spring preview.

All last week we were treated with springtime weather in the middle of February. I took some pictures to prove it.


the view from my front window (with Octavio's car)


sunshine and construction


yes... such beautiful weather

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anything you can do, I can do better.

I just find this really funny:
Zimbabwean female runner actually a man

What's even funnier is that the guy's name is one letter away from "Shithole".

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by the way

I continually get junk mail from a company that, as far as I can tell, has some wierd system of coming up with random sender names. Today I got mail from these people:

Cyndreka Manston
Balty Wingfield
Courlette Leverer

They kind of sound normal at first, but would you ever name your child Balty Wingfield?

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Real American Hero.


Hunter S. Thompson
1937-2005



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the new singles.

The music page has been refurnished with some new songs. Simply click here. (there's also the old link at the bottom of this page. Gya ha huh duh...) I also must give thanks to Sir Cody for his expertise in website craft.

I've always liked Brian Eno's thing about never releasing the lyrics to his songs, but hell, just this once...

Steel Tube Stallions
I heard the stork was rummaging for infants. Demand was reaching over with his glove. But as regal as he was he was no eagle that's because he'd never gone out with the gypsies in the sea.
We saw the fires burning on a cactus. Yukon eyes held vigil under swollen lights. But a dandy is a dandy still, no matter what he says, and you can touch him when he's opening your throat. And Jack and Jill were playing ill with chronic writer's block among the Basilisks who DJed in the clubs.
(futurist guitar sequence)
Give me hell just one more time with feeling. Give me all the bullets in your teeth. Cause I've gotta find a preacher with a name like Funny Cide who can release me from this day-glo imagery. And I've gone with neon honeys to the bar outside of town where we can choke on some electric lion cakes.

Brownsville
I stepped off the train one day in Brownsville, I stepped off the train that day to find my little lady'd gone up to the windmill, Monday and Tuesday. Won'tcha come on down? Won'tcha come on down?
Last time I said I won't kill the bullfrog. Last time I said I got somethin' new. This time I'm just burnin' down the web-log. Backwards and forwards. Won'tcha come on down? Folks won'tcha come on down? We got a little bit of sass left!

Voice from the Ether, and You will Eat your Fill
????
(something about tongues)

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state of the music address.
by Caws Pobi

I figured it high time to let you all in on what I've been up to lately in my music makings. Yes, I'm working on the "new album", but by "new album" I don't mean that everything is completely organized so that I can pop it out all at once. By album I mean a general theme that drives my creativity for a period of time. When (if) I finish all the songs that are born out of this idea, I will put them all on a CD and Tristan will make some nice artwork for it and then you'll have your album.



The album's name is Synestheseus. What the hell does that mean, you ask?

synesthesia - A condition in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another, as when the hearing of a sound produces the visualization of a color
Theseus - Greek hero and king of Athens. He is credited with many great adventures and feats, such as killing the Minotoar, in addition to being a fine politician. In his later life, however, he became an idiot and got himself killed, and nobody really cared.

I just like the way the two words fit together, and this new word suggests a kind of ancient visual/musical hero who enchants the people with his visible music only to get too big for his britches and end up dead. I like this character, and figured I'd name the album after him.



The word synesthesia also fits in with the psychedelic theme that I've been playing with. Seeing as how I've been studying psychedelic art all term for one of my classes, I've been more inspired by the artwork of people like Peter Max, Victor Moscoso and Heinz Edelmann than by the music of, say, the Strawberry Alarm Clock. But I have been listening to plenty of "mind-revealing, soul manifesting" music. I also realized that this whole genre isn't too far from what I've always been doing. I mean, writing crazy songs with senseless words and bizarre noises isn't really a departure for me, it's just that now I'm doing it with a certain aesthetic in mind. Although I have to say the new songs are quite different from anything I've done before, simply because I'm writing actual songs and making them sound like I want them to sound. This is the stuff I've wanted to make for a long time but for some reason or another was unable to.



Hopefully Cody and I will renovate the music page soon and put up some new singles, so you can all hear about things. Feather pink revolvers. Sweet Organic children. Twisted lines of broken signs that lead you down a well to a blue barrier garden, teeming with sugar-fed iron animals. A colorless sky with purple clouds, shooting star eyelids and bouncing suns. The thoughts and tastes of a thick tongue which licks the flowers awake. A collective albeit being worth seeing, and another the exploding frip-frap thunder clap.

