Syllables

Syllables

is it too meta

wasting lines whining about

counting syllables

"Well we really meant you to visit Paris in May,

but the rhythm required two syllables."

—Vernon Duke

Small Town, Big Laughs

[via]

Did I tell you we saw Michael Perry last month?

(Of course I didn't. I wasn't writing much on here last month.)

We saw Michael Perry last month.

Jessica's a big fan, and has read all of his books, and taught a couple of them in her English classes. I've read parts of one she loaned to me months ago...enough to recognize he's a great storyteller with a diverse background and a killer vocabulary.

If you read his books, you will laugh.
If you see him in person, you will laugh even harder.

In his writing, as well as in person, he always has the right word. His stories are tight, descriptive, heart-warming, and funny as hell.

He spoke at Stage North in Washburn, Wisconsin, and we bought tickets online the day of the show, a spur-of-the-moment decision during our late-summer getaway to Bayfield and the shores of Lake Superior.

We planned our day's activities and the drive down to Washburn with time to spare, hoping to secure a third- or fourth-row seat and optimal vantage point.

Turns out Stage North holds only about 130 people, so while we did, in fact, get our third-row seating, there were only eight rows total. How we found tickets the day of the event is still a mystery to me, after the night we were treated to.

Perry walked on stage in a T-shirt, jeans, and work boots, with a few pages of leader notes taped to the floor at his feet from which to jog his memory, and told stories for an hour before taking a break, and then came back 15 minutes later for another 45. Nearly two hours of "The Clodhopper Monologues," as they were titled, described as "country standup."

He talked about life on a farm in a very small Wisconsin town (and whether the word is pronounced "manoo-er" or "ma-nerr"), his job as a volunteer firefighter and registered nurse, his writing process and ties to New York City, involving agents, editors and publishers.

Aside from his three books, he's written for The New York Times Magazine, Esquire, Salon.com, Men's Health and others. While he may have some big-time connections, he remains genuinely and sincerely small-town.

But always, always...big-time funny.

I'm reading "Population: 485" right now. Give it a read. And if you find one of his speaking engagements within 100 miles...

...go.

"And for the love of Pete, don't moo at the cows.

This is the habit of outsiders."

—Michael Perry

Harvest Moon

Tonight, we were supposed to watch the Super Harvest Moon rise, but heavy cloud cover prevented the gigantic orange moon from appearing, and instead all we saw were sporadic hazy glimpses of a smallish white moon.

Boo.

So we celebrated the beginning of autumn with candy corn.

Now here's some Neil Young...

"And Fall, with her yeller harvest moon

and the hills growin' brown and golden

under a sinkin' sun."

—Roy Bean

Inspiration, Art, and Grilled Cheese

I spend time...sometimes much of my time...searching for inspiration.

Writing inspiration.
Life inspiration.
Inspiration to become inspired to find writing and life inspiration.

I find it in the wheelbarrows of writing books I own.

Or listening to a published author discuss writing process.

Or the moon. And the stars. And the sun.

Or a good grilled cheese sandwich.

I find inspiration in the quotes I post at the bottom of these blog entries. Sometimes, that's my favorite part of blogging, and writing my column, is searching for a quote that ties in, however tangentially, with what I've written.

Tonight I opened the book, Page After Page, by Heather Sellers, and found a little inspiration. Or at least encouragement that I may actually be what I sometimes don't believe I am: an artist.

Sellers writes, "The qualities that make me an artist are the ability to obsess on minutiae and the ability to feel intensely. These qualities also make me prone to being swamped by a mood and getting sidetracked by obsessive worrying."

She continues, "When an artist has a mood, it's always a Big Deal. This is how the work gets done. This is also how the work doesn't get done."

Those paragraphs clinch it: I'm an artist!

Don't have to hand me a paintbrush or stick of charcoal to prove it.
Or even a pen or a keyboard.

Just give me something to obsess over.
Then I'm more artistic than Pablo Picasso.

"We should be taught not to wait for inspiration

to start a thing. Action always generates inspiration.

Inspiration seldom generates action."

—Frank Tibolt

In The Spotlight

In The Spotlight

golden orange orb

propped low in the evening sky

a backlit drive home

"Nobody of any real culture, for instance, talks nowadays

about the beauty of sunset. Sunsets are quite old fashioned.

To admire them is a distinct sign of provincialism

of temperament. Upon the other hand they go on."

—Oscar Wilde

Just Sit Down and Write!...Anywhere.

Content.
And platform.

As long as I've been a blogger, I've often paid more attention to one of the above than the other. (I'll let you click through my blog to determine which.)

I search through Blogger, Wordpress, Tumblr. I play around with templates, sidebars, colors, gadgets, widgets.

And then I wonder why I'm up until 3am, and my blog still hasn't been updated.

That tends to be my M.O. when it comes to any type of writing. I'd rather read books about writing or compare books about writing or browse writing forums or discuss writing than actually...you know...write. These other activities make me feel like I'm committing to the craft, but they don't fill notebooks or Word docs, do they?

Same with blogging. Dozens of times, I've considered switching to Wordpress, but have become frustrated when trying to set up some of its more advanced features. After reading a couple of articles about how hip and cool Tumblr is becoming (perhaps by the founders or stockholders?), I perused that site as well.

While texting with a tech geek buddy of mine, I explained my goals to update the look of this blog, or start a new blog or...

...and he shot back with, "Content is more important than platform."

I hate it when he's so correct. And so succinct.

The exercise of this month is bringing content back to this blog. Perhaps sooner than later, some of it may actually be good content.

And maybe someday it'll move to Wordpress.

But for now...content.

"The Republicans have a me too candidate

running on a yes but platform,

advised by a has been staff."

—Adlai Stevenson

Nature Makes Insomniacs

The howling wind in the trees jars him awake every night at 3am, scraggly, leafless branches scratching against the windows and walls of his dirty attic room.

Damn wind! he mutters as he lies on the lumpy, twin mattress, staring up at the ceiling for the third week. Night after night! He envisions a tiny adobe hut in the middle of the desert, the nearest tree miles away in downtown Scottsdale. Sleeeep. I need sleep. He smashes the pillow against his face and waits for sunrise.

