled with really lame wannabe fitted hat wearing "gangstas" he tuned them out first listening to Blinded by the Lights by the Streets. He was "super into the hook" and Mike Skinner's stream of consciousness writing... little did he know about the ecstasy driven storyline, but awesome still. What was even more fascinating was that he said he didn't even know he had this on his iPod, and so he listened to the first five tracks of the album. We dished about this for a bit. He moved himself into some Black Moth Super Rainbow and (the to be expected) Broken Social Scene... starts droppin' bombs on me about Nas and how he's lyrically misunderstood, talking about subtle nuances and shit. I'm like, when I was 16 I moped, wore lots of black, and listened to the Cure. I would have talked about how Robert Smith was a misunderstood lyricist and how the album Disintegration changed my life. I wasn't nearly as insightful... didn't know who Mike Skinner was.

guten morgen!

2008-09-26T11:30:00.004-04:00

Somehow yesterday I was transformed into this half-a-pack-a-day smoke coming out of my ears no sleep till Brooklyn type of narcissist. After that wine induced night I woke in my bed after a series of bizarre dreams -- like, I was tripping on mushrooms on my old campus, a ridiculously heavy backpack strapped to myself, and all of my middle school nemeses were there -- pissed at myself for leaving the window open again because my throat hurts and the fan was already on. I'm a sucker for listening to storms as I try to fall asleep but I'm forgetting we're punching into fall and summer is long gone. My sufficient enough weekend was bumped up to a 4-day weekend yesterday when office manager Betty called me to say they were closing the Arts Center because of (potential) power outages. I'm feeling lazy and thin this morning, sleep gunk half gluing my eyelids shut, hands shaking like a wino's would. My room needs to be cleaned, it's vomiting itself up again. I'm trapped inside a toddler who can't hold his animal crackers... so I guess I have something to do today.

no. 52

2008-09-24T13:20:00.003-04:00

The ground feels the same
underneath our feet, I'm sure,
though there seems to be more of
it between us these days.
My skin is pink on the nape
of my neck where the sun
hits me on my way to work,
and I'm sure that on some
afternoons you feel it too,
puckered, soft, and flushed.
Sleep must be the same,
perhaps, with constant
tossing, turning, churning...
For my mind can't rest when
it thinks of you or the way
your glasses rest upon your ears.
The lines connecting you and I
are long and thin and taut,
and I know you're there
pulling me back and forth
like some childhood game
I've forgotten about.

sleep tight, tiger

2008-09-23T00:58:00.003-04:00

First I would like to say that I have loved this album since I first got it back in 2005. It reminds me of the many summer nights spent with special people driving up and back Absecon Island with nothing but the sweet taste of innocence fleeting from our lips. I realized while driving the other night my affinity for Swedish music. Lykke Li, PB&J, Husky Rescue, Jose Gonzalez, Belle and Sebastian, (and I believe) Camera Obscura among others and others and others. But these have been on my list for frequent listening as of late. While musically (at least) have managed to cling to the past -- Otis Redding make me want to locate a time machine and pick out my 'fro -- I have started to cling to other things... like my love of what is basically a 9 to 5 schedule, the sound of my heels clicking against the tile floor while I walk up to my office in the morning--coffee in hand, wearing pencil skirts, and research assignments though I've always sort of enjoyed those. I wake and retire to my bed both in early hours. I like things this way. My life is becoming ever so simple. I don't seek to change it any time soon.

public transportation

2008-09-22T19:06:00.004-04:00

I'm perpetually amazed and bewildered by the New York City subway system. I love feeling somewhat in the company of others but completely alone. I forgot to mention this.

take offs and landings?

2008-09-22T18:50:00.004-04:00

I have been pondering what difference there really is between an arrival and a return. We look at the two each as very separate things, and there is significant emotional weight to each. After a great effort to keep myself sane while in transit for some hours over the weekend, I am here -- barely alive and well (at least yesterday) -- to tell the tale. Friday night was my big return to the Drew campus and New York City as well. It had been months (since graduation) since I had been back and I must say it was delightful having some handfuls of people happily waiting to greet me in each place. I think of the aforementioned terms as arrival meaning what it traditionally means, and returns as a departure I suppose. Arrivals and returns to places one doesn't call home come with much anticipation, the return home is oftentimes dreaded or a sad experience. I'm actually not sure what to make of any of this now. You can always go home, but wherever you visit won't always be the same.

things

2008-09-17T11:29:00.013-04:00

Eucharist

My knees are chapped and bruised
from kneeling before you, an unnamed
god that I sacrifice my insides for.

