It’s not like The IP doesn’t appreciate Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, and Barbara Kruger, but he often finds the messages and imagery of conventional (original), capitalistic art (i.e. ‘advertising’) more interesting than the above artists’ takes on the same.  The one caveat is that The IP likes the simpler, less self-conscious graphics and messages of the Mid-Twentieth Century the best:

The IP just gets all wrapped up in the concept of the thing, that they were actually trying to sell such a kit that one could have for “1/4 down.”  Some crazy heliocopter with pontoons that you tow behind your boat.  WTF?

Whereas:

 

Hey, The IP has always liked Kruger because, like The IP, she values the power and simplicity of the black & white, periodical ad.  She feels like a kindred spirit to The IP. 

But how powerful is the above message today?  Think about it.  Some folks might say “That’s exactly how I feel!” as if one’s essential identity as a consumer is an admirable thing.  After all, didn’t W tell us to “go shopping” after 9-11? Didn’t Cheney say there could never be any compromise on “our American way of life?”  Wasn’t that stimulus check all about going shopping?  And what was with that SATC movie?  WTF!!

Now, compare Kruger’s purposefully ironic art with the real deal, 3 panels from an advertisement The IP found in a 1962 Mechanix Illustrated:

Whoa!

Ads like that prey on the most vulnerable attribute of man, his ego.  Admit it.  You can’t look at any one of those sad sacks and accompanying captions without asking yourself if you, too, might be like him.  

And that’s why, for a limited time, The IP is offering:

Or, for you disillusioned and overly-educated incredulous pithecanthopes:

Not enough education?  Too much education?  It’s two sides of  the same fuckin’ coin, my friends.  So put that in your pipe and smoke it.

And just who are these “homies” to which The IP refers?  They are these guys:

The IP almost forgot how cool it is to just sit and watch the fireflies at dusk.  Fireflies like open meadows, and where The IP lives there is one (mostly because his landlord will not mow the frickin’ area).  He (The IP) sat down on the back steps last night and watched those amazing chemical lights blink off and on…What’s that?!!  A little brown bat cruised by on his nightly circuit…The IP can hear a Southern Toad chirping down by the brook…The IP is beginning to understand why this area is called Brookhaven.  The IP has crossed over and seen so many little brooks around here it’s kinda crazy.  It’s dendritific!!

Inside, a few June Bugs got under the door jamb and started mindlessly smashing into the IP’s pole lamp.  But hey, it’s June, and it’s the June Bugs’ time.  They don’t live more than a week.  One often finds them dead on the floor because they are so fucking stupid they go toward any kind of light and just bash their beetle heads against it over and over and over.  I suppose that could be a metaphor for the behavior of some people.  The least The IP can do is catch them and throw them back outside.  Right?

OK.  Here’s your little Summer Solstice diagram so you can understand what it’s all about:

Blog at ya later!!

In the midst of The IP’s recent move, he uncovered a collection he relegated to the corner of a closet back in 1999.  Safely stashed in an American Tourister Tiara suitcase, it languished, alone, forgotten, forsaken…until a week ago when The IP opened it for the first time since. 

The bulk of this matchbook collection came from a yard-sale purchase in Skokie, IL.  Buying a collection is kinda cheatin’ if you ask The IP.  After all, some Skokie dude spent his whole life grabbing these matchbooks from countless hotels, restaurants, bars, etc.  He did all the work.  And you can actually read a good chunk of this guy’s life from his matchbooks. WTF?  It’s matchbooks from Hawaii, Wyoming, California, and lots of custom wedding matchbooks with the name of the couple embossed in some tacky way, sometimes with a little cartoon wedding couple underneath the names and date.  And this guy was “MR.” Chicago; holy crap and WTF!  By the looks of it, he went to every restaurant in the Chicago MSA!

Matchbooks are a disapearing art.  With matchbooks, you gotta grab one’s attention in such a small space; get a message acrost in a simple and punchy way.  Let’s look at a few from The IP’s collection in detail:

This one struck The IP as a bit weird.  WTF?  Why would a place called The Wagon Wheel have a giant, wood-frame indoor pool with palm trees?  Did they actually have such indoor pools?  And this place was in Rockton, IL.  WTF?  “Hey, let’s go to Rockton!”  Why was this guy at the Rockton Wagon Wheel?  What’s up with Rockton?

