i’m on another episode of the snow ghost community show, discussing my opinions on art (and everything) in worcester. i’ll cut you to the end, where i say something i think about a lot in a way i’ve never said before: “anything can grow in a garden– who cares?”. also i call everyone with pretentions of being a fine artist in worcester “a chump”. it’ll be great when that bites me in the ass. i’m trying to not look at the camera dead-on, in keeping with my decision to be 3/4 as much as possible.

today i went to the beach, which was great, but i didn’t eat all day and then at 7:30 got really really grouchy. earlier i passed to will and danielle the meme “D.W-P.O.M.F-B.”, a weird mishearing so psychologically damaging i can’t even write it on the internet.

september looks like it may be money month for me, with lots of small scams (aka jobs) for me to run– chiefly silk screening at RISD and the start on the street street fair. there’s more but i don’t want to ruin it. anyway, also bumping this [next] month is a big installation at the new as220 “mercantile block” space in providence. and this is big, like 20 foot ceilings, nigh-unlimited floor space. since it’s a really great opportunity for me, i’m doing that thing i like to do- something i’ve never done and have no skills at and haven’t really thought out supergreat. tentative title “my life 08″. oh, and i got the ask on the virtue of a couple snappy mass emails, nothing else. this is good, but “nothing else”? why not do the unthinkable and just write letters all day? no more nothing! anyway i’m trying to get two weeks off from my troubles to work on the bastard on site, but that may be unfeasible. but it would be fun, and as close to a vacation as i’ll ever get, it seems.

last night it was a little chilly, and get dark earlier than i had expected. today i realized that it was going to get really cold again, and in not a very long time. i’m strategizing for what will surely be, without adequate strategy, a really really rough winter.

here are my current best plans:

and

my solution to everything nowadays is “a blog”. anyway, here’s the new creatures blog: Li’l Champ. i don’t know yet if every day is going to be a new-new creature, as i would like to also feature toys from the personal collection. anyways, one a day, let’s go (again). most if not all of the hybrid toys will be online saleable. there’s two up now, catch ‘em. any ideas, say ‘em.

“like nasa or some other space administration”

the other day me and jon knapp went and saw the new speed racer movie, it was awesome, everything looked like it was made out of candy. to be specific, everything looked like it was made out of skittles. also the editing was really fast in a way i enjoyed, but then halfway through i got accustomed to it, and i was disappointed, and then at the end everything got way faster. not a mind blowing experience but fun.

working on this new mix as promised but the computer keeps crashing. it was really hot for a few days so i’ve been moving towards a polyphasic sleep routine, you know, so i can sleep through the dumbest part of the day. it’s good in that i’m closer to a dream state all the time, and my time management is better. it’s bad in that there are conspicuous chunks of time i am dead to the world. ultimately, it’s good for projects, weirdfor society (which might be two goods, the jury’s still out). the other day me and seah decided to start a worcester r buckminster fuller appreciation society, this sort of ties in.

smelly fartson and nik perry are on the snow ghost show this week, talking about the pros and cons of worcestermass, and about “making your own fun”. it’s good. and i’m in the background for most of it, which is weird, and at some points i’m obliquely referenced, which is particularly appropriate given the topic at hand. nik perry is perfect. “whatever blows your hair back”. also, this is a good example of how bloggy it was at my booth– at the beginning of the video there’s like eight bloggers with digicams in people’s faces. towards the end you can see me take a picture that i posted yesterday. i’m going to really enjoy watching this in 20 years.

bo diddley passed away today in his florida home. he was 79.

bo diddley remains one of my favorite musicians. important notes are:
• named after an expression meaning “nothing”
• has a rhythm named after him
• songs sometimes only had one chord
• lots of guitar gimmicks and instrumental jokes
• band had a maraca player

when i first started playing guitar i would play the bo diddley riff for literally hours on end, which would make me feel like a mountain (i remember thinking this exact thought).

bo diddley bo diddley RIP. • - - • - - • - - - • - • - - -

today was a crafts fair in the park, which was good and i did OK, and more than that i had a fun time talking fast and counting coup with passers by and those i just walked right up to. i bought a bunch of tiny glass elephants and some soap that smells like oatmeal cookies, the idea being that i would start to smell like cookies and subconsciously you would connect the smell of cookies to me, and then when you made cookies you would think to yourself or someone nearby “you know who i should call?…”. pretty devious on a few fronts really. pictured above is ashling’s arm, she got a cool sunburn which you can well imagine. see also: heavy reppin’ (with pogo), a laffy lady (with dark clouds (that flew by really fast with no static)).