To keep you close I must take you in,
holding you tight to my chest like an idol,
quaking and rocking as though entranced in prayer.

My forehead and lips burn with devotion
where you have anointed me.
It is here you have delivered me from the others.

You come, my sweet, motionless and sacred.
You go, restless and afraid.
Oh my darling full of grace, redeem me.

The Mighty Oak

There are roots,
thick and heavy roots
that clench themselves
to the driest soil.
They twist and turn
into complex shapes,
rigid and unforgiving.
No one can climb here
for the branches are brittle.
The bark is tough and remains
untouched for fear of tearing
skin, its been split in patches
by the curious, the few who've
tasted the tenderness within.
It may be because this tree
is filled with ancient secrets,
ghostly whispers fill its arms,
as they reach toward the skies.
It is silly to think
one should even try to reach
the top, it'd be easier
just to slip inside,
sleep a while.

darling,

2008-09-16T12:11:00.005-04:00

if all of the

stress
pangs
heartbreak
years
years
years
disgust
confusion
desperation
vulnerability
anxiety
and desire

were for this one single moment in time,

so fucking be it.

Youth Novel

2008-09-15T08:58:00.002-04:00

It has been brought to my attention (needless to say I've been aware of it for a while) that I have stopped updating here. I've stopped writing in general. If not for a general lack of interesting things to say or "blogworthy" topics, then just out of sheer laziness and the unwillingness to explore my own head. Since my hiatus I've started a new job, a real one in fact that my $200,000 education "prepared" me for. It's at the Ocean City Arts Center and it's so good that I'm quitting my other job. Remember? The nonsensical one that I have recently discovered to be littered with roaches, rats, and termites among crotchety old, impatient, stank-breathed customers. I'm turning my back on organic fruits and veggies as well as strange and bizarre meatless meats for something worlds better... for now.

I have found myself to be transforming into a small town girl with a big city heart and attitude of sorts, talking about my past life and future goals as what drag queens from the 1950s would refer to as a career girl (and I hope my hidden reference to the movie To Wong Foo...Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar was apparent, and if not it is now). Anyways, I notice that I have begun to say things like "I'm due in at the office" more frequently and something about having a job where my brain remains in my head for 6+ hours certainly tickles me... where it tickles me I'm not sure but just know I'm laughing about it.

Someone out there somewhere is reading this, so do me the favor of giving me something I should write about. I feel myself lapsing back into the LiveJournal style of recapping my days. And even I don't care much about that.

anonymous commenting

2008-08-27T21:45:00.000-04:00

is ridiculous. if you're going to criticize me don't hide yourself.

I WANT THIS NOW

2008-08-27T10:43:00.000-04:00

http://www.anthropologie.com/anthro/catalog/productdetail.jsp?_dyncharset=ISO-8859-1&_dynSessConf=8053303066977135625&id=830094&parentid=APP_DRESS_GRAPHIC&pushId=APP_DRESS_GRAPHIC&popId=APPAREL&sortProperties=&navCount=2&navAction=jump&fromCategoryPage=true&selectedProductSize=&selectedProductSize1=&color=grm

so uhhh.. can I have?

days of yore

2008-08-27T10:27:00.000-04:00

When I think about my current post-grad situation I am filled with bitterness, but then there are moments when I suck it the fuck up and realize that there are people from high school that are worse off than I am. Well, maybe they're not necessarily worse, just far more fucking stupid. And not booksmart-stupid, just absolutely superficial and incredibly lame. As I managed to roll myself onto my side this morning after a night of God only knows what I found myself on this person's facebook profile:

and although the profile is quite fascinating, I'm only going to share with you this person's favorite books:

Men's Health, Fitness Rx, Money, Playboy, and the Guinness book of world records.
Actually, while trying to copy these down I found the personal interests blogworthy as well:

"Philly, Sports, Lifting, UFC, Music, Eating, Sleeping, Friends, traveling, PHILADELPHIA EAGLES, 76ers, makin money, eating extremely healthy, amino acids, SKANKS, beef jerky (yum yum!), eating steak with massive amounts of ketchup, blazin and being philosophical, watching movies, breakfast, fantasy football, nl poker, tan brunettes, protein!!!!, the beach, going for runs, ballin out, WAWA, lunch, Eating, dinner, baller ass cars, studying on aderol... its so much fun, observing people, Benjamins, tattoos, food, the montauk monster."

So disgustingly college and disgustingly Rutgers I suppose I'm glad I never went there.