***

The coyotes howling at the moon jar him awake every night at 3am...

— • — • —

My entry in the 100 Words Challenge, with the prompt, "jars."

Priorities

Priorities

some days blogs and words

wait in line behind pizza

laundry and the laze

"Among my most prized possessions

are words that I have never spoken."

—Orson Scott Card

Bessie Was A Looker Back In High School

Do cows have social status?

I'm not asking if they amble back to the barn after milking and spend their free time updating their Facebook and Twitter, but...

...are there cool cows, and uncool cows?

Driving past a muddy, fenced-in field earlier this week, I saw two cows sitting together in the slop, barely a couple of feet from each other, while another stood in front of them, also huddled close. Several other cows trudged elsewhere in the one-acre pen near the barn, and there were at least two more sitting alone.

How do these cows decide who to hang with when they're not having their udders yanked?

Are there cliques like there were back in high school? Are there nerd cows and jock cows and brain cows and party cows and goody four-shoes cows? Do some cows stay home every night chewing their cud while others stay out until...well, until they come home?...just in time for their 4am milking?

All of these thoughts flashed through my head in the five seconds it took to drive past a farm in Kiel. And after reading this, I hope they flash through yours the next time you see a herd (gang...clique...whatever) of cows.

I need to remove myself from the rural, I think.

"Single-mindedness is all very well in cows or baboons;

in an animal claiming to belong to the same species

as Shakespeare it is simply disgraceful."

—Aldous Huxley

Go, Packer(s), Go!

OK, Packers fans, listen up! This blog post is for you.

It's also for Niners fans, Lions fans, Ravens fans...Lakers fans, Spurs fans...and on and on.

This post is for airing English language pet peeves (but just a few, because if I aired them all, I'd never finish this post by midnight), and first on the list tonight is the "s" on the end of many sports teams.

If you're a fan of the Green Bay Packers, you're a Packers fan. Not...a Packer fan. It might sound a little clumsy, but the "s" is correct.

I run into this often when designing ads at the newspaper I work for. When bars have drink specials listed in their ads, I word them as "Packers Specials," or "Packers Drink Specials"...always writing Packers as plural.

Sometimes they'll call to correct the ad. "Take that 's' off of Packers," they'll say, sometimes with a tone of superiority as if they've caught a serious error.

I've stopped trying to explain to most advertisers that the "s" belongs there, and instead repeat to myself the old business maxim that the customer is always right. Even when they're very...very...wrong. (Hey, I'm not the one paying for the ad!)

Many of you reading this are not Packer fans...you're Packers fans.

My buddy isn't a Charger fan, he's a Chargers fan.

I'm not a Lion fan...I'm a glutton for punishment.

Got it?

— • — • —

Sticking with the bar theme, a supper club ran an ad several months ago, advertising a specific drink that, if you don't live in Wisconsin, you may not have heard of.

The bar owner advertised Old-Fashioneds (which are delicious, by the way; I recommend it with Southern Comfort and sour). When the ad appeared in our paper, a few bar patrons pointed out the error we'd made in the ad, which caused the owner to call and alert us to our mistake.

Several customers laughed at my spelling, certain that the drink is an Old Fashion.

It is not.

I prefer to hyphenate my Old-Fashioneds, but I've seen it just as often without the hyphen. Unfortunately, I've also seen it advertised dozens of times in other newspapers as an Old Fashion. (what is that, like bell bottom jeans?!?)

Regardless, you'll never catch me sipping an Old Fashion, watching the Packer game.

Got it?

— • — • —

Another nit to pick in this post is the difference between back yard (n.), and backyard (adj.).

Associated Press style defines the terms as above...the noun is two words, the adjective is one word. (unless my Stylebook is out of date and they've updated this entry.)

"My back yard will soon be filled with billions of snowflakes, and I plan to hibernate through the winter. Before summer bids its final farewell, however, we should have one last backyard barbecue."

These examples are correct to me, although in Mitch Albom's latest column, he uses "backyards" as a noun. I've heard from more than one source that you should consistently use "backyard" in all instances. I haven't yet adopted that thought, but am open to persuasion.

— • — • —

One more tiny peeve down here, and I'll start making a new list for the next English language entry I write.

When referring to someone with a title, I capitalize every word only if the full title is used:
"We've got to address our budget issues," said Stony Brook High School Principal James Bruckmeier.

But I don't agree with the example: "The board voted to send school Principal Thomas Stenson to the weekend seminar." I prefer, "school principal Thomas Stenson."

The capital P in principal looks out of place in that instance, but I have found in the AP Stylebook an example that reads, "...school Chancellor Thomas Stenson," and others have disagreed with me as well. But I've also found an ally or two.

— • — • —

This is the kind of stuff I ponder for fun. I'm a total grammar geek, word nerd, punctuation dork. Sometimes I find a reliable source to back me up...other times I argue my case solely because it feels right to me. But I'm not perfect by any means.

Maybe I'll write my own book, and then I'll be correct 100 percent of the time.

Gregg's Stylebook, by Gregg (who has so much style...especially when sipping an Old-Fashioned.)

"I never made a mistake in grammar but one

in my life and as soon as I done it I seen it."

—Carl Sandburg

500 Words...Go! (Aren't You Finished Yet?!?)

I've been taking inventory of all of the Web 2.0 writing projects I've participated in...or at least seriously considered, even if I didn't pull on the water wings and jump into the deep end. And they all seem to have a general theme attached to them: Write your ass off!

Don't feel like writing?
Write, anyway!
Not feeling inspired on a particular day?
Make something up, and write it down!

The most obvious one is the one you're reading: write a blog entry every day for a month. Every...day. All month long. If you miss a day? Looooser! Thanks for playing, try again next month. It even has a fancy name to make it sound more official...NaBloPoMo, National Blog Posting Month. (sounds like a banquet you should wear a tie to, no?)

NaBloPoMo was inspired by NaNoWriMo, which is National Novel Writing Month, in which you write a 50,000-word novel during the 30 days of November. This is the deep end I haven't jumped or dove into yet...I've only dipped my toes. My best effort crashed and burned before I reached 10,000 words.