yesterday there was a lot going on, but i didn’t go to the bone zone show, i went to the noise show at the firehouse, which was as advertised but shirt quitters didn’t play. chris cooper (angst hase pfeffer nase) destroyed it with a classic table top guitar set on the ground, and i filmed it and already put it up on the internet. there was almost no one there that didn’t live there, which was a bummer, but the lesson is “book a local draw”. i gave them all the money i had, and was glad to do it: a big change jar, with a lot of quarters in it, except for $1.50, which i got a coffee with later (although the diner didn’t charge for the coffee). i told george washington myers that i would say something about him on the internet so here goes: hi george!

tonight i went to a show that jenine played, at the go go. also matt f and a touring act called led to sea, which was good songwriting over violin with phrase samplers, outside by the fire, real nice. tomorrow i catch up on some bullshit, start some new bullshit. bed!

yesterday and today i had nice visiting with pen pal and regular pal emily bloodmilk, a known delight. still living in minneapolis and now, getting married! ding dong, baby! we hung out with purtle and had a really good drawing session, then today went on errands pertaining to the new HBML limited edition sneaker (this is real). driving around i kept forgetting which one was left and which was right, so i got back into saying [driver’s name] for left, [passenger name] for right. lots of this: “go emily. ok, not this light but the next. go me. ok, go emily.”. which greatly contributed to our PMAs. ah, lucky be the line that landed emily!

oh, and in re: last friday and poetry, we sidled into gerardo’s bakery on pleasant (right downtown) and the guy tries to sell us a CDR of his friend playing viola and children (!) reading his (the counter guy, gerardo’s) poetry! $7 which i didn’t have but i’m going back tomorrow! all proceeds go to “teaching music to children”. seek and ye shall find!

friday there was an art opening for mike t at HBML, and both the show and the set up ruled. the show is a lot of new prints and drawings, plus a limited edition cereal that mike made special for HBML, with a cool 4-color silkscreened box, and inside, actual breakfast. the set up was kicking it all day with mike t, chip, nathan, and ML. it was a beautiful day, the bench saw a lot of action. lots of awesome folks came out for the show itself, it ruled. afterwards there was a three-stage attack on duck yao, which culminated in all of us at one long thanksgiving-style table, shoveling taoist eats into our stinky mouths. perfection!

saturday me and purtle drove to north ham town for another weekend of play rehearsals, which was once again really really fun. last week we pretty much just hung out with madeline and gossiped, this week we got to explore the town a little more, we went to the skatepark (which is pretty good), hung out with josh TC, played some handball, and on top of that, we hung out with madeline and gossiped (which is fun). the play is going great and me and mike discovered that with all this monkey time (and a sort of carte blanche for hyjinx) we’re developing a practically marxian confidence, with minds less quieted than flowy. sure there will always be those times in the preposterously expensive ice cream shop with magnificent yoga instructor where you find yourself describing the cover art for munchie, in which a leather-jacketed hitler puppet surfs a pizza over loni anderson, and your mind is telling your brain “shutupshutupshutup” and your brain isn’t telling your mouth. but that’s why weeks have next weeks, RITE?!!?

incidentally handball is really fun, we’ve got to get a crowtown session burning. oh, and next weekend the play begins for real, with actual strangers that i spit on a little bit. oh, and i half-secured a ride for this wednesday’s show in turner’s falls, so eat it!

picture above from daily panel, which is still turning.

the most important part about today was that walking through the classic empty brick industrial ssection of town at night from the pizza thing at the free school to the punk show in the old thrift store, the moon coming up was so big it looked like a massive sports arena just outside of town. the show was cool, dan and jen came out, and so did crusty tim, who is moving to worcester (or wArcester as he calls it) in two weeks, and i can’t wait until he developes underlings, or i overhear people talking about him. i told him i’d show him around town, where the cheap sandwiches are, where the loose cigarettes are sold. as far as bands, the only one i paid attention to was red thread, and they were awesome, and everyone was moving, which makes everyone feel good. mike’s ramp got moved from the go go to there, so now people can skate during the entire show and not be disruptive to people trying to walk or stand or dance or not get hit by skateboards. there was a dog and the dog kept chasing the skateboarders back and forth back and forth, nipping at the air but not daring to bite (and always getting out of the way and once, pooping). it was cute but also a bummer– a loud show is no place for a dog, or didn’t you hear that spazz song? sort of met some new folks, and then i did that thing i like to do nowadays, which is leave the scene while my memories are still beautiful. there’s another show next friday, i need to come up with something to make it interesting…

