A Pisser

This is exactly why (had I any talent) I'd never strive to write the Great American Novel. It's all so... oppressive. Betraying intimacies. Dreaming up bullshit. Ah, the weight of the world and my constant struggle. Out of it I shall make great art!

No; I'd rather be political correspondent with a feminist tack. A sure way to assignate with a lot of women, no? LOL Once knew a runt political 'activist' of a socialist stripe. He claimed it was a great way to get laid. 

If I did write, drawing upon memories... hmm... I once had a date in Manhattan. We went to dinner in the East 50s (Beef Wellington and Côtes du Rhône), walked over to the vest-pocket park under Sutton Place and the Queensboro Bridge, took a cab to the Rainbow Room atop 30 Rock where we saw Ella Fitzgerald, then a Hansom cab ride in Central Park. The stuff of romantic novels?  Took her home.

She later incorporated it into a film script. I sued.
"You can't do that! That's my life there!!!" LOL
Just kidding. It was a memorable night; curious to think:
if I remember so well after near 50 years, how's about since?

Wonderful Thing

This has been in the repertoire a while.

If you've never heard it, you should.

Not that you should do as I say. LOL

It really is boffo and words fail; really.

Stop, Thief!

I've finally done it! After years and years of determined effort, I've stolen the Matterhorn. Just had to have it...  because it's there.

Was scrolling through my Twitter feed (I don't post but keep up, as they say.) and came to be reading through comments. One of them was from a witty woman so I read her profile and posts. Evidently, she's a Brit living in NYC and something of a travel maven. Many excellent shots. This was one of them. It was hours ago and I don't remember her name, so I can't credit. A bit of a virtual escape.

Am reminded of visiting Disneyland. (Have never been to Europe.) In 1973. Growing up watching Disney show on Sunday nights, was a tyke when they opened Disneyland. A longing never to be fulfilled, so far away and "We can't afford it."

Went with my ex-wife, of similar sentiment, and we had a blast. Somehow we scored a couple of doobies. It really was a memorable day of childhood recaptured. In mine dotage that is all I choose to remember... the bliss.

Aesthetic Apparition

Rummaging through the files as I'm not going anywhere today, this is a lovely shot. Printed up nicely, the detail of the grasses and the differential in texture from the foliage to the architecture, the linear aspect perpendicular. Spent an afternoon a couple years ago at Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin West. Now he was an artist; does my taking a picture, however common-sensibly composed make me one too? I don't think so.

Wish I had some idea of what to do with myself. I've gotten a little aggravated with the Kindle content. The choice of literary histories, and I do mean histories written by a literate person, has gotten sparse. They've removed all the public domain books and replaced them with magazine type pieces written for semi-literates in the free zone while putting a charge on the old classics. Read one about Ivan the Terrible the other day. I swear, the writer described an exchange of diplomatic notes Ivan had with a Persian potentate as sort of like a Twitter tangle. Ugh.

I'm going to start making use of Project Gutenberg in this regard. I like reading older histories and travel books. I've very little interest in fiction. Read a biography of J.R.R. Tolkien the other day. In one sitting. Read The Hobbit in high school; the Ring Trilogy not until my thirties! Didn't care for them at all and don't understand the fascination with it. I could say the same thing about the Star Wars and Trekkie fabulists. No, I don't need the unreal to illustrate anything I can't know from realistic accounts.

Just did download a few books thusly. Thisly is my life.

I think reading so much has got me motivated to write;

sort of letting off the psychic pressure of so many words.

If I run into any human beings, I'll let you know.

Low Ceiling

This is the extent to which the muse has grabbed me this morning. As is; bit of a tweak toward bluer. Reminds of a Cummings poem from teenager days...

o by the by

has anybody seen
little you-i
who stood on a green
hill and threw
his wish at blue

with a swoop and a dart
out flew his wish
(it dived like a fish
but it climbed like a dream)
throbbing like a heart
singing like a flame

blue took it my
far beyond far
and high beyond high
bluer took it your
but bluest took it our
away beyond where

what wonderful thing
is the end of a string
(murmurs little you-i
as the hill becomes nil)
and will somebody tell
me why people let go

No wind. (Yeah - about a kite!) The sun rising. Quickly burning off.

LOL Inspired by Cummings and Yeats, I did once write poetry. Blank verse.

It was usually to a girl. There's no such thing as romance anymore.

What is it? Two dates and you owe me a sack session? I wouldn't know.

Provocation

I could make something happen...

could key this vehicle... APPOMATTOX.

Then we'd have an incident!

Perhaps a trip to the ER as well. 

For the Record

I no longer know what this blog is supposed to be. Aside from the academic exercise of writing and the exposition of ubiquitous photography, there's not much else to it. I have no life! The muse has gone. I surely don't want it to be a series of complaints about a boring existence. I am living on a very fixed and small income, just enough to survive, which is all I require. Hence there's probably a great need for the benefit of human interaction, of which there is absolutely none. It's driven home again as I sit in the neighborhood coffee place full of strangers or people I've seen over the years who couldn't be bothered with the most basic courtesies.

Meanwhile, they're playing Christmas muzak (for the past several weeks) which is rendered utterly meaningless. I'll bet the royalties are less costly! Frankly, it's annoying. Yet I have to come here to get online. And what's that but a cascade of farce. These petroglyphs are telling a story too. I'm sure there is an expert somewhere who can decipher it. I can't get past feeling, as desirous of 'news' as the next fellow, when I surf the Internet, it's all a sucker's game. A virtual connection to something happening somewhere as there's nothing happening here!

I would that I could come up with some sort of a project, un raison d'être as it were. The most renowned blog (not that this is the aim) as far as I know was by a woman whose goal was to cook every recipe in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. I saw the film, have never looked at the blog. LOL. It was funny too that, as the woman neared completion, followers made overtures to Julia to acknowledge and connect with the blogger, which she refused to do. Well, evidently her husband had a problem with it too! I'd love to meet a woman like this.

Can't think of a thing along this line. Years ago, in one of the NYC tabloids, there was a daily feature called The Inquiring Photographer. Some general interest question was asked and a picture taken, the photo and the response published. On the up and up - wasn't used to make people look foolish like the Leno person-in-the-street queries exposing their ignorance. That could get interesting and give the opportunity to do portraits, but the hurdles are complicated. People surely don't want to have something published which might come back to bite them. I'm just imagining. Don't think about monetizing the effort, which places everything in another dimension.

As it is, there are perhaps ten people who read this blog. None declare themselves to be 'followers' LOL but it's a very curious thing to me. I make so many complaints about being solitary yet no one connects. Very curious. I don't know what to make of it. I don't know how to proceed. The only motivation is the desire to write. I've no interest in fiction. Please God I have more of a life, as they say.

Today is Friday. Formerly, recently, I might have gone to a Happy Hour at a local pub where I was smitten of a staff member, shall we say, but I was never comfortable there and, yes, wished I could have gotten to know that person in different circumstances. It's taken me a while to get over that unfounded infatuation. I can't imagine her at church, so let that go. There's to be no Happy Hour today, anywhere. Not interested. But Christians have no alternative. I suppose the circumstance is predicated by most such people having families. I really do feel empathy for people who go to bars for human involvement, to see their erstwhile friends, to celebrate getting through another tedious week. But it caused me to have conflicts which came to a head when one of the yobs intruded upon my entirely solipsistic perception of the moment. (Get thee behind me.) I was such a fool.

So, for the record, absolutely nothing happening.
I haven't got much time left in my life. Hoping for a miracle?