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Ideas, and accounts of life from my perspective, but no honking
Friday, July 18, 2003
Now I've done it. I've plagerized another blogger's blog. Appropriated another's mispelled stream-of- consciousness. Cut 'n' pasted it, lock stock 'n' barrel, from his website to my own.
It's like wearing a mask, a very ordinary mask, that changes nothing.
The sensation is curious, like closing your eyes and turning out the lights.
Of course, these aren't my observations, because I stole them. I'm representing these words, but they were written by someone else. Not me.
The thief's mask, stolen.
It's like wearing a mask, a very ordinary mask, that changes nothing.
The sensation is curious, like closing your eyes and turning out the lights.
Of course, these aren't my observations, because I stole them. I'm representing these words, but they were written by someone else. Not me.
The thief's mask, stolen.
Thursday, July 17, 2003
Last weekend J and I saw a scary movie about a future governor who travels back in time to the present, where he disguises himself as a human actor. Everybody can tell he doesn't really act, but they pretend not to notice because he's in all these big movies.
The movie was totally preposterous, except for the subtext.
I would like to see Mel Brooks direct and star in "The League of Extraordinary Jews (and One Gentile)". He could dress up like Allan Quartermensch, with a grey beard and safari hat. His attempt at a Scottish accent alone would be worth the price of addmission. This would be better as a SNL skit, probably. I run out of steam after Benjamin D'Israeli..who else?
The movie was totally preposterous, except for the subtext.
I would like to see Mel Brooks direct and star in "The League of Extraordinary Jews (and One Gentile)". He could dress up like Allan Quartermensch, with a grey beard and safari hat. His attempt at a Scottish accent alone would be worth the price of addmission. This would be better as a SNL skit, probably. I run out of steam after Benjamin D'Israeli..who else?
Monday, July 14, 2003
Treblets -
Treblets are like giant centipedes with snapper jaws, about 18' long with black segmented bodies. Think "trilobyte" crossed with "tribble". They hide in the shed in my backyard, and in caverns deep underground, sleeping in their sunless world for millions of years. When roused, they swarm into the spaces between the walls, under the floorboards, through sewer pipes.
JR and I invented the Treblets when we were ten or eleven years old. We used to pretend that we were construction workers who had acidentally disturbed a sleeping nest of them in the backyard, and then had to run, get our feet off the ground, climb trees to escape them. It was sort of like "Tremors", come to think of it. One more piece of evidence that Hollywood screenwriters have been monitoring my brain for ideas.
The physical model for the Treblet was a snorkle I had bought to use in Lake Ontario, so I could look at the bottom while swimming and breath uninterupted. But after few instances of waves sloshing down my breathing tube, sending me into a sputtering panic, I lost heart for that enterprise and began to see the snorkle as more of a sinister object. The snorkle was a hard plastic orange tube attached to a soft, segmented black rubber accordian tube, which ended in a pincher-like mouthpiece. The rubbery mouthpiece with its suggestive pinchers reminded us of "The Tingler", a centipede-like monster from an old Vincent Price movie.
JR and I planned a trio of Treblet movies, modeled after the George Romero zombie cycle and following a similar time-of-day progression: "Night of Fear", "Dawn of Death", and "Day of Terror".
We haven't yet made the movies, but nothing's stopping us.
After a 25-year hybernation, a Treblet showed up in my dreams the morning of 7/12/03. It was being kept as a pet in a cluttered apartment, and I was nervous because I kept losing track of it. It would burrow playfully under piles of paper and liked to be held in my trembling hands, or climb down an endless staircase of my hands like a Slinky (tm). The girl who owned it was a housemate and she didn't want to keep it penned up in a terrarium.
I tried to be friends with it, but its shiny black body and scrambling claw legs freaked me out.
Treblets are like giant centipedes with snapper jaws, about 18' long with black segmented bodies. Think "trilobyte" crossed with "tribble". They hide in the shed in my backyard, and in caverns deep underground, sleeping in their sunless world for millions of years. When roused, they swarm into the spaces between the walls, under the floorboards, through sewer pipes.