One year I'll write a novel...in a month. That's 1,667 words a day to cross the finish line, and if you don't do it, you're someone who's attempted a novel in a month, not written a novel in a month. Harsh.

Another writing exercise is one I mentioned a few days ago: 100 haiku in 100 days. If the day is drawing to a close and you haven't written that day's haiku, you better stare at an oak tree until you're struck with 17 syllables of poetic revelation!

These writing processes focus solely on getting words down...not necessarily good words. Just words. The idea is that out of the piles of rubble, you might pull a sentence or paragraph or theme that can be dusted off and polished. (I'm lucky if I find the occasional serviceable prepositional phrase...but I keep plugging away.)

Another writing tool is Write or Die, by Dr. Wicked. (makes writing sound even scarier than it already is, doesn't it?) This program makes you set a goal (1,000 words) and a time limit (14 nanoseconds). If you don't meet your goal in the allotted time, you...um....die, or something. (I'll find out when I download the desktop version. If my blogging comes to a sudden halt (not that that's ever happened on this blog before), you can assume I've gambled and lost at Write or Die. Yikes.) At the very least you lose your gym membership, or they come and take away your pet for a week. I dunno.

[side note: isn't a parenthetical nested inside of another parenthetical one of the most gorgeous visuals on the written page? I digress.]

The goal is the same. Write words. Good words, bad words, misspelled words. Just...words.

Writing a blog entry every day...whether it's an essay, or a three-line poem, or a photo-laden post...leaves little time for editing. Some days you pull up a blog screen, scribble down your thoughts and hit Publish. And then you come back and read it a few days later, cringing at how loose and rambling some (or all) of your ideas are. (This may be a perfect example of such an entry.)

I believe in the benefits of writing every day, even though I've rarely kept such a schedule.

And I believe in the benefits of all of the writing exercises I've listed above, which is why I continue to attempt some of them. The community of other writers attempting the same thing can be a great motivator.

I've been a NaBloPoMo loser a handful of times...but I've also been a winner a few times, too. Sometimes life gets in the way, and the best you can be is a 28 or 29 out of 30.

The secret is to get back in front of your computer or pick up that pen and, as Goldberg always says...

...just write, just write, just write.

Whew!
Tomorrow's blog post will be much shorter (and hopefully more coherent) than this one. Goodnight.

"Being a writer is like having homework

every night for the rest of your life."

—Lawrence Kasdan

Over The Falls In A Barrel

During our late summer escape to Bayfield, Wis., about a month ago, one of the sights Jessica and I had on our list of must-sees was Copper Falls State Park, which was recommended by two friends.

Blanketed by gray, dreary skies on the drive up on Thursday, we postponed the visit until Sunday, assuming we'd make a brief stop, stare at some water falling down into a pool of other water, ooh and ahh a little, snap a few photos, and continue our drive home.

Not...so...fast.

Inside the park, we discovered a scenic, hilly, mile-and-a-half trail that contained several falls, a section of cascades, and more nature than perhaps we were ready to explore at the end of a long weekend. But it was a gorgeous hike on an impeccably maintained trail, and we're both eager to return.

If you're driving up Highway 13 in Ashland County next summer, I recommend a couple-hour visit. I promise the views are more spectacular than my photos.

"Many a calm river begins as a turbulent waterfall,

yet none hurtles and foams all the way to the sea."

—Mikhail Lermontov

Three Feet Plus One Butt Plus Two HandsEquals A Touchdown. Or At Least It Should.

Waking up on the first Sunday of the NFL regular season is akin to waking up on Christmas morning. For some of us, it's even better.

I'd been looking forward to this morning for most of the pre-season, because while we've been inundated for months with news of holdouts and injuries and trades and predictions, there's a different feel when the regular season gets under way. The blemishes on a team's record stay with them all season. Don't screw up, or you might not be playing past the first Sunday in January.

As a Detroit Lions fan for the past 20 years, I've seen more screwing up than one fan should have to endure, with the majority of the team's off-seasons beginning immediately after the last second ticks away from their final regular season game.

This year, I'm more optimistic. Not necessarily about a playoff run, mind you. I'm more of a realist than that. The Lions are at least a couple (hundred) years away from being a playoff team.

But they drafted well and were active in free agency, and I expected them to win a few more than the two or three (or, um...zero) games they'd won in recent seasons.

My Christmas Day of football was marred very early, however, by a couple of huge boulders of coal in my athletic sweat sock.

Near the end of the first half, the Lions' young quarterback and only hope to make that offense click, Matthew Stafford, was planted on his shoulder by a Bears linebacker, and could potentially be out several weeks with an injury.

Lump No. 1.

Late in the game, after allowing the Bears to climb out of an 11-point hole and take a five-point lead, Detroit still had a chance to win, and a pass from backup quarterback Shaun Hill found superstar receiver Calvin Johnson in the back of the end zone, who outjumped the defender, grabbed it with both hands, landed in bounds, sat down, rolled over, let the ball go, and stood up to celebrate.

Touchdown, right?
Wrong. The refs called it a touchdown, then huddled up and reversed the call to an incomplete pass. After several minutes of review, it was confirmed that it was indeed an incomplete pass, according to the rules—the stupid, stupid rules—of the NFL.

Lump No. 2...delivered with a sledgehammer.

The rule states that the receiver has to maintain possession of the ball "through the entire process of the catch."

The entire process, eh? When exactly does the process end? Before the team's first practice on Tuesday?? Does Johnson have to shower with the ball after the game to show he still has possession?

It was a lousy call, one that generated plenty of comments on the social sides of the Interwebs. Cris Carter from ESPN said he knew as soon as they signaled a touchdown that it wasn't really a touchdown because the receiver didn't stand up with the ball in his possession, able to hand it to the official.

So, perhaps a correct call...but a lousy rule. I don't know all the tiny details buried in the rulebook.

But I do know the Lions are 0-1 instead of 1-0, a position in which they've grown to feel quite comfortable.

But this particular fan...on this particular football Sunday...hasn't.

"The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion

our adversaries are insane."

