Friday, December 08, 2006

i want answers.

Serious questions.

1. What is behind the impulse to denigrate utility?
When I step into a room in which every object that meets my eye is patterened and ornamented and stylized my first impulse is to turn and walk back out. It seems to camoflage everything, to level things out to a baseline background hum. To put it in the form of a question, Alex, is there something rude or unacceptable about a bucket being a container to hold stuff? Is it really improved in any way by being covered in flowers and shaped like a duckie?


2. Why is 'prettiness' generally accepted as an ingredient of Beauty? Think about it. Generally accepted standards of beauty include prettiness (prettiness is a combination of shiny, colorful, symmetrical, uniform, and rounded)

3. Why do people seem to equate 'shininess' with value?
To me a room full of shiny objects is a room full of moving white dots. Like being surrounded with cabbage butterflies. And while that might be momentarily lovely outside, when the same effect occurs indoors it is unsettling. When it occurs contantly it is beyond irritating.

Feel free to suggest studies and books and things. To me these issues aren't airy fairy concepts; they're issues of basic comfort. Who wants to be surround with confusion? Apparently most of the world. And I want to know why. Do other people experience some kind of visceral animal pleasure response to pattern and shine and symmetry? I don't. I never have.

And so, let me close with this plea:
Ladies and gentlemen, if you are Christian, if you truly love Jesus, then please, please...walk the talk this Christmas season.
Ignoring the color wheel makes Baby Jesus cry.

Thursday, December 07, 2006

UPDATED: a peek inside the sanctum sanctorum

NOTE: this is my SPARE BEDROOM. I was in a frolicsome mood and I did a post about my SPARE BEDROOM, OK???
There are a couple of pictures of my husbands' GARAGE tacked on at the end.
Good Gravy MARIE. This is not what my whole house looks like. We are somewhat civilized. Even though there is a great big picture of a naked blue woman displayed in my dining room in such a way that it can clearly be seen from halfway down the street in either direction. It is a Matisse, therefore it is classy.
Now then.
Welcome to the craft room and emergency dormition chamber!
Everyone should have one of these. This is where I keep all the supplies for my art stuff. It also holds a purportedly 200 year old bed to which I retreat when the Biker is staging one of his nocturnal performances of 'Drowning Phlegm Mammoth Submits to Liposuction.'


Yes it's sideways but you get the idea. It's a poster with different North American snakes on it. I buy old posters at garage sales because they're pretty useful for making patterns, or to back collages with. I really liked the picture on this one so I stuck it up.
I like snakes; they're so graceful and elegant. And yes I pick them up and shit. It helps that there aren't any poisonous ones on this side of the Cascades. I can just run around thoughtlessly waving them about. And I do.



One wall papered with Civil War era sheet music, masterfully applied by this little Muk if I do say so myself. I cooked up -literally, on the stove- an archival adhesive to stabilize them with, treated the ground with the same and finished it with water based polymer. Shit was like handling cigarette ash, some of it. Time is not kind to acid treated pulp. Makes rockin' wallpaper though. Plus it cost 3 dollars and sweat. Can't beat that.



The Skeletal Hand of Doom suspended over the Purportedly 200 Year Old Bed of Obscene Frolic. I'm probably the first splittail thats been between these rails since Pearl Harbor was attacked. From the Biker side of the family. 'Nuff said.


I've had this poster since I was 17. It is a reproduction. No you may not have it. No I will not accept money for it. Quit bothering me.



My beloved Tank Girl sticker, blocking the breeze that shoots out of the cable outlet whenever there's a high wind from the south. Why someone saw fit to put a cable outlet halfway up the center of a wall is a mystery, like Mothman, and why Lindsay Lohan refuses to wear uns and REALLY REALLY SHOULD.



I've had this map of Stonehenge for 20 years. It was folded up in the back of a British Parks Department (whatever the correct name for that is) booklet. The whole thing is beautifully, beautifully hand inked. No not this exact one. You know what I mean.
Whoever produced this map was a master. I've done calligraphy since 1978 and I know how difficult it is to simply maintain uniformity, let alone freehand map symbols. A beautiful thing.
I was on a Stonehenge kick about ten years ago. I read every nonfiction book and article I could find on the subject. What I learned is that nobody knows who built it or what its for, but they DO know that it's 1. big, and 2. made of rocks.



Let's call the large skull here Mr. Coyote, although I suspect that it may actually be a rottweiler. Really. We won't ask, though. The small one is Mr. Bunny Rabbit. The neibors cat drug it in off the road and left it in my shed to rot into a squirming mat of bones, fur, and what we ardent compost devotees here at rancho FirstNations refer to as 'motile rice'.