JR and I invented the Treblets when we were ten or eleven years old. We used to pretend that we were construction workers who had acidentally disturbed a sleeping nest of them in the backyard, and then had to run, get our feet off the ground, climb trees to escape them. It was sort of like "Tremors", come to think of it. One more piece of evidence that Hollywood screenwriters have been monitoring my brain for ideas.
The physical model for the Treblet was a snorkle I had bought to use in Lake Ontario, so I could look at the bottom while swimming and breath uninterupted. But after few instances of waves sloshing down my breathing tube, sending me into a sputtering panic, I lost heart for that enterprise and began to see the snorkle as more of a sinister object. The snorkle was a hard plastic orange tube attached to a soft, segmented black rubber accordian tube, which ended in a pincher-like mouthpiece. The rubbery mouthpiece with its suggestive pinchers reminded us of "The Tingler", a centipede-like monster from an old Vincent Price movie.
JR and I planned a trio of Treblet movies, modeled after the George Romero zombie cycle and following a similar time-of-day progression: "Night of Fear", "Dawn of Death", and "Day of Terror".
We haven't yet made the movies, but nothing's stopping us.
After a 25-year hybernation, a Treblet showed up in my dreams the morning of 7/12/03. It was being kept as a pet in a cluttered apartment, and I was nervous because I kept losing track of it. It would burrow playfully under piles of paper and liked to be held in my trembling hands, or climb down an endless staircase of my hands like a Slinky (tm). The girl who owned it was a housemate and she didn't want to keep it penned up in a terrarium.
I tried to be friends with it, but its shiny black body and scrambling claw legs freaked me out.
Tuesday, July 08, 2003
I need sleep.
We haven't been sleeping much.
JR called yesterday and asked if we'd like to come over and watch "Best In Show" on Comedy Central. I said "We need sleep. We haven't been sleeping much." I hope he enjoyed watching it without us. I love watching movies with JR, especially really funny or really bad movies. As kids we watched "Octaman", "Invasion of the Eye Creatures", "It's Alive" (both 1967 and 1976).
I don't need to get into the pleasures of watching bad movies, but just let me say that our enjoyment was discovered indepedently, without irony and mostly as a by-product of dissapointment. As 10-year-olds, our main source of movies was commercial TV. We would scour the TV Guide for weekend movie listings and eagerly anticipate tuning-in to one that had a thrilling premise. Often, despite an intriguing one-sentence plot synopsis, it would turn out to have no magic in it. We were seeking magic in our lives, and our laughter at its faults was relief from the desolate feeling of dreams betrayed.
J's art show opened today, she called from the gallery and said "It's hot here. Lots of people milling around".
Here is a description of her show:
The New World Ergonomy is a metaphorical re-humanization of the workplace through participatory choreography. You are all cordially invited to come get your ergonomic evaluation.
Hope to see you there!
What: The New World Ergonomy
By: J
Where: "The Summer Line" @ New Langton Arts
When: Tuesday-Saturday, July 8-12, from 12-6pm. There will be a reception Wednesday 6-8.
Other Summer Line Artists featured:Joseph Reihsen, Helene Renard, Jon Rubin and Kate Pocrass.
The Summer Line previewed in Artweek:
http://www.artweek.com/previews.html
NWE is partially funded by CA$H.
Curious now? Read on...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bodies are meant for moving.
"ergonomics
Pronunciation: "&r-g&-'na-miks
Function: noun plural but singular or plural in construction Etymology: erg- + -nomics (as in economics ) Date: 1949
:an applied science concerned with designing and arranging things people use so that the people and things interact most efficiently and safely -- called also human engineering "
-Merriam Webster's On-line Dictionary
The typical American worker squashes herself into inhuman positions, physically, mentally and emotionally. We are told to sit at precise right angles and not to deviate from this configuration because of the level of intense repetition that office work requires. We sit all day, both at work and in the car during our unproductive minutes and hours commuting.