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happy birthday Cody.

Yeah, it's late, but we are still going to celebrate Cody's big...uh...new-year-old birthday. Tanzyobi omedeto gozaimasu!*

On a completely unrelated note, here is a great blog I found recently: ChiEf. You may think your life sucks, but this guy seems downright proud of it. Somebody needs to give him some lemonade.


*probably butchered Japanese for "happy birthday"

happy Stadium Mud Buggies Day.

I am a firm believer in establishing an alternative holiday to celebrate on this particular date, one for all the people who aren't fortunate enough to participate in the annual tradition of girlfriend-bribery.

So what do I propose? Stadium Mud Buggies!





Look at those little bastards go! I'll bet on the bright red car over the water car any day.

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I love stupid personality quizzes.

Today I was paroosing blogs and links and I came across a random personality quiz, having something to do with long-term relationships. If I were actually in one, I probably would be touchy about being quizzed over myself. But I'm not. So I gave it a shot. Here are some things I learned about myself:

- You are a hard nut to crack. You have a wicked sense of humor. Despite your reserved nature, you are more comfortable (and successful) in the meeting and courting mode than you are in a long term relationship. You feel misunderstood, and usually you are.
Hit the nail on the head, except for the 'successful' part.

- When you're in a good mood, you're funny, fascinating and a sexy firecracker, but when you're in a bad mood you are moody, broody and impatient. If you had your way, even in a long term relationship you would have enough time apart to deal with your bad moods yourself; unfortunately, it rarely works that way.
Don't I know it. And I love the term "sexy firecracker".

- Don't pair up with someone who'll make sexual demands of you. That's just not going to fly at all.
Wait, it won't?

- Of the 197012 people who have taken this quiz, 5.3 % are this type.
Yeah. That figures.

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my camera's fake eye.




For all its faults, OSU does have a damn-nice campus.


Some groovy books I've been reading.


So one Monday night we were sitting around drinking some cheap beer when Octavio presented me with an article he read for his Asian American Studies class. The article was all about Asian American women finding happiness with caucasian men. Octavio remarked "this is like something that should be in a Brettist Manifesto." And the term Brettism was born.


After Jose and I left a Skolos + Wedell lecture (any design nerds out there?) I just had to get a shot of the stadium construction in the fog. Coolest picture ever.

midterms: crab factory ship.

I'm studying for an art midterm tomorrow, but I thought I'd take a break to continue a little tradition we have here at The Flying Wheel. That's right; fun with web translation. Once again, we have Emi Necozawa's web diary to thank for these mini adventures in the surreal:



"...there is a virus characteristic stomachache which is called ' the gastro ' in France, it seems. Exceeding obtaining."

"Occurring too quickly, you nap. Opening the semi- eye, you slept to seem, circumstances and dream of the room blending, it means mysterious thing. The bathrobe which depends on the closet appearing in dream that way, the black who wears the bathrobe being backward."

"Perhaps, whether me there is no this, that. When pain experienced until now, it is different to do."

"But the weekend which the liquor or the meal are not produced.... Lonesome nee. The night, 1 person the carrot is eaten placidly."

"This the repetition of the crab factory ship of yesterday it is?! The children who fight with the actuality which is harsher than such a hell it is the shelf! ...If with you were encouraged and the air was attached, it exceeded the mountain of pain. With true story, being story of the child who is used at the carpet factory."

"In society there is a living hell on the hell truly with a lot of."

Amen to that.

together again.

Good news, everyone! Last night Octavio discovered my watch in the front closet underneath some random garments. So I have regained my sense of time! Halle..uh..loo.. forget it.

Yeah, that's the face my watch made.

timeless.

So I lost my watch, and it has had a significant impact on my life. My watch was a part of me, virtually a digital time-keeping implant on my wrist that I counted on to always be there. Putting it on was the first thing I did in the morning, taking it off the last thing I did at night. I have developed a reflex of looking at my arm whenever I need to know the time or date or day of the week, and let me tell you it is ridiculous and frustrating to continue doing it only to find myself looking at my bare arm. I don't have the same concept of time anymore. I have been late for several classes. I don't even know offhand when the first of the month will roll around so I can pay my rent (I must search for a calendar, or ask another watch-blessed person for the date). I've had my little Timex Expedition since high school, and it has treated me well. Its face stayed bright through thick and thin. It welcomed my little customizations such as black marker and staples. It will be missed.