The IP  wants to jump into that pool!  There’s nobody there!  Look at that pool!

But The IP found this sad notice on the InterWebs:

VILLAGE OF ROCKTON

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

JUNE 19, 2007

…items 2, 3, and 4 on the agenda relative to the development of the former Wagon Wheel property by TCS Real Estate. Roll call: all ayes. Motion carried 6-0.

Motion by Winters second by Flodeen to approve the second reading of the following documents relative to the former Wagon Wheel property and TCS

Real Estate:

1. Ordinance authorizing the issuance of a $524,246.00 Tax Increment Allocation Revenue Note (Wagon Wheel Site Redevelopment Project Area) Series 2006, of the Village of Rockton.

2. Covenant to Enter Into an Easement Agreement between the Village of Rockton and TCS Real Estate, LLC for an existing water tower, denoting rights of ingress/egress to remove or to place utilities, wire, pipe or other transmissions lines on the former Wagon Wheel tower.

3. Easement Agreement on which water tower, water well and appurtenant shed structures are currently situated upon on the former wagon Wheel property.

Maybe they will build an Applebee’s or an Olive Garden in its place.OK.  What about this one:

The IP vaguely remembers this sub-chain of hotels.  Unfortunately, this matchbook’s staple, the one that is used to hold the matches in place, has oxidized and stained the cover.  Now it looks like Mr. Sandman is hurling a big dookie in his sleep.  Oh well. 

This one is great:

They’re willing to “Teletype” your next reservation at one of their own chain’s hotels for FREE!!  WTF?  Things never change…except for the technology of teletype.

The IP will continue to peruse his matchbook collection and share some of its highlights now and again.

SPECIAL SHOUT OUT to FM!  No, not the radio frequency, the IP coworker recovering from a total hip replacement.  The IP and FM think alike in many ways.  Check out the little giftie he gave The IP just before he went under the knife:

Who dares The IP to actually put this on his car?  It would be fine while he was driving; it’s leaving the car to go into the grocery store he’s worried about.  We’ve still got folks around here proudly displaying their Bush 04stickers.  WTF! 

Oh, BTW, check out jojo’s nice motion panorama of our Piedmont Park over at his site.  It proves that some parts of Hotlanta are actually quite nice.  WARNING:  There is also a picture of some rude heteros at his condo’s pool…disgusting!!! 

Hey listen.  The IP knows he’s not one of the Joads, and he has no intention of trying to pass himself off as some farmer in the Midwest.  WTF, after all.

But when trying to understand a recent weather pattern here in The ATL, The IP, in an almost-self-induced hypnosis, imagined himself as a character in Steinbeck’s TGOW:

When June was half gone, the big clouds moved up out

of Texas and the Gulf, high heavy clouds, rain-heads. The

men in the fields looked up at the clouds and sniffed at them

and held wet fingers up to sense the wind. And the horses

were nervous while the clouds were up. The rain-heads

dropped a little spattering and hurried on to some other

country. Behind them the sky was pale again and the sun

flared. In the dust there were drop craters where the rain

had fallen, and there were clean splashes on the corn, and

that was all.

Gee Whiz pithecanthropes.  If you just changed the line “hurried on to some other country” to “hurried on to some other COUNTY,” you would have the exact situation here in The IP’s neighborhood; well, not like an actual Oklahoma dustbowl, but weirdly dry for the time of the year.  My county seems to be missing all these “popcorn” thunderstorms.  Just some thunder rumble and breeze, then nothing.  The IP had to water his bowling balls with a hose instead of Mother Nature doing so with a downpour.  WTF?   

…and some succomb to the AC.

Atlanta set a “for-the-date” high-temp record yesterday:  98-degrees.  Not as hot as some places, but still, it’s a record high.  There’s smog and crap in the air too, so lately it’s been good just to “chill” inside. 