F#A#

2008-08-22T00:28:00.000-04:00

my teeth chatter, crooked and unforgiving
as my bones fold themselves into the most twisted of shapes
and like the oldest tree i stand, weakly,
bending and snapping in the air of the pending autumn.

my body is a maze i remain in, my skin
puckering as it bleeds into falsely white sheets.
i greet myself in the mirror that hangs on a wall
by the buzzing light of the television, unknowingly.

in this life i crave absolution and solace,
my raspy voice prays for it at night and somewhere
in a drawer lay books that remain unread
and a God whose name stains my lips.

here i sit in an unnamed room
surrounded by found objects of little meaning.
i search for a way to get back to my vivid dreams,
to when time and space collided and i understood how.

it's nobody's fault but my own

2008-08-19T19:32:00.000-04:00

As quickly as summer brushed itself onto the thirstiest of lips, it has receded like the most bitter tide to ever wash against the shore. I had at one time or another in the past few months found myself on the cusp of major life changes like perpetually turning pages in a book that is longer than Tolstoy's War and Peace. Now I just feel as though I'm stagnant, an stone unturned, collecting my thoughts and feelings like moss atop my cracking skin. Looking in the mirror I can see myself aging. I crave sleep more than anything, and no matter what conversation begins I find myself lapsing back to some pointless thought, my mind meandering about like a stray cat. Months ago I felt as though the world rested upon the tips of my curled toes, now I feel like it's barely within reach. The summer of this or that was not really summer at all. I watch the world around me, the innocence around me, and I have forgotten about the true essence of this time. The spirit of summers past has escaped me and I no longer anticipate it's coming or dread its leaving us. It's just another three months and it will return. A blur encapsulates me. What is with the human preoccupation of getting things accomplished? Tonight while driving home, it is the early evening, the sun is setting much sooner than it would have not too long ago, a flock of birds lifted themselves from the ground and into the tops of trees that line up behind the houses on my street... they are fleeting silhouettes in a melon colored sky. I wonder what I am doing but they're just finding a place to sleep.

on hiatus

2008-08-19T16:07:00.000-04:00

until my mind can make sense of things.

as it is writ so it shall be done

2008-08-15T20:13:00.000-04:00

I'm stuck in some awful sort of paradox. My lack of thoughts and inability to write is bizarre being that since my last post I've been totally and completely overwhelmed by an overload of emotion and events. My patience and emotional and mental stamina have been tried. It is here that I now stand, still without anything of much substance to say. Where do I go from here?

time to send someone away

2008-08-03T17:00:00.000-04:00

After a very long few days I realized it was Sunday, however, I'm postponing my 'Piece of the Week' segment until Tuesday. With work, etc. I haven't had a second to let my mind rest. If anyone has suggestions about a piece or topic they'd like me to talk about send it my way! I think things may work better that way.

what goes around

2008-07-30T19:04:00.000-04:00

Rejection is an awful feeling. What's worse is when you're convinced you've got something nailed down and then it goes in the complete opposite direction. I didn't get the Philly job. What's a girl to do?

worth sharing

2008-07-29T12:51:00.001-04:00

The Strokes - You Only Live Once - The Strokes

iMEEM exclusive... makes me hear the song differently...

second piece of the week

2008-07-27T23:43:00.001-04:00

Interior (The Rape) by Edgar Degas, 1868-9

In the fall semester of my junior year I took an art history course entitled Theory and Criticism. On the first day of class our professor told us that this was in fact the hardest course within the major and essentially we would be teaching ourselves the material (via torturous hour long weekly presentations by every student in the class for the next 3 and a half months). Hundreds and hundreds of pages of scholarly articles later on topics I didn't even know could be applied to art history brought the class to the painting you see above. It has almost been three years since I discussed this piece in depth, and it is still fresh in my mind. The startled feeling I get right where both sides of my ribcage meet each other remains and I am stunned.

Degas is obviously a well known painter, but most importantly among the laymen his named strikes a particular key. Thick and colorful images of ballerinas in formation with one another come to mind and the delicacy with which the paint was applied to such supple canvases reminds us of Impressionism -- one of the most revered and respected movements in art. The part of our brain that stores pictures is triggered and releases Monet's waterlilies, Manet's seascapes, and the faces of the many Renoir children. The goal of this "glamorous" high painting was light, to capture it and maintain it in the most realistic of ways throughout the entire piece. An even balance of luminous color is cast upon the canvas using apparent brush strokes, clearly not as striking as the Expressionistic application seen in such Van Goghs but still powerful. Artists working within this spectrum wanted to give the impression of the ideal. They were working their way out of Realism, and Impressionism was the best way to give a realistic depiction of a world that was only perfect on the outside, which brings us to Degas' The Rape. Here we are reminded that no matter how many idyllic flower scenes and bourgeois French citizens an artist focuses on there is a dark, frightening mind within that realizes not all is as it seems.