Did you know that if you dump bleach on maggots they foam up? They do. Just like pop. Try it sometime and see! It's science!




Speaking of unpleasant decay, here's some socks.
I like socks.
I should wash these.
No this is not why we have maggots.
Come on. We live in dairy country = cows = manure = flies, and the neibors cats like to kill shit and leave it laying in my yard = dead shit in my yard = flies = promiscuous fly sex = muk with a shovel full of maggoty field rat walking towards the neibors yard looking pissed off.
Ooo. Wait a sec:

Meet Hanta!
Hanta here is a field rat I found dried into a hairy little hardtack wafer in my shed. I brought it through the shop on my way to go flick it over into the neibors yard when I had a brilliant idea.
I nailed it next to the doorway to the Bikers' spray booth. At eye level.
And said nothing.
It took him ONE YEAR to notice it.

As long as we're invading his privacy...

The Shop of Evil.
There is No Humping in the Shop of Evil.
That USED to be our Sportster.

...and this USED TO BE MY WORKBENCH.
Can you spot it?
This is where I used to refinish furniture and make things. This is where I used to keep my bench vise, circular saw, clamps, bits, my detail sanders, my power drill, my woodworking tools, abrasives, paints, brushes, hand tools, thinner, masking, tape, scribes etc. All organized, all painted orange so they couldn't get mixed up with his tools, yeah.
See much orange in that picture? Me neither.
It's been taken over.
It was built for me. It was made for me. It is too short for the YB to use.
Now you know who uses it?
Miniature bikers.
All YB's miniature toy-sized companion breed biker friends come over and use MY WORKBENCH and get all their miniature biker crap all over it.
Stupid miniature bikers.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Blue Mole Misery Of Entrail Kikaido!

THE EVIL SUBSTANCE HAS VANISHED!
The weather gods have seen fit to remove the vile, vile frozen vileness and return something approaching normalcy to my little slice o' heaven. Which means rain, floods, high winds, falling trees, power outages and death dealing, cartwheeling, jagged sheets of corrugated barn roof flying past.
But no snow!!!!

This week I discovered that I have a WAY BETTER car stereo than I thought I did.

Monday, I left early and was driving through Lynden on my way to go pick up the Goonybird. I had the radio on, something of a novelty for me because I really don't need the distraction. That and if a good song comes on it makes me drive faster and I don't need any more speeding tickets either. But the Yummy Biker had left it on turned to his classic rock station, and they were playing 'Queen', and so, you know.
When I heard the first bars of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' play I reached over and beeped the volume control a couple times. The speakers didn't distort or anything, so I beeped it a couple more times and that was pretty good too. I gave it a good 'shave and a haircut, two bits!' and yup, still clear as a bell!
So then I sort of kept my finger on it for a couple of seconds and the volume went up REALLY REALLY LOUD.
I mean DAMN.
The rearview mirror was actually vibrating along with the bass notes. The metal grille off the drivers side speaker popped out.
Yeah.
Righteous.
Me and Freddie Mercury were well into 'gotta MOUCHE gotta MOUCHE can you do the fan DAN go?' at the light on Benson and Grover when I noticed all the kids at the bus stop staring. I think the side panels must have actually been fluttering at this point. I keep a lot of change in the ashtray but it sounded like a great big 'ol vibrator on the 'Xaviera' setting buzzing away in there.
I have never had a really good car stereo in my life.
I was feeling COOL.

Despite having a city budget that allows for things like providing detailed, fitted Dutch costumes for all the employees of all the businesses along Front street, the streets in Lynbden were covered in ice and slush about seven inches deep.
Perfect roostertail conditions.
So I hit the side streets and did a little painting.
For those of you who had parents who actually gave a fuck, 'painting' means you select a suitable medium, in this case filthy, icy slush full of gravel, and apply it to your ground, in this case maybe possibly the fronts of some houses. And some cars. Now what I might actually have been doing was simply gunning the engine in order to avoid being stuck, and should that have happened to kick up a little bit of a roostertail or maybe even quite a sizeable roostertail, maybe like a tsunami kind of a thing actually, well, blame that on the city of Lynden. Lax bastards.
Amped on vandalism, I went down (sideways) to the Dairy Queen and grabbed a couple of burgers. As I waited in the drivethru I noticed that the parking lot of the nearby Fairway Center grocery store was nearly abandoned and was also covered in beautiful brown heaps of slush.