Actually, The IP had a few folks over to check out his new pad and visit the big open house at PDK Airport this past Saturday.  After about 45 minutes on the tarmac looking at vintage planes both static and flying, we all concluded it was time to go…too hot…  too goddamned blasted freakin hot!! 

Recently, The IP began contributing a larger share to help increase “global warming” by actually turning on the first-ever air-conditioning system for which he had to pay.  It’s true.  ##Cottage St., up in Mass, still has no AC.  The IP remembers some dreadful heat waves in the late-70s where at least some AC would have been nice, “cool” so to speak.  The IP remembers having the Chicken Pox in the Summer of 76…he’s supposes they were Bicentennial Pox because he remembers all the Bicentennial crap on the TV and radio while he itched and squirmed in the freakin heat.  Sumthin about that Cottage St. house that makes it hotter INSIDE than outside during the summer.  The second floor was a sauna.  That’s where The IP tried to “sleep,” in the summer of 76, but the combination of Chicken Pox, extreme heat and humidity, and the constant drone of a completely ineffectual window fan kept him up.  That’s why all he could do for about 3 days was just listen to the radio… 

So why is The IP telling you this?  Oh yeah, the AC at The IP’s place.  Man, did he feel guilty succumbing to the AC.  “Just throw the switch, IP.  Jesus IP, what’s your problem?  Just throw the switch!”

You see, before The IP’s current place, the AC was FREE and controlled by his landlord.  The IP even closed some of the vents because it became TOO cold!  Then it became “The Ice Cave,” a name The IP gave it to be able to construct a workable trope for his cold existence.  He took to wearing sweaters and long-sleeve shirts when inside; and dying from heat shock upon leaving his apartment.  WTF?  

Our friend jojo was once a non-AC elitist, but he too succumbed to the Almighty Cool Air.  Ahhhhhhhhhh!

But, as noted above, The IP bought some AC credits back in the 70s!!!!  Many days and nights of Cottage St. Sauna.   So, it was mostly an AC weekend at The IP’s place, and the way things look, that might be the case for a long while.

OK here’s the new outdoor cocktail/utility table The IP said he would make:

This was perhaps the easiest home project ever.  It’s all about having the right tools:

The new, 1&1/4″-wide bit was all it took to drill a perfectly sized hole into the log.  Yeah, the bit got hot and it took constant blowing into the hole to evacuate the sawdust, but it worked.  The IP matched the bit to the post of the um-brella.

Hey.  A special shout-out to a BFF of high calibre, BS, who got up at 5:30 am to avoid heat and smog and run in training for the Peachtree Road Race.  Even when it’s hot, life doesn’t stop… 

This heat is bad, but not really THAT bad.  The IP had the unfortunate circumstance of living in Chicago during the summer of 1995.  He doubts (and hopes) he’ll never witness shit like that again.   You pithecanthropes should read this wiki entry; it’s scary on many levels:

Really Hot

…On Skyland Drive, in Ashford Park, in Atlanta

Hello you fellow pithecanthopes.  

Hey; The IP will be the first to tell you that blogs are intrinsically self-indulgent.  Yet today even The IP thinks he’s going a bit too far in that regard.  But if you stick with him here, he thinks you’ll at least be entertained.

Inside and Outside The IP

OK.  Let’s go out the back kitchen door and check on that bowling ball landscape.

That screen door was recently installed by The IP

The Kudzu monsters are growing out back…still a nice view

“Thank you” to the pithecanthopes that suggested “counter-sinking” the bowling balls.  This The IP did.  And, as you can see below, he added some vegetation (he also added a 5th bowling ball):

The plant is Liriope Muscari.  I bought them under the trade name “Cleopatra.”  The woman at the nursery must have known her shit because I’m already enamoured of these plants and they have a big rooting section on the Intarwebs. 

Above is one of The IP’s Liriopes with a small flower.  They eventually can have a significant number of blooms and the grow bigger but don’t spread.  They like almost any kind of soil and they grow in shade, sun, or both. 

Even The IP’s ride looks comfortable in this new neighborhood.