So...I guess I need to go buy a cheap watch. Any ideas?


I've grown occustomed to your face...

"That's not ballerish."

I forgot to put this one up before:


This is my cousin Alex. He's a...um...baller.

a toast to El Diablo.

The other day my associate Jose and I found an old website he was working on for his design class a year or two ago. You should check it out. Jose, who hails from El Salvador, is a great designer and he used to paint incredible pictures before losing the time and passion for it. He is an artist without pretention, someone who defines himself by his own name rather than his status or position. We need more artists like that. Women seem to get annoyed by his honesty and awareness of their deceptive tendencies, but I believe his resilience and refusal to mask his personal truths are what drive his creativity and ulramodern/minimalist approach.

Me & Eno



Just two peas in a pod.
...A very strange pod...

picture pages.

Did I mention my new digital camera? Well, here are some pictures I took with it.


Chinatown, SF


Japanese bags


the preacher


the thinker


my DIY studio


abraham lincoln

music and film.

"In love there is always one who suffers and one who is bored." -Balzac

Lately I have been watching music movies. The first was the Man of Letters DVD, a documentary about Momus made in the mid-90s. It isn't so much a documentary as it was an opportunity for Momus to embellish his philosophies as a pop musician through conversations with his hip or artsy friends, or through his own narration. But I've always enjoyed his musings, and the dialogues didn't fail in making me think (and the quote above is printed on the back of the case under "things to think about while listening to Momus"). The film also features a handful of cutely low-budget and sometimes briliantly cheesy music videos, as well as a more recent short film chronicling Nick's move from New York to Tokyo.

The other music movie I watched was Let it Be, which I borrowed on VHS from Natsuki. The quality wasn't baby's-ass-smooth, but it was still enjoyable. It's interesting to watch the relationship between The Beatles at that point in their career together (the end, essentially): Paul appears to be the master and commander, John is his first mate with Yoko on an invisible leash, and George and Ringo just space out and go along with whatever is taking place, be it a lecture from Paul or a looong blues jam session...with a black dude on keyboard. The movie left me with the urge to go up on the roof and plug in my amp. But it's too cold out.

*Momus bonus: I found this site on which he picks apart some of his love-song lyrics. Interesting, even if you haven't heard the songs.

it's just a phase...



Peter Max, Milton Glazer, Bob Masse, the white album, Smile, The Man Who Sold the World, The Doors, early Zeppelin, studying the connection between art nouveau and 1960s psychedelic design, writing strange 'dream-of-consciousness' songs... I must be going through a psychedelic phase.

God to Southeast Asia: "Merry Christmas!"

I hope all my readers holied their holidays. My days were filled with holi. Big boxes full, even.

So how about those tsunamis? Really, there's nothing funny or merry about that whole mess. I would like to give props to Japan for giving half a billion dollars towards helping the victims, and also a shout-out to Coca Cola for their donation of 10 million. I can't say that I've donated anything...but I can buy a coke downstairs for a dollar. And I think I will.

But apparently somebody is excited about the disaster. I read in the paper today that OSU's Hinsdale Wave Research Laboratory is thrilled to be getting so much attention:
"As a horrified world tuned in to the tragic aftermath of the Southeast Asia tsunami, OSU found its own place in the international media spotlight."
How nice! It says news reporters, the Discovery Channel and even the Today Show have come to the laboratory to cover the incredible spectacle of a model city getting wet in a big wave pool. I remember when the research lab opened, and how excited OSU was then. I understand that the lab is extremely useful for simulations and experiments in studying the effects of tsunamis, but naturally I gave the story hell. Come see a robot swim around in a pool! This week we added some blocks in the middle to represent a city getting wet! Great date idea!

But boy, they showed me! Now everybody wants to know what really happens in the case of a tsunami hitting an indoor swimming pool. "Well, as you can see some waves start to go around, and then the waves hit these blocks that resemble builings and...there ya go. Shit happens." I used to be a bit of a wave researcher myself, in my bathtub, testing the effects of large waves on little plastic boats. And as an expert, I can tell you the worst part is when the big bar of soap falls into the ocean, and then water starts spilling out onto the floor.

