June 2008 Archives

Thinking a lot lately about the time of legends. Not as far back as dragons or unicorns. Or even King Arthur. I've been reading up on that not-so-distant moment in our American history when a band of Famous Artists put out the word that they were looking for people who enjoyed drawing.

Can you imagine that? A Famous Artists School, right here in the U.S?

"It started over 18 years ago when a group of America's most successful artists...met in New York City. They knew that all over America there were people who liked to draw who could be turned into good artists. Albert Dorne asked, 'Why can't we give these people the training they need -- including all the trade secrets and know-how we've learned over the years?'

He suggested a new kind of art school -- a home study art school -- that would give talented people the best professional art training, no matter where they live.

The famous artists agreed."

It was like something the Medici's might have dreamed up in Florence. And it happened. In Connecticut.

Why isn't this studied in school books? And where are all those famous artists now anyways? I haven't heard from Norman Rockwell in years.

I was talking with a pal
about how my 10-year-old daughter
would still like to be 8 years old,
and my pal said "You know,
a little part of all of us is
still 8 years old."

And it's really true.
For example,
thanks to these skin lotions
I've been using
for the last 32 years,
my feet are 8 years old.

At the time, I thought it was a great idea.
I don't know why. It just seemed like a
cool thing to do.

But now I think it's kind of gross.

I bought a new wallet last weekend and this time I'm gonna get it right. I think I must be 0-6 on wallets over the past two decades. Each one, destroyed by me stuffing it full of receipts. No more. I say those who don't study history, with regard to their wallets, are doomed to repeat history with regard to their wallets! Well, I've studied my history. So alright then.

In related "fresh-start" news, I've decided I'm giving up on cursive. I gave cursive a fair chance. But who am I kidding? I can't read my own cursive. What good is a writing style that the writer themselves can't read? I might as well bark at a piece of paper and then put it aside as if I've accomplished something. Arf!

Oh, I'll still "sign" for things, but if you've seen my signature you know, that's not cursive.

I know what you're thinking. "Cecil," you're thinking, "how many times have we heard you say you're going to give up cursive?" I guess three times, probably. But this is the first time I've said it sober.

So it'll be mostly print for me from here on out. Maybe a cursive "s" or "t" mixed in just to keep things rolling. Possibly a "z." You didn't expect me to give up cursive "z," did you?

Look out world, I've got a flat wallet and handwriting humans can read!

One reason above all: he has a fired up base. All the more fired up as the choice on the war becomes clear. McCain has a base that's, at best, ambivalent. He's their Lieberman. The betrayer. Independents love that. But the base, not so much. Bush had an army of free volunteers. McCain will have empty offices.....

It's not a small thing, to beat the Clintons in a Democractic primary. In so many ways, it's as shocking as beating a sitting president in a primary, something that's so hard to do, Teddy couldn't pull it off with all the Kennedy glory and resources on his side, against a sad-sack Jimmy Carter.

It's not a small thing.

I watched The Passion of the Christ the other night. I'm Jewish and I've had this itch to see it and judge for myself whether it was anti-semitic.

Sure enough, most of the non-pre-Christian Jews in the movie are weasels. But then about a third of the way through, we meet the Roman guards. And they're even worse. Monstrous, in fact. Then a bit later, a few Jewish characters show up who are downright human. So it's a thick stew.

It seemed to me like Mel was accentuating the evil of all the bad guys and we just got caught up in that multiplier. Jesus' suffering is the center piece of the movie. The more villainous the villains, the greater the sacrifice. Fagan-like features on some of the Jewish characters aside, I didn't spot him going out of his way to take it to my peeps. I mean, we don't come across great. But what are you gonna do, right? It's no fun being the bad guy in someone else's liturgy.

Thinking back on kurfluffle around the film's release, my theory is that Mel's sort of the Saddam Hussein of religious-themed movie making. Both he and Saddam had mental issues that caused them to behave as if they'd done something bad that they hadn't actually done. Oh, maybe they'd thought about doing those bad things. A lot. But the bottom-line is: I found no weapons of mass-anti-semitism in this film.

Does this all mean that if we had left Saddam in power, he would have eventually been pulled over by the LA police? It's hard to say. But I think yes.

A post-script: after watching the film, I had the uncomfortable experience of dreaming that I was a Roman guard, forced to mistreat Jesus who was played (in my dream) by the character Dwight Schrute from The Office. That same night, my wife, who opted not to watch the movie, dreamt she could fly with whales.

So while I don't think the film is anti-semitic, I'm not sure I can recommend it as a rental.

i dreamt i adopted
a dog without a body or a head
and we went fishing.

afterwards, while I was
untangling the line,
a nice lady came up to see how
my dog and i were doing.

"his tail isn't wagging much," she said.
"i don't think he's ok."