Remember that Impressionism shows that everything seems fine on the outside, well, this is the antithesis of that. This concept is not proven by examining the darkness of the scene, nor is the woman's torn dress or the positioning of the man against the wall a true hint to the obscurity of private lives. It's in the tilted and warped perspective, the focal point, and the sheer uncertainty of the presentation that makes us question our own realities. Every formal aspect of this painting leads the viewer to believe that the situation we are first presented with may not be as it seems. It is said that this scene is based on a Zola story, one of a woman who wants her lover to kill her husband so they can elope and live together. If this is known ahead of time, one could speculate that the man (who we initially perceive as the rapist) has arrived to his lover's bedroom after killing her husband. She waits anxiously for his return, the torn dress symbolically representing her torn conscience. Light as the central focus could have been used in this instance to set the figures apart from the viewer, placing them in a lower moral caliber than us. But perhaps the picture is telling us exactly what we are told, and the Degas has manipulated the light to place the woman in a vulnerable position, she is in fact crouched and set below the male figure who is in "power". Whether we are witnessing a raw love born from infidelity or an innocence that has been ripped from one person by another, this unsettling image is what I believe to be the epitome of Impressionism (at its highest).

It is ideas such as these that I believe inspired Neo-Impressionists like Georges Seurat to fragment reality and give the viewer an image that is admired and confusing -- showing us familiarity and ripping it away by manipulating a site so that it is looked upon in a way that at one point was inconceivable. The Gravelines done by Seurat at the fin-de-siecle are a perfect example of this. Such dizzying pieces remind us of the Night Cafe by Vincent Van Gogh and how the prettiness of painting done un plein air is in fact underrated.

seahorses 4 eva

2008-07-25T00:32:00.000-04:00

Apparently a guy was tripping on acid and his friends recorded what he said. I don't know what Dan Deacon has to do with this, but it's entertaining. NO WAY.

i haz job, i haz it!

2008-07-24T10:17:00.000-04:00

OKAY FRIENDS here's the deal: I'm no longer unemployed, babysitting, or working odd (but fun) jobs for people. I'm also not working a career job, nevertheless, I am an employed individual who is now contributing somehow to society. This morning I was hired to work at a local organic food market.

The better news: I'll stop asking you to pick me up because I'll finally have money for gas.

transparent things

2008-07-23T12:26:00.001-04:00

Since last summer I've been really into Fujiya and Miyagi, as well as most music like this (Cut Copy, Hot Chip, Datarock, etc.). It's just come to my attention, however, that F+M says "Sock it to me" in way too many of their songs. Is that really necessary?

You don't see David Byrne doing this shit.

thank you for being a friend

2008-07-22T19:55:00.001-04:00

As most of you know I'm a huge Golden Girls fan, have been since about age eleven. It might seem strange for a girl my age to not only be an avid watcher (three times a day), but to quote lines from the show in casual conversation is very much a part of my daily routine. So for a person like me, today is a sad day. Estelle Getty, the actress who played Sophia Petrillo on the series passed away today. On the show she was known as a sassy, witty, brash little woman filled with old world charm. She reminded me very much of my own grandmother. That being said I haven't much else to say.

R.I.P. Estelle, we loved you!

first piece of the week

2008-07-20T18:30:00.000-04:00

If you think you've noticed some changes on my blog you're correct! To the right I've added a section entitled Piece of the Week. It not only includes a picture of whatever I have chosen for this week but if you click the image it will lead you somewhere that will educate you further about the artist. Every Sunday I will introduce a new piece of artwork and briefly discuss it in hopes of starting some sort of discussion or at least a place for those interested to pose questions. The Andres Serrano post is still up for grabs, though.

Yellow, White, Blue over Yellow on Gray by Mark Rothko, 1954

While watching a program on the artist this afternoon on Ovation TV I became inspired to have this as my first piece. Rothko has always been an artist that inspires me in some fantastical way. I believe it has something to do about the interplay between his color fields and the radiative qualities each section possesses as it plays with the others and the viewer. Mark Rothko once said that the ideal painting has three qualities: romanticism, tragedy, and the clear preoccupation with death. Many art historians say that there is a romantic element to Rothko's body of work (especially in regards to the vibrant, lovely paintings), but much to the surprise of many it is his stark, dark, solid works that are the triumphant and joyous ones. Pieces like the one I have chosen, according to Rothko, are the sad ones filled with tragic players.