“WTF?” you say?  So did The IP when he saw this stupendous stump.  The previous tenent was keeping it as evidence for his claim…he claimed a tree fell on and crushed his pickup truck.  The IP can say he did see a crushed pickup truck when he first saw the place, so it probably happened.  One thing The IP can tell you is that he uprighted that stump last night all by himself.   Talk about your cool cocktail tables!!!

OK.  The IP will leave you with a glimpse of his “studio/office.” 

The place is coming together…slowly.

The news of this evening’s trolley crash in Newton, MA, kinda shook up The IP.  His concern goes out to all involved.  The IP knows that that every one in his family has ingrained memories about the D Line.  It’s amazing that so many people in Boston still commute by trolley.  The D Line is actually a former steam railroad line, so it’s rides like a trolley but commutes like a train.  It still works like it did in 1850.

The below article has an uncanny immediacy about it.  The reporters really committed to the witness interviews and let those guide the piece:

Multiple injuries, operator trapped, after trolleys collide in Newton

May 28, 2008 09:28 PM

By Noah Bierman and James Vaznis, Globe Staff

A trolley car on the D branch of the Green Line in Newton smashed into another car from behind this afternoon, injuring multiple people. The operator of one of the trolleys is still trapped, the MBTA said.

The operator, who is a woman, suffered injuries that “appear to be very serious,” said Joe Pesaturo, spokesman for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.

Pesaturo said one two-car trolley rear-ended the second as both headed westbound, away from Boston.

The collision occurred at about 6 p.m. on the way into the Woodland station. The trolley that was rear-ended was just emerging from a scheduled stop-light when it was hit from behind, he said. The operator who was trapped was the one in the train in the rear, Pesaturo said.

Six people were taken to local hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries, one was Medflighted to Boston Medical Center, and five were treated and released at the scene, said Pesaturo.

Frank Lam, 41, of Natick was commuting home from his computer job in the frontmost trolley.

“Basically, what happened is we were at a stop, and we just got plowed into by second train,” he said.

He said a few people were thrown around at the time of the impact, but “for the most part everybody was able to walk off the train.”

He said he went to the trolley behind to see if he could help and found one woman trapped but conscious, “wedged into a corner,” and then went out to the front of the trolley and saw through an opening a blue shirt that appeared to belong to the train operator.

“All I saw was a T blue shirt. It looked like her back or something,” he said.

Aerial pictures of the scene shown by local TV stations showed smashed trolley cars, rescue vehicles clustering at the scene, and injured people being placed on stretchers.

The footage also showed rescue workers gathering around the front of one smashed car.

Matt Stone, 46, an accounting manager from Framingham, was also sitting in the frontmost trolley, on his way to pick up his car at the Riverside station at the tail end of the same commute he has made for the past 3 years.

“We were stopped and all of a sudden we got hit from behind and there was no warning, nothing,” Stone said. “There was two separate impacts: the first knocked me off my seat, the next knocked me across the aisle.”

Stone was lightly bruised. Most of the 20 to 25 people on his train were not seriously injured, but a few appeared to be badly hurt, he said.

“One woman hit her face on the seat and had blood from a cut on her nose,” Stone said. “There was a 70-year-old old guy who went ballistic screaming at the conductor, ‘You killed my wife! You killed my wife!’ And the wife is going, ‘I’m OK! I’m OK.’”

After the crash, “Somebody started saying, ‘The train behind is on fire, and we got to get outta here,’” Stone said. The passengers got off, briefly got on another train that was facing the opposite direction, then got off that train because it was stuck behind the crash, and walked along the tracks to the Riverside Station.

Jack Condon, 74, a Dorset Road resident, said, “I was going for a walk and I heard a crash and I said ‘Uh-oh, this is a bad one’ and then I heard what I thought were a couple of explosions, or at least they sounded like they were explosions.”

He said he thought it might be a car accident on the nearby highway and then he saw “all the ambulances, and that’s when I knew it was a train.”

Steve Cadrain, a neighborhood resident, said he ran down to the accident site, jumping a fence and boarded one of the damaged trolleys.