When the accident involving a double trailer semi truck and the Land Rover occurred I missed the whole thing. I sure as fuck had no chance of hearing it because me and Jimmy Page were singing 'Valhalla' at the time. I was also going in rapid circles, or maybe sideways. I recall being more concerned with trying not to hit any light poles. My view was further obscured by grease, ketchup and splattered tomato fragments. This happened when I had the wheel cranked over hard with one hand and was kind of gesturing operatically with the burger in the other and slapped it into the passengers side window.
DOWN INTHE LAND OFTHE ICE! AND! SNOW!
WHERE THE MIDNIGHT SUN ANDTHE HOT! SPRINGS! GLOW! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
-HA!
Blat!
Because you have to gesture right there at that 'HA!' part. Only not with a hamburger. And probably not going in circles in a tiny underinsured car in an icy parking lot with the radio cranked so loud it was making Baby Jesus cry.

And maybe not with two sherrifs' cars parked out on the main road.

When the revolutions slowed I finally noticed the wreck. A nasty one. Someone had come around the corner of Kok Road and run their Land Rover under the rear end of a semi trailer carrying a metal cargo container. The entire front of the 'Rover was peeled back to the windsheild. I mean, this thing was BAD FUCKED.

As I sat there and goggled at the wreck I noticed the sherrifs get out of their car. Then they turned to each other. Then turned and looked straight at me.

I turned off the stereo.
I drove away.
Slowly. With part of a tomato and a piece of cheese stuck to the passengers side window.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

make it go away.

POME ABOUT HOW SNOW SHOULD NOT BE ON THE WORLD.

make the bad potty snow leave.
bad, bad toilet snow.
dirty smelly potty snow,
stinky butt fart snow.
i hate snow.

No longer snowbound thanks to the City of Sumas, I roamed at large yesterday. Our streets are plowed and sanded and have been maintained that way. No sweat; no problem. Run the plow-sander around every few hours while the snow is falling, every evening when it isn't, problem solved, move on.

See, out here on this end of the county people retain some dim memory of weather past and don't spaz the fuck out like a bunch of overstimulated chihuahuas every time the white stuff arrives, like they do down in Seattle. I swear to you.
And whats even worse is that every person with an ailing car and a fresh lobotomy scar decided to take to the goddamn freeway at the same time. And what time was that? Why, right in the middle of the assbastardly BLIZZARD. C'mon, Ru Leen, git them kids inta their shorts and t shirts! Hell yeah I know yew having labor pains. Don't be a damn wimp. Lemme crack open this here bottle of Canadian Mist and go warm up the Volkswagen!
And there they still sit, knawing on their own extremeties and huffing their own funk inside the frozen tombs that their Mitsubishis and Toyotas have become.
WHAT
THE
FUCK.
When I lived in Seattle, I was poor. I was a single mother. I relied on public transport. Still, I did not instantly dash outside like a depressed lemming when the snow hit. I watched the news and the sky and stocked up on cnadles, canned food and baby milk. You see, I knew, thanks to something coded deep within my dim ancestral pool of instinct, that ICE IS SLIPPERY.
And so I would sit in my cozy apartment, cuddled in the bay window seat drinking nice hot soup with my baby, watching the Mercedes-es and the BMWs-es of the financially fortunate skating sideways down 17th Avenue hill, twirling and pinballing from side to side of the street, bouncing off parked cars and snow berms and retaining walls and the front of busses while the clueless organism behind the wheel frantically floored the gas and honked the horn. This would happen all damn day and on into the night. You could hear them beeping and whirring into the distance as they glissanded down into the center of the MLK way five way intersection at the bottom of the hill, where they were turned into the worlds most expensive bump actuated pinwheels.

I got out to see my Goonybird yesterday, and my face still aches from smiling. This is the BEST KID. Of course he has the BEST MOMMY too. He is way into playing lets pretend games, so we sat in a circle on the rug, and he made us a campfire out of whole wheat bread crusts.

So far the Stainless Steel Amazon has failed to chase off her boyfriend, so who knows? I may have to come up with a nickname for this one. Seeing as how he has chosen-voluntarily, without outside coercion, kids; CHOSEN- to contend with my daughter and her amazing Random Death Dealing Temper and Explosions With Fire and Death Fragments Of Deadly Death and Exploding Gasoline Napalm Angry Of Temper, that nickname might just end up being 'Poor Bastard'.
In fact, I think that's it. D, you are hereby christened The Poor Bastard.

If my daughter reads this I am so dead.*snerk!*
MISUSE OF BLOG MEDIUM ALERT:
well, maybe if she changed her tune he would be 'lucky bastard.'
MISUSE OF BLOG MEDIUM COMPLETE

Yeah, I'm going to quit now while I still have an extended family.
I love you all deeply and unreasonably, my darlings, but I cannot spend the time visiting around that I used to because this end of the house is freezing.
This SUCKS.
I MISS YOU.
XOOFN
*snif*