Wipe Your Feet

inothernews: “Light bulbs, bottle caps, toothbrushes, Popsicle...

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:31:10 -0800

“Light bulbs, bottle caps, toothbrushes, Popsicle sticks and tiny pieces of plastic, each the size of a grain of rice, inhabit the Pacific garbage patch, an area of widely dispersed trash that doubles in size every decade and is now believed to be roughly twice the size of Texas.”

Ugh. Click through to read the whole article, “Researchers Explore Growing Ocean Garbage Patches,” at the New York Times.

Sadly, we only have our polluting selves to blame.

(Photo: Marion Aguilera / AP via the New York Times)

christinefriar: Lil Wayne - Mrs Officer

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:04:12 -0800

christinefriar:

Lil Wayne - Mrs Officer

congratulations. you now have 2 orange chairs. one of them has...

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:34:50 -0800

congratulations.

you now have 2 orange chairs.

one of them has what feels like the motor from a medium-sized boat inside of it. when you plug it in, it feels like you’re about to shove off from the dock. for some reason, this makes me feel as though it would be effective in drawing out helpful memories in analysis. “but doctor, really! i was only six weeks old, at the time! how could i possibly remember my —- [brrrrrrrrrrrrrrmmmmmmmmmm] — my god. they really did give Daisy away.”

“and maybe that’s why you resent your grandfather.”

“my god, doctor, i feel almost certain that’s why.”

dreaming of her christmas list

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:31:44 -0800

dreaming of her christmas list

November 9, 2009: 10:34 AM

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:54:51 -0800

overheardatstarbucks: Girl #1: I could never be bigger than the guy. Girl #2: Yeah, you like big...

(via creaves)

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:43:33 -0800

(via creaves)

velvet underground & nico — chelsea girls

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:41:59 -0800

velvet underground & nico — chelsea girls

Although generally quiet and not vocal, giraffes have been heard...

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:12:08 -0800

Although generally quiet and not vocal, giraffes have been heard to make various sounds. Courting males will emit loud coughs. Females will call their young by whistling or bellowing. Calves will bleat, moo, or make mewing sounds. In addition, giraffes will grunt, snort, hiss, or make strange flute-like sounds. Recent research has shown evidence that the animal communicates at an infrasound level.

(wiki)

wearethedigitalkids: I love Jonathan Harris. “I Want You To...

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:58:39 -0800

wearethedigitalkids:

I love Jonathan Harris.

“I Want You To Want Me is an interactive installation about online dating, commissioned by and installed at New York’s MoMA on Valentine’s Day 2008, as part of their Design and the Elastic Mind show.”

the cool kids — beeper

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:46:48 -0800

the cool kids — beeper

A few years ago, a close friend of my family’s, Karen,...

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 19:14:57 -0800

A few years ago, a close friend of my family’s, Karen, gave me a bottle of 1983 Dom Perignon. It had been sitting on her refrigerator, and she didn’t want to drink it (not a champagne person, she claimed), but it was making her feel guilty just sitting there, because she was concerned it wasn’t being stored properly. She gave it to me, because it happened to be my birth year, and because Karen is a wonderful person. I was like, Karen, girl, sell it on the eBay! but she didn’t want to, so I took it from her, and I decided to save it for an occasion. Eventually, the occasion became when Peter I landed our first big-deal jobs.

Tonight we’re drinking the Dom Perignon, and I wanted to let Karen know that it’s the best glass of anything I’ve ever had in my life.

Fake Dinner Party Conversations

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 17:43:00 -0800

Tess: Chris, thanks so much for coming over. I know last time we all had dinner things got a...

tumbledore: Dead Meadow - “Sleepy Silver Door” Today is the Fog...

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 14:32:19 -0800

tumbledore:

Dead Meadow - “Sleepy Silver Door”

Today is the Fog Rising Festival at Broadway Studios in SF, featuring Witch (J Mascis’ other band), Imaad Wasif, members of Dead Meadow, and more.

here’s to swimmin with bow-legged women

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 14:30:47 -0800

here’s to swimmin with bow-legged women

sadie fan fiction it was christmas morning, 2014. peter came...

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:58:00 -0800

sadie fan fiction

it was christmas morning, 2014. peter came into the kitchen, where sadie was staring out the window.

“good morning!” he said, taking a sticky ribbon out from one of the cabinets. “come here, let me put this on your collar.”

sadie sat as peter affixed the bow. he patted her on the head.