still chuggin’ on this grant, which interjects at a well-trod fujichia fiasco node, being that 1,) i need a single specific project to bump, and 2,) i need to talk about it like it’s peanut butter or some other life-altering thing, knowing that people know that i know that it’s not. also it has to be something that i not care about enough to just up and do until nine months from now (when they announce the winners) and it has to be something that doesn’t really make money (for reasons i won’t go into right now). it’s cool, i still have a good 23 hours until it’s due. my connectch told me that they fund miles and miles of exactly the sort of dumb shit you’d think they would, and the only thing between me and the money is my ability to talk like i deserve it, in the money language that they speak. fuuuuuckk.

went out for a brain-cleaning walk and a stop at coffee shop to read more yesterday’s answers, and wound up buying jam at the supermarket and running into annie and dave p. some classic old lady rolled up to annie and demanded to know what happened to her face (annie has two lower lip piercings) and didn’t she know that that metal was going to “go right through [her] body” (?) ? annie told her she was turning into a cyborg, the lady was disgusted with us, saying we’d be sorry. i told her “life’s for living”. it ruled. i love supermarket encounters!

incidentally, the crossword oracle was surprisingly on point today– i got INTO ATOM (compare with INFRA ELLE ATOM from a few days ago), CURRY FAVOR NOTE, TRAPS INGENIOUS, LOOP SAGEADVICE, USUAL RARE GOOP, MINTEDITION VAT, and both ORANGES ESP SST and STEM SSTS FLEET (from two different puzzles).

drawing above by james mcshane, of something i think about constantly. it happened to him, he said it was “not that bad”.

this year for lent i gave up apologizing for things. maybe it sounds like this sucks, but i got in the habit of apologizing for things so fast it was really a bummer. it was a strain on me taking the hit a million times a day, but more importantly i was just overusing it and not meaning it and it was putting me in a weird power spot. i’ve slipped up a few times so far and i really don’t advocate this for everyone but for me it rules, almost apologizing and then saying “yup, i said it, and not for no reason”. totally positive responsibility-taking. yesterday i was trying to compliment a nice lady on having ass-long hair (actually post-ass, almost to her knees). i forget what i said but it was a sentiment near to “i like it because it’s totally fucked”. uhh… then “straight up”.

i guess i don’t know of other people that are really into lent (NB: i am not christian any more than i am anything else). i see lent as a real good worcester holiday– it has both self-denial and pancakes, and at the end there’s candy and zombies. this year ML is giving up what he always gives up- every beverage except water. GOD BLESS.

catching up…

wednesday’s missoula oblangata show was super good- lots of folks, it started more or less on time, i played some new songs and a bunch of covers, the play was great. afterwards i traveled with the troupe back to northhampton, where there next show and my friends were. i stayed at “bill murry’s house”, a nice big rented house with action figures, good magazines and bad movies EVERYWHERE. it was good hanging out with the missoula oblangata– immediately upon getting in the car we got into a cool gossiping mode, until i realized the next day that the majority of what these people have heard me say in all of our time together has been petty BS. ok, i’m not actually worried.

friday’s show with billy blue and the terribles was awesome. i opened the show somewhat awkwardly, being a solo singer at the dancey movey rock show, but it was ok. i played some new songs and old standbys of course, and stood on a table and was a spectacle. the billy blue blues band tore it up and lots of folks were dancing, which is ideal. at one point during a harmonica solo MZ hoisted billy blue on his shoulders– BB was so psyched he almost couldn’t play, it ruled. terribles tore up in the style, with a lot of folks going nuts. dance party mix tapes before, intermittent, and after the bands. a few times i had to distract people that were wasted and unfortunately fixated on something or someone, but i’m pretty good at this. my method is to get inbetween and sing a catchy song that they’ll want to sing along to. sinatra usually works. the night was a mess but the place wasn’t so bad in the morning. i had a ton of fun, and it was a great send-off for bily blue (who is flying to spain in a few days for a european tour).

also collective a go go in today’s t & g, because of the “punk house” book (which i still haven’t seen despite my artwork on the back cover). yikes!