It is important to keep in mind that while Mark Rothko was working within the New York School of Abstract Expressionists, also known as the Irascibles (which included Pollock, de Kooning, etc.), the maxims to which he worked were very different for an abstract painter. Like all artists whose work seemed to transform over time into something more obscure and oftentimes confusing, they all started out using "traditional" techniques with identifiable "forms". In his early work from the 1930s there was an obvious preoccupation with color which stemmed from his admiration of Henri Matisse and the painting The Red Studio. Using color as the primary expressive tool was Rothko's game. Each block can be likened to a paragraph and how that paragraph speaks for the whole is what makes it "work".

What most people don't realize when looking at a piece is that they don't have to search for meaning, and the reason for that is because there isn't one. I heard an artist speak once about a person he witnessed at the Tate Modern who was looking at a Rothko. It was a large, red schemed, heavy yet staggering work. The viewer looked at it from every allowable angle as if "he dropped his coat somewhere into the space and was desperately trying to retrieve it but didn't know how to approach searching for it." It isn't meaning that you should walk away with, it is an experience. Paintings such as these are meant to leave the viewer with an experiential enlightenment. What Mark Rothko truly strived to do was create a cohesive space, one where architectural form and visual form could come together to embody a spirit of some sort. These works are meditative and majestic. We should contemplate them, let them become a part of us. I've never been so physically affected by another artist's work and it baffles me.

your own personal jesus

2008-07-19T21:20:00.000-04:00

Piss Christ by Andres Serrano, 1989
"I am not a heretic. I like to believe that rather than destroy icons, I make new ones." -Serrano

A few years back in one of my art history courses I was introduced to Andres Serrano's Piss Christ. In short, he placed a crucifix in a receptacle of some sort, filled it with his own urine, then proceeded to take a photograph of it. This piece has been the object of much controversy, for obvious reasons. Here we are faced with the destruction of religious meaning and symbolism, degradation of a whole mass of followers and God's one and only son, among other things. My feelings remain almost indifferent -- mostly because I like to avoid religiously charged conversations and as an amateur art historian I've learned to respect and accept (for a limited amount of time) others' opinions -- and so I'd like to know what others think about this. We are the risk taking era, especially within the arts: Pollock's drips, Newman's zips, Marden's encaustic sticks, Oldenberg's and Christo's larger than life installations, International Yves Klein Blue, Janine Antoni's hair painting performance piece, and of course, human expulsions.

Disregard

2008-07-19T15:47:00.000-04:00

the previous post. I feel empty and void of all thoughts right now. I have experienced the most bizarre and uncomfortable 24 hours my life.

hot child in the city

2008-07-18T20:05:00.001-04:00

I'm currently sitting in Matt's room on Terrace Avenue in Jersey City Heights and I don't think I have ever been this hot in my life. I'm pretty sure that my denim shorts have become one with my body and I've been covered in a new skin, one that requires peeling to remove. In this cozy little split level live my friends Hello Midnight (they have real names I promise) and we are finally together since graduation... or since the Knitting Factory. I honestly don't remember. I also don't know what I'm writing about since this heat is making me delirious. Make what you will of it.

i feel the temperature risin'

2008-07-17T12:49:00.000-04:00

Over the years I've experienced various types of fevers (Hello Midnight, Lion on Oil, a small case of Monument, Timemachine) and I've even caused others to suffer from Shade fever. David Lynch's television series Twin Peaks has caused me to suffer from feverish nightmares!

But just when I thought I was safe I'm seeing the outbreak of Dark Knight fever!

And I think I'm falling victim!

seni seviyorum

2008-07-17T11:28:00.000-04:00

After a long day in Philadelphia I came home, laid out in my driveway, then came inside to revel in the nice conditioned air. I soon realized I had a voicemail that must have come in when I turned my phone off during my job interview, so I dialed up and listened to it. It was my dearest friend, Berk, telling me that he and our other friend Devin would be in Brigantine in a few hours until Friday -- mind you, Brigantine is where I grew up, and they have been spending summers there since we were all kids and I never knew them until senior year of college. I haven't been that excited in a long time. The longest time Berk and I ever went without seeing each other was during winter break for 6 weeks, and even then I went up to New York for a visit. The night was spent drinking wine out on Devin's family's dock on the bay, then driving down to where I used to live and walking along the jetty at night -- the Atlantic City skyline looking strangely fabulous -- and putzing around in the water a bit taking night-time photographs. Everything was lovely until I came home and walked in on my parents having sex. So like some sort of odd fractional mathematics, my great night got canceled out.

