I missed you, and I am glad you survived. You didn't go and get a Mickey tat or anything crazy, did you?
******************
See this article on Salon about digitizing libraries, and then go read Nicholson Baker’s Doublefold. Baker may be a bit of an extremist but I am mostly with him. (See this review of Doublefold which I had to write for a library school class, if you like.)
***********************
Suffice it to say at the moment that this quote from Anneli Rufus’ excerpt from her book The Farewell Chronicles [How we really respond to death] hit the proverbial nail smackdab on the head: What you did not expect, and what Hallmark never hints about, is all those other ways you feel when people die. Weird, messy, nasty, sticky, scary feelings that slop over the rim of sorrow, or poison it, or take its place. Hooboy. Sometimes that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you read something so completely true?…got it.
*************************
I was doing some research on cited reference searching at work last night and came across a discussion of Picasso's “Guernica.” It reminded me of two insipid things which I will share with you for no particular reason whatsoever, other than my boys have done nothing wildly amusing in the past twelve hours, and Corelli’s Mandolin is all right but not riveting.
1) On “Ally McBeal,” which I shamefacedly confess to loving for the first few seasons, there was an ancient judge who referred to Picasso as “Pick-a-sew.” He just loved “old Pick-a-sew’s paintings.” At the time I thought it was funny.
2) I remember reading somewhere once that you should not hang prints of “Guernica” in the bedroom as it was very likely to disturb your sleep. Apparently the painting was a hot one for college dorm rooms and yuppie apartments for a while. Perhaps then the would-be art appreciators looked up the history of the subject of the painting and what Picasso was trying to say and do with his work. Even without knowing these facts, I was never tempted by the painting; I’ve never been a Picasso fan.
My tastes tend to run towards more illustrator/painterly types like Maxfield Parrish. (I do have several Parrish prints hanging throughout my house, and one in the bedroom. His use of light is exquisite, and very restful.) In fact, other than the Annenberg collection tour, a retrospective of Parrish’s work is the only art show I have deliberately travelled to a museum to see. I drove to Philly to see the show and dragged my long-suffering brothers throughout the whole museum. They were very bored. But considering the alternative was hanging out in the hospital room with my dying mother, I understand why Parrish won, even for a few hours.
******************
Must...take...boys...to...grocery....store......I SOOO can *not* get my shit together this morning. This will perk me up: I call it "Carrie Donovan meets Jiminy Glick."
1 comment:
and by the way, all that discoloration on the boy's bod - chalk. They were coloring each other with sidewalk chalk.
Post a Comment