—Mark Twain

(inspiration for post title via...and of course, John Madden)

True Colors Painted Over

Condescending and self-absorbed, reducing his own mistakes to microscopic missteps while magnifying others’ with the Hubble telescope, he was a rotten person. He passed blame better than a professional quarterback.

All the grunts at the mill knew it, but if he knew it himself, he never let on. He’d worn a flimsy façade of superiority for so many years, he probably wouldn’t recognize his true self if he searched for days in the mirror. The only person he’d fooled was the bumbling, introverted, moderately talented hack buried beneath the act.

Rotten and clueless. What a way to stumble through life.

— • — • —

My entry in the 100 Words Challenge, with the prompt, "rotten."

The Haves and Have-Nots

The light changed and he stepped off of the curb, crossing in front of four lanes of cars rushing home from work on Friday evening.

He wore a faded, frayed, rumpled, red jacket to shield himself from the early fall chill, and geometrical print shorts that were once probably bright yellow, but were now only a loud fashion statement. A crooked baseball cap covered spriggy, unkempt hair, and white socks rose to mid-calf from his black shoes.

As he shuffled across the intersection, his right arm hung limp at his side, while the left swayed with his step, propelling him toward the other curb.

One of the drivers eyed the pedestrian’s every step, noticing the effort exerted by his spindly white legs.

The driver looked down at his own blue jeans, baggy shirt, name-brand tennis shoes, lively music spilling out of his car speakers to signal the beginning of the weekend.

Maybe...maybe I don’t have it so bad after all, he thought.

"Nowadays people can be divided into

three classes: the haves, the have-nots

and the have-not-paid-for-what-they-haves."

—Earl Wilson

Seventeen Syllables...Give or Take

Do you haiku?
If you don't, you should.

I'm kind of hooked on haiku. Or at least I was. I haven't written many lately, save for the one on this blog a few days ago.

It doesn't take long...usually. They're only 17 syllables, after all...three little lines, of five syllables, seven syllables and five again. That's the traditional format, but many poets break that rule, and loosely define a haiku as a poem consisting of three short lines, often about nature, but sometimes...not. (strict, aren't they?)

Last winter, I participated in a haiku challenge, writing 100 haiku in 100 days. If you skipped the 23rd day, for example, you started over at No. 1 until you wrote for 100 consecutive days.

Sometimes they came easily, appearing in my head almost fully formed after a single glance out the window for inspiration. Other times...it came down to the last minute of the day, and I hastily scribbled terms like "pleasant pachyderm" as my third line...only because it had five syllables, not because I have an affinity for elephants.

A couple of other poets and I completed the 100 days (I may have tripped up three weeks into it and had to start over at syllable one), and I plan to publish the 300 haiku in a compilation. Hopefully we'll attempt another 100 soon.

A couple of examples among my 100 haiku include:

feeling old these days

scrape across and shave away

salt and pepper scruff

— • — • —

one winter drawback

snow fluttering softly down

my car has dandruff

When Jessica was in Paris in spring, she bought a book for me from Shakespeare and Co., called Book of Haikus, by Jack Kerouac. He rarely followed the 5—7—5 format, but it's fascinating to read these brief glimpses into his thoughts:

Terraces of fern

in the dripping

Redwood shade

— • — • —

Mayonnaise—

mayonnaise comes in cans

Down the river

— • — • —

Here comes the nightly

moth, to his nightly

Death, at my lamp

If you've never written a haiku before, I recommend you find your best (or any) 17 syllables, and leave them in the comments section. And if you have written a haiku before...might I suggest 100 in 100 days?

"Above all, a haiku must be very simple

and free of all poetic trickery and make

a little picture and yet be as airy and

graceful as a Vivaldi pastorella."

—Jack Kerouac

The Magic of a Bluesky Mountain

For the last 15 years, I've been planning a trip.

By "planning," I mean "dreaming about," because if I'd really been planning it, I'm sure I would have gone by now. Over the years, however, other vacations have leapfrogged this particular trip, such as three trips to Vegas in the past seven years.

I'd like to say I'm finished with Vegas for a while, but a few friends were there last weekend, and a latenight voicemail bragging about how much fun they were having at the Hard Rock caused me to feel the familiar tug, luring me back. Hopefully I've snipped those strings.

I'd also like to spend a long weekend in Key West, watching the sun dip into the Gulf of Mexico at day's end and perhaps finding writing inspiration from a gust of Hemingway in the air.

I digress.
Back to my trip, yes?

Someday, I'm going to hang in Taos, New Mexico, for a few days, or a week, or...I don't know how long.

Years ago in college, I was assigned writing guru Natalie Goldberg's book, Writing Down The Bones, in a creative writing class, and I was hooked. On writing...on Goldberg...all of the above. She lives and teaches in Taos, and in several of her books, she describes the bluest blues of the Taos sky, and the magic of Taos Mountain.

Taos Mountain (via)

Taos is a popular retreat for artists, writers and creative types, and it sounds like such a laid-back, barefoot kinda place. So someday...I'm going to pack my car with shorts, shirts, sandals (or not), several notebooks and a dozen pens, my laptop, my camera and a good supply of batteries and memory cards...and I'm going to take off.

Drive down through St.Louis and Oklahoma City and northern Texas, stopping when and where the urge strikes...and when I arrive in Taos, find a tiny adobe house with a view of the mountain, and stay until I'm feeling restored (which may take months). Then drive home through Denver, bringing a trunkful of that creative energy from Taos back to the Midwest.

Someday.

Where are some of your dream destinations...near or far?

"Life is not orderly. No matter how we try

to make life so, right in the middle of it we die,

lose a leg, fall in love, drop a jar of applesauce."

—Natalie Goldberg

A Picasso or a Garfunkel...

(via)

Tonight's art-related topic is...
...Art Garfunkel.

(thanks for the nudge, Barenaked Ladies.)

I received tickets in May to see Art Garfunkel in concert in July...along with his more famous singing partner, Paul Simon, of course. Because...not to be mean, but who'd go see Garfunkel without Simon? (probably millions of people. I apologize.)