the two one five versus the two one two

2008-07-15T18:17:00.000-04:00

I spent the later part of senior year desperately searching for a job in New York City after a year's worth of preparation for life in the Big Apple, otherwise known as Beasting Out 101. Creating a "sound" network of friends and potential colleagues, finally learning to navigate the subway system on my own and without a map, and seeking out the illest spots to chill in the city was no easy feat, but this sort of difficulty is most definitely welcome. The arts sector is painfully unwelcoming, however. Fuck a degree and a respectable education (despite what my fellow classmates have to say), all I need is an endless, over-expensive black wardrobe and a perpetual pout in order to be qualified for a job that consists of sitting behind a Macbook offering absolutely nothing to gallery frequenters. That being said, after this quest I'm turning my back on the grande pomme and diving head first into the city of brotherly love. Yes, Philadelphia -- better known to my friends who are residents as Illadelphia -- and ill it is. I spent the day with some choice heads meandering about the city and I came to the conclusion that it is as cool if not cooler than New York being that it's got all the personality and less than half the pretentious attitude. Tomorrow I have an interview in Old City for a Gallery Coordinator/Assistant position at the Clay Studio, and I'm fully psyched. If this is it for me, then it's onward to my (hopefully wonderful) new and independent life. But seriously, 212 (etc. etc.) I fucking miss you even though you're a bitch who insists that boots and scarves are alright in the summertime and Long Island Iced Teas and Camel Lights should be at least $8.

if things start splittin' at the seams

2008-07-15T13:27:00.000-04:00

I'm not one to really give you a detailed journal-esque entry about what is specifically going on in my life, so instead I'll leave you with a song that says exactly how I feel at the current moment. It's a really great track from one of my favorite albums this summer.

No One's Gonna Love You by Band of Horses, from their album Cease to Begin

hey zeus!

2008-07-14T11:51:00.001-04:00

Is this what I'm in for?

north american scum

2008-07-13T20:59:00.000-04:00

My friend Chris recently posted this bulletin to Myspace (I hate to admit that I even have an account but let's admit it, we have them to check out other people's pictures and read bulletins, and sometimes promote our cough blogs cough):

"those american apparel models that are plastered all over myspace and on the website are quite possibly the ugliest and most beat looking people i have ever seen. they look like they smell bad and the one girl who models the "slim slack" looks like a horse and the gross guy with long hair thats always on my myspace when i go to look in my inbox looks like a dirty seal...i never want to meet people that look like them and think they look cool."

I love the ferocity with which he wrote this. Those cats are a bit too pale and a bit too out of bed looking for me. What's the big deal?

you always come to the party

2008-07-13T16:27:00.000-04:00

I want this.

Master of None by Beach House, from their self titled album.

heart of chambers

2008-07-13T16:12:00.001-04:00

When important people in your life have gone you're only left with a memory. Their names and faces are almost permanently engraved on specific songs, places, and even seasons. Those you have spent the most intimate of times with, whether friends or lovers, are the people who remain closest to your heart -- an organ which is our life force, but has for some reason been deemed a muscle that is capable of physically feeling emotion. It is strange that when you "love" you feel this gnawing, pulling, tightness in the left side of your chest and the heart actually responds, pumping hard inside of you as if it is the one responsible for creating such a mentally dependent feeling. Of the many times I have experienced this feeling, I wonder what my heart makes of meaning. If it can in fact feel "love" then can it sense meaning? And if so, what does it mean when those who once made your pulse meaningfully exist come back into your life? I'd like to think that there is something bigger than my own mind's interpretation of the world around me and that these recurring characters in my life are playing a bigger part in this game I play day to day. I crave meaningful encounters and have for a while now. Amidst all of this superficial nonsense I concern myself with, where can I place the tangible parts of my own reality? These days I wonder if I even have any.

My friend Zoe has brought the following to my attention, and I leave you with this:

Mammals and birds have hearts with four chambers. Reptiles and turtles have hearts with three chambers. Fish have hearts with two chambers. Insects and mollusks have hearts with one chamber. Worms have hearts with one chamber, although they may have as many as eleven single-chambered hearts. Unicellular bacteria have no hearts at all; but even they have fluid eternally in motion, washing from one side of the cell to the other, swirling and whirling. No living being is without interior liquid motion. We all churn inside.