This intensity has always seemed peculiar to me. To type, we hold our arms in front of our torsos like Tyrannosaurus Rex, as if they were some sort of vestigial attachments that fit most easily onto a computer keyboard. We do this for hours each day. Forcing human bodies to conform to right angles seems to be the only way to adapt such rigid requirements.
Bodies don't have to be forced into slots designed for machines. This project is a way to use choreography as a form of research to discover ways of being in a space that are both productive and human.
This piece will be performed at New Langton Arts as part of a larger show about work, products and services, "Sliv & Dulet Present: The Summer Line," in June and July 2003.
For the week of July 7th through the 11th, I and three other visual and performing artists will perform and make work from noon to 6 pm in New Langton's gallery spaces. My goal is to choreograph new ergonomic movement progressions and positions throughout the day. These improvisations will be documented on camera and in writing throughout the week. This documentation will be prepared each evening and hung on a nearby wall each morning. At the end of the show, I will compile the texts and images into a self-published manual.
The show will begin at noon on each day. When I've finished hanging the previous day's documentation, I will begin my daily research. To do this, I will use the work cubicle in different ways, finding points of kinetic equilibrium, using ergonomics to define the motions in between, instead of the frozen positions. I will use chairs, desks, scrap computer equipment, ergonomics props and a potted plant. The improvisations will be recorded in the following ways:
a) a digital video camera with a remote control (to describe motion)
b) a single-lens-reflex camera with a timed shutter release (to record sculptural moments)
c) drawings, diagrams and journaling (to fill in the blanks)
d) audio recording (for interviews with "clients")
When people come into the gallery, they will be invited into the research cubicle, where I will direct them in experiments with their own ergonomic choreographies, using motivations of mood and comfort to find combinations of improvised movement progressions and "positions". Current and past injuries will be documented and studied during these sessions.
Here is the show's website:
http://www.newlangtonarts.org/
More later.
We haven't been sleeping much.
JR called yesterday and asked if we'd like to come over and watch "Best In Show" on Comedy Central. I said "We need sleep. We haven't been sleeping much." I hope he enjoyed watching it without us. I love watching movies with JR, especially really funny or really bad movies. As kids we watched "Octaman", "Invasion of the Eye Creatures", "It's Alive" (both 1967 and 1976).
I don't need to get into the pleasures of watching bad movies, but just let me say that our enjoyment was discovered indepedently, without irony and mostly as a by-product of dissapointment. As 10-year-olds, our main source of movies was commercial TV. We would scour the TV Guide for weekend movie listings and eagerly anticipate tuning-in to one that had a thrilling premise. Often, despite an intriguing one-sentence plot synopsis, it would turn out to have no magic in it. We were seeking magic in our lives, and our laughter at its faults was relief from the desolate feeling of dreams betrayed.
J's art show opened today, she called from the gallery and said "It's hot here. Lots of people milling around".
Here is a description of her show:
The New World Ergonomy is a metaphorical re-humanization of the workplace through participatory choreography. You are all cordially invited to come get your ergonomic evaluation.
Hope to see you there!
What: The New World Ergonomy
By: J
Where: "The Summer Line" @ New Langton Arts
When: Tuesday-Saturday, July 8-12, from 12-6pm. There will be a reception Wednesday 6-8.
Other Summer Line Artists featured:Joseph Reihsen, Helene Renard, Jon Rubin and Kate Pocrass.
The Summer Line previewed in Artweek:
http://www.artweek.com/previews.html
NWE is partially funded by CA$H.
Curious now? Read on...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bodies are meant for moving.
"ergonomics
Pronunciation: "&r-g&-'na-miks
Function: noun plural but singular or plural in construction Etymology: erg- + -nomics (as in economics ) Date: 1949
:an applied science concerned with designing and arranging things people use so that the people and things interact most efficiently and safely -- called also human engineering "
-Merriam Webster's On-line Dictionary
The typical American worker squashes herself into inhuman positions, physically, mentally and emotionally. We are told to sit at precise right angles and not to deviate from this configuration because of the level of intense repetition that office work requires. We sit all day, both at work and in the car during our unproductive minutes and hours commuting.