A couple of weeks after the tickets were purchased, the tour promoters sent out an e-mail, notifying eager concert-goers that the rest of the current Simon & Garfunkel tour had been postponed (read: canceled), because Art had come down with a throat condition with a fancy name that made it sound more serious than a sore throat.

Hard to sing without your best stuff, right? Hence...no Simon. No Garfunkel. Just the sound...of silence. (that was too easy. feel free to boo for that one.)

Truth be told, I was never the biggest Simon & Garfunkel fan. I liked them, and I knew many of their hits. But I didn't own their music, and was never an over-the-top fan. Until...I knew I had tickets. And then learned that they'd been taken away. Then, for some reason, I wanted to hear Bridge Over Troubled Water more than any other song that had ever been written. (thank you for wading through the hyperbole. I hope it wasn't too messy.)

I hope Art is feeling better.
And I hope he and Paul hit the road again soon.

(via)

"I don't think that Simon & Garfunkel

as a live act compares to

Simon & Garfunkel as a studio act."

—Paul Simon

Artistic Vision or Spilled Paint Can?

(via)

In the movie L.A. Story (rent it, you'll laugh), Steve Martin's character accompanies several friends to an art gallery, and as they stand in front of a painting, the camera angle not revealing the painting to the viewer, Martin gives his interpretation:

"I like the relationships. I mean each character has his own story. The puppy is a bit too much but you have to overlook things like that in these kinds of paintings. But...the way he's holding her. It's almost...filthy. I mean he's...he's about to kiss her, and she's...pulling away. The way his leg's sort of smashed up against her. Look how he's painted the blouse sort of...translucent, you can just make out her...breast underneath, and it's...you know, sort of touching him about...here. It's really...pretty torrid, don't you think?

Then of course you have the...onlookers, peeking at them from behind the doorway, like they're all shocked...

...they wish!

Yeah, I must admit when I see a painting like this, I get, uh...emotionallyyy...erect."

The camera flashes to the painting on the wall, showing a four-by-eight-foot rectangular mass of red that could have been applied with a roller...a few subtle shadows barely visible, but nothing else of distinction to the painting.

When I visit an art gallery, which is...OK, never (rarely)...I always think of that scene, and wonder what I'm missing in the paintings that a seasoned art critic would see. For instance, what do you see here? I see something that's going to need a second bottle of Windex before it's clean.

(via)

"Abstract art: a product of the untalented

sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered."

—Al Capp

Flying, But Grounded

flying, but grounded

tethered by many

lifelines...family and friends

until the strings snap

Kites Over Lake Michigan, at Neshotah Beach in Two Rivers, Wis.
What a great way to use a beach!

"Throw your dreams into space like a kite,

and you do not know what it will bring back,

a new life, a new friend, a new love, a new country."

—Anais Nin

Monet On A Plate

Food is art.
Or at least...it can be.

Perhaps a glop of day-old macaroni & cheese at the college dining hall doesn't qualify as art, but one can hardly argue that it isn't worthy of such labels as "abstract" or "impressionistic."

Truly artsy food is a dab here, a morsel there, a drizzle over both. With enough room left on the plate for a couple of slices of take-out pizza.

(via)

I've eaten at all points on the spectrum: from pizza on paper plates to pasty thick macaroni & cheese to appetizers and entrées with acres of pristine whiteness surrounding the tiny bites of food. And I like it all.

Trouble is, sometimes the artsy foods are served with a heavy dose of pretension, and that—coupled with the exorbitant price per ounce of the food you're sampling—can make for a thoroughly unenjoyable dining experience.

We recently dined at one of these restaurants, and as our server was explaining to us the contents of the barren plate, she remarked about the imported Maraschino cherries in one corner.

Uh...I believe she misspoke, and should have more correctly said Maraschino cherry...singular...as there was only one, sliced in half, sitting all by its lonesome self.

Gee. That didn't really fill me up. Could I maybe have half a grape, too, please? And how much extra will that cost?

One should enjoy all dining experiences, but at restaurants like those, it's best to be prepared to hoist your nose up in the air as high as your server, lest you not fit in.

Also...have the number of the nearest pizza joint handy, because you'll probably go home hungry.

"Too many people just eat to consume calories.

Try dining for a change."

—John Walters

Leaving Las Vegas

“Tink we can trust ’im, Boss?” the shifty-eyed punk asked his stocky superior. “A guy fingers his own bruddah, ain’t no tellin’ who he’s gonna bust next!”

Backed into a corner of the dank parking garage below the Strip, I noticed rats scurrying about...none bigger than me.

I’d arrived three years ago and the city immediately sunk its claws into me. Strung out on glitz, gambling, and girls, I’d done despicable things to people I loved.

As the thugs patted their Smith & Wesson bulges, I heard, “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.”

I was...staying...in Vegas.

— • — • —

My entry in the 100 Words Challenge, with the prompt, "fingers."

(The word count may appear to be a few words short, because of how ellipses affect the way the words are counted, but there are exactly 100 words here...trust me. And I know I overuse the ellipsis...almost to a fault.)

A Starry Encore

Between songs on her live disc, "Miles of Aisles," Joni Mitchell explains to the crowd what she sees as the difference between the performing arts and the visual arts:

"That's one thing that's always like, uh...been a major difference between, like, the performing arts to me and being a painter, you know. Like a painter does a painting...and he does a painting, that's it, you know he's had the joy of creating it and he hangs it on some wall, somebody buys it...somebody buys it again, or maybe nobody buys it and it sits up in a loft somewhere till he dies. But he's never...nobody ever says to him...you know, nobody ever said to Van Gogh...'Paint a Starry Night again, man!' You know? He painted it, that was it."

Vincent van Gogh's "Starry Night" (via)

Van Gogh probably never went on tour, or had to paint the same painting 250 nights a year.

"Moons and Junes and ferris wheels

the dizzy dancing way you feel

as ev'ry fairy tale comes real.

I've looked at love that way."

—Joni Mitchell, "Both Sides Now"

A Caricature of My Present Self

Everyone has a dream job, right?

Years ago, mine was—and probably still is, to a degree—to be an editorial cartoonist. Or the CCP (chief creative pencil) of a wildly popular comic strip. (Calvin and Hobbes immediately springs to mind. I miss those guys.)

