one thing today

  I was a really weird little kid. Just now I saw a scene in a movie called  The Beast with Five Fingers.  A man hears scary sounds and tries, with great difficulty, to get out of bed. For some reason, it sparked something I did when I was about ten years old. I think I had just finished reading Pearl Bucks  The Good Earth -  one of my first grown up books - and while showering I pretended I was a rice picker who had to gather the grain no matter how hard it was raining … i.e. the shower. On my hands and needs, gasping for air, trying not to surrender to the torrential downpour, I gathered the rice until the hot water ran out.  

  Martha Hyer is is running thru the thick jungle. She is more beautiful than she is in Psycho. Her clothes get torn more and more in a sexy fashion. She falls into quicksand - we were fascinated with that way of dying when we were kids. A snake slithers down a thick tree branch. She screams her pretty head off. A vine suddenly appears above her. She grabs it and pulls herself up into Tarzans arms. He carries her to soft grass and washes off the mud on her legs and arms. Although she returns to the great white doctor at the end of the movie, in real life she marries the 6’3” lug. I don’t blame her.  

  This painting is one of the first representations of urban proletariat. Whereas peasants or country workers had often been shown, city workers had seldom been painted. Unlike Courbet or Millet, Caillebotte does not incorporate any social, moralising or political message in his work. His thorough documentary study (gestures, tools, accessories) justifies his position among the most accomplished realists.

  This is such a beautiful photograph of a beautiful man who was a beautiful storyteller.  Do you know who he is? 

  The West Village always goes all out for Trick or Treat. Lots of color and imagination. Especially when leaves swirl thru the air and across the streets  and light streams through all the stripping branches. 

  Why do dogs love fire hydrants?  Turns out, it could actually be the dyes inside of the paint used for most municipal hydrants.  Veterinarians have suggested that  something in the scent actually smells "sweet" to your canine, and replicates canine urine to a certain degree . Dogs urinate on fire hydrants to mark their territory and communicate with other dogs. They may lift their legs to reach elevated surfaces like fire hydrants to leave their scent near nose level. Other dogs can then smell the scent and leave their own mark.  

... I'm not sure if someone will like something I paint.  for example ... it's my nephews birthday - his 25th.  above is my favorite picture of his mother.  She looks like a young Italian actress being introduced in a neo realistic 50s movie. I don't think I will give it to him.  In addition to its still being wet - oils - ugh- I don't think he will get it and will feel guilty about wanting to throw it in a drawer. I'll give it to his ma for her birthday.   

  ... songs I don't like.  1. The Circle Game 2. The Priest  3. Woodstock  4. 5. 6. 7. 8.  9.  10.  She's written 271 songs. 

  ... rich. I am watching a documentary about Robert Kennedy.  He seemed to be a very good man, more emotional and introspective than his most famous brother. One year, he promised Ethel an extra special birthday  party and present. He placed a man dressed in tails with a big pink bow across his face at her feet. The mother of eleven removed the bow and danced with Gene Kelly the rest of the night.  

  Actor Andrew Garfield is very grateful for the time he had with his dying mother. He read her poetry and after each one - he’d ask her “again, another or quiet.” He says he has “borrowed grief” for all the people who did not have the same opportunity as he had - to be with their mother at the end of her life in such a rich way.  

 

  ... there is an old expression, "zou go." It means "running dog" to describe a lackey or yes man--a dog unerringly faithful to its master, in the hope of being fed scraps.

  There are two Honeymooners every Saturday night at midnight. They soothe me. I only have to use maybe a quarter of my brain. They make me remember my fathers laugh. I love Norton in particular, especially if he dances the Huckelbuck. The four of them are one hundred per cent predictable and kinda fool me into thinking that nothing changes, that life stays the same, which isn't true - but for an hour each week - tv defies fact.