semi-charmed life

2008-07-12T15:41:00.000-04:00

A few nights before I graduated from college (a strangely quiet night, in fact) I walked with my friend Matt down behind our dorm, through a eerily dark but not so quiet parking lot, down the secret stairs and to a neighboring elementary school, Miller High Life longnecks in hand. Matt and I had quite a year. We went from being super tight friends to people who at one point barely spoke. The impending end of our college career had forced us back into some kind of friendship and so we took this odd moment to spend some time together, recollecting the past two years and talking about what God only knows now. In the stillness of one of our last Madison nights we sat on a swing set, just downhill from this large, looming rectangular box of a school whose presence was undeniable. The one thing I can distinctly remember talking about was how in these final days we needed to make some substantial memories. An awful montage of scenes fluttered through my buzzing brain as I listened to him go on a diatribe (a word I can thank Matt for adding to my Words for Regular Usage list). I knew for a fact that we had had some crazy times, not just the times that people usually reflect back on as crazy but some legitimately insane times where if it wasn't for each of us, neither of us thought we would make it out alive. The two of us had fashioned ourselves into the whackest of tag teams. How many people do you know that walk into a social situation with a meticulously crafted escape plan? With two years full of panic rooms, shooting galleries, (oftentimes grimy) New York City bars, rock anthems (I'll explain this later), characters out of the most frightening of comic books (Timemachine, Werewolf, The Ultimate Warrior, Metal Sheik, Killa Kasai, AK-47, etc. etc. this could go on forever), princes, disasters, and chuckles all alike... I deemed this not the soberist of friendships but incredible nonetheless. This night out on the playground, wishing we could go back and rewrite our childhoods and speaking of how much cooler we could have been, was fantastic and strange. No matter who we once were, he will still have been the awkward, pale kid with an almost-unibrow, and I the chubby kid whose mother made her to go public school in plaid skirts and knee-high socks for her entire sixth grade year.

Thank God for change, but despite how much each of us has evolved into pseudo hipster non domestic beer drinking pubcrawlers these ghosts still haunt the ends of our minds and unwillingly we accept that this has shaped us into the shells of people we proudly call ourselves today. Looking back on this particular moment in both our lives I think we each realized how alike we were and that we had in fact made memories. Please, this kid can't take a car ride lasting more than ten minutes without a drink in hand and I remember his temper tantrum from last summer about how I needed to drive faster because he couldn't be in the car anymore. Needless to say, the car ride was like 15 minutes each way, I was buying him dinner AND providing him with a place to stay. I digress, but if you're curious that story ended with him chugging Jim Beam in my basement upon arrival at my house.

Whether or not he and I struggled to carry an old, musty couch from some campus basement back to the large lawn in front of our dorms where we had spent numerous afternoons criticizing the physically fit people playing frisbee in the distance and drinking Twisted Tea from mugs so as to not get written up for "open containers" (the vaguest title of misdemeanors), our friendship was in fact real and tangible. Matt and I, both Leos born three days apart, are as he would say "reactionary people." We are people who have fought, smacked, hit, thrown TVs at each other, scream and cry holding each other in the middle of parties, holding back each others hair in our upstrokes... people who have said to piss of and piss on, I love you and hate you. We are two strange people who may have deemed Closer by Nine Inch Nails our theme song at one drunken time or another. I laugh as I type up all of this. Once we had brought that couch to Hoyt Lawn we sat and stared out at it. We were fortunate enough to live on the best part of the campus and in the mistiness of that night, while Fatty slept soundly after pulling an all-nighter for a four page paper, while Pablo and Eric did whatever it is they did, while the City hummed softly some miles away we were there, in silence, together.

For a fraction of a moment I forgot this was soon coming to an end. And then in the midst of it all we awoke the morning of graduation. Back to square one and "I hate you!" we stood in his room, Matt still drunk from the night before that had ended a little over two hours prior to the 9:30 AM line-up. In his wrinkled cap and gown, shirt and tie, he jumped back into bed declaring that he would not be attending graduation. After Pete and I forced him up, we walked to the Forum together for the last time, fighting the whole way. I'll say no more for to most of those reading these are no surprises, but if he is reading this, I hope he looks back on these times with great fondness as I am right now.

