Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Weird

So my High School was/is pretty well respected, and most people who went/go there tend to go to college, lead normal-ish, middle-class lives. Then there's this story I saw in the local Pittsburgh paper today, mentioning one of my classmates (admittedly a very experimental drug user, though I always thought he was a really intelligent guy past the facade) who is now part of an FBI investigation because, after having been arrested on 8 charges of felony drug counts as well as aggravated assault, he had the living shit beat out of him by jail guards. Ended up with a broken nose, bruised eyes, perforated eardrums, ''...and possibly other head injuries.'' Fucked up picture included in the article.

Truthfully, I'm not exactly sure why I'm posting this... I guess its just kind of weird seeing someone who I kind of respected as, albeit incredibly fringe, intelligent in a wholly different kind of way reduced to this pathetic image of a mentally-broken serious drug abuser (8 felony counts of possession implies so much) who's been physically broken by none other than the Man. I can't help but wonder, 'where, if anywhere at all, do his freedoms lie?' He can't trust himself, and he can't trust the Man - both have reduced him to barely anything at all. What options does this guy have, who once struck me as a very outsider creative force? Shit, guy was one of the main influences on me deciding to start drawing...

Friday, October 22, 2010

Procrastination

Read a great article in the New Yorker about the philosophical examination of procrastination. The article is reviewing a book of essays called 'the thief of time', but it offers a number of fantastic points, historic writings and theories. One of my favorites is the external tool of 'extended will' which is used to fight procrastination.
Ulysses had his men tie him to the mast of his ship because he knew he would not be able to resist the songs of the siren. Gambling addicts initiate contracts with casinos to ban them from the premises. Victor Hugo would write naked and have his valet hide his clothes so as to prevent him from going out. This next one blew my mind from a number of different perspectives: a PhD candidate at Chapel Hill wrote software that enables people to shut off their internet access for up to eight hours. It currently has an estimated 75,000 users. It's called "Freedom". sheeeeeeet.

There's another great concept by Thomas Schelling, a game theorist called "The divided self". that procrastination is not the fault of a single person but a collection of selves arguing, debating, and bargaining in a sort of parliamentary chamber. "Not only were motions tabled and opposed, certain proposals were aired in order to mask others"

A number of very interesting experiments are discussed as well. The economist George Lowenstein ran one in which people were asked to pick out a movie to watch immediately and a movie to watch at a later date. The immediate film was typically a light and fluffy affair--a romantic comedy or a blockbuster--and the later film was more serious and important. "The problem, of course, is that when the time comes to watch the serious movie, another frothy one will often seem more appealing. This is why Netflix queues are filled with movies that never get watched: our responsible selves put "hotel Rwanda" and "the seventh seal" in our queue, but when the time comes we end up in front of a rerun of "the hangover""

I will now stop procrastinating and call sandwich shops to discuss my upcoming "Sandwich Tour of Hells Kitchen", which will be featured on Groupon.com starting next Friday, along with "Hey Ho! Let's Go! Punk Rock on the Bowery", a pub crawl that compares the punks of the 1970s to the punks of the 1870's. Also available will be "Jewish Gangsters of the Lower East Side" and "Greenwich Village Literary Tour". Boom.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Peter Inspired Me


Here I am again, with multiple posts in a row... But hey, Lucid got shut down by The Man and I'm in a super music-funk now that I don't have a music blog to call home so I'm throwing some shit your way, just like ol' boy Peter. Band's name is Natural Snow Buildings. They are from France. They are not Metal, nor Rock, nor whatever the hell else you might expect from me. Except wait, they're an experimental drone group... so I guess that does kind of sound like something I would recommend. Anyway, don't let that relatively vague precursor of a classification deter you - this band is pretty. Not in a glam, or David Bowie, or Blondie, or... well fuck you guys its not like that. These 2 dudes do some pretty impressive stuff, on a very lo-fi, drone-y level. "Slayer of the King of Hell" is the best rival I've ever heard to what AMT has to offer in the way of non-freak-out drone-y, Indian-inspired psychedelia. Its great. Its lo-fi as shit. Its experimental. Its groovy. Its a really long album. If anything, I implore you to download this, start it about 20 minutes before you hit the sack, and then revel in the beautiful, hazy, wavy, psychedelic radicalitude of this album as you drift into that wonderful selfless void.

At the very least, it won't hurt your ears.

Slayer of the King of Hell
http://www.mediafire.com/file/zyugyufzcz0/Slayer%20of%20the%20King%20of%20Hell.zip

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

DEEDLYDEEDLYDEEDLY EXCELLLLLLLENT!!!

Fuck yes.

http://www.firstshowing.net/2010/09/23/alex-winter-confirms-new-bill-ted-sequel-in-development/

Vegetable Man

So I've been working on advertisements for selling vegetables, and in the course of my research came across these two gems:





It's great to live in a world where things like this exist.

Monday, October 11, 2010

From me to you


Avey Tare - Under There [2010]


http://www26.zippyshare.com/v/83398348/file.html

<3

Vancouver part 2

My last day in Vancouver was good but had a very unfortunate surprise ending. I got together with that tour guide, who gave me an awwwwesome tour. He had it all down pat--history, stories, statistics, good jokes, bad jokes, passion, pride...he even hooked with me with one of my favorite motifs: cynical history. Afterwards, we went out for beers, japadogs, and more touring. We ended up at a book reading (my suggestion) at the Museum of Vancouver. This radio host wrote a book called "Adventures in Solitude: What Not to Wear to a Nude Potluck and Other Stories from Desolation Bay". It's a memoir about a chunk of land that his father bought in the boonies of British Columbia and his return as an older man. There's some great stories of bushwacking, drunken fishing, and more or less being in the grip of nature. The reading included some music by a fav local band called "Said the Whale".