Happy Birthday Jesus!


Not a chance in Heaven!

Happy Birthday Candace!


"Oh damn, this rocks!"

then the robots danced.

I've been at home with the flim fam this week, admiring the Christ tree and it's lighty lights. It gets a bit boring here in Lebanonia, what with nobody living around these parts anymore, and no where's really to go. But this house is big and nice and the downstairs is warm.

I realized this holiday season that I don't really have a shine for Christmas music anymore. I was sitting in one of the OSU dorm eating areas working on a project when some of the tunes-in-question came over the radio, and the realization cam to me that I've been hearing the same songs every December my entire life. Sure, these songs may have programmed a Pavlovian Christmas-mood reaction within me, but that doesn't mean I'm not sick of them. I am quite.

What's worse is all these "new" versions of the same old songs. These newer artists have discovered a tried and true way of making more money: Holiday Albums! They require no creative effort, and people are guaranteed to buy them! But I can't imagine who would. Really, who wants to hear Little Drummer Boy sung by Beyonce? Or Usher? Or Timberlake? Or Celine? Or Britney? Or Christina? Or Jahosephat? Or ...Bush? Or random guy on the street who needs a buck so he cut a Christmas record?
I don't. And neither do you.

Sinatra can pull it off. So can Deano and Ray, and maybe the London Symphony Orchestra. But you can only reinterpret these songs so many times before you have to let them go. I was recording my own Christmas-themed songs last weekend, and you know what I did? I wrote my own. I added some heaping bags of Caws-Pobi-craziness. I even started to cover a well known diddy about a baby in a manger, but a third of the way through the song the music stops and begins again with new sounds and words. The only worry I had with these songs is that maybe they are too eccentric, that perhaps Christmas music is a sacred cow that cannot be tipped. But then I figured that it must be tipped, that I create all my music on the basis that there is no such thing as 'too eccentric', and then the only worry I had was whether the songs are wierd enough. As of now my own regards to the songs I'm making are still unsettled. Working within a theme is fun, but it is a limit. Also, I feel that these aren't necessarily the kind of songs I would normally be producing, but the Christmas theme adds a drift towards novelty and sillyness that I didn't bother to correct. In the end I just say - what the hell. Now that Cody's back maybe we can get my dusty music site up and running again, and then you'll all be able to hear what the hell I'm talking about.

Yeah. What was this post about? I can't remember. But here's this:

"holiday" portrait.



And one with Max...


And one with Chad...and an aeroplane...

baroque Giger: the fractured fractal post...

Well, the pretty fractal pictures I had up for a few days have decided they don't want to be up anymore. "Direct linking not allowed" and all that. But I still have what I wrote below. So anyway...

...Fractals! More specifically, visualizations of math equations with infinitesimal solutions. It's intriguing to see math and art come together so beautifully, considering art is one of my greatest loves and math one of my deepest hates. What struck me about this fractal artwork is that the artist seems to be the equation itself. These twisting, pulsing, beautiful and bizarre images come not from the imagination of a human mind but from intricate, complex patterns of numbers and pixels. I can look at the pictures above and my brain automatically draws connections to sea shells, skeletons, 17th century art movements or biomechanical Swiss surrealism. But that is all the fault of my schemas, as I could probably never look at an image created by Utlrafractal (the software used to create the pictures above) and simply see numbers.

Here is a good site for more information on fractals and the applications of, and here is a site with some rad images.

Northern Gumption.



You all must check out my boy Tristan's site Marginalia. His doodles have always been super good cheese, transcending the notebook-paper margins into which they are born. They are so good that I am hereby commissioning Sir Tristan of Goshen to provide arts and designs for my album packaging if I ever get around to finishing that next album.

Now, back to studying.

finals continue...


(make up your own caption...)

"The LORD is God and has given us light. Join in procession with leafy branches up to the horns of the altar."




Still not convinced that Jesus is your savior? Watch this.

the fortress.

I'm drinking strong coffee and writing an essay about Weegee. I guess I didn't post much for this month of November, but I've been busy, you know.

