An Afternoon-to-Evening Time Unit

On Friday, My concrete guy called at noon saying it was time to sail; he would pick me up in 20 minutes. 15 minutes later I was in the car with the beer on the way to the boat. A beautiful day of sailing commences.

On land in the evening, I walked a mile down the street over the river to a gallery; things were starting well, many interesting bodies there. Went to the corner intersection to collect some more friends. There seemed to be performance art going on. This is a 6-cornered large intersection marking the center of the gentrified former artist district. One corner had 3 people twirling batons with fringe standing in the street. A pretty spectacle. A standing jamming guitarist accompanied them. Then on another corner, a guy was on a pedestal in a white wedding dress loudly reading poetry from a notebook with his beard. Beside him on both flanks were conga players; the guys were making a heavy rhythm. Across the street were some dudes in dresses doing karaoke requests with an unplugged microphone. Another corner had a guy in a wig holding crackers softly yelling “this is matzo ……this IS matzo” to a woman in a chair looking forward while making tai chi gestures. One of the most surreal things I witnessed was a woman in full burger king uniform, visor and nametag, walk through a group gawking, not noticing the irony. There were more acts and costumed people. Occasionally they would stop the acts and just yell heyyyyy while pointing across the streets at each other. I asked some of the guys how they were affiliated and what the occasion was. He said they were on their 9th week there. The performance art pleased me, making me think the artists were retaking the neighborhood.

I found one of my guys and went to look for the others in a coffee shop. I was required to talk to a couple of single girls in front of me. I asked them about my missing friends and the establishment. I told them about the party down the street at the erotic gallery.

My guy and I went back there and chatted up the leather and rubber girls and some normally dressed suburban girls with outstanding bodies. There was a rubber dress girl with a slave guy who held an ashtray and followed her. The coffee shop girls showed up with wide eyes. They learned new things there. The show contained very well done drawings and many small top quality remarkably sexy/clean girl photos with little nudity. Buy a large print. Also in the back room were digital prints of a woman and her copy wearing different sexy outfits or spanking each other. There was a poorly dressed transvestite talking with a sexy redhead in a miniskirt and her boyfriend. Red was saying and gesturing how she always takes the stairs and parks far away. They must have been discussing why her ass and legs looked so good. Fun atmosphere. Proprietress Ms Marilyn was dressed nice with her short leather skirt and fish net rest. With her wild hair she was the perfect hostess.

July , 2001

New Architecture

I was in Rome this morning

February 04, 2007
We wrapped up the Italy adventure with another road trip.
This time to the mountainous center north east of Rome. We saw mountains and castles and waterfalls. We hiked up and down the mountain town of Spoleto. Umbria is the region. I got into the usual trouble wanting vegetables on my sandwich. Damn, slices of meat on dry slices of bread is just not a balanced meal; they humor my insane idea and put tomatoes on, then watch me eat with smirks. On the way back we drove thru the industrial city of Terni. They make steel there; it looks like a steel town. Their biggest customer is the police. The gun factories are also right there and some very well stocked gun shops are visible from the street.

Photo of Spoleto school kids


I had a smooth flight to the U.S. I had planned on staying at a friend's apt that night. He was trying to finish his deadline and had to work later than 4:00, so I dropped my bags in a bar, had a beer, and read the Village Voice. He finally came home, we hung out, then another dude came over. We went out for food and margaritas. Then to a music place where a friend was playing her rocking acoustic guitar music. So I got to see many friends right away. Then an old friend from Chicago was in town and called, he was nearby so he came over too. Fun. I got to mention that "I was in Rome this morning" many times. Went to bed at a reasonable hour but I had been up for 20 some hours.

Friend from Chicago is a magazine writer in town to cover an architectural CAD convention (just one company). He took me to a party in the Guggenheim Museum. Nice party: music, drinks, food, architects. I crashed it with someone else's name tag. I got nervous when a conventioneer was admiring the firm I work for (on the tag). She was despondent when I didn't respond about my workplace. After I hid my tag, I had a nice long talk with a buoyant Canadian architect, plus I ran into Monica from the firm on the same floor as my work studio. Fun.

Well I am happy to be back in NY, talking to people in english, reading the news in english, and watching tv in english. There are no espresso bars and people here don't like Americans as much, but I'll try to enjoy myself. Thanks for listening to my stories, and thanks for the nice responses.

Love,
Brian

Learning is Entertainment.

I like to command a corner. My alertly seated view from the window, all the way down to 0’-0” AFF. I control much more power simultaneously observing down two streets at the nearby corner. Even though big firearms are not even useful these days, and not very legal in my neighborhood; I can see where they could be helpful with some projects.

My view provides an advantage over ground pedestrians. While they are busy scanning their 2 dimensional world for danger or pleasure or both, they rarely notice an observer from above.

Phone conversations are pleasantly revealing. Especially the small pacing radius of the soon to be extinct pay phones. Gestures and postures are readable from afar.

I can often deduce the thoughts of walkers below. I can see the top of that woman’s head turned slightly, with enough eye rotating angle left - she is watching that stylish man across the street, while attempting to not appear so. I can tell from his gait, he does not notice her, even after she stumbles on a crack.

I can read the thoughts of someone staring, head forward of the shoulders, his line of sight down the sidewalk to a large man. Then he gets distracted by a tire squeak, turning his head toward the sound. When he remembers his original interest, he looks back down the sidewalk. I see he cannot locate that guy using the shoulder and head weaving technique. He looks at the ground forgetting why he was tracking the man. Looking up, he makes a quick scan around to see if anyone noticed his confusion (or maybe looking for something else). He turns and leans with arms cocked, stops, turns 180 and trots away.

Though the talkers sometimes have enough leftover brain processing to actually look up.

I fully enjoy my leisure time. hmm perhaps foolishly.

Skeletons are for Archaeologists

Rock Show Observations #9

For example, I met a woman from rural Pennsylvania backstage at a rock show. She traveled far with the mother of the guitar player to see her childhood playmate all grown. The show was in New York City, a stunning difference from the hometown in the hills. She wore a decade-old blond hairstyle, an undergraceful gait, and one snaggly tooth. I am sure she is considered hot in her hometown. Here she was in New York City, hanging out with the rock stars. I could sense her nervous, excited, scared of the freaks, be calm, elevated status, bewildered mood. I engaged her in conversation. I seemed to scare her with my artistical talk. Not the danger scared, but the, I don’t know what to say, scared. My specific concepts and unusual words did not sink in.

During the rock show

I watched a front-row bouncer feed his animals.

The meatheaded guy was pacing the gap between the stage and the people packed against the railing. He was eating small things by the handful, maybe nuts. He would stop and look through the multitude. Occasionally talking with people but not looking at them; he would sprinkle his food into the outstretched hand of those he was restricting. Interesting because the restrictor is a member the lower strata of well thought out people and the people who manage to work up to the front row are of the highest strata.

I pursue the Amateur study of Anthropology whenever I can.

Nice-Wallpaper-Pattern--millerx

Meditation Application

Stuck in traffic, I pulled off into more traffic plus a high school getting out. Amazing accumulation of chaos. I was trapped with people different than me all over the place. I wanted to detonate. I wanted to jump outta there. I wanted to drive over the cars and trucks around me.

I had to give up. Had to disperse the rage.

Steam from ears

Melting,

Melted.

I could then putt putt along with the flow and kill no one.

Don’t remember much after that.

Had to nap later.

Vegetative-Strata