Stupid bird 2

OK, so this cardinal—I will let you guess the sex. No, I won't. This stupid male cardinal has been attacking my father's house for months. Every day. Morning, afternoon. Dunno what he does after dark. Sometimes the bedroom windows, sometimes the kitchen windows. He mostly goes for corners, for some reason. He is defending his territory against this male cardinal who just follows him everywhere.
    And I tell you what, if he manages to find a mate, I am personally going to fight against the teaching of evolution in schools.


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Stupid bird

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Bad dog

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Nice morning

Portal to another world. Hopefully not soon for Ellie Mae or my father.


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Location:Ledbetter Flat Rd,Talladega,United States

Uh oh 2

I have now laboriously written the story of how my plane's engine went out twice on my damn I phone and had my words erased. Trying again.
Making our descent into Dallas the air was bumpy. As we landed moving pretty quickly, I noticed a fleet of trucks paralleling the plane, lights flashing.
"Welcome to Dallas folks," said the pilot. "You may be wondering about the emergency vehicles. We had an engine go out on dissent. A clogged fuel filter. We didn't want to tell you till we were safely on the ground."
The passengers burst into applause.

Location:Oak Ln,Alpine,United States

Uh oh

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Location:Ledbetter Flat Rd,Talladega,United States

absolutely no photographs

Some people, even though they happen to be world renowned photographers themselves, don't care to have their pictures made. So if you are trying to take a picture of, let's say, an amusing sign, they try to lean out of the frame. They should know better. We use Jason Bourne tactics.

recent acquisitions

Library Ladder

Chafing Dish

Spring cleaning is my favorite time of year —when other people do it. And now, as I prepare to decide what's in the truck, I am acquiring things and deciding where in the U.S.A. they are going to live. The ladder is due to take up residence in Block Island, where loft ceilings make it almost requisite. However I'm liking it right here. The chafing dish will definitely stay in NYC where Winter Entertainments take place. Summer gets the grills. And then there are the tea cart and leather hassock. Eeniemeenieminiemo

hard news

Staff of Life magazine @1988

The staff of the only Life there is left—pictures on the web—now numbers two that I know of. And last week the news was that the once-great magazine company of Time Inc. is likely to be sold to the publishers of Good Housekeeping, bless their hearts.
      All the "girl" magazines, that is, or profitable ones—In Style, Real Simple & etc and the cash cow, People. The boy magazines, Time, Sports Illustrated and Fortune are apparently so elderly and unmarriageable that no one will have them. They will be kept to dwindle away or die the Life digital death. And they are selling the Time-Life building.
       It feels personal. All the talented, bright people who were nurtured by that company, like a small town before the Warner and then AOL "mergers"—just gone. I myself spent some 17 years at Life and worked at People three separate times, including as copy clerk on the very first issue, and just before, thank fortune (no, not Fortune), taking the last great buyout in 2001. Now it feels like my toil was valueless. Magazine history has been downsized.

v day report

Somebody went to the groomers on Valentine's Day.

Somebody got a hat on Valentine's Day and used it to mop up spilt milk.

heart this

It was pushing midnight last night when a dinner guest checked his watch and exclaimed, "I better get out of here before Valentine's Day!"
   And here is a pretty grim Valentine's Day op-ed piece I did for the New York Times eighteen years ago. The child has her own child now.

nice day

. . .and that's all I have to say.

pillow talk

Write this and put it near your bed where you'll see it before you go to sleep.
Go to sleep.
Within three days you will have The Dream.
Even if you don't remember dreams, you will remember this one.

Mine was my favorite kind, a sort of espionage/travel/chase saga. It even had a name, The Persistent Passage (a pun referring apparently to both my flight and to a passage in a book—escapes of two sorts). I twice actually woke up, wrote parts of it down and fell back asleep and dreamed another chapter.

Have fun tonight!

my spot

photo by Chien-Chi Chang

This is the best photo ever made of my favorite place in New York City—and maybe in the world. When the sun shines through the window for five minutes, it is the best. I am not the only one who likes it here. Ruca the dog is quite fond of it. Camilla the Mimi likes it. Many of my friends and relations find it, um, gemutlich. If you have never been here, you should check it out. Right now the best time of day is one in the afternoon. Gemutlich.

block island report

mass report

photo by Eva Porter

A big dog!

Sis and family got buried too!

where's the truck?

The truck takes a winter vacation in Woonsocket, R.I.

tie that binds

A package in the mail is always a special thing. You bring it into the kitchen table, open it up and find—a wonderful surprise?
A Christian tie? WTF? WWJD?
OK, you caption this tie. I'm speechless.

hipsta style

Much brouhaha lately about Hipstamatic (top) and whether filters applied by a computer program are art. And also about Instagram, which helps produce such photos and then puts them on line and apparently uses them for ads (since purchase by Facebook).
What do you think? The straight shot (bottom) or the artified?

a fearsome moment

 There was a near tragedy yesterday when it seemed as if the Shrine to Dependancy (as well as a gesture of solidarity with my developing world brothers and sisters who proudly keep their fridges in their

living rooms, though granted they don't have another one in the kitchen), aka The Beer Refrigerator, was on the fritz. Yes, the light in the Timex display with Cigarettes from Around the World still worked

but that in the fridge was ominously Off. I changed the bulb. Didn't help. Then I noticed that there was a drip running down from the freezer that you have to defrost yourself. It was defrosting. My heart sank. I have had this refrigerator (though not always beverage-dedicated) since I moved in here in—1976?   "I guess its time has come," I thought. I quit smoking years ago and often keep nothing but cold water in there. I was sad, though. I had thought it would outlast the one I bought 25  years ago (which has already outlasted three in Block Island in the past decade alone—what is it with appliances these days?) And what would I do when I had a party?
    Checked the plug thinking perhaps the cleaner pulled it out with the vacuum. It was solid. Thought about the fuse. The cigarette light was on the same plug. Eventually realized the fridge had an extension cord and was unplugged from it. Don't think I'm impossibly slow, all this happened in a couple of minutes. Phew: Addiction Central is safe.

visuals

Need to add some visuals to my previous post. Here's my nevvy Mason Dowling getting more abstract by the day.
And there are Jessica Rath's original-stock apple trees.
Ain't art wonderful?

insider art

Haven't figured out what holiday this is.

Speaking of art, I have a bit of a roundup here of recent events and artists in the inner circle.
The Artist Known as Chang is rumored to be in town, though I haven't seen him yet, only edited his bio for the millionth time.
Jessica Rath's well reviewed show is still at the Pasadena Museum of Art and has been featured in  Smithsonian magazine.
John Dominus, photographer extraordinaire is out of the hospital. Here is a little known example of his work for LIFE magazine.
After a run of successes, Lynn Johnson has been named the Photographer's Photographer by National Geographic photographers. And appointed as professor at Syracuse University.
And finally, Woonsocket makes the Boston Globe as a piece of conceptual art. 

name that relationship!

Photo by Jan Jenner

 We're giving you an easy one this time. . .