I've written about it before, and continue to be fascinated by those who can turn a blank page into a panel or strip that's smart, funny, and creatively drawn.

Problem is...I'm not always smart, only occasionally funny, and...creative with a pencil? Rarely, if ever.

Last year at the Manitowoc library, we saw Joe Heller, a cartoonist based at the Green Bay Press Gazette, and syndicated in more than 350 newspapers. He shared the story of how his career grew over 30-plus years, and his process for creating award-winning cartoons.

He has a great job: every day he absorbs as much news and gossip as he can, and then scribbles down a drawing four times a week...very often thought-provoking, and very often funny.

Every so often he'll post an update on Facebook that says, "My latest cartoon was just picked up by the New York Times!" And my reaction is always, "Way to go, Joe!" Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

As a young boy, I attempted to put pencil to paper, and I speak the truth when I say it's for the best that I'm sitting in front of this keyboard instead of an easel or drafting table.

What's your dream job?

"No one blames themselves if they don't understand a cartoon,

as they might with a painting or "real" art;

they simply think it's a bad cartoon."

—Chris Ware

— • — • —

The September theme for NaBloPoMo is "art."
I'm not promising or forecasting anything. I'm just sayin'.

Road To Nowhere

The sterile, bright, fluorescent lights shone down on him from the ceiling as he was wheeled down the long corridor, their narrow, semi-opaque fixtures imitating the dashed center line on the highway he’d been traveling only minutes before.

From his horizontal vantage point, he saw hanging above him a clear plastic bag, with a thin tube leading to...where?

Suddenly, the lights sped more quickly past him, and footsteps behind him quickened.

“Get him in here, stat!” shouted an important voice.

As the end of the gurney where his feet lay kicked open the swinging doors, the lights began to dim.

— • — • —

My entry in the 100 Words Challenge, with the prompt, "corridor."

Running Out of Options

“Failure...is not...an option!!” bellowed the drill sergeant, the straight bill of his cap tapping the recruit on the forehead.

Ironic, thought the newbie. His entire life until now had been a failure.

Failed to get the grades.

Failed to get the girl.

Failed to make his parents proud.

And now he’s told it’s no longer an option?

He stood rigid, naked except for his one-size-too-big skivvies, wide awake, the rising sun’s first rays peeking through the window, while his daddy for the next 13 weeks sprayed spittle in his face as he barked orders.

Failed to make the right decision?

— • — • —

My entry in the 100 Words Challenge, with the prompt, "failed."

I'm An Alright Guy, Too

Back in the winter/spring of 1995, I was working for a builder...swinging a hammer, framing walls, sheeting walls, hefting walls...freely throwing around words like, "joist."

While this post is not about my brief career as a carpenter, I will forever remember the last house I framed, because it was where I was introduced to a pot-smoking, folk-singing storyteller.

Almost every day, Todd Snider's "Alright Guy" would come blaring through the speakers of the boom box. And after hearing it a handful of times, I looked forward to those four minutes every day when he'd come on and tell me how alright he was.



I purchased his debut album, "Songs For The Daily Planet," released on Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville Records label (which I don't think exists today), and found that Snider was more than a one-hit wonder, although the radio stations only seemed to pick up on one other of his tunes, a quirky little ditty called, "Beer Run." (b--double e--double r--u--n...beer ruunnnn! all you need is a ten and a fiver, a car, a key and a sober driver.)

I kept up with his albums for a while, but lost touch with his newer releases. I nearly wore out the three I owned, though.

Several weeks ago, I saw in a entertainment newspaper an ad for the annual Acoustic Fest in Manitowoc, with a day-long lineup that's usually filled with local talent. I glanced down the list and saw Snider's name as the headliner. He'd been in Green Bay two nights before.

Not only would I get to see him live for the first time...I'd get to see him free!...and in my own town, within walking distance of my home. (Did I mention that ice-cold beers were only two bucks?? They were. I didn't count how many I had.)

We arrived an hour or so ahead of Snider's showtime and sat on the grass in the small park until Michael McDermott came on stage (he was a late addition to the lineup, and quite talented...check out some of his stuff), when we went and stood off to the side of the stage for a closer view. Shortly before McDermott's set was over, a long white car pulled up behind the band shell and Snider exited the vehicle, immediately attracting a crowd of about a dozen people who recognized him.

I bolted over for a chance to say hi, and when Jessica saw the direction I took, she and a buddy of ours followed.

After Snider posed for a couple of photos, he turned to walk into the door behind the band shell, and I stopped him with, "Hey, Todd, ya got time for one more? I've been a fan since your Alright Guy days."

"Oh, sure, I'll play that one tonight," was his reply.

I bet he plays that one at all of his shows, though. Duh. Whyyy didn't I reach for a more obscure title?!?

A couple of alright guys. (I'm the hatless, tieless, harmonicaless, beer-holding alright guy.)

Jessica was ready with her camera, and thus...I met the man whose stories I'd been listening to for 15 years...over and over and over.

He played for a little over an hour (can't expect much more from a free show) and was as entertaining in person as on his records. We sat on the ground in the front row, and heard "Alright Guy," and "I Spoke As A Child," and "Conservative Christian Right-Wing Republican Straight White American Male." (I highly recommend looking up that last one. Aw, hell...here you go.)

I won't wait again to see him until he returns to my city. I'll go find him next time he's in Wisconsin.

Because he really is an alright guy.

"They say 3 percent of the people use 5 to 6 percent of their brain;

97 percent use 3 percent and the rest goes down the drain.

I'll never know which one I am but I'll bet you my last dime,

99 percent think we're 3 percent 100 percent of the time."

—Todd Snider, "Statistician's Blues"

Time To Lift The Cloud and Peek At Summer

I'm in kind of a pissy mood.
(I know. Months and months of nothing,
and I come back with a first sentence like that?? Sorry.)

Where was I?...oh, yeah.
I'm in kind of a pissy mood.

And I don't know why.

Things are good.
I'm in a place that's infinitely better for my soul than the last place I was in.