“wait here, now.” he closed the kitchen doors. sadie walked over to them and pressed her ear against the wood.

i have a surprise for you, sadie heard peter say.

what! a surprise! answered tess. i love surprises!

sadie heard peter’s footsteps as he came back into the kitchen. he opened the door, picked her up, and brought her into the living room. tess was on the sofa.

“look! i got you a puppy!” peter said. he put sadie down.

sadie went over to tess, who scratched her neck. “that’s not a puppy!” she said, and they laughed.

hahahahahahaha. it was like a cruel siren to sadie’s ears. hahahahaha. that’s not a puppy!

sadie’s tail dropped. she left the room. tess and peter were toasting their glasses of egg nog: to their health, to the tree, but not to the dog. that’s not a puppy!

sadie’s nails clicked on the floor as she approached her wicker basket of toys. with a front paw, she shoved it aside to reveal a small bottle of whiskey. its cap had been replaced by a cork, which she pulled out with her teeth as she held the bottle between her furry forearms. she slid the bottle over to her water bowl, tipped the bottle over and emptied it into the half-empty dish, filling it to the brim. she lapped it up, wincing.

she remembered long ago, when she had been a puppy. they would walk her down the street in west hollywood, talking about how small she was. neighbors stopped. “my god,” they’d say, “what an adorable puppy.” when she got home, there would be wet food. when she went to bed, she was safe within the shiny gold barricade of her puppy gate. she was never asked to sit, or to high-five, or to sit down. she was only asked to be adorable.

that’s not a puppy! hahahaha!

sadie reached under the oven, flattening herself against the tile floor. she stuck her nose underneath the warm metal, rooting around. when she emerged, she had a Newport in her mouth. she stood on her hind legs and pawed at the door of the oven. it opened, and she lit the Newport on the oven’s pilot, letting the heavy oven door slam. who cared. she sat, then sat down, by her whiskey bowl, letting the ash from her cigarette drop on the floor. let the cats clean it up. what else were they good for? when she’d finished her whiskey, she pulled a pack of playing cards from the bookshelf and brought her Newport over to the kitchen table. she set up a game of solitaire.

she remembered spring days when tess or peter would carry her over the puddles she hated to step in, and fall days when they would encourage her to attempt to climb a tree after a squirrel. she remembered summer days when they would fill her water dish with crushed ice, and the time they took turns feeding her bits of duck confit from their fancy pizza. she remembered being handed piece after piece of bacon following a traumatic vet visit. fistfuls of bacon. a single tear slid down her muzzle, extinguishing her Newport. she was about to throw it into the ashtray with the others when she felt a hand atop her head.

“sadie,” said peter, “this is no way to spend christmas.”

“do you still remember how to play poker?” asked tess. “you’re a good dog, you know.”

peter poured them all glasses of egg nog, and they played poker and smoked for a few hours, before opening the rest of their presents.

Czech street map

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 10:30:00 -0800

Czech street map

lali puna — faking the books

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 10:00:00 -0800

lali puna — faking the books

can we unpack the irony of an honest abe...

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 02:26:03 -0800

can we unpack the irony of an honest abe impersonator/commemorative art

I am considering a trial run of Radical Honesty. I don’t want to do it because I’m “addicted to lying” or because I’m crazy about Dr. Brad Blanton, but rather because I have become addicted to apologizing and I think maybe that’s a form of lying, plus it’s ridiculous. Two days ago, I apologized while putting money in somebody’s tip jar. Then I apologized for apologizing. Then I apologized for being so strange. I think I would have preferred to have said nothing; if pressed, it would have to have been something like “Thank you for this coffee. It’s good, but overpriced.”

I like the idea of a thrilling social crime. It seems so selfish, so unsympathetic to the tiny emotional deaths caused in others, and yet it’s endlessly defensible: it’s honesty! Social graces are lovely, but fake. They make others feel nice, but that’s their only purpose; what good is any of it if we don’t mean it?

I can think of a few examples of people whose honesty has created this air of super-charisma about them, perceptible even to people who don’t know them all that well; I’m not sure, but I think being honest comes across as being in charge. I wonder if you also feel great, because you have so much less remembering to do (as Mark Twain would have reminded you). Imagine what you could do with all that extra space on your mind’s hard drive.

New York subway map by Zero Per Zero

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 01:05:56 -0800

New York subway map by Zero Per Zero

Photo

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:04:09 -0800