“I went on the train, there was virtually no blood. There was one woman who was bleeding.”

He said he saw a female conductor walking off the trolley, “looking for a friend.” He said he thought she might have been looking for the operator who was trapped in the front part of the trolley.

Joyce Friedman, also a neighborhood resident, said neighbors offered to open up their houses to victims, but none of them took advantage of the offer.

“It was a huge, huge crash. It sounded like an explosion,” she said. “I thought it was an enormous truck crash on Beacon Street. We never think of the Green Line running behind our houses.”

“It was like an accordion, the two front ends squished together,” she said.

The line has been shut down in the area, and shuttle bus service is running between Reservoir and Riverside, the MBTA announced on its website.

Ralph Ranalli, Michael Levenson, and Rachana Rathi of the Globe staff contributed to this report, along with Globe correspondents John M. Guilfoil, Jill Jorgensen, and Matt Collette. 

That reporting is great.  The IP especially likes this quote:

“I went on the train, there was virtually no blood. There was one woman who was bleeding.”

WTF!!!  That was brilliant!! He says there was “virtually” no blood, but then hits you with the whammy “There was one woman who was bleeding.”  You can’t script stuff like that. 

Anywaze.  That a trolley can rear-end another trolley is nuts in 2008.  The IP feels most safe on that electric train at Hartsfield ATL; it has NO human operators.  But let’s not blame the motorwoman on the D Line.  No decent rail system would be designed to let such an accident happen…maybe in 1850, but not in 2008.

Days One & Two: “Tourists don’t go to Wembley!!”

Shortly after The IP’s arrival at the trashy foreign arrivals terminal at Heathrow, he got his first dose of British “charm” in the form of a terribly rude customs agent who demanded to know why he was spending his first nights adjacent to the cavernous Wembley Stadium in the NW London borough of Brent.  The reason was simply that my traveling partner, who was arriving the next evening, had made reservations at an affordable hotel; it was just a starting point and a place to stay.  But the goonish British
customs woman just could not believe The IP.  “Why are you going to
Wembley??  Let me see your hotel reservation!  Tourists don’t go to
Wembley!”  Then she turned to her colleague one desk over and said “He says he’s going to Wembley!  Why would he go to Wembley?”

This treatment not only made The IP have misgivings for having ever decided to go to London, it made him wonder why Wembley was held in such low regard by the British customs woman.  Was he going to be jumped and rolled outside of Wembley Stadium?  Was Brent one of those places they list as “Places NOT to see” in the guidebooks?  WTF?

After a long-but-pleasant ride on The Tube, The IP finally climbed up the
Wembley Central station stairs and onto the streets of the seemingly
questionable borough of Brent, home to The New Wembley Stadium.

As The IP made his way to his hotel, he was struck by the almost complete
lack (except of himself) of any Caucasian people.  Almost everyone seemed
to be from the Indian subcontinent or Africa, and all the stores and restaurants confirmed this observation.  And when he entered his hotel and saw a bunch of guys watching a cricket match from Bangladesh on the wide screen TV in the lobby, he understood what Brent was all about.

The hustle and bustle of Brent’s main drag was punctuated by odors of
exotic spices wafting out of little food shops and restaurants.  If
tourists were not supposed to go to this area, it was hard for The IP to
understand why.  Brent had an undeniable vibrancy about it, and all the
brown people made me feel like I was in a foreign country.  As it turns
out, that is exactly why some Brits, like that woman at Heathrow, questioned
my destination.

In The IP’s guidebook, he would actually tell the reader to visit Brent, to
get a good dose of the new, post-colonial Britain.  This is the Britain
where immigrants from all the countries it colonized flood the city and set
up shop for themselves.  If today’s Brits gripe, they should read some
history and put it all into context.  Besides, after a big and cheap dosa,
they might just change their tune.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dosa

OK.  On to some pics and observations from Brent:

Most pithecanththropes have heard that London Town is a rainy place, but The IP did not expect bangs of thunder and hail on his first day there.  The above pic was taken from his hotel room just after such a storm.  Check out The “New” Wembley stadium with its big suspension arch…

The “Old” Wembley still evokes great memories for a lot of Londoners, mostly for epic soccer games and epic rock concerts.  It’s twin towers became iconic…all gone.