mango pickle down river

2008-07-11T18:44:00.000-04:00

This morning I woke, threw on my super fashionable mesh shorts that I bought at Target instead of a bathing suit, and slipped up into my Champion brand racer back sports bra (which is my new, most favorite thing to wear all the time and in all seriousness). I walked to my closet, slid open the doors, and stared into the frightening abyss of it all, not trying to make myself feel like a disgusting over-consumer, but to decide which pair of brightly colored Pumas I wanted to put on my two feet. I go with the indigo and white, very light and very worn in ones. They're dirty and misshapen and I love them. These shoes are a testament to the fact that I often do get up off my ass and do things (despite the fact that I purchased them online). These days my ass isn't such a bad thing to discuss, in my opinion at the very least. If you recall I declared this the summer of fitness and so I have a heartbreakingly long list of exercises and things I do to (get) keep myself in shape. I counter all of my stern efforts by drinking excessively, but I can be proud of the fact that I don't really each much of anything. So yeah, I dressed myself and did some obscene looking stretches in my driveway before starting my run. I hadn't even gotten up off the ground and the sweat was starting to bead at my temples and on the back of my neck being as it was incredibly humid out. I put in my headphones, start up Kala by M.I.A. which is the best to run to, and go go go go go go go. I love running to this album, not because it's good or anything but because its beat is something I can stick with. Half a mile and album in I was definitely dying but it was the good kind of death approaching, the warming light and all. The worst part about running to your destination is knowing that you have to turn around and run home. Home is no place I'm in any hurry to run back to, but I don't think I'm ready for the big white light. When I returned home my mother was drinking her bowl of coffee at the kitchen counter. Disregarding my profuse sweating, inability to speak, headphones still in ears, and the difficulty with which I maneuvered myself to the refrigerator, she asks what's wrong. I opened my mouth and stuck my head under the water dispenser of our fridge, and replenished myself. She said nothing.

That was my morning.

the procreation of advertising

2008-07-01T00:21:00.000-04:00

Briefly, I'd like to address recent ad campaigns whose target audience is unclear. When children are the target we see bold and vivid color, playful music, and often cartoon inspired scenes. Women and mothers that are aimed at by advertisements seem to be approached by orderly, organized themes and visualizations. We can probably agree that the majority of commercials out there are aimed towards women who are probably the largest consumer audience out there. So when we want to freshen our spaces or seek out a new room fragrance, why is a computer animated octopus or elephant launching the product? Moreover, in Air Wick's plug-in room freshener commercial, how on earth does this elephant mother have a centipede for a son? It all makes no sense to me. Last I checked, none of these animals were domesticated, and some aren't even fit to live above water!

in reverie

2008-06-29T12:21:00.001-04:00

In the mornings I wake to a clumsily crafted life,
a wrinkled blanket that has taken some time to weave
and in the crispness of the day I wonder where it was I lost you.

Did you drop out from inside me as I rose from my bed,
or was it in the shower as I washed away the previous night?

Could it have been in my recurring dream
in that nameless hallway where you slipped away into some room,
one whose door was locked and all my keys don't fit?

I hold my breath thinking that will keep you in,
for with each exhalation one or another kiss floats away
and outside in the misty summer you hang in the humid haze.

There are many things that I may call my own
but you are no longer one of them,
I don't think you ever were.

hypervoyeurism

2008-06-29T11:41:00.000-04:00

When we know people are watching we act differently, speak differently, position our bodies in a manner that (we think) flatters our form. The head is tilted a little higher, the outfit may be slightly more brazen. Our laugh is distinctly heard across the room. The moment your presence enters a room it is tried to be made known. Voices lift and carry themselves at a higher volume. The truth of the matter is that people do not notice us more, they notice a change in behavior that is instantly tagged as abnormal. We must blog as if no one is reading.

oh where is your inflammatory writ?

2008-06-27T00:48:00.001-04:00

sweat
I feel the space between us
as it presses itself into my thighs.
It is hot and full of emptiness.

Where our mouths once met,
leaving us wide-eyed and hungry,
there is nothing but a ghostly imprint.

I lay wrapped in a mess of tangled sheets
with a heart that beats much for nothing,
licking my lips hoping to taste you there.

What I remember of your face
is embossed somewhere between my eyes,
it fades as though left bathing in sunlight.

My insides once churned and boiled
as if I sat upon a molten surface
but I seem to be dormant as of late.

Like the smoke in my eyes,
you're a painful reminder
of the vices I find myself running to.

I want to know what it is to burn,
to glow at the center where my ribs meet,
and to fizzle and die into the night.

OH MY GOD

2008-06-26T22:56:00.000-04:00

this girl is visiting me tomorrow and i can't wait to get wasted and hang with her!

chaw chee chaw chee chaw

2008-06-24T21:04:00.001-04:00

While watching Current TV this evening -- in between the pods about rising gas prices and a sunken ship in the Philippines -- I found out that Jason Bateman, the actor who plays Michael Bluthe on the old TV series Arrested Development, has confirmed that there will in fact be a full length movie! I don't know when it's going to be released, but I'm super excited!

If you like Arrested Development, don't own DVDs, and want to watch it somehow you can do so here.