But that's when I got a text message from my father saying that my grandfather (his father) was in the hospital for congenital heart failure. One of his lungs collapsed and this was most likely the end. My grandfather would have turned 90 next month, has been in and out of the hospital countless times over the past 10 years+, and we've had scares so many times it's ridiculous (thirty years ago, my parents considered pushing their wedding forward because they were worried he wasn't going to make it). But this time it was pretty obvious. I booked the first flight back the next morning and the day after he passed on.

The funny thing was that he was on a breathing tube and because it was in his will that he didn't want to be on life support, my father and grandmother made the decision to get the family together at about noon, remove the tube, and spend the last few hours together. My grandfather was an obstinate, cantankerous man who always had to have the last word. So despite our decision, he went on his own Saturday morning. The next 36 hours were spent comforting my grandmother and taking care of the funeral necessities, which was exhausting and emotional to say the least. The funeral was this morning, and although my grandfather was an atheist, we said Kaddish, the traditional Jewish prayer for mourning. My brothers, cousin, father and I all spoke beautifully and he was buried at the family plot in Paramus, NJ.

What was new to me here was the act of physically burying the casket. With four shovels, 7 strapping family members, and my dads men's group, we shoveled loads of dirt into his grave until it was full. The idea here being that no strangers taking care of the corpse. This basically comes from a conservative Jewish exclusion policy that no one outside the faith has the opportunity to "corrupt" the soul on it's way to heaven, but that's besides the point. What was significant about this was the rigorous send off that honored this man.

There are many things to say about my grandfather. One is that he fought hard for social justice throughout his life, forming and participating in community organizations and marching on Washington with Martin Luther King Jr. Another is that he dreamt of a racially harmonious world, even though much of family (including his now-estranged brother) refused to attend my aunts wedding when she married a black man. At the funeral, I spoke of his passionately creative mind, his love for painting, film, theater, writing and abstract concepts. One of his most prevalent qualities was his undying loyalty and love for his wife, whom he had been married to for 62 years.

Finally, we have his humor. For six years, he convinced my cousin that there was a little man in the ATM machine that gave out money. Once while coalescing after a visit the hospital, he claimed to have been given an infusion with the blood of Burt Lancaster. Even into the days of wheelchairs and walkers, he would break into a cha-cha while crossing the living room. Below is a video that I hope you enjoy...the story here is that my grandmother was in a bicycling PSA and although my grandfather was asked to play the "straight man", he refused, and here are the outtakes



Although we'd been preparing for this day for a long time, he will be greatly missed.

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Vancouver

So I been on vacation about a week and its been nice, refreshing, fun and interesting...at times. I can't say its been my best trip, but lack of preparation and planning is the only thing at fault.

I decided I wanted to go to Vancouver because
A) I love the pacific northwest: culture, climate, food; I've had great experiences in North California and Portland
B) My aunt lives in Seattle and my cousin goes to school in Bellingham, a beautiful area btwn there and Vancouver so it seemed like a good way to see em all
B) I imagined it's a damn cool Canadian city and a good counterpart to NYC w/urban arts culture, modernity and surrounding nature

This is also a major Couchsurfing trip, and CS culture is a very particular type of travel culture. Those of you who don't know, this is a GIANT community of travelers worldwide. They can typically be a little scatterbrained and certainly travel on the type of shoestring budget that I find can be very restricting and uncomfortable, but they are awesomely adventurous, friendly and extroverted people. My hosts, for example, are two fabulous gay guys who have hosted 80 people over the course of 8 weeks and are fun, kind, wacky guys who are soooo happy to be surrounded by travelers every day of the week.

One Australian guy, David, that I met was a great travel partner for a day or two. We hiked Lynn Peak, a 9 km hike of 1000m elevation. On a beautiful day (when I thought I was gonna get rain all week), it was EXACTLY what I wanted to do. And it was easy, cause he had a car. The next day we spent wandering around, drinkin beers, not exactly finding what we were looking for (generally having a cool time while doing it), but when we were at a serious loss for the next step, our interests began to divert.

I saw a really cool tour go by that my family has connections with, but he didn't wanna do it, so I gave the guide my card to hook up with him later and we went to an art gallery. Now David is a very outdoorsy sort of person and I knew he would not be into art, but I really wanted to go and there was practically nothing else in the area so we went. The stuff wasn't very good, but he goes off into a diatribe of how disgusting it was and it really just pumped negativity into the already uncomfortable situation and unfortunately, that was how we said goodbye. I sat around for a bit, waiting for the tour guide to call me and later found out that he got caught up grabbing beers with his tourists (some of whom were damn cute). I kicked myself for missing out on that and fighting with David instead, and stood on line for rush tix at a film festival for 20 minutes before realizing I couldn't get in.

So this was just one shitty thing that came about. I'm hookin up with the guide later today but otherwise Im really not sure what I'm doing here. I've wanted to bike around but I keep passing that up for other opportunities. My cousin is coming up this weekend to hang out with me/see his girlfriend and he's a fun, cool, outdoorsy guy so I really gotta make some plans with him (esp cause he's got a car) but it's gonna rain most of the weekend. I may end up spending a lot more time at the film festival (I saw one pretty intrstiing bawdy sex comedy from China about nonagenarians at a northern farming village), so that'll be cool but I'm lacking a travel partner and I knew that would get me down.

How come no one stopped and said "Hey Jonah, Canada can be pretty boring"? Again, I'm probably not looking in the right places, hooking up with the right people and making the right plans, but I guess I got a coupla more days to get that right.

On the upside, I had a blast biking around Seattle, hanging with my Aunt and I got a couple more days of that before I go home, so I'm looking forward to wrapping up the trip with positivity.