 The “New” Wembley has a roof that moves back and forth depending on the weather, much like the one in Seattle.  The arch is the key to supporting the moveable roof. 

Above are The IP’s short-term buddies and inteviewees.  They were so honest, open, and friendly, The IP almost cried…  Here is the “diversity” that no Benneton ad can really capture…How else would they pose so naturally?  You know what’s so funny?  The IP asked them what they most wanted for Brent.  They said “Better football fields.” 

 The above pic does not really capture the hustle and bustle of Brent, but it will do.  To think this place is miles from the traditional “center” of London is amazing…

The bourough of Brent is an amalgam of immigrants…check out that sign…  “Afro Caribbean, Middle Eastern, Asian…”  WTF?

Walk a couple of blocks and you think you are in some stereotype of the classic London suburb…  note the looming arch of Wembley…

For the two days The IP was in Brent, he could not figure out the popularity of chicken joints…they’re everywhere, regardless if they really know about Tennessee.

 OK.  The IP will be back with more London adventure and an update on the bowling-ball landscape project…stay tuned.

Hey all you pithecanthropes!   It sure has been a long time since The IP blogged at ya.  Ever since he had to move, go to London, establish utilities at his new pad, document weird structures in the backcountry of the Great Smoky Mountains, do some home improvement projects, and generally adapt to his new neighborhood, he just hasn’t had time to post. 

Rather than jump right in to the London trip (he’s already written some text and formatted pictures of that) The IP will share some “events” from his most recent weekend here on Skyland Drive.

RETURN OF THE BOWLING BALLS

Some of you pithecanthropes may recall The IP’s bowling ball collection from way back when he lived in that little apartment in Brookline, MA.  He made a pretty cool bowling ball sculpture garden just outside the place; some neighborhood bastards stole the balls eventually.  Ever since that first garden, The IP has longed for another opportunity to do some bowling ball landscaping.  That time arrived!!

First, The IP had to prepare the area adjacent to his duplex apt.  With no gutter system, rain at The IP’s new pad just drips off the roof and creates a “drip line” on the ground.  

Borrowing an approach from Japanese and FLW rain-control designs, The IP first enhanced the drip line by filling it with egg stone so the rain would drip onto the latter and not gouge out a little muddy trench in the dirt.  Then to make the new drip line stand out visually, The IP put in some black mulch behind it along the length of the wall.

Then, choosing from his collection of swirly-colored bowling balls (never can pass up a good one at the thrifts) he placed them symmetrically along the base of the wall. 

The overall effect, in The IP’s mind, is both serious and insouciant.  Don’t you agree?

SUNDAY MORNING COFFEE WITH WHITE PEOPLE AND A B-17 AT PDK

Atlanta’s Peachtree Dekalb Airport (PDK) is adjacent to The IP’s new pad.  In fact, this was a major factor in his choosing this location to live.  The air-traffic around here is a constant entertainment for The IP, as he has always loved airplanes (and heliocopters [sic]!!!).  

Yesterday, while driving to the Krogers [sic], The IP was dumbfounded by the sight of a huge B-17 bomber taking off from PDK.  WTF!  So, figuring that it would be there thru the weekend, The IP took his Sunday coffee to go over to the surprisingly accommodating viewing area at PDK. 

Sure enough, the big B-17 was running rides ($500 a pop!) all morning long.

The scene at PDK on the weekends is a lovefest of very White parents and kids.  Hey, The IP has no problems with that, but he thinks he will never wear another golf shirt again. 

OK you pithecanthropes, be patient and you’ll be rewarded with a London series of posts with pics and commentary and, as always, a few surprises, like this pic from Great Smoky Mountains National Park:

A SPECIAL SHOUT-OUT TO THE INJURED PARENTALS AND A WISH FOR A QUICK REPAIR!!!

It’s as simple as that, folks.

The IP will blog at ya when he gets back…