This intensity has always seemed peculiar to me. To type, we hold our arms in front of our torsos like Tyrannosaurus Rex, as if they were some sort of vestigial attachments that fit most easily onto a computer keyboard. We do this for hours each day. Forcing human bodies to conform to right angles seems to be the only way to adapt such rigid requirements.
Bodies don't have to be forced into slots designed for machines. This project is a way to use choreography as a form of research to discover ways of being in a space that are both productive and human.
This piece will be performed at New Langton Arts as part of a larger show about work, products and services, "Sliv & Dulet Present: The Summer Line," in June and July 2003.
For the week of July 7th through the 11th, I and three other visual and performing artists will perform and make work from noon to 6 pm in New Langton's gallery spaces. My goal is to choreograph new ergonomic movement progressions and positions throughout the day. These improvisations will be documented on camera and in writing throughout the week. This documentation will be prepared each evening and hung on a nearby wall each morning. At the end of the show, I will compile the texts and images into a self-published manual.
The show will begin at noon on each day. When I've finished hanging the previous day's documentation, I will begin my daily research. To do this, I will use the work cubicle in different ways, finding points of kinetic equilibrium, using ergonomics to define the motions in between, instead of the frozen positions. I will use chairs, desks, scrap computer equipment, ergonomics props and a potted plant. The improvisations will be recorded in the following ways:
a) a digital video camera with a remote control (to describe motion)
b) a single-lens-reflex camera with a timed shutter release (to record sculptural moments)
c) drawings, diagrams and journaling (to fill in the blanks)
d) audio recording (for interviews with "clients")
When people come into the gallery, they will be invited into the research cubicle, where I will direct them in experiments with their own ergonomic choreographies, using motivations of mood and comfort to find combinations of improvised movement progressions and "positions". Current and past injuries will be documented and studied during these sessions.
Here is the show's website:
http://www.newlangtonarts.org/
More later.
Monday, July 07, 2003
J and I looked at houses in the East Bay yesterday. Some nice single-famliy homes in Oakland and Berekely that i was excited about, and J also to a certain extent. But suburbs and hot weather make her claustrophobic, so we may not find anything she can put up with over there. It may also be that San Francisco is so expensive that we won't find anything acceptable here, at least not without some serious looking and good luck.
I don't like fretting about our house search, it should be fun. I may want to cut back on the amount of time I spend on it and instead relax with J, see friends, call family, relax in coffee shops, go running, buy those pants and running shoes I need, clean the house, fix my bike...
I'm reading The Folk of the Air by Peter S. Beagle. The first 60 pages are really cool, a sort of alternate Berkeley world circa 1976. Magic is in the air, and mystery is afoot. Intimations of Creative Anachronism have been muttered. The novel is still winding up; I can't wait to see it spring.
JR called me today, out of the blue, and I thought it was in response to my e-mail to him this monring, but no, apparently I have been sending out psychic butterflies and one of them fluttered by his forehead while he was stacking boxes at Walgreens.
He invited J and I over to see "Best in Show" on Comedy Central tonight, but I think J won't want to do that since we spent last night with another of my friends sitting on his couch watching a charming old live-action/animation video of "The Amazing World of Jules Vern". i don't think two nights in a row of sitting watching a video in someone else's house is gonna fly with her, especially since she's very busy with her art show setting up this afternoon.
I should call him back at work and let him know it's a no go for tonight, but can he come to the art show?
More later.
I don't like fretting about our house search, it should be fun. I may want to cut back on the amount of time I spend on it and instead relax with J, see friends, call family, relax in coffee shops, go running, buy those pants and running shoes I need, clean the house, fix my bike...
I'm reading The Folk of the Air by Peter S. Beagle. The first 60 pages are really cool, a sort of alternate Berkeley world circa 1976. Magic is in the air, and mystery is afoot. Intimations of Creative Anachronism have been muttered. The novel is still winding up; I can't wait to see it spring.
JR called me today, out of the blue, and I thought it was in response to my e-mail to him this monring, but no, apparently I have been sending out psychic butterflies and one of them fluttered by his forehead while he was stacking boxes at Walgreens.