Sometimes in the dark hours of one's life we cope in strange ways. The stress will keep stinging you all over like a bodysuit of bees until something snaps in your mind and you start doing something, building something. A fort! Random things are brought together and wrapped up in blankets, sheets and towels to create a space, one that didn't exist before. And you inhabit that space, which may be small and uncomfortable, but it feels secure. And you sleep in it, and then wake up and perfect it some more. Further fortify it against everything. The fort must be solid and strong! We shall pack some rations for the coming night, and make sure the entrance can be sealed from within. That way the in can stay in and the out can stay out.

But eventually I destroyed the fort. I woke up and made some coffee and looked at the cacoon that filled my living room like Richard Dreyfus's mock mountain, and I knew it couldn't exist anymore. I did not want to inhabit that space. So I dismantled it, returning my apartment to the way it was. Now I look back on the rise and fall of the fort, and I can't help but laugh.

You've gotta ask yourself...

Which David Bowie are you?

My test revealed that I am Berlin-era Bowie, collaborating with Brian Eno and drinking hard liquor with Iggy Pop. Personally I would say I'm more of a pre-Ziggy, post-Man Who Sold the World, Hunky Dory (with a haircut) Bowie.



But what do I know?

Hyper nonsense world tabasco shower.

I've got nothin to write about. I just thought I should post a new post.

Let's see... Oh, I saw Dawn of the Dead the other day. The new one, that is. I've seen the old one, which was better, but the new one is good zombie fun...if your idea of fun is black zombie babies and chainsaw'd people.

Hey, does anyone still eat Pop Tarts? I do. I like them. I should get some. Mmm. I could go for one right now. A big pop tart that I could sleep in, and then wake up and eat it, and then go back to sleep. I'm sure somewhere...

Here's to drinking burning embers.

"the screaming lifestyle of my nightmares."



You know what? Ralph Steadman is one of my favorite living artists. Now you know.

http://www.ralphsteadman.com/

day off from thinking.

So I'm finally giving you a real post. It's been a strange week, really. Or maybe not. Maybe it just seems strange from today's vantage point.

I've been pretty out of it all day today. I don't know why, but my theory is that my brain is giving me the day off. I've been thinking too much this past week- thinking about classes and homework and people and politics and faulty expectations and plenty of other things. And it's probably because of all this troubled thinking that I haven't had a sober night's sleep in 5 days. This morning I woke up at about 10:30 and was not greeted by the usual avalanche of thoughts. Instead everything was simplified.
Get up. Drink some water. Oh look, Joel is still sleeping. Oh that's right, dishes need to be done. Oh well. In the meantime, coffee.

My brain was only concerned with the immediate. I had to make a conscious effort to think about the deeper, more contemplative things. I wasn't even terribly stressed out about my history of photography midterm tomorrow, althought I probably should be. Today was just for being and doing. I do what must be done. Even now, I'm having trouble coming up with sentences.

Maybe you want to hear my thoughts on that election. Was I depressed? Was I shocked? Was I horribly crushed and disappointed? No, not really. So Bush is president again. Sure, I wasn't expecting it, but it's not so surprising. What, you didn't know that America was chock full of idiots? I did. So you can't really say that Mr. Bush is an inapporopriate figurehead of this 'proud nation'. And so what if he is president? He's not president of my immediate environment. He doesn't rule Brettamerica. And look at the bright side- we get to laugh at him for another 4 years.

I'm sure tomorrow my brain will be up and running again, and all the thoughts and troubles will be back to buzz around my head. But right now I have to print out some photographs. Y'all have a good one.

look everyone!

It's nothing but a big train wreck!

join us!

Some new links to associate eblos. The ring of fire is almost complete.

http://www.outhouserat.blogspot.com/

http://www.devilinasuit.blogspot.com/

22 special kids.

So I'm 22 now. I have 1 year of legal drinking experience. I'm an official bar veteran. What did I do this weekend, you ask? With the birthday and the halloween happening stuff and the week with its end? Well, I did some stuff. But you know, I don't feel like writing about it. I just don't. I'd have to hit these keys a bunch of times and type all these words and then I'd have to read it and make sure it makes sense and doesn't offend anyone (too much) and then I'd have to post it and all that... So I'm not going to. Just assume I did something crazy, or make up your own "Brett's 22nd Birthday" story. Cus I'm tired.


I'm a dork for Halloween!