I spend substantial portions of my day laughing and talking and listening and thinking and laughing some more.

Summer is right around the corner, if not already squarely landed on top of us.

And I have rocks on my blog, where there used to be no rocks.

How can life be bad?

Um...I dunno.

The last couple of days have been real downers for me.
And what better way to rid yourself of the downers than to come and whine about it on your blog, right? Right.

I know they won't last long. They rarely do. They come and go, and often I'm quite skilled in tricking them into...going.

I thought I'd jump back into this whole blogging thing by making a list of definite/probable/possible activities I have planned for my summer, and (hopefully) reading a little feedback about what your summer holds. (that is...if I have any readers who continue to check this URL. it's been dormant for...wow. never mind.) Help rid me of my pre-summer blahs by telling me all about your swell-weather plans!

• My summers—and other seasons, for that matter—always contain music. And this season will be no different. My biggest musical event will be Simon & Garfunkel in mid-July, which was an early birthday gift from the sweetest person I know. We briefly considered buying tickets to see them in early May, but other conflicts prevented it. And now, just a couple of months later, I get to see them anyway! (I'd previously listed this as a "holy balls" moment, so...) Holy balls!

• Other lesser-known musical entertainment on the agenda includes BoDeans, John Eddie, Stephen Kellogg & The Sixers, and possibly a Will Hoge show. Not to mention a band or two or seven at Summerfest. So there will most definitely be music!

• We've talked about taking a drive way up into northern Wisconsin and spending a day or two among the Apostle Islands on Lake Superior. I've never been that far north in my own state. It's time to go.

• Other travel plans will include a a trip or two around the lake into Michigan, and possibly a ride across the big pond on the Badger.

• Reading. Writing. Photography. These are things I claim to be interested in. Hmm...I wish someone would tell me why I don't spend more time doing them.

• I hope to explore more farmer's markets, buying vegetables and learning more about cooking meats and vegetables, and savoring the aforementioned...cooked meats and vegetables.

• Bocce ball! Because what is summer without bocce ball?!? (Answer: Winter.)

• Organizing. Sorting. Downsizing. After my move last month, I still have plenty of all of those to do, and will make some progress toward that end before the leaves turn colors. I hope.

• I'd like to find a blog theme and background and header and actual posts that I'm happy with, and that I am eager to return to in order to rant and rave about my summer thoughts and activities and events.

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I see I haven't lost my knack for rambling. In general, it looks to be a low-key summer, but if you want to click down to the comments section and brag about a trip abroad or the new Jaguar you're going to own by the Fourth of July, please do! I'd love to hear it all.

Perhaps I'll return again before September.

Perhaps.

(I can feel my mood lifting already.)

"People don't notice whether it's

winter or summer when they're happy."

—Anton Chekhov

Sorry, Tom.

As we celebrate my favorite holiday of the year today...my favorite day of the year, to be more precise...I thought I’d give the guest of honor a little face time.

This particular turkey greeted me recently when we stopped to visit some friends, and he didn’t seem too keen on having his photo taken.

I kept moving closer to take some better shots, and he staked his claim to his territory by sounding his gobble and strutting in my direction.

If I crouched down to take a shot from a better angle, he made a more aggressive move toward me. (The turkey’s owner told me that my crouching stance was a sign of confrontation, to which tom didn’t take too kindly.)

After a few photos from various angles, I’d had enough and stopped my photo shoot just short of being pecked in the shins.

Seeing this guy, I almost feel bad for eating one of his brothers on this, my favorite day of the year. Almost.

(Did I mention he acted a bit too cocky for his waddle?)

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

“Thanksgiving dinners take 18 hours
to prepare. They are consumed in
12 minutes. Halftimes take 12 minutes.
This is not coincidence.”
—Erma Bombeck

And A Glowing Light Shall Strand Them

“Our first stop has to be a gas station,” he said, glancing down at the golden glowing fuel light on the dash as he backed out of the parking ramp after a full weekend, ready for a long, latenight drive home.

“Yeah,” she agreed, looking at the fuel gauge needle. “And I really need to find a bathroom before we hit the road, too.”

They drove down the main drag, many of the stores long closed for the business day, but confident there would be at least a half dozen gas stations to choose from before the big city turned to lonely road.

A Mobil sign and well-lit parking lot signaled a destination with a solution to the empty fuel tank, and they pulled in, noticing a minor inconvenience.

“That’s one of those little half convenience stores,” he said, motioning to the tiny building that may or may not have had the caffeine he craved for the journey home.

“And they probably have those gross outdoor bathrooms, too,” she added, “where you have to go inside for the key, and then back outside to find the bathroom door.”

He drove slowly through the lot, surveying the situation, and continued out the back exit.

“There will be something right up the street. We still have a couple miles of main street left,” he said.

About a half mile after pulling back on to the main road, he saw a sign guiding him to the interstate highway that would lead them home.

“Isn’t that the way to our highway?” he asked, veering on to the exit ramp before she had a chance to answer. “Looks like an easy way to catch our road.”

As they continued in their new direction, the atmosphere in the car changed noticeably, as he realized what he’d done. And so did she.

“I, um...uh...maybe I shouldn’t have taken this,” he offered, noting his error.

She said nothing.

The lights of the main drag disappeared, leaving the couple to travel into the darkness of the connecting highway. The darkness punctuated only by the now brighter glow of the fuel light, staring up and mocking him for his decision as he drove into the drizzly, chilly, late night.

“Didn’t I just say that our first stop had to be a gas station??” he asked, incredulous at his poor judgment. “We were at...a Mobil…gas station! And we left!”

He watched the fuel light as much as he watched the road ahead, as they drove.

“I have Triple-A!” she offered with a smile and a lilt in her voice, trying to ease the tension of the situation.

He chuckled nervously, and replied, “We may need it!”

The conversation subsided, save for a few more chuckles, as they both thought it best not to vocalize what was really going through their minds.

But they both knew.

Their night might have...just maybe...grown a bit longer.

“We were right there! At a gas station!” he repeated with a laugh, rolling through his brain the predicament he’d put them in.