He invited J and I over to see "Best in Show" on Comedy Central tonight, but I think J won't want to do that since we spent last night with another of my friends sitting on his couch watching a charming old live-action/animation video of "The Amazing World of Jules Vern". i don't think two nights in a row of sitting watching a video in someone else's house is gonna fly with her, especially since she's very busy with her art show setting up this afternoon.
I should call him back at work and let him know it's a no go for tonight, but can he come to the art show?
More later.
Okay, I have a few more ideas about "Hegemony Cricket":
Jen plays The Blue Fairy? Or do we cast more performers?
Start with monlogues, individual blossoms of character. See where they intersect idea-wise. Move 3X5 cards around, devise structure.
Should have done this a year ago.
We want to set up a time to meet with CY, our potential director. Maybe if I contact her and set up a meeting it will kick us into gear and get me moving on the writing.
I'm great at coming up with vaible, exciting ideas for theatre, and good at excecuting them small scale, for solo performance, as long as they are short-term projects. I tend to fall down at the polishing, creating larger structure and involving more artists. Should I attempt to challenge myself, to get better at those things or just deal with the fact that my tools are limited and play to my strengths?
It may be too late to learn Basic Theatre Craft 101, now that I'm in the public eye. Or that may just be my whiny, stick-in-the-mud self, afraid to do the work and experience the growth that is necessary.
But then, what's wrong knowing your voice and using it?
Note to self: Stay Tuned.
Jen plays The Blue Fairy? Or do we cast more performers?
Start with monlogues, individual blossoms of character. See where they intersect idea-wise. Move 3X5 cards around, devise structure.
Should have done this a year ago.
We want to set up a time to meet with CY, our potential director. Maybe if I contact her and set up a meeting it will kick us into gear and get me moving on the writing.
I'm great at coming up with vaible, exciting ideas for theatre, and good at excecuting them small scale, for solo performance, as long as they are short-term projects. I tend to fall down at the polishing, creating larger structure and involving more artists. Should I attempt to challenge myself, to get better at those things or just deal with the fact that my tools are limited and play to my strengths?
It may be too late to learn Basic Theatre Craft 101, now that I'm in the public eye. Or that may just be my whiny, stick-in-the-mud self, afraid to do the work and experience the growth that is necessary.
But then, what's wrong knowing your voice and using it?
Note to self: Stay Tuned.
Wednesday, July 02, 2003
Okay, I had a dream a few nights ago.
My Dad was alive. He was sitting on our old couch, looking older, weaker, thinner than I remember. A small group of people were sitting around the coffee table across from and next to him, talking and laughing. They were loud, and it looked like Dad was withdrawing from the conversation, that they were alienating him.
At first I was worried that Dad looked weak, but then I thought "Hey, he's alive! It must have been a dream that he was dead." It was that feeling you get when you wake up and say thank God it was just a dream.
Dad slid down in his seat, his eyes watering.
Dad (sighing): "I guess I just don't have it in me anymore." I got the feeling he was refering to his art, that he didn't have any more ideas, or that his latest work wasn't good.
I reached out and grasped his hand and looked into his eyes. We were both weeping, holding hands.
I said "Seeing you this way helps me understand you're dead."
I woke up, feeling clear in my head.
My Dad was alive. He was sitting on our old couch, looking older, weaker, thinner than I remember. A small group of people were sitting around the coffee table across from and next to him, talking and laughing. They were loud, and it looked like Dad was withdrawing from the conversation, that they were alienating him.
At first I was worried that Dad looked weak, but then I thought "Hey, he's alive! It must have been a dream that he was dead." It was that feeling you get when you wake up and say thank God it was just a dream.
Dad slid down in his seat, his eyes watering.
Dad (sighing): "I guess I just don't have it in me anymore." I got the feeling he was refering to his art, that he didn't have any more ideas, or that his latest work wasn't good.
I reached out and grasped his hand and looked into his eyes. We were both weeping, holding hands.
I said "Seeing you this way helps me understand you're dead."
I woke up, feeling clear in my head.
