clay-awesome

dido has always been a source of embarrassment for me. pitchfork acknowledges her existence only to make fun of her. my dad is a fan. she's pretty and blond. but does she deserve her rep as a pretty english bore, only fit for elevators? i admit that i have all her cd's in my car, and i actually listen to them.

because i like her.

dido writes about love (don't we all?), but keeps the eye-rolling at a minimum. 'stoned' is typically dido:

When you're stoned, baby, I am drunk
We make love seems a little desolate
It's hard sometimes not to look away
And think what's the point when I'm having to hold this fire down
I think I'll explode if I can't feel this free now

not many adult contemporary pop stars directly reference the wacky weed these days. she definitely has an edge. clearly, she's obsessed with being in love, as many women are. but she doesn't write about falling in love, being in love, or missing her lover in the traditional sense. leave that to the sarah mclachlins and john mayors of the world. she writes about being unfulfilled, in the "i'll never be happy, so fuck you" sense. and i like her little nods to nihilism with phrases like 'what's the point', and 'love seems a little desolate'.

there are other little things that make dido endearing: like a true brit, she complains in the language of navies and empires. dido will let you know, young man, that this land is hers, that she'll go down with this ship, that her other lover is lost at sea, presumably drowned. she's said in concert that she wrote 'take my hand' as a teen to try to get boys into bed with her. she was too young, apparently, to realize that she's hot.

"it's different now that it's morning and i can't face your smile," goes 'don't believe in love', "i slip away and out of sight, you've overstayed your time." i doubt i would ever make friends with this pop star in real life. maybe if i worked on her sponsorship contract, or for one of her record labels. but i feel safe in knowing that if i should ever quietly excuse myself from dido's flat, it would be a relief for her too.

random beauty

city-data, climbing magazine, le fashion, tatula, deviant art

space

antoine predock

at Starbucks, San Francisco

a guant with gray whiskers on his face stood outside Starbucks at Powell and O'Farrell, begging for change with one hand, holding a Street Sheet with the other. his unkepmt appearance contrasted with every shorter, more Asian, more made-up and trendy passerby. more significantly, his naked shabbiness, in this shopping and tourism destination of America, contrasted with those who try so hard to hide their own.

then, startling, he picked up and walked away. too bad. i was going to give him a dollar.

poor quality mobile phone pics

manny the manhole cat. dwp workers found him found him in a manhole sump pump.

genocide rock in marin county, ca.

window reflection of me.

the aphorisms

by hippocrates

"so what do you do all day?" is frequently asked of me since i've been out of school and unemployed. i keep myself busy with study and hobbies. today i came across 'the aphorisms' by hippocrates. bound in leather, this volume smelled like it's been around for decades and not opened for almost as long. each aphorism was printed on one page in greek, latin, and english.

hippocrates frequently implicates bloodletting:

Pregnant women if plethoric may be purged from the fourth to the seventh month; but even within these periods moderately: earlier or later purging must be cautiously avoided.

The back part of the head being in pain, relief is found by opening a vein in the forehead.

he also often invokes common sense:

Neither fasting nor fulness, nor any other excess, is advantageous.

Delirium attended with laughter is less dangerous than delirium
attended with a serious mood.

and the occasional hedging of advice:

Fumigation with aromatics promotes menstruation, and would be
useful in many other cases, if it did not occasion heaviness of the
head.

the book makes a great christmas gift for someone who appreciates camp by anachronism.