A few uncomfortable miles down the road, they saw a sign for the next exit, which was still a couple of miles away. Another mile, and they passed a sign for an upcoming convenience center.

“Kwik Trips are open 24 hours, aren’t they?” he asked, not really searching for an answer.

“I think so,” she answered. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure they are.”

They approached their exit, the vehicle thankfully still powered by what little fuel must have been left in the tank, and saw a different glow than before. This time...the glow of a Kwik Trip sign and lights shining down on the fuel pumps they sought.

The tension lifted as they pulled next to a pump.

“I thought this was an 11-gallon tank, with about a gallon left when the fuel light comes on,” he said as he started pumping fuel. The gauge went past 11, all the way to 14 gallons.

“I might have been a bit off with my numbers,” he grinned at her, and she laughed.

As they went in to pay, they noticed they’d found one of the biggest, fanciest Kwik Trips they’d ever seen, complete with a latenight clerk who tried to sell them doughnuts and pizza and everything else in the store before ringing up just the fuel. And the caffeine.

They’d found their pot of gold at the end of the driving-on-fumes rainbow. And they turned toward home.

 

“Restore human legs as a means of travel.
Pedestrians rely on food for fuel and
need no special parking facilities.”
—Lewis Mumford

How Long Will My 100 Days Take??

I read a tweet Tuesday from @WritingSpirit, in which she asked about people's goals for the last 100 days of 2009, seeing as how Wednesday was the first day of the last 100 days.

She outlined a 100-day challenge whereby participants agree to do a certain task for 100 consecutive days...whether it be working on a book or other writing project, or sticking to an exercise regimen...and if during the 100 days, one day is missed, then the 100 days starts over.

Good motivation not to miss a day. Would you want to start over after, like, Day 64?!? Me, either.

I pondered what I might do for the final 100 days of the year, and how I could make them count. (no, I'm not going to blog for 100 consecutive days. I am a realist, after all.)

My mission is to do something...anything...creative with words. Every day. From now until 2010. Might seem like a simple goal, but with my recent level of slackitude, it's what I need to nudge me back in the right direction.

So blog entries, columns, first drafts, finished drafts, morning pages (popularized by Julia Cameron), poems...they all count.

I have a tiny crutch I can use when I'm feeling only 17 syllables of creativity, which is a 100 Haiku In 100 Days challenge that I'm publishing on Twitter. Check it out if you're into haiku. (and who isn't?!?)

I hope to pay more attention to other areas of my writing during these 100 days, but even if I look back as I begin 2010 and have a hundred haiku to show for this challenge, I'll consider it a success.

Your 100 days can start any time. So why don't you jump in and join me?

You just may soar past me when I stumble on Day 23 and have to begin again.

"Friends are like melons;
shall I tell you why?
To find one good
you must one hundred try."
—Claude Mermet

All's "Fair" In Love and Carnie Games

“I want to see you play a game,” she said as we strolled among the ring tosses and dart games and water gun races at the Manitowoc County Fair recently.

I could say that I was forced into foolishly spending money to play a game I couldn’t win, just to impress a girl and win a prize I didn’t even want.

But I knew I was going to play one particular game as soon as I saw it. This game and I had history, and I wanted to show it that I was still the master.

The game of choice involved three pieces of four-inch PVC pipe, sitting on a shelf about six feet high, with two pieces side by side on the shelf with about an inch of space between them, and the third piece centered on top of the bottom two.

The objective: throw a softball at the three pieces of PVC and knock all of them off of the shelf at once. Aim it correctly, and you’ve won yourself a prize. Nothing to it, right?

That’s what I thought several years ago when I first saw the game at a fireman’s picnic in Sun Prairie.

There was a big, stuffed Tigger hanging there as a prize that year, and for reasons that escape me now, I wanted that Tigger.

So I bought my two balls for five bucks, leaned up as far as I could, took careful aim, and threw the softball with a dart shooter’s motion at a contact point I thought would work. One or two of the pieces fell, and my attempt fell short.

“No, no, no,” said a buddy of mine who’d had a few beers earlier that evening. “You have to throw the ball…get some velocity on it to knock ‘em all down.”

So I backed up a few feet and wound up for my second one, missing my target completely. (I may have had a few beers that night, too.)

I bought a couple more balls, went back to my up-close dart shooter’s strategy, and continued to almost win...two balls and five bucks at a time.

Eventually I hit the right spot, and they all tumbled off of the shelf, and I took home my $20 Tigger.

When I saw the game at the fair, I scanned the back wall of stuffed prizes and saw nothing I wanted to take home. All I knew is I wanted to make those three pieces of PVC drop.

I paid my five bucks, threw my first ball, and didn’t even come close enough to get excited, hitting all three pieces but leaving two of them still resting on the shelf. I slid a few feet over to another stack and threw my second ball, knocking two of them down this time.

“You’re close, buddy! You’ve got the right idea,” said the guy working the game.

Just what I was looking for. False encouragement from a guy who wanted only one thing. Another five bucks.

I paused for a bit, took a few steps back to talk strategy with the girl I was trying to impress, and stepped forward again, plunking down another five bucks.

Same result. Good aim, good motion...ohhh, so very close. But no prize.

Meanwhile, a lady in her 60s with about five grandchildren in tow came walking up and bought a couple balls, too. With a wild-armed throwing motion she missed with her first attempt.

But on her second one, she found the target and all three pieces of pipe went flying off the shelf.

A couple of us who saw it ooh-ed and ahh-ed and clapped for her, and she came over to me and said, “Not bad for an old grandma, eh??” Then she picked out a stuffed monkey/ape/primate-type thing with a T-shirt that said, “I’m bringing SEXY back!” on it, handed it to one of the children and said, “Come on, kids, let’s go.”

And off they all went to claim another prize at another game.

The guy working the game caught my attention and said to me, with a little bit of a grin, “I’ll give you three balls for five bucks. You were so close before. You almost had it!”

And away we walked, empty-handed, and only ten bucks down.

Anybody wanna buy a big, stuffed Tigger? I’ll sell him cheap. Twelve bucks.

“The economic game is not supposed to be
rigged like some shady ring toss
on a carnival midway.